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 C A R I T A 
 
 MRS OLIPHANT 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 THE CHRONICLES OF CARLINGFORD 
 
 ETC. ETC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES 
 VOL. I. 
 
 SECOND EDITION 
 
 LONDON 
 SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 
 
 1877 
 
 \^All rights reserved'^
 
 
 -^ CONTENTS 
 
 0^ 
 '1 
 
 THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 CHAPTKK PAGE 
 
 I. The Beresfords 1 
 
 II. A Fright ,20 
 
 III. Honeymooning 38 
 
 IV. The Three CHARixnas 55 
 
 V. Coming Home 74 
 
 \{. The Constiltation 93 
 
 Vll. The Catastrophe 113 
 
 VIII. Consolation 131 
 
 IX. The Hill 150 
 
 X. The Sqfaee 170 
 
 Xr. Mrs. Meredith 188 
 
 XII. The IIorsE next Door 208 
 
 XIII. The Yoitng People ..... 229 
 
 XI \'. The Old People . . . . . . 249 
 
 XV. Roger 268 
 
 XVI. Sunday Evening 289
 
 CAKITA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE BERESFOEDS. 
 
 James Beresford and Annie his wife had been 
 married for more than a dozen years — their 
 only child, indeed, had nearly attamed the age 
 of twelve at the time when this history begins. 
 They had both got footing on that plateau of 
 middle age which, if it comes to something like 
 level ground at thirty, need not think of a 
 descending step for twenty years — the time of 
 the greatest enjoyments and most solid progress 
 of life. He was at one end and she at the other 
 of the first decade ; the one approaching the 
 forties, the other scarcely well out of the 
 twenties ; both ready to laugh at the advance 
 of years, which was as yet but a joke to them, 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 CARITA. 
 
 and neither having thought of bidding any grave 
 farewell to youth. She was impulsive, enthusi- 
 astic and nervous ; he philosophical and specu- 
 lative, a man ready to discuss any theory in 
 earth or heaven, and without any prejudices 
 such as might make one subject of discussion 
 appear less legitimate than another. They were 
 not very rich, but neither were they poor in 
 any sense of the word. He had been called to 
 the Bar, but had never gone any further in that 
 career. They had enough between them to live 
 on without show, but without pinching, as so 
 many people of quietly social, semi-hterary 
 tastes do in London. They knew a number of 
 people. They saw all the pictures, read all the 
 books, and heard all the music that was going ; 
 not absorbed in any art, but with just enough 
 devotion to all to make their life full and 
 pleasant. And there could scarcely be a 
 pleasanter life. The fantasies of youth, but 
 not the sentiment of youth, had ended for both. 
 Mr. Beresford had some mildly scientific pur- 
 suits, was a member of some learned societies, 
 and of one or two new and advanced clubs 
 where clever men were supposed to abound. 
 Occasionally in his comfortable library he wrote
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 6 
 
 an article for a review or magazine, which was 
 very much talked about by his friends, to the 
 great edification and amusement of people who 
 live by writing articles and say nothing about 
 them. This gave him an agreeable sense of duty 
 to add seriousness to his life ; and he was never 
 without occupation — meetings of committees, 
 scraps of semi-public business, educational and 
 other projects, which, for the moment at least, 
 seemed full of interest to the world, made him 
 feel himself a not unimportant, certainly not a 
 useless, man. Mrs. Beresford, on her side, had 
 the natural occupation of her housekeeping, 
 and her child, whose education gave her much 
 thought — so much thought that many people 
 with full nurseries listened with a certain awe 
 to her ideas of all that was necessary for her 
 httle girl, and sighed to think how much less 
 was possible when there were six or seven little 
 girls to think of. 
 
 The child, however, was not so over-edu- 
 cated and over-cared for as might have been 
 fancied ; for the parents were young, as has been 
 said, very fond of each other, and fond of their 
 OA\ n way ; which likings did not consist with 
 the burden of dragging a small child with them 
 B 2
 
 CARITA. 
 
 wherever they went. The Beresfords liked to 
 go about ' honeymooning/ as their friends called 
 it, and as they themselves were not displeased 
 to call it, by themselves, over the world. They 
 would start sometimes quite suddenly, to the 
 Eiviera in the middle of winter, to escape Lon- 
 don fogs and wintry chills ; to Paris at Easter ; 
 to Scotland in the autumn ; even to Norway 
 sometimes, or such difficult places ; and it stood 
 to reason that they could not take the child with 
 them when they started at a day's notice on 
 these delightful journeys. For their journeys 
 were delightful. They were well enough off 
 not to require to count the cost ; they went 
 lightly, with little luggage and no servants, and 
 they went everywhere together. But it would 
 have been bad for the little girl ; therefore she 
 stayed at home, under the care of the best of 
 nurses, who had been Mrs. Beresford's nurse 
 before the child's ; and the father and mother, 
 like two lovers, roamed lightly about the world. 
 But when they were at home, Mrs. Beresford 
 talked a great deal about education, and had 
 plans enough to have educated six princesses, 
 let alone one little girl of undistinguis^.ed 
 lineage. It was a very lucky thing for all
 
 THE BERESFOKDS. 5 
 
 parties, their friends said, that they had but this 
 one child. Had they been hampered by half- 
 a-dozen, what could they have done ? It would 
 have changed their life completely. And one 
 of their many felicities was, that whereas they 
 were preserved from the old-maidishness of 
 ■childless married persons by having a child, 
 their freedom of action was preserved by the 
 fact that they had but one. 
 
 And they were wonderfully free of other re- 
 lations who might have hampered them. Mrs. 
 Beresford had been an orphan from her child- 
 hood, brought up by her grandmother, who in 
 the course of nature was dead too ; and Mr. 
 Beresford's only two relations were a wealthy 
 aunt. Charity Beresford, who lived in a pretty 
 house in the country, within driving distance of 
 London, and with whom lived his elder sister. 
 Cherry Beresford, named after her aunt, and 
 living in considerable subjection to that energetic 
 woman. Miss Beresford was the richest mem- 
 ber of the family, and her nephew had expecta- 
 tions from her ; and Charity was the favourite 
 female name of this branch of the race. But 
 the idea of calling her child Charity did not at 
 all smile upon young Mrs. Beresford when her
 
 6 CARITA. 
 
 baby was born. She was beguiled, however, 
 by the unusual look of it, which charmed her, 
 into calling the little girl by the more melodious 
 name of Carita, contracted prettily into Cara in 
 the drawing-room, and Carry in the nursery. 
 Aunt Charity growled when she heard of this, 
 but did not otherwise complain, and gentle 
 Aunt Cherry declared herself unfeignedly glad 
 that her little niece had thus escaped the worse 
 consequences of a symbohcal name. When the 
 young couple went away pleasuring, little Cara 
 very often would be sent to Sunninghill, to pass 
 the quiet days there under the charge of the 
 aunts ; and so all responsibility was removed 
 from the minds of the parents. They had a 
 letter sent to them every day to assure them of 
 their welfare, however far off they might go — 
 an extravagance which Aunt Charity condemned 
 loudly, but which Aunt Cherry was proud of, as 
 showing the devotion of the parents to little 
 Cara. The child herself was very happy at 
 Sunninghill, and was a much more prominent 
 person there than at home, where very often, 
 she was in the way, and interrupted conversa- 
 tion. For a father and mother who are very 
 fond of each other, and have a great deal to
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 7 
 
 talk of, often, it must be allowed, are hampered 
 by the presence of one curious child, with quick 
 ears and an inconveniently good memory. In 
 this particular the half-dozen would have been 
 more easily managed than the one. 
 
 Thus the Beresfords led a very pleasant life. 
 They had the prettiest house ; naturally, travel- 
 ling so much as they did, they had been able to 
 ' pick up' a great many charming things. You 
 could scarcely see their walls for pictures ; some 
 very good, one or two wonderful windfalls, and 
 the rest pretty enough ; nothing strikingly bad, 
 or next to nothing. Where other people had 
 ordinary china, they had genuine old faience, 
 and one or two plaques which Eaphael himself 
 might have seen perhaps — Urbino ware, with 
 Messer Giorgio's name upon it. Not to speak 
 of the Venice point which Mrs. Beresford wore, 
 there were brackets in the drawing-room hung 
 with scraps of old point coupe which many a 
 lady would have been glad to trim her dress 
 with; and, instead of common portieres^ they 
 had two pieces of old tapestry from an Italian 
 convent which devotees went down on their 
 knees before. But I have not space to tell you 
 how many pretty things they had. It was one
 
 8 CARITA. 
 
 of the pleasures of their life whenever they saw 
 anything that pleased them to bring it home for 
 the decoration of that pretty drawing-room, or 
 the library, which Mr. Beresford had filled with 
 old vellum-bound volumes of curious editions, 
 and pretty books in Eussian leather which, kept 
 the room always fragrant. What was wanting 
 to this pleasant, warm, ftill, delightful living ? 
 Nothing but continuance ; and it had not 
 struck either of them that there was any doubt 
 of this for long, long years at least. What a 
 long way off threescore years and ten look when 
 you are not yet forty ! and death looked further 
 off* still. Neither of them thought of dying. 
 Why should they ? For, to be sure, though we 
 know very well that must happen to us some 
 time, in our hearts we are incredulous, and do 
 not beheve that we ever can die. The Beres- 
 fords never dreamt of anything so frightful. 
 They were well, they were happy, they were 
 young ; and as it had been, so it would be ; 
 and a world so bright they felt must mean to 
 go on for ever. 
 
 When Cara was about ten, however, the 
 mother began to feel less well than usual. There 
 was nothing much the matter with her, it was
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 9 
 
 thought : want of ' tone,' — a little irritability 
 of disposition — a nervous temperament. What 
 she wanted was change of air and scene. And 
 she got that, and got better, as was thought ; 
 but then became ill again. No, not ill — unwell, 
 indisposed, mal a son aise, nothing more. There 
 was nothing the matter with her really, the 
 doctors thought. Her lungs and her heart, and 
 all vital organs, were perfectly sound ; but there 
 was a little local irritation which, acting upon 
 a nervous temperament The nervous tem- 
 perament was perpetually kept in the front, and 
 all sorts of evils imputed to its agency. At 
 Sunninghill, it must be confessed, they did not 
 believe in the illness at all. 
 
 ' Fudge,' said Aunt Charity, who had always 
 been strong, and had no faith in nerves, ' don't 
 talk to me of your nervous temperaments. I 
 know what it means. It means that Annie has 
 fallen sick of always having her own way. She 
 has everything she can desire, and she is ill of 
 having nothing more to wish for. A case of 
 Alexander over again in a London drawing- 
 room — that's what it is, and nothing else, my 
 word upon it ; and I know my niece.' 
 
 ' Yes, Mr. Maxwell ; perhaps there is some
 
 10 CARITA. 
 
 truth in what Aunt Charity says,' said Miss 
 Cherry. ' I think you know I don't judge 
 harshly ' 
 
 ' That means that /judge harshly,' said Miss 
 Charity, bursting in ; ' thank you, my dear. 
 Well, you may call me uncharitable if you 
 please ; but there's where it is ; let James lose 
 the half of his fortune, or all his china get 
 broken, and she'd come round in no time — 
 that's what ails Annie. But as she belongs to 
 a very refined society, and has a silly husband, 
 it's called nerves. Bless me. Cherry, I hope I 
 knew what nerves were, and all about it, before 
 you were born.' 
 
 ' You could not know Annie before I was 
 born,' said Miss Cherry, who was devoid of 
 imagination. ' I hope you will give her your 
 best attention, Mr. Maxwell. My brother James 
 is a very fond husband, poor fellow ! If any- 
 thing happened to Annie, he would never get 
 the better of it. As for marrying again, or any- 
 thing of that sort ' 
 
 ' Good heavens ! ' said the doctor ; ' I hope 
 there is no need to take such an idea into con- 
 sideration. We must not go so fast.' 
 
 Miss Charity laughed. She was a great deal
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 11 
 
 older than lier niece, but much more sensible. 
 ' There's the seventh commandment to be thought 
 of,' she said ; for her remarks were sometimes 
 more free than they ought to be, and put Miss 
 Cherry to the blush : and this was all the worse 
 because she immediately walked out into the 
 ^garden through the open window and left the 
 younger lady alone with the doctor, who was an 
 old friend of the family, and contemporary of the 
 second Charity Beresford. Very old friends they 
 were ; even it was supposed that in their youth 
 there had been or might have been passages of 
 sentiment between these two now sitting so 
 calmly opposite each other. Mr. Maxwell, how- 
 ever, by this time was a widower, and not at all 
 sentimental. He laughed, too, as Miss Beres- 
 ford made her exit by the window. He was 
 very Avell used to the family, and all its ways. 
 
 ' She wears very well,' he said, reflectively. 
 ' I don't thmk she has aged to speak of for these 
 twenty years. When I used to be coming here 
 in my early days, when I was beginning prac- 
 tice ' 
 
 ' The rest of us have changed very much 
 since then.' 
 
 ' Yes,' said Mr. Maxwell, thinking most of
 
 12 CAKITA. 
 
 himself ; ' but she not at all. I could thhik 
 when I look at her that I was still, as I say, a 
 young fellow beginning practice ' 
 
 Miss Cherry sighed — very softly, but still 
 she did sigh : over forty, but still in the position 
 and with many of the sentiments of a girl. 
 People laugh at the combination, but it is a ^ 
 touching one on the whole. Wliat ages of lin- 
 gering monotonous hfe had passed over her 
 since her present companion began his practice, 
 since her Aunt Charity had begun to be an old 
 woman! Dr. Maxwell had married, had lost his 
 wife, had gone through perhaps sharper troubles 
 than Mss Cherry had known. He was now 
 middle-aged and stoutish and weather-beaten — 
 weather-beaten in aspect and in soul — while she 
 was slim and soft and maidenly still. The sigh 
 was half for those uneventful years, and half for 
 the undevelopment which she was conscious of 
 — the unchangedness of herself, underneath the 
 outer guise, which w^as changed ; but this was 
 not safe ground, nor could it be talked of. So 
 she brushed away the sigh with a little cough, 
 and added quickly : 
 
 ' I know perhaps what nerves are better than 
 my aunt does, and I know Annie better. Tell
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 13- 
 
 me seriously, Mi\ Maxwell, now we are alone. 
 You don't apprehend anything serious ? Should 
 she go on travelling and running about as they 
 do if there is really anything the matter? I^O' 
 one can be so much interested as I am. You 
 would be quite frank with me ? ' 
 
 ' It is the best thing for her,' said the doctor. 
 ' You now — I should not say the same for you. 
 You are a tranquil person and patient ; but for 
 her, the more she runs about the better. It 
 distracts her and keeps her from thinking. If 
 she worries, it's all over with a woman like 
 that.' 
 
 ' She has so little to worry about.' 
 ' Just so ; and the less one has to bear the 
 less one is fit for ; that is to say,' said the doctor, 
 getting up and going to the window, ' the less 
 some people are fit for. There's that old aunt 
 of yours to prove me a fool. She has never had 
 anything to bear, that I know of; and she is 
 strong enough to bear anything. Sixty- eight, 
 and just look at her. There's a physique for 
 you — that is the kind of woman,' Mr. Maxwell 
 said, with a little outburst of professional en- 
 thusiasm, ' that I admire — as straight as a rod 
 still, and every faculty in good order. That a
 
 14 CARITA. 
 
 woman like that should never have married is a 
 loss to the world.' 
 
 Miss Cherry, who had gone to the window 
 too, and stood by his side, looked out somewhat 
 wistfully at her old aunt. Cherry was not hke 
 her, but took after the other side of the family, 
 her own mother, who had died young, and had 
 not possessed any physique to speak of. ' It 
 is very sweet to-day in the garden,' she said, 
 inconsequently, and stepped out into the world 
 of flowers and sunshine. Sunninghill was an 
 ideal house for two ladies, a place which people 
 who were shut out from such delights considered 
 quite enough for happiness. Indeed, Miss 
 Cherry Beresford's friends in general resented 
 deeply the little plaintive air she sometimes took 
 upon her. ' Wliat could she wish for more ? ' 
 they said, indignantly ; ' a place that was just 
 too good to be wasted on two single women. 
 There should be a family in it.' This was 
 especially the sentiment of the rector's wife, who 
 was a friend of Cherry's, and who felt it a per- 
 sonal slight to herself, who had a large family 
 and many cares, when Cherry Beresford, with 
 not a thing in the world to trouble her, pre- 
 sumed to look as if she was not quite happy.
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 15 
 
 The house stood upon a liill, fringed round with 
 small but delightful woods. These woods were 
 on a level with the highest turrets of the great 
 beautiful royal Castle of St. George, which lay 
 full within sight in the afternoon sunshine. 
 So you may imagine what a view it was that 
 was visible from the old smooth velvet lawn 
 round the house, which formed the apex to 
 these woods. The quiet plain all around lay 
 basking in the light underneath, and the Castle 
 upon its hill dominated, with a broad and placid 
 grandeur, that majestic sweep of country, with 
 all its hghts and shadows. The royal flag flut 
 tered on the breeze, the great tower rose grey 
 and solid against the sky. Green branches 
 framed in this picture on every side ; the cut- 
 tings in the trees made a picture-gallery indeed 
 of different views for different hours, according 
 to the lights. ' What a lovely place it is ! ' Mr. 
 Maxwell said, with sudden enthusiasm ; ' I 
 always forget how lovely it is till I come back.' 
 ' Yes, it is beautiful,' said Cherry, who was 
 used to it. ' If you are going to send them 
 away, I suppose Cara may come to us for 
 the summer ? — that makes such a difference.' 
 Cherry was very well used to the different lights.
 
 .1.6 CAEITA. 
 
 She acknowledged the beauty of her home, and 
 yet I can fancy circumstances under which she 
 would have liked a little house in a street better. 
 Man or woman either cannot live by beauty 
 alone any more than by bread. 
 
 ' Here's a pretty business,' said Miss Beres- 
 ford, briskly ; ' half of my roses, I beheve, 
 spoiled for this year ; no second show this time. 
 Jones is the greatest idiot ; he pretends to know 
 everything, and he knows nothing. Your 
 protege^ Cherry, of course. All the incapables 
 hang on by you.' 
 
 ' I can't see any signs of deficiency,' said 
 the doctor, looking round. 
 
 ' Not at this moment ; if there were, he 
 should have his dismissal on the spot. If those 
 two go ofi* again, as you are always sending 
 them off, tell James I insist on the child coming 
 here. Ah ! that's what your women of nervous 
 temperament do — leave their children at home 
 in a poky London square, while they go wan- 
 dering over the world. Tell them I wish it,' 
 said Miss Beresford, with a laugh ; ' they never 
 go against me.' 
 
 ' They know how kind you always are.' 
 
 ' They know I'm old and will have something
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 17 
 
 to leave behind me, that's the plain English ot 
 it — as if I was going to accept poor Cherry's 
 subjection, poor soul, without rewarding her for 
 it ! It is she who will have everything when 
 I'm gone. I've told them that, but still they 
 think there's a chance that Cara might cut her 
 old aunt out. I can see through them. I see 
 through most people,' she added, with a laugh, 
 looking at him full. How could she know the 
 thought passing through his mind at the mo- 
 ment, which was the abrupt reflection, uncalled 
 for perhaps, that for a professional man, who 
 had made no extraordinary name in his pro- 
 fession, Cherry Beresford, though an old maiden, 
 would make not such a bad wife ? Could the 
 old witch see through broadcloth, and the com- 
 fortable coating of middle-aged flesh and blood, 
 straight into a man's heart ? He grew red fool- 
 ishly, as if that were possible, and stammered a 
 httle in his reply : 
 
 ' r can believe everything that is clever of 
 you as well as everything that is kind ; though 
 why you ladies should make such a point of 
 having a little chit like that, who can only dis- 
 turb your quiet in this paradise of a place ' 
 
 ' Oh, how can you say so ! ' said Cherry. 
 VOL. I. c
 
 18 CARITA. 
 
 ' The child's voice and the child's face make all 
 the difference — they are better than sunshine. 
 They make the place beautiful. I would give 
 it all, twenty times over, to have the child.' 
 
 • Whom her mother is very glad to leave 
 behind her.' 
 
 ' Hold your tongue. Cherry,' said the elder 
 lady ; ' you mild little old maids, you are 
 always in a way about children. I never took 
 up that line. A child in the abstract is a nui- 
 sance. Now, a man — there are advantages 
 about a man. Sometimes he's a nuisance too, 
 but sometimes he's a help. Believe them, and 
 they'll tell you that marriage was always far 
 from their thoughts, but that children are their 
 delight. That's not my way of thinking. But 
 I happen to like little Cara because she is Cara, 
 not because she is a child. So she may come 
 and take her chance with the rest.' 
 
 Cherry had turned away along the garden 
 path, and was looking through one of the open- 
 ings at one of the views. She knew it by 
 heart — exactly how the hght fell, and where 
 were the shadows, and the name of every tower, 
 and almost the shape of every cloud. Was it 
 wonderful that this was not so delightful to her
 
 THE BERESFORDS. 19 
 
 as to the strangers who could not see that view 
 every day in their hves ? To some people, in- 
 deed, the atmospheric changes, the effects of 
 wind and colour, the waverings and dispersions 
 of those clouds, w^ould have made poetry enough 
 to fill up all that was wanting ; but poor Miss 
 Cherry was not poetical in this big way, though 
 she was very fond of pretty verses, and even 
 wrote some occasionally ; but how she longed 
 for the child's innocent looks — the child's cease- 
 less prattle ! Her gentle delicacy was hurt at that 
 unnecessary gibe about the old-maidishness, and 
 her supposed sham rejection of the husband 
 who had never come her way. ' Why should 
 she talk of men — especially before him ? What 
 do I want with men ? ' said poor Miss Cherry 
 to herself ; ' but my own niece — my brother's 
 child — surely I may wish for her.' And surely 
 there could not have been a more innocent 
 wish. 
 
 c 2
 
 20 CARITA. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A FRIGHT. 
 
 ' Which you please ; you are not gouty or 
 rheumatical, or anything of that sort,' said Mr. 
 Maxwell, almost gaily. ' Homburg, for instance 
 — Homburg would do — or Baden, if you prefer 
 that. I incline to the one you prefer ; and en- 
 joy yourself as much as you can — that is my 
 prescription. Open air, novelty, change ; and 
 if you find you don't rehsh one place, go to 
 another. The sea, if you take a fancy for the 
 sea ; and Sir William is of my opinion exactly. 
 Choose the place which amuses you most.^ 
 
 ' It seems to me,' said Mr. Beresford, ' that 
 these wise men are laughing at you, Annie. 
 They know there's nothing the matter with you. 
 If I were not much obliged to them for thinking 
 so, I should say you had some reason to be 
 offended. One knows what you doctors mean 
 when you tell a patient to do whatever she 
 hkes best.'
 
 A FRIGHT. 21 
 
 ' It means one of two things,' said Mrs. 
 Beresford ; ' either that it is nothing, or that 
 it is hopeless ' 
 
 Her husband burst into a soft laugh. 
 ' Well ! ' he said, ' it is very evident it cannot 
 be the last — so it must be as I say. It is in- 
 jurious to our pride, my darling ; for I allow that 
 it is pleasant to possess either in your own 
 person or your wife's a delicate and mysterious 
 malady, of which it can be said that it baffles 
 the doctors, without very much hurting the 
 patient ; but never mind. If you can bear this 
 disrespectful verdict that you have nothing the 
 matter with you, I assure you it makes me 
 quite happy.' 
 
 Mrs. Beresford looked at the doctor with 
 very keen, eager eyes — eyes which had grown 
 bigger and keener of late, perhaps from the 
 faihng of the round, smooth outhnes of the 
 face. She noticed that, though Maxwell saw 
 very well that she was looking at him, he did 
 nut reply to those looks, but rather turned to 
 her husband and answered him, as if he had 
 not observed her at all. 
 
 ' I don't mean to be at all disrespectful,' he 
 said ; ' there is a httle disturbance of the system,
 
 22 CARITA. 
 
 which might turn to something as serious as 
 you could desire, and take away the comfort of 
 life perhaps more completely than a regular 
 disease ; but I hope that is not likely to hap- 
 pen here.' 
 
 ' No ; I don't think it,' said the easy man. 
 * We shall try Baden, which is the prettiest — 
 unless you prefer some other place ; in short, 
 we shall go oJBT without guide or compass, and 
 do exactly what pleases ourselves. We have 
 done so, it must be allowed, pretty often before 
 — but to do it with the sanction of the fa- 
 culty ' 
 
 ' And the child. — as usual — will go to Sun- 
 ninghill?' 
 
 ' Why should you say as usual, Mr. Max- 
 well ? ' said Mrs. Beresford, with a suspicion of 
 offence. 'Do you think I ought to take her 
 with me ? Do you suppose, perhaps, that I 
 might not come back again — that I might 
 never — see ' 
 
 ' This is so unnecessary,' said the doctor, 
 remonstrating. ' What must I say ? I wish I 
 was as certain of a thousand a year. You will 
 come back quite well, I hope.' 
 
 'When people are very ill don't you say
 
 A FRIGHT. 23 
 
 much the same things to them? There was 
 poor Susan Maitland, whom you banished to 
 Italy to die. People talked of her coming 
 back again. Oh, no ! I am not tldnking of 
 myself, but of the subject in general. One 
 needed only to look in her face to see that she 
 would never come back.' 
 
 ' People have different ideas of their duty,' 
 said Maxwell. ' Some think it best not to 
 frighten a patient with thoughts of death. I 
 don't know that one can lay down any rule ; 
 one is guided by circumstances. To some 
 nervous people it is best not to say anything 
 Some are more frightened than others — just as 
 some people are more susceptible to pain than 
 others.' 
 
 ' Now I am going to ask you another ques- 
 tion,' said Mrs. Beresford. ' Suppose you had 
 a patient very ill — I mean hopelessly ill, be- 
 yond all cure — do you think it is right to keep 
 them alive as you do now, strugghng to the 
 last, staving off every new attack that might 
 carry them off in quiet, fighting on and on to 
 the last moment, and even prolonging that, 
 when it comes so far, with cordials and stimu 
 lants ? Keeping their breath in their poor, suf-
 
 24 CARITA. 
 
 feriDg bodies till you get to the end of your 
 resources — ^your dreadful, cruel resources, that 
 is what I call them. Do you think this is- 
 right ? I had an aunt who died dreadfully — of 
 cancer ' 
 
 ' Ah ! An aunt ? You did not tell me 
 this,' said the doctor, oflf his guard ; then, re- 
 covering himself, with something that looked 
 like alarm, he said, hurriedly : ' What would 
 you have us do — kill the poor creatures ? neg- 
 lect them ? refuse what aid, what alleviations- 
 we can ' 
 
 ' I'll tell you what I should like you to do if 
 it were me,' she said, eagerly. ' When it was 
 all over, when you were siure I could not get 
 better, when there was nothing more in life but 
 to suffer — suffer : then I should like you to 
 make a strong, sweet dose for me to put me 
 out of my trouble. I should like James to 
 give it me. Do you remember what was said 
 that time in India, in the mutiny? I don't 
 know if it was true, but people said it. That 
 the husbands of some of the poor ladies kissed 
 them and shot them, to save them ; don't you 
 remember ? That is what I should hke you to 
 do — a sweet, strong dose ; and James would
 
 A FRIGHT. 25 
 
 bi'ing it to me and kiss me, and put it to my 
 lips. That would be true love ! ' she said,, 
 growing excited, the pale roses in her cheeks 
 becoming hectic red ; ' that would be true 
 friendship, Mr. Maxwell ! Then I should not 
 feel afraid. I should feel that you two stood 
 between me and anguish, between me and 
 
 agony 
 
 Both the men rose to their feet as if to re- 
 strain her vehemence, with one impulse. ' My 
 darling, my darhng ! ' said James Beresford, in 
 dismay, ' what are you thinking of ? ' As for 
 Mr. Maxwell, he walked to the window and 
 looked out, his featirres working painfully. 
 There was a moment in which the husband 
 and ^vife clung together, he consoling her with 
 every reassuring word that he could think of, 
 she clinging to him with long, hysterical sobs. 
 ' My love, what has put this into your head ? * 
 he said, half sobbing too, yet pretending to 
 laugh. ' My Annie, what fancy is this ? Have 
 you lost your wits, my darling ? Why, this is 
 all folly ; it is a dream ; it is a craze you have 
 taken into your head. Here is Maxwell will 
 tell you ' 
 
 But Maxwell made him a sign over his-
 
 26 CARITA. 
 
 wife's head so impassioned and imperative that 
 the man was struck dumb for the moment. 
 He gazed blankly at the doctor, then stooped 
 •down to murmur fond words less distinct and 
 articulate in her ear. Fortunately, she was too 
 much excited, too much disturbed, to notice 
 this sudden pause, or that the doctor said 
 nothing in response to her husband's appeal. 
 She held fast by his arm and sobbed, but gra- 
 dually grew calmer, soothed by his tenderness, 
 and after a while made a half-smihng, tear- 
 ful apology for her weakness. It was after 
 dinner on a lovely summer evening, not more 
 than twilight, though it was late. The two 
 gentlemen had been lingering over their claret, 
 while she lay on the sofa waiting for them, for 
 she did not choose to be shut up upstairs all 
 by herself, she said. After she had recovered 
 they went to the drawing-room, where the 
 windows were all open, and a couple of softly - 
 burning lamps lit up the twilight with two half- 
 veiled moons of hght. There was not a lovely 
 prospect as at Sunninghill ; nothing, indeed, but 
 the London square, where a few trees vege- 
 tated, just room enough for the dews to fall, 
 and for ' the little span of sky and little lot of
 
 A FRIGHT. 2i 
 
 stars ' to unfold themselves. But even London 
 air grows soft with that musical effect of sum- 
 mer, and the sounds of passing voices and foot- 
 steps broke in with a faint, far-off sound as in 
 dreams : the country itself could not have been 
 more peaceful. Mrs. Beresford, half ashamed 
 of herself, sat down at the httle, bright tea- 
 table, just within the circle of one of the lamps, 
 and made tea, talking with a little attempt at 
 gaiety, in which, indeed, the natiural revulsion 
 of rehef after that outbreak of alarm and 
 melancholy was evident. It was she now who 
 was the soul of .the little party ; for the doctor 
 was moody and preoccupied, and her husband 
 watched her with an anxiety almost too great 
 to be kept within the bounds of ordinary calm. 
 She rose, however, to the occasion. She began 
 to talk of their probable travels, of Baden and 
 Homburg, and all the other places which had 
 been suggested to her. 'We shall be as well 
 known about the world as the Wandering 
 Jew,' she said ; ' better, for he had not a wife ; 
 and now that we have nearly exhausted 
 Europe, there will be nothing for us but the 
 East or Egypt — suppose we go to Egypt ; that 
 would be original ? '
 
 28 CAKITA. 
 
 ' Not at all original,' said Mr. Maxwell, who 
 seemed half to resent her new-born gaiety. 
 ' All the cockneys in the world go to Egypt. 
 Mr. Cook does the Pyramids regularly ; and as 
 for Jerusalem, it is common, common as Mar- 
 gate, and the society not much unlike.' 
 
 'Margate is very bracing, I have always 
 heard,' said Mrs. Beresford, ' and much cheaper 
 than a German bath. What do you say to 
 saving money, James, and eating shrimps and 
 riding donkeys ? I remember being at Margate 
 when I was a child. They say there is no such 
 air anywhere ; and Mr. Maxwell says that the 
 sea, if I like the sea ' 
 
 ' As for bracing air, my love, I think there 
 is nothing like St. Moritz. Do you remember 
 how it set me up after that — that ' 
 
 ' Give him a big, well-sounding name, 
 doctor,' said Mrs. Beresford, laughing; 'it was 
 only a bilious attack. But talking of the sea, 
 there is Biarritz — that would do, don't you 
 think ? It is warm, and it was gay. After all, 
 however, I don't think I care for the sea. The 
 Italian lakes are fine in the autumn, and as it 
 gets cooler we might get on perhaps to Florence, 
 or even Eome — or Kamtschatka, or Timbuctoo,
 
 A FRIGHT. 29 
 
 or the Great Sahara,' she said, with a burst of 
 laughter. 'You are complaisance itself, you 
 gentlemen. Now I'll go and sing you some- 
 thing to reward you for humouring me to the 
 top of my bent, and licensing me to go where I 
 please.' 
 
 She had a pretty voice and sang well. The 
 piano was at the other end of the room, the 
 ' back drawing-room ' of the commonplace 
 London house. The two men kept their places 
 while she went away into the dim evening, and 
 sat down there scarcely visible, and sang. The 
 soft, sweet voice, not powerful, but penetrating, 
 rose like a bird in the soft gloom. James 
 Beresford looked at the doctor with an entreat- 
 ing look of secret anguish as the first notes rose 
 into the air, so Hquid, so tender, so sweet. 
 
 ' Are you afraid ? tell me I ' he said, with 
 pathetic brevity. 
 
 Maxwell could not bear this questioning. 
 He started up, and went to look this time at a 
 picture on the wall. ' I don't know that I have 
 any occasion to be afraid,' he said, standing 
 with his back turned to his questioner, and 
 quite invisible from the piano. ' I'm — a nei- 
 vous man for a doctor when I'm interested in a 
 case '
 
 30 CARITA. 
 
 Here there was a pause, for she had ended 
 the first verse of the song, and the low warble 
 of the symphony was not enough to cover their 
 voices. 
 
 ' Don't speak of her as a case,' said Beres- 
 ford, low but eager, as the singing recommenced : 
 ' you chill my very blood.' 
 
 'I didn't mean to,' said the doctor, with 
 colloquial homehness ; and he went away into 
 the back drawing-room and sat down near the 
 piano, to escape being questioned, poor Beres- 
 ford thought, who sat still mournfully in the 
 narrow circle of the lamplight, asking himself 
 whether there was really anything to fear. The 
 soft security of the house with all its open win- 
 dows, the friendly voices heard outside, the sub- 
 dued pleasant light, the sweet voice singing in 
 the dimness, what a picture of safety and tran- 
 quillity it made ! What should happen to dis- 
 turb it ? Why should it not go on for ever ? 
 James Beresford's sober head grew giddy as he 
 asked himself this question, a sudden new ache 
 undreamed of before leaping up, in spite of him, 
 into his heart. The doctor pretended to be 
 absorbed in the song ; he beat time with his 
 fingers as the measure went on. Never in the
 
 A FRIGHT. 31 
 
 memory of man had he shown so much interest 
 in singing before. Was it to conceal something 
 else, something which could not be put into 
 words, against the peace of this happy house,, 
 which had come into his heart? 
 
 Fortunately, however, Beresford thought, 
 his wife forgot all about that agitating scene for 
 some days. She did not speak of it again ; and 
 for about a week after was unusually Hvely and 
 gay, stronger and better than she had been for 
 some time, and more light in heart, talking of 
 their journey, and making preparations for it 
 with all the pleasant little sentiment which their 
 ' honeymooning ' expeditions had always roused 
 in her. When everything was ready, however, 
 the evening before they left home a change 
 again came over her. Cara had been sent to 
 Sunninghill with her nurse that day, and the 
 child had been unwilling to go, and had clung 
 to her mother with unusual pertinacity. Even 
 when this is inconvenient it is always flattering : 
 and perhaps Mrs. Beresford was pleased with 
 the shght annoyance and embarrassment which 
 it caused. 
 
 'Eemember, James,' she said, with some 
 vivacity, as they sat together that evening, ' this
 
 32 CARITA. 
 
 is to be the last time we go honeymooning. 
 Next time we are to be respectable old married 
 people (as we are, with our almost grown-up 
 daughter). She is nearly as tall as I am, the 
 ^hild ! nearly eleven — and so very tall for her 
 age.' 
 
 ' I think we might take her,' said Beresford, 
 who indeed had often wished for her before. 
 ' She is old enough to bear the travelling, and 
 otherwise it would do her good.' 
 
 ' Yes ; this must be the last time,' she said, 
 lier voice suddenly dropping into a sigh, and 
 lier mood changing as rapidly. A house is 
 dreary on the eve of departure. Boxes in the 
 hall, pinafores on the furniture, the pretty 
 china, the most valuable nicknacks all carried 
 away and locked up — even the habitual books 
 disturbed from their places, the last Pall Mall 
 on the table. The cloud came over her face as 
 shadows flit over the hills, coming down even 
 while she was speaking. ' The last time ! ' she 
 said. • I can't help shivering. Has it grown 
 cold ? or is it that some one is walking over 
 my grave, as people say ? ' 
 
 ' Why, Annie, I never knew you were super- 
 stitious.'
 
 A FEIGHT. 33 
 
 ' No. It is a new thing for me ; but that is 
 scarcely superstition. And why should 1 care 
 who walked over my grave ? I must die some 
 time or other and be buried, unless they have 
 taken to burning before then. But there is 
 one thing I feel a great deal about,' she added, 
 suddenly. ' I said it once before, and you were 
 frightened, James. If you knew that I was 
 going to die of a painful disease — must die — 
 that nothing could happen to save me, that there 
 was nothing before me but hopeless pain — 
 James, dear, listen to me ! — don't you think you 
 would have the courage for my sake to make an 
 end of me, to put me out of my trouble ? ' 
 
 ' Annie, for Heaven's sake don't talk so. It 
 is nonsense, but it makes me unhappy. ' 
 
 ' As a matter of speculation,' she said ; with 
 a knowledge of his weakness, ' you can't think 
 it would be wrong to do it — do you, James ?' 
 
 'As a matter of speculation,' he said, and 
 the natiu-al man awoke in him. He forgot the 
 pain the idea had caused him, and thought of it 
 only as an idea ; to put it in other words, the 
 woman beguiled him, and he got upon one of 
 his hobbies. ' There are many things one allows 
 as speculation which one is not fond of in fact. 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 CARITA. 
 
 People must have a certain power over their 
 own lives, and I think with you, my love, that 
 it is no charity to keep infirm and suffering 
 people just alive, and compel them to drag their 
 existence on from day to day. ISTotwithstand- 
 ing Heaven's canon 'gainst self-slaughter, I think 
 people should be allowed a certain choice. I 
 am not altogether against euthanasia ; and if 
 indeed recovery is hopeless and hfe only 
 pain ' 
 
 * Yes, James,' she said, eagerly, her eyes 
 lighting up, her cheeks flaming with the red of 
 excitement ; ' I am glad you see it like that ; 
 one might go further perhaps — when from any 
 reason life was a burden ; when one was use- 
 less, hopeless, unhappy ' 
 
 ' Stop a little ; we are going too fast,' he said, 
 with a smile, so entirely did the argument be- 
 guile him. ' No one is justified in treating 
 unhappiness like a mortal disease ; unhappiness 
 may pass away — does pass away, we all know, 
 even when it seems worst. I cannot allow that ; 
 neither would I let people judge which lives 
 were useless, their own or other people's ; but 
 illness which was beyond the possibihty of cure 
 might be different; therefore, if the patient
 
 A FRIGHT. 35 
 
 wished it, his wish, I think, should be law- 
 
 Annie, my darling ! what is this ? what do you 
 mean ? ' 
 
 She had suddenly risen from where she was 
 sitting near him, and thrown herself half at his 
 feet, half into his arms. 
 
 ' Only this,' she said ; ' promise me — promise 
 me, James ! if this should ever happen to me — 
 if you had the assurance, not only from me, but 
 from — the people who know — that I had a 
 terrible complaint, that I could never get better ; 
 promise that you would put me out of my pain, 
 James. Promise that you would give me some- 
 thing to deliver me. You would not stand by 
 and see me going down, down into the valley of 
 death, into misery and weariness and constant 
 pain, and, God ! loathsomeness, James ! ' 
 
 She buried her head in his breast, clinging 
 to him with a grasp which was almost fierce ; 
 her very fingers which held him, appealing 
 strenuously, forcing a consent from him. What 
 could he say ? He was too much distressed and 
 horrified to know how to shape his answer. 
 Fond words, caresses, soothings of every kind 
 were all in vain for use at such a moment. ' Par 
 be it from you, my darling ; far be it from you,' 
 
 D 2
 
 36 CARITA. 
 
 he cried. ' You ! oh, how can you let your 
 imagination cheat you so, my love ! Nothing 
 like this is going to happen, my Annie, my best, 
 my dearest ' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' she cried ; ' but if it were not imagin- 
 ation ! — promise me, James.' 
 
 Wliether she did eventually 'v\Ting this wild 
 promise from him he never knew. He would 
 have said anything to calm her, and finally he 
 succeeded ; and having once more cleared her 
 bosom of this perilous stujQT, she regained her 
 gaiety, her courage and spirits, and they set off 
 as cheerful as any pair of honeymoon travellers 
 need wish to be. But after she had left him 
 and gone to her room pacified and comforted 
 that night, you may fancy what sort of a half- 
 hour that poor man had as he closed the win- 
 dows, which had still been left open, and put 
 out the lamps, as was his practice, for they were 
 considerate people and did not keep their ser- 
 vants out of bed. He stepped out on the balcony 
 and looked up at the moon, which was shedding 
 her stream of silver hght as impartially upon 
 the London housetops as if those white roofs 
 had been forest trees. How still it seemed, 
 every one asleep or going to rest, for it was late
 
 A FRIGHT. 37 
 
 — a few lights glimmering in high windows, a 
 sensation of soft repose in the very air ! God 
 help this silent, sleeping earth, upon which, 
 even in her sleep, dark evils were creeping ! 
 Was some one perhaps dying somewhere even at 
 that serene moment, in the sweet and tranquil 
 stillness? His heart contracted with a great 
 pang. Li the midst of hfe we are in death. 
 Why had those haunting, terrible words come 
 into his ears ?
 
