Trumps

“And my father?” asked Hope, in a low voice.

“He went abroad for many years. Then he returned, and came sometimes to Pinewood. His life was irregular. I think he gambled, for he and your grandfather often had high words in the library about the money that he wanted. But your grandfather never allowed you to leave the place. He rarely spoke of your mother; but I think he often thought of her, and he gradually fell into the habit you remember. Yet he had the same ambition for you that he had had for your mother. He treated me always with stately politeness; but I know that it was a dreary home for a young girl. Hope,” said Mrs. Simcoe, after a short pause, “that is all—the end you yourself remember.”

“Yes,” replied Hope, in the same low, appalled tone, “my father went out upon the pond, one evening, with a friend to bathe, and was drowned. Mr. Gray’s boys found him. My grandfather would not let me wear mourning for him. I wore a blue ribbon the day Dr. Peewee preached his funeral sermon; and I did not care to wear black. Aunty, I had seen him too little to love him like a father, you know.”

She said it almost as if apologizing to Mrs. Simcoe, who merely bowed her head.

It was past midnight. It was the very moment when Abel Newt was starting with horror as he saw his own reflection in the glass.

Something yet remained to be said between those two women. Each knew it—neither dared to begin.

Hope Wayne closed her eyes with an inward prayer, and then said, calmly, but in a low voice,

“And, aunty, the young man?”

Mrs. Simcoe took Hope’s face between her caressing hands. She smoothed the glistening golden hair, and kissed her upon the forehead.

“Aunty, the young man?” said Hope, in the same tone.

“Was Lawrence Newt,” answered Mrs. Simcoe.

—It was the moment when Abel sat at his desk writing the name that Mrs. Simcoe had pronounced.

Hope Wayne was perfectly sure it was coming, and yet the word shot out upon her like a tongue of lightning. At first she felt every nerve in her frame relaxed—a mist clouded her eyes—she had a weary sense of happiness, for she thought she was dying. The mist passed. She felt her cheeks glowing, and was preternaturally calm. Mrs. Simcoe sat beside her, weeping silently.

“Good-night, dearest aunty!” said Hope, as she rose and bent down to kiss her.

“My child!” said the older woman, in tones that trembled out of an aching heart.

Hope took her candle, and moved toward the door. As she went she heard Mrs. Simcoe repeating, in the old murmuring sunset strain,

CHAPTER LXXVI. — A SOCIAL GLASS.

The Honorable Abel Newt was elected to Congress in place of the Honorable Watkins Bodley, who withdrew on account of the embarrassment of his private affairs. At a special meeting of the General Committee, Mr. Enos Slugby, Chairman of the Ward Committee, introduced a long and eloquent resolution, deploring the loss sustained by the city and by the whole country in the resignation of the Honorable Watkins Bodley—sympathizing with him in the perplexity of his private affairs—but rejoicing that the word “close up!” was always faithfully obeyed—that there was always a fresh soldier to fill the place of the retiring—and that the Party never summoned her sons in vain.

General Belch then rose and offered a resolution:

“Resolved—That in the Honorable Abel Newt, our representative, just elected by a triumphant majority of the votes of the enlightened and independent voters of the district—a constituency of whose favor the most experienced and illustrious statesmen might be proud—we recognize a worthy exemplar of the purest republican virtues, a consistent enemy of a purse-proud aristocracy, the equally unflinching friend of the people; a man who dedicates with enthusiasm the rare powers of his youth, and his profoundest and sincerest convictions, to the great cause of popular rights of which the Party is the exponent.

“Resolved—That the Honorable Abel Newt be requested, at the earliest possible moment, to unfold to his fellow-citizens his views upon State and National political affairs.”

Mr. William Condor spoke feelingly in support of the resolutions:

“Fellow-citizens!” he said, eloquently, in conclusion, “if there is one thing nobler than another, it is an upright, downright, disinterested, honest man. Such I am proud and happy to declare my friend, your friend, the friend of all honest men, to be; and I call for three cheers for Honest Abel Newt!”

