That is courtship, Urith—summer in the midst of winter. Now listen to matrimony—what that is:—

That's the proper way to regard it. After marriage storms always come; after matrimony nipping frosts and wintry gales. It can't be summer-time all the year. Now just see," continued Uncle Sol, climbing upon the table and seating himself thereon, and then fumbling in his pocket. "Dos't fancy it was ever summer-time with thy father and mother after they were wed? Not a bit, wench—not a bit. They had their quarrels. I don't say that they were exactly of the same sort as be yours, but they were every whit as bad—aye! and worse, and all about this." He opened his hand and showed a broken silver crown piece of Charles I., perforated, and with a ribbon holding it. "I'll tell thee all about it. Afore thy father was like to be married to my sister, he was mighty taken in love with someone else. Well, Urith, I won't conceal it from thee—it was with Margaret Penwarne, that afterward married old Squire Cleverdon, and became the mother of thy Anthony. Everyone said they would make a pair, but he was poor and she had naught, and none can build their nest out of love; so it was put off. But I suppose they had passed their word to each other, and in token of good faith had broken a silver crown and parted it between them. This half," said Uncle Sol, "belonged to thy father. Well, I reckon he ought, when he married thy mother, to have put away from his thoughts the very memory of Margaret Cleverdon. I could not see into his heart—I cannot say what was there. Maybe he had ceased to think of her after she was wed to Anthony Cleverdon, and he had taken thy mother; maybe he had not. All men have their little failings—some one way, some another. Mine is—well, you know it, niece, so let it pass. I hurt none but myself. But thy father never parted with the broken half-token, but would keep it. Many words passed between them over it, and the more angry thy mother was, the more obstinate became thy father. One day they were terrible bad—a regular storm it was, Urith. Then I took down my single-stick, and I went up to Richard, and said I to him, 'Dick, thou art in the wrong. Give me up the half-token, or, by the Lord, I'll lay thy head open for thee!' He knew me, and that I was a man of my word. He considered a moment, and then he put it into my hand—on one condition, that I should never give it to my sister. I swore to that, and we shook hands, and so peace was made for the time. There"——said the old man, descending from the table. "I will give thee the half-token, maid, for my oath does not hold me now. Thine it shall be; and when thou wearest it, or holdest it, think on this—that there is no married life without storms and vexations, and that the only way in which peace is to be gotten is for the one in the wrong to give up to the other."

He put the half-token into Urith's hand.

She received it without a word, and held it in her bruised palm. Her face was lowering, and she mused, looking at the coin.

Yes, he who is in the wrong must abandon his wrongful way—give up what offended the other. What had she to yield? Nothing. She had done her utmost to retain Anthony's love. She had not been false to him by a moment's thought. She had striven against her own nature to fit herself to be his companion. She loved him—she loved him with her whole soul; and yet she hated him—hated him because he had slighted and neglected her at the Cakes, because he was suffering himself to be lured from her by Julian, because he was dissatisfied with his house, resented against her his quarrel with his father. She could hardly discriminate between her love and her hate. One merged into the other, or grew out of the other.

"Come!" said the old man, looking about for his hat. "By the Lord! the boy has gone off with my wet cap. Well, I shall wear his, I cannot tarry here. I will go seek out my friend Cudlip at the Hare and Hounds. I shall not be late, but I want to hear news. There is a wind that the Duke of Monmouth has set sail from the Lowlands. The militia have been called out and the trainbands gathered. Come, Urith, do not look so grave. Brighten up with some of the humours of the maid who sang of winter on Trinity Monday. It cannot be summer-time all the year—why, neither can it be winter."

Then he swung out of the house trolling:—

CHAPTER XL. "THIS FOR JULIAN."

Urith was left alone looking at the broken token. It did not bring to her the cynical consolation that her uncle intended it to convey. It was not even poor comfort, it was no sort of comfort whatever to learn that others had been unhappy in the same way as herself—that there had been discord between her father and mother. The broken token was to her a token of universal breakage—of broken trust, broken ambitions, broken words, broken hearts—but that all the world was in wreck was no relief to Urith, whose only world for which she cared was contained within the bounds of Willsworthy.

She had dreamed with reverence of her father; but Uncle Sol had shown her that this father had been false in heart to her mother. Her own story was that of her mother. Each had married one whose heart had been pre-engaged. After a little while, no doubt of sincere struggle, the heart swung back to its eldest allegiance. As Urith sat in the hall window, looking out into the court, her eyes rested on the vane over the stables. Now that arrow pointed to the west! Sometimes it veered to other quarters, but the prevailing winds came from the Atlantic, and that vane, though for a few days it may have swerved to north or south, though for a whole month, nay—a whole spring it may have pointed east, as though nailed in that aspect, yet round it swung eventually, and for the rest of the year hardly deviated from west. So was it with the heart of Anthony; so had it been with the heart of her father. Each had had a first love; then there had come a sway towards another point, and eventually a swing round into the direction that had become habitual.