 38 CARITA. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HONEYMOONING. 
 
 The real honeymoon is not always a delightful 
 moment. This, .which sounds like heresy to 
 the romantic, and blasphemy to the young, is a 
 fact which a great many people acknowledge 
 readily enough when they have got beyond the 
 stage at which it sounds hke an offence to the 
 wife or to the husband who is supposed to have 
 made that period rapturous. The new pair 
 have not the easy acquaintance with each other 
 which makes the happiness of close companion- 
 ship ; perhaps they have not that sympathy 
 with each other's tastes which is almost a better 
 practical tie than simple love. They are half 
 afraid of each other ; they are making dis- 
 coveries every day of new points in each other's 
 characters, delightful or undelightful as may be, 
 which bewilder their first confidence of union ; 
 and the more mind and feehng there is between
 
 HOI^EYMOONING. 39 
 
 them, tlie more likely is tliis to be the case. The 
 shallow and superficial ' get on ' better than 
 those who have a great deal of excellence or 
 tender depth of sentiment to be found out. 
 But after the pair have come to full acquaintance ; 
 after they have learned each other from ABC 
 up to the most difficult chapter ; after the inter- 
 course of ordinary life has borne its fruit ; there 
 is nothing in the world so delightful as the 
 honeymooning which has passed by many years 
 the legitimate period of the honeymoon. Some- 
 times one sees respectable fathers and mothers 
 enjoying it, who have sent off their children to 
 the orthodox honeymoon, and only then feel 
 \nth a surprised pleasure how sweet it is to 
 have their own solitude a deux ; to be left to 
 themselves for a serene and happy moment ; to 
 feel themselves dearer and nearer than they 
 ever were before. There is something infinitely 
 touching and tender in this honeymooning of 
 the old. James Beresford and his wife, how- 
 ever, were not of these. They were still young, 
 and of all the pleasures they had there was 
 none equal to this close and unbroken compa- 
 nionship. They knew each other so well, and all 
 their mutual tastes, that they scarcely required
 
 40 CARITA. 
 
 to put their intercourse into words ; and yet 
 how they would talk ! — about everything, about 
 nothing, as if they had just met after a long 
 absence, and had thoughts to exchange on every 
 subject. This is a paradox ; but we are not 
 bound to explain paradoxes which are of the 
 very essence of life, and the most attractive 
 things in it. It had been the habit of these 
 two to go everywhere together. Mrs. Beresford 
 had not the prejudices of an English female 
 Phihstine. She went where her husband 
 wanted to go, fearing nothing, and trotted 
 about with him high and low, through picture- 
 galleries and old churches, to studios, even be- 
 hind the scenes of the operas, and through the 
 smoke-clouds of big ateliers. Nothing came 
 amiss to her with him by her side. It is almost 
 the only way in which a woman can enjoy the 
 freedom of movement, the easy locomotion of a 
 man. Mrs. Beresford went away quite cheer- 
 fully, as we have said. She forgot or put away 
 her mysterious terrors. She addressed herself 
 to all the ordinary enjoyments which she knew 
 so well. ' We shall never be so free again,' she 
 said, half laughing, half with a remote infinite- 
 simal pang. ' We shall have to go to the cor-
 
 HONEYMOONING. 4 1 
 
 rect places and do the right things when Cara 
 is with us.' ' We must give up bric-a-brac/ 
 she said afterwards. ' Cara must not grow up 
 acquainted with all those dusty back premises ; 
 her pretty frocks would be spoiled, and her 
 infantine sincerity. If she had heard you bar- 
 gaining, James, for that Buen Eetiro cup ! 
 Saying it is naught, it is naught, and then brag- 
 ging of the treasure you had found as soon as 
 it was out of the dealer's hands.' 
 
 ' Well,' he said, with a shrug of his shoulders; 
 ' I only do as other people do. Principles of 
 honour don't consist with collecting. I am no 
 worse than my neighbours.' 
 
 * But that will never do for Cara,' said the 
 mother ; ' if you and I are not all her fancy 
 painted us, we will not do for Cara. No, I 
 thought you had never remarked her really. 
 She is the most uncompromising little idealist ! 
 and if we disappoint her, James, I don't know 
 what the child will do.' 
 
 *It appears to me that you are making a 
 bugbear of Cara.' 
 
 ' No ; but I know her. We must give up 
 the bric-a-brac ; for if you continue with it 
 under her blue eyes you will be ruined. If
 
 42 CAKITA. 
 
 she was here she would make you go back and 
 tell the mail he has sold you that cup too 
 cheap.' 
 
 ' That would be nonsense,' said Mr. Beres- 
 ford, involuntarily putting his hand into the 
 pocket where he kept his money. ' Folly ! 
 You don't suppose he gave half as much for it 
 as he sold it to us for. The very mention of 
 that sort of sickening conscientiousness puts one 
 out. We are to sell in the dearest and buy in 
 the cheapest market, eh ? That's the true 
 principle of trade.' 
 
 ' It is not in the Bible, though,' said Mrs. 
 Beresford, with a smile. ' Cara would open 
 her eyes and wonder ; and you, who are the 
 weakest of men, could never stand against her 
 if Cara made big eyes.' 
 
 ' The weakest of men ! You flatter me, it 
 must be allowed ' 
 
 ' Yes ; so you are, James. You could not 
 endure to be disapproved of. What would 
 have become of you if I, instead of giving in to 
 all your ways, had been a more correct and 
 proper person? If I had made you visit just 
 the right things — go to English parties, and 
 keep to the proper sort of tourist society? If
 
 HOXEYMOONING. 43 
 
 you had been obliged to sit indoors in the even- 
 ings and read a Galignani or a Tauchnitz novel 
 while I worked, what would have become of 
 you? I know well enough, for my part.' 
 
 ' I should have done it, I suppose,' he said, 
 half laughing ; ' and will Cara — little Cara — be 
 like that ? You frighten me, Annie ; we had 
 better make away with her somehow ; marry 
 her, or hand her over to the aunts, before it 
 comes to this.' 
 
 Then a sudden change came over the 
 smiling face. 'Cara — or some one else — will 
 most likely be hke that. Poor James ! I foresee 
 trouble for you. How you will think of me 
 when you are in bonds ! when you want to go 
 out and roam about on the Boulevards, and 
 have to sit still instead and read aloud to some- 
 body ! Ah, how you will think of me ! You 
 will say. Poor Annie! if Annie had but lived ' 
 
 ' What is this ? what is this ? ' he said. 
 ' Again, Annie ! I think you want to make me 
 miserable ; to take all the comfort out of my 
 life.' 
 
 ' Oh, no, no; not that,' she said. 'I am 
 only going to get my bonnet, and then we shall 
 go out. Cara is not here yet to keep us in
 
 44 CARITA. 
 
 order. We can honeymoon yet for one more 
 year.' 
 
 Was this only the caprice of her nature (she 
 had always been capricious) going a little 
 further than usual ? Her husband liked her all 
 the better for her quick changes of sentiment ; 
 the laughing and crying that were like an April 
 sky. He said to himself that she had always 
 been hke that ; always changing in a moment, 
 quarrelling sometimes even, making him uncom- 
 fortable for mere variety. Monotony was the 
 thing she hated ; and now she had taken this 
 fad, this fancy, and thought herself ill. How 
 could she be ill when she still could run about 
 with him and enjoy herself as much as ever ? 
 How keen she had been in the bric-a-brac shop 
 of which she had chosen to talk! He never 
 should have found out that Buen Eetiro cup but 
 for her. It was her sharp eyes that saw it. It 
 was she who had rummaged through the dust and 
 all the commonplace gatherings to those things 
 which had really interest. Ill ! though all the 
 College of Physicians swore it, and she to 
 boot, he would not beheve that she was ill. 
 Disturbance of the system — that was all the 
 worst of them ever said ; but how little mean-
 
 HONEYMOONING. 45 
 
 ing there was in that ! Out of sorts ! reduced 
 to plain Enghsh, that was what disturbance of 
 the system meant ; and everybody was subject 
 to as much. She came in, while he was in the 
 ftdl course of these thoughts, with a brilliant 
 little flush on her cheeks, her eyes shining, her 
 whole aspect full of animation. ' I am ready, 
 Sir,' she said, making him a mocking curtsey. 
 Yes ; capricious, that was what she had always 
 been, and he loved her for it. It explained her 
 changes, her fancies, her strange notions better 
 than anything else could do. 
 
 That was the first day, however, on which 
 her strength really showed symptoms of break- 
 ing down. She got tired, which was a thing 
 she never owned to ; lost the pretty flush on 
 her cheek, became pale, and worn out. ' I don't 
 know what is the matter with me,' she said ; ' all 
 at once I feel so tired.' 
 
 *And with very good reason,' said he. 
 ' Think how rapidly we have been travelhng ; 
 think what we have been doing since. Why, 
 you were on foot the whole morning. You are 
 tired ; so am I, for that matter. I was thinking 
 of saying so, but you are always so hard upon 
 my little fatigues. What a comfort for me to
 
 46 CARITA. 
 
 find that you, too, for once in a way, can give 
 in ! ' Thus he tried to take her favourite part 
 and laugh her out of her terrors. She con- 
 sented with a smile more serious than her 
 gravity had been of old, and they went back to 
 their room and dined ' quietly ; ' and he sat and 
 read to her, according to the picture of English 
 domesticity which she had drawn out with smiles 
 a few hours before. It was so soon after that 
 tirade of hers that they could not but remember 
 it, both of them. As it happened, there was 
 nothing but a Tauchnitz novel to read (and who 
 that has been ill or sad, or who has had illness 
 or sadness to solace in a foreign place, but has 
 blessed the novels of Tauchnitz ?), and he read 
 it, scarcely knowing what the words were which 
 fluttered before his eyes. And as for her, she 
 did not take much notice of the story either, 
 but lay on the sofa, and hstened, partly to his 
 voice, partly to the distant sound of the band 
 playing, with strange heaviness and aching in 
 her heart. It was not that she wished to be 
 out listening to the band, moving about in the 
 warm air, hearing the babble of society — that 
 was not what she cared for ; but to be lying 
 there out of the current ; to have dropped aside
 
 HONEYMOONING. 47 
 
 out of the stream ; to be unable for tlie common 
 strain of life ! So he read, sadly thinking, not 
 knowing what he read ; and she half listened, 
 not knowing what she was listening to. It was 
 the first time, and the first time is the worst, 
 though the best. ' It is only once in a way,' he 
 said to her, w^hen the long evening was over ; 
 ' to-morrow you will be as well as ever.' And 
 so she w^as. It was the most natural thing in 
 the world that both or either of them should 
 be tired, once in a way. 
 
 The Beresfords stayed for a long time on the 
 Continent that year. They went about to a 
 great many places. They stayed at Baden till 
 they were tired of the place. They went to 
 Dresden, because Mrs. Beresford took a fancy to 
 see the great San Sisto picture again. Then 
 they went on to lovely old-world Prague, and to 
 lively Vienna, and through the Tyrol to Milan, 
 and then back again to the Italian lakes. 
 Wherever they went they found people whom 
 it was pleasant to know, whom they had met 
 before on their many journeys — people of all 
 countries and every tongue — noble people, 
 beautiful people, clever people — the sort of 
 society which can only be had by taking a great
 
 48 CARITA. 
 
 deal of trouble about it, and which, even with 
 the greatest amount of trouble, many people 
 miss entirely. This society included ambassa- 
 dors and hill-farmers, poor cures, bishops, great 
 statesmen, and professors who were passing rich 
 on five shillings a day : nothing was too great or 
 too small for them ; and as wherever they went 
 they had been before, so wherever they went 
 they found friends. Sometimes it was only a 
 chambermaid ; but, nevertheless, there she was 
 with a pleasant human smile. And, to tell the 
 truth, James Beresford began to be very glad of 
 the friendly chambermaids, and to calculate 
 more where they were to be found than upon 
 any other kind of society ; for his wife had fol- 
 lowed her usual practice of coming without a 
 maid, and, as her strength flagged often, he was 
 thankful, too thankful, to have some one who 
 would be tender of her, and care for her as he 
 himself was not always permitted to do, and as 
 nobody else but a woman could. Oh, how he 
 longed to get home, while he wandered about 
 from one beautiful spot to another, hating the 
 fine scenery, loathing and sickening at every- 
 thing he had loved! Commonplace London 
 and the Square with its comforts would have 
 pleased him a hundred times better than lovely
 
 HONEYMOONING. 49 
 
 Como or the wild glory of the mountains ; but 
 she would not hear of going home. One day, 
 when the solemn Enghsh of a favourite Kammer 
 Madchen had roused him to the intolerable 
 nature of the situation, he had tried, indeed 
 with all his might to move her to return. ' Your 
 goot laty,' Gretchen had said, 'is nod — well. 
 I ton't untershtand your goot laty. She would 
 be bedder, mooch bedder at 'ome, in Lonton.' 
 ' I think you are right, Gretchen,' he had said, 
 and very humbly went in to try what he could 
 do. ' My love,' he said, ' I am beginning to get 
 tired of the Tyrol. I should like to get home. 
 The Societies are beginning. I see Huxley's 
 lectures start next week. I hke to be there, 
 you know, when all my friends are there 
 Shouldn't you be pleased to get home ? ' 
 
 ' No,' she said. She had been lying on the 
 sofa, but got up as soon as he came in. ' You 
 know I hate autumn in London ; the fogs kill 
 me. I can't — I can't go back to the fogs. Go 
 yourself, James, if you please, and attend all 
 your dear Societies, and hear Mr. Huxley. Take 
 me to Como first, and get me rooms that look 
 on the lake, and hire Abbondio's boat for me ; 
 and then you can go.' 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 CARITA. 
 
 ' It is likely that ' I should go,' he said, 
 ' without you, my darling! When did I ever 
 leave you ? But there are so many comforts 
 at home you can't have here ; and advice — I 
 want advice. You don't get better so fast as I 
 hoped.' 
 
 She looked at him with a strange smile. 
 ' No ; I don't get better, do I .^ ' she said. ' Those 
 doctors tell such lies; but I don't get worse, 
 James ; you must allow I don't get worse. I 
 am not so strong as I thought I was ; I can't go 
 running about everywhere as I used to do. I 
 am getting old, you know. After thirty I 
 beheve there is always a difference.' 
 
 ' What nonsense, Annie 1 there is no dif- 
 ference in you. You don't get back your 
 strength ' 
 
 ' That's it ; that's all. If you were to leave 
 me quite alone and quiet, to recruit now ; yes, 
 I think I should like to know that you were in 
 London enjo}dng yourself. Why shouldn't you 
 enjoy yoiu-self ? Women get worn out sooner 
 than men; and I don't want to cripple you, 
 James. No ; take me to Como — I have taken 
 a fancy to Como — and then you can come back 
 for me whenever you please.'
 
 HONEYMOONING. 51 
 
 ' I am not going to leave you,' lie said, with 
 a sigh. ' You must not be unreasonable, my 
 darling. What pleasure would it be to me to 
 go home without you ? It was you I was think- 
 ing of ; for me it is all right. I am quite happy 
 here. As for Huxley and the rest, you don't 
 think I care for them. It was you I was think- 
 ing of.' 
 
 ' You said the Societies. Whatever you do, 
 James, speak the truth. I suppose,' she added, 
 with a laugh which sounded harsh, ' you are 
 afraid I shall get very ill — die, perhaps, away 
 from home ? ' 
 
 Poor man ! what was he to say? ' Oh, Annie !' 
 he cried, ' how you stab me ! If I thought any- 
 thing of the kind, you know I'd have Sir 
 William here to-morrow, or any one, if it should 
 cost me all I have. I know very well there is 
 no danger,' he went on, taking a certain for- 
 lorn comfort out of his own bold words ; ' but 
 you don't get up your strength as you ought, 
 and knocking about in these bare rooms can't 
 be good for you ; and, living as we are — and 
 you have no maid ' 
 
 ' I hate a maid. I like Gretchen a great 
 
 deal better. She makes so much of me.' 
 
 £ 2 UBRARY 
 
 UNIVKRSI7Y or fUJWftJr
 
 52 CARITA. 
 
 ' Then take Gretcben with you, my dearest ; 
 take her to Como ; keep her with you till you 
 get home.' 
 
 ' Oh, how like a man that is !' she said, 
 laughing. ' Take Gretchen with me — Gretchen, 
 who is her father's only daughter, the life and 
 soul of the place ! What would he do without 
 Gretchen ? He would have to shut up altogether. 
 I might drop out of the world, and I would not 
 be missed half so much as she would be. Do 
 you know I begin to get tired of this place, and 
 the hills, James,' she cried, starting up. ' Let 
 us go and ask about Donato and his horses. I 
 want to get to Como before October. Why, 
 we'll come in for the vintage ! I hke the vin- 
 tage ; and there are advertisements everywhere 
 about a sale at one of the villas. We shall be 
 sure to pick up something. Is it too late to 
 start to-day ? ' 
 
 ' My darhng, when you take a thing into 
 your head ' 
 
 ' Yes, to be sure, I hke to do it all at once. 
 I was always hot-headed. Now mind, we are 
 to start to-morrow. I always loved Como, 
 James ; you know I always did. We went 
 there the first year we were married. I don't
 
 HONEYMOONING. 53 
 
 call it honeymooning when we don't go to 
 Como ; and remember this is our last bout of 
 honeymooning ; we shall have Cara next 
 year.' 
 
 She laughed, and was very gay all the even- 
 ing, delighted with the idea of the change. But 
 when he put her into Donato's big old-fashioned 
 veitura next morning, and saw everything fast- 
 ened on, and prepared for the long, slow jour- 
 ney, poor Beresford was very sad. He thought, 
 if he could only have a long talk with Maxwell, 
 and hear what Sir William had got to say, and 
 know what it was that he had to fear, he should 
 be less unhappy. There must be something, or 
 she would not be so strange ; but what was it ? 
 Almost anything was better, he thought, than 
 fighting in the dark — fighting with ghosts, not 
 knowing what you were afraid of. She was 
 quite light-hearted at first, interested with the 
 drive, and waved her hands to the hills as they 
 went slowly out of sight. ' Good-bye,' she said, 
 ' you dear old giants ! I hope those white furs of 
 yours will keep you warm till we bring Cara. 
 What will Cara think of the mountains ? She 
 never saw anything bigger than SunninghilL' 
 
 ' Sunninghill has the effect of being much
 
 54 CARITA. 
 
 higher than it is with that great level stretch of 
 flat country. It impresses the imagination just 
 as much as your giants. Don't laugh, Annie ; 
 but your mountains stifle me. I never have 
 air enoucrh to breathe. I like miles and miles 
 of country round me. You know my weak- 
 ness.' 
 
 ' Sunninghill before the Alps ! ' she cried, 
 laughing. ' 'Tis clear you are a true cockney. 
 Give me your shoulder for a pillow, I think I 
 shall go to sleep.' 
 
 And so she did ; and the horses jogged on 
 and on, now slow, now fast, their bells jing- 
 ling, and Donato's whip making harmless 
 circles and slashes over their heads ; and 
 houses and hedgerows, and slopes of mountain, 
 flew past in a dream. James Beresford could 
 see nothing but the wan lines of the face that 
 rested on his shoulder, solemn in that deep 
 sleep of weariness. How worn she was ! how 
 pale ! growing whiter, he thought, and whiter, 
 till sometimes in terror he stooped down close 
 to make sure that the pale lips were parted by 
 living breath.
 
 00 
 
 CHAPTEE lY. 
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 
 
 To live at Simningliill, with one's feet on a level 
 with the highest pinnacle of the big Castle at 
 St. George's, what a thing it was in summer ! 
 All that country is eloquent with trees — big 
 beeches, big oaks, straight elms, sweet birch- 
 trees ; even the very holly-bushes, in their 
 dark green, grow tall into prickly straggling 
 monsters, as big as the elms. But the triumph 
 of the place perhaps is in spring, when the 
 primroses come too thick for counting, and the 
 woods are full of their fairy, indefinable fra- 
 grance. In the ripe summer there was no such 
 lovely suggestion about ; all was at that per- 
 fection which suggests only decay. The wild 
 flowers were foxgloves, with here and there in 
 the marshy places a lingering plume of meadow- 
 sweet. The ferns had grown too strong and 
 tall, like little trees. The woods were in their
 
 56 CAKITA. 
 
 darkest, fullest garments of green ; not another 
 leaflet to come anywhere ; all full, and mature, 
 and complete. Wild honeysuckle waved flags 
 of yellow and brown from the high branches 
 of big trees, which it had caught and tangled 
 in ; and made the hedge into one big wall of 
 flowers — almost too much when the sun was on 
 it. In the very heart of August it was as cool 
 in these shadowy wood-walks as in a Gothic 
 chapel, and here and there on a little plateau 
 of brown e,arth a bench underneath a tree 
 offered rest and a view to the wayfarer. Mrs. 
 Burchell was sitting on one of these, panting a 
 little, on the special day we have to record. 
 She was that rector's wife already mentioned, 
 who was a contemporary of Cherry Beresford, 
 and who grudged so much that ' two single 
 women ' should have all the dehghts of Sunning- 
 hill. She was just Miss Cherry's age, fat and 
 fair, but more than forty, and she had seven 
 children, and felt herself inconceivably in ad- 
 vance of Cherry, for whom she retained her old 
 friendship however, modified by a little envy 
 and a good deal of contempt. Cherry was an 
 old maid ; that of itself surely was quite enough
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 57 
 
 to warrant the contempt and the envy. You 
 had but to look at Mr. BiurcheH's rectory, which 
 lay at the foot of the hill under the shadow of 
 the woods, but facing towards the high road, 
 which was very dusty, and exposed without a 
 tree to the blaze of the west, and to compare it 
 with the beautiful house on the top of the hill, 
 sheltered so carefully, not too much nor too 
 little — set in velvet lawns and dewy gardens, 
 dust and noise kept at arm's length — to see the 
 difference between them. It was ,a difference 
 which ]\Irs. Burchell for her part could not 
 learn not to resent ; though, indeed, but for the 
 benefice bestowed by Miss Beresford, the Bur- 
 chells must have had a much worse lot, or 
 indeed perhaps never would have united their 
 lots at all. The rector's wife might have been 
 as poor a creature as Miss Cherry, an old maid, 
 and none of the seven Burchells might ever 
 have come into being, but for the gift of that 
 dusty Eectory from the ladies on the hill ; but 
 the rectorinn did not think of that. She was 
 seated on the bench under the big oak, fanning 
 herself with her handkerchief, while Agnes, her 
 eldest daughter, and Dolly, her youngest, duti-
 
 58 CARITA. 
 
 fully waited for her. They were going up to 
 ' The Hill ' for tea, which was a weekly cere- 
 monial at least. 
 
 ' At all events, mamma, you must allow,* 
 said Agnes, ' that it is better to Hve at the foot 
 of the hill than at the top. You never could 
 take any walks if you had this long pull up 
 every time you went out.' 
 
 ' They don't have any long pull,' said her 
 mother ; ' they have their carriage. Ah, yes, 
 they are very different from a poor clergyman's 
 wife, who has done her duty all her life without 
 much reward for it. It is not those who 
 deserve them most, or who have most need of 
 them, who get the good things of this hfe, my 
 dear. I don't want to judge my neighbours ; 
 but Miss Charity Beresford I have heard all my 
 life was not so very much better than a heathen. 
 It may not go so far as that — but I have seen 
 her, with my own eyes, laugh at your papa's 
 best sermons. I am afraid she is not far re- 
 moved from the wicked that flourish like a green 
 bay tree ; yet look at her lot in life and your 
 papa's — a gentleman, too, and a clergyman 
 with so many opportunities of doing good — and 
 she in this fine place, a mere old woman ! '
 
 THE THREE CHAEITIES. 59 
 
 ' If papa lived here should we all hve here ? ' 
 said Dolly, whose small brain was confused by 
 this suggestion ; ' then I should have the pony 
 instead of Cara, and Miss Cherry would be my 
 auntie ! Oh, I wish papa lived here ! ' 
 
 ' Hold your tongue,' said her mother. 
 ^ Cherry Beresford is a ridiculous old creature. 
 Dear me, when I think of the time when she 
 and I were girls together ! Who would have 
 thought that I should have been the one to toil 
 up here in the sun, while she drove in her 
 carriage. Oh, yes, that's very true, she was 
 born the richest — but some girls have better 
 luck than others ! It was mine, you see, to 
 marry a poor clergyman. Ah, well, I daresay 
 Cherry would give her head to be in my place 
 now ! ' 
 
 ' And you in hers ? Is that what you mean, 
 mamma?' 
 
 ' Me in hers ! I'd hke to be in her house, 
 if that's what you mean ; but me a fanciful, 
 discontented, soured old maid — me ! ' 
 
 ' Then, mamma dear, if you are better off in 
 one way and she in another, you are equal,' 
 said Agnes, somewhat crossly ; ' that's compen- 
 sation. Have not you rested long enough ? '
 
 60 CARITA. 
 
 Agnes was in the uncomfortable position of an 
 involuntary critic. She had been used to hear 
 a great deal about the Miss Beresfords all her 
 life, and only a little while before had awoke 
 out of the tranquil satisfaction of use and wont, 
 to wonder if all this abuse was justifiable. She 
 stood under the tree with her back to her 
 mother, looking out upon the view with an im- 
 patient sadness in her face. She was fond of 
 her mother ; but to hear so many unnecessary 
 animadversions vexed and ashamed her, and the 
 only way in which she could show this was by 
 an angry tone and demeanour, which sat very 
 badly upon her innocent countenance and in- 
 genuous looks. 
 
 Just then they heard the sound of footsteps 
 coming towards them, and voices softly clear in 
 the warm air. ' But, Cara, we must not be so 
 ready to blame. All of us do wrong sometimes — 
 not only little girls, but people who are grown up.' 
 
 ' Then, Aunt Cherry, you ought not, and one 
 ought to blame you. A little child who cannot 
 read — yes, perhaps that ought to be excused — 
 ^ it does not know ; but us ' 
 
 ' We do wrong, too, every day, every 
 minute, Cara. You will learn that as you grow
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 61 
 
 older, and learn to be kind, I hope, and for- 
 give.' 
 
 ' I shall never learn that.' 
 
 They came within sight as these words were 
 said. Miss Cherry, in a cool grey gown, with 
 a broad hat which Mrs. Burchell thought far 
 too young for her ; little Cara in her white frock, 
 the shadows speckling and waving over her, 
 erect as a little white pillar, carrying herself so 
 straight. They made a pretty picture coming 
 down the brown mossy path all broken up by 
 big roots under the cool shade of the trees. On 
 the bank behind them were low forests of coarse 
 fern, and a bundle of foxgloves flowering high 
 up on a brown knoll. The cool and tranquil 
 look of them felt almost like an insult to the hot 
 and panting wayfarers who had toiled up the 
 path this hot day. Mrs. Burchell was in black 
 silk, as became her age and position ; she had a 
 great deal of dark hair, and, though she blamed 
 Miss Cherry for it, she, too, wore a hat ; but, 
 though she had been resting for ten minutes, 
 she was still red and panting. ' Ah, Cherry,' 
 she said, ' how lucky you are coming down- 
 hill while we lave been climbing ! Some people 
 have always the best of it. It makes me feel
 
 62 CARITA. 
 
 hotter and hotter to see you so cool and so 
 much at your ease.' 
 
 'We have come to meet you,' said Miss 
 Cherry, ' and we shall be equal the rest of the 
 way, for we shall all climb, Little Dolly, will 
 you drag me up ? You are so big and so strong, 
 and you like to help old ladies. Come.' 
 
 Dolly being a very little mite, more fit to be 
 carried, was made very happy by this address. 
 She stretched forth two fat, small hands, and 
 made great pretences to drag her thin charge. 
 ' But you must want to come, or I can't drag 
 you,' she said. 
 
 ' Dolly is a little, wise woman, and speaks 
 proverbs and parables,' said Miss Cherry. 
 ' Yes, dear, I want to come ; but we must wait 
 for mamma.' 
 
 'Oh, go on, you are light and airy ; you 
 have not been tried with a large family like me ! 
 You had better give me your arm, Agnes, for 
 the rest of the way. What a pull it is ! I don't 
 think I should ever walk if I had my choice. 
 If I could afford a pair of ponies like yours ; 
 but with so many children ponies are out of the 
 question,' said Mrs. Burchell, still aggrieved. 
 Miss Cherry looked wistfully at the pretty
 
 THE THEEE CHARITIES. 63 
 
 daughter upon whose arm her friend laid a 
 heavy hand. 
 
 ' Perhaps we both have something that the 
 other would like to have,' she said, mildly. ' I 
 beheve that is the way in hfe.' 
 
 ' Oh, it would never do for you, a single 
 woman, to wish for children ! I consider that 
 most improper,' said the rector's wife. ' Of 
 course we all wished for husbands in our day, 
 and some of us were successful and some 
 weren't ; but it isn't a subject to be talked of, 
 pardon me, my dear Cherry, before young 
 girls.' 
 
 Miss Cherry opened her mild eyes very 
 wide, and then she blushed a delicate, over- 
 whelming old-maidenly blush, one of those de- 
 monstrations of feeling which are almost more 
 exquisite in the old than in the young. She did 
 not make any reply. Mrs. Burchell went on 
 in her daughter's ear : ' She is an old fool — look 
 at her. Blushing ! as if she were a young girl.' 
 
 ' I can't blush when I please, mamma,' said 
 Agnes ; ' neither, I suppose, can she. Lean on 
 me a little heavier ; we shall soon get to the top 
 now.' 
 
 Why, she runs actually/ said poor Mrs.
 
 64 CARITA. 
 
 Burchell. ' She is as light as Dolly ; she doesn't 
 mind the hill. So, Cara, your papa and mamma 
 have gone away again ? Why don't they take 
 you with them ? I should think you are old 
 enough now to go too. How different people are ! 
 Now, I can never bear to be separated from 
 my children. I like them to go everywhere 
 with me. It is quite astonishing the difference. 
 Doesn't your Aunt Charity think it strange that 
 they should always send you here ? ' 
 
 ' Aunt Charity likes to have me,' said Cara ; 
 ' for mamma travels very fast, and I should get 
 very tired. I think I like the Hill best. 
 Mamma is not very strong, and I should have 
 to stop all my lessons.' 
 
 ' But you would not mind that, I should 
 think. My girls are always so glad to get 
 lessons over. They would go mad with joy to 
 have their month's holiday, and I am sure so 
 would you.' 
 
 ' No,' said Cara ; ' I am nearly twelve, and I 
 can only play three or four tunes, and talk a 
 little French with Aunt Cherry. We pronounce 
 very badly,' she continued, with a blush. ' I 
 know by the French people who come to see 
 us in the Square.'
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 65 
 
 ' You poor child ! do you mean to say they 
 let you stay up at night, and hear people talk- 
 ing in the drawing-room ? How very wrong for 
 you, both for your mind and health ! that is 
 what makes you so thin, I am sure ; and you 
 must hear a great many things that you ought 
 not to hear.' 
 
 Cara opened her blue eyes very wide. She 
 was on the whole gratified by the idea that she 
 had heard things she ought not to hear. That 
 perhaps accounted for her superior wisdom 
 which she felt in herself. 
 
 ' Mamma says I ought to learn to judge for 
 myself,' she said, with dignity. ' When there 
 is an argument going on I like to listen, and 
 often she makes me tell her what I thought, 
 and which side I take.' 
 
 Mrs. Burchell gave Agnes a significant look ; 
 and Agnes, it must be allowed, who heard little 
 conversation which did not turn on personal 
 subjects, was sHghtly horrified too. 
 
 ' Poor child ! ' repeated the rector's wife ; 
 ' Sit your age ! — and what kind of subjects do 
 they talk about .? It must be very bad for 
 you.' 
 
 • Oh, about books chiefly ! ' said Cara, ' and 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 CARITA. 
 
 pictures— but I don't understand pictures — and 
 sometimes about politics. I like that — about 
 Ireland and Mr. Gladstone they talked once. 
 And to hear the Frenchmen talk about Ireland 
 — -just as if it were Poland, papa said.' 
 
 'Well, T am sure it could not be much 
 worse,' Mrs. Burchell said, after a pause of 
 alarm. She did not know much about Ireland, 
 except that they shot landlords there, and that 
 when she advertised for a housemaid she said 
 ' No Irish need apply ; ' and she knew nothing 
 at all about Poland, and what the analogy was 
 between them she had not an idea. She looked 
 at Cara after this with a Httle awe ; but naturally 
 held fast by her censure, which no doubt must 
 be just, though she could not tell how. 
 
 ' It cannot be good for you to hear such 
 talk as that,' she said. ' A good romp and go 
 to bed at eight o'clock, that is what I hold with 
 for my girls. You are a great deal too old for 
 your age. Before you are eighteen, people will 
 be taking you for five-and-twenty. To hear 
 you talk, one would think you were eighteen 
 now.' 
 
 ' I wish they would,' said Cara ; ' I don't 
 like to be always thought a child. I have often.
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 67 
 
 things I want to say just on my very lips. I 
 know 1 could set tlie people right if I might 
 but speak. But mamma holds up her finger, 
 and I dare not. If I were eighteen, I should 
 be grown up, and I might give my opinion — 
 and twenty-five ! Is Agnes twenty-five ? ' 
 
 ' Agnes ! you spiteful little thing ! ' cried 
 the mother, getting redder and redder. Agnes 
 was sixteen, and the eldest of five, so that to 
 add anything to her age was very undesirable. 
 Cara was too much bewildered to ask what it 
 was which made her a ' spiteful little thing,' 
 for just then they came to the final plateau, 
 where the path reached the level of the lawn. 
 And there, snipping away at her roses, was 
 Miss Beresford herself, in a deep sun-bonnet 
 and garden gloves, with a large pair of scissors 
 in her hand, and two baskets at her feet. The 
 roses were m the full flush of their second 
 bloom, notwithstanding their mistress's fears. 
 She was snipping off the withered flowers, the 
 defective buds, and yellow leaves on one hand, 
 and here and there making a savage dash at a 
 sound twig infested by a colony of green flies, 
 while she cut roses for the decoration of the 
 room. One of the baskets was filled with 
 
 F 2
 
 68 CAEITA. 
 
 these flowers, and Miss Cherry, who had pre- 
 ceded them, had hfted this basket from the 
 path, and was looking at it with a perplexed 
 face. 
 
 ' There's a " Malmaison " which is perfect,' 
 said Miss Charity ; ' and as for those " Giant 
 
 of Battles " ' She liked to pronounce their 
 
 names in her own way, scorning pretence, as 
 she said ; and she put down her nose into the 
 basket with true satisfaction. The one thing 
 in the world Miss Charity was a little ' oflf her 
 head ' about was a line rose. 
 
 ' They are fine flowers,' said Miss Cherry, 
 very seriously, her soft voice relaxing, with no 
 smile ; ' but the stalks are so short ! How am 
 I to arrange them ? unless you put them bolt 
 upright, each one by itself, as they are in a 
 rose show ? ' 
 
 ' You don't think I'm going to sacrifice my 
 buds,' said Miss Charity ; ' never ! I see you 
 do it, and that dolt of a gardener, and it goes 
 to my heart. Put them bolt uj^right ; what 
 could be better? or they do very well in flat 
 dishes. You can't go wrong with roses ; but 
 sacrifice my buds — not for the world ! ' 
 
 ' There is not one long enough to put in
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 69 
 
 one's belt,' said Miss Cherry, who looked half 
 disposed to cry. ' We have more roses than 
 anyone, but they never look nice, for they never 
 have any stalks. I must think what is to be 
 done. The fiat dishes are not effective, and the 
 pyramids are wearisome, and specimen glasses 
 make the table like a child's garden.' 
 
 ' There's a dinner party to-night,' said Miss 
 Beresford ; ' that's why Cherry is put out. 
 Come to the arboiu: and sit down, you poor 
 hot people. How very hot you look, to be sure ! 
 That is what it is to be stout. Neither Cherry 
 nor I are stout, and it is a great advantage to 
 us, especially in summer. Come, Maria, you 
 shall have some tea.' 
 
 ' I don't consider myself stout,' said Mrs. 
 Burchell, offended. 'The mother of a large 
 family naturally develops a little. " It would 
 not do, my dear, if you were as slim as you 
 were at twenty," my husband says to me; " only 
 old maids are thin ; " and if he likes it ' 
 
 'Yes; you see we're all old maids here,' said 
 Miss Charity, with one of her hearty laughs. 
 Her handsome old face shone cool at the bottom 
 of the deep tunnel of her sun-bonnet, clear red 
 and white, as if she had been twenty ; and with
 
 70 CARITA. 
 
 large, blue, undimmed eyes, from which little 
 Cara had taken hers, and not from either 
 father's or mother's. Cara, indeed, was con- 
 sidered by everybody ' the very image ' of Miss 
 Charity, and copied her somewhat, it must be 
 allowed, in a longer step and more erect car- 
 riage than was common to little girls. Miss 
 Charity put down her scissors in her other 
 basket, while Miss Cherry bent her reflective 
 and troubled countenance over the roses, and 
 drew oif her big garden gloves, and led the way 
 to the arboiu- or bower, which was not so cock- 
 ney an erection as its name portended. At 
 that height, under the shadow of a group of big 
 fragrant limes, in which two openings cleverly 
 cut revealed the broad beautiful plain below, 
 one with St. George's noble Castle in the midst 
 of the leafy frame, the air was always fresh and 
 sweet. By stretching your neck, as all the 
 young Burchells knew, you could see the dusty 
 road below, and the Eectory lying deep down 
 in the shadow of the trees ; but not a speck of 
 dust made its way up to the soft velvet lawn, 
 or entered at the ever- opened windows. 'Ah, 
 yes, there's our poor httle place, children ; a 
 very different place from this ! ' Mrs. Burchell
 
 THE THREE CHARITIES. 71 
 
 said, plaintively, as she sat down and began to 
 fan herself once more. 
 
 ' You once thought it a very nice little 
 place, Maria,' said Miss Charity. ' I am afraid 
 you are getting tired of the rector, good 
 man ' 
 
 ' I ? ' said Mrs. Burcliell, ' tired of my 
 husband ! You little know him or me, or you 
 would not say such a thing. Nobody except 
 those who have a husband like mine can under- 
 stand what a blessing it is ' 
 
 ' We don't keep anything of the kind up 
 here,' said Miss Charity ; ' and here comes the 
 tea. Cherry has gone in to have a cry over 
 her roses. When one has not one thing to 
 trouble about, one finds another. You because 
 your house is not so big as ours ; she because I 
 cut the roses too short. We are but poor 
 creatures, the best of us. Well, what's the 
 news, Maria ? I always expect a budget of news 
 when I see you.' 
 
 The rector's wife, offended, began by various 
 excuses, as that she was the last person in the 
 world to hear anything, and that gossips knew 
 better than to bring tales to her ; but in the end 
 unfolded her stores and satisfied Miss Charity,
 
 72 CAKITA. 
 
 who took a lively interest in her fellow-creatures, 
 and loved to hear everything that was going on. 
 By the time this recital was fairly begun Miss 
 Cherry came back, carrying with her own hands 
 a bowl of creamy milk for little Dolly, who 
 clung to her skirts and went with her wherever 
 she went. Mrs. Burchell sat in the summer- 
 house, which afforded a little shelter, and was 
 safer as well as more decorous than the grass 
 outside. When Cherry sat down with the 
 children, Agnes had her gossip, too, to pour 
 into the gentle old maiden's sympathetic ears. 
 Agnes was in the crotchety stage of youth, 
 when the newly-developed creature wants to be 
 doing something for its fellows. She had tried 
 the school and the parish, not with very great 
 success. She wanted Miss Cherry to tell her 
 what to do. ' The schoolmistress can teach the 
 girls better than I can. She shrugs her shoulders 
 at me. She is certificated, and knows every- 
 thing ; and the old women are not at their ease. 
 They talk about my dear papa, and what a 
 beautiful sermon it was last Sunday. And 
 mamma is busy with her housekeeping. Couldn't 
 you tell me, dear Miss Cherry, anything a girl 
 can do ? ' Miss Cherry somehow was a girl
 
 THE THEEE CHARITIES. 73 
 
 herself, though she was old. It was more 
 natural to appeal to her than even to mamma. 
 
 Dolly for her part drank her milk, and 
 dipped her biscuit in it, and made ' a figure ' of 
 herself unnoticed by anybody, carrying on a 
 monologue of her own all the time. And Cara 
 sat on the lawn, with the leaves playing over 
 her, flecking her pretty head and white frock 
 with a perpetual coming and going of light and 
 shadow. Cara said nothing to any one. She 
 was looking out with her blue eyes well open, 
 through the branches over big St. George's, 
 upon that misty blueness which was the world.
 
 74 CAEITA. 
 
 CHAPTEE y. 
 
 COMING HOME. 
 
 They stayed in Como till late in October, now- 
 here, now there, as caprice guided their steps. 
 Sometimes Mrs. Beresford would be pleased to 
 be quiet, to float about the lake in the boat, 
 doing nothing, taking in the air and the sun- 
 shine ; or to sit at her window watching the 
 storms that would sometimes come with little 
 warning, turning the lovely Italian lake in a 
 moment into a wild Highland loch — a trans- 
 formation which always delighted her. She liked 
 the storms, until one day a boat was upset, 
 which had a great effect upon her mind. The 
 people about her thought her heartless in her 
 investigations into this accident, which threw 
 several poor families into dire trouble and 
 sorrow. 
 
 ' Would the men die directly ? ' she asked ;
 
 COMING HOME. 75 
 
 ^ or would they have time to think and time to 
 struggle?' 
 
 Her husband reminded her of the common 
 idea that all the scenes of your life came before 
 you, as in a panorama, when you were drown- 
 ing. ' I should not like that,' she said, with a 
 shiver. Then Abbondio interposed, he to whom 
 the boat belonged which the Beresfords hired, 
 and told how he had been drowned once. 
 
 ' They brought me back,' he said ; ' and I 
 shall have to die twice now, which is hard upon 
 a man ; for I was gone ; if they had not brought 
 me back, I should never have known anything 
 more. No, Signora, I did not see all that had 
 happened in my hfe. I felt only that I had 
 slipped the net, and was grasping and grasping 
 at it, and could not get it.' 
 
 ' That was painful,' she said, eagerly. 
 
 ' It was a confusion,' said the fisherman. 
 
 Mrs. Beresford called to her husband to give 
 him some money for the poor widows who had 
 lost their men in the boat. ' A confusion ! ' she 
 said to herself, dreamily. It was a very still 
 day after the storm, and she had been looking 
 with a strang€^ wistfulness at the soft blue 
 ripples of the water which had drowned these
 
 76 CAHITA. 
 
 men. ' A confusion ! How strange it is that 
 we know so little about dying ! A lingering 
 death would be good for that, that you could 
 write it down hour by hour that others might 
 know.' 
 
 ' One would not be able,' said her husband ; 
 ' besides, I think everything gets misty ; and 
 one ceases to be interested about otTier people. 
 I don't much believe those stories that represent 
 passionate feeling in the dying. The soul gets 
 languid. Did I ever tell you what a friend of 
 mine said who w^as dead like Abbondio till the 
 doctors got hold of her and forced her back ? ' 
 
 ' No,' she said, growing very pale ; ' tell me, 
 James.' 
 
 ' She told me that she felt nothing that was 
 painful, but as if she was floating away on the 
 sea somewhere about Capri, where she had 
 once been. Do you remember the sea there, 
 how blue it is about those great Faraglioni rocks? 
 And there she was floating — floating — not suf- 
 fering ; mind and body, all softly afloat ; until 
 they got hold of her, as I say, and forced her 
 back.' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' said Mrs. Beresford, with a shiver ; 
 ' I should not like to be forced back. Poor
 
 COMING HOME. 77 
 
 soul ! She will have to die once again some 
 time ; but if it was only like that, she wdll not 
 be much afraid.' 
 