They were given with ardor; and then General Belch was called out for a few remarks, “which he delivered,” said the Evening Banner of the Union, “with his accustomed humor, keeping the audience in a roar of laughter, and sending every body happy to bed.”

The Committee-meeting was over, and the spectators retired to the neighboring bar-rooms. Mr. Slugby, Mr. Condor, and General Belch tarried behind, with two or three more.

“Shall we go to Newt’s?” asked the General.

“Yes, I told him we should be round after the meeting,” replied Mr. Condor; and the party were presently at his rooms.

The Honorable Abel had placed several full decanters upon the table, with a box of cigars.

“Mr. Newt,” said Enos Slugby, after they had been smoking and drinking for some time.

Abel turned his head.

“You have an uncle, have you not?”

Abel nodded.

“A very eminent merchant, I believe. His name is very well known, and he commands great respect. Ahem!”

Mr. Slugby cleared his throat; then continued:

“He will naturally be very much interested in the career and success of his nephew.”

“Oh, immensely!” replied Abel, in a thick voice, and with a look and tone which suggested to his friends that he was rapidly priming himself. “Immensely, enormously!”

“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Slugby, with an air of curious meditation. “I do not remember to have heard the character of his political proclivities mentioned. But, of course, as the brother of Boniface Newt and the uncle of the Honorable Abel Newt”—here Mr. Slugby bowed to that gentleman, who winked at him over the rim of his glass—“he is naturally a friend of the people.”

“Yes,” returned Abel.

“I think you said he was very fond of you?” added Mr. Slugby, while his friends looked expectantly on.

“Fond? It’s a clear case of apple of the eye,” answered Abel, chuckling.

“Very good,” said William Condor; “very good, indeed! Capital!” laughed Belch; and whispered to his neighbor Condor, “In vino veritas.”

As they whispered, and smiled, and nodded together, Abel Newt glanced around the circle with sullen, fiery eyes.

“Uncle Lawrence is worth a million of dollars,” said he, carelessly.

The group of political gentlemen shook their heads in silent admiration. They seemed to themselves to have struck a golden vein, and General Belch could not help inwardly complimenting himself upon his profound sagacity in having put forward a candidate who had a bachelor uncle who doated upon him, and who was worth a million. He perceived at once his own increased importance in the Party. To have displaced Watkins Bodley—who was not only an uncertain party implement, but poor—by an unhesitating young man of great ability and of enormous prospects, he knew was to have secured for himself whatever he chose to ask. The fat nose reddened and glistened as if it would burst with triumph and joy. General Arcularius Belch was satisfied.

“Of course,” said William Condor, “a man of Mr. Lawrence Newt’s experience and knowledge of the world is aware that there are certain necessary expenses attendant upon elections—such as printing, rent, lighting, warming, posting, etc.—”

“In fact, sundries,” said Abel, smiling with the black eyes.

“Yes, precisely; sundries,” answered Mr. Condor, “which sometimes swell to quite an inordinate figure. Your uncle, I presume, Mr. Newt, would not be unwilling to contribute a certain share of the expense of your election; and indeed, now that you are so conspicuous a leader, he would probably expect to contribute handsomely to the current expenses of the Party. Isn’t it so?”

“Of course,” said General Belch.

“Of course,” said Enos Slugby.

“Of course,” echoed the two or three other gentlemen who sat silently, assiduously smoking and drinking.

“Oh, clearly, of course,” answered Abel, still thickly, and in a tone by no means agreeable to his companions. “What should you consider to be his fair share?”

“Well,” began Condor, “I should think, in ordinary times, a thousand a year; and then, as particular occasion demands.”

At this distinct little speech the whole company lifted their glasses that they might more conveniently watch Abel.

With a half-maudlin grin he looked along the line.

“By-the-by, Condor, how much do you give a year?” asked he.

There was a moment’s silence.

“Hit, by G——!” energetically said one of the silent men.

“Good for Newt!” cried General Belch, thumping the table.

There was another little burst of laughter, with the least possible merriment in it. William Condor joined with an entirely unruffled face.

“As for Belch,” continued Abel, with what would be called in animals an ugly expression—“Belch is the clown, and they left him off easy. The Party is like the old kings, it keeps a good many fools to make it laugh.”