Fox's words at the dance in the house of the Cakes returned to her:—"You cannot root out old love with a word." With Anthony it had been old love. Since childhood he and Julian had known each other, and had looked on each other in the light of lovers. It was a love that had ramified in its roots throughout his heart and mind. It was with this love as with the coltsfoot in the fields. When once the weed was there, it was impossible to eradicate it; the spade that cut it, the pick that tore it up, the sickle that reaped it down, only multiplied it; every severed fibre became a fresh plant—every lopped head seeded on the ground and dispersed its grain. For a while a crop of barley or oats appeared, and the coltsfoot was lost in the upright growth; but the crop was cut and carried, and the coltsfoot remained.

Was this a justification for Anthony? Urith did not stay to inquire. She considered herself, her anguish of disappointment, her despair of the future—not him. With all the freshness and vehemence of youth, she had given herself wholly to Anthony. She had loved—cared for—no one before; and when she loved and cared for him it was with a completeness to which nothing lacked. Hers was a love infinite as the ocean, and now she found that his had been but a love, in comparison with hers, like a puddle that is dried up by the July sun.

She did not consider the matter with regard to Anthony's justification, only as affecting herself—as darkening her entire future. The coltsfoot must go on growing, and spread throughout the field. It could not be extirpated, only concealed for a while. She could never look into Anthony's face—never kiss him again, never endure a word of love from him any more, because of that hateful, hideous, ever-spreading, all-absorbing, only temporarily-coverable weed of first love for Julian. An indescribable horror of the future filled her—an inexpressible agony contracted her heart as with a cramp. She threw up her hands and clutched in the air at nothing; she gasped for breath as one drowning, but could inhale nothing contenting. Everything was gone from her with Anthony, not only everything that made life happy, but endurable. Down the stream belonging to the manor was a little mill, furnished with small grinding-stones, and a wheel that ever turned in the stream that shot over it. No miller lived at the mill. When rye, barley, or wheat had to be ground, some person from the house went down, set the mill, and poured in the grain. Night and day the wheel went round, and now in her brain was set up some such a mill—there was a whirl within, and a noise in her ears. The little manor-mill could be unset, so that, though the wheel turned, the stones did not grind unless needed; but to this inner mill in her head there was no relaxation. It would, grind, grind as long as the stream of life ran—grind her heart, grind up her trust, her hopes, her love, her faith in God, her belief in men—grind up all that was gentle in her nature, till it ground all her nobler nature up into an arid dust.

The day declined, and she was still looking at the broken token.

The mill was grinding, and was turning out horrible thoughts of jealousy, it ground her love and poured forth hate, it ground up confidence and sent out suspicion. She sprang to her feet. Where was Anthony now? What was he doing all this while? He had been away a long time; with whom had he been tarrying?

The mill was grinding, and now, as she threw in the jealous thoughts, the hate, the suspicions, it had just turned out, it ground them over again, and sent forth a wondrous series of fancies in a magic dust that filled her eyes and ears; in her eyes it made her see Anthony in Julian's society, in her ears it made her hear what they said to each other. The dust fell into her blood, and made it boil and rage; it fell on her brain, and there it caught fire and spluttered. She was as one mad in her agony—so mad that she caught at the stanchions of the window and strove to tear them out of the solid granite in which they were set, not that she desired to burst through the window, but that she must tear at and break something.

Why had Anthony marred her life, blistered her soul? She had started from girlhood in simplicity, prepared to be happy in a quiet way, rambling over the moors in a desultory fashion, attending to the farm and garden and the poultry yard. She would have been content, if left alone, never to have seen a man. Her years would have slipped away free from any great sorrow, without any great cares. Willsworthy contented her where wants were few. She loved and was proud of the place; but Anthony, since he had been there had found fault with it, had undervalued it, laughed at it; had shown her how bleak it was, how ungenerous was the soil, how out of repair its buildings, how lacking in all advantages.

Anthony had taught her to depreciate what she had highly esteemed. Why need he have done that?

The wheel and the grindstones were turning, and out ran the bitter answer—because Willsworthy was hers, that was why he scorned it, why he saw in it only faults.

She paced the little hall, every now and then clasping her hands over her burning temples, pressing them in with all her force, as though by main strength to arrest the churn of those grindstones. Then she put them to her ears to shut out the sound of the revolving wheel.