 ' She was as far gone as she could go, to 
 come back, I have heard. What queer talk 
 this is, my darling ! The accident has spoiled 
 all our pleasure.' 
 
 * No ; it is pleasant talk. I like that idea of 
 floating ; it is better, far better, than Abbondio's 
 confusion ; but that, I suppose, was because of 
 the suddenness in his case, and clutching at 
 something perhaps as he got into the water. It 
 was not an accident with her, was it? She 
 was dying of an illness as we poor women do.' 
 
 ' And most men, Annie ; the greater part 
 of us all.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes ; I know. Poor woman ! And 
 they brought her back ? ' 
 
 ' Her family was round her bed, my darling, 
 praying for her life, asking nothing but to get 
 her back. You don't consider her children, 
 and her husband. Don't let us talk of it. It 
 makes me think of jumping into this wicked 
 lake, and getting it all over.' 
 
 ' Ah ! do you feel that too ? It is wicked, 
 James ; how dare you think such things ? Take
 
 78 CARITA. 
 
 me back home ; yes, home. 1 am tired of this 
 place. It is all very well when it is fine, but 
 winter is coming. To-morrow let us go home.' 
 
 He took her to the shore with a few long 
 sweeps of the oars, glad in his heart of that 
 decision. He, too, was very tired of the place ; 
 more tired of the eternal shining than of the 
 storm, and it was getting late in the year for 
 the Alps. JSTevertheless it was by the Alps that 
 this capricious woman insisted upon returning, 
 and they had something very near an accident 
 in the snows which roused and pleased her 
 mightily. After the excitement, however, no- 
 thing would satisfy her but to rush to London 
 with the utmost speed. She objected to stay 
 even a single night in Paris. She had been 
 seized with a passion of longing for the hum- 
 drum Square. 
 
 Miss Cherry brought Cara up from Sunning- 
 hill to be at home to receive her mother. But 
 the pair of travellers had stolen a march upon 
 the household, and instead of waiting to be 
 received in a proper manner in the evening, 
 with dinner ready and everything comfortable, 
 had arrived at an absurd hour in the morning, 
 before the maids were out of bed, and when
 
 COMING HOME. 79 
 
 there was nothing prepared in the house. Cook 
 herself came, much aggrieved, to tell Miss 
 Cherry this, while Cara ran upstairs to her 
 mother's room. ' I don't make no doubt as 
 folks get very fanciful when they're ill ; but 
 still. Miss, there's reason in all things. At six 
 o'clock in the morning, and we not up, as why 
 should we be, not thinking of nothing of the 
 sort, and not a thing in the house ? ' 
 
 ' It was hard, cook,' said the sympathetic 
 Miss Cherry ; ' but then you know my brother 
 had a right to come to his own house when he 
 pleased. Coming home is not hke going any- 
 where else. But I hope Mrs. Beresford is 
 looking better ? ' 
 
 ' Better I ' said cook, spreading out her 
 hands; and Sarah, the housemaid, shook her 
 head and put her apron to her eyes. 
 
 ' Dear, dear ! ' said kind Miss Cherry, ap- 
 palled by their tears ; ' but travelling all night 
 makes any one look ill. I shall not go up until 
 she has had a good look at her child. Miss 
 Cara is hke a little rose.' 
 
 ' So she is, Miss, bless her ! ' assented the 
 maids ; and Clierry had to wait for a long time 
 in the library before even her brother came to
 
 80 CARITA. 
 
 her. One thing which struck her with great 
 surprise was, that there were no boxes about 
 half emptied, in which precious fragihties had 
 been packed in straw and wicker cases. The 
 Buen Eetiro cup was the only thing they had 
 bought, and that was among Mrs. Beresford's 
 things — smashed ; and they had both forgotten 
 its very existence. No more wonderful sign 
 could have been of the changed times. 
 
 When Miss Cherry in her turn was introduced 
 into the bedroom in which Mrs.Beresford still lay, 
 resting herself, she all but cried out with sudden 
 panic. She only just stopped herself in time ; 
 her mouth was open ; her tongue in the very 
 act of forming the ' Oh ! ' when her brother's 
 look stopped her. Not that he saw what she 
 was going to say, or all the effect his wife's 
 changed looks had upon her. He himself had 
 got used to them. He asked her, half aside, 
 ' How do you think she is looking ? ' with an 
 eager look in his eyes. 
 
 ' She is looking — tired,' said Miss Cherry. 
 'Most people do after travelling all night. I 
 could not have hfted my head from the pillow ; 
 but Annie had always so much spirit.' 
 
 ' Yes ; she has no end of spirit,' said poor
 
 COMING HOME. 81 
 
 James Beresford, looking admiringly at his 
 wife. He flattered himself, poor fellow ! that 
 Cherry had not remarked the thinness of the 
 worn face, beside which her own faintly-coloured 
 old maid's countenance almost looked fresh and 
 round and blooming. He had been alarmed at 
 the thought of what ' they ' would think of her 
 looks ; but now his spirits rose. Cherry did 
 not seem to have remarked it ; and what a 
 hypocrite poor Cherry felt, sitting there smiling, 
 with her heart sinking more and more every 
 moment ! ' What will he do without his wife ? ' 
 she was asking herself. And, alas ! that wife's 
 worn looks ; her fi'etful little outbursts of im- 
 patience ; all her caprices and restlessness be- 
 trayed a progress of evil more rapid than any- 
 one had even feared. 
 
 ' Does Mr. Maxwell know you have come 
 back? He will want to see you. He was 
 always so anxious to have news of you,' she 
 said, falteringly. 
 
 ' We have forgotten what doctors are like,' 
 said Mrs. Beresford. ' T don't want ever to 
 renew my acquaintance with them. James, 
 send him a note and let him come to dinner. 
 Yes, Cara ! What has my pet got to say ? ' 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 CARITA. 
 
 'You said two different things at once, 
 mamma — that you did not want to see doctors 
 again, and that Mr. Maxwell was to come to 
 dinner.' 
 
 ' I told you she was an idealist,' said Mrs. 
 Beresford, smiling. Then changing — as she had 
 got into a way of doing — in a moment, she 
 added, ' Get down from the bed, Cara ; you tire 
 me. There, sit there, further back. Children 
 flutter so ; they are always in motion. Cherry 
 is still — she is a comfort ; and, James, Mrs. 
 Meredith can come, if she likes to come before 
 I get up. She is a soft, tranquil woman, like 
 Cherry ; silly, perhaps, but that does not mat- 
 ter. When one is over tired, silly people who 
 don't fatigue one are the best ' 
 
 ' I wonder does she think me silly ? ' Miss 
 Cherry said to herself ; and it is to be feared 
 there was not much doubt on the subject. 
 After she had made this speech about Mrs. 
 Meredith, next door, the invahd sent them all 
 away, that she might rest. This was no more 
 than a passing fancy, like other notions that 
 flitted across her restless brain. They went 
 down softly to the library, avoiding by common 
 consent the drawing-room, which was her room,
 
 COMING HOME. 83 
 
 and so closely associated with all her ways. 
 There James Beresford interrogated his sister 
 very closely. ' You don't see a very great 
 change — nothing more than you expected ? ' 
 He was tired, too, poor fellow ! worn out in 
 body and in soul. 
 
 ' I think you should see Mr. Maxwell at 
 once,' said Miss Cherry, who was timid, and did 
 not like to commit herself. ' What does it 
 matter what I think, who don't know ? I think 
 she is perhaps — more worn than I expected; 
 but then she has been travelling all night. Per- 
 haps you ought not to have allowed her to do 
 so much.' 
 
 ' I ? How could I help it ? and I was too 
 thankful to get home. How I hate those plea- 
 sure places ! the more beautiful they are, the 
 more terrible. I detest them. I shall never be 
 able to endure mountains and lakes again — 
 till Annie is better,' he added, with such a 
 miserable pretence at a smile that his kind sister 
 almost broke down. She made up her mind to 
 remain at his entreaty, though both of them 
 had a doubt whether the invalid would like it. 
 ' Annie will be pleased, I am sure,' he said, with 
 hesitation. How well they all understood her ! 
 
 g2
 
 84 CARITA. 
 
 But quiet Miss Cherry felt no anger with the 
 fanciful, capricious, suffering woman, who meant 
 happiness in this house, notwithstanding all her 
 uncertain moods and ways. 
 
 ' I will tell her I have something to do in 
 town, and ask her to give me a bed for a few 
 nights.' 
 
 ' Aunt Cherry, you had nothing to do when 
 we started ; you meant to go home to-day.' 
 
 ' Yes, Cara ; but I should hke to see your 
 mamma get a little better.' 
 
 ' Then please tell her so,' said the child ; 
 'please tell her so. I know what you think. 
 You think she is very, very ill ; but you will 
 not say it. You try to deceive papa and me, 
 and her too. I cannot bear to be deceived.' 
 
 ' My dear, some time or other you will learn 
 to know that one must not say everything one 
 thinks ; though indeed, indeed, I would always 
 have you say the truth.' 
 
 ' I shall never learn not to say what I think,' 
 said the httle girl, with erect head and severe 
 blue eyes fixed upon her aunt disapprovingly. 
 Miss Cherry was nervous and easily disturbed. 
 She could not bear even Cara's disapproval, and 
 she began to cry in spite of herself, even then
 
 COMING HOME. 85 
 
 not quite ingenuou-sly she felt ; for her disturbed 
 nerves and her distress and sympathy for her 
 brother were at the bottom of her emotion, 
 though Cara's severity gave an immediate reason 
 for her tears. 
 
 Mrs. Beresford was better in the evening, 
 and came dovm to dinner, putting on one of her 
 prettiest dresses in honour of the return. ' I 
 have worn nothing but grey alpaca for months,' 
 she said ; ' hke you. Cherry ; I am quite glad to 
 get out of it, and feel at home again. We have 
 had rather a long spell of honeymooning this 
 time, and we were beginning to get tired of 
 each other ; but it was the last, you know, for 
 Cara is to go with us next year.' 
 
 Cara, who was sitting by, began to speak. 
 
 ' If ,' she said, and then stopped, arrested 
 
 in spite of herself by such a passionate look as 
 she had never seen before in her father's eyes. 
 
 ' K — what ? You think I shall change my 
 mind? Ah, Mr. Maxwell, how do you do! 
 Am I feeling strong ? Well, not strong, per- 
 haps, but very well to-night. I have ups and 
 downs. And poor James there, whom I have 
 punished severely, will tell you I have grown
 
 86 CARITA. 
 
 the most fanciful, troublesome, capricious wo 
 man. James ! ' 
 
 He had taken Cara into a corner, and was 
 whispering to her in a voice which made the 
 child tremble : ' If you say a word ! if you vex 
 your mother or frighten her with that idiotic 
 sincerity of yours, by Heaven I'll kill you ! ' he 
 said, clenching his hand. ' Capricious ! Yes, 
 you never saw anything like it, Maxwell. Such 
 a round as she has led me — such a life as I 
 have had ! ' And he laughed. Heaven help 
 them ! they all laughed, pretending to see the 
 joke. While the child in the corner, her little 
 frame thrilling in every nerve with that strange, 
 violent whisper, the first roughness that had 
 ever come her way, sat staring at the group 
 in a trance of wonder What did it mean? 
 Why were they false all of them, crying when 
 she was not there, pretending to laugh as soon 
 as they turned to her. It was Cara's first intro- 
 duction to the mysteries of life. 
 
 That night when Miss Cherry had cried 
 herself almost blind, after a stolen interview 
 with the doctor in the passage as he left the 
 house, she was frightened nearly out of her 
 wits by a sudden apparition. It was late, for
 
 COMING HOME. 87 
 
 Cherry, though used to early hours, had not 
 been able to think of sleep after the doctor's 
 melancholy shake of the head and whisper of 
 ' I fear the worst.' She was fitting sadly think- 
 ing of what that pretty hoi se would be with 
 the mistress gone. What v ould become of 
 James ? Some men have worK to occupy them. 
 Some men are absorbed in t^\e outdoor life 
 which makes a woman less a companion to 
 them, perpetual and cherished ; but James ! 
 Cherry Beresford was so different a woman 
 from her sister-in-law, that the affection be- 
 tween them had been limited, and almost con- 
 ventional — the enforced union of relations, not 
 anything spontaneous ; for where mutual 
 understanding is not, there cannot be much 
 loA'e. But this did not blind her perception as 
 to what his wife was to James. She herself 
 had not been very much to him, nor he to her. 
 They had loved each other calmly, like brother 
 and sister, but they had not been companions 
 since they were children. Cherry, who was 
 very simple and true, not deceiving herself any 
 more than other people, knew very well that 
 she could never fill for him anything of the place 
 his wife had left vacant. Her heart would
 
 88 CARITA, 
 
 bleed for him ; but that was all — and what 
 would become of him ? She shivered and wept 
 at the thought, but could think of nothing — 
 nothing ! What would poor James do ? 
 
 Then Cara came stalking in upon her in her 
 nightgown, witb a candle in her hand, white 
 and chill as a Httle ghost, her face very pale, 
 her brown hair hanging about her shoulders, 
 her white bare feet showing below her night- 
 dress, all lighted up by the candle she carried. 
 ' I have come to ask you what it all means,' 
 the child said ; ' none of you say what is true. 
 You laugh when I can see you are more like 
 crying, and you make jokes, and you tell — hes. 
 Have you all gone mad. Aunt Cherry ? or what 
 does it mean ? ' 
 
 Upon this a httle burst of impatience came 
 to Miss Cherry, which was an ease to her over- 
 wrought feelings. You disagreeable, tiresome 
 little child ! How dare you make yourself a 
 judge of other people ? Are you so wise or so 
 sensible that you should be able to say exactly 
 what is right and what is wrong ? I wonder 
 at you, Cara ! When you see us unhappy, all 
 upset and miserable, about yom: poor mamma.'
 
 COMING HOME. 89 
 
 'But why? To tell me — lies, will that 
 make her well ? ' 
 
 ' You should have been whipt,' cried the 
 indignant lady. ' Oh, you should have been 
 whipt when you were a small child, and then 
 you never would have dared to speak so to me, 
 and to your poor father, whose heart is broken ! 
 Would you like us to go and tell her how ill 
 she is, and beg of her to make haste and die ? 
 Poor, poor Annie ! that is what would be best 
 for her, to get rid of the pain. Is that what 
 you would like us to do ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, Aunt Cherry, Aunt Cherry ! don't say 
 that mamma — that mamma ' 
 
 ' No, my darling, I can't say it,' cried Miss 
 Cherry, drawing the child into her arms, kissing 
 and crying over her. ' I won't say it. I'll 
 never, never give up hope. Doctors are 
 deceived every day. Nobody can tell what 
 may happen, and God hears prayers when we 
 pray with all our hearts. But that's why we 
 hide our feelings, Cara ; why we laugh, dear, 
 when we would Hke to cry ; why we try to talk 
 as if we were happy when we are very sad ; for 
 she would give up hope if she once knew '
 
 90 CAEITA. 
 
 ' And would that make any difference ? ' 
 said the child, in all the impenetrabihty of 
 wonder, one revelation bursting upon her after 
 another, feeling this new dark mysterious world 
 beyond her powers. 
 
 ' Would hope make any difference ? ' cried 
 Miss Cherry. ' Oh, child, how little you know ! 
 It is hope that makes all the difference. If you 
 think things are going well, it helps them to go 
 well — it keeps up your strength, it cheers yoiu* 
 heart, it makes you a different creature. Every- 
 thing, everything, lies in keeping up hope.' 
 
 ' I don't understand,' said Cara, slowly. 
 She had pushed open a door unawares into a 
 spiritual world of which she knew nothing. 
 She had not one of the happy superficial 
 natures which sail over mysteries. That which 
 was deeper than fact and truer than truth was 
 a perplexity and aching wonder to the child. 
 She could not fathom it, she had but just dis- 
 covered it. She stood quite still while Miss 
 Cherry explained to her as well as she could 
 how nothing must be said or done that would 
 alarm the patient, how everything must be 
 made smooth and kept cheerful round her. 
 ' And, Cara, you will remember — you will say
 
 COMING HOME. 91 
 
 nothing to frighten her, whatever you may 
 hear. If she should suffer very much, you 
 must always look as if you felt sure she would 
 soon be better.' 
 
 ' Even if it is not true ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, my dear child ! the only way to mend 
 that is to pray to God day and night, day and 
 night, to make it true ! He can and He will — or, 
 oh, Cara ! we hope He will,' cried Miss Cherry, 
 'svith tears. ' And you can help by always 
 praying, and always being cheerful. Look at 
 your poor papa, how he smiles and jokes, and 
 his heart is breaking all the time.' 
 
 ' His heart is breaking ! ' said Cara, under 
 her breath. 
 
 'But if we all do what we can, and are 
 cheerful, and trust in God, she may get better, 
 dear. There is so much we can do. That is 
 how I try to keep up my heart. We must 
 never look frightened, never let her get alarmed. 
 Keep cheerful, cheerful, Cara, whatever we do.' 
 
 The child went back to bed with her head 
 buzzing full of strange thoughts. She knew 
 very well that nurse had often exhorted her to 
 patience under toothache, for instance, as the 
 best cure ; but it never had been cured by that
 
 92 CARITA. 
 
 in Cara's experience. Was cheerfulness likely 
 to answer in her mother's case, and smiles in- 
 stead of crying, and people saying things they 
 did not believe ? Such knowledge was too high 
 for her. It confused her head, and made it 
 ache and throb with the multitude of her 
 thoughts.
 
 93 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 
 
 ' Yes, Miss Carry, if you like. Your dear mamma 
 is falling into a doze ; and I don't wonder, poor 
 dear, after all those doctors a-poking and finger- 
 ing. Oil, it turns my heart sick ! If I don't get 
 a breath of air I'll die. Sit in the corner, honey, 
 behind the curtains. Don't you tease her, nor 
 talk to her ; if she wants anything, ring the bell. 
 There now, my darling, don't say as you haven't 
 got your way. How that child has worried to 
 get into the room ! ' said nurse, confidentially, as 
 she went soft-footed and noiseless downstairs, 
 with an anxious maid in attendance. ' But a 
 sick-room ain't a place for a child. It's bad 
 enough for the like of me.' 
 
 ' Yes, poor soul ! I can't think how you 
 stand it night and day as you do,' said Sarah 
 the housemaid, under her breath. 
 
 ' Bless you, I'm used to it,' she said ; ' but
 
 94 CARITA. 
 
 there's things as I can't bear. Them doctors 
 a-staring and a-poking, and looking as if they 
 knowed everything. What do they know more 
 than me? It's experience does it, not their Latin 
 and their wise looks. I know well enough 
 what they'll say — and 1 could have said it my- 
 self and welcome, 'stead of taking all that money 
 out of master's pocket, as can't do good to no- 
 body. I'd have said it as easy as they could — 
 allowing as it's any good to say it, which is 
 what I can't see.' 
 
 ' What is it then, nursey ? ' said Sarah. ' It 
 seems awkward hke, when folks comes with 
 kind inquiries, never to know no more nor the 
 door you're opening. But I won't say a word,' 
 she added, contradictory but coaxing, ' if you 
 mind.' 
 
 ' I'll warrant as you won't,' said nurse ; and 
 so disappeared down the kitchen stairs to snatch 
 that cup of tea which is the saving of poor 
 women. 'And make it strong, do, or I can't 
 go through with it much longer,' she said, throw- 
 ing herself into a chair. 
 
 This was some months after the home- 
 coming of the invalid. Mrs. Beresford had 
 ralleid, and spent a pleasant Christmas with her
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 95 
 
 friends round her once more, and she recovered 
 her looks a httle, and raised high hopes in all 
 those who watched her so curiously. But just 
 as spring began to touch the Square, and the 
 crocuses appeared, a sudden and rapid relapse 
 had come on, and to-day there had been a con- 
 sultation of the doctors of a kind which could 
 not be mistaken, so deeply serious was it. They 
 were in Mr. Beresford's study while nurse went 
 downstairs, and he had just been called in so- 
 lemnly from the next room to hear her fate, 
 which implied his own. She had dropped into 
 an uneasy sleep when her trial was over, too 
 tired and worn out to be capable of more ; and 
 it was during this moment that niu-se had yielded 
 to Cara's entreaties, made through the half- 
 open door. The child had not seen her mother 
 all day, and her whole being was penetrated by 
 the sense of anxiety and foreboding that was in 
 the house. She had wandered up and down 
 the staircase all the time the doctors had been 
 about, and her little, anxious face affected nurse 
 with pity. It was the best thing for Cara to 
 take the watch by her mother's side during this 
 moment of suspense, as it was the best thing for 
 nurse to get out of the sick-room and refresh
 
 96 CARITA. 
 
 lierself with change. Nurse's heart was heavy 
 too, but not with suspense. There had been 
 no mystery to her in the growing illness. She 
 was an ' old-fashioned servant ' — alas ! of a very 
 old-fashioned sort indeed; for few in any age, 
 we fear, are those poetical retainers whose 
 service is given for duty, not for need. Nurse 
 served not for duty, indeed ; to which word she 
 might have objected- — for was it not the duty 
 'of them as she had done everything for' to 
 look after her, as much as hers to look after 
 them ? — but for love, which is a more effectual 
 argument. She liked her good wages and her 
 comforts, as an honest woman has a right to do ; 
 but she liked the ' family ' better still, and cared 
 not very much for any other family, not even 
 that with which she was herself connected in 
 the capacity of sister and aunt — for, though she 
 had been married, she had no children of her 
 own. Mrs. Beresford had been her child ; then, 
 so long after, Cara. Her heart was concentrated 
 in those two. But after this trial of the medical 
 examination, which was almost as hard upon 
 her as upon her mistress, nurse was very thank- 
 ful to take advantage of that door, and escape 
 for a little into the more cheerful world of the
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 97 
 
 kitchen, with all its coming and going, and the 
 cup of tea which cook, sympathetic and curious, 
 and very anxious to hear all that could be heard, 
 made for her with such friendly care. 
 
 Thus httle Cara stole in and established her- 
 self noiselessly in the corner by her mother's 
 bedside, hidden by the curtains. Many and 
 strange had been the thoughts in the child's 
 head through these winter months, since her 
 parents came home. She had lived a very quiet 
 life for a child since ever she could remember, 
 though it was a happy life enough ; and the 
 curious baby rigidity of the little code of morals 
 which she had formed for herself had been un- 
 broken up to that time. Cara had felt that, 
 whosoever did wrong ought to be hanged, 
 beheaded, burnt, or whatsoever penalty was 
 practicable, at once, without benefit of clergy. 
 A lie being the worst possible offence that ever 
 came within her ken, had been as murder in 
 the swift and sudden vengeance of her thoughts. 
 The offence had been considered capital, beyond 
 the reach of pardon or extenuation. It is im- 
 possible to tell what horrible overthrow of all 
 her canons ensued when her father and aunt 
 not only sanctioned, but enforced, lying upon 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 CAEITA. 
 
 her, and boldly avowed their practice of it them- 
 selves as a duty. Cara had lost herself for a 
 long time after that. She had wandered through 
 that bottomless darkness for months, and now 
 had only just come to a glimmering of daylight 
 again by aid of the individual argument, that 
 though truth was necessary for the world in 
 general, modifications were permitted in cases 
 where people were ill — in the case of mamma 
 being ill, which was the immediate thing before 
 her. It was the one evil she was individually 
 cognisant of in the world ; but the thing was 
 to accept it, not struggle against it, as guilt 
 which was justified by necessity. Cara felt that 
 here was one thing upon which more light 
 would come as one grew older — a prospect 
 which generally this little idealist treated with 
 the contempt it deserved. Mamma would be 
 better then, she thought, and the world get back 
 into its due balance and equilibrium without 
 any one being the worse. Probably now that 
 time was soon approaching, now that the doctors 
 had come and found what was the matter, and 
 probably very soon, Cara hoped, the worst 
 of all her difficulties would be removed ; and 
 upon this doubtful subject she would be able to
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 99 
 
 get the opinion of the individual on whose be- 
 half the others were defying Heaven with so 
 much horrible daring, of mamma herself, for 
 whom the sun and moon were being made to 
 stand still, and all the world was put out of 
 joint for the time. This hope was in her 
 thoughts as she took her seat in nurse's big, 
 softly-cushioned chair, which never creaked nor 
 made any noise, and sat there as still as a mouse, 
 sometimes not unHke a mouse, peeping round, 
 the corner of the curtain at her charge, who lay 
 half buried among the pillows which her rest- 
 lessness had thrown into disorder, with little 
 starts and twitches of movement, and now and 
 then a broken moan. Worn as she was, there 
 was still beauty in the face — white and sharp- 
 ened with pain, with red hectic spots upon it, 
 like stains on the half- transparent flesh. Her 
 hair had been pushed away under a cap, which 
 had come loose, and only half confined the soft 
 golden brown locks, which had not lost their 
 lustre ; she had thrown out one arm from under 
 the bedclothes, which lay on the white coverlet, 
 an ivory hand, half visible only through the 
 lace and needlework of the sleeve. With what 
 wondering awe and pity Cara looked at ner — 
 
 h2
 
 100 CARITA. 
 
 pity which was inexpressible, Hke all profound 
 childish sentiments ! Poor mamma ! who suffered 
 as she ? for whom else did God permit the law& 
 of truth to be broken ? She was very fond of 
 her beautiful mother, proud of her, and ohy 
 so piteously sorry for her. Why should she be ill 
 — she who hated it so much? Cara herself now 
 and then was ill, and had to put up with it, with- 
 out making any fuss. But mamma was different. 
 The still child watched with a pity which was 
 unfathomable, and beyond the reach of words. 
 
 The room was very still ; it was at the back 
 of the house, looking out upon nothing but 
 gardens ; so quiet that you could not have 
 thought you were within reach of the full tor- 
 rent of London life. The little petillement of 
 the fire, the occasional soft falling of the ashes, 
 the ticking of the small, soft-toned clock, were 
 the only audible sounds. It was a warm spring 
 afternoon, and, but that Mrs. Beresford hked to 
 see it, there was no need for a fire. It made 
 the room warm and drowsy. How it was that, 
 amid all her confused and troubled thoughts, 
 such a reflective child as httle Cara should have 
 got drowsy too, who can tell ? The stillness 
 and quiet were unusual to her. She was leaning 
 back against nurse's chair, her feet curled up,
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 101 
 
 her small frame entirely contained within it, her 
 mother sleeping beside her, the room very still, 
 with those soft rhythms of periodic sound. All 
 at once she came to herself in a moment, after a 
 lapse, the dm-ation of which she knew nothing 
 of. It was the sound of voices which roused 
 her. Her mother speaking — her father, though 
 how he gut there she could not tell, stand- 
 ing, very haggard and pale, in front of tlie 
 fire. 
 
 ' You said you would tell me — oh, tell me the 
 truth ! I am tired of waiting, and of uncer- 
 tainty. James, in pity, the truth ! ' 
 
 ' Yes, my darling ; but they came — to no de- 
 ■cision. It is so long since Sir Wilham saw you. 
 You could not bear him, you know. He must 
 come again — he must have time ' 
 
 ' James ! You are not telling me the truth ! ' 
 
 Cara saw that her father turned round to 
 t]ie fire, and held out his hands to it, as if he 
 were cold. That change made his voice sound 
 further away. ' Annie, Annie 1 do you think I 
 would deceive you ? ' he said, faltering. Neither 
 of them knew that the child was there behind 
 the curtain, but of that Cara never thought. 
 
 ' What did they say ? ' she cried. ' Oh, yes, 
 you deceive me : you do nothing but deceive
 
 102 CARITA. 
 
 me ; and now, at least, I must know the truth. 
 I will send for Maxwell to come back, and he 
 will tell me — he is honest, not like you. James, 
 James ! have you no love for me left ? You did 
 love me once — and promised. What did they 
 say ? I know they have told you. You cannot 
 hide it from me — it is in your face.' 
 
 He made no answer, but stooped down over 
 the fire, so that his very profile might be hid 
 from her. She could not see anything, he 
 thought, in his shoulders — and yet the tremor 
 in his frame, the very gesture told more plainly 
 than words. She sat up in her bed, growing 
 wild with eager energy. Her cap fell back, 
 which had been loose before, and her long hair 
 streamed over her shoulders. 'Bring me the 
 medicine-box, quick, quick ! ' she cried. He ran 
 to obey her, glad of the diversion, and knowing 
 how often she had paroxysms of pain, which 
 had to be still(3d at all hazards. The neat little 
 medicine-chest, with its orderly drawers and 
 shelves, like a toy in tiny regularity and neat- 
 ness, was kept in a closet at the other end of the 
 room. He brought it out, and put it down on 
 the table by her bedside. ' Is it the usual pain ? ' 
 he said, his voice trembhng. And now she
 
 THE CONSULTATIOI!^. 103 
 
 could see all the misery in his haggard face. 
 She clutched with her white, feverish fingers at 
 his arm. 
 
 ' Tell me. You have heard — oh, I can see, 
 you have heard — tell me, what do they say ? ' 
 
 He tried for a moment to get free ; but 
 what was the use ? His face, all quivering with 
 miserable excitement, his heavy eyes that would 
 not look her in the face, his hps, not steady 
 enough even to frame an excuse, were more 
 telhng than any words. She devoured his face 
 with her strained eyes, holding him by his 
 sleeve. Then, with a convulsive shiver, ' It is 
 as I thought. I see what it is,' she cried. 
 
 ' my darling ! ' he said, sinking down on 
 his knees by her bedside. ' What do they 
 know ? They are mistaken every day. How 
 often have we said that, you and I ? Why 
 should we make gods of them now ? Annie ! 
 we never believed in doctors, you and I ! ' 
 
 ' I believe in them now,' she said. All her 
 excitement had faded from her. The hectic red 
 had disappeared from her cheeks, a convulsive 
 shivering was all that remained of her strong 
 excitement and emotion. She was hushed by 
 the certainty. No doubt was in her mind as to
 
 104 CARITA. 
 
 the truth of it There was silence for a mo- 
 ment — a long, long time, as it seemed ; and 
 when the silence was broken, it was she who 
 spoke, not in complaint or despair, but with a 
 strange, chill wonder and reflective pain. ' There 
 are some people who would not have minded so 
 much,' she said, in a half whisper. ' Some 
 people do not feel the pain so much — or — the 
 loathing. my God, my God, me ! ' What 
 could be said? Hard sobs shook the man's 
 helpless frame. He could do nothing for her 
 — and she was dearer to him than his life. 
 
 ' Do not cry,' she said, as if she had been 
 talking to a child ; ' that hurts me more. Don't 
 you remember when we talked of it — if it ever 
 came to this, James — and I made you promise. 
 You promised. Surely, surely, you must re- 
 member ? In summer, before we went away.' 
 
 He tried to look at her blankly, as if he did 
 not know what she meant ; but, God lielp him, 
 he remembered every word. 
 
 ' Yes ; you know what I mean. I can see 
 it in your eyes. You can't deceive me now, 
 James ! you promised ! ' 
 
 ' Never ! never ! ' he said, his voice broken 
 with passionate sobs.
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 105 
 
 ' I tliiiik you promised ; but at least you 
 said it was right — no wickedness in it. Oh, do 
 it, James ! You can save me still. Why should 
 I have any more pain, now ? I could bear it if 
 it was for any good ; but why should I now^ 
 James ? ' 
 
 'I cannot, I cannot,' he cried ; ' do not ask 
 me. Myself, if you will, but not you — not 
 you!' 
 
 ' Yourself ! ' she said, with a dreamy con- 
 tempt. In her deadly danger and despair she 
 was somehow raised above all creatures who 
 had no warrant of death m them. ' Why your- 
 self ? You are safe ; there is no vulture coming 
 to gnaw your flesh. James, have you not 
 the heart of a man to save me ! Think if it had 
 been in India, in the Mutiny — and you said it 
 would be right.' 
 
 ' How could I know ? ' cried the unhappy 
 man, with the artlessness of despair ; ' how could 
 I tell it was coming to us ? I did not think 
 what I was saying. I thought of others — 
 strangers. Annie ! oh, let me go ! — let me go ! ' 
 
 ' Think a moment,' she said, still holding 
 him ; ' think what it will be. Torment ! It is 
 hard to bear now, but nothing to what it will
 
 106 CAEITA. 
 
 be — and worse than torment. You will sicken 
 at me ; the place will be unendurable. God ! 
 James, save me ! oh, save me ! It would be so 
 easy — nothing but a dose, a drink — and all 
 safe. James ! James ! ' 
 
 The man burst out into terrible tears — ^he 
 was beyond the stage at which self-restraint 
 exists — but as for her, she was calm. It was 
 she who held the chief place in this conflict. 
 He was but secondary. The day, the moment 
 was for him but one of many ; his Hfe would 
 flow on the same as before, but hers had to stop 
 if not now, yet immediately. She had her sen- 
 tence dehvered to her. And suddenly a fever 
 of longing woke up in her — a desire to taste 
 this strange death, at once to anticipate fate, 
 like that vertigo which makes shipwrecked 
 people plunge into the sea to meet their end a 
 few minutes before it comes inevitably, fore- 
 stalling it, not waiting for it. She rushed all at 
 once into sudden energy and excitement. 
 
 ' Come,' she cried, with a breathlessness 
 which was half haste, half from the sudden 
 acceleration of her heart. ' Come ; this is the 
 moment. There could be no time as good as 
 now. I am not unhappy about it, nor sorry.
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 107 
 
 It is like champagne. James, if you love me, 
 do it at once ; do it now ! ' 
 
 He made no reply, but clung to the bed, 
 hiding his face, with a convulsive shivering all 
 over him. Was it that the excitement in her 
 communicated itself to him, and that he was 
 tempted to obey ? There was a singing and a 
 buzzing in his ears. Despair and misery stupe- 
 fied him. Sooner or later she was to be taken 
 trom him : now, or a few weeks, a few months 
 hence through a burning path of torture. And 
 he could make it easy. Was it a devil or an 
 angel that tugged at his heart, and echoed what 
 she said ? 
 
 ' Come,' she said, in soft tones of pleading,, 
 ' cannot you see ? I am in the right mind now 
 Death takes people constantly by surprise, but 
 I am just as I should like to be, able to under- 
 stand everything, able to feel what is happening 
 to me, not in pain, or unhappy. Oh, quick, 
 quick, James ! you shall hold my hand, and as 
 long as I can speak I will tell you how it feels ; 
 like your friend. You remember Como and 
 the boat and the floating away. Quick, quick, 
 while I am happy, out of pain, clear in my 
 head ! ' Then her voice softened still more, and
 
 108 CAEITA. 
 
 .a piteous smile came upon her face. ' Sorry 
 only for you — my James, my poor James ! 
 But you would rather send me away like this 
 than see me perishing — perishing ! Come, 
 James ! ' 
 
 She loosed her hold upon him to let him 
 rise, and he stumbled up to his feet hke a man 
 dazed, paused, looked at her ; then throwing 
 up his arms in a paroxysm of despair and 
 misery, turned and fled from the room. ' Ah ! ' 
 she gave a cry that he thought pursued him, 
 echoing and echoing round his head as he 
 rushed out of the house like a hunted man. 
 But she had no power to pm^sLie him, though 
 her cry had. She sat up gazing after him, her 
 arm stretched out, her head bent forward as 
 when she was talking. Then her arm relaxed, 
 her head drooped, a rush of womanish childish 
 tears came to her eyes. Tears ! at such a 
 moment they made everything dim around her, 
 but cleared away gradually like a mist, and 
 once more the doomed woman saw clear. He 
 was gone who should have been her loving 
 executioner and saviour ; but — her heart, which 
 had sunk with the disappointment, gave 
 another leap in her breast. He had left the
 
 THE CONSULTATION. 109' 
 
 remedy in her hands. The little medicine- 
 chest stood open beside her on the table, within 
 her reach. She did not pause to think, but put 
 out her hand and selected one of the bottles 
 firmly yet trembling, trembhng only in her 
 nerves, not in her courage. It required a Httle 
 effort to pluck it out of the closely -fitting case, 
 and then she held death in her hands. 
 
 Just then a little rustle behind the curtain, 
 a childish face peeping round the corner, dis- 
 turbed her more than anything else in the 
 world would have done. ' Mamma,' said Cara, 
 ' what is that ? What is that you are going to 
 take ? If papa would not give it you, can it 
 be good for you ? Oh, don't take it, mamma ! ' 
 
 Mrs. Beresford trembled so much that she 
 could scarcely hold the bottle in her hand. 
 ' It is something that will put my pain away,'' 
 she said, quite humbly. ' Cara, my darling, 
 I must take it ; it will put away my pain ! ' 
 
 ' Are you sure, quite sure ? ' said the child. 
 ' Shall I ring for nurse, mamma, or shall I do 
 it? My hand is quite steady. I can drop 
 medicine as well as nurse can. Mamma, you 
 are quite, quite sure it will do you good ; then 
 let me give it you.'
 
 110 CARITA. 
 
 ' No, no,' she said, with a low shriek and 
 shudder, turning away from her. ' No, Cara, 
 not for the world.' 
 
 ' But I am very steady ; and here is your 
 glass, mamma.' 
 
 ' God forbid ! ' she cried, ' not you, not you.' 
 This last strange incident seemed to take from 
 her the last excuse for delay, and hurried on 
 her fate. She paused a moment, with her 
 hands clasped close upon the little phial, and 
 looked upward, her face inspired and shining 
 with a wonderful solemnity. Then slowly she 
 unclasped her fingers, sighed, and put it to her 
 lips. It was not the right way to take medi- 
 cine, poor little Cara thought, whose mind was 
 all in a confusion, not knowing what to think. 
 But the moment the deed was done, that solemn 
 look which frightened Cara passed away from 
 her mother's face. ' Ah ! ' she cried, fretfully, 
 wiping her lips with her handkerchief, ' how 
 nasty, how nasty it is! Give me a piece of 
 sugar, a bit of biscuit, anything to put the taste 
 away.' 
 
 Cara brought the biscuit, pleased to be of 
 use. She picked up the bottle which had 
 dropped out of her mother's hand, and put it
 
 THE CONSULTATION. Ill 
 
 back tidily in the case. She smoothed the dis- 
 ordered pillow. Mamma had been vexed be- 
 cause papa would not tell her something, would 
 not let her know the truth, which was precisely 
 what Cara herself objected to in him ; but per- 
 haps papa might have reason on his side too, 
 for she was not strong enough to be agitated. 
 And no doubt he would come back presently 
 and make amends. In the meantime it pleased 
 Cara to be her mother's sole attendant ; she 
 put everything tidy with great care, drawing 
 the coverlet straight, and smoothing the bed. 
 The medicine-chest was too heavy for her to 
 carry back to its proper place, but at least she 
 put it exactly level upon the table, with the 
 other things cosily arranged round it. Her 
 mother, following her movements with drowsy 
 eyes, smiled softly upon her. ' Cara, come 
 here,' she said ; ' come and give me a kiss. 
 You will be good, and take care of papa ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' said Cara, astonished. She was 
 almost frightened by the kiss, so clinging and 
 solemn, which her mother gave her, not on her 
 cheek, but her mouth. Then Mrs. Beresford 
 dropped back on the pillow, her eyes closing. 
 Cara had finished her tidying. She thought
 
 1 12 CARITA. 
 
 the room looked more still than ever, and her 
 patient more comfortable ; and with a cnrious 
 mixture of satisfaction and wonder she went 
 back behind the curtain to nurse's big chair. 
 Then her mother called her again ; her eyes 
 altogether closed this time, her voice like one 
 half asleep. 
 
 ' Cara, tell him I was not angry ; tell him 
 it is quite true — no pain, only floating, floating 
 away.' 
 
 ' What are you saying, mamma ? ' 
 
 ^Floating, floating; he will know.' Then 
 she half opened the drowsy eyes again, with a 
 smile in them. ' Give me one kiss more, my 
 Cara. I am going to sleep now.' 
 
 The child could not tell what made her 
 heart beat so, and filled her with terror. She 
 watched her mother for a moment, scarcely 
 daring to draw her breath, and then rang the 
 bell, with a confused desire to cry for help, 
 though she could not have told why.
 
 113 
 
 CHAPTEE Vn. 
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 
 
 Jmies Beresford was not brave. He was very 
 kind and tender and good ; but he had not 
 courage to meet the darker emergencies of hfe. 
 He felt as he rushed downstairs from his wife's 
 presence that he had but postponed the evil 
 day, and that many another dreadful argument 
 on this subject, which was not within the range 
 of arguing, lay before him. What could he say 
 to her? He felt the abstract justice of her 
 plea. A hopeless, miserable, lingering, loath- 
 some disease, which wore out even love itself, 
 and made death a longed-for relief instead of a 
 calamity. What could he say when she ap- 
 pealed to him to release her from that anguish 
 of waiting, and hasten the deliverance which 
 only could come in one way ? He could not 
 say that it would be wicked or a sin ; all that 
 he could say was, that he had not the courage 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 CARITA. 
 
 to do it — had not the strength to put her away 
 from him. Was it true, he asked himself, that 
 he would rather watch out her lingering agonies 
 than deprive himself of the sight of her, or 
 consent to part with her a day sooner than he 
 must ? Was it himself he was thinking of 
 alone, not her ? Could he see her anguish and 
 not dare to set her free? He knew that, in 
 the case of another man, he would have coun- 
 selled the harder self-sacrifice. But he, how 
 could he do it ? He rushed out of the house, 
 through the afternoon sunshine, away to the 
 first space he could find near, and struck across 
 the open park, where there was no one to 
 disturb him, avoiding all the pleasant walks 
 and paths where people were. The open space 
 and the silence subdued his excitement; and 
 yet what could really bring him peace? He 
 had no peace to look for — nothing but a 
 renewed and ever-new painful struggle with 
 her and with himself. Yes, even with himself. 
 If she suffered greatly, he asked, with a shud- 
 der, how could he stand by and look on, 
 knowing that he could deliver her? And 
 would not she renew her prayers and cries to 
 him for dehverance ? God help him ! It was
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 115 
 
 not as if he had made an end of that mad 
 prayer once and for ever by refusing it. It 
 would come back — he knew it would come 
 back — hour by hoiu' and day by day. 
 