His tone was threatening, and nobody laughed. General Belch looked as if he were restraining himself from knocking his friend down. But they all saw that their host was mastered by his own liquor.

“Squeeze Lawrence Newt, will you? Why, Lord, gentlemen, what do you suppose he thinks of you—I mean, of fellows like you?” asked Abel.

He paused, and glared around him. William Condor daintily knocked off the ash of his cigar faith the tip of his little finger, and said, calmly,

“I am sure I don’t know.”

“Nor care,” said General Belch.

“He thinks you’re all a set of white-livered sneaks!” shouted Abel, in a voice harsh and hoarse with liquor.

The gentlemen were silent. The leaders wagged their feet nervously; the others looked rather amused.

“No offense,” resumed Abel. “I don’t mean he despises you in particular, but all bar-room bobtails.”

His voice thickened rapidly.

“Of all mean, mis-mis-rabble hounds, he thinks you are the dirt-est.”

Still no reply was made. The honorable gentleman looked at his guests leeringly, but found no responsive glance.

“In vino veritas,” whispered Condor to his neighbor Belch. William Condor was always clean in linen and calm in manner.

“Don’t be ‘larmed, fel-fel-f’-low cit-zens! Lawrence Newt’s no friend of mine. I guess his G—— d—— pride ‘ll get a tumble some day; by G—— I do!” Abel added, with a fierce hiss.

The guests looked alarmed as they heard the last words. Abel ceased, and passed the decanter, which they did not decline; for they all felt as if the Honorable Abel Newt would probably throw it at the head of any man who said or did what he did not approve. There was a low anxious murmur of conversation among them until Abel was evidently very intoxicated, and his head sank upon his breast.

“I’m terribly afraid we’ve burned our fingers,” said Mr. Enos Slugby, looking a little ruefully at the honorable representative.

“Oh, I hope not,” said General Belch; “but there may be some breakers ahead. If we lose the Grant it won’t be the first cause or man that has been betrayed by the bottle. Condor, let me fill your glass. It is clear that if our dear friend Newt has a weakness it is the bottle; and if our enemies at Washington, who want to head off this Grant, have a strength, it is finding out an adversary’s soft spot. We may find in this case that it’s dangerous playing with edged tools. But I’ve great faith in his want of principle. We can show him so clearly that his interest, his advance, his career depend so entirely upon his conduct, that I think we can keep him straight. And, for my part, if we can only work this Grant through, I shall retire upon my share of the proceeds, and leave politics to those who love ‘em. But I don’t mean to have worked for nothing—hey, Condor?”

“Amen,” replied William, placidly.

“By-the-by, Condor,” said Mr. Enos Slugby.

Mr. Condor turned toward him inquiringly.

“I heard Jim say t’other day—”

“Who’s Jim?” asked Condor.

“Jim!” returned Slugby, “Jim—why, Jim’s the party in my district.”

“Oh yes—yes; I beg pardon,” said Condor; “the name had escaped me.”

“Well, I heard Jim say t’other day that Mr. William Condor was getting too d——d stuck up, and that he’d yank him out of his office if he didn’t mind his eye. That’s you, Condor; so I advise you to look out. It’s easy enough to manage Jim, if you take care. He’ll go as gently as a well-broke filly; but if he once takes a lurch—if he thinks you’re too 'proud’ or ‘big,’ it’s all up with you. So mind how you treat Jim.”

“Well, well,” said Belch, impatiently; “we’ve other business on hand now.”

“Exactly,” said Condor; “we are the Honorable Abel’s Jim. Turn about is fair play. Jim makes us go; we make Abel go. It’s a lovely series of checks and balances.”

He said it so quietly and airily that they all laughed. Then the General continued:

“We’re going to send Newt to look after Ele, and I rather think we shall have to send somebody to look after Newt. However, we’ll see. Let’s leave this hog to snore by himself.”

They rose as he spoke.

“What were the words of your resolution, Belch?” asked William Condor, with his eyes twinkling. “I don’t quite remember. Did you say,” he added, looking at Abel, who lay huddled, dead drunk, in his chair, “that he dedicated to his country his profoundest and sincerest, or sincerest and profoundest convictions?”