On the mantel-shelf was a brass pestle for crushing spices. She took it down. Into it were stuffed the old gloves of Julian Crymes. It was a characteristic trait of the conduct of the house; nothing was put where it ought to be, or might be expected to be. After these gloves had lain about, at one time in the window, at another on the settle, then upon the table, Urith had finally thrust them out of the way into the pestle, and there they had remained forgotten till now. In the train of her thoughts Urith was led to the challenge of Julian, when she recalled where the gloves were, and these she now took from the place to which she had consigned them.

She unfolded them and shook the dust from them. Then she stood with one foot on the hearthstone, her burning head resting against the granite upper stone of the fireplace, looking at the gloves. Had Julian made good her threat? Was she really, deliberately, with determinate malice, winding Anthony off Urith's hand on to her own? And if so—to what would this lead? How would she—Urith—be tortured between them? Every hair of her head was a nerve, and each suffering pain.

She lifted her brow from the granite, then dashed it back again, and felt no jar, so acute was the inner suffering she endured. It were better that Anthony, or she—were dead. Such a condition of affairs as that of which the mill in her head ground out a picture, was worse than death. She could not endure it, she knew—she must go mad with the torment. Oh, would! oh—would that Fox's fuse had been left to take its effect in the ear of Anthony's horse, and dash him to pieces against the rocks of the Walla!

She could no longer bear the confinement of the house. She gasped and her bosom laboured. She put the gloves between her teeth, and her hands again to her head, but her dark hair fell down about her shoulders. She did not heed it. Her mind was otherwise occupied. In a dim way she was aware of it, and her hands felt for her hair, how to bind it together and fasten it again, but her mind was elsewhere, and her fingers only dishevelled her hair the more.

The air of the room oppressed her; the walls contracted on her; the ceiling came down like lead upon her brain. She plucked the gloves out of her mouth and threw them on the table, then went forth.

The rain had ceased. Evening had set in, dark for June, because the twilight could not struggle through the dense vapours overhead.

"Where is Anthony? I must see Anthony!" Her words were so hoarse, so strange that they startled her. It is said that when one is possessed, the evil spirit in the man speaks out of him in a strange voice, utterly unlike that which is natural. It might be so now. The old demon in Urith that had gone to sleep was awaking, refreshed with slumber, to reassert his power.

Where was Anthony? What delayed his return? Had he on leaving Willsworthy gone direct to Julian to pour out into her sympathetic ear the story of his domestic troubles? Was he telling her of his wife's shortcomings?—of her temper?—her untidiness?—her waywardness? Were they jeering together in confidence at poor little moorland Willsworthy? Were they talking over the great mistake Anthony had made in taking Urith in the place of Julian? Were they laughing over that scene when Anthony led out Urith for the dance at the Cakes? She saw their hands meet, and their eyes—their eyes—as at the Cakes.

Then there issued from her breast a scream—a scream of unendurable pain; it came from her involuntarily; it was forced from her by the stress of agony within, but the voice was hoarse and inhuman. She was aware of it, and grasped her hair and thrust it into her mouth to gnaw at, and to stifle the cries of pain which might burst from her again.

She had descended the hill a little way when she thought she discerned a figure approaching, mounting the rough lane. It might be Anthony—it might be Solomon Gibbs. She was unprepared to meet either, so she slipped aside into the little chapel. The portion of wall by the door was fallen, making a gap, but further back grew a large sycamore, out of the floor of the sacred building, near the angle formed by the south and west walls. Behind this she retreated, and thence could see the person who ascended the path, unobserved.

She was startled when Fox Crymes stepped through the gap where had been the door. There was sufficient light for her to distinguish him, but he could not observe her, as the shadows thrown by the dense foliage of the sycamore from above, and the side shadows from the walls, made the corner where Urith stood thoroughly obscure.

She supposed at first that Fox had stopped there for a moment to shake out his wet cloak and readjust it; he did, in fact, rearrange the position of the mantle, but it was not so as more effectually to protect himself from rain as to leave his right arm free. Moreover, after that he had fitted his cloak to suit his pleasure, he did not resume his ascent of the lane to Willsworthy.

For a while Urith's thoughts were turned into a new channel. She wondered, in the first place, why Fox should come to Willsworthy at that hour; and next, why Fox, if Willsworthy should be his destination, halted where he was, without attempting to proceed.

His conduct also perplexed her. He seated himself on a stone and whistled low to himself through a broken tooth in front that he had—a whistle that was more of a hiss of defiance than a merry pipe. Then he took out his hunting-knife, and tried the point on his fingers. This did not perfectly satisfy him, and he whetted it on a piece of freestone moulding still in position, that formed a jamb of the old door, of which the arch and the other jamb were fallen.