 Oh, how people talk (he thought) of such 
 mysteries when the trouble is not theirs ! He 
 himself had argued the question often, in her 
 hearing, even with her support. He had made 
 it as clear as day to himself and to others. He 
 had asked what but cowardice — miserable cow- 
 ardice — would keep a man from fulfilling this 
 last dread, yet tender service? Only love 
 would dare it — but love supreme, what will 
 that not do, to save, to succour, to help, to 
 deliver? Love was not love which would 
 shrink and think of self. So he had often said 
 with indignant, impassioned expansion of the 
 heart — and she had listened and echoed what 
 he said. All this returned to him as he rushed 
 across the dewy grass, wet with spring rains, 
 and untrodden by any other foot, with London 
 vague in mists and muffled noises all round. 
 Brave words — brave words ! he remembered 
 them, and his heart grew sick with self-pity. 
 How did he know it was coming to him ? How 
 could he think that this case which was so 
 I 2
 
 116 CARITA. 
 
 plain, so clear, should one day be his own? 
 God and all good spirits have pity upon him ! 
 He would have bidden you to do it, praised 
 you with tears of sympathy for that tremendous 
 proof of love ; but himself ? He shrank, 
 shrank, contracted within himself; retreated, 
 crouching and slinking, from the house. What 
 a poor cur he was, not worthy the name of 
 man ! but he could not do it ; it was beyond 
 the measure of his powers. 
 
 When he turned to go home the afternoon 
 light was waning. Small heart had he to go 
 home. If he could have escaped anywhere he 
 would have been tempted to do so ; and yet he 
 was on the rack till he returned to her. Oh, 
 that Heaven would give her that sweet patience, 
 that angelical calm in suffering, which some 
 women have ! Was it only rehgious women 
 who had that calm? He asked himself this 
 question with a piteous helplessness ; for neither 
 he nor she had been religious in the ordinary 
 sense of the word. They had been good so far 
 as they knew how — enjoying themselves, yet 
 without unkindness, nay, with true friendliness, 
 charity, brotherly-heartedness to their neigh- 
 bours ; but as for God, they had known little
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 117 
 
 and thought less of that supreme vague Exist- 
 ence whom they accepted as a belief, without 
 knowing Him as a person, or desiring to know. 
 And now, perhaps, had their theory of life been 
 different they might have been better prepared 
 for this emergency. Was it so ? He could 
 not tell. Perhaps philosophy was enough with 
 some strong natures, perhaps it was tempera- 
 ment. Who can tell how human creatures are 
 moved ; who touches the spring, and what the 
 spring is, which makes one rebellious and 
 another submissive, sweet as an angel? He 
 had loved the movement, the variety, the indo- 
 cility, the very caprice, of his wife, in all of 
 which she was so much herself. Submission, 
 resignedness, were not in that changeful, viva- 
 cious, wilful nature ; but, oh, if only now the 
 meekness of the more passive woman could 
 somehow get transfused into her veins, the 
 heavenly patience, the self courage that can 
 meet anguish with a smile ! There was Cherry, 
 his faded old maiden sister — had it been she, it 
 was in her to have drawn her cloak over the 
 gnawing vulture, and borne her tortures with- 
 out a sign of flmching. But even the very idea 
 of this comparison hurt him while it flashed
 
 118 CARITA. 
 
 throiigli his mind. It was a slight to Annie to 
 think that any one could bear this horrible fate 
 more nobly than she. Poor Annie I by this 
 time had she exhausted the first shock ? Had 
 she forgiven him ? Was she asking for him ? 
 He turned, bewildered by all his dreary 
 thoughts, and calmed a little by fatigue and 
 silence, to go home once more. 
 
 It was getting dusk. As he passed the 
 populous places of the park the hum of voices 
 and pleasant sounds came over him dreamily 
 like a waft of warmer air. He passed through 
 that murmur of life and pleasure, and hurried 
 along to the more silent stony streets among 
 which his Square lay. As he approached he 
 overtook Maxwell walking in the same direc- 
 tion, who looked at him with some suspicion. 
 The two men accosted each other at the same 
 moment. 
 
 ' I wanted to see you. Come with me,' said 
 
 Beresford ; and ' What is the matter ? Why 
 
 did you send for me ? ' the doctor cried. 
 
 Then Maxwell explained that a hurried 
 message had come for him more than an hour 
 before, while he was out, and that he was on 
 his way to the Square now.
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 119 
 
 ' Has there been any — change ? ' he said. 
 After this they sped along hurriedly with little 
 conversation. There seemed something strange 
 already about the house when they came in sight 
 of it. The blinds were down in all the upper 
 windows, but at the library appeared Cara's little 
 white face looking eagerly out. She was look- 
 ing out, but she did not see them, and an organ- 
 man stood in front of the house grinding out 
 the notes of the Trovatore's song ' Ah, che la 
 morte,' upon his terrible instrument. Cara's 
 eyes and attention seemed absorbed in this. 
 James Beresford opened the door with his latch- 
 key unobserved by any one, and went upstairs 
 direct, followed by the doctor, to his wife's 
 room. 
 
 How still it was ! How dark ! She was fond 
 of light, and always had one of those tall moon- 
 lamps, which were her favourites ; there was 
 no lamp in the room, however, now, but only 
 some twinkling candles, and through the side 
 window a glimmer of chill blue sky. Nurse 
 rose as her master opened the door. She gave 
 a low cry at the sight of him. ' Oh, don't come 
 here, sir, don't come here ! ' she cried. 
 
 ' Is she angry, still angry .^ ' said poor Beres- 
 ford, his countenance falling.
 
 120 CARITA. 
 
 'Oh, go away, sir ; it was the doctor we 
 wanted ! ' said the woman. 
 
 Meantime Maxwell had pushed forward to 
 the bedside. He gave a cry of dismay and 
 horror, surprise taking from him all self-controL 
 ' When did this happen ? ' he said. 
 
 James Beresford pressed forward too, push- 
 ing aside the woman who tried to prevent him ; 
 and there he saw — what.^ Not his wife: a 
 pale, lovely image, still as she never was in her 
 life, far away, passive, solemn, neither caring 
 for him nor any one ; beyond all pain or fear 
 of pain. ' My God ! ' he said. He did not seem 
 even to wonder. Suddenly it became quite 
 clear to him that for years he had known ex- 
 actly how this would be. 
 
 Maxwell put the husband, who stood stupe- 
 fied, out of his way ; he called the weeping nurse, 
 who, now that there was nothing to conceal, gave 
 free outlet to her sorrow. ' Oh, don't ask me, 
 sir, I can't tell you ! ' she said among her sobs. 
 ' Miss Carry rung the bell and I came. And 
 from that to this never a word from her, no 
 more than moans and hard breathing. I sent 
 for you, sir, and then for the nearest as I could 
 get. He came, but there was nothing as could
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 121 
 
 be done. If she took it herself or if it was give 
 her, how can I tell ? Miss Carry, poor child, 
 she don't know what's happened ; she's watch- 
 ing in the hbrary for her papa. The medicme- 
 box was on the table, sir, as you see. Oh, I 
 don't hold with them medicine-boxes ; they puts 
 things into folk's heads ? The other doctor said 
 as it was laudanum ; but if she took it, or if it 
 
 was give her ' 
 
 Mr. Maxwell stopped the woman by a touch 
 on the arm. Poor Beresford stood still there, 
 supporting himself by the bed, gazing upon that 
 which was no more his wife. His countenance 
 AY as like that of one who had himself died; his 
 mouth was open, the under lip dropped ; the 
 eyes strained and tearless. He heard, yet he did 
 not hear what they were saying. Later it came 
 back to his mind ; at present he knew nothing 
 of it. ' God help him ! ' said the doctor, turning 
 away to the other end of the room. And there 
 he heard the rest of the story. They left the 
 two together who had been all in all to each 
 other. Had he given her the quietus, he who 
 loved her most, or had she taken it ? This was 
 what neither of them could tell. They stood 
 whispering together while the husband, propping
 
 122 CAEITA. 
 
 Mmself by the bed, looked at her. At her ? It 
 was not her. He stood and looked and won- 
 dered, with a dull aching in him. No more — 
 he could not go to her, call her by her name. 
 A dreary, horrible sense that this still figure 
 was some one else, a something new and un- 
 known to him, another woman who was not 
 his wife, came into his soul. He was frozen by 
 the sudden shock ; his blood turned into ice, 
 his heart to stone. Annie ! oh, heaven, no ; not 
 that ; not the marble woman lying in her place ? 
 He was himself stone, but she was sculptured 
 marble, a figure to put on a monument. Two 
 hours of time — light, frivolous, flying hours — 
 €0uld not chans^e flesh and blood into that'. 
 could not put life so far, and make it so impos- 
 sible. He did not feel that he was bereaved, 
 or a mourner, or that he had lost what he most 
 loved ; he felt only a stone, looking at stone, 
 with a dull ache in him, and a dull consterna- 
 tion, nothing more. When Maxwell came and 
 took him by the arm he obeyed stupidly, and 
 went with his friend, not moving with any will 
 of his own, but only because the other moved 
 him ; making no ' scene ' or terrible demonstra- 
 tions of misery. Maxwell led him downstairs.
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 123 
 
 holding him by the arm, as if he had been 
 made of wood, and took him to the hbrary, and 
 thrust him into a chair, still in the same passive 
 state. It was quite dark there, and Cara, 
 roused from her partial trance of watching at 
 the window, stumbled down from her chair at 
 the sight of them, with a cry of alarm, yet 
 relief, for the lamps outside had beguiled tlie 
 child and kept her from perceiving how dark it 
 had grown till she turned round. No one had 
 thought of bringing in the lamp, of lighting the 
 candles, or any of the common offices of life in 
 that house where Death had so suddenly set up 
 his seat. The doctor rang the bell and ordered 
 hghts and wdne. He began to fear for James : 
 his own mind was agitated with doubts, and a 
 mingled severity and sympathy. He felt that 
 whatever had happened he must find it out; 
 but, whatever had happened, how could he do 
 less than feel the sentiment of a brother for his 
 friend? He did not take much notice of the 
 child, but stooped and kissed her, being the 
 friend of the house, and bade her go to her 
 nurse in a softened tender tone. But he scarcely 
 remarked that Cara did not go. Poor child, 
 who had lost her mother ! but his pity for her
 
 124 CAEITA. 
 
 was of a secondary kind. It was the man whom 
 he had to think of — who had done it, perhaps — 
 who, perhaps, was his wife's innocent murderer 
 — yet whom, nevertheless, this good man felt his 
 heart yearn and melt over. When the frightened 
 servant came in, with red eyes, bringing the 
 wine. Maxwell poured out some for the chief 
 sufferer, who sat motionless where he had placed 
 liim, saying nothing. It was necessary to rouse 
 him one way or other from this stupefaction 
 of pain. 
 
 ' Beresford,' he said curtly, ' hsten to me ; 
 we must understand each other. It is you who 
 have done this ? Be frank with me — be open, 
 it is either you or she herself. I have never 
 met with such a case before ; but I am not the 
 man to be hard upon you. Beresford ! James ! 
 think, my dear fellow, think; we were boys 
 together ; you can't suppose I'll be hard on 
 you.' 
 
 ' She asked me — she begged of me,' said 
 Beresford, slowly. 'Maxwell, you are clever, you 
 can do wonders.' 
 
 ' I can't bring those back that have gone — 
 there^' said the doctor, a sudden spasm coming 
 in his throat. ' Don't speak of the impossible.
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 125 
 
 Clever — God knows ! miserable bunglers, that 
 is what we are, knowing nothing. James ! I 
 won't blame you ; I would have done it myself 
 in your place. Speak out ; you need not have 
 any reserves from me.' 
 
 ' It isn't that. Maxwell, look here ; they've 
 spirited my wife away, and put that in her 
 place.' 
 
 ' God ! he's going mad,' said the doctor, 
 feeling his own head buzz and swim. 
 
 ' No,' was the answer, with a sigh. ' No, I 
 almost wish I could. I tell you it is not her. 
 You saw it as well as I. That my wife? 
 Maxwell— — ' 
 
 ' It is all that remains of her,' said the doctor, 
 sternly. ' Mind what I say ; I must know ; no 
 more of this raving. Did you do it ? Of course 
 she asked you, poor soul ! ' (Here the doctor's 
 voice wavered as if a gust of wind had blown it 
 about.) 'She never could endure the thought 
 of pain ; she asked you, it was natural : and you 
 gave her — opium?' 
 
 ' Nothing . I dared not,' he said, vdth a 
 shiver. ' I had not the courage. I let her 
 plead ; but I had not the courage. What? put 
 her away from me, willingly? how could I do
 
 126 CARITA. 
 
 it? Yes, if she had been in a paroxysm ; if I 
 had seen her in agony; but she was calm, not 
 suffering, and she asked me to do it in cold 
 blood?' 
 
 ' What then ? ' The doctor spoke sternly, 
 keeping the tone of authority to which in his 
 stupefied state poor Beresford appeared to re- 
 spond. Cara from a corner looked on with 
 wide-open eyes, listening to everything. 
 
 ' Nothing more,' he said, still sighing 
 heavily. ' It was more than I could bear. I 
 rushed away. I went out to calm myself — to 
 try and think ; and I met you. Maxwell ; and 
 now ' 
 
 He lifted his hands with a shuddering ges- 
 ture. ' That is all — that is all ! and this de- 
 solate place is my-— home ; and that is — Annie ! 
 ISTo, no ! Maxwell, some of your doctors — your 
 cruel doctors — have taken her away to try their 
 experiments. Oh, say it is so, and I'll thank 
 you on my knees ! ' 
 
 ' Be quiet, Beresford ! Try and be a man. 
 Don't you see what I have got to do ? If it was 
 not you, it was herself. I don't blame her, 
 poor soul, poor soul ! the thought of all she had 
 to go through made her mad. Be silent, man.
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 127 
 
 I tell you ! We must not have her branded 
 with the name of suicide, James,' cried the 
 doctor, fairly sobbing. ' Poor girl, poor girl ! it 
 is not much wonder if she was afraid ; but we 
 must not let them say ill of her now she is 
 gone. I remember her before you married her, 
 a lovely creature ; and there she is, lying — but 
 they must not speak ill of her. I'll say it 
 
 was Yes, if it's a lie I can't help that — 
 
 my conscience will bear it — there must not be 
 talk, and an inquest. Yes, that's what I'll say.' 
 
 ' An inquest ! ' said the wretched husband, 
 waking up from his stupor with a great cry. 
 
 ' I'U take it upon myself,' said Maxwell,, 
 going to the writing-table. Then he saw Cara 
 leaning out of her chair towards them with 
 great strained wide-open eyes. 
 
 ' Cara ! have you heard all we were saying ? ' 
 
 ' I don't understand, I don't understand ! ^ 
 said the child with sudden sobs. ' What have 
 you done to my mamma ? ' 
 
 The door of the Ubrary opened softly, and 
 they all started as if at the approach of a Tiew 
 calamity. 
 
 ' If you please, sir,' said John, addressmg 
 Maxwell with natural recognition of the only
 
 128 CARm. 
 
 ■source of authority, ' I came to see if you 
 wouldn't have some dinner — and master ' 
 
 With a moan, Beresford hid his face in his 
 iands. Dinner must be, whosoever Hves or 
 dies — ^if the world were breaking up — if hope 
 and love had failed for ever. John stood for a 
 moment against the more powerful light of the 
 ;gas in the hall, for his answer, and then, not 
 getting any, he had the grace to steal quietly 
 .away. 
 
 But this wonderftil intrusion of the outer 
 •ordinary life disturbed the melancholy assem- 
 bly. It roused Beresford to a sense of what 
 had befallen him. He got up and began to 
 pace up and down the long room, and Cara's 
 sobs broke the silence, and Maxwell at the 
 table, with a spasm in his throat, compiled the 
 certificate of the death. In what medical form 
 he put it I cannot tell ; but he strained his 
 conscience and said something which would 
 pass, which nobody could contradict ; was not 
 that enough ? ' I hope I may never do any- 
 thing more wicked,' he said, muttering to him- 
 self The nurse came to call the child, which 
 was the first thing that had seemed natiural to 
 Oara in the whole miserable day's proceedings.
 
 THE CATASTROPHE. 129 
 
 She did not resist the command to go to bed, 
 as they had all resisted the invitation to dine. 
 She got up quickly when nurse called her, glad 
 of something she was used to. 
 
 ' It's the only place as we're all fit for,' said 
 nurse, with a sigh of weariness ; ' your poor 
 papa, Miss Carry, as well as the rest.' Then 
 she turned to the gentlemen with a touch of 
 natural oratory. ' What is the use of talking,' 
 she said ; ' I'm one as has loved her since first 
 she drew breath. She was my child, she was ; 
 and look you here, I'm glad — her old nurse is 
 glad. I'll not cry nor make no moan for her,' 
 said nurse, the tears running down her cheeks. 
 'I'd have give her that dose myself if the 
 darling had asked me ; I would, and never 
 have trembled. I'd have done it and stood up 
 bold and told you I done it, and I don't blame 
 her. She's seen what it was, and so have I.' 
 
 ' Nurse, you are a good woman,' said the 
 doctor, coming hastily forward and grasping 
 her hand. ' Nurse, hold your tongue, and don't 
 say a word. Don't let those idiots talk down- 
 stairs. I'm ready to give them the reason of it 
 whoever asks. I did not know it would come 
 on so quickly when I left to-day ; but I know 
 VOL. I. K
 
 130 caritI. 
 
 what it is that has carried her off. It was to 
 be expected, if we hadn't all been a parcel 
 of fools.' 
 
 Nurse looked him anxiously in the face. 
 
 ' Then it wasn't— it wasn't ? Ah ! ' she 
 
 added, drawing a long breath, ' I think I un- 
 derstand.' 
 
 ' Now, hold your tongue,' he cried, curtly, 
 'and stop the others. You are a sensible 
 woman. My poor little Cara, good-night.' 
 
 ' Don't speak to him,' nurse whispered, 
 drawing the child away. 'Leave your poor 
 papa alone, darling. God help him, he can't 
 say nothing to you to-night. Here's Sarah 
 coming to put you to bed, and glad I'd be to 
 be there too : it's the only place as we're fit 
 for now.' 
 
 Sarah, who was waiting outside, had red 
 eyes overflowing with tears. She hugged the 
 little girl and kissed her, bursting out into fits 
 of subdued crying. But Cara's own sobs were 
 stilled and over. Her head ached with bewil- 
 dering pain ; her mind was full of confused 
 bewildering thoughts.
 
 131 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 CONSOLATION. 
 
 ' This is indeed an affliction, dear Miss Beres- 
 ford. We came up directly we heard of it ; I 
 would not let a moment pass. Oh, how little 
 we know ! We were thinking of your poor . 
 niece as having^ returned from her foreign tour; 
 as being about to enter upon the brilliant 
 society of the season. I don't know when I 
 have received such a shock ; and my poor 
 Maria, her feehngs were almost beyond control ; 
 but she would not stay away.' 
 
 'I thought she would come,' said Miss 
 Charity. ' Maria always likes to get news from 
 the fountain-head, and to see how people are 
 bearing their troubles. Yes, my dear, I am 
 bearing mine very well, as you see. Poor 
 Annie ! she was only my niece by marriage 
 after all. At my age one sees even one's own 
 nieces, women with families, die without great 
 x2
 
 132 CARITA. 
 
 trouble. It may sound hard, but it's true. 
 When a woman is married, and has her own 
 children about her, you can't but feel that she's 
 less to you. It's dreadful for them. ; but, so far 
 as you are concerned, you lost her long ago.' 
 
 ' Oh, dear Miss Beresford, you like to pre- 
 tend you are calm, to hide how soft-hearted 
 you are! But we know you better than that. 
 I myself, though I knew (comparatively) so 
 little of poor Mrs. James ' 
 
 'And I thought you did not like each 
 other, so it is all the more kind of you to cry. 
 Cherry will cry too as much as you please, and 
 be thankful for your sympathy. Have you had 
 a pleasant walk? I think the primroses are 
 thicker than ever this spring. We have been 
 sending up basketsful. She was fond of 
 
 them ' Here the old lady faltered for a 
 
 moment. This was the kind of allusion that 
 melted her, not straightforward talk. She was 
 in profound black, a great deal more crape than 
 the dressmaker thought at all necessary, but 
 Miss Charity had her own views on these 
 subjects. ' Put double upon me, and take it off 
 the child,' she had said, to the wonder of the 
 tradespeople, who felt that the mourning for a
 
 CONSOLATION. 133 
 
 niece by marriage was a very different thing 
 from that which was required for a mother. 
 Mrs. Burchell respected her greatly for her 
 crape. She knew the vahie of it, and the 
 unthriftiness, and felt that this was indeed 
 sho^vmg respect. 
 
 ' We heard it was very sudden at last,' said 
 the Eector, that nobody had the least idea — it 
 was a very lingering disorder that she was sup- 
 posed to have ? So we heard, at least. Do you 
 happen to know how the doctors accounted 
 for its suddenness at last ? There is something 
 very dreadful to the imagination in so sudden a 
 death.' 
 
 ' I wish I could think I should have as quick 
 an end,' said Miss Charity ; ' but we Beresfords 
 are strong, and die hard. We can't shake off life 
 hke that. We have to get rid of it by inches.' 
 
 ' My dear lady,' said the Eector, ' I don't 
 mean to say that I would put any trust in death- 
 bed repentances ; but surely it is a privilege to 
 have that time left to us for solemn thought, 
 for making sure that we are in the right way.' 
 
 'I never think much when I am ill, my 
 dear Eector ; I can't. I think why the flies buzz 
 60, and I think if I was Martha it would make
 
 134 CARITA. 
 
 me unhappy to have such a red nose ; and if 
 you came to me, instead of listening to what you 
 said, I should be thinking all the time that your 
 white tie was undone ' (here the Eector furtively 
 and nervously glanced down, and instinctively 
 put up his hand to feel if the remark was true) 
 ' or your coat rusty at the elbows. I say these 
 things at a hazard, not that I ever remarked 
 them,' she added, laughing. ' You are tidiness 
 itself 
 
 The Eector was put out by these chance 
 possibilities of criticism, and could not but feel 
 that Miss Charity's quick eyes must have seen 
 him with his white tie untidy, loosely unfastened^ 
 under his beard. He had grown a beard, like 
 so many clergymen, and it was not an improve- 
 ment. Instead of looking clean, as he once did, 
 he looked black and coarse, a mixture of sea- 
 captain and divine. He kept putting up his 
 hand stealthily all the time he remained, and 
 inviting his wife, with nervous glances, to let 
 him know if all was right. Unfortunately he 
 could not see it under the forest of black beard. 
 
 ' We heard,' said his wife, coming to his re- 
 lief, ' that there was something about an opiate 
 — an over-dose, something of that sort — that
 
 CONSOLATION. 135 
 
 poor Mrs. James had taken it without measuring 
 it, or — you know how everything is exaggerated. 
 I was quite afraid, and so glad to see the death 
 in the paper without any inquest or formahties 
 of that kind, which must be so painful. Was 
 there really nothing in the story of the opiate ? 
 It is so strange how things get about.' 
 
 ' I don't think it at all strange, Maria. The 
 servants call in a strange doctor, in their fright, 
 who does not know anything about her case or 
 temperament. He hears that she has to take 
 some calming drops to relieve her pain, and of 
 course he jumps in his ignorance to the idea of 
 an over-dose. It is the fashionable thing now- 
 a-days. It is what they all say ' 
 
 ' And there was no truth in it ? ' 
 
 'None whatever,' said Miss Charity, who, 
 safest of all advocates, implicitly believed what 
 she was saying, not knowing that any doubt 
 had ever existed on the subject. She sat facing 
 them in her new mourning, so freshly, crisply 
 black. Miss Charity knew of no mystery even, 
 and her calm certainty had all the genuine 
 force of truth. 
 
 The Eector and his wife looked at each 
 other. ' It shows that one should not beheve
 
 136 CAKITA. 
 
 the tenth part of what one hears,' he said. ' I 
 was told confidently that poor Mrs. James 
 Beresford held strange ideas about some things.' 
 
 ' That you may be quite sure of, Eector. I 
 never knew any one yet worth their salt who 
 did not hold odd ideas about something ' 
 
 ' Not about fundamentals, my dear lady. I 
 am not straitlaced ; but there are some matters 
 — on some things, I am sure, none of us would 
 like to give an uncertain sound. Life, for ex- 
 ample — human life, is too sacred to be trifled 
 with ; but there is a set of speculatists, of false 
 philosophers — I don't know what to call them 
 — sceptics, infidels they generally are, and at 
 the same time radicals, repubhcans ' 
 
 ' Ah, politics ? I dare say poor Annie was 
 odd in pohtics. What did it matter ? they were 
 not political people. If James had been in 
 Parliament, indeed, as I should like to have 
 seen him — but unfortunately he was a man of 
 fine tastes ; that is fatal. A man of fine tastes, 
 who is fond of travelling, and collecting, and 
 rapt up in his wife, will never become a pubhc 
 man ; and I should like to have seen James in 
 Parliament. Strange ideas ! oh, yes, queer to 
 the last degree. If there is anything worse than
 
 CONSOLATION. 137 
 
 republicanism (is there?) I sliould think poor 
 Annie went in for that.' 
 
 ' That is bad enough, but it is not exactly 
 what I meant,' said the Eector ; and then he 
 rose up with an air of the deepest conventional 
 respect. ' My dear, here is your kind friend, 
 Miss Cherry,' he said. 
 
 ^lis. Burchell sprang up at the intimation, 
 and rushed forward with open arms. She had 
 put on a black merino dress instead of her usual 
 silk, and a black shawl, to mark her sense of 
 the calamity — and swallowed up poor slim Miss 
 Cherry in the entanglements of that embriice, 
 with solemn fervour. Cherry had not much 
 sense of humour, and she was too good to pass 
 any judgment upon the sudden warmth of affec- 
 tion thus exhibited ; but it was a little confusing 
 and suffocating to find herself without any 
 warning engulfed in Mrs. Burchell's old merino 
 and the folds of her shawl. 
 
 ' Oh, my dear, dear Cherry, if I could but 
 tell you how I feel for you ! How little did 
 we think when we last met ' 
 
 ' You are very kind,' said Miss Cherry, draw- 
 ing herself forth somewhat hmp and crushed 
 from this embrace. ' I am sure you are very
 
 138 CARITA. 
 
 kind.' Her lips quivered and the tears came 
 to her eyes ; but she was not so overwhelmed 
 as her consoler, who had begun to sob. ' It is 
 my poor brother I think of,' said Miss Cherry. 
 ' It is little to us in comparison with what it is 
 to him. I think of him most ; more than of 
 poor Annie, who is safe out of all trouble.' 
 
 ' We must hope so, at least,' said the Eector, 
 shaking his head ; and his wife stopped sobbing, 
 and interchanged a glance with him, which was 
 full of meaning. 
 
 ' Poor Mrs. James ! It was so sudden. I 
 fear there was no time for preparation — no time 
 even for thought ? ' 
 
 ' Men soon get the better of these things,' 
 said Miss Charity, ' and the more they feel it at 
 the time the more easily they are cured. Cherry 
 there will think of her longer than her husband 
 will. I don't mean to say your grief's so great, 
 my dear, but it will last.' 
 
 ' Oh, aunt, you do James injustice ! He 
 thought of nothing but Annie. The light of 
 his eyes is gone, and the comfort of his house, 
 and all he cares for in hfe.' 
 
 Here poor Miss Cherry, moved by her own 
 eloquence, began to cry, picturing to herself
 
 CONSOLATION. 139 
 
 this dismal future. Nothing at Sunninghill was 
 chauged : the room was as full of primroses as 
 the woods were ; great baskets of them mingled 
 witli blue violets filled every corner ; the sun- 
 shine came in unclouded ; the whole place was 
 bright. It struck the tender-hearted woman 
 with sudden compunction : ' We are not touched/ 
 she said ; ' we have everything just the same as 
 ever, as bright ; but my poor James, in that 
 house by himself; and the child! Oh, Aunt 
 Charity, when I think of him, I feel as if my 
 heart would break.' 
 
 Miss Charity took up her work and began 
 to knit furiously. ' He will get over it,' she said, 
 ' in time. It will be dreadful work at first ; 
 but he will get over it. He has plenty of friends, 
 both men and women. Don't upset me with 
 your talk ; he will get over it — men always do.' 
 
 ' And let us hope it wiU lead him to think 
 more seriously,' said Mrs. Burchell. ' Oh, I am 
 sure if you thought my dear husband could be 
 of any use — we all know he has not been what 
 we may call serious, and oh, dear Miss Beresford, 
 would not this affliction be a cheap price to 
 pay for it, if it brought him to a better state of 
 mind ? '
 
 140 CARITA. 
 
 ' His wife's life ? It would be a high price 
 for any advantage that would come to him, I 
 think. Dry your eyes, Cherry, and go and put 
 on your bonnet. This is Mr. Maxwell's day, 
 and you had better go back to town with him.' 
 
 ' Was it Mr. Maxwell who attended poor Mrs. 
 James ? I hope he is considered a clever man.' 
 
 ' How oddly you good people speak ! Do you 
 want to insinuate that he is not a clever man ? 
 He takes charge of my health, you know, and 
 he has kept me going long enough. Eh ! yes, 
 I am irritable, I suppose ; we are all put out. 
 You good quiet folks, with all your children 
 about, nothing happening to you ' 
 
 ' Indeed, Miss Beresford, you do us great in- 
 justice,' said Mrs. Burchell, stung, as was natural, 
 by such an assertion, while the Eector slowly 
 shook his head. * We do not complain ; but per- 
 haps if we were to tell all, as some people do. No- 
 thing happening tons! — ah, how little you know ! ' 
 
 ' Well, well, let us say you have a great many 
 troubles; you can feel then for other people. 
 Ah, here is Mr. Maxwell. Don't talk of me 
 now ; don't think of me, my good man. I am 
 as well — as well — a great deal better than a poor 
 useless woman of nearly threescore and ten has
 
 CONSOLATION. 141 
 
 any right to be when the young are taken. How- 
 ls James ? ' 
 
 The doctor, who had come in by the open 
 window with a famiharity which made the Eector 
 and his wife look at each other, sat down by the 
 old lady's side and began to talk to her. Miss 
 Cherry had gone to put on her bonnet, and by- 
 and-by Mr. and Mrs. Burchell rose to take their 
 leave. 
 
 ' I am so glad to hear that, sad as it was, it 
 was a natural death, and one that you expected,' 
 said the Eector, taking Maxwell aside for a 
 moment. 
 
 The doctor stared at him, with somewhat 
 fiery eyes. ' A natural death ? Mrs. Beresford's ? 
 What did you expect it to be ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, my dear sir, I don't mean anything ; 
 We had heard very difierent accounts — so many 
 things are said ' 
 
 ' You should put a stop to them then,' said 
 the other, who was not without temper ; and he 
 and Miss Charity paused in their sadder talk, as 
 the visitors disappeared, to interchange some 
 remarks about them which were not compli- 
 mentary. 
 
 ' What they can mean by making up such
 
 142 CARITA. 
 
 wicked lies, and putting a slur on her memory, 
 poor child ! ' said the old lady with a sudden 
 gush of hot hears. 
 
 The doctor said something very hotly about 
 
 * meddlesome parsons,' and hastily plunged again 
 into descriptions of poor James. The other 
 was not a subject on which he could linger. ' I 
 never saw a man so broken-hearted ; they were 
 always together ; he misses her morning, noon, 
 and night. Cherry must come to him ; she 
 must come at once,' he said, forgetting how long 
 it was since he had spoken of Cherry before by 
 her Christian name. But Miss Charity noticed 
 it with the keen spectator instinct of her age, 
 and ruminated in an undercurrent of thought 
 even while she thought of ' poor James,' whe- 
 ther Maxwell's faith in Cherry ' meant anything,' 
 or if new combinations of life might be involved 
 in the sequences of that death scene. 
 
 The same thought was in the minds of the 
 clerical pair as they went down the hill. ' Will 
 that come to anything ? ' they said to each other. 
 
 ' It is a nice little property,' said the Eector, 
 
 * and I suppose she will have everything.' 
 
 ' But if I was Cherry,' said Mrs. Burchell, ' I 
 should not like to be thrown at his head in tliat
 
 CONSOLATION. 143 
 
 very open way. Going with him to town ! It 
 is as <2[ood as offering her to him.' 
 
 ' She is no longer young, my dear,' said the 
 Eector, ' and people now-a-days have not your 
 deHcacy.' 
 
 ' Oh, I have no patience with their nonsense !' 
 she cried ; ' and their friendships, forsooth — as 
 if men and women could ever be friends ! ' 
 
 And it is possible that in other circum- 
 stances Miss Cherry's tranquil soul might have 
 owned a flutter at thought of the escort which 
 she accepted so quietly to-day ; but she was 
 absorbed with thoughts of her brother and of 
 the possible use she might be, which was sweet 
 to her, notwithstanding her grief Miss Charity 
 shook her head doubtfully. ' It is not Cherry 
 that will help him,' she said, ' but the child will 
 be the better of a woman in the house.' 
 
 Eeally that was what Mr. Maxwell wanted, 
 a woman in the house ; something to speak to, 
 something to refer everything to ; something to 
 blame even, if things were not all right. The 
 funeral was over, and all that dismal business 
 which appals yet gives a temporary occupation 
 and support to the sorrowful. And now the 
 blank of common life had recommenced.
 
 144 CARITA. 
 
 ' Perhaps she will not help him much ; but 
 she will be there,' said the doctor. He was glad 
 for himself that a soft-voiced, soft-eyed, pitying 
 creature should be there. There was help in 
 the mere fact, whatever she might say or do. 
 
 Cara had been living a strange life through 
 these melancholy days. She had not known, 
 poor child, the full significance of that scene 
 by her mother's bedside, of which she had been 
 a witness. She did not fully understand even 
 now : but glimmers of horrible intelligence had 
 come to her during that interview in the library, 
 and the things she had heard afterwards from 
 the servants had enlightened her still more. She 
 heard the whispers that circulated among them, 
 terrified whispers, said half under their breath. 
 That she had done it herself — that she knew, 
 poor dear, what she was doing — that if anything 
 had been known, there would have been an 
 inquest, and things would have come out. This 
 was what Cara heard breathing about in half 
 whispers, and which filled her with strange 
 panic, lest her secret should escape her. She 
 knew the secret, and she only. Nobody had ques- 
 tioned her, but the child's impulse to tell had 
 bound her very soul for days after. She had
 
 CONSOLATION. 145 
 
 resisted it, though she had felt guilty and miser- 
 able to know something which no one else 
 knew ; but she had kept her secret. ' Don't let 
 us brand her with the name of suicide.' These 
 words seemed to ring in her ears night and day. 
 She repeated them over and over to herself. 
 
 * Don't let us brand her with the name of sui- 
 cide.' 
 
 ^ No, no,' poor Cara said to herself, trem- 
 bling ; ' no, no : ' though this premature and 
 horrible secret weighed down her heart like a 
 visible burden. Oh, if she could but have told 
 it to nurse, or to Aunt Cherry ! but she must 
 not, not even to papa. When her aunt arrived, 
 it was mingled torture and relief to the poor 
 child. She clung round her with sobbing, long- 
 ing so to tell ; but even to cling and to sob was 
 consolatory, and Aunt Cherry Avanted no expla- 
 nation of that unusual depth of childish distress. 
 
 * Cara was not like other children,' she said to 
 herself. She had feelings which were deeper 
 and more tender. She was ' sensitive,' she was 
 ' nervous.' She was more loving than the or- 
 dinary children, who cry one moment and for- 
 get the next. And kind Cherry, though her 
 own grief was of the milder, secondary kind, as 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 CARITA. 
 
 was natural, had always tears of sympatliy to 
 give for the grief of others. She took the little 
 girl almost entirely into her own care, and would 
 talk to her for hours together ; about being 
 ' good,' about subduing all her little irritabihties, 
 in order to please mamma, who was in heaven, 
 and would be grieved in her happiness to think 
 that her child was not ' good.' Cara was greatly 
 awed and subdued by this talk. It hushed her, 
 yet set her wondering ; and those conversations 
 were sometimes very strange ones, which went 
 on between the two in their melancholy and 
 silent hours. 
 
 ' Does everybody go to heaven who dies ? '' 
 said Cara, with awe-stricken looks. 
 
 Miss Cherry trembled a little, having some 
 fear of false doctrine before her eyes. * Every- 
 body, I hope, who loves God. There are bad 
 people, Cara ; but we don't know them, you 
 and I' 
 
 ' Who love God ? but I never think of God, 
 Aunt Cherry. At least, I do now ; I wonder. 
 But if they did not do that, would they still go 
 to heaven all the same?' 
 
 ' God loves us, dear,' said Cherry, with the 
 tears in her soft eyes. ' Fathers and mothers
 
 CONSOLATION. 147 
 
 love their children, whether their children love 
 them or not. That is all we know.' 
 
 ' Whatever they do ? if they even laugh, 
 and go wrong ? Yes,' said Cara, very thought- 
 fully, ' I suppose papa would not send me away, 
 out into the dark, if I did ever so wrong.' 
 
 ' I am sure he would not ; but you must not 
 think of such things, dear ; they are too difficult 
 for you. When you are older, you will under- 
 stand better,' Cherry said, faltering, and with 
 something in her heart which contradicted her ; 
 for did not the child ' understand ' better than 
 she? 
 
 Then Cara started another difficulty, quite 
 as appalling ; facing it with innocent confidence, 
 yet wonder : ' What sort of a place,' she asked, 
 softly, looking up with her blue eyes full of 
 serious faith and awe, ' is heaven ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, my dear,' said Miss Cherry, ' you ask 
 me what I would give all I have in the world 
 to know ! There are so many whom I love 
 there.' 
 
 ' But what do you think? Often when one 
 d(jesn't know, one has an idea. I don't know 
 Italy, or India ; but I imagine something. Aunt 
 Cherry, tell me what you think.' 
 l2
 
 148 CARITA. 
 
 ' Oh, Cara, my darling, I don't know what it 
 is like ! I know there is no trouble or pain in 
 it ; and that God is not so far off as here. No, 
 He is not far off here ; but we can't see Him ; 
 and we are such poor dull creatures. And I 
 thinks Cara, I think that our Lord must be al- 
 ways about there. That people may go and 
 stand on the roadside and see Him pass, and 
 talk to Him, and be satisfied about everything.' 
 
 ' How — be satisfied about everything ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, child ! I should not w^ant anything 
 more. He sees both sides, my darling, both 
 here and there, and understands. I am sure 
 they must be able to speak to Him, and go to 
 Him, whenever they will ' 
 
 This thought brought great tears, a suffusion 
 of utter wistfulness yet heart-content, to Cherry's 
 eyes. Little Cara did not know very well 
 what was meant by such words. She did not 
 understand this conception of the great Creator 
 as a better taught child might have done. But 
 she said to herself, all secretly : ' If there is One 
 like that, whether it is in heaven or earth, I 
 might tell Him, and it would be no harm.' 
 
 While Miss Cherry dried her eyes, her
 
 CONSOLATION. 149 
 
 heart lightened by that overflowiDg. Perhaps, 
 though they had not seen Him, He had passed 
 that way, and heard the babble — what was it 
 more ? — between the woman and the child.
 
 150 CARITA. 
 
 CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 THE HILL. 
 
 After this a long interval passed, which it is 
 needless to describe in detail. Five years is a 
 long time in a life ; how much it does ! Makes 
 ties and breaks them, gives life and withdraws 
 it, finds you happy and leaves you miserable, 
 builds you up or plucks you down ; and at the 
 same time how little it does ! Buffets you, 
 caresses you, plays at shuttlecock with you ; 
 yet leaves you the same man or woman, un- 
 changed. Most of this time James Beresford 
 had spent in absences, now here, now there ; 
 not travels according to the old happy sense, 
 though in a real and matter-of-fact sense they 
 were more travels than those he had made so 
 happily in the honeymooning days. But he 
 did not like to use the word. He called his 
 long voyages absences, nothing more. And 
 they were of a very different kind from those 
 expeditions of old. He avoided the Continent
 
 THE HILL. 151 
 
 as if pestilence had been there, and would not 
 even cross it to get the mail at Brindisi, but 
 went all the way round from Southampton 
 when he went to the East. He went up the 
 Nile, with a scientific party, observing some 
 phenomena or other. He went to America in 
 the same way. He was not a very good sailor, 
 but he made up his mind to that as the best 
 way of fighting through those lonely years. 
 Once he went as far north as any but real 
 Arctic explorers, with their souls in it, had 
 ever done. Once he tracked the possible path 
 of Eussia across the wildest border wastes to 
 the Indian frontier. He went everywhere lan- 
 guidly but persistently, seldom roused, but 
 never discouraged. A man may be very brave 
 outside, though he is not brave within ; and 
 weakness is linked to strength in ways beyond 
 our guessing. He went into such wilds once, 
 that they gave him an ' ovation ' at the Geo- 
 graphical Society's meeting, not because of any 
 information he had brought them, or anything 
 he had done, but because he had been so far 
 off, where so few people had ever been. And 
 periodically he came back to the Square ; he 
 would not leave that famihar house. His wife's
 
 152 CAEITA. 
 
 drawing-room was kept just as she had hked it^ 
 though no one entered the room : the cook and 
 John the butler, who had married, having the 
 charge of everything. And when Mr. Beresford 
 came back to England, he went home, living 
 downstairs generally, with one of his travelling 
 companions to bear him company. Maxwell 
 and he had dropped apart. They were still by 
 way of being fast friends, and doubtless, had 
 one wanted the other, would still have proved 
 so — last resource of friendship, in which the 
 severed may still hope. But, as nothing hap- 
 pened to either, their relations waxed cold and 
 distant. The doctor had never got clear of the 
 suspicion which had risen in his mind at Mrs^ 
 Beresford's death. It is true that had James 
 Beresford given the poor lady that 'strong 
 sweet dose ' she once had asked for, Maxwell 
 would have forgiven his friend with all his 
 heart. I do not know, in such a strange case, 
 what the doctor could have done ; probably 
 exactly as he did afterwards do, invent a death- 
 certificate which might be accepted as possible,, 
 though it was not in accordance with the facts. 
 But, anyhow, he would have taken up warmly, 
 and stood by his friend to his last gasp. This
 
 THE HILL. 153 
 
 being the case, it is impossible to tell on what 
 principle it was that Maxwell half hated Beres- 
 ford, having a lurking suspicion that he had 
 done it — a suspicion contradicted by his own 
 statement and by several of the facts. But 
 this was the case. The man who would have 
 helped his wife boldly, heart-brokenly, to escape 
 from living agony, was one thing ; but he wha 
 would give her a fatal draught, or connive at 
 her getting it, and then veil himself so that no 
 one should know, was different. So Mx. Max- 
 well thought. The inconsistency might be 
 absurd ; but it was so. They positively dropped 
 out of acquaintance. The men who visited 
 James Beresford when he was at home, were 
 men with tags to their names, mystic initials^ 
 F.G.S.'s, F.E.S.'s, F.S.A.'s, and others of that 
 class. And Maxwell, who was his oldest friend^ 
 dropped off. He said to himself that if Beres 
 ford ever wanted him badly, he would find hi& 
 friendship surviving. But Beresford did not 
 want Maxwell nor Maxwell Beresford; and 
 thus they w^ere severed for a suspicion which 
 would not have severed them had it been a 
 reality, or so at least Maxwell thought. The 
 doctor still went down once a week regularly
 
 154 CARITA. 
 
 to visit Miss Charity, and so kept up his know- 
 ledge of the family ; but ' nothing came ' of the 
 old fancy that had been supposed to exist 
 between him and Cherry. They all hardened 
 down unconsciously, these middle-aged folk, in 
 their various ways. The doctor became a little 
 rougher, a little redder, a trifle more weather- 
 beaten ; and Miss Cherry grew imperceptibly 
 more faded, more slim, more prim. As for 
 Miss Charity, being now over seventy, she was 
 younger than ever; her un wrinkled cheeks 
 .smoother, her blue eyes as blue, her step almost 
 more alert, her garden more full of roses. 
 ' After seventy,' she tersely said, ' one gets a 
 new lease.' And Mrs. Burchell, at the Eectory, 
 was a little stouter, and her husband a little 
 more burly, and both of them more critical. 
 Pifty is perhaps a less amiable age than three- 
 score and ten. I am not sure that it is not the 
 least amiable age of all ; the one at which 
 nature begins to resent the fact of growing old. 
 Of all the elder generation, James Beresford 
 was the one to whom it made least change, 
 notwithstanding that he was the only one who 
 had ' come through ' any considerable struggle. 
 He was still speculative, still fond of philoso-
 
 THE HILL. 155 
 
 pHcal talk, still slow to carry out to logical 
 conclusions any of the somewhat daring theories 
 which he loved to play with. He was as little 
 affected as ever by what he believed and what 
 he did not believe. 
 