“And you, Condor,” said Enos Slugby, smiling, as he lighted a fresh cigar, “did you say that you were proud and happy, or happy and proud, to call him your friend?”

“Lord! Lord! what an old hum it is—isn’t it?” said General Belch, cheerfully, as he smoothed his hat with his coat-sleeve, and put it on.

They went down stairs laughing and chatting; and the Honorable Abel Newt, the worthy exemplar of the purest republican virtues—as the resolution stated when it appeared in the next morning’s papers—was left snoring amidst his constituency of empty decanters and drained glasses.

CHAPTER LXXVII. — FACE TO FACE.

“Signore Pittore! what brings a bird into the barn-yard?” said Lawrence Newt, as Arthur Merlin entered his office.

“The hope of some crumb of comfort.”

“Do you dip from your empyrean to the cold earth—from the studio to a counting-room—to find comfort?” asked Lawrence Newt, cheerfully.

Arthur Merlin looked only half sympathetic with his friend’s gayety. There was a wan air on his face, a piteous look in his eyes, which touched Lawrence.

“Why, Arthur, what is it?”

“Do you remember what Diana said?” replied the painter. “She said, ‘I am sure that that silly shepherd will not sleep there forever. Never fear, he will wake up. Diana never looks or loves for nothing.’”

Lawrence Newt gazed at him without speaking.

“Come,” said Arthur, with a feeble effort at fun, “you have correspondence all over the world. What is the news from Latmos? Has the silly shepherd waked up?”

“My dear Arthur,” said Mr. Newt, gravely, “I told you long ago that he was dead to all that heavenly splendor.”

The two men gazed steadfastly at each other without speaking. At length Arthur said, in a low voice,

“Dead?”

“Dead.”

As Lawrence Newt spoke the word the air far off and near seemed to him to ring again with that pervasive murmur, sad, soft, infinitely tender, “Good-by, Mr. Newt, good-by!”

But his eye was calm and his face cheerful.

“Arthur, sit down.”

The young man seated himself, and the older one drawing a chair to the window, they sat with their backs to the outer office and looked upon the ships.

“I am older than you, Arthur, and I am your friend. What I am going to say to you I have no right to say, except in your entire friendship.”

The young man’s eyes glistened.

“Go on,” he said.

“When I first knew you I knew that you loved Hope Wayne.”

A flush deepened upon Arthur’s face, and his fingers played idly upon the arm of the chair.

“I hoped that Hope Wayne would love you. I was sure that she would. It never occurred to me that she could—could—”

Arthur turned and looked at him.

“Could love any body else,” said Lawrence Newt, as his eyes wandered dreamily among the vessels, as if the canvas were the wings of his memory sailing far away.

“Suddenly, without the least suspicion on my part, I discovered that she did love somebody else.”

“Yes,” said Arthur, “so did I.”

“What could I do?” said the other, still abstractedly gazing; “for I loved her.”

“You loved her?” cried Arthur Merlin, so suddenly and loud that Thomas Tray looked up from his great red Russia book and turned his head toward the inner office.

“Certainly I loved her,” replied Lawrence Newt, calmly, and with tender sweetness; “and I had a right to, for I loved her mother. Could I have had my way Hope Wayne’s mother would have been my wife.”

Arthur Merlin stole a glance at the face of his companion.

“I was a child and she was a child—a boy and a girl. It was not to be. She married another man and died; but her memory is forever sacred to me, and so is her daughter.”

To this astonishing revelation Arthur Merlin said nothing. His fingers still played idly on the chair, and his eyes, like the eyes of Lawrence, looked out upon the river. Every thing in Lawrence Newt’s conduct was at once explained; and the poor artist was ready to curse his absurd folly in making his friend involuntarily sit for Endymion. Lawrence Newt knew his friend’s thoughts.

“Arthur,” he said, in a low voice, “did I not say that, if Endymion were not dead, it would be impossible not to awake and love her? Do you not see that I was dead to her?”

“But does she know it?” asked the painter.