This occupied Fox for some time, but not continuously, for every now and then he stood up, stole to the lane, and cautiously peered down it, never exposing himself so as to be observed by any person ascending the rough way.

The air was still, hardly any wind stirred, but what little there was came in sudden puffs that shook the foliage of the sycamore burdened with wet, and sent down a shower upon the floor. Urith could not feel the wind, and when it came it was as though a shudder went through the tree, and it tossed off the burden of water oppressing it, much as would a long-haired spaniel on emerging from a bath.

Bats were abroad. One swept up and down the old chapel, noiseless, till it came close to the ear, when the whirr of the wings was as that of the sails of a mill.

An uneasy peewhit was awake and awing, flitting and uttering its plaintive, desolate cry. It was not visible in the grey night-sky, and was still for a minute; then screamed over the ruins; then wheeled away, and called, as an echo from a distance, an answer to its own cry.

Fox stood forward again in the road, and strained his eyes down the lane; then stole a little way along it to where he could, or thought he could, see a longer stretch of it; then came back at a run, and stood snorting in the ruins once more. Again, soft and still, came on a comminuted rain—the very dust of rain—so fine and so light that it took no direction, but floated on the air, and hardly fell.

Fox turned to the sycamore-tree. No shelter could be had beneath its water-burdened leaves, that gathered the moisture and shot it down on the ground. But he did not look at it as wanting its shelter. He stepped toward it, then drew back; exclaimed, "Ah! Anthony. Here's one for Urith," and struck his knife into the bole. The blade glanced through the bark, sheering off a long strip, that rolled over and fell to the ground attached to the tree at the bottom. "You took her and Willsworthy from me," said Fox, drawing back. Then he aimed another blow at the tree, cursing, "And here is for my eye!"

Urith started back; each blow seemed to be aimed at and to hit her, who was behind the tree. She felt each stroke as a sharp spasm in her heart.

Fox dragged at his knife, worked it up, down, till he had loosened it; then withdrew it. Then he laid his left hand, muffled in his cloak, against the sycamore trunk, and raised his knife again. "That is not enough," he whispered, and it was to Urith as though he breathed it into her ear. He struck savagely into the side of the tree, as though into a man, under the ribs, and said, "And this for Julian."

Before he could release his blade, Urith had stepped forth and had laid her hand on him.

"Answer me," she said: "What do you mean by those words, 'And this for Julian?'"

CHAPTER XLI. "THAT FOR URITH."

Fox cowered, and retreated step by step before Urith, who stepped forward at every step he retreated. He seemed to contract to a third of his size before her eyes, over which a lambent, phosphorescent fire played. They were fixed on his face; he looked up but once, and then, scorched and withered, let his eyes fall, and did not again venture to meet hers.

Her hands were on his shoulders. It might have been thought that she was driving him backward, but it was not so. He recoiled instinctively; but for her hands he might have staggered and fallen among the scattered stones of the old chapel that strewed the floor.

"Answer me!" said Urith, again. "What did you mean, when you said—'This for Julian?'"

"What did I mean?" he repeated, irresolutely.

"Answer me—what did you mean? I can understand that in thought Anthony stood before you when you struck—once because I had cast you over, and had taken him—once because he touched and hurt your eye—but why the third time for Julian?"

He lifted one shoulder after the other, squirming uneasily under her hands, and did not reply, save with a scoffing snort through his nostrils.

"I know that you are waiting here for Anthony—and like yourself, waiting to deal a treacherous blow. It is not such as you who meet a foe face to face, after an open challenge, in a fair field."

"An open challenge, in a fair field!" echoed Fox, recovering some of his audacity, after the first shock of alarm at discovery had passed away. "Would that be a fair field in which all the skill, all the strength is on one side? An open challenge! Did he challenge me when he struck me with the gloves in the face and hurt my eye? No—he never warned me, and why should I forewarn him?"

"Come!" said Urith, "go on before—up to Willsworthy; I will not run the chance of being seen here talking with you, as if in secret. Go on—I follow."

She waved him imperiously forth, and he obeyed as a whipped cur, sneaked through the broken doorway forth into the lane. He looked down the road to see if Anthony were ascending, but saw no one. Then he turned his head to observe Urith, hastily sheathed his knife, and trudged forward in the direction required.