 As for Cara, however, these five years had 
 made a great difference to her ; they had 
 widened the skies over her head and the earth 
 under her feet. Whereas she had been but 
 twelve, a child, groping and often in the dark, 
 now she was seventeen, and every new day 
 that rose was a new wonder to her. Darkness 
 had fled away, and the firmament all around 
 her quivered and trembled with light ; night 
 but pretended to be, as in summer, when twi- 
 light meets twilight, and makes the moment of 
 so-called midnight and darkness the merriest 
 and sweetest of jests. Everything was bright 
 around her feet, and before her in that flowery 
 path which led through tracts of sunshine. She 
 was no more afraid of life than the flowers are. 
 Eound about her the elders, who were her 
 guides, and ought to have been her examples, 
 were not, she might have perceived, had she 
 paused to think, exuberantly happy. They had 
 no blessedness to boast of, nor any exemption
 
 156 CARITA. 
 
 from common ills ; but it no more occurred to 
 Cara to think that she, she could ever be like 
 her good Aunt Cherry, or Mrs. Burchell, than 
 that she could be turned into a blue bird, like 
 the prince in the fairy tale. The one transform- 
 ation would have been less wonderful than 
 the other. She had lived chiefly at Sunninghill 
 during her father's absence, and it was a favour- 
 ite theory with the young Burchells, all but 
 two (there were ten of them), that she would 
 progress in time to be the Miss Cherry, and 
 then the Miss Charity, of that maiden house. 
 A fate was upon it, they said. It was always 
 to be in the hands of a Miss Beresford, an old- 
 maidish Charity, to be transmitted to another 
 Charity after her. This was one of the favourite 
 jokes of the rectorial household, warmly main- 
 tained except by two, i.e. Agnes, the eldest, a 
 young woman full of aspirations ; and Eoger, 
 the second boy, who had aspirations too, or 
 rather who had one aspiration, of which Cara 
 was the object. She would not die Charity 
 Beresford if he could help it ; but this was a 
 secret design of which nobody knew. Cara's 
 presence, it may be supposed, had made a great
 
 THE HILL. 157 
 
 deal of difference at Suniiingliill. It had intro- 
 duced a governess and a great many lessons ; 
 and it had introduced juvenile parties and an 
 amount of fun unparalleled before in the neigh- 
 bourhood. Not that she was a very meriy 
 child, though she was full of visionary happi- 
 ness ; but when she was there, there too was 
 drawn everything the two other elder Charity 
 Beresfords could think of as delightsome. The 
 amusements of the princesses down in St. 
 George's were infinitely less considered. To 
 be sure there were many of them, and Cara 
 was but one. She would have been quite happy 
 enough in the garden, among the roses ; but 
 because this was the case she had every ' dis- 
 traction ' that love could think of, and all the 
 young people in the neighbourhood had reason 
 to rejoice that Cara Beresford had come to live 
 with her aunts at Sunninghill. 
 
 However, these delights came to an end 
 when Mr. Beresford came home at length ' to 
 settle.' To say with what secret dismay, though 
 external pleasure, this news was received at 
 ' the Hill ' would require a volume. The hearts 
 of the ladies there sank into their shoes. They
 
 158 CARITA. 
 
 did not dare to say anything but that they were 
 dehghted. 
 
 ' Of course I am to be congratulated,' Miss 
 Charity said, with a countenance that seemed 
 to be cut out of stone. 'To see James settle 
 down to his life again is the greatest desire I 
 can have. What good was he to any one, 
 wandering hke that over tlie face of the earth ? 
 We might all have been dead and buried before 
 we could have called him back.' 
 
 ' Of course we are delighted^' said Miss 
 Cherry, with a quaver in her voice. ' He is 
 my only brother. People get separated when 
 they come to our time of life, but James and I 
 have always been one in heart. I am more 
 glad than words can say.' And then she cried. 
 But she was not a strong-minded or consistent 
 person, and her little paradoxes surprised no- 
 body. Miss Charity herself, however, who was 
 not given to tears, made her blue eyes more 
 muddy that first evening after the news came, 
 than all her seventy years had made them. 
 ' What is the child to do ? ' she asked abruptly 
 when they were alone ; ' of an age to be " out," 
 and without a chaperon, or any sense in his 
 head to teach him that such a thing is wanted?*
 
 THE HILL. 159 
 
 ' You would not like him to marry again ? *" 
 said Miss Cherry, blowing her agitated nose. 
 
 ' I'd like him to have some sense, or sensible 
 notions in his head, whatever he does. What 
 is to become of the child ? ' 
 
 Alas ! I fear it was, ' What is to become of 
 us without her ? ' that filled their minds most. 
 
 It was autumn ; the end of the season at 
 which the HiU was most beautiful. It had its 
 loveliness too in winter, when the wonderful 
 branching of the trees — all that symmetry of 
 line and network which summer hides with 
 loving decorations — was made visible against 
 the broader background of the skies, which 
 gained infinitude from the dropping of those 
 evanescent clouds of foliage. But the common 
 mind rejected the idea of the Hill in winter as 
 that place of bliss which it was acknowledged 
 to be during the warmer half of the year. In 
 autumn, however, the ' mistL and mellow fruit- 
 fulness ' of the great plain, the tints of fervid 
 colour which came to the trees, the soft hazy 
 distances and half-mournful brightness of the 
 waning season, gave the place a special beauty. 
 There were still abundant flowers fringing tlie 
 lawn ; blazing red salvias, geraniums, all the-
 
 160 CARITA. 
 
 warm-liued plants tliat reacli the ' fall ; ' big 
 hollyhocks flaunting behind backs, and languish- 
 ing dahlias. Some late roses lingered still ; the 
 air was sweet with the faint soft perfume of 
 mignonette ; petunias, just on the point of top- 
 pling over into decay, made a flutter of white 
 and lilac against the walls, and here and there 
 a bunch of belated honeysuckle, or cluster of 
 jessamine stars out of date, threw themselves 
 forth upon the trelhs. It was on the sweetest 
 mellow autumnal day, warm as July, yet misty 
 as October, that the Miss Beresfords had their 
 last garden-party for Cara. All their parties 
 ivere for Cara ; but this was especially hers, her 
 friends far and near coming to take leave of 
 her, as her life at the Hill terminated. 
 
 ' She goes just at the proper moment,' Miss 
 Charity said, sitting out on the lawn in her 
 white crape shawl, receiving her visitors, with 
 St. George's and all the plain beyond shining 
 through the autumn branches like a picture laid 
 at her feet. ' She takes the full good of us 
 to the last, and when winter comes, which lays 
 us bare, she will be off with the other birds. 
 She lasts just a little longer than the swallows,' 
 said the old lady with a laugh.
 
 THE HILL. 161 
 
 ' But you can't wonder, dear Mrs. Beresford, 
 that she should wish to go to her father. What 
 can come up to a father ? ' said Mrs. Burchell, 
 meaning, it is to be supposed, to smooth over 
 the wound. 
 
 Miss Charity hfted her big green fan omi- 
 nously in her hand. It was closed, and it might 
 have inflicted no slight blow ; and, of all things 
 in the world, it would have pleased the old lady 
 most to bring it down smartly upon that fat hand, 
 stufied desperately into a tight purple glove, 
 and very moist and discoloured by the confine- 
 ment, which rested on the admirable clergy- 
 woman's knee. 
 
 Meanwhile Eoger Burchell, who was bold, 
 and did not miss his chances, had got Cara away 
 from the croquet players and the talk, on pre 
 tence of showing her something. ' I am coming 
 to see you in town,' he said. ' It is as easy to 
 go there as to come here, and I shan't care for 
 coming here when you are gone. So you need 
 not say good-bye to me.' 
 
 'Very well,' said Cara, laughing; 'is that 
 all ? I don't mean to say good-bye to any one. 
 I am not going for good. Of course I shall 
 come back.' 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 162 CAEITA. 
 
 'You will never come back just tlie same/ 
 said Eoger; 'but mind what I tell you. I 
 mean to come to town. I have an aunt at 
 Notting Hill. When I get leave from the col- 
 lege I shall go there. The old lady will be 
 pleased ; and so you shall see me every Sunday, 
 just as you do now.' 
 
 ' Every Simday ! ' said Cara, slightly sur- 
 prised. ' I don't mind, Eoger ; it can't matter 
 to me ; but I don't think they will hke it here.' 
 
 ' They will hke it if you do,' said the enter- 
 prising youth. He was twenty, and soon about 
 to enter on his profession, which was that of an 
 engineer. He was not deeply concerned as to 
 what his parents might feel ; but at the same 
 time he was perfectly confident of their appre- 
 ciation of Cara as an excellent match, should 
 that luck be his. This is not intended to mean 
 that Eoger thought of Cara as a good match. 
 He had, on the contrary, an honest boyish love 
 for her, quite true and genuine, if not of the 
 highest kind. She was the prettiest girl he knew, 
 and the sweetest. She was clever too in her 
 way, though that was not his way. She was the 
 sort of girl to be proud of, wherever you might 
 go with her ; and, in short, Eoger was so fond
 
 THE HILL. 163 
 
 of Cara, that but for that brilhant of idea of his, 
 of passing liis Sundays with his aunt at Notting 
 Hill instead of at home, her departure would 
 have clouded heaven and earth for him. As it 
 was, he felt the new was rather an improvement 
 on the old ; it would throw him into closer con- 
 tact with the object of his love. Cara took the 
 arrangement generally with great composm^e. 
 She was glad enough to think of seeing some 
 one on the dull Sundays ; and somehow the 
 Sundays used to be duller in the Square, where 
 nobody minded them, than at the Hill, where 
 they were kept in the most orthodox way. 
 Thus she had no objection to Eoger's \dsits ; 
 but the prospect did not excite her. ' I suppose 
 you are soon going away somewhere ? ' she said, 
 with great calm. 'Where are you going? to 
 Lidia ? You cannot come from Liclia to your 
 aunt at Notting Hill.' 
 
 ' But I shall not go — not as long as I can 
 help it — not till ' 
 
 Here Eoger looked at her with eager eyes. 
 He was not handsome ; he was stoutly built, 
 like his father, with puffy cheeks and premature 
 black whiskers. But his eyes at the present 
 moment were full of fire. ' Not till — — ' How 
 
 M 2
 
 164 CARITA. 
 
 mucli he meant by that broken phrase ! and to 
 Cara it meant just nothing at all. She did not 
 even look at him, to meet his eyes, which were so 
 full of ardour. But she was not disinclined to 
 loiter along this walk instead of joining the 
 crowd. She was thinking her own thoughts, 
 not his. 
 
 'I wonder if papa will be changed? I 
 wonder if the house will look strange ? I won- 
 der ' said Cara, half under her breath. She 
 
 was not talking to him, yet perhaps if he had 
 not been with her she would not have said the 
 words aloud. He was a kind of shield to her 
 from others, an unconscious half-companion. She 
 did not mind what she said when he was there. 
 Sometimes she rephed to him at random ; often 
 he so answered her, not knowing what she 
 meant. It was from want of comprehension 
 on his part, not want of attention ; but it was 
 simple carelessness on hers. He listened to these 
 wonderings of hers eagerly, with full determi- 
 nation to fathom what she meant. 
 
 ' He will be changed, and so will the house,' 
 said Eoger. ' We may be sure of it. You were 
 but a child when you left ; now you are a — 
 young lady. Even if he was not changed, you 
 would think him so,' cried Eoger, with insight
 
 THE HILL. 165 
 
 which surprised himself ; ' but those who have 
 grown up with you, Cara — I, for instance, who 
 have seen you every day, I can never change. 
 You may think so, but you will be mistaken. I 
 shall always be the same.' 
 
 She turned to look at him, half amused, 
 half wondering. ' You, Eoger ; but what has 
 that to do with it ? ' she said. How little she 
 cared ! She had faith in him : oh, yes ; did not 
 think he would change ; believed he would 
 always be the same. What did it matter ? It 
 did not make her either sadder or gladder to 
 know that it was unlikely there would be any 
 alteration in him. 
 
 ' What are you doing here, Cara, when you 
 ought to be looking after your guests, or play- 
 ing croquet, or amusing yourself ? ' 
 
 ' I am amusing myself, Aunt Cherry, as 
 much as I wish to amuse myself. It is not 
 amusing to go away.' 
 
 ' My darling, we must think of your poor 
 father,' said Miss Cherry, her voice trembling ; 
 ' and there are all your young friends. Will 
 you go and help to form that game, Eoger ? 
 They want a gentleman. Cara, dear, I would 
 rather you did not walk with Eoger Burchell 
 like this, when everybody is here.'
 
 166 CAEITA. 
 
 ' He said he had something to show me/ 
 said Cara. ' I was glad to get away. All this 
 looks so like saying farewell ; as if I might 
 never be here again.' 
 
 ' Cara, if you make me cry, I shall not be 
 fit to be seen ; and we must not make a show 
 of ourselves before all these people.' Miss 
 Cherry pressed her handkerchief to her eyes. 
 ' I am so silly ; my eyes get so red for nothing. 
 What did Eoger have to show you ? He ought 
 to be at work, that boy.' 
 
 ' He has an aunt at dotting Hill,' said Cara, 
 with a soft laugh ; ' and he told me he meant 
 to come to town on Sundays instead of coming 
 here. He says he shall see me quite as often 
 as usual. I suppose he thought I should miss 
 him. Poor Eoger ! if that were all ! ' 
 
 ' But, Cara, we must not allow that,' said 
 Miss Cherry. 'I must speak to his mother. 
 See him every Sunday, as usual ! it is ridiculous ; 
 it must be put a stop to. Eoger Burchell ! a 
 lad who is nobody, who has his way to make 
 in the world, and neither connections, nor 
 fortune, nor any advantage ' 
 
 Here Miss Cherry was arrested by Cara's 
 look turned calmly upon her, without excite-
 
 THE HILL. 167 
 
 ment or anxiety, yet with that half-smile which 
 shows when a young observer has seen the 
 weak point in the elder's discourse. 
 
 ' What should his connections or his fortune 
 have to do with it if he wanted to see me and I 
 wanted to see him ? ' said Car a ; ' we have been 
 friends all our lives. But do not make yourself 
 uneasy, Aunt Cherry ; for though I might, per- 
 haps, like well enough to see Eoger now and 
 then, I don't want him every Sunday. What 
 would papa say ? Eoger thinks Sunday in the 
 Square is like Sunday here — church, and then 
 a stroll, and then church again. You know it 
 was not like that when I was at home before.' 
 
 ' N'o,' said Miss Cherry, with a sigh ; ' but 
 then it was different.' She had her own thoughts 
 as to whose fault that was, and by whose in- 
 fluence James had been led away from natural 
 churchgoiug ; but she was far too loyal, both to 
 the dead and to the living, to show this. ' Cara,' 
 she added, hurriedly, ' in that respect, things will 
 be as you hke best hereafter. You will be the 
 one to settle what Sunday is to be — and what 
 a great many other things are to be. You 
 must reahse what is before you, my dear child.' 
 
 ' I can't reahse Eoger there in papa's library,'
 
 168 CAEITA. 
 
 said Car a, ' or upstairs. Am I to live there ? in 
 tlie drawing-room. Will it never be changed ? * 
 
 ' It is so pretty, Cara — and you would like 
 the things to be as pleased her,' said Miss 
 Cherry, in trembling tones. 
 
 Cara did not make any response — her face 
 wore a doubtful expression, but she did not say 
 anything. She turned her back upon the land- 
 scape, and looked up at the house. ' Shall I 
 never come back just the same?' she said. 
 ' Eoger says so ; but he is not clever — how 
 should he know ? what should change me ? 
 But the Square is not like the Hill,' she added, 
 with a little shiver. ' Papa will not think of 
 me as you do — everything for Cara ; that will 
 make a change.' 
 
 ' But you can think of him,' said Cherry, 
 ' everything for him ; and, perhaps, for a woman 
 that is the happiest way of the two.' 
 
 Once more Cara was silent. Clouds of 
 doubt, of reluctance, of unwilling repugnance,, 
 were floating through her mind. She had a 
 horror and fear of the Square, in which her life 
 was henceforward to be passed — and of her 
 father, of whom she knew so much more than 
 he was aware. For a moment the old tumult
 
 THE HILL. 169 
 
 in her soul about the secret she had never told 
 came surging back upon her, a sudden tide 
 from which she could scarcely escape. ' Come, 
 Aunt Cherry,' she said, suddenly seizing her 
 astonished companion by the arm. ' Come and 
 play for us. We must have a dance on the 
 lawn my last day.'
 
 170 CARITA. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE SQUARE. 
 
 It was a rainy afternoon when Cara reached 
 the Square. It had been settled, against Miss 
 Cherry's will, that she was to go alone. The 
 girl, who was often ' queer,' especially when 
 anything connected with her natural home, lier 
 father's house, was in question, had requested 
 that it should be so — and Miss Charity ap- 
 proved, to whose final decision everything was 
 submitted at Sunninghill. 'Don't interfere 
 with her,' Miss Charity had said ; ' she is like 
 her mother. She has a vein of caprice in her. 
 You never could argue (if you remember) with 
 poor Annie. You had either to give in to her, 
 or to say no once for all, and stick to it. Carry 
 is not like her mother all through — there are 
 gleams of the Beresford in her. But there is a 
 vein of caprice, and I wouldn't cross her, just 
 at this crisis of her hfe.'
 
 THE SQUARE. 17 L 
 
 ' But I don't see why it should be such a 
 crisis. It is a change of scene, to be sure, and 
 leaving us ought to be a trial,' said Miss Cherry, 
 dubiously. The feeling within herself was, 
 that she would have been glad had she been 
 more sure that this was a trial. Girls were un- 
 grateful in their lightheartedness, and sometimes 
 loved the risks of independence. ' It is not as 
 if she were going among strangers,' said Miss 
 Cherry. ' She is going to her home, and to 
 her father.' 
 
 ' A father whom she has never known since 
 she was a child — a house that has never lost 
 the shadow of that dying ! ' 
 
 ' Then why must not I go with her ? ' said 
 Miss Cherry. The old lady shrugged her 
 shoulders, but said no more. And Cara got 
 her way. As she was to go alone, she was 
 packed, Vv^ith all her belongings, into the car- 
 riage ; nurse going with her, who was to help 
 in the housekeeping, and take care of the young 
 mistress of the old familiar house. The rail- 
 way, it is true, would have carried them there 
 in half the time ; but Cara liked the preparation 
 of the long, silent drive, and it pleased the elder 
 ladies that their darling should make her solitary
 
 172 CARITA. 
 
 journey so to lier father's house. The road led 
 through beautiful royal parks, more than one, 
 and by ghmpses of the pleasant river. It was 
 like an old-fashioned expedition made in the 
 days before railways, with full time for all the 
 anticipations, all the dreams, of what was to 
 come. Though her mind was fiill of natural 
 excitement and sadness, Cara could not help 
 feeling herself like one of the heroines of Miss 
 Austen's novels as she drove along. She had 
 plenty of grave matters to think about, and was 
 very much in earnest as to her hfe generally ; 
 yet, with the unconscious doubleness of youth, 
 she could not help feeling only half herself, and 
 half Ehzabeth Bennet or Catherine Moreland 
 going off into the world. And, indeed, without 
 sharing the difficulties of these young ladies, Cara 
 Beresford in her own person had no small pro- 
 blem before her. To fill the place of her mother, 
 an accomphshed woman, she who was only 
 a girl ; to make his home pleasant to her father ; 
 to set agoing once more something like family 
 life. And she only seventeen, and so differently 
 situated, she said to herself, from other girls 1 
 Had she not enough to think of? The trees 
 and the bridges, the gleams of shining river.
 
 THE SQUARE. 173 
 
 the great stretches of wooded country, all glided 
 past her like things in a dream. It was they 
 that were moving, not she. ISTurse talked now 
 and then ; but nurse's talking did not disturb 
 Cara ; she knew by long experience just how 
 to put in convenient ayes and noes, so as to 
 keep the good woman going. And thus she 
 went on, her head full of thoughts. Her difS- 
 oulties were more grave than those which 
 generally fall to the lot of so young a girl — but, 
 nevertheless, with the frivolity of youth, she 
 could feel herself something like Catherine 
 Moreland, hurrying along to Northanger 
 Abbey, and all the wonders and mysteries 
 there. 
 
 She had expected to find her father already 
 arrived and awaiting her ; but he did not come 
 until she had been an hour or two in the house 
 — which Nvas half a relief and half an offence to 
 her. She was received with a kind of worship 
 by John and cook, to whom their young mis- 
 tress, whom they had only known as a child, 
 was a wonder and dehght, and who mingled a 
 greater degree of affectionate familiarity with 
 the awe they ought to have felt for her than 
 was quite consistent with Cara's dignity. They
 
 174 CARITA. 
 
 were anxious to pet and make much of her on 
 her arrival — cook hurrying upstairs, unneces- 
 sarily Cara thought, to show how prettily her 
 room had been prepared ; and John bringing 
 her tea, with cake and the daintiest bread and 
 butter, and a broad smile of pleasure on his 
 face. Cara thought it incumbent upon her to 
 send away the cake and bread and butter, 
 taking only the tea, to prove beyond all power 
 of misconception that she was no longer a child 
 — but she was sorry for it after, when John, 
 protesting and horrified, had carried it away 
 downstairs again. Still, though one is shghtly 
 hungry, it is best to keep up one's dignity, and 
 ' begin,' as Aunt Cherry said, ' as you meant to 
 go on.' Cara would not let herself be governed 
 by old servants, that she had determined — and 
 it was best to show them at once that this could 
 not be. 
 
 Then she went up with some shrinking, 
 feeling like a sea - bather making the first 
 plunge, into the drawing-room, which no one 
 had used for the last five years. She was 
 obliged to confess that it was very pretty, 
 notwithstandincr that it friditened her. She 
 half expected some one to rise from the chair
 
 THE SQUAEE. 175 
 
 before the first newly-lighted October fire to 
 receive her as she went in. The little cabinets, 
 the pretty brackets for the china, the scraps of 
 old lace upon the velvet, the glimmer of old, 
 dim, picturesque mirrors, the subdued yet 
 brilliant colour in the bits of tapestry, all 
 moved her to admiration. At Sunninghill they 
 had, as became a lady's house, many pretty 
 things, but with as little idea of art as it is 
 possible in the present day to succeed in having. 
 Miss Cherry knew nothing of art ; and it had 
 been invented, Miss Charity thought, since her 
 days, which was the time when people liked to 
 have respectable sohd furniture, and did not 
 understand aesthetics. The graceful balance 
 and harmony of this new old house gave Cara 
 a new sensation of admiring pleasure — and yet 
 she did not like it. It would be hard to tell 
 what was the cause of the painful impression 
 which prejudiced her mind — yet there it was. 
 Her own mother — her dead mother — that 
 visionary figure, half nurse, half goddess, which 
 gives a quite visionary support and consolation 
 to some motherless children, did not exist for 
 Cara. She remembered how she had been 
 sent off to the Hill when they went away to
 
 176 CARITA. 
 
 enjoy themselves, and how she had been sent 
 off to the nursery when they sat talking 
 to each other. It had been a happy home, 
 and she had been petted and made much 
 of by times — but this was what she recollected 
 most clearly. And then there rose up before 
 her, intensified by distance, that scene in her 
 mother's room, which she had never confided to 
 any one. She resented this mystery that was 
 in the past, which returned and wrapped her 
 in a kind of mist when she came back. Why 
 had not her parents been straightforward 
 people, with no mysteries such, as Cara said to 
 herself, she hated ? Why was there a skeleton 
 in the cupboard? All the things she had read 
 in books about this had made Cara angry, and 
 it vexed her to the heart to feel and know that 
 there was one in her home. She had buried 
 the secret so completely in her own bosom that 
 it had made an aching spot all round it where 
 it lay: like that bit of a garden which Hes 
 under a noxious shadow — hke that bit of a 
 field where a fire has been — was this place in 
 her heart where her secret lay. She felt it, in 
 all its force, when she came home. At the 
 Hill there were no secrets; they Hved with
 
 THE SQUARE. 177 
 
 their windows open and their hearts, fearing 
 no sudden appearance, no discovery. But here 
 it seemed that the old trouble had been waiting 
 all these years, till the girl went back who 
 alone knew all about it, the father's past and 
 the mother's past ; and even the atmosphere of 
 the long-shut-up house felt pernicious. Cara 
 did not like to look round her as it came to 
 be dark, lest she see some one sitting in the 
 corner in the shadow. It seemed to her more 
 than once that somebody moved in the dis- 
 tance, going out or coming in, with a sweep 
 of a long skirt, just disappearing as she looked 
 up. This meant, I suppose (or at least so many 
 people would say), that her digestion was not 
 in such good order as it should have been — 
 but digestion was not a thing which came 
 within Cara's range of thought. 
 
 Her father arrived about half-past six by 
 the Continental train. Cara stood at the door 
 of the drawing-room, with her heart beating, 
 wondering if she ought to run down and re- 
 ceive him, or if he would come to her. She 
 heard him ask if she had come, and then he 
 added, ' I will go to my room at once, John. 
 I suppose dinner is nearly ready. I did not. 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 178 CARITA. 
 
 expect to have been so late. Bring my things 
 to my room.' 
 
 ' Shall I call Miss Cara, sir ? ' 
 
 ' Fo ; never mind. I shall see her at 
 dinner,' he said. 
 
 And Cara instinctively closed the drawing- 
 room door at which she had been standing, as 
 she heard him begin to come up the stairs. 
 She stood there, with her heart beating, in case 
 he should call her ; but he did not. Then she 
 too went to dress, with a chilled and stifled 
 sensation, the first sense of repulse which she 
 had ever experienced. When she was ready, 
 she went back again very quickly and noise- 
 lessly, leaving the door open. By-and-by her 
 father's step became audible coming down, and 
 he paused when he got to the door ; but then 
 resumed and went on again, sending her word 
 that she would find him in the dining-room. It 
 was unreasonable, the high swelling of ofience 
 and injured pride that she felt in her heart — 
 but there it was. Was this how he meant to 
 use her— her, his only child — now the mistress 
 of his house? She went down, after an in- 
 terval of proud and painful reluctance, a slim, 
 girlish creature, in her white dress, her blue
 
 THE SQUARE. 179 
 
 eyes somewhat strained and large, more widely 
 opened tlian was consistent with perfect com- 
 posure. She was not beautiful, like her mother. 
 A certain visionary youthful severity was in 
 her looks. She was different altogether, diffe- 
 rent in every way, from the pet and darling of 
 the ladies at the Hill. Her father had not seen 
 her since she had leaped into long dresses and 
 young-womanhood, and he was startled by the 
 change. Involuntarily, as he looked at her, 
 her mother s description of the child Cara came 
 back to his mind. Perhaps he was all the 
 more quick to notice this that his eye had been 
 caught as he paused at the drawing-room door 
 by the last purchase he had made in bric-a- 
 brac, the Buen Eetiro cup, of which his wife n 
 had said playfully that Cara would insist that 
 he should tell the dealer the exact value before 
 he bought it. This strange idea brought a half 
 smile to his face, and yet his memories were so 
 far from smiling. The cup had been broken 
 to bits in the careless packing of that last 
 journey home, when bric-a-brac had lost all 
 interest in the gathering mists of suffering 
 and despondency — and then afterwards, in an 
 interval of apparent improvement, had been 
 
 IX 2
 
 180 CAEITA. 
 
 carefully put together and placed on a shelf, 
 high up, where its imperfections were not 
 visible. It was the sight of it which had kept 
 Beresford from going into the room. He would 
 have made the effort for Cara's sake, he thought, 
 but that this rehc, so connected with the last 
 chapter of all, had thrust that recollection upon 
 him. He had never entered poor Annie's 
 drawing-room since the week she died. 
 
 ' Well, Cara, my dear, I am glad to see you,'' 
 he said, putting his arm round his daughter, 
 and kissing her. ' You must forgive me for 
 not coming upstairs. How you have grown ! — 
 or rather, you have become a young lady all at 
 once. I don't know that you are much taller.' 
 
 ' No ; I have not grown,' said Cara. ' I 
 suppose the long dress makes a difference. It 
 is that, perhaps.' 
 
 ' Yes,' he said. ' Sit down, my dear ; dinner 
 waits. I have had a long journey, and I want 
 something. I never eat much when I am tra- 
 velling. I came by Dieppe, which is a route 
 I detest. Ah, I forgot ! You have never been 
 across the Channel yet, Cara.' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 They both recollected why — and that ' the
 
 THE SQUAEE. 181 
 
 next expedition ' after those long honeymooning 
 travels was to have been accompanied by ' the 
 child.' Cara remembered this with a certain 
 bitterness ; her father merely with melancholy 
 sentiment. 
 
 ' Ah ! ' he said, vaguely, ' we must mend 
 that — some day. And how are the aunts? 
 I can fancy that my sister looks just as she 
 always did. She and I are at the age when 
 people change little. But Aunt Charity ? she is 
 getting quite an old Avoman now — over seventy 
 Have you been dull in the country, Cara ? or 
 have they petted you so much that you will 
 feel it dull to be here ? ' 
 
 He looked at her with a smile which lit up 
 his face, and touched her heart just a little; but 
 the question touched something else than her 
 heart — her pride and sense of importance. 
 
 ' I was not dull,' she said. ' One is not dull 
 when one has something to do — and is with 
 those whom one loves.' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' he said, looking at her with a little 
 curiosity ; ' that is a better way of putting it, 
 certainly,' he added, with a smile. 
 
 Then there was a pause. John, behind Mr. 
 Eeresford's chair, who had been in the house
 
 ib2 CAEITA. 
 
 when Cara was born, and who thought he knew 
 his master thoroughly, had much ado not to 
 interfere, to whisper some instructions in her 
 father's ear as to how a child hke this should 
 be dealt with, or to breathe into Cara's an en- 
 treaty that she would humour her papa. He 
 said to his wife afterwards that to see them two 
 sitting, pretending to eat their dinners, and 
 never speaking, no more nor if they were wax 
 images — or, when they did talk, talking like 
 company — made him that he didn't know 
 whether he was standing on his head or his 
 heels. How many hints our servants could 
 give us if decorum permitted their interference ! 
 John felt himself a true friend of both parties, 
 anxious to bring them as near to each other 
 as they ought to be ; but he knew tha-t it would 
 have been as much as his place was worth had 
 he ventured to say anything. So he stood 
 regretfully, wistfully, behind backs and looked 
 on. If he could but have caught Miss Cara's 
 eye ! but he did not, not even when, in the 
 confusion of his feelings, he offered her mustard 
 instead of sugar with her pudding. Her feehngs 
 were so confused also that she never noticed 
 the mistake. Thus the dinner passed with
 
 THE SQUAEE. 183 
 
 nothing but the sparest company conversation. 
 There were but these two in the world of their 
 immediate family, therefore they had no safe 
 neutral ground of brothers and sisters to talk 
 about. 
 
 ' Is your room comfortable ? ' Mr. Beres- 
 ford said, when they had got through a com- 
 fortless meal. 'If I had been here sooner, I 
 should have refurnished it; but you must 
 do it yourself, Cara, and please your own 
 taste.' 
 
 ' I don't think I have any taste,' she said. 
 
 ' Ah, well ! — perhaps it does not matter 
 much ; but the things that pleased you at ten 
 will scarcely please you at seventeen. Seven- 
 teen are you ? and out^ I suppose ? One might 
 have been sure of that. Cherry would have 
 no peace till she had you to go to parties with 
 her.' 
 
 ' We very rarely go to parties,' said Cara, 
 with dignity. 'Of course at seventeen one is 
 grown up. One does not require parties to 
 prove that.' 
 
 He looked at her again, and this time 
 laughed. ' I am afraid you are very positive 
 and very decided,' he said. ' I don't think it is
 
 184 CAEITA. 
 
 necessary, my dear, to be so sure of everything. 
 You must not think T am finding fault.' 
 
 Her heart swelled — what else could she 
 think ? She did not wish, however, to appear 
 angry, which evidently was impolitic, but shifted 
 the subject to her father's recent travels, on 
 which there was much to be said. ' Are you 
 going to the geographical meeting? Are they 
 to have one expressly for you, like last year ? ' 
 she said, not without a hidden meaning, of 
 which he was conscious in spite of himself. 
 
 ' You know what they said last year ? Of 
 course there was no reason for it ; for I am not 
 an explorer, and discovered nothing ; but how 
 could I help it ? No ; there will be no meeting 
 this time, thank Heaven.' 
 
 And he saw that a faint little smile came 
 upon Cara's lips. Instead of being delighted to 
 see that her father had come to such honour, 
 this little creature had thought it humbug. So 
 it was — but it galled him to know that his 
 daughter felt it to be so. Had she laughed out, 
 and given him an account of the scene at the 
 Hill ; how Aunt Cherry had read the account 
 out of the papers with such joy and pleasure ; 
 and Aunt Charity had wiped her spectacles
 
 THE SQUARE. 185 
 
 and taken the paper herself to read the record 
 of his vahant deeds — the httle family joke would 
 have drawn them together, even if it had been 
 half at his expense. But no man likes to feel 
 that his claims to honour are judged coolly by 
 his immediate belongings, and the Httle remark 
 wounded him. This, he said to himself, was 
 not the sort of sweet girl who would make the 
 house once more a home to him. He let her 
 go upstairs without saying anything of his 
 further intentions for the evening. And Cara 
 felt that she had been unsuccessful in the key- 
 note she had struck ; though without blaming 
 herself seriously, for, after all, it was he and not 
 she who ought to have struck this key-note. 
 She went upstairs in a little flutter of dissatis- 
 faction with herself and him. But, as soon as 
 she had got upstairs, Cara, with true feminine 
 instinct, began to make Httle overtures of recon- 
 ciliation. She went round the room to see 
 what could be done to make it more homelike. 
 She lighted the candles on the mantelpiece, and 
 placed some books uppermost on the table, 
 about which she could talk to him. She was 
 not fond of work in her own person, but she had 
 read in good story-books that needlework was
 
 186 CAHITA. 
 
 one of the accessories to an ideal scene of 
 domesticity — therefore, she hunted up a piece of 
 work and an oft-mislaid case with thimble and 
 scissors, and placed them ready on a little table. 
 Then she called John, softly, as he went up- 
 stairs, to ask him if her father took tea, or 
 rather, when he took tea, the possibihty of 
 leaving out that ceremonial altogether not 
 having occurred to her. 
 
 ' If you please, miss,' said John, 'with a 
 deprecating air, ' master has had his cup of 
 coffee, and he's gone out. I think he ain't gone 
 no further than next door ; and I'll make bold 
 to say as he'll be back — soon,' said John. 
 
 Cara went back to her chair, without a 
 word ; her heart beat high — her face grew 
 crimson in spite of herself. She retreated to 
 her seat and took up a book, and began to 
 read at a furious pace. She did not very well 
 know what it was about ; but she had read a 
 long chapter before John, going downstairs and 
 then coming up again in a middle-aged, respect- 
 able butler's leisurely way, could place the httle 
 tea-tray on the table near her. There was but 
 one cup. It was evident that she was expected 
 to take this refreshment alone. She save a
 
 THE SQUARE. 187 
 
 little good-liumoured nod at the man as he 
 looked round, with the comprehensive glance of 
 his class, to see if anything wanted removal — 
 and went on reading. The book was about 
 unconscious cerebration, and other not highly 
 intelhgible things. Some of the phrases in it 
 got entangled, like the strav/s and floating rub- 
 bish on a stream, with the touch of wild com- 
 motion in her mind, and so lived in her after 
 this mood and a great many others had passed 
 away. She went on reading till she had heard 
 John go down, and reach his own regions at 
 the bottom of the stairs. Then she put the 
 book down, and looked up, as if to meet the 
 look of some one else who would understand 
 her. Poor child ! and there was no one there. 
 This was Cara's first night in the Square.
 
 188 GAEITA. 
 
 CHAPTEE XI. 
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 
 
 It was Mrs. Meredith who Kved next door — an 
 old friend, who was the only person Mrs. Beres- 
 ford had permitted to come and see her when 
 «he returned ill, and of whom Miss Cherry had 
 felt with confidence that Cara would find a 
 friend in her. She had lived there almost ever 
 since Cara was born, with her two sons, boys a 
 little older than Cara ; a pretty gentle woman, 
 ' not clever,' her fi:iends said — ' silly,' according 
 to some critics, of whom poor Annie Beresford 
 had been one — ^but very popular everywhere 
 and pleasant ; a woman whom most people 
 were glad to know. It would be hard to say 
 exactly in what her charm lay. There were 
 handsomer women than she to be met with by 
 the score who were much less beloved — and as 
 for her mind, it scarcely counted at all in the 
 estimate of her merits. But she was kind, sym-
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 18^ 
 
 pathetic, sweet-mannered — affectionate and ca- 
 ressing when it was becoming to be so — smihng: 
 and friendly everywhere. Great talkers liked 
 her, for she would listen to them as if she en- 
 joyed it ; and silent people liked her, for she 
 did not look bored by their side, but would 
 make a httle play of little phrases, till they felt 
 themselves actually amusing. She had very 
 sweet liquid brown eyes — not too bright or 
 penetrating, but sympathetic always — and a soft, 
 pretty white hand. She was not young, nor did 
 she look younger than she was^; but her sym- 
 pathies flowed so readily, and her looks were sa 
 friendly, that she belonged to the younger part 
 of the world always by natural right. Her boys 
 were her chief thought and occupation. One 
 of them was six, one four years older than Cara ;. 
 so that Oswald was three-and-twenty and Ed- 
 ward on the eve of his majority when the girl 
 arrived at her father's house. Mrs. Meredith's 
 perpetual occupation with these boys, her happi- 
 ness in their hohday times, her melancholy when 
 they went to school, had kept her friends in- 
 terested for a number of years. Men who 
 breathed sighs of relief when the terrible period 
 of the hohdays came to an end, and their own
 
 190 CARITA. 
 
 schoolboys were got rid of, put on soft looks of 
 pity when they heard that Oswald and Edward 
 were gone too ; and mothers who were them- 
 selves too thankful that no drownings or shoot- 
 ings, not even a broken collar-bone or a sprained 
 ankle, had marked the blissful vacations in their 
 own house, half cried with Mrs. Meredith over 
 the silence of hers ' when the boys were away.' 
 They came and carried her off to family dinners, 
 and made little parties to keep her from feeling 
 it; as if there had been no boys in the world 
 but those two.^ ' For you know her circum- 
 stances are so peculiar,' her friends said. The 
 peculiarity of her circumstances consisted in this, 
 that, though she had lived alone for these fifteen 
 years in the Square, she was not a widow — 
 neither was she a separated or in any way 
 blameable wife. All that could be said was that 
 the circumstances were very peculiar. She who 
 was so sweet, whom everybody liked, did not 
 somehow ' get on ' with her husband. " Abody 
 likes me but my man,' said a Scotch fisher- 
 woman in a similar position. Mrs. Meredith did 
 not commit herself even to so terse a descrip- 
 tion. She said nothing at all about it. Mr. 
 Meredith was in India — though whether he had 
 always been there, or had judiciously retired to
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 191 
 
 that wide place, in consequence of his inabihty 
 to get on with the most universally-hked of 
 women, it was not generally known. But there 
 he was. He had been known to come home 
 twice within the fifteen years, and had paid a 
 visit at the Square among other visits he had 
 paid — and his wife's friends had found no par- 
 ticular objections to him. But he had gone 
 back again, and she had remained, placidly 
 living her independent life. She was well off. 
 Her boys were at Harrow first, and then at the 
 University, where Edward still was disporting 
 himself; though he had just got through his 
 examination for the Indian Civil Service, and 
 had more practical work in prospect. Oswald, 
 who had ended his career at Oxford, was living 
 at home ; but even the grown-up son in the 
 house had not removed any of her popularity. 
 She had a perpetual levee every afternoon. Not 
 a morning passed that two or three ladies did 
 not rusli in, in the sacred hours before luncheon, 
 when nobody is out, to tell her or ask her about 
 something ; and the husbands would drop in on 
 their way from business, from their offices or 
 clubs, just for ten minutes before they went 
 home. This was how her life was spent — and 
 though sometimes she woukl speak of that life
 
 192 CAEITA. 
 
 despondently, as one passed under a perpetual 
 shadow, yet, in fact, it was a very pleasant, en- 
 tertaining, genial life. To be sure, had she been 
 passionately attached to the absent Mr. Mere- 
 dith, she might have found drawbacks in it ; 
 but, according to appearances, this was scarcely 
 the case, and perhaps never had been. 
 