“I believe she does now,” was the slow answer. “But she has not known it long.”

“Does Amy Waring know it?”

“No,” replied Lawrence Newt, quietly, “but she will to-night.”

The two men sat silently together for some time. The junior partner came in, spoke to Arthur, wrote a little, and went out again. Thomas Tray glanced up occasionally from his great volume, and the melancholy eyes of Little Malacca scarcely turned from the two figures which he watched from his desk through the office windows. Venables was promoted to be second to Thomas Tray on the very day that Gabriel was admitted a junior partner. They were all aware that the head of the house was engaged in some deeply interesting conversation, and they learned from Little Malacca who the stranger was.

The two men sat silently together, Lawrence Newt evidently tranquilly waiting, Arthur Merlin vainly trying to say something further.

“I wonder—” he began, at length, and stopped. A painful expression of doubt clouded his face; but Lawrence turned to him cheerfully, and said, in a frank, assuring tone,

“Arthur, speak out.”

“Well,” said the artist, with almost a girl’s shyness in his whole manner, “before you, at least, I can speak, and am not ashamed. I want to know whether—you—think—”

He spoke very slowly, and stopped again. Before he resumed he saw Lawrence Newt shake his head negatively.

“Why, what?” asked Arthur, quickly.

“I do not believe she ever will,” replied the other, as if the artist had asked a question with his eyes. He spoke in a very low, serious tone.

“Will what?” asked Arthur, his face burning with a bright crimson flush.

Lawrence Newt waited a moment to give his friend time to recover, before he said,

“Shall I say what?”

Arthur also waited for a little while; then he said, sadly,

“No, it’s no matter.”

He seemed to have grown older as he sat looking from the window. His hands idly played no longer, but rested quietly upon the chair. He shook his head slowly, and repeated, in a tone that touched his friend to the heart,

“No—no—it’s no matter.”

“But, Arthur, it’s only my opinion,” said the other, kindly.

“And mine too,” replied the artist, with an inexpressible sadness.

Lawrence Newt was silent. After a few moments Arthur Merlin rose and shook his hand.

“Good-by!” he said. “We shall meet to-night.”

CHAPTER LXXVIII. — FINISHING PICTURES.

Arthur Merlin returned to his studio and carefully locked the door. Then he opened a huge port-folio, which was full of sketches—and they were all of the same subject, treated in a hundred ways—they were all Hope Wayne.

Sometimes it was a lady leaning from an oriel window in a medieval tower, listening in the moonlight, with love in her eyes and attitude, to the music of a guitar, touched by a gallant knight below, who looked as Arthur Merlin would have looked had Arthur Merlin been a gallant medieval knight.

Then it was Juliet, pale and unconscious in the tomb; superb in snow-white drapery; pure as an angel, lovely as a woman; but it was Hope Wayne still—and Romeo stole frightened in, but Romeo was Arthur.

Or it was Beatrice moving in a radiant heaven; while far below, kneeling, and with clasped hands, gazing upward, the melancholy Dante watched the vision.

Or the fair phantom of Goethe’s ballad looked out with humid, passionate glances between the clustering reeds she pushed aside, and lured the fisherman with love.

There were scores of such sketches, from romance, and history, and fancy, and in each the beauty was Hope Wayne’s; and it was strange to see that in each, however different from all the others, there was still a charm characteristic of the woman he loved; so that it seemed a vivid record of all the impressions she had made upon him, and as if all heroines of poetry or history were only ladies in waiting upon her. In all of them, too, there was a separation between them. She was remote in sphere or in space; there was the feeling of inaccessibility between them in all.

As he turned them slowly over, and gazed at them as earnestly as if his glance could make that beauty live, he suddenly perceived, what he had never before felt, that the instinct which had unconsciously given the same character of hopelessness to the incident of the sketches was the same that had made him so readily acquiesce in what Lawrence Newt had hinted. He paused at a drawing of Pygmalion and his statue. The same instinct had selected the moment before the sculptor’s prayer was granted; when he looks at the immovable beauty of his statue with the yearning love that made the marble live. But the statue of Arthur’s Pygmalion would never live. It was a statue only, and forever. He asked himself why he had not selected the moment when she falls breathing and blushing into the sculptor’s arms.