Urith said nothing till the hall was entered, when she pointed to a seat, and went with a candlestick into the kitchen to obtain a light. She returned directly, having shut the doors between, so that no servant could overhear what was said. The candlestick she placed on the table, and then planted herself opposite Fox Crymes. He was sitting with his back to the table, so that the light was off his face, and such as there was from a single candle fell on Urith; but he did not look up. His eyes were on the skirt of her dress and on her feet, and by them he could see that she was quivering with emotion. He seemed to see her through the flicker of hot air that rises from a kiln. He wiped his eyes, thinking that his sight was disturbed, but by a second look ascertained that the tremulous motion was in Urith. It was like the quiver of a butterfly's wings when fluttering at the window trying to escape.

"I am ready," said Urith. "What did you mean when you said 'This for Julian?'"

He half-lifted his cunning eyes, but let them fall again. He had recovered his assurance and decided on his course.

"I suppose," sneered he, "that you will allow that I have a right to chastise the man who insults our good name, to bring my sister into the mouths of folk?"

"Has he done so?"

"You ask that?" he laughed, mockingly. "How remote this spot must be to be where the breath of scandal does not blow. You ask that? Why, 'fore heaven, I supposed that jealousy quickened and sharpened ears, but yours must be singularly blunt, or, mayhap, deadened by indifference."

"Tell me plainly what you have to say."

"Do you not know that your Anthony was engaged, or all but engaged—had been for some fifteen years—to my sister? Then he saw you under remarkable circumstances, saw and attended you along the Lyke Way that night of the fire on the moor. Then a spark of the wild fire fell into his blood, and he forgot his old, established first love, and in a mad humour took you. Take a scale," pursued Fox. "Put in one shell my sister with her wealth, her civilized beauty, her heritage, the grand old house of Kilworthy, and her representation of a grand old line. Put in also"—he suited the action to his word, in imaginary scales in the air before him, and saw the shrink of Urith's feet at each item he named—"put in also his father's favor, Hall—where he was born and bred, the inheritance of his family for many generations, with its associations, his sister's company, the respect of his neighbours; all that and more that I have not named into the one shell, and into the other.—Come, come!"—he crooked his finger, and made a sign with his knuckle, and a distorted face full of mockery and malice—"come, skip in and sit yourself down with a couple of paniers of peat earth, that grows only rushes. What say you? Do you outweigh Julian and all the rest? And your peat earth, sour and barren, does that sink your scale heavier than all the bags of gold and rich warm soil of Kilworthy and Hall combined?"

He glanced upward hurriedly, to see what effect his words had. All this that he said Urith had said it to herself; but though the same thoughts uttered to herself cut her like razors, they were as razors dipped in poison, when coming articulate from the lips of Fox.

"Do you not suppose," continued he, "that after the first fancy was over, Anthony wearied of you, and went back in heart out from this wilderness, back to Goshen and to the Land of Promise rolled into one, with the flesh-pots, and without hard labour? Of course he did. He were a fool if he did not, or your hold over him must be magical indeed, and the value of Willsworthy altogether extraordinary."

Again he furtively looked at her. Her eyes were off him, he felt it, before he saw it. She was looking down at the floor, and her teeth were fastened into her clenched hands. She was biting them to keep under the hysteric paroxysm that was coming over her. He took a malevolent delight in lashing her to a frenzy with his cruel words, and so avenging himself on her for his rejection, avenging himself on her in the most terrible way possible, by making her relations with her husband henceforth intolerable.

She could no longer speak. He saw it, and he waited for no words. He went on: "You married him; you married him, notwithstanding that he had offered the grossest insult to the memory of your father. You married him indecently early after your mother's death, and that was an outrage on her memory. Whether you have the blessing of father and mother on your union is more than doubtful. I should rather say that out of heaven they fling their united curses on you for what you have done."

A hoarse sound issued from her throat. It was not a cry, nor a groan, but like the gasp of a dying person.

"And now the curse is working. Of course Anthony is hungering after what he has thrown away. But he cannot get Kilworthy. You stand in the way. He can get Hall only by casting you over. That he will do."

Suddenly Urith became rigid as stone. She could not speak, she dropped her hands, and looked with large fixed eyes at Fox. He saw, by the cessation of the quiver of her skirt, that she had become stiff as if dead.

"That," repeated Fox, "he is prepared to do. His father made him the offer. If he would leave you, then, said the old Squire, all should be as before. Anthony should go back to Hall, live with his father, be treated as heir, and command his pocket—only you were to be discarded wholly, and he was not to see you again."

Fox paused, and began his hissing whistle through his broken tooth. He waited to let the full force of his words fall on her to crush her, before he went on still further to maltreat her with words more terrible than blows of bludgeons or stabs of poisoned knife.

Now he twisted his belt round, and laid the scabbarded hunting knife before him on his lap, played with it, and then slowly drew forth the blade.