 This lady was the first visitor Cara had in 
 the Square. She came in next morning, about 
 twelve o'clock, when the girl was languidly 
 wondering what was to become of her. Cara 
 had not spent a cheerful morning. Her father 
 had come to breakfast, and had talked to her a 
 little about ordinary matters, and things that 
 were in the newspaper. He was as much 
 puzzled as a man could be what to do with this 
 seventeen-year-old girl whom he had sent for, 
 as a matter of course, when he himself came 
 home to settle, but whom now he found likely 
 to be an interruption to all his habits. He did 
 not know Cara, and was somehow uneasy in her 
 presence, feeling in her a suspicion and distrust 
 of himself which he could by no means account 
 for. And Cara did not know him, except that 
 she did distrust and suspect him, yet expected 
 somethincr from him, she could not tell what ;
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 193 
 
 something better than the talk about colhsions 
 and shipwrecks in the papers. She tried to 
 respond, and the breakfast was not a sullen or 
 silent meal. But what a contrast it was from 
 tlie bright table at the Hill, with the windows 
 open to the lawn, and all the spontaneous happy- 
 talk, which was not made up for any one, but 
 flowed naturally, like the air they breathed ! 
 Mr. Beresford was much more accomplished 
 than Aunt Cherry ; a clever man, instead of the 
 mild old maiden whom everybody smiled at, 
 
 but All this went through Cara's mind 
 
 as she poured out his coffee, and listened to his 
 account of the new steamboat. There was a 
 perfect ferment of thought going on in her 
 brain while she sat opposite to him, saying yes 
 and no, and now and then asking a question, 
 by way of showing a little interest. She was 
 asking herself how things would have been if 
 her mother had lived ; how they would have 
 talked then : whether they would have admitted 
 her to any share in the talk, or kept her outside, 
 as they had done when she was a child ? All 
 these questions were jostling each other in her 
 mind, and misty scenes rising before her, one 
 confusing and mixing up with the other ; the 
 VOL. I.
 
 194 CAEITA. 
 
 same breakfast-table, as she remembered it of old, 
 when the father and mother in their talk would 
 sometimes not hear her questions, and some- 
 times say, ' Don't tease, child,' and sometimes 
 bid her run away to the nursery ; and as it 
 might have been with her mother still sitting 
 by, and herself a silent third person. Mr. 
 Beresford had not a notion what the thoughts 
 were which were going on under Cara's pretty 
 hair, so smoothly wound about her head, and 
 shining in the autumn sunshine, and under the 
 pretty dark blue morning dress which ' threw 
 up,' as Cherry meant it to do, the girl's white- 
 ness and brightness. She could make him out 
 to some degree, only putting more meaning in 
 him than he was himself at all aware of; but 
 he could not make out her. Did thought dwell 
 at all in such well-shaped little heads, under 
 hau" so carefully coiled and twisted ? He did 
 not know, and could no more divine her than if 
 she had been the Sphinx in person ; but Cara, 
 if she went wrong, did so by putting too much 
 meaning into him. 
 
 When breakfast was over, he rose up, still 
 holding his paper in his hand. ' I am afraid 
 you will feel the want of your usual occupa-
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 195 
 
 tioDS,' he said. ' Lessons are over for you, I 
 suppose ? It is very early to give up education. 
 Are you reading anything ? You must let me 
 know Avhat you have been doing, and if I can 
 help you.' 
 
 How helpless he looked standing there, in- 
 specting her ! but he did not look so helpless as 
 he felt. How was he, a man who had never 
 done any of hfe's ordinary duties, to take the 
 super\^sion of a girl into his hands ? If she had 
 been a boy, he might have set her down by his 
 side (the confusion of pronouns is inevitable) to 
 work at Greek — a Greek play, for instance, 
 which is always useful ; but he supposed music 
 and needlework would be what she was thinking 
 of. No ; if she had been a boy, he would have 
 done better than take her to his study and set 
 her down to a Greek play ; he could have sent 
 her to the University, like Edward Meredith, 
 like every properly educated young man. But 
 a girl of seventeen, he had always understood, 
 was of an age to take the control of her father's 
 house — was ' out ' — a being to be taken into 
 society, to sit at the head of his table (though 
 rather young) ; and the idea that she might 
 require occupation or instruction between the 
 o2
 
 196 CAE>TA. 
 
 moments of discharging these necessary duties 
 had not occurred to him. It did now, however, 
 quite suddenly. What was she going to do? 
 When he went into his hbrary, she would go to 
 the drawing-room. Would she take her needle- 
 work ? would she go to the long disused piano ? 
 What would the young strange female creature 
 do? 
 
 ' Thank you, papa,' said Cara ; which was of 
 all others the most bewildering reply she could 
 have given him. He gazed at her again, and 
 then went away in his utter helplessness. 
 
 'You v^ill find me in the library, if you 
 want me,' he said aloud. But in himself he 
 said, with more confidence, ' Mrs. Meredith will 
 know ; ' or rather, perhaps, if the truth must be 
 said, he thought, ' She will know. She will see 
 at once what ought to be done. She will tell 
 me all about it to-night ! ' And with this con- 
 solation he went into his library and betook 
 himself to his important morning's work. He 
 had to verify a quotation, which he thought had 
 been WTongly used in his friend Mr. Fortis' book 
 about Africa. He had to write to one or two 
 Fellows of his pet Society, about a series of lec- 
 tures on an interesting point of comparative
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 197 
 
 science, which lie thought the great authority on 
 the subject might be persuaded to give. He had 
 to write to Mr. Sienna Brown about a Titian 
 which had been repainted and very much in- 
 jured, and about which he had been asked to 
 give his opinion by the noble proprietor, whom 
 he had met on his return home. It will be per- 
 ceived that it would have been a serious disad- 
 vantage to public interests had Mr. Beresford 
 been required to withdraw his thoughts from 
 such important matters, and occupy them with 
 the education of an unremarkable girl. 
 
 And Cara went upstairs. She had already 
 seen cook, who had kindly told her what she 
 thought would be ' very nice ' for dinner, and 
 had agreed humbly ; but had not, perhaps, 
 been quite so humble when cook entreated 
 ' jyiiss Cara, dear,' with the confidence of an old 
 servant, not to be frightened, and assured her 
 that she'd soon get to know her papa's ways. 
 
 When she got to the drawing-room, she 
 went first to the windows and looked out, and 
 thought that a few more plants in the balcony 
 would be an advantage, and recollected how 
 she used to play in the Square, and gave a side- 
 long glance at the railings of next door, won-
 
 198 CARITA. 
 
 dering whether ' the boys ' were at home, and 
 if they had chaDged. Then she came in, and 
 went to the fire, and looked at herself and the 
 big silent room behind her in the great mirror 
 over the mantelpiece. Cara was not vain — it 
 was not to see how she looked that she gazed 
 wistfully into that reflection of the room in 
 which she was standing, so rich and full with all 
 its pictures, its china, its tapestries and deco- 
 rations confronting her like a picture, with one 
 lonely little girl in it, in a dark blue dress and 
 white collar, and big, sad, strained blue eyes. 
 What a forlorn little thing that girl seemed ! 
 nobody to interchange looks with even, except 
 herself in the glass ; and the room so crowded 
 with still life, so destitute of everything else : 
 so rich, so warm, so beautiful, so poor, so des- 
 titute, so lonely ! What was she to do with 
 herself for the long, solitary day ? She could 
 not go out, unless she went with nurse, as she 
 used to do when she was a child. She was an 
 open-air girl, loving freedom, and had been used 
 to roam about as she pleased in the sweet woods 
 about the Hill. You may imagine how lost the 
 poor child felt herself in those stony regions 
 round the Square.
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 199 
 
 And it was just then that Mrs. Meredith 
 arrived. She came ni, rusthng in her pretty 
 rich silk gown, which was dark blue too, like 
 Cara's. She came and took the girl into her 
 kind arms and kissed her. ' If I had known 
 when you were coming yesterday, I should have 
 been here to receive you,' she said ; ' my poor, 
 dear child, coming back all by yourself ! Why 
 did not Aunt Cherry come with you, to get 
 you a little used to it before you were left 
 alone ? ' 
 
 ' We thought it was best,' said Cara, feeling 
 all at once that she had brought the greatest 
 part of her troubles on herself. ' We thought 
 papa would like it best.' 
 
 ' Now, my dear,' said Mrs. Meredith, giving 
 her a kiss, and then shaking a pretty finger at 
 her, ' you must not begin by making a bugbear 
 of papa. What he wishes is that you should be 
 happy. Don't look sad, my darling. Ah, yes, 
 I know it is a trial coming back here ! It is a 
 trial to me even,' said Mrs. Meredith, looking 
 round and drying her soft eyes, ' to come into 
 your poor mamma's room, and see everything 
 as she left it ; and think what a trial it must be 
 to Azm, Cara ? '
 
 200 CARITA. 
 
 ' He has never been here,' said the girl, half 
 melted, half resisting. 
 
 ' Poor soul ! ' said Mrs. Meredith. ' Poor 
 man ! Oh, Cara ! if it be hard for you, think 
 what it is for him ! You are only a child, and 
 you have all your life before you, you dear 
 young happy thing.' 
 
 ' I am not so very happy.' 
 
 ' For the moment, my darling ; but wait a 
 little, wait,' said the kind woman, her eyes 
 lighting up — ' till the boys come home. There, 
 you see what a foolish woman I am, Cara. I 
 think everything mends when the boys come 
 home. I ought to say when Edward comes 
 home, to be sure, fori have Oswald with me now. 
 But Edward always was your friend ; don't you 
 remember ? Oswald was older ; but it makes a 
 great difference somehow when they are men, 
 A man and a boy are two different things ; and 
 it is the boy that I like the best. But I have 
 been so calculating upon you, my dear. You 
 must run in half-a-dozen times a day. You 
 must send for me whenever you want me. You 
 must walk with me when I go out. I have no 
 daughter, Cara, and you have no mother. Come, 
 darling, shall it be a bargain? '
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 201 
 
 The tears were in this sweet woman's eyes, 
 whom everybody loved. Perhaps she did not 
 mean every word she said — who does ? but 
 there was a general truth of feeling in it all, 
 that kept her right. Cara ran straight into her 
 arms, and cried upon her shoulder. Perhaps 
 because she was frightened and distrustful in 
 other particulars of her life, she was utterly be- 
 lievinsr here. Here was the ideal for which she 
 had looked — a friend, who yet should be some- 
 thing more than a friend ; more tender than 
 Cara could remember her mother to have been, 
 yet something like what an ideal mother, a 
 mother of the imagination, would be. Sweet 
 looks, still beautiful, the girl thought in the en- 
 thusiasm of her age, yet something subdued and 
 mild with experience — an authority, a know- 
 ledge, a power which no contemporary could 
 have. Cara abandoned herself in utter and 
 total forgetfulness of all prejudices, resistances, 
 and doubts, to this new influence. Her mother's 
 friend, the boys* mother, who had been her own 
 playmates, and about whom she was so curious, 
 without knowing it — her nearest neighbour, her 
 natural succour, a daughterless woman, while 
 she was a motherless girl. Happiness seemed
 
 202 CARITA. 
 
 to come back to her with a leap. ' I shall not 
 mind if I may always come to you, and ask you 
 about everything,' she said. 
 
 ' And of course you must do that. Did not 
 Cherry tell you so ? I thought Cherry would 
 have been faithful to me. Ah ! she did ? then 
 I am happy, dear ; for if I have one weakness 
 more than another it is that my friends should 
 not give me up. But Cherry should have come 
 with you,' said Mrs. Meredith, shaking her 
 head. 
 
 ' It was all for papa ' 
 
 ' But that is what I find fault with — papa's 
 only daughter, only child, thinking for a mo- 
 ment that her happiness was not what he wanted 
 most.' 
 
 Cara drooped her guilty head. She was 
 guilty ; yes, she did not deny it ; but probably 
 this goddess-woman, this ideal aid and suc- 
 cour, did not know how little in the happier 
 days had been thought of Cara. She had always 
 thought of ' the boys ' first of all ; but then Mr. 
 Meredith — Cara had an odd sort of recollection 
 somehow that Mr. Meredith was not first, and 
 that perhaps this might account for the other 
 differences. So she did not say anything, but
 
 MRS. MEREDITH. 203 
 
 sat down on a stool at her new-old friend's feet, 
 and felt that the strange, rich, beautiful room 
 had become home. 
 
 ' Now I never could do anything like this,' 
 said Mrs. Meredith, looking round. ' I am fond 
 of china too ; but I never know what is good 
 and what is bad; and sometimes I see your 
 papa take down a bit which I think beautiful, 
 and look at it with such a face. How is one to 
 know,' she said, laughing merrily, ' if one is not 
 clever ? I got the book with all the marks in 
 it, but, my dear child, I never recollect one of 
 them ; and then such quantities of pretty china 
 are never marked at all. Ah, I can understand 
 why he doesn't come here ! I think I would 
 make little changes, Cara. Take down that, for 
 instance' — and she pointed at random to the 
 range of velvet-covered shelves, on the apex of 
 which stood the Buen Eetiro cup — ' and put a 
 picture in its place. Confuse him by a few 
 changes. Now stop : is he in ? I think we 
 might do it at once, and then we could have 
 him up.' 
 
 Cara shrank perceptibly. She drew herself 
 a little away from the stranger's side. ' You are 
 frightened,' cried Mrs. Meredith, with a soft
 
 204 CARITA. 
 
 laiigli. ' Now, Cara, Cara, this is exactly what 
 I tell you must not be. You don't know how 
 good and gentle he is. I can talk to him of 
 anything — even my servants, if I am in trouble 
 with them ; and every woman in London, who 
 is not an angel, is in trouble with her servants 
 from time to time. Last time my cook left 
 
 me Why, there is nothing,' said Mrs. 
 
 Meredith, reflectively, ' of which I could not 
 talk to your papa. He is kindness itself.' 
 
 This was meant to be very reassuring, but 
 somehow it did not please Cara. A half resent- 
 ment (not so distinct as that) came into her 
 mind that her father, who surely belonged to 
 her, rather than to any other person on the face 
 of the earth, should be thus explained to her 
 and recommended. The feeling was natural, 
 but painful, and somewhat absurd, for there 
 could be no doubt that she did not know him, 
 and apparently Mrs. Meredith did ; and what 
 she said was wise ; only somehow it jarred 
 upon Cara, who was sensitive all over, and felt 
 every touch, now here, now there. 
 
 ' Well, my dear, never mind, if you don't 
 like it, for to-day ; but the longer it is put off 
 the more difficult it will be. Whatever is to be
 
 MES. MEREDITH. 205 
 
 done oiiglit to be done at once I always think. 
 He should not have taken a panic about this 
 room ; why should he ? Poor dear Annie ! 
 everything she loved ought to be dear to him ; 
 that would be my feeling. And Cara, dear, 
 you might do a great deal ; you might remove 
 this superstition for ever, for I do think it is 
 superstition. However, if you wish me to say 
 no more about it, I will hold my tongue. And 
 now what shall we do to-day ? Shall we go out 
 after luncheon ? As soon as you have given 
 your papa his lunch, you shall put on your 
 things, and I will call for you. My people never 
 begin to come before four ; and you shall come 
 in with me and see them. That will amuse 
 you, for there are all sorts of people. And your 
 papa and you are going to dine with us ; I told 
 him last night you must come. You will see 
 Oswald and renew your acquaintance with him, 
 and ^ve can talk. Oswald is very good-looking, 
 Cara. Do you remember him? he has dark 
 hair now and dark eyes ; but I wish he had al- 
 ways remained a boy ; though of course that is 
 not possible,' she said, shaking her head with a 
 sigh. ' Now I must run away, and get through 
 my morning's work. No, don't disturb your
 
 206 CARITA. 
 
 papa ; evening is his time. I shall see him in 
 the evening. But be sure you are ready to go 
 out at half-past two.' 
 
 How little time there seemed to be for 
 moping or thinking after this visit ! Cara made 
 a rapid survey of the drawing-room when she 
 returned to it, to see what changes could be 
 made, as her friend suggested. She would not 
 have had the courage to do any such thing, had 
 it not been suggested to her. It was her father's 
 room, not hers ; and what right had she to 
 meddle ? But somewhat a different hght seemed 
 to have entered with her visitor. Cara saw, too, 
 when she examined, that changes could be 
 made which would make everything different, 
 yet leave everything fundamentally the same. 
 Her heart fluttered a little at the thought of 
 such daring. She might have taken such a 
 thing upon her at the Hill, without thinking 
 whether or not she had a right to do it ; but 
 then she never could have had time to move 
 anything without Miss Charity or Miss Cherry 
 coming in, in the constant cheery intercourse of 
 the house. But for these changes she would 
 have abundant time ; no one would come to 
 inspect while her rearrangements were going
 
 ]MES. MEREDITH. 207 
 
 on . However, there was no time to think of them 
 now; the day was busy and full. She came 
 downstairs for luncheon with her bonnet on, 
 that she might not be too late. ' I am going 
 out with Mrs. Meredith,' she said to her father, 
 in explanation of her out-of-door costume. 
 
 ' Ah, that is right ' he said. 'And we are 
 to dine there this evening.' Even he looked 
 brighter and more genial when he said this. 
 And the languid day had grown warm and 
 bright, ftdl of occupations and interest ; and to 
 keep Mrs. Meredith waiting — to be too late — 
 that would never do.
 
 208 CAEITA. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 
 
 Mrs. Meredith's drawing-room was not like 
 the twin room next door. It was more ornate, 
 though not nearly so beautifiil. The three 
 windows were draped in long misty white cur- 
 tains, which veiled the light even at its brightest 
 and made a curious artificial semblance of mys- 
 tery and retirement on this autumn afternoon, 
 when the red sunshine glowed outside. Long 
 looking-glasses here and there reflected these 
 veiled hghts. There was a good deal of gilding, 
 and florid furniture, which insisted on being 
 looked at. Cara sat down on an ottoman 
 close to the further window after their walk, 
 while Mrs. Meredith went to take off her bonnet. 
 She wanted to see the people arrive, and was a 
 little ciurious about them. There were, for a 
 country house, a good many visitors at the Hill ; 
 but they came irregularly, and sometimes it
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 209 
 
 would happen that for days together not a soul 
 would appear. But Mrs. Meredith had no more 
 doubt of tlie arrival of her friends than if they 
 had all been invited guests. Cara was still 
 seated alone, looking out, her pretty profile re- 
 lieved as^ainst the white curtain like a delicate 
 little cameo, when the first visitor arrived, who 
 was a lady, and showed some annoyance to find 
 the room already occupied. ' I thought I must 
 be the first,' she said, giving the familiar salu- 
 tation of a kiss to Mrs. Meredith as she entered. 
 ' Never mind, it is only Cara Beresford,' said that 
 lady, and led her friend by the hand to where 
 two chairs were placed at the corner of the fire. 
 Here they sat and talked in low tones with 
 great animation, the ' he saids ' and ' she saids ' 
 being almost all that reached Cara's ear, who, 
 though a little excited by the expectation of 
 ' company,' did not understand this odd version 
 of it. By-and-by, however, the lady came 
 across to her and began to talk, and Cara saw 
 that some one else had arrived. The ruom 
 filled gradually after this, two or three people 
 coming and going, each of them in their turn re- 
 ceiving a few minutes' particular audience. 
 Nothing could be more evident than tliat it was 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 CARITA. 
 
 to see the lady of the house that these people 
 came ; for, though the visitors generally knew 
 each other, there was not much general conver- 
 sation. Every new-comer directed his or her 
 glance to Mrs. Meredith's corner, and, if the 
 previous audience was not concluded, relapsed 
 into a corner, and talked a little to the next 
 person, whoever that might be. In this way 
 Cara received various points of enlightenment 
 as to this new society. Most of them had just 
 returned to town. They talked of Switzerland, 
 they talked of Scotland ; of meeting So-and-so 
 here and there ; of this one who was going to 
 be married, and that one who was supposed to 
 be dying ; but all this talk was subsidiary to the 
 grand object of the visit, which was the per- 
 sonal interview. Cara, though she was too 
 young to relish her own spectator position, could 
 not help being interested by the way in which 
 her friend received her guests. She had a 
 different aspect for each. The present one, as 
 Cara saw looking up, after an interval, was a 
 man, with whom Mrs. Meredith was standing in 
 front of the furthest window. She was looking 
 up in his face, with her eyes full of interest, not 
 saying much ; listening with her whole mind
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 211 
 
 and power, every fold in her dress, every line 
 of her hair and features, falling in with the sen- 
 timent of attention. Instead of talking, she 
 assented with little nods of her head and soft ac- 
 quiescent or remonstrative movements of her 
 delicate hands, which were lightly clasped 
 together. This was not at all her attitude with 
 the ladies, whom she placed beside her, in one 
 of the low chairs, with httle caressing touches 
 and smiles and low- voiced talk. How curious 
 it was to watch them one by one ! Cara felt a 
 strong desire, too, to have something to tell ; to 
 go and make her confession or say her say upon 
 some matter interesting enough to call forth that 
 sympathetic, absorbed look — the soft touch 
 upon her shoulder, or half embrace. 
 
 It was tolerably late when the visitors went 
 away — half-past six, within an hour of dinner. 
 The ladies were the last to go, as they had been 
 the first to come ; and Cara, relieved by the de- 
 parture of the almost last stranger, drew timidly 
 near the lire, when Mrs. Meredith called her. It 
 was only as she approached — and the girl felt 
 cold, sitting so far off and being so secondary, 
 which is a thing that makes everybody chilly — 
 that she perceived somebody remaining, a gen- 
 p 2
 
 212 CARITA. 
 
 tleman seated in an easy-cliair — an old gentle- 
 man (according to Cara ; he was not of that 
 opinion himself), who had kept his place calmly 
 for a long time without budging, whosoever 
 went or came. 
 
 ' Well, you have got through the heavy 
 work,' said this patient visitor, ' and I hope you 
 have sent them off happier. It has not been 
 your fault, I am sure, if they are not happier ; 
 they have each had their audience and their 
 appropriate word.' 
 
 ' You always laugh at me, Mr. Somerville : 
 why should I not say what I think they wiU 
 like best to the people who come to see me ? ' 
 
 ' Ah, when you put it like that!' he said ; 
 ' certainly, why shouldn't you ? But I think 
 some of those good people thought that you 
 gave them beautiful advice and consolation, 
 didn't you ? I thought it seemed like that as I 
 looked on.' 
 
 ' You are always so severe. Come, my 
 darling, you are out of sight there ; come and 
 smooth down this mentor of mine by the sight 
 of your young face. This is my neighbour's 
 child, Miss Beresford, from next door.' 
 
 ' Ah, the neighbour ! ' said Mr. Somerville,
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 213 
 
 with a slight emphasis, and then he got up 
 somewhat stifl3y and made Cara his bow. ' Does 
 not he come for his daily bread like the rest ? ' 
 he said, in an undertone. 
 
 ' Mr. Beresford is going to dine with me 
 to-night, with Cara, who has just come home,' 
 said Mrs. Meredith, with a shght shade of embar- 
 rassment on her face. 
 
 ' Ah ! from school ? ' said this disagreeable 
 old man. 
 
 It had grown dark, and the lady herself had 
 lighted the candles on the mantelpiece. He 
 was sitting immediately under a little group of 
 lights in a florid branched candlestick, which 
 threw a glow upon his baldness. Cara, un- 
 favourably disposed, thought there was a sneer 
 instead of a smile upon his face, which was 
 partially in shade. 
 
 'J have never been to school,' said the girl, 
 unreasonably angry at the imputation ; and just 
 then some one else came in — another gentleman, 
 w4th whom Mrs. Meredith, who had advanced 
 to meet him, lingered near the door. Mr. 
 Somerville watched over Cara's head, and cer- 
 tainly his smile had more amusement than 
 benevolence in it.
 
 214 CARITA. 
 
 ' All ! * he said again ; ' then you miss the 
 dehght of feehng free : no girl who has not been 
 at school can understand the pleasure of not 
 being at school any longer. Where have you 
 been, then, while your father has been away? ' 
 
 ' With my aunts, at Sunninghill,' said Cara, 
 unnecessarily communicative, as is the habit of 
 youth. 
 
 ' Ah, yes, with your aunts ! I used to know 
 some of your family. Look at her now,' said 
 the critic, more to himself than to Cara — ' this 
 is a new phase. This one she is smoothing 
 down.' 
 
 Cara could not help a furtive glance. The 
 new comer had said something, she could not 
 hear what, and stood half-defiant at the door. 
 Mrs. Meredith's smile spoke volumes. She held 
 out her hand with a deprecating, conciliatory 
 look. They could not hear what she said ; but 
 the low tone, the soft aspect, the extended hand, 
 were full of meaning. The old gentleman 
 burst into a broken, hoarse laugh. It was 
 because the new-comer, melting all at once, 
 took the lady's hand and bowed low over it, as 
 if performing an act of homage. Mr. Somer- 
 ville laughed, but the stranger did not hear.
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 215 
 
 ' This is a great deal too instructive for you,' 
 he said. ' Come and tell me about your aunts. 
 You think me quite an old man, eh ? and I 
 think you quite a little girl.' 
 
 ' I am not so young! I am seventeen.' 
 
 ' Well ! And I am seven-and-fifty — not old 
 at all — a spruce and spry bachelor, quite ready 
 to make love to any one ; but such are the 
 erroneous ideas we entertain of each other. 
 Have you known Mrs. Meredith a long time ? 
 or is this your first acquaintance ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, a very long time — almost since ever I 
 was born !' 
 
 ' And I have known her nearly twenty years 
 longer than that. Are you very fond of her ? 
 Yes, most people are. So is your father, I 
 suppose, like the rest. But now you are the 
 mistress of the house, eh? you should not let 
 your natural-born subjects stray out of your 
 kingdom o' nights.' 
 
 ' I have not any kingdom,' said Cara, mourn- 
 fully. ' The house is so sad. I should like to 
 change it if papa would consent.' 
 
 ' That would be very good,' said the volun- 
 teer counsellor, with alacrity. ' You could not 
 do anything better, and I dare say he will do it
 
 216 CARITA. 
 
 if you say so. A man has a great deal of ten- 
 derness for liis wife's only child when he has 
 lost her. You have your own love and the 
 other too.' 
 
 'Have I?' said the girl, wistfully. Then 
 she remembered that to talk of her private 
 affairs and household circumstances with a 
 stranger was a wonderful derehction of duty. 
 She made herself quite stiff accordingly in obe- 
 dience to propriety, and changed her tone. 
 
 ' Is not Oswald at home ? ' she said. ' I 
 thought I should be sure to see him.' 
 
 ' Oswald is at home, but he keeps away at 
 this hour. He overdoes it, I think ; but sons 
 like to have their mothers to themselves; I 
 don't think they hke her to have such troops of 
 friends. And Oswald, you know, is a man, and 
 would like to be master.' 
 
 ' He has no right to be master ! ' said Cara, 
 the colour rising on her cheeks. ' Why should 
 not she have her friends ? ' 
 
 ' That is exactly what I tell him ; but most 
 likely he will understand you better. He is not 
 my ideal of a young man ; so you have no call 
 to be angry with me on account of Oswald.' 
 
 ' I — angry with — you ; when I don't know
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 217 
 
 you — when I never saw you before ! I beg your 
 pardon,' cried Cara, fearing that perhaps this 
 might sound rude ; but if it was rude it was 
 true. 
 
 ' Must you go ? ' said Mrs. Meredith to her 
 visitor. ' Well, I will not delay you, for it is 
 late ; but that is all over, is it not ? I cannot 
 afford to be misunderstood by any one I care 
 for. Won't you say " How d'ye do ? " to Mr. 
 Somerville, my old friend, whom you see always, 
 and Miss Beresford, my young friend, whom 
 you have never seen before ? ' 
 
 ' I have not time, indeed,' said the stranger, 
 \\dth a vague bow towards the fireplace ; ' but 
 I go away happy — it is all over, indeed. I 
 shall know better than ever to listen to de- 
 tractors and mischief-makers again.' 
 
 ' That is right,' she said, giving him her hand 
 once more. When he was gone she turned 
 back with a little air of fatigue. 'Somebody 
 had persuaded that foolish boy that I thought 
 him a bore. He is not a bore — except now and 
 then ; but he is too young,' said Mrs. Meredith, 
 shaking her head. ' You young people are so 
 exigent, Cara. You want always to be first ; 
 and in friendship that, you know, is impossible. 
 All are equal on that ground.'
 
 218 CARITA. 
 
 ' I am glad you have a lesson now and 
 then,' said ]\ir. Somerville. ' You know my 
 opinion on that subject.' 
 
 ' Are you going to dine with us, dear Mr. 
 Somerville ? ' said Mrs, Meredith, sweetly, look- 
 ing at her watch. ' Do. You know Mr. Beres- 
 ford is coming, who is very fine company 
 indeed. No ? I am so sorry. It would be so 
 much more amusing for him, not to speak of 
 Cara and me.' 
 
 ' I am very sorry I can't amuse you to- 
 night,' he said, getting to his feet more briskly 
 than Cara expected. Mrs. Meredith, laughed ; 
 and there was a certain sound of hostility in the 
 laugh, as though she was glad of the little prick 
 she had bestowed. 
 
 ' Cara, you must run and dress,' she said ; 
 ' not any toilette to speak of, dear. There will 
 only be your father and Oswald ; but you must 
 be quick, for we have been kept very late this 
 evening. I wonder you can resist that young 
 face,' she said, as Cara went away. ' You are 
 fond of youth, I know.' 
 
 ' I am not fond of affording amusement,' he 
 said. He limped slightly as he walked, which 
 was the reason he had allowed Cara to go be-
 
 THE HOUSE jVEXT DOOK. 219 
 
 fore him. ' Yes ; I like youth. Generally it 
 makes few phrases, and it knows what it means.' 
 
 ' Which is just what I dislike.' 
 
 ' Yes ; elderly sirens naturally do. But next 
 time Beresford comes to dine, and you ask me, 
 if you will give me a little longer notice I will 
 come, for I want to meet him.' 
 
 ' Let it be on Saturday, then,' she said ; 
 ' that is, if he has no engagement. I will let 
 you know.' 
 
 ' As if she did not know what engagements 
 he had ! ' Mr. Somerville said to himself : ' as 
 if he ever dreamt of going anywhere that would 
 interfere with his visits here ! ' He struck his 
 stick sharply against the stairs as he went down. 
 He had no sense of hostility to Mrs. Meredith, 
 but rather that kind of uneasy liking akin to 
 repugnance, which made him wish to annoy 
 her. He felt sure she was made angry by the 
 sound of his stick on the stairs. Her household 
 went upon velvet, and made no noise ; for 
 though she was not fanciful she had nerves, 
 and was made to start and jump by any sudden 
 noise. 
 
 Cara heard him go with his stick along the 
 Square, as nurse, who was her maid, closed the
 
 220 CARITA. 
 
 windows of her room. The sound got less dis- 
 tinct after this, but still she could hear it gra- 
 dually disappearing. What a disagreeable old 
 man he was, though he said he did not think 
 himself old ; at seven-and-fifty ! Cara thought 
 seven-and-twenty oldish, and seven-and-thirty 
 the age of a grandfather ; and yet he did not 
 think himself old ! So strange are the delusions 
 which impartial people have to encounter in 
 this world. Nurse interrupted her thoughts by 
 a question about her dress. One of her very 
 prettiest evening dresses lay opened out upon 
 her bed. 
 
 ' That is too fine,' said Cara ; ' we are to be 
 quite alone.' 
 
 ' You haven't seen Mr. Oswald, have you, 
 Miss Cara, dear ? He has grown up that hani^- 
 some you would not know him. He was 
 always a fine boy ; but now — I don't know as 
 I've ever seen a nicer-looking young man.' 
 
 ' I will have my plain white frock, please, 
 nurse — the one I wore last night,' said Cara, 
 absolutely unaware of any connection that 
 could exist between Oswald Meredith's good 
 looks and her second-best evening dress — a 
 dress that might do for a small dance, as Aunt
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 221 
 
 Cheny had impressed upon her. It never 
 occurred to the girl that her own simple beauty 
 could be heightened by this frock or that. 
 Vanity comes on early or late, according to the 
 character; but, except under very favourable 
 (or unfavourable) circumstances, seldom de- 
 velops in early youth. Cara had not even 
 begun to think whether she herself was pretty /W'-'^' 
 or not, and she w^ould have scorned with hot 
 shame and contempt the idea of dressing for 
 effect. People only think of dress when they 
 have self-consciousness. She did not under- 
 stand enough of the a, b, c of that sentiment to 
 put any meaning to what nurse said, and in- 
 sisted upon her plain muslin gown, laughing at 
 the earnestness of the attendant. ' It is too 
 fine,' she said. * Indeed I am not obstinate : it 
 would be a great deal too fine.' Her father 
 was waiting for her in the hall when the simple 
 toilette was completed, and Mrs. Meredith had 
 not yet made her appearance when the two 
 went into the drawing-room next door. Mr. 
 Beresford sat down with his eyes turned to- 
 wards the door. ' She is almost always late,' 
 he said, with a smile. He was a different man 
 here — ^indulgent, gentle, fatherly. Mrs. Mere-
 
 222 CARITA. 
 
 dith came in immediately after, with pretty 
 lace about her shoulders and on her head. 
 ' Oswald is late, as usual,' she said, putting her 
 hand into Mr. Beresford's. He looked at her, 
 smiling, with a satisfied friendly look, as if his 
 eyes loved to dwell upon her. He smiled at 
 Oswald's lateness ; did not look cross, as men 
 do when they are waiting for their dinner. 
 ' Cara is punctual, you see,' he said, with a 
 smile. ' ■ 
 
 ' Cara is a dear child,' said Mrs. Meredith. 
 ' She has been with me all day. How odd that 
 you should be made complete by a daughter 
 and I by a son, such old friends as we are ! 
 Ah ! here is Oswald. Would you have known 
 him, Cara? Oswald, this is ' 
 
 ' There is no need to tell me who it is,' said 
 Oswald. Cara saw, when she looked at him, 
 that what the others had said was true. It did 
 not move her particularly, but still she could 
 see that he was very handsome, as everybody 
 had told her. He took her hand, which she 
 held out timidly, and, without any ceremony, 
 drew it within his arm. ' We must go to 
 dinner at once,' he said, ' or Sims will put 
 poison in the soup. She longs to poison me, I
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOE. 223 
 
 know, in my soup, because I am always late ; 
 but I hope she will let me off for your sake, 
 Cara. And so really you are little Cara? I 
 did not beheve it, but I see it is true now.' 
 
 ' Why did you not believe it ? I think I 
 should have known you,' said Cara, ' if I had 
 met you anywhere. It is quite true ; but you 
 are just like Oswald all the same.' 
 
 ' What is quite true ? ' Oswald was a great 
 deal more vain than Cara was, being older and 
 having had more time to see the effect of his 
 good looks. He laughed and did not push his 
 question any further. It was a pleasant begin- 
 ning. He had his mother's sympathetic grace of 
 manner, and, Cara felt at once, understood her, 
 and all her difficulties at a glance, as Mrs. 
 Meredith had done. How far this was true may 
 be an open question ; but she was convinced of 
 it, which for the moment was enough. 
 
 ' We did not come downstairs so ceremo- 
 niously last time we met,' he said. ' When you 
 came for the nursery tea, with nurse behind you. 
 I think Edward held the chief place in your 
 affections then. He was nearer your age ; but 
 thank Heaven that fellow is out of the way,
 
 224 CARITA. 
 
 and I have a little time to make the running 
 before he comes back ! ' 
 
 Cara did not know what it meant to ' make 
 the running,' and was puzzled. She was not ac- 
 quainted with any slang except that which has 
 crept into books, but an expression of pleasure 
 in Edward's absence appalled her. ' I remem- 
 ber him best,' she said, ' because he was more 
 near my age ; but you were both big boys — too 
 big to care for a little thing like me. I re- 
 member seeing you come in with a latch-key 
 one afternoon and open the door — ah ! ' said 
 Cara, with a little cry. It had been on the 
 afternoon of her mother's death when she had 
 been placed at the window to look for her 
 father's coming, and had seen the two big boys 
 in the afternoon hght, and watched them, with 
 an interest which quite distracted her atten- 
 tion for the moment, fitting the key into the 
 door. 
 
 ' What is it ? ' he said, looking at her very 
 kindly. ' You have not been here for a long 
 time — yes, it must bring back so many things. 
 Look, Cara ! Sims is gracious ; she will not 
 poison me this time. She has not even frowned 
 at me, and it is all because of you.'
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 225 
 
 * I like Sims,' said Cara, her heart rising, she 
 could not tell why. ' I like everybody I used 
 to know.' 
 
 ' So do I — because you do ; otherwise I am 
 not so fond of my fellow-creatures ; some of 
 them plague one's life out. What are you going 
 to do when you get used to the excitement of 
 seeing us all again? You will find yourself 
 very badly off for something to do.' 
 
 ' Do you ? ' said Cara, innocently. 
 
 ' My mother does for me. She thinks me 
 very idle. So I am, I suppose. What is the 
 good of muddling what little brains one has in 
 work ? One in a family who does that is 
 enough. Edward is that excellent person. He 
 goes in for Greek so that my head aches ; though 
 why he should, being intended for the Civil 
 Service, I don't know.' 
 
 ' Won't it do him any good ? ' said Cara, with 
 regret. She was practical, and did not like to 
 hear of this waste of labour. ' Is Edward — 
 changed — like you ? ' she added softly, after a 
 pause. He looked at her with laughing bright 
 eyes, all softened and liquid with pleasure. He 
 knew what she meant, and that his handsome 
 face was havmg its natural effect upon Cara ; 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 CARITA. 
 
 though, being much older than Cara, he could 
 not have beheved how httle effect his good looks 
 really had. 
 
 ' I think he is very like what he always was,' 
 he said ; ' he is such a good fellow, Cara. If 
 anyone asks you which is the best of the 
 Merediths, say Edward. You may be sure you 
 will be right. Listen what the elders are saying ; 
 they are talking about you and me.' 
 
 ' Why about you and me ? ' Cara was 
 always slightly alarmed to hear that she was 
 being talked of. It roused the latent suspicion 
 in her which had been startled into being at 
 her mother's death. She stopped talking, and 
 looked at the other two. His mother was 
 opposite to Oswald, and her father was opposite 
 to her. What an odd arrangement it seemed 
 when you came to think of it ! If papa had got 
 one of the boys, and she, Cara, had fallen to the 
 lot of Mrs. Meredith — would that have been 
 better? She looked at Oswald's mother and 
 wondered ; then bethought herself of the Hill 
 and blushed. No, such an idea was nothing 
 but treachery to the Hill, where it was Cara, 
 and no other, who was the chosen child. 
 
 ' She has grown into a little Hly,' said Mrs.
 
 THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR. 227 
 
 Mereditli. ' She is shy, but open and winning, 
 and I like girls to be shy like that. I do not 
 wonder that you are proud of her.' 
 
 ' Am I proud of her ? I am not sure. She is 
 nice-looking, I think.' 
 
 ' Nice-looking ! She has grown into a little 
 lily. It is wonderful how she blends two like- 
 nesses ; I see you both. Ah ! have I said too 
 much ? A happy child so often does that ; you 
 will forgive me if I say anything that 
 liurts ' 
 
 ' You could not say anything that hurts,' he 
 .said in a low voice, ' it would not hurt coming 
 from you.' 
 
 ' Well, perhaps it ought not,' she said, with 
 a smile, ' because it is said in true friendship. I 
 noticed that at once in Cara — sometimes one and 
 sometimes the other — hke both. That is not 
 the case with my boys. I shall not have Edward 
 till Christmas. You know it has always been my 
 happy time when the boys were here.' 
 
 ' Is Oswald doing anything — ? ' A close 
 observer would have seen that Mr. Beresford 
 was not fond of Oswald. He was not nearly so 
 well-disposed to him as Mrs. Meredith was to 
 Cara. Perhaps it was purely on moral grounds 
 
 Q 2
 
 228 CAKITA. 
 
 and justifiable ; perhaps the young man and his 
 senior came in each other's way more than the 
 girl and the matron did. This abrupt question 
 rather put a stop to poor Mrs. Meredith. She 
 blushed a little and faltered as she rephed.
 
 229 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 
 
 Cara's second evening at home was passed much 
 more happily than the first, thanks to Mrs. 
 Meredith, and her spirits rose in consequence ; 
 but next morning there ensued a fall, as was 
 natural, in her spiritual barometer. She went 
 to the window in the drawing-room when she was 
 all alone, and gazed wistfully at as much as she 
 could see of the step and entrance of the house 
 next door. Did they mean her to ' run in half- 
 a-dozen times a day,' as Mrs. Meredith had said? 
 Cara had been brought up in her aunt's old- 
 fashioned notions, with strenuous injunctions not 
 ' to make herself cheap,' and to cultivate ' a 
 proper pride.' She had often been told that 
 running into sudden intimacy was foolish, and 
 that a girl should be rather shy than eager 
 about overtures of ordinary friendship. All 
 these things restrained her, and her own dispo-
 
 230 CARITA. 
 
 sition which favoured all reserves. But she 
 could not help going to the window and look- 
 ing out wistfully. Only a wall between them ! 
 and how much more cheerful it was on the 
 other side of that wall. Her heart beat as she 
 saw Oswald come out, not because it was Oswald 
 — on the whole she would have preferred his 
 mother ; but solitude ceased to be solitude when 
 friendly figures thus appear, even outside. 
 Oswald glanced up and saw her. He took off 
 his hat — he paused — ^finally, he turned and came 
 up the steps just underneath where she was 
 standing. In another moment he came in, his 
 hat in his hand, his face full of brightness of the 
 morning. Nurse showed him in with a sort of 
 affectionate enthusiasm. ' Here is Mr. Oswald,, 
 Miss Cara, come to see you.' 
 
 The women servants were all the slaves of 
 the handsome young fellow. Wherever he 
 went he had that part of the community on 
 his side. 
 
 ' I came to see that you are not the worse 
 for your dull dinner last evening,' he said. ' It 
 used to be etiquette to ask for one's partner at a 
 ball ; how much more after a domestic evening. 
 Have you a headache ? were you very much
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 231 
 
 bored ? It is for my interest to know, that I 
 may be able to make out whether you will come 
 again.' 
 
 ' Were you bored that you ask me ? ' said 
 Cara. ' I was very happy.' 
 
 ' And, thanks to you, I was very happy,' he 
 said. ' Clearly four are better company than 
 three. Your father and my mother have their 
 own kind of talking. Why, I have not been in 
 this room since I was a child ; how much hand- 
 somer it is than ours ! Come, Cara, tell me all 
 about the pictures and the china. Of course 
 you must be a little connoisseur. Should one 
 say connoisseuse ? I never know. Virtuosa^ 
 that is a prettier word, and we are all in the way 
 of the cardinal virtues here.' 
 