Alone in his studio the artist blushed, as if the very thought were wrong; and he felt that he had never really dared to hope, however he had longed, and wished, and flattered his fancy.

He looked at each one of the drawings carefully and long, then kissed it and turned it upon its face. When he had seen them all he sat for a moment; then quietly tore them into long strips, then into small pieces; and, lifting the window, scattered them upon the air. The wind whirled them over the street.

“Oh, what a pretty snow-storm!” said the little street children, looking up.

Then Arthur Merlin turned to his great easel, upon which stood the canvas of the picture of Diana and Endymion. Through the parted clouds the face of the Queen and huntress—the face of Hope Wayne—looked tenderly upon the sleeping figure of the shepherd on the bare top of the grassy hill—the face and figure of Lawrence Newt.

The painter took his brushes and his pallet, and his maulstick. He paused for some time again, as he stood before the easel, then he went quietly to work. He touched it here and there. He stepped back to mark the effect—rubbed with his finger—sighed—stepped back—and still worked on. The hours glided away, and daylight began to fade, but not until he had finished his work.

Then he scraped his pallet and washed his brushes, and seated himself upon the sofa opposite the easel. There was no picture, of Diana or of Endymion any longer. In the place of Diana there was a full summer moon shining calmly in a cloudless heaven. Its benignant light fell upon a solitary grave upon a hill-top, which filled the spot where Endymion had lain.

Arthur Merlin sat in the corner of the sofa with folded arms, looking at the picture, until the darkness entirely hid it from view.

CHAPTER LXXIX. — THE LAST THROW.

While Arthur and Lawrence were conversing in the office of the latter, Abel Newt, hat in hand, stood in Hope Wayne’s parlor. His hair was thinner and grizzled; his face bloated, and his eyes dull. His hands had that dead, chalky color in which appetite openly paints its excesses. The hand trembled as it held the hat; and as the man stood before the mirror, he was straining his eyes at his own reflection, and by some secret magic he saw, as if dimly traced beside it, the figure of the boy that stood in the parlor of Pinewood—how many thousand years ago?

He heard a step, and turned.

Hope Wayne stopped, leaving the door open, bowed, and looked inquiringly at him. She was dressed simply in a morning dress, and her golden hair clustered and curled around the fresh beauty of her face—the rose of health.

“Did you wish to say something to me?” she asked, observing that Abel merely stared at her stupidly.

He bowed his head in assent.

“What do you wish to say?”

Her voice was as cold and remote as if she were a spirit.

Abel Newt was evidently abashed by the reception. But he moved toward her, and began in a tone of doubtful familiarity.

“Miss Hope, I—”

“Mr. Newt, you have no right to address me in that way.”

“Miss Wayne, I have come to—to—”

He stopped, embarrassed, rubbing his fingers upon the palms of his hands. She looked at him steadily. He waited a few moments, then began again in a hurried tone:

“Miss Wayne, we are both older than we once were; and once, I think, we were not altogether indifferent to each other. Time has taught us many things. I find that my heart, after foolish wanderings, is still true to its first devotion. We can both view things more calmly, not less truly, however, than we once did. I am upon the eve of a public career. I have outgrown morbid emotions, and I come to ask you if you would take time to reflect whether I might not renew my addresses; for indeed I love, and can love, no other woman.”

Hope Wayne stood pale, incredulous, and confounded while Abel Newt, with some of the old fire in the eye and the old sweetness in the voice, poured out these rapid words, and advanced toward her.

“Stop, Sir,” she said, as soon as she could command herself. “Is this all you have to say?”

“Don’t drive me to despair,” he said, suddenly, in reply, and so fiercely that Hope Wayne started. “Listen.” He spoke with stern command.

“I am utterly ruined. I have no friends. I have bad habits. You can save me—will you do it?”