"But now—" he said leisurely, "now I reckon you can see why I took out my knife, and why I would strike him down before he leaves you and returns to Hall. Already has there been talk concerning him and my sister. He gave rise to it at the dance at the Cakes. But you know better than I what happened there, as I went away with my father, who arrived from London. When young blood boils, it is forgotten that the sound of the bubbling is audible. When hearts flame, it is not remembered that they give out light and smoke. I suppose that Anthony and my sister forgot that they were in the midst of observant eyes when they met again, as of old so often; just as they forgot that you existed and were a bar between them. I tell you I do not know what took place then, as I was not there, but you had eyes and could see, and may remember."

He put the knife upright with the haft on his knee, and set his finger at the end of the blade, balancing it in that position. She saw it, her eyes were attracted by the blade; the light of the candle flashed on the polished steel; then Fox turned the blade and the light went out, then again it flashed, as the surface again came round over against the candle.

"When Anthony is back at Hall, I know well what will take place. Even now he comes over often to Kilworthy, too often, forgetful of you, forgetful of all save his old regard, his love for Julian, that draws him there; he cannot keep away even now. When he is at Hall nothing will retain him, and he will bring my sister's fair name into the dirt. Have I not a cause to take out this knife? Must I not stand as her guardian? My father is old, he has no thoughts for aught save the Protestant cause and Liberty and Parliamentary rights. He lets all go its own way, and, unless I were present to defend my sister, he would wake, rub his eyes, and find—find that all the world was talking about the affairs of his house, and his grey hairs would be brought in shame to the grave. Julian has no mother, and has only me. She and I have bickered and fought, but I value the honour of my family, and for that I can, when need be, strike a blow. You know now what it is I fear; you know what it is I meant when I took out my knife and waited in the chapel for the man who would bring my sister to dishonour. I could tell you more—I could tell you that which would make you kiss the blade that tapped his blood, that entered his false heart and let out the black falsity that is there, but——" He looked hesitatingly at her, then slowly rose, and, watching her, went backwards to the door.

She stood motionless, white, as though frozen, and as still; her hands were uplifted. She had been about to raise them to her mouth again, but the frost had seized them as they were being lifted, and were held rigid, in suspense. Her eyes were wide and fixed, her mouth half-open, and her lower jaw quivered as with intense cold, the only part of her in which any motion remained. So stiff, so congealed did she seem, that it occurred to Fox, as he looked at her, that were he to touch and stir her wild flowing hair, it would break and fall like icicles on the floor. He stepped back to the door, then held up his finger, with a smile about his lips—

"I am coming back again. I am not going to run away."

A convulsive movement in her arms. Her hands went up with a jerk to her mouth.

"No," said Fox; "do not bite your pretty hands. There"—he turned to the table and picked up the old pair of gloves that lay there—"if you must tear something, tear these. They will do you good."

He put the gloves to her hands, and they mechanically closed on them. Her eyes were as stones. All light had deserted them, as fire had deserted her blood, had died out of her heart.

Fox went out, and remained absent about five minutes. Suddenly the door was dashed open, and he came in excitedly. "He is coming—he is hard at hand. I have more to say. Do you mistrust me? Do you think I am telling lies? I will say it to his face; and then——" He drew his knife and made a stroke with it in the air, then sheathed it again. "Go," said he, "go in yonder." He pointed to the well-chamber that opened out of the hall. "Remain there. The rest I will tell Anthony to his face." He caught her by the wrist and led her to the door, and almost forced her into the little chamber.

Then he went across the hall to the door that led to the kitchen, opened it, and looked into a small passage; crossed that to another door communicating with the kitchen, and turned the key in it. He returned to the hall, and was shutting the door behind him when Anthony entered from outside.

Anthony raised his brows with surprise at the sight of Fox there, and flushed with anger. This was the man who was going to displace him at Hall, occupy his inheritance, and take his very name. And Fox—this treacherous friend—had the daring to come to his house and meet him.

"What brings you here?" asked Anthony, roughly.

"An excellent reason, which you might divine."

Fox had completely recovered his assurance. He came across the room toward the seat he had occupied before, and, with a "By your leave," resumed it. He thus sat with his face in shadow, and his back to the door of the well-chamber.

"And, pray, what are you doing in my house? Hast come to see me or Master Gibbs?"

"You—you alone."

Anthony threw himself into the settle; his brow was knit; he was angry at the intrusion, and yet not altogether unwilling to see Fox—for he desired to have a word with him relative to his proposed marriage with Bessie, and assumption of his name.

"And I," said he; "I desire an explanation with you, Fox."