 ' But I am not at all a virtuosa. I don't 
 know. I was a child, too, when I used to be at 
 home, and I suppose it hurts papa to come into 
 this room. He has never been here since I 
 came ; never at all, I think, since mamma 
 died.' 
 
 ' Does he leave you by yourself all the even- 
 ing ? what a shame ! ' said Oswald. ' Is he so 
 full of sentiment as that ? One never knows 
 people. Come, Cara, if that is the case, it is
 
 2 32 CARITA. 
 
 clear that I must spend the evenings with 
 you.' 
 
 Cara laughed frankly at the suggestion. 
 She did not understand what he meant by a 
 slight emphasis upon the pronouns, which 
 seemed to point out some balance of duties. 
 She said, ' I have only been here for two even- 
 ings. The first was very. dull. I had nothing 
 to read but that book, and I was not happy. 
 The second was last night. Oh, I am not ac- 
 customed to much company. I can be quite 
 happy by myself, when I am used to things.' 
 
 ' That means you don't want me,' said 
 Oswald ; ' but I shall come all the same. What 
 IS the book about ? You don't mean to say 
 you understand that! What is unconscious 
 cerebration, Cara ? Good heavens ! how rash 
 I have been. Are you an F.R.S. already, like 
 the rest of your father's friends ? ' 
 
 ' I don't know what it means,' said Cara, ' no 
 more than I know about the china. But I read a 
 chapter that first night ; it was always something. 
 You see there are very few books in this room. 
 They have been taken away, I suppose. No- 
 body, except mamma, has ever lived here.' 
 
 She gave a little shiver as she spoke, and
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 233 
 
 looked wistfully round. Even in the morning, 
 with the sunshine coming in, how still it was ! 
 Oswald thought he would like to break the 
 china, and make a human noise, over the head 
 of the father who was sitting below, making 
 believe to think so much of the memory of his 
 dead wife, and neglecting his living child. The 
 young man had a grudge against the elder one, 
 which gave an edge to his indignation. 
 
 ' You shall have books,' he said, ' and com- 
 pany too, if you will have me, Cara : that will 
 bring them to their senses,' he added to himself 
 in a half-laughing, half-angry undertone. 
 
 What did he mean ? Cara had no idea. She 
 laughed too, with a little colour starting to licr 
 face, wondering what Aunt Charity would think 
 if she knew that Oswald meant to spend his even- 
 ings with her. Cara herself did not see any 
 harm in it, though she felt it was a joke, and 
 could not be. 
 
 ' You were going out,' she said, ' when you 
 saw me at the window. Had you anything to 
 do ? for if you had you must not stay and waste 
 your time with me.' 
 
 ' Why should I have anything to do ? ' 
 
 ' I thought young men had,' said Cara. ' Of
 
 234 CARITA. 
 
 course I don't know very mucli about them. I 
 know only the Burchells well ; they are never 
 allowed to come and talk in the morning. If 
 it is Eeginald, he always says he ought to be 
 reading ; and Eoger, he is of course at work, 
 you know.' 
 
 ' I don't know in the least,' said Oswald ; ' but 
 I should like to learn. What does this revela- 
 tion of Eogers and Eeginalds mean ? I never 
 supposed there were any such persons. I thought 
 that Edward and myself were about the limit of 
 friendship allowed to little Cara, and here is a 
 clan, a tribe. I forewarn you at once that I put 
 myself in opposition to your Eeginalds and 
 Eogers. I dislike the gentlemen. I am glad 
 to hear that they have no time to talk in 
 the mornings. I, for my part, have plenty of 
 time.' 
 
 ' Oh, you are not likely to know them' said, 
 Cara, laughing, ' unless, indeed, Eoger comes on 
 Sundays, as he said. They are probably not so 
 rich as you are. Their father is a clergyman, and 
 they have to work. I should like that myself 
 better than doing nothing.' 
 
 ' That means,' said Oswald, with great show 
 of savagery, setting his teeth, ' that you prefer
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 235 
 
 the said Eoger, who must not talk o'mornings, to 
 me, presumably not required to work ? Know,, 
 then, young lady, that I have as much need to 
 work as your Eoger ; more, for I mean to be 
 somebody. If I go in for the bar it is with the 
 intention of being Lord Chancellor ; and that 
 wants work — work ! such as would take the 
 very breath away from your clergyman's sons, 
 who probably intend to be mere clergymen, and 
 drop into a fat living.' 
 
 ' Eoger is an engineer,' said Cara ; ' he is at 
 the College ; he walks about with chains, mea- 
 suring. I don't know what is the good of it, 
 but I suppose it is of some good. There are so 
 many things,' she added, with a sigh, that one 
 is obhged to take for granted. Some day, I 
 suppose, he will have bridges and lighthouses^ 
 to make. That one can understand — that would 
 be worth doing.' 
 
 ' I hate Eoger ! ' said Oswald. ' I shall never 
 believe in any hghthouses of his making ; there 
 will be a flaw in them. Do you remember the 
 Eddystone, which came down ever so often? 
 Eoger 's will tumble down. I know it. And when 
 you have seen it topple over into the sea you
 
 236 CARITA. 
 
 shall come and see me tranquilly seated on the 
 •woolsack, and recant all your errors.' 
 
 Upon which they both laughed — not that 
 there was much wit in the suggestion, but they 
 were both young, and the one lighted up the 
 other with gay gleams of possible mirth. 
 
 ' However,' said Oswald, ' that we may not 
 throw that comparison to too remote a period, 
 where do you think I was going ? Talk of me 
 as an idler, if you please. Does this look like 
 idhng ? ' He took from his pocket a little roll 
 of paper, carefully folded, and breaking open the 
 cover showed her a number of MS. pages, fairly 
 copied out in graduated lines. Cara's face grew 
 crimson with sudden excitement. 
 
 ' Poetry ! ' she said ; but capital letters 
 would scarcely convey all she meant. ' Oswald, 
 are you a poet ? ' 
 
 He laughed again, which jarred upon her 
 feelings, for poetry (she felt) was not a thing to 
 laugh at. ' I write verses,' he said ; ' that is 
 idling — most people call it so, Cara, as well as 
 you.' 
 
 ' But I would never call it so ! Oh, Oswald, 
 
 if there is anything in the world I care for . 
 
 Eead me some, will you.^ Oh, do read me
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 237 
 
 something. There is nothing,' cried Cara, her 
 lips trembling, her eyes expanding, her whole 
 figure swelling with a sigh of feeling, ' nothing 
 I care for so much. I would rather know a poet 
 than a king ! ' 
 
 Upon this Oswald laughed again, and looked 
 at her with kind admiration. His eyes glowed, 
 but with a brotherly light. ' You are a httle en- 
 thusiast,' he said. ' I called you virtuosa, and 
 you are one in the old-fashioned sense, for that is 
 wider than bric-a-brac. Yes ; I sometimes think 
 I might be a poet if I had anyone to inspire 
 me, to keep me away from petty things. I am 
 my mother's son, Cara. I like to please every- 
 body, and that is not in favour of the highest 
 pursuits. I want a Muse. What if you were 
 born to be my Muse ? You shall see some of 
 the things that are printed,' he added ; ' not 
 these. I am more sure of them when they have 
 attained the reality of print.' 
 
 ' Then they are printed ? ' Cara's eyes grew 
 bigger and bigger, her interest grew to the 
 height of enthusiasm. 'How proud your 
 mother must be, Oswald ! I wonder she did 
 not tell me. Does Edward write, too ? ' 
 
 'Edward!' cried the other with disdain; ' a
 
 ^38 CARITA. 
 
 <3lodhopper ; a plodding, steady, respectable 
 fellow, who has passed for the Civil Service. 
 Poetry would be more sadly in his way than 
 it is in mine. Oh, yes, it is sadly in mine. My 
 mother does not know much ; but instead of 
 being enthusiastic she is annoyed with what 
 she does know. That is the kind of thing one 
 has to meet with in this world,' he said, with 
 a sigh over his own troubles. ' Sometimes there 
 is one like you — one more generous, more 
 capable of appreciating the things that do 
 not pay — with some people the things that 
 pay are everything. And poetry does not pay, 
 Cara.' 
 
 ' I don't like you even to say so.' 
 ' Thanks for caring what I say ; you have 
 an eye for the ideal. I should like to be set 
 on a pedestal, and to have something better ex 
 pected from me. That is how men are made, 
 Cara. To know that someone — a creature 
 like yourself — expects something, thinks us 
 capable of something. I am talking senti- 
 ment,' he said, with a laugh ; ' decidedly you 
 are the Muse I am looking for. On a good 
 pedestal, with plenty of white muslin, there is 
 not a Greek of them all would come up to 
 jou.'
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 239 
 
 'I don't know what you mean, Oswald. 
 Now you are laughing at me.' 
 
 'Well, let us laugh,' he said, putting his 
 papers into his pocket again. ' Are you com- 
 ing to my mother's reception this afternoon? 
 I hear you were there yesterday. What do you 
 think of it? Was old Somerville there with his 
 wig ? He is the guardian angel ; he comes to see 
 that we all go on as we ought, and that no one 
 goes too far. He does not approve of me. 
 He writes to India about me that I will never 
 be of much use in the world.' 
 
 ' To India.' 
 
 ' Yes ; all the information about us goes 
 out there. Edward gives satisfaction, but not 
 the rest of us. It is not easy to please people 
 so far off who have not you to judge, but 
 only your actions set down in black and white. 
 Well, I suppose I must go now — my actions 
 don't tell for much : " Went into the house next 
 door, and got a great deal of good from httle 
 Cara." That would not count, you see; not 
 €ven if I put down, " Cheered up little Cara, 
 who was mopish." Might I say that ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, indeed ; you have cheered me up 
 very much,' said Cara, giving him her hand. 
 Oswald stooped over her a moment, and the
 
 240 CARITA. 
 
 girl thought he was going to kiss her, which 
 made her retreat a step backwards, her counte- 
 nance flaming, and all the shy dignity and 
 quick wrath of her age stirred into movement. 
 But he only laughed and squeezed her hand, 
 and ran downstairs, his feet ringing young 
 and light through the vacant house. Cara 
 would have gone to the window and looked 
 after him but for that — was it a threatening of a 
 visionary kiss ? How silly she was! Of course 
 he did not mean anything of the kind. If he 
 did, it was just as if she had been his sister, 
 and Cara felt that her momentary alarm 
 showed her own silliness, a girl that had never 
 been used to anything. How much an only 
 child lost by being an only child, she reflected 
 gravely, sitting down after he left her by the 
 fire. How pleasant it would have been to 
 have a brother like Oswald. And if he should 
 be a poet ! But this excited Cara more when 
 he was talking to her than after he was gone. 
 He did not fall in with her ideas of the poet, 
 who was a being of angelic type to her imagi- 
 nation, not a youth with laughter glancing 
 from his eyes. 
 
 That evening Cara sat solitary after dinner.
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 241 
 
 the pretty silver lamp lighted, with its white 
 moon-orb of light upon the table by her ; the 
 fire burning just bright enough for company, 
 for it still was not cold. She had said, timidly, 
 * Shall you come upstairs this evening, papa ? ' 
 and had received a mildly evasive answer, 
 and she thought about nine o'clock that she 
 heard the hall door shut, just as John came 
 into the room with tea. She thought the man 
 looked at her compassionately, but she would 
 not question him. The room looked very 
 pretty in the firelight and lamplight, with the 
 little tray gleaming in all its brightness of 
 china and silver, and the httle white figure 
 seated by the fire ; but it was very lonely. 
 She took up a book a little more interesting 
 than the one which had been her first re- 
 soiu*ce, but presently let it drop on her knee 
 wondering and asking herself would Oswald 
 €ome ? Perhaps he had forgotten ; perhaps he 
 had noticed her shrink when he went away, 
 and, meaning nothing by his gesture, did not 
 know why she had retreated from him — per- 
 haps . But who could tell what might 
 
 have stopped him ? A boy was not like a 
 girl — h^ might have been asked somewhere. 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 242 CARITA. 
 
 He might have gone to the theatre. Perhaps 
 he had a dub, and was there among his- 
 friends. All this passed through her head 
 as she sat with the book in her hand, holding 
 it open on her knee. Then she began to read, 
 and forgot for the minute ; then suddenly the 
 book dropped again, and she thought, with a 
 sort of childish longing, of what might be 
 going on next door, just on the other side of 
 the wall, where everything was sure to be so 
 cheerful. If she could only pierce that un- 
 kindly wall, and see through ! That made her 
 think of Pyramus and Thisbe, and she smiled, 
 but soon grew grave again. Was this how 
 she was to go on living — lonely all the even- 
 ing through, her father seeking society some- 
 where else, she could not tell where? She 
 thought of the drawing-room at the Hill, and 
 her eyes grew wet ; how they would miss her 
 there! and here nobody wanted Cara. Her 
 father, perhaps, might think it right that his 
 child should live under his roof ; but that was 
 all he cared apparently ; and was it to be 
 always thus, and never change ? At seven- 
 teen it is so natural to think that everything 
 that is, is unalterable and will never change.
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 243 
 
 Then Cara, with a gulp, and a determination 
 to be as happy as she could in the terrible 
 circumstances, and above all, to shun Oswald, 
 who had not kept his word, opened her book 
 again, and this time got into the story, which 
 had been prefaced by various interludes of 
 philosophising, and remembered no more till 
 nurse came to inquire if she did not mean to 
 go to bed to-night. So the evening did not 
 hang so heavy on her hands as she thought. 
 
 Next day Oswald came again, and told her 
 of a forgotten engagement which he had been 
 obliged to keep ; and they chatted gaily as be- 
 fore ; and he brought her some poems, printed 
 in a magazine, which sounded beautiful when 
 he read them, to her great delight, but did not 
 seem so beautiful when she read them over her- 
 self, as she begged she might be allowed to do. 
 After this there was a great deal of intercourse 
 between the two houses, and Cara's hfe grew 
 brighter. Now and then, it was true, she 
 would be left to spend an evening alone ; but 
 she got other friends, and went to some parties 
 with Mrs. Meredith, Oswald attending them. 
 He was always about ; he came and had long 
 b2
 
 244 CAEITA. 
 
 private talks with her, reading his verses and 
 appealing to her sympathies and counsel ; he 
 walked with her when she went out with his 
 mother ; he was always by her side wherever 
 they went. ' I know Edward will cut me out 
 when he comes, so I must make the running 
 now,' he said often, and Cara no longer won- 
 dered what making the running meant. She 
 got so used to his presence that it seemed 
 strange when he was not there. 
 
 ' It's easy to see what that will end in,' said 
 Nurse to John and Cook in the kitchen. 
 
 ' I wish as one could see what the other 
 would end in,' Cook replied. But the house- 
 hold watched the two young people with proud 
 delight, going to the window to look at them 
 when they went out, and rejoicing over the 
 handsome couple. 
 
 ' I always said as our Miss Cara was one as 
 would settle directly,' her faithful attendant 
 said. ' Seventeen ! it's too young, that is, for 
 anything.' 
 
 'But he haven't got a penny,' said Cook, 
 who was more prudent, ' and he don't do no- 
 thing. I'd like a man as could work for me, if 
 I was Miss Cara.'
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 245 
 
 ' I'd like him better if he hadn't no call to 
 work,' said Nurse, with true patrician feeling. 
 
 But the chief parties knew nothing of these 
 remarks. They were very cheerful and full of 
 mutual confidences. Oswald confiding to Cara 
 his doubts and difficulties, his aspirations 
 (which were chiefly in verse) and light-hearted 
 anticipations, not going so far as to be called 
 hopes, of sitting one day on the woolsack. 
 Cara, though she had a great respect for Os- 
 wald, did not think much about the woolsack. 
 But it was astonishing how she got used to 
 him, how she liked him, and, notwithstanding 
 the occasional dull evenings, how much more 
 variety seemed to have come into her fife. 
 Sometimes Mrs. Meredith herself would talk to 
 the girl about her son. 
 
 ' If he would work more steadily I should 
 be happier, Cara,' she would say ; ' and 
 perhaps if he had a strong inducement he 
 would work. He is so clever, and able to do 
 what he likes.' 
 
 Cara did not know about this ; but she 
 liked his lively company. They were the best 
 of friends ; they talked to each other of every 
 foolish thing that comes into the heads of
 
 246 CARITA. 
 
 young people; but she had a vague idea that 
 he did not talk to her as the others thought he 
 did. He was not hke Eoger even ; though 
 Eoger was no more Hke him than night was 
 like day. Eoger was — different. She could 
 not have told how, and nobody knew of this 
 difference nor spoke to her on the subject. 
 And thus life floated on very pleasantly, with 
 more excitement than had existed in that 
 placid school-girl hfe at the Hill. Miss Cherry 
 came two or three times on a day's visit to her 
 darling, and observed what was going on and 
 was puzzled ; but Aunt Charity had her first 
 attack of bronchitis that year, and it was 
 winter weather, not good for travelling. 
 
 'Yes, I think she's happy on the whole,' 
 was Miss Cherry's report to the elder aunt 
 when she went home — which, as may be sup- 
 posed, was not a clear enough dehverance for 
 Aunt Charity. 
 
 ' Is the young man in love with her ? ' said 
 the old lady ; ' is she in love with him ? 
 James should not be such a fool as to let them 
 be constantly together, unless it is a match that 
 would please him.' 
 
 * James is not thinking of anything of the
 
 THE YOUNG PEOPLE. 247 
 
 kind,' said Miss Cherry, impatiently. ' James 
 is taken up with his own affairs, and he thinks 
 Cara a little girl still.' 
 
 ' To be sure he does — that is where men 
 always go wrong,' said Aunt Charity, ' and 
 James will always be a fool to the end of the 
 chapter.' 
 
 Cherry winced at this, for she was the 
 model of a good sister, and never had seen any 
 man who was so much her ideal as James — 
 though in some things he was foolish, she was 
 obliged to allow. Perhaps, as Aunt Charity 
 was ill, and the house, as it were, shut up and 
 given over to invalidism for the winter, it was 
 as well that Cara should be away, getting some 
 enjoyment of her young life. Had she been at 
 home it would have been dull for her, for Miss 
 Cherry was in almost constant attendance upon 
 the old lady. Thus things had turned out 
 very well, as they so often do, even when they 
 look least promising. Had Cara been at the 
 Hill, Miss Cherry would not have been so free 
 to devote herself to Aunt Charity, and both the 
 child and the old lady would have suffered. True, 
 Miss Cherry's own life might have had a little 
 additional brightness, but who thought of that?
 
 248 CAEITA. 
 
 She did not herself, and you may be sure no 
 one else did. It was altogether a fortunate 
 arrangement, as things had turned out, and as 
 for Cara, why was there not Providence to 
 watch over her, if her father was remiss ? 
 Miss Cherry felt that there was something hke 
 infidelity in the anxious desire she felt some- 
 times to go and help Providence in this deli- 
 cate task.
 
 249 
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 
 
 When Mrs. Beresford died, as has been de- 
 scribed, there was a great flutter of talk and 
 private discussion among all who knew her 
 about the particulars of her death. It was ' so 
 sudden at the last,' after giving every indication 
 of turning out a lingering and slow malady, that 
 public curiosity was very greatly excited on the 
 subject. True, the talk was suppressed per- 
 emptorily by Mr. Maxwell whenever he came 
 across it, charitably by other less authoritative 
 judges ; but it lingered, as was natural, and 
 perhaps the bereaved husband did not have 
 all that fulness of sympathy which generally 
 attends so great a loss. There were many 
 people, indeed, to whom it appeared that such 
 a loss was worse even than a more simple and 
 less mysterious one, and that the survivor was 
 entitled to more instead of less pity ; but mys-
 
 250 CARITA. 
 
 terious circumstances always damp the public 
 sympathy more or less, and people do not like 
 to compromise themselves by kindness which 
 might seem complicity or guilty knowledge if, in 
 the course of time, anything not known at the 
 moment should be found out. Thus James 
 Beresford, though much pitied, did not meet 
 with that warmth of personal sympathy which 
 circumstances like his so often call forth. He 
 was not himself sensible of it indeed, being 
 too miserable to take any notice of what was 
 going on around him ; but most of his friends 
 were fully sensible of this fact, and aware that 
 but few overtures of active kindness were made 
 to the melancholy man, whose very abandon- 
 ment of his home and life made another item 
 in the mysterious indictment against him, of 
 which everybody felt the burden yet nobody 
 knew the rights. It was in these painful cir- 
 cumstances that Mrs. Meredith first formed the 
 link which now associated her with her next 
 door neighbour. The first time he had come 
 home after his wife's death, which was only for 
 a week or two, the kind woman had met him, 
 indeed had laid her simple, tender-hearted plan 
 to meet him — going hstlessly into his forsaken
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 251 
 
 bouse. She had gone up to him, holding out 
 her hand, her features all moved and quivering 
 with feehng. ' Won't you come in and sit with 
 me in the evening? ' she said. ' It is the time 
 one feels one's loneliness most — and my boys 
 are away, Mr. Beresford.' Her soft eyes, as 
 she raised them to him, were full of tears ; her 
 look so pitiful, so full of fellow-feeling, that his 
 heart was as much touched for her as hers 
 seemed to be for him. Of all ways of conso- 
 lation, is there any so effective as that of lead- 
 ing those whom you grieve for to grieve also a 
 little for you, as a fellow-sufferer? His heart 
 was touched. He could not persuade himself 
 to go the very first evening, but he came soon, 
 and when he had come once returned again 
 and again. It was the first new habit he formed 
 after that mournful breaking-up of all his 
 habits. He could not bear much at a time of 
 the dismal place which he still called home ; 
 but now and then he was forced to be there, 
 and when he came this new sweet habit gave 
 him a little strength to meet the chaos into 
 which his life otherwise was thrown. Did not 
 Dante, too, get a little comfort from the sweet 
 looks of that sympathising woman who used to
 
 252 CARITA. 
 
 glance at him from her window after the lady 
 of his heart was carried by the angels to 
 heaven ? There was no wrong to his Annie in 
 that refuge which kindness made for him from 
 the miseries of the world. Eventually it be- 
 came a matter of course that he should seek 
 that shelter. He went out of his own house 
 and knocked at her door mechanically, and 
 would sit by her, content only to be there, often 
 saying httle, getting himself softly healed and 
 soothed, and made capable of taking up again 
 the burden of his hfe. She was not the same 
 kind of woman as his wife — her habits of mind 
 were different. The variety, the fluctuating 
 charm, the constant movement and change that 
 were in Mrs. Beresford did not exist in this 
 other. She would sit and work by the lamp- 
 light, looking up sweetly to answer, but happy 
 to be silent if her companion hked it. She 
 made herself always the second and not the 
 first, responding, not leading ; her gift was to 
 divine what was in others, to follow where they 
 went. It was this that made her so popular 
 with all her friends. When they came to her 
 for advice she would give it without that doubt 
 and fear of responsibility which restrains so
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 253 
 
 many people. For why ? she had a rule which 
 was infallible, and which made her safe from 
 responsibility, although she was not herself 
 aware how closely she acted upon it. Her in- 
 falhble guide was a faculty of seeing what 
 people themselves wished, how their own judg- 
 ments were tending, and what individually 
 they wanted to do. This she followed some- 
 times consciously, but often quite unconsciously, 
 as habit led her, and she was never afraid of 
 saying Do this, or Do that. It was one of her 
 great attractions. She might be wise or she 
 might be less than wise, in her decisions, her 
 friends said, but she never shilly-shallied, never 
 was afraid of saying to you with sweet frank- 
 ness and boldness what she thought it would be 
 good to do. 
 
 The consequence of this simple rule was 
 that good advice from Mrs. Meredith's Hps was 
 ever so much more popular than good advice 
 had ever been known to be before. It is not a 
 commodity which is generally admired, how- 
 ever admirable it may be ; but those whom she 
 advised were not only edified but flattered and 
 brightened. It made themselves feel more 
 wise. It was sweet at once to the giver and
 
 254 CARITA. 
 
 to the receiver, and kindled an increased 
 warmth of sympathy between them. Now and 
 then, to be sure, the course of action she re- 
 commended might not be a successful one, but 
 is not that the case with all human counsel ? 
 This, which was the secret of her power with 
 all her other friends, subjugated James Beres- 
 ford too. As there is nothing so dear to a man 
 as his own way, so there is no individual so 
 dear as that friend who will recommend and 
 glorify his own way to him, and help him to 
 enjoyment of it. This she did with a gentle 
 patience and constancy which was wonderful. 
 It was natural to her, like all great gifts, and 
 the great charm of it all was that few people 
 suspected the reflection from their own feelings 
 and sentiments which coloured Mrs. Meredith's 
 mind, nor was she at all invariably aware of it 
 herself. Sometimes she believed implicitly in 
 her own advice as the natural growth of her 
 own thoughts and experiences, and believed 
 herself to have an independent judgment. And 
 it is to be supposed that she had opinions and 
 ideas — certainly she had ways of her own, the 
 brightest, and kindest, and most caressing that 
 could be conceived.
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 255^ 
 
 This was the secret of those absences which 
 had left Cara so lonely. They had become 
 now the confirmed and constant habit of her 
 father's hfe. And it would be vain to say that 
 this had been done without remark. While he 
 was at home for a week or two only in a year 
 no one said anything about his frequent visits 
 to the kind neighbour who was not even a 
 widow ; but lately he had stayed longer when 
 he came back to the Square, sometimes remain- 
 ing a month instead of a week, and now it was 
 understood that he had returned 'for good.' 
 Both Mrs. Meredith and Mr. Beresford had, it 
 may be supposed, friends who took the respon- 
 sibility of their conduct, and thought it neces- 
 sary to supervise them in their innocent but un- 
 usual intimacy, and these excellent persons 
 were in the attitude of suspended judgment 
 waiting to see what difference Cara's presence 
 would make, and that of Oswald, in the one 
 house and the other. But it had not as yet 
 made any very apparent difference. At nine 
 o'clock, or thereabouts, the door would shut in 
 the one house, and Cook and John would ex- 
 change glances ; while in the other the bell 
 would tinkle, and the two maids, who divided
 
 256 CARITA. 
 
 John's duties between them, would say, ' There 
 is Mr. Beresford, as usual ! ' and shrug their 
 shoulders. He came in, and they did not take 
 the trouble now even to announce the habitual 
 visitor, who had his special chair and his special 
 -corner, as if he belonged to the house. Some- 
 times the two friends would talk long and much, 
 sometimes they scarcely talked at all. They 
 knew each other like brother and sister, and yet 
 there was between them a delicate separation 
 such as does not exist between relations. In 
 the warm room, softly lighted and friendly, the 
 man who had been wounded found a refiige 
 which was more hke the old blessedness of 
 home than anything else could be, and yet was 
 not that blessedness. It did not occiu- to him 
 that because his daughter had come back to 
 him he was to be banished from this other 
 shelter. Cara's coming, indeed, had scarcely 
 been her father's doing. Many discussions on 
 the point had taken place among all his friends, 
 and Mrs. Meredith had been spurred up by 
 everybody to represent his duty to him. She 
 had done it with a faint sense in her mind that 
 it would affect herself in some ur desirable way.
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 257 
 
 and with a certainty that she was departing 
 altogether from her usual rule of argument with 
 the personal wishes of her clients. Mr. Beres- 
 ford had no personal wish on the subject. 
 He preferred rather that Cara should stay 
 where she was happy. ' If she comes here 
 what can I do for her ? ' he said. ' My society 
 is not what a girl will like. I cannot take her to 
 the dances and gaieties which will please her.' 
 
 ' Why not ? ' Mrs. Meredith had said. 
 
 ' Why not ! ' He was petrified by her want 
 of perception. ' What could I do in such 
 places ? And she is happy where she is. She 
 has women about her who know how to manage 
 her. Her coming would derange my life 
 altogether. You, who feel everybody's diffi- 
 culties, you must feel this. What am I to do 
 with a girl of seventeen ? It would be wretched 
 for her, and it could not be any addition to my 
 happiness.' 
 
 ' Don't you think too much of that,' said 
 Mrs. Meredith, faltering ; for indeed this was 
 not at all her way. And it was hard for her 
 to go against those feelings on the part of her 
 companion which, on ordinary occasions, she 
 followed implicitly. Even for herself Cara's. 
 
 VOL. I. s
 
 258 CARITA. 
 
 presence would complicate the relations gene- 
 rally ; but when she saw her duty, she did it, 
 though with faltering. Everybody else had 
 spurred and goaded her up to this duty, and 
 she would not shrink. ' If you are going to 
 settle, you ought to have your child with you.' 
 
 'That you should dwell like this upon 
 abstract oughts ! ' said Mr. Beresford ; ' you, 
 who are so full of understanding of personal 
 difficulties. It is not like you. If I feel that 
 Cara is better where she is — happier, more 
 suitably cared for ' 
 
 ' Still, you know when the father is settled 
 at home his only child should be with him,' 
 Mrs. Meredith reiterated. She was faithful to 
 her consigne. If she did not see it, other 
 people did, for whom she was the mouthpiece. 
 But it will be perceived that those persons were 
 right who said she was not clever. When she 
 was not following her favourite and congenial 
 pursuit of divining others and reflecting them in 
 her own person, she was reduced to this help- 
 less play of reiteration, and stuck to her one 
 point till everybody was tired of it. Beresford 
 was so impatient that he got up from his chair 
 and began to pace up and down the room.
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 259 
 
 'There is reason in all things,' he said. ' My 
 house now is emphatically a bachelor house, 
 my servants suit me, my hfe is arranged as I 
 like it, or at least as I can support it best. Cara 
 would make a revolution in everything. What 
 should I do with her ? How should I amuse 
 her ? for, of course, she would want amusement. 
 And she is happy, quite happy, where she is ; 
 nowhere could she be so well as she is now. 
 My aunt and my sister are wrapt up in her. 
 Yes, yes, of course I am fond of my poor little 
 girl ; but what could I do with her ? You are 
 always so reasonable — but not here.' 
 
 'She should be with her father,' said Mrs. 
 Meredith, sticking to her consigne ; and of 
 course he thought it was perversity and opposi- 
 tion, and never divined what it cost her to 
 maintain, against all her habits of mind, the 
 opposite side. When, however, it appeared by 
 the Sunninghill letters that the ladies there 
 took the same view, Mr. Beresford had no more 
 to say. He yielded, but not with a good grace. 
 ' You shall have your will,' he said ; ' but Cara 
 will not be happy.' He did not take Oswald 
 Meredith into consideration, or any such strange 
 influence ; and as for changing his own habits,
 
 260 CARITA. 
 
 how was that to be thought of ? Life was hard 
 enough anyhow, with all the alleviations which 
 fate permitted. Did anyone suppose that a 
 girl of seventeen, whom he scarcely kneWy 
 could be made into a companion for him by the 
 mere fact that she was his daughter ? No ; hi& 
 mornings, which were occupied with what he 
 called hard work ; his afternoons, which he 
 spent among his serious friends in his clubs and 
 learned societies ; and that evening hour, most 
 refreshing to his soul of any, in which the 
 truest sympathy, the tenderest kindness proved 
 a cordial which kept him alive — which of these,. 
 was it to be supposed, he would give up for the 
 society of little Cara? He was very glad to 
 give her all that was wanted for her comfort — 
 a good careful attendant, plenty of dresses and 
 pocket-money, and so forth ; but he could not 
 devote himself, surely (who could expect it?)^ 
 to the society of a child. That anyone should 
 expect this gave him even a little repulsion 
 from, a half-prejudice against her. When she 
 appeared, with that serious, half- disapproving 
 look of hers, and when he reahsed her, seated 
 upstairs in that drawing-room which he had 
 never entered since her mother^s death, among
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 261 
 
 all her mother's relics, recalHng to him at once 
 a poignant sense of his loss and a sharp thrill of 
 conscious pain, in having so far surmounted 
 that loss and put it behind him, the impulse of 
 separation came still more strongly upon him. 
 He shut himself up in his study more deter- 
 minedly in the morning, and in the evening 
 had more need than ever of the consoling visits 
 which wound him up and kept his moral being 
 in harmony. He had to ask Mrs. Meredith her 
 advice and her opinion, and to ask even her 
 guidance in respect to Cara. Who could tell 
 him so well what to do with a girl as the kindest 
 and best of women ? Oswald, who had been at 
 home for some time, did not like these visits so 
 well as his mother did. No one ever suggested 
 to the young man that he was de trop ; but to 
 be sure there were Dauses in their conversation 
 when this third person was present, and allusions 
 would be made which he did not understand. 
 So that latterly he had been out or in the 
 library downstairs when Mr. Beresford came ; 
 very often out, which Mrs. Meredith did not 
 hke, but did not know how to prevent, for to 
 be sure she felt the embarrassment also of her 
 son's shght disapproval, and of the restraint his
 
 262 CARITA. 
 
 presence produced. Why should he cause a 
 restraint ? her boy ! but she felt that he did so, 
 and it made her unhappy. It was pleasanter in 
 the former evenings, when Mr. Beresford came 
 home only now and then, and there was neither 
 a Cara nor an Oswald to perplex the simple 
 state of affairs. 
 
 ' How is she to amuse herself ! ' Mr. Beres- 
 ford said to her. ' Yes, yes, I know you will 
 do what you can — when was there ever a time 
 when you did not do what you could and 
 more ? — but I cannot take her about, I cannot 
 have anyone in the house to keep her com- 
 pany, and how is she to live there, a young 
 girl, alone ? ' 
 
 ' I think Cara will do very well,' said Mrs. 
 Meredith. ' She can always come to me. I 
 have told her so ; and the people we know are 
 all beginning to call. She will soon have 
 plenty of friends. People will invite her, and 
 you must go with her here and there.' 
 
 ' / go with her ? You know how I hate 
 going out ! ' 
 
 ' Once at least — say only once. You must 
 do that, and then you will find Cara will have 
 her own friends ; she will not be a difficulty
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 263 
 
 any longer. I am glad you trust in me to do 
 what I can for her — and Oswald.' 
 
 ' Of course I trust in you,' he said ; ' but it 
 will break up everything. I know it will — 
 after coming to a kind of calm, after feehng 
 that I can settle down again, and that life is 
 not utterly distasteful to me — you will not 
 wonder that I should be frightened for every- 
 thing. And you, who have done so much for 
 me.' 
 
 ' I have not done anything,' said Mrs. Mere- 
 dith, looking up smihng from her book. 
 
 ' You say so, but it is you who have done 
 everything ; and if I am to be plucked from 
 my refuge now, and pitched forth upon the 
 
 world 1 believe I am a coward. I shrink 
 
 from mere outside intercourse, from being 
 knocked up against one and another, and shut 
 out from what I prize most.' 
 
 ' How can that be ? ' she said ; ' you get 
 fretful, you men, when everything does not go 
 as you wish. Have a little patience. When 
 Oswald came home, it seemed at first as if he, 
 dear boy, was going to upset all my habits; 
 but it was a vain fear. The first little strange^ 
 ness is over, and he has settled down ; and we
 
 264 CAKITA. 
 
 are happy — happier than ever. It will be the 
 same with Cara and you.' 
 
 Beresford gave a half-groan of dissent. I 
 fear Mrs. Meredith saw that it had a double 
 meaning, and that it expressed a certain impa- 
 tience of her son as well as of his daughter ; 
 but this was one of the things which she would 
 not see. 
 
 'Yes,' she said, with a little nod of her 
 head, ' I will answer for it, it will be just the 
 same with Cara and you.' 
 
 Mr. Beresford gave a little snort at this of 
 absolute dissatisfaction. ' I don't like changes 
 of any kind,' he said ; ' when we have got to 
 be tolerably well in this dismal world, why not 
 be content with it, and stop there ! Le mieux 
 est Vennemi du Men. How true that is ! and 
 yet what can be better than well? I dislike 
 changes, and this almost more than any other. 
 I foresee it will bring me a thousand troubles 
 — not to you, I hope,' he said, his voice 
 slightly faltering ; ' it would be unbearable in- 
 deed if it brought any trouble to you.' 
 
 ' Cara cannot bring any trouble to me,' she 
 said brightly ; ' of that I am sure enough : you 
 are making a ghost of the dearest child. By
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 265 
 
 and by you will see how sweet she is and how 
 good.' 
 
 ' All girls have a way of being sweet and 
 good,' he said cynically, which was a mood 
 quite uncongenial to him and out of his way. 
 
 ' That is not hke you,' said Mrs. Meredith. 
 
 He knew it was not. The thought had 
 passed through his own mind that the saying was 
 ungenerous and unworthy of him, and unworthy 
 of utterance in her presence. What could any 
 man be worth who could utter one of those 
 foolish stock taunts against women in any stage 
 of life, before a woman who was to him the 
 queen of friends, the essence of everything con- 
 solatory and sweet. ' You are always right,' he 
 replied hastily, ' and I am wrong, as a matter of 
 course. I am out of sorts. I had but just 
 caught hold of life again and found it practica- 
 ble, and here seems something that may unsettle 
 all ; but I am wrong, it is almost certain, and 
 you must be right.' 
 
 ' That is a delightful sentiment — for me ; 
 but I am sure of my ground about Cara. Oh, 
 quite sure ! ' she said, ' as sure — as I am of my 
 own boys.' 
 
 Beresford did not say anything, but he
 
 266 CARITA. 
 
 breathed a short impatient sigh. Her boys were 
 all very well at a distance. When they had been 
 absent he had been fond of them, and had shared 
 in the sentiment expressed by all Mrs. Mere- 
 dith's friends, of regret for their absence ; but 
 when a small share even of a woman's company 
 has become one of your daily comforts it is 
 difficult not to find her grown-up son in your 
 way. He reflected upon this as he shook hands 
 with her, and went back to his dwelHng-place 
 next door with a consciousness of impatience 
 which was quite unjustifiable. To be sure her 
 grown-up son had a right to her which nothing 
 could gainsay, and was, in a sort of a way, master 
 of the house under her, and might even have a 
 kind of right to show certain mild objections and 
 dishkes to special visitors. Mr. Beresford could 
 not deny these privileges of a son ; but they 
 galled him, and there was in his mind an unex- 
 pressed irritation against those troublesome 
 members of the new generation who would 
 thrust themselves in the wav of their elders, and 
 tread upon their heels perpetually. Children 
 were much pleasanter than these grown-up 
 young people. He did not see the use of them. 
 Cara, for instance, though it was supposed she
 
 THE OLD PEOPLE. 267 
 
 was to keep house for her father, of what use 
 was she in the house ? Cook (naturally) knew 
 a hundred times more than she did, and kept 
 everything going as on wheels. As for Oswald 
 Meredith, who had been a sprightly and delight- 
 ful boy, what was he now ? — an idle young man 
 about town, quite beyond his mother's manage- 
 ment ; doing nothing, probably good for nothing, 
 idling away the best years of his life. Why did 
 not she send him to India, as he was doing so 
 httle here ? What an ease to everybody con- 
 cerned that would be ! He thought of it in the 
 most philosophical way, as good for everybody,, 
 best for the young man — a relief to his mother's 
 anxieties, a thing which his best friends must 
 desire. What a pity that it could not be done 
 at once ! But it would scarcely be good policy 
 on his part to suggest it to Oswald's mother. 
 She might think he had other motives ; and 
 what motive could he have except to promote 
 the welfare of the son of such a kind friend ?
 
 2QS CAKITA. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 ROGER. 
 
 IRoGER BuRCHELL had set his mind steadily, from 
 the moment of Cara's translation to her father's 
 house, upon spending those Sundays, which he 
 Jiad hitherto passed at home, with his aunt 
 at Notting Hill. But the rest of the world has 
 ^ way of throwing obstacles in the path of 
 heroes of twenty in a quite incredible and 
 heartless manner. It was not that the authori- 
 ties at the Eectory made any serious objections. 
 There was so many of them that one was not 
 missed — and Eoger was not one of the more 
 useful members of the family. He had no voice, 
 for one thing, and therefore was useless in 
 church ; and he declined Sunday-school work, 
 and was disposed to be noisy, and disturbed the 
 attention of the little ones ; therefore he could 
 be dispensed with at home, and nobody cared 
 to interfere with his incHnations. Neither had
 
 ROGER. 269' 
 
 the aunt at Netting Hill any objection to Eoger 
 — he was a friendly boy, willing to take a quiet 
 walk, ready to be kind to those who were kind 
 to him — and to have somebody to share her 
 solitary Sunday's dinner, and make her feel like 
 other people when she went to church, was- 
 pleasant to her. He was a boy who never 
 would want to shirk morning church, or keep 
 the servants from it, to get him a late breakfast, 
 like so many young men. But accident, not 
 evil intention, came in Eoger's way. His aunt 
 fell ill, and then something went wrong at the 
 Engineering College, and leave was withheld — 
 entirely by caprice or mistake, for Eoger of 
 course, was sure of being entirely innocent, as 
 such youthful sufferers generally are. The up- 
 shot was, that his first Sunday in London did 
 not really occur until Cara had been a whole 
 month in her new home. How he chafed and 
 fretted under this delay it is unnecessary to tell. 
 It seemed to him an age since that October 
 afternoon when the sun was so warm on the 
 Hill, and Cara stood by his side looking over 
 the country in its autumn tints, and watching 
 the shadows fly and the hghts gleam over St. 
 George's. What a long time it was ! the mel-
 
 270 CARITA. 
 
 low autumn had stolen away into the fogs of 
 winter ; November is but the next month, yet 
 what a difference there is between its clammy 
 chills, and the thick air that stifles and chokes 
 you, and that warmth and sunny glow with 
 which red-breasted October sings the fall of the 
 leaves and the gathering-in of the fruit ! And 
 in that time how much might have happened. 
 Had it been dreary for her all by herself in 
 London, separated from her friends ? or had she 
 found new people to keep her cheerful, and for- 
 gotten the friends of her youth? These were 
 the questions the lad asked himself as he went 
 up to town from Berkshii-e, on the evening of 
 Saturday, the 25th of November. All that he 
 had heard of since she left had been from a letter 
 which Miss Cherry had read to his sister Agnes, 
 and from which it appeared that Cara felt Lon- 
 don lonely, and regretted her friends in the 
 country. ' How I wish I could have a peep at 
 all of you or any of you ! ' she had said. Agnes 
 had been pleased with the expression, and so 
 was he. ' All of us or any of us,' he said to 
 himself for the hundredth time as the train flew 
 over the rain-sodden country. He thought, 
 with a thrill at his heart, that her face would
 
 ROGER. 271 
 
 light up, as he had seen it do, and she would be 
 glad to see him. She would put into his that 
 small hand, that seemed to melt in his grasp like 
 a flake of snow ; and perhaps there would come 
 upon her cheek that faint crimson, which only 
 things very pleasant brought there — the reflec- 
 tion of a sweet excitement. What an era that 
 would be for Eoger ! he dreamt it out moment 
 by moment, till he almost felt that it had oc- 
 curred. Sometimes a dream of the other kind 
 would start across him — a horrible fancy that 
 he would find her happy among others, making 
 new friends, forgetting the old ; but this was too 
 painful to be encouraged. He thought the train 
 as slow as an old hackney coach, when at last, 
 after all these delays, he got away and found 
 himself actually on the road to London and to 
 her, and thought of a story he had heard of 
 someone in hot haste, as he was, who had jumped 
 out of his carriage and pushed it on behind to 
 arrive the sooner. Eoger felt disposed to do so, 
 though his train was an express, and though lie 
 knew he could not go to the Square that evening 
 to see her. But he was so much nearer her 
 when he got to Notting Hill. She was on one 
 side of the Park and he on the other. Next day
 
 272 CARTTA. 
 
 he would walk across, through all the Sunday 
 people, through the yellow fog, under the bare- 
 branched trees, and knock at her door. There 
 was still a moment of suspense, still a long win- 
 try night — and then ! 
 