Hope stood before him silent. His hard black eye was fixed upon her with a kind of defying appeal for help. Her state of mind for some days, since she had heard Mrs. Simcoe’s story, had been one of curious mental tension. She was inspired by a sense of renunciation—of self-sacrifice. It seemed to her that some great work to do, something which should occupy every moment, and all her powers and thoughts, was her only hope of contentment. What it might be, what it ought to be, she had not conceived. Was it not offered now? Horrible, repulsive, degrading—yes, but was it not so much the worthier? Here stood the man she had loved in all the prime and power of his youth, full of hope, and beauty, and vigor—the hero that satisfied the girl’s longing—and he was bent, gray, wan, shaking, utterly lost, except for her. Should she restore him to that lost manhood? Could she forgive herself if she suffered her own feelings, tastes, pride, to prevent?

While the thought whirled through her excited brain:

“Remember,” he said, solemnly—“remember it is the salvation of a human soul upon which you are deciding.”

There was perfect silence for some minutes. The low, quick ticking of the clock upon the mantle was all they heard.

“I have decided,” she said, at last.

“What is it?” he asked, under his breath.

“What you knew it would be,” she answered.

“Then you refuse?” he said, in a half-threatening tone.

“I refuse!”

“Then the damnation of a soul rest upon your head forever,” he said, in a loud coarse voice, crushing his hat, and his black eyes glaring.

“Have you done?” she asked, pale and calm.

“No, Hope Wayne, I have not done; I am not deceived by your smooth face and your quiet eyes. I have known long enough that you meant to marry my Uncle Lawrence, although he is old enough to be your father. The whole world has known it and seen it. And I came to give you a chance of saving your name by showing to the world that my uncle came here familiarly because you were to marry his nephew. You refuse the chance. There was a time when you would have flown into my arms, and now you reject me ... And I shall have my revenge! I warn you to beware, Mrs. Lawrence Newt! I warn you that my saintly uncle is not beyond misfortune, nor his milksop partner, the Reverend Gabriel Bennet. I am a man at bay; and it is you who put me there; you who might save me and won’t. You who will one day remember and suffer.”

He threw up his arms in uncontrollable rage and excitement. His thick hoarse voice, his burning, bad, black eyes, his quivering hands, his bloated body, made him a terrible spectacle.

“Have you done?” asked Hope Wayne, with saintly dignity.

“Yes, I have done for this time,” he hissed; “but I shall cross you many a time. You and yours,” he sneered, “but never so that you can harm me. You shall feel, but never see me. You have left me nothing but despair. And the doom of my soul be upon yours!”

He rushed from the room, and Hope Wayne stood speechless. Attracted by the loud tone of his voice, Mrs. Simcoe had come down stairs, and the moment he was gone she was by Hope’s side. They seated themselves together upon the sofa, and Hope leaned her head upon her aunty’s shoulder and wept with utter surprise, grief, indignation, and weariness.

CHAPTER LXXX. — CLOUDS BREAKING.

The next morning Amy Waring came to Hope Wayne radiant with the prospect of her Aunt Martha’s restoration to the world. Hope shook her hand warmly, and looked into her friend’s illuminated face.

“She is engaged to Lawrence Newt,” said Hope, in her heart, as she kissed Amy’s lips.

“God bless you, Amy!” she added, with so much earnestness that Amy looked surprised.

“I am very glad,” said Hope, frankly.

“Why, what do you know about it?” asked Amy.

“Do you think I am blind?” said Hope.

“No; but no eyes could see it, it was so hidden.”

“It can’t be hidden,” said Hope, earnestly.

Amy stopped, looked inquiringly at her friend, and blushed—wondering what she meant.

“Come, Hope, at least we are hiding from each other. I came to ask you to a family festival.”

“I am ready,” answered Hope, with an air of quiet knowledge, and not at all surprised. Amy Waring was confused, she hardly knew why.

“Why, Hope, I mean only that Lawrence Newt—”

Hope Wayne smiled so tenderly and calmly, and with such tranquil consciousness that she knew every thing Amy was about to say, that Amy stopped again.

“Go on,” said Hope, placidly; “I want to hear it from your own lips.”

Amy Waring was in doubt no longer. She knew that Hope expected to hear that she was engaged. And not with less placidity than Hope’s, she said:

“Lawrence Newt wants us all to come and dine with him, because my Aunt Martha is found, and he wishes to bring Aunt Bennet and her together.”