"Come, now!" exclaimed young Crymes. "I have a desire to speak with you, and you with me. Which is to come first? Shall we toss? But, nay! I will begin; and then, when I have done, we shall see what desire remains in you to talk to me and pluck thy crow."

"I want then to know what has brought you here? Where is my wife? Where is Urith? Have you seen her?" Anthony turned his head, and looked about the room.

"What!" said Fox, with a jeer in his tone, "dost think because thou runnest to Kilworthy to make love to my sister Julian, that I came here to sweetheart thy wife?"

"Silence!" said Anthony, with a burst of rage, and sprang from his seat.

"I will not keep silence," retorted Fox, turning grey with alarm at the hasty motion, and with concentrated rage. "Nay, Anthony, I will not be silent! Answer me; hast thou not been this very day with Julian?"

"And what if I did see her? I went to Kilworthy to find you."

"You go there oftentimes to find me, but, somehow, always when I am out, and Julian is at home. When I am not there, do you return here, or go elsewhere? Nay, you console yourself for my absence by her society—bringing her into ill-repute in the county."

"You lie!" shouted Anthony.

"I do not lie," retorted Fox. "Did you not remain with her to-day. Where else have you been? Who drew your initials on the glass beside hers, and bound them together with a true lover's knot?"

Anthony's head fell. He had planted himself on the hearthstone, with his back to the fireplace—now without burning logs or peat in it. The flush that had been driven by anger to his face deepened with shame to a dark crimson.

Fox observed him out of his small keen eyes.

"Tell me this," he pursued. "Was it not indiscreet that thy father should come in and find thee and Julian locked in each other's arms, exchanging lovers' kisses?"

Anthony looked suddenly up, and in a moment all the blood left his face and rushed to his heart. He saw behind the chair in which sat Fox, the form of his wife. Urith—grey as a corpse, but with fire spirting from her eyes, and her nostrils and lips quivering. Her hand was lifted, clenched, on something, he could not see what.

"Tell me," repeated Fox, slowly rising, and putting his hand to his belt. "Tell me—can you deny that?—can you say that it is a lie? Your own father told me what he had seen. Did he lie?"

Anthony did not hear him, did not see him; his eyes were fixed in sorrow, shame, despair, on Urith. Oh, that she should hear this, and that he should be unable to answer!

"Strike—kill him!" her voice was hoarse—like that of a man; and she dashed the gloves, torn to shreds by her teeth, against his breast.

Instantly, Fox's arm was raised, the knife flashed in the candle-light, and fell on him, struck him where he had been touched by the gloves.

"That," the words attended the blows, "that for Urith." Anthony dropped on the hearthstone.

Then, as Fox raised his arm once more—without a cry, without a word, Urith sprang before him, thrust him back with all her force, that he reeled to the table, and only saved himself from a fall by catching at it, and she sank consciousless on the hearthstone beside Anthony.

CHAPTER XLII. ON THE BRIDGE.

Fox soon recovered himself, and seeing Anthony moving and rising on one hand, he came up to him again and thrust him back, and once more stooping over him, raised the knife.

"One for Urith," he said, "one for myself, and then one for Julian."

Before he could strike he was caught by the neck and dragged away.

Luke Cleverdon was in the hall; he had entered unobserved. Fox stood leaning against the table, hiding his weapon behind him, looking at Luke with angry yet alarmed eyes.

"Go," said Luke, waving his left hand. "I have not the strength to detain you, nor are there sufficient here to assist me were I to summon aid. Go!"

Fox, still watching him, sidled to the door, holding his knife behind him, but with a sharp, quick look at Anthony, who was disengaging himself from the burden of Urith, lying unconscious across him, and raising himself from where he had fallen. Blood flowed from his bosom and stained his vest.

"It was she. She bade me!" said Fox, pointing towards Urith. Then he passed through the door into the porch, and forth into the night.

Luke bent over Urith, who remained unconscious, and raised her to enable Anthony to mount to his feet, then he gently laid her down again, and said:

"Before any one comes in, Anthony, let me attend to you, and let us hide, if it may be, what has happened from other eyes."

He tore open Anthony's vest and shirt, and disclosed his breast. The knife had struck and dinted the broken token, then had glanced off and dealt a flesh wound. So forcible had been the blow that the impress of the broken crown, its part of a circle, and the ragged edge were stamped on Anthony's skin. The wound he had received was not dangerous. The token had saved his life. Had it not turned the point of Fox's knife, he would have been a dead man; the blade would have entered his heart.

Luke went to the well-chamber, brought thence a towel, tore it down the middle, passed it about the body of Anthony, and bound the linen so fast round him as to draw together the lips of the wound, and stay the flow of blood.