 His aunt thought very well of the young 
 man when he got to dotting Hill. She was 
 his mother's sister, a widow and without child- 
 ren, and Eoger had been named after her 
 husband, the late Captain Brandon, whose por- 
 trait hung over her mantelpiece, and whose 
 memory was her pride. She thought her 
 nephew was like her side of the house, not 
 ' those Burchells,' and felt a thrill of pride as 
 he came in, tall and strong, in his red-brown 
 hair and budding moustache, with a touch of 
 autumn colour about him in the heavy despon- 
 dency of the November day. 
 
 ' What weather ! ' she said, ' what weather^ 
 Eoger ! I daresay it is a little better in the 
 country ; but we have nothing else to expect in 
 November, when the wind blows up the smoke 
 out of the city. 
 
 Eoger hastened to assure her that the coun- 
 try was a great deal worse, that the river was 
 like a big, dismal ditch, full of mists and rains.
 
 ROGER. 273 
 
 and that town, with its cheerful hghts and 
 cheerful company, was the only place. Aunt 
 Mary let herself be persuaded. She gave him 
 a nice little dish of cutlets with his tea. She 
 asked him questions about his mother and sis- 
 ter, and whether his papa's opinions were not 
 getting modified by experience and by the 
 course of events. 
 
 ' Hasn't he learnt to take warning by all 
 this Komanisiug ? ' she asked, and shook her 
 head at Eoger's doubtful reply. She differed 
 so much in ecclesiastical opinion from her 
 brother-in-law, that she very seldom went to 
 the Eectory. But she was glad to hear all 
 about her godchild, little Mary, and how Phihp 
 was getting on at Cambridge. And how plea- 
 sant it was to have someone to talk to, instead 
 of sitting all alone and melancholy, thinking, 
 or reading the newspaper. She made much of 
 Eoger, and told him he would always be wel- 
 come ; he was to come as often as he pleased. 
 
 ' I shall see her to-morrow,' Eoger said to 
 himself, as he laid his head upon his pillow. 
 The thought did not stop him from sleeping ; 
 why should it ? but it suggested a string of 
 dreams, some of whicli were terribly tanta- 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 CARITA. 
 
 Using. He was just putting out his hand to 
 take hers, just about to hear the answer to 
 some momentous question, when he would 
 wake suddenly and lose it all ; but still even the 
 disappointment only awakened him to the fact 
 that he was to see her to-morrow ; he was to 
 see her to-morrow; nay, to-day, though this 
 yellow glimmer did not look much like day- 
 light. He got up the moment he was called, 
 and dressed with much pains and care — too 
 much care. When his toilet was careless 
 Eoger looked, as he was, a gentleman ; but 
 when he took extra pains, a Sunday look crept 
 about him, a certain stiffness, as of a man 
 occupying clothes to which he was unaccus- 
 tomed. His frock-coat — it was his first — was 
 uglier and squarer than even frock-coats gene- 
 rally are, his hat looked higher, his gloves a 
 terrible bondage. Poor boy ! but for Cara he 
 never would have had that frock-coat ; thus to 
 look our best we look our worst, and evil be- 
 comes our good. But his aunt was much 
 pleased with his appearance when he went to 
 church with her, and thought his dress just 
 what eyery gentleman ought to wear on Sun- 
 day.
 
 ROGER. 275 
 
 'But yoiir gloves are too tight, my dear/ 
 she said. 
 
 Eoger thought everything was tight, and 
 was in twenty minds to abandon his fine 
 clothes and put on the rough morning suit he 
 had come in ; but the frock-coat carried the 
 day. He could not eat at Mrs. Brandon's 
 early dinner. She was quite unhappy about 
 him, and begged him not to stand on cere- 
 mony, but to tell her frankly if it was not to 
 his mind. 'For if you are going to spend 
 your Sundays with me it is just as easy to buy 
 one thing as another,' Aunt Mary said, good, 
 kind, deceived woman. She was very glad he 
 should take a walk afterwards, hoping it would 
 do him good. 
 
 ' And I think perhaps I had better call at 
 the Square and see Miss Beresford. Her aunt 
 is sure to ask me when I see her,' he said. 
 
 ' Do, my dear,' said the unsuspecting 
 woman. And he set off across the park. It 
 was damp enough and foggy enough to quench 
 any man's courage. The Sunday people, who 
 were out in spite of all disadvantages, were 
 blue, half with the cold and half with the 
 colour of the pitiless day. A few old ladies in 
 
 T 2
 
 276 CARITA. 
 
 close broughams took tlieir constitutional drive 
 slowly round and round. What pleasure could 
 they find in it ? still, as it is the ordinance of 
 heaven that there should be old ladies as well 
 as young men of twenty, it was a good thing 
 they had comfortable broughams to drive 
 about in ; and they had been young in their 
 time, Eoger supposed, feeling it hard upon 
 everybody not to have the expectations, the 
 hopes, that made his own heart beat. How it 
 beat and thumped against his breast ! He was 
 almost sorry, though he was glad, when the 
 walk was over and the tall roofs of the houses 
 in the Square overshadowed him. His heart 
 jumped higher still, though he thought it had 
 been incapable of more, when he got to the 
 house. ' Doors where my heart was used to 
 beat.' He did not know any poetry to speak 
 of, and these words did not come to him. He 
 felt that she must be glad to see him, this dull, 
 damp Sunday afternoon, the very time when 
 heaven and earth stood still, when there was 
 nothing to amuse or occupy the languid mind. 
 No doubt she and her father would be sitting 
 together, suppressing two mutual yawns, read- 
 ing two dull books ; or, oh, blessed chance !
 
 ROGER. 277 
 
 perhaps her father would have retired to his 
 library, and Cara would be alone. He pic- 
 tured this to himself — a silent room, a Sunday 
 solitude, a little drooping figure by the chim- 
 ney-corner, brightening up at sight of a well- 
 known face — when the drawing-room door 
 opened before him, and his dream exploded 
 hke a bubble, and with a shock of self-derision 
 and disappointment more bitter than honest 
 Eoger had ever felt in all his simple life before. 
 There were several people in the room, but na- 
 turally Eoger's glance sought out the only one 
 he was interested in, the only one he knew in 
 the httle company. She was standing in front 
 of one of the windows, the pale wintry light 
 behind making a silhouette of her pretty 
 figure, and the fine Hues of her profile ; but 
 curiously enough, it was not she, after the first 
 glance, who attracted Eoger's gaze, but the 
 other figure which stood beside her, close to 
 her, young, and friendly, in all the confidence 
 of intimacy. It was Oswald Meredith who was 
 holding a book in which he was showing Cara 
 something — she, holding the corner of it with 
 one hand, drew it down to her level, and with 
 a raised finger of the other seemed to check
 
 278 CAEITA. 
 
 what he was saying. They made the prettiest 
 group ; another young man, sitting at the 
 table, gazing at the pair, thought so too, with 
 an envious sentiment, not so strong or so bitter 
 as Eoger's, but enough to swear by. Oswald 
 had all the luck, this young fellow was saying 
 to himself : little Cara, too ! Behind was Mrs. 
 Meredith, sitting by the fire, and Mr. Beres- 
 ford, gloomy and sombre, standing by her. 
 It was the first time he had been in this 
 room, and the visit had been made expressly 
 for the purpose of dragging him into it. He 
 stood near his friend, looking down, sometimes 
 looking at her, but otherwise never raising his 
 eyes. This, however, was a side scene alto- 
 gether uninteresting to Eoger. What was it 
 to him what these two elder people might be 
 feeling or thinking? All that he could see 
 was Cara and ' that fellow,' who presumed to 
 be there, standing by her side, occupying her 
 attention. And how interested she looked! 
 more than in all the years they had known 
 each other she had ever looked for him. 
 
 Cara started at the sound of his name. ' Mr. 
 Burchell? oh, something must be wrong at 
 home ! ' she cried ; then, turning round sud-
 
 ROGER. 279 
 
 denly, stopped with a nervous laiigli of relief. 
 * Oh, it is only Eoger ! what a fright you gave 
 me ! I thought it must be your father, and that 
 Aunt Charity was ill. Papa, this is Eoger Bur- 
 chell, from the Eectory. You remember, he 
 said he would come and see me. But, Eoger, 
 I thought you were coming directly, and it is 
 quite a long time now since I left home.' 
 
 ' I could not come sooner,' he said, com- 
 forted by this. ' I came as soon as ever I could. 
 My aunt was ill and could not have me ; and 
 then there was some trouble at the College,' he 
 added, hiurriedly, feeling himself to be getting 
 too explanatory. Cara had given him her hand ; 
 she had pointed to a chair near where she was 
 standing; she had given up the book which 
 Oswald now held, and over which he was look- 
 ing, half-amused, at the new-comer. Eoger 
 was as much occupied by him, with hot instinct 
 of rivalry, as he was with Cara herself, who was 
 the goddess of his thoughts ; and how the plain 
 young eugineer, in his stiff frock-coat, despised 
 the handsome young man about town, so easy 
 and so much at home ! with a virulence of con- 
 tempt which no one could have thought to be 
 in Eoger. ' Do yoi^ bite your thumb at me,
 
 280 CARITA. 
 
 sir ? ' he was tempted to say, making up to him 
 straight before the other had time to open his 
 hps. But of course, being in civilised society,. 
 Eoger did not dare to obey his impulse, though 
 it stirred him to the heart. 
 
 'You don't introduce us to your friend, 
 Cara,' said Oswald, smiling, in an undertone. 
 
 The fellow called her Cara ! Was it all set- 
 tled, then, and beyond hope, in four short 
 weeks ? Oh, what a fool Eoger had been to 
 allow himself to be kept away ! 
 
 ' Mr. Eoger Burchell — Mr. Meredith — Mr, 
 Edward Meredith,' said Cara, with a sHght 
 evanescent blush. ' Eoger is almost as old a 
 friend at the Hill as you are at the Square. 
 We have all been children together ; ' and then 
 there was a pause which poor little Cara, not 
 used to keeping such hostile elements in har- 
 mony, did not know how to manage. She 
 asked timidly if he had been at the Hill — ^if he 
 had seen ? 
 
 ' I came direct from the College last night,' 
 he said ; and poor Eoger could not keep a httle 
 flavour of bitterness out of his tone, as who 
 should say, ' A pretty fool I was to come 
 ataU!'
 
 ROGER. 281 
 
 « The— College ? ' said Oswald, in his half- 
 laughing tone. 
 
 ' I mean only the Scientific College, not any- 
 thing to do with a University,' said Eoger, de- 
 fiant in spite of himself. ' I am an engineer — a 
 working man ' — and though he said this as a 
 piece of bravado, poor fellow ! it is inconceiv- 
 able how Sundayish, how endimanche, how 
 much like a real working man in unused best 
 raiment, he felt in his frock-coat. 
 
 ' Oh, tell me about that ! ' said Mrs. Mere- 
 dith, coming forward ; ' it is just what I want 
 to know. Mr. Eoger Burchell, did you say, 
 Cara ? I think I used to know your mother. I 
 have seen her with Miss Cherry Beresford ? 
 Yes ; I thought it must be the same. Do you 
 know I have a particular reason for wishing to 
 hear about your College ? One of my friends 
 wants to send his son there if he can get in. 
 Will you tell me about it ? I know you want 
 to talk to Cara ' 
 
 ' Oh, no ; not if she is engaged,' said Eoger, 
 and blushed hot with excessive youthful shame 
 when he had made this foohsh speech. 
 
 ' She will not be engaged long, for we are 
 going presently,' said the smihng gracious
 
 282 caritI. 
 
 woman, who began to exercise her usual charm 
 upon the angry lad in spite of himself. She 
 drew a chair near to the spot where he still 
 stood defiant. 'I shall not keep you long/ 
 she said; and what could Eoger do but sit 
 down, though so much against his will, and 
 allow himself to be questioned ? 
 
 ' Your friend from the country is impatient 
 of your other friends,' said Oswald, closing the 
 book which he held out to Cara, and marking 
 the place as he gave it to her. ' Do you want 
 to get rid of us as much as he does ? ' 
 
 ' He does not want to get rid of anyone, 
 but he does not imderstand — society,' said Cara, 
 in the same undertone. Eoger could not hear 
 what it was, but he felt sure they were talking 
 of him, though he did his best to listen to Mrs. 
 Meredith's questions. Then the other one rose, 
 who was not so handsome as Oswald, and went 
 to her other side, completely shutting her out 
 from the eyes of the poor fellow who had come 
 so far, and taken so much trouble to see her. 
 The College — what did he care for the College ! 
 about which the soft-voiced stranger was ques- 
 tioning him. He made her vague broken 
 answers, and turned round undisguisedly, poor
 
 KOGER. 283 
 
 fellow ! to where Cara stood ; yet all he could 
 see of her was the skirt of her blue dress from 
 the other side of Edward Meredith, whose head, 
 leaning forward, came between Eoger and the 
 girl on whom his heart was set. 
 
 ' Mr. Burchell, Cara and her father are 
 dining with my boys and me. Edward is only 
 with me for a few hours ; he is going away by 
 the last train. Will not you come, too, and 
 join us ? Then Cara can see a little more of 
 you. Do you stay in town to-night ? ' 
 
 Two impulses struggled in Eoger 's mind — 
 to refuse disdainfully, or to accept gratefully. 
 In the first case he would have said he had 
 dined already, making a little brag of his aunt's 
 early hours — in the second — a calculation 
 passed very quickly through his mind, so quick 
 that it was concluded almost before Mrs. Mere- 
 dith's invitation. 
 
 ' I could,' he said, faltering ; ' or, perhaps, 
 if your son is going I might go, too, which 
 would be best ' 
 
 ' Very well, then, it is a bargain,' she said, 
 putting out her hand with a dehghtful smile. 
 He felt how warm and sweet it was, even 
 though he was trying at the moment to see
 
 284 CAEITA. 
 
 Cara. This was the kind of mother these 
 fellows had, and Cara living next door! 
 Surely all the luck seems to be centred on 
 some people ; others have no chance against 
 them. He stood by while Mrs. Meredith got 
 up, drawing her sons with her. ' Come, boys, 
 you can carry on your talk later,' she said. 
 ' Good -by for the moment, Cara mia.' Then 
 she turned to Mr. Beresford, who stood gloomily, 
 with his eyes bent on the fire. ' You are not 
 sorry you have broken the spell?' she said, 
 with a voice which she kept for him alone, or 
 so at least he thought. 
 
 He gave his shoulders a hasty shrug. ' We 
 can talk of that later. I am going to see you 
 to the door,' he said, giving her his arm. The 
 boys hngered. Oswald was patting his book 
 affectionately with one hand. It was Edward 
 who was ' making the running ' now. 
 
 ' You are still coming to dine, Cara ? ' he 
 said. ' Don't turn me off for this friend. He 
 cannot be such an old friend as I am ; and I 
 have only a few hours ' 
 
 ' So has he,' said Cara ; ' and he told me 
 he was coming. What am I to do ? ' 
 
 ' There are three courses that you can
 
 KOGER. 285 
 
 pursue/ said Oswald. ' Leave him, as Ned 
 recommends ; stay with him, as I certainly 
 don't recommend; or bring him with you. 
 And which of these, Cara, you may choose will 
 be a lesson as to your opinion of us. But you 
 can't stay with him ; that would be a slight to 
 my mother, and your father would not allow 
 it. The compromise would be to bring him.' 
 
 ' Oh, how can I do that, unless Mrs. Mere- 
 dith told me to do it ? No ; perhaps he will 
 go away of himself — perhaps ' 
 
 ' Poor wretch ! he looks unhappy enough,' 
 said Edward, with a sympathy of fellow-feeling. 
 Oswald laughed. The misery and offence in 
 the new-comer's face was only amusing to him. 
 
 ' Cara,' he said, ' if you are going to begin 
 offensive warfare, and to flaunt young men 
 from the country in our faces, I for one will 
 rebel. It is not fair to us ; we were not pre- 
 pared for anything of the sort.' 
 
 ' My mother is calling us,' said Edward, im- 
 patiently. Two or three times before his 
 brother had irritated him to-day. Either he 
 was in a very UTitable mood, or Oswald was 
 more provoking than usual. ' I have only a 
 few hours,' he continued, aggrieved, in a low
 
 286 CARITA. 
 
 tone, ' and I have scarcely spoken to you, Cara ; 
 and it was you and I who used to be the closest 
 friends. Don't you remember? Oswald can 
 see you when he pleases ; I have only one day. 
 You won't disappoint us, will you ? I wish 
 you'd go ' — this was to his brother — ' I'll follow. 
 There are some things I want to speak to Cara 
 about, and you have taken her up all the after- 
 noon with your poetry. Yes, yes ; I see, there 
 is him behind ; but, Cara, look here, you won't 
 be persuaded to stay away to-night ? ' 
 
 ' Not if I can help it,' said the girl, who 
 was too much embarrassed by this first social 
 difficulty to feel the flattery involved. She 
 turned to Eoger, when the others went down- 
 stairs, with a somewhat disturbed and tremu- 
 lous smile. 
 
 ' They are our next-door neighbours, and 
 they are very kind,' she said. ' Mrs. Meredith 
 is so good to me ; as kind as if she were a 
 relation ' (this was all Cara knew of relation- 
 ships). ' I don't know what I should do with- 
 out her ; and I have known the boys all my 
 life. Eoger, won't you sit down.^ I am so 
 sorry to have been taken up like this the very 
 moment you came.'
 
 ROGER. 287 
 
 ' But if tliey live next door, and you know 
 them so well, I daresay you are very often 
 taken up like this,' said Eoger, ' and that will 
 be hard upon your country friends. And I 
 think,' he added, taking courage as he found 
 that the door remained closed, and that not even 
 her father (estimable man !) came back, that we 
 have a better claim than they have ; for you 
 wfere only a child when you came to the Hill,, 
 and you have grown up there.' 
 
 ' I like all my old friends,' said Cara, eva- 
 sively. ' Some are — I mean they differ — one 
 likes them for different things.' 
 
 The poor boy leaped to the worse interpre- 
 tation of this, which, indeed, was not very far 
 from the true one. ^ Some are poorer and not 
 so fine as others,' he said ; ' but, perhaps, Cara, 
 the rough ones, the homely ones, those you 
 despise, are the most true.' 
 
 ' I don't despise anyone,' she said, turning 
 away, and taking up Oswald Meredith's book. 
 
 By Jove ! even when he was gone was ' that 
 fellow' to have the best of it with his con- 
 founded book ? Eoger's heart swelled ; and 
 then he felt that expediency was very much to 
 be thought of, and that when a man could not
 
 288 CARITA. 
 
 have all he wanted it was wise to put up with 
 what he could get. 
 
 ' Cara, don't be angry with me,' he said. 
 ' I shall hke your friends, too, if — if you wish 
 me. The lady is very nice and kind, as you 
 say. She has asked me to go there to dinner, 
 too.' 
 
 ' You ! ' Cara said, with (he thought) a gleam 
 of annoyance. Eoger jumped up, wild with 
 rage and jealousy, but then he sat down again, 
 which was certainly the best thing for him 
 to do.
 
 289 
 
 CHAPTEE XVI. 
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 
 
 To sit down in your morning clothes, painfully 
 conscious of a blue tie with a pin in it, at a 
 decorous dinner-table with three men in correct 
 evening dress, and two ladies — not indeed bare- 
 shouldered according to ancient use, but yet 
 arrayed in all the niceties of that demi-toilette 
 which is the despair of the vulgar — is in itself 
 no small trial to a sensitive and thin-skinned 
 youth. Eoger Burchell had not been able to 
 resist the spell which Mrs. Meredith exercised 
 upon everybody who came near her, nor had he 
 been able to count the cost of that evening 
 spent in Cara's society, and to strike a balance 
 between the pain it would cause him and the 
 pleasure to be procured from it. He was not 
 calm enough to do this. He had not thought 
 of any pain involved, but snatched at the chance 
 of carrying out his hopes and spending the 
 VOL. I. u
 
 290 CARITA. 
 
 evening in her society without thinking of 
 any results. To be sure, instmctive dishke and 
 repugnance had moved him at the first sight of 
 the two young men. What did they want here ? 
 What had Cara to do with them ? But that was 
 all ; and he had not realised how hard it would 
 be to sit by and see these natural enemies so 
 much nearer and more intimate with Cara than 
 himself, linked to her by ties even of older 
 friendship than he could boast of, poor fellow. 
 All this was unthought-of misery. It was true 
 that after the Merediths went away in the short 
 interval before dinner he had half-an-hour with 
 Cara by herself — but she asked him questions 
 about his aunt and about his little sisters, show- 
 ing no interest in himself, and at last begged 
 him to excuse her, as she must get ready for 
 dinner. Even then he did not know how dark 
 his fate was to be ; but he could not get ready 
 for dinner. He looked at himself in the glass, 
 and at his blue tie which he had thought so 
 well of in the morning. The best that anyone 
 could say for poor Eoger was that he looked 
 like a respectable mechanic in his Sunday cos- 
 tume, and a consciousness of this fact impressed 
 itself upon his own mind for the first time. Yes
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 291 
 
 — the long glass in the glimmering half- lighted 
 drawing-room showed him his own image as no 
 o^lass at home had ever done — like an enmneer 
 in his Sunday clothes, one of his practical 
 ' mates ' in the workshop, who showed him how 
 to make boilers and screws, and asked him for 
 beer — exactly like one of them. While this 
 latter thought was in his mind, Cara came softly 
 into the room in her white dress, the most per- 
 fect dainty creature, tearing poor Eoger's heart 
 in two. How unhke she was to himself in his 
 blue tie I he felt as if he could never leave her, 
 and yet wished himself with his aunt in Notting 
 Hill ; for what had he to do here ? 
 
 The dinner was not, perhaps, the abundant 
 meal which Koger had been used to see on 
 occasions when there was company. There was 
 no huge joint, no pair of visible fowls, with a 
 tongue placed between them, which was his 
 mother's grand dish, but a succession of small 
 matters handed round, which Roger tried to 
 despise. He tried hard to despise everything — 
 the over-dress (as he felt it to be), the flowers 
 on the dainty table, the ready flow of talk. How 
 could these fellows find so much to say ? He 
 coidd have talked to Cara (perhaps) had they 
 
 u2
 
 292 CARITA. 
 
 been alone together ; but to chatter as these 
 fellows did — he could as soon fly, he said to 
 himself. There were no decorous silences, no 
 long pauses, such as he had been used to, but a 
 constant, easy flow of this, which, no doubt, 
 they called conversation ! It could not be said 
 that he himself added much to it. Now and 
 then, after considerable pondering, he would 
 fire off a remark, but this seldom happened till 
 after the subject had been dismissed by the 
 others, and when it required a polite efibrt on 
 their parts to make out what he meant ; and he 
 discovered this with a hot blush of shame as 
 soon as his little speech was made. The only 
 comfort he had was that Cara did not talk very 
 much either ; but then she hstened with pleased 
 looks while the Meredith family chattered. 
 How they all chattered, mother and sons ! 
 Eoger did not think they could be quite — he 
 did not know what word to use — not quite — . 
 Perfectly respectable people did not, so far as he 
 Knew, indulge in such streams of conversation. 
 He felt there was sometliing Awong in so much 
 talk. 
 
 And when they went upstairs after dinner it 
 was still worse. Mr. Beresford and the others
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 293 
 
 did not sit over their wine, which Eoger would 
 liave thought the best thing possible had he 
 found themselves satisfactory ; but as this was 
 not the case, and he was siu'e that the only ob- 
 ject of the young Merediths in not staying below 
 and drinking themselves stupid was anxiety to 
 be with Cara, too, he took their quick move as 
 another sign of depravity. It was new-fashioned, 
 it was un-English, it was almost wicked. He 
 followed upstairs with a protest in his soul. 
 Cara and Mrs. Meredith were sitting together 
 over the fire. They drew a httle apart as the 
 others came in, and Mr. Beresford placed him- 
 self by the elder lady, and Oswald by Cara. 
 So ! Eoger said to himself, that was the habitual 
 way m which they arranged themselves — 
 nothing could be more clear ; flirtation, nothing 
 but flirtation, between the old people and be- 
 tween the young people. It was more than 
 wrong, it was monstrous. He supposed such 
 things did happen in London society, where 
 everything that was bad happened ; but to t]]ink 
 of poor little, innocent Cara being thrown into 
 the midst of such a set of people ! Eoger could 
 scarcely command his feehngs. After standing 
 about bchind-backs for a time with Edward,
 
 294 CARITA. 
 
 who, to tell the truth, seemed a little ' out of it ' 
 too, Eoger's sense of horror forced him forward 
 to the front of the fire, where he suddenly placed 
 himself with that temerity of enraged shyness 
 which is bolder than assurance. At all events, 
 there could be no particular conversation be- 
 tween Oswald and Cara while he stood there. 
 
 This made a httle break in the low- voiced 
 talk. Mrs. Meredith, who sat on the other side 
 in a low chair, with a little table by her elbow, 
 on which stood a lamp, turned from Mr. Beres- 
 ford to look at him. He could not easily think 
 ill of tills soft-smihng lady ; but he made an 
 effort, and succeeded even in this. 
 
 ' Are you at the University, Mr. Burchell ? [ 
 she said, smiling upon him. 
 
 There was some work lying upon her little 
 table. He jumped at this evidence of Sabbath- 
 breaking and profanity with inward satisfaction 
 as a sign that she must be bad too. 
 
 'Ko,' he said, with unnecessary explana- 
 toriness, ' I am not so lucky. I have got my 
 own way to make in the world. I have to start 
 work at once. I was afraid you would give me 
 credit for more than I deserved. My brother's 
 at Cambridge, for he is going into the Church ;
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 295 
 
 but as for me, I've got my own way to make in 
 the world.' 
 
 ' So have the rest of us/ said Oswald. ' You 
 must not take such high ground of superiority. 
 We have all got our own way to make in the 
 world.' 
 
 ' That is all very well,' said Eoger, deter- 
 mined to separate himself from all resemblance 
 to his companions ; ' but I'm a rough, practical 
 man, not in your elegant way. I'm an engineer 
 — I am going to India, I suppose ' 
 
 ' And so, I suppose, am I,' said Edward, 
 looking, as Eoger thought, towards Cara with 
 a sigh. ' But I am not very fond of the idea. 
 I hope you like it better than I do ? ' 
 
 ' Nobody will ask my opinion whether I like 
 it or not,' said Eoger. He caught a glimpse of 
 himself at this moment in a mirror opposite, and 
 his blue tie seemed to glare at him and force 
 him on. 'I shaU have to do whatever will 
 make me independent soonest. They've got a 
 number of children at home.' 
 
 ' It is very fine to be independent,' said 
 Mrs. Meredith, in her soft way ; ' or at least so 
 all you boys think. You like to be able to do 
 what you please without reference to your
 
 296 CARITA. 
 
 fathers and mothers.' She looked at her own 
 boys as she spoke, not at Eoger, and even this 
 added to his exasperation. How different they 
 were with tliis soft mother, whose very look was 
 a caress, from what he was, with all the children 
 at home, and a father and mother whom num- 
 bers made impartial, and who had few prejudices 
 in Eoger's favour. Poor boy, his heart swelled 
 with a sense of his disadvantages ; and naturally 
 he did all he could to make them show the 
 more. 
 
 ' Independence don't mean that sort of 
 thing to me,' he said; ' it is taking the expense 
 off my father, that's what they think of I 
 must get my own living as soon as I can, that 
 is what it means ; and if it is not a very good 
 living, so much the worse for me. No one else 
 will pay much attention. Whether one does 
 what one likes or does what one must, makes 
 all the difference ' 
 
 'That is spoken like a philosopher,' said 
 Mr. Beresford, who had been looking at the 
 young bear thus making uncouth noises of self- 
 assertion with distasteful amusement ; ' but 
 you must recollect that very few of us have 
 the privilege of doing what we like. When
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 297 
 
 we get this advantage, it is generally when we 
 cease to prize it, when we should be thankful to 
 go back to the must, and be under force again/ 
 
 Under other circumstances Eoger could 
 only have been respectful of Cara's father, but 
 he v\^as otherwise inspired now, and ready to 
 defy even that most privileged of mortals. ' So 
 you people say, sir,' he said, with a rough show 
 of respect, ' who have things all your own way. 
 So long as you don't know what it is to be 
 under force of circumstances, I suppose it seems 
 rather fine than otherwise to do your duty 
 though you don't like it. I have thought that 
 myself now and again. It looks self-denying 
 and all that ; but if it's true, as people say, 
 that you do best what you like best, I don't see 
 the good of self-denial in that way.' 
 
 ' I agree with Mr. Burchell,' said Osw^ald ; 
 ' but I go further. What is the good of self- 
 denial in any way ? It always involves unkind- 
 ness to somebody. Nature gives you a beautiful 
 day, for instance, and you turn your back upon 
 her and work. What could be more unkind 
 and ungrateful ? Or Cara says to me, " Come 
 out and play croquet in the Square 
 
 'I hate croquet,' cried Cara, indignantly.
 
 298 CARITA. 
 
 ' I never did such a thing in my hfe ; besides, 
 it is winter, and I could not play croquet if I 
 liked it ever so much.' 
 
 ' What does it matter about details ? I use 
 the word croquet as a symbol — or my mother 
 requires my attendance upon her somewhere. 
 Then the rest of the world turn round and call 
 me idle ! Self-denial is a disagreeable quality, 
 Cara. Let us avoid it. At the best it is only 
 extracting merit out of necessity, for nobody 
 denies himself except when he's obliged to do 
 so.' 
 
 ' Sybarite ! ' said Mrs. Meredith, shaking 
 her head at her son ; and then she turned to 
 talk to Mr. Beresford, and the four young 
 people were left to themselves. 
 
 ' Sit down, Eoger,' said Cara ; ' why should 
 you stand up there as if you were defying the 
 w^orld. You are all quite wrong. It is not 
 self-denial to do what you are forced to do. 
 When you give up anything of your own free 
 will because it is right, then perhaps ' 
 
 ' Only perhaps, Cara ? Don't take away 
 the little satisfaction one has in doing a thing 
 that is disagreeable. Look here,' said Edward, 
 suddenly seating himself in the vacant place by 
 her which Eoger had neglected to take, ' going
 
 SUNDAY EVENING, 299 
 
 to India is very (lisngreeable to me. I tliiuk 
 1 could do just as well at home. My feeliug 
 is all against it ; I miglit, perhaps, make more 
 money there, but money is not everything. 
 There is no necessity that I can see, one way 
 or another — but my mother wishes it — that is 
 to say, my mother thinks my father would like 
 it ' 
 
 Eoger looked quickly at Mrs. Meredith. Is 
 there a father ? he said to himself, with a mental 
 whistle of astonishment, to which he dared not 
 give audible utterance. ' Whew ! ' and the 
 astute young man immediately leaped to the 
 conviction that here was something unquestion- 
 ably AM^ong. 
 
 ' I thought — ^it was Oswald — whom Mr. 
 Meredith wanted ' 
 
 Oswald laughed. ' Have you not found out, 
 Cara, that Oswald is an individual ? ' he said. ' If 
 Ned likes to be knocked about the world ac- 
 cording to other people's fancies, that is his affair. 
 I don't. Yes, it was Oswald that was wanted ; 
 but I never was a man for competitive exami- 
 nations, my ideas don't run in that channel, so 
 I dropped my mantle upon my brother. Oh, 
 he will have compensation ; he will be a Member 
 of Council while I am only a briefless barrister.
 
 300 CARITA. 
 
 He will move princes about like chessmen while 
 I have no influence with anyone but a stray 
 editor. ISTed will be the great man of the family 
 — what, you don't approve of me ! You would 
 rather Ned stayed at home than I ? ' 
 
 Cara had given him a very young girl's 
 most emphatic sign of disapproval. She turned 
 her shoulder upon him, and averted her head. 
 Poor Eoger looked on with a burning heart, 
 seeing the two brothers, one on each side of her, 
 contending, as it seemed, for her approbation. 
 The fact that there were two seemed to shut 
 him out more and more. He was indignant, 
 disappointed, wounded. He said to himself in 
 his heart every ill thing he conld think of 
 against this strange house. First, the Sunday 
 dinner-party — even though he had himself con- 
 doned it by becoming one of the guests ; 
 second, the work left on the table, which he 
 felt sure the mistress of the house was quite 
 capable of taking up, although restrained by 
 his presence from actually doing so. Then the 
 separation of the family — the father in India, 
 the mother here. What a house for Cara to 
 be thrown into ! What an example for her ! 
 A woman who lived apart from her husband
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 301 
 
 and yet asked people to dinner could not be a 
 proper woman to have the charge of Cara. Of 
 course, she was just the sort of person to en- 
 courage a girl in flirting, to put evil into her 
 head. These were the thoughts that kept burn- 
 ing and scorching the brain of poor Eoger as 
 he stood before the fire in this strange house, 
 the people on either side of him so much en- 
 gaged with each other, and he so completely 
 left out. Why did he come here to make him- 
 self unhappy ? Why build such foolish hopes 
 upon this day ? His aunt at Notting Hill would 
 have been a much better companion, a great 
 deal kinder, and she would be wondering now 
 what had become of him, or thinking, per- 
 haps, that he was enjoying himself! Strange 
 enjoyment ! He made a distinct pause in his 
 thoughts to realise her, but he made no sort of 
 movement to go away, which was the only 
 thing he could do to relieve her anxiety. She 
 would w^onder if he meant to come back ; if he 
 was going to stay all night ; or if he had gone 
 off straif>ht from his friend's house to catch the 
 train. There were not all the usual trains on 
 Sunday nights, and tliis would perplex her, 
 poor lady, still more. All this passed through
 
 302 CARITA. 
 
 liis mind, and he was very uncomfortable. Yet 
 he made no attempt to go away. 
 
 ' Eoger,' said Cara, getting up suddenly, for 
 she felt herself embarrassed on her side, and 
 was glad of a way of escape, ' are you going 
 back to the College to-night ? ' 
 
 Her question chimed in with his thoughts, 
 but he did not reply in the way that would 
 have seemed most m keeping with those 
 thoughts. ' It does not matter,' he said ; ' I 
 think I shall go down by the first train to- 
 morrow.' As soon as he felt her soft eyes 
 upon him the foolish young fellow thought that 
 all must go well. 
 
 ' If I were you I would go to-night,' she 
 said ; ' you will be obhged to get up so early, 
 and it is so dark in the mornings. You never 
 
 used to like getting up .' Eoger felt the 
 
 light and the warmth coming back to him, flood- 
 ing him round and round. 
 
 ' I don't mind now,' he said. ' It does not 
 matter. To-night is better than to-morrow,' 
 which was an incoherent utterance that Cara 
 could not understand. 
 
 ' Have you been enjoying it, then ? I was 
 afraid you did not like them,' said Cara, very
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 303 
 
 low, so that no one could hear but himself. 
 Then Eoger glowed with sudden kindness, and 
 felt ready to embrace the whole party. 
 
 ' It is only my bad manners,' he said. ' Oh, 
 Cara, have I been making myself disagreeable ? 
 You know they always go on at me about my 
 manners at home.' 
 
 ' Your manners are well enough,' she said, 
 with a serious look. ' I thought you were not 
 — pleased. Come, then, and sit down, and 
 talk with the rest ; they are more like you than 
 they are like me. You ought to be friends, 
 for you are all — boys. A girl has less to say to 
 them. And then Edward is going to India, 
 too ' 
 
 ' I would rather talk to you ; but I will do 
 whatever you like, Cara.' 
 
 ' Yes ; but do it, then,' she said with a smile, 
 and, leaving him there she went over to the 
 other side of the fire, and sat down under the 
 shadow of Mrs. Meredith, from whence she 
 looked across placidly at the three whom she 
 had abandoned. Mrs. Meredith smiled upon 
 Cara, putting out her hand caressingly to lay it 
 upon the girl's shoulder. They made a pretty 
 group ; but Mr. Beresford, who was leaning
 
 304 CARITA. 
 
 over the little table, talking earnestly, did not 
 care for the interruption. A slight cloud came 
 over his face when his daughter came Avithin 
 hearing. He finished what he was saying 
 quickly, and then was silent ; it had not been 
 intended for her ear. While on the other 
 side of the room the young men looked at each 
 other in a kind of armed truce, and a moment 
 of dead silence elapsed, the first that had oc- 
 curred since they came into the room, in the 
 midst of which Mrs. Meredith was heard say- 
 inof, ' I fear you are not amusing yourself, Cara. 
 Are the boys disagreeable? Go and sing 
 something for us. I like your soft little voice 
 on Sunday night. Sing me the " Angels ; " that 
 suits you best.' 
 
 'Just what I was going to suggest,' said 
 Oswald, getting up and going to the piano to 
 open it for her. It was in the back part of the 
 room, which was but partially lighted. Both the 
 others, in their difierent ways, bestowed a 
 private benediction on Oswald, who was more 
 ready than either of them. They sat looking 
 wistfully into the dimness, listening to Cara's 
 soft voice, wdiich rose out of it hke a bird. 
 ' Angels, ever bright and fair,' she sang, look- 
 ing herself, that little white vision, only half-
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 305 
 
 visible, like any thing angelic or fairj^-like, 
 which the imagination chose to select. Koger 
 listened with his heart full. But for the appari- 
 tion of that other fio-ure beside lier, behind lier, 
 who stood keeping time with an involuntary 
 movement of his head and hand in a way which 
 tempted even his brother to blaspheme, Eoger's 
 heart would have run over with a soft ecstasy. 
 He had never heard Cara sing before, except 
 in her schoolgirl days. As for the other two, 
 the elder pair, Mr. Beresford's countenance 
 cleared and he resumed his talk, and Mrs. 
 Meredith once more gave him her whole 
 attention, while Edward and Eoger stared into 
 the back drawing-room. They did not address 
 nor take any notice of each other, but gazed 
 blankly at Cara, who, having already one 
 attendant, evidently wanted none of them. 
 When she had come to an end of that song, 
 Mrs. Meredith, though she was to all appear- 
 ance absorbed in what Mr. Beresford was say- 
 ing, cast a word over her shoulder to the 
 young performer. 
 
 ' That was very sweet ; thank you, dear. 
 Now sing us something else.' And Cara went on 
 
 Eoger sat and listened, between misery and 
 VOL. I. X
 
 306 CARITA. 
 
 rapture. He did not know which predominated. 
 Edward, to whose state of mind no one had 
 any clue, turned over a book, and hummed the 
 air she was singing. Xot a word passed be- 
 tween the young men, notwithstanding that 
 they were both boys, as Cara had said, both 
 going to India, and with every kind of bond of 
 external resemblance. But Eoger did not feel 
 any direct hatred to Edward as he did to the 
 other, who was always thrusting himself for- 
 ward ; and thus an hour passed away. When 
 that was over, Cara rose and said good-night. 
 Then there was a question who was to take her 
 home, which showed as much as did his own 
 attitude — reclining tranquilly in his chair — that 
 Mr. Beresford had no idea of going away. 
 Here Eoger sprang to the front, for once fore- 
 stalling Oswald. He took his leave hurriedly, 
 with confused thanks to Mrs. Meredith, and 
 followed Cara closely as she went downstairs, 
 alarmed less someone might interfere even at 
 the last moment. It was but a few steps, un- 
 fortunately, from one door to the other, and 
 though she lingered a moment on the step, 
 wrapping her shawl closely around her, Cara 
 did not ask him to go in. 
 
 ' It was very kind of you to come,' she said,
 
 SUNDAY EVENING. 307' 
 
 giving him her hand; 'and I am afraid you 
 have not enjoyed it, Eoger ; but you will like 
 them better when you see more of them.' She 
 said this as people say so many things, apolo- 
 getic and otherwise, not because she wanted to 
 apologise for the Merediths, but because she did 
 not know very well what to say. 
 
 ' I don't think I shall ever hke them,' said 
 Eoger ; ' but that does not matter. Cara, let 
 me just say one word. I don't think that they 
 are the right kind of people — for you.' 
 
 ' For me ! ' After the first astonishment 
 Cara laughed. ' I did not think you set up for 
 being such a critic. What have they done to 
 make you think ill of them ? They have been 
 very kind to you.' 
 
 ' I did not want their kindness,' said Eoger, 
 hotly ; ' they are not the kind of people I like 
 to see you with, Cara.' 
 
 ' I think I will say good-night,' said Cara, 
 with dignity. ' It is cold here, and you have a 
 long walk to Notting Hill. It is a pity 3^ou 
 missed your train. Good-night.' 
 
 She did not so much as look at him, as she 
 turned away and disappeared, the door closing 
 behind her. He had offended her now to make 
 an appropriate finish of this unhappy Sunday !
 
 308 CARITA. 
 
 But however cold it might have been to Cara, 
 it was not cold to Eoger as he pushed his way 
 at a tremendous pace along the Sunday streets, 
 so much darker than usual on account of the 
 closed shops, and filled with passengers so dif- 
 ferent from the usual crowd. He would have 
 kept liimself warm in Siberia at that pace. His 
 aunt w^as waiting for him, but half-disposed to 
 give up her watch, and wondering what had 
 become of liira, as he thought she would. 
 
 ' I am very glad to have you for another 
 night, Eoger ; but I thought you must have 
 rushed off to catch the train without tliinking of 
 your portmanteau,' she said ; and then she gave 
 him a glass of ^\ine, half-proud, half-disap- 
 pointed to hear that he had dined ' with his fine 
 friends,' and sent him to bed with kind good- 
 nights ; for he had to start early in the morning, 
 and, no doubt, she thought, the day had been 
 fatiguing, though so pleasant. She was kinder 
 than Cara ; perhaps it would have been better 
 for him if he had not gone to the Square at all, 
 but contented himself ^^ith Notting Hill. 
 
 EXD OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 Spottiswoode tfc Co., Printers, New-street Square, London.
 
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