That was all. Hope looked as confusedly at the calm Amy as Amy, a moment since, had looked at her. Then they both smiled, for they had, perhaps, some vague idea of what each had been thinking.

The same evening the Round Table met. Arthur Merlin came early—so did Hope Wayne. They sat together talking rapidly, but Hope did not escape observing the unusual sadness of the artist—a sadness of manner rather than of expression. In a thousand ways there was a deference in his treatment of her which was unusual and touching. She had been very sure that he had understood what she meant when she spoke to him with an air of badinage about his picture. And certainly it was plain enough. It was clear enough; only he would not see what was before his eyes, nor hear what was in his ears, and so had to grope a little further until Lawrence Newt suddenly struck a light and showed him where he was.

While they were yet talking Lawrence Newt came in. He spoke to Amy Waring, and then went straight up to Hope Wayne and put out his hand with the old frank smile breaking over his face. She rose and answered his smile, and laid her hand in his. They looked in each other’s eyes; and Lawrence Newt saw in Hope Wayne’s the beauty of a girl that long ago, as a boy, he had loved; and in his own, Hope felt that tenderness which had made her mother’s happiness.

It was but a moment. It was but a word. For the first time he said,

“Hope.”

And for the first time she answered,

“Lawrence.”

Amy Waring heard them. The two words seemed sharp: they pierced her heart, and she felt faint. The room swam, but she bit her lip till the blood came, and her stout heart preserved her from falling.

“It is what I knew: they are engaged.”

But how was it that the manner of Lawrence Newt toward herself was never before more loyal and devoted? How was it that the quiet hilarity of the morning was not gone, but stole into his conversation with her so pointedly that she could not help feeling that it magnetized her, and that, against her will, she was more than ever cheerful? How was it that she knew it was herself who helped make that hilarity—that it was not only her friend Hope who inspired it?

They are secrets not to be told. But as they all sat around the table, and Arthur Merlin for the first time insisted upon reading from Byron, and in his rich melancholy voice recited

“Though the day of my destiny’s over,”

It was clear that the cloud had lifted—that the spell of constraint was removed; and yet none of them precisely understood why.

“To-morrow, then,” said Lawrence Newt as they parted.

“To-morrow,” echoed Amy Waring and Hope Wayne.

Arthur Merlin pulled his cap over his eyes and sauntered slowly homeward, whistling musingly, and murmuring,

“A bird in the wilderness singing, That speaks to my spirit of thee.”

His Aunt Winnifred heard him as he came in. The good old lady had placed a fresh tract where he would be sure to see it when he entered his room. She heard his cautious step stealing up stairs, for the painter was careful to make no noise; and as she listened she drew pictures upon her fancy of the scenes in which her boy had been mingling. It was Aunt Winnifred’s firm conviction that society—that is, the great world of which she knew nothing—languished for the smile and presence of her nephew, Arthur. That very evening her gossip, Mrs. Toxer, had been in, and Aunt Winnifred had discussed her favorite theme until Mrs. Toxer went home with a vague idea that all the young and beautiful unmarried women in the city were secretly pining away for love of Arthur Merlin.

“Mercy me, now!” said Aunt Winnifred as she lay listening to the creaking step of her nephew. “I wonder what poor girl’s heart that wicked boy has been breaking to-night;” and she turned over and fell asleep again.

That young man reached his room, and struck a light. It flashed upon a paper. He took it up eagerly, then smiled as he saw that it was a tract, and read, “A word to the Unhappy.”

“Dear Aunt Winnifred!” said he to himself; “does she think a man’s griefs are like a child’s bumps and bruises, to be cured by applying a piece of paper?”

He smiled sadly, with the profound conviction that no man had ever before really known what unhappiness was, and so tumbled into bed and fell asleep. And as he dreamed, Hope Wayne came to him and smiled, as Diana smiled in his picture upon Endymion.

“See!” she said, “I love you; look here!”

And in his dream he looked and saw a full moon in a summer sky shining upon a fresh grave upon a hill-top.