He said not one word whilst thus engaged. Nor did Anthony, whose eyes reverted to Urith, lying with face as marble and motionless upon the floor.

When Luke had finished his work, he said, gravely, "Now I will call in aid. Urith must be conveyed upstairs; you ride for a surgeon, and do not be seen. Go to my house, and tarry till I arrive. Take one of your best horses, and go."

Anthony obeyed in silence.

When Mistress Penwarne had returned from the visit to Magdalen Cleverdon, she had communicated the intelligence of Fox's suit, and of the old Squire's resolution, to Luke, and he at once started for Willsworthy, that he might see Anthony. Of the offer made by the father to Anthony he, of course, knew nothing; but the proposal to marry Bessie to Fox, and for the latter to assume the name of Cleverdon, filled him with concern. Bessie would need a firmer supporter than her Aunt Magdalen to enable her to resist the pressure brought upon her. Moreover, Luke was alarmed at the thought of the result to Anthony. He would be driven to desperation, become violent, and might provoke a broil with Fox, in which weapons would be drawn.

He arrived at Willsworthy in time to save the life of Anthony, and he had no doubt that the quarrel had arisen over the suit for Bessie, and the meditated assumption of the Cleverdon name. Anthony was hot-headed, and would never endure that Fox should step into his rights. But Luke could not understand what had induced Fox to run his head into danger. That he was audacious he knew, but this was a piece of audacity of which he did not suppose him to be capable.

Anthony saddled and bridled the best horse in the stable, and rode to Tavistock, where he placed himself in the hands of a surgeon. He did not explain how he had come by the wound, but he requested the man to keep silence concerning it. Quarrels over their cups were not infrequent among the young men, and these led to blows and sword thrusts, as a matter of course.

The surgeon confirmed the opinion expressed by Luke. The wound was not serious, it would soon heal; and he sewed it up. As he did so, he talked. There was a stir in the place. Squire Crymes of Kilworthy had been sending round messages to the villages, calling on the young men to join him. He made no secret of his intentions to march to the standard of the Duke of Monmouth.

"It is a curious fact," said Surgeon Pierce, "but his Lordship the Earl of Bedford had been sending down a large quantity of arms to his house that had been built out of the abbey ruins. His agent had told folks that the Earl was going to fit up a hall there with pikes, and guns, and casques, and breastplates, for all the world like the ancient halls in the days before Queen Elizabeth. Things do happen strangely," continued the surgeon. "All at once, not an hour ago it was whispered among the young men who were about in the market-place talking of the news, and asking each other whether they'd fight for the Pope or for the Duke, that there were all these weapons in his Lordship's hall; and that no one was on the spot to guard them. Well, they went to the place, got in, and no resistance offered, and armed themselves with whatever they could find, and are off the Lord knows where."

When Anthony left the surgeon's house, he considered what he should do, after having seen his cousin. To Luke's lodgings in the rectory at Peter Tavy he at once rode. His cousin he must speak to. To Willsworthy he could not return. The breach between him and Urith was irreparable. She knew that he had tampered with temptation, and believed him to be more faithless to her than he really had been. He would not, indeed he could not, explain the circumstances to her, for no explanation could make the facts assume a better colour. It was true that he had turned for a while in heart from Urith. Even now, he felt he did not love her. But no more did he love Julian. With the latter he was angry. When he thought of her, his blood began to simmer with rage. If he could have caught her now in his arms, he would have strangled her. She had played with him, lured him on, till she had utterly destroyed his happiness.

What had he done? He had kissed Julian. That was nothing; it was no mortal crime. Why should he not kiss an old friend and comrade whom he had known from childhood? What right had Urith to take offence at that? Had he written their initials on the glass, and united them by a true lovers' knot? He had; but he had also effaced it, and linked his own initial with that of Urith. He loved Urith no longer. His married life had been wretched. He had committed an act of folly in marrying her. Well, was he to be cut off from all his old acquaintances because he was the husband of Urith? Was he to treat them with distance and coldness? And then, how Julian had looked at him! how she had bent over him, and she—yes, she—had kissed him! Was he to sit still as a stone to receive the salutation of a pretty girl? Who would? Not a Puritan, not a saint. It was impossible—impossible to young flesh and blood. A girl's kiss must be returned with usury—tenfold. He was in toils—entangled hand and foot—and he sought in vain to break through them. But he could not remain thus bound—bound by obligation to Urith, whom he did not love—bound by old association to Julian, whom he once had loved, and who loved him still—loved him stormily, fervently. What could he do? He must not go near Julian—he dare not. He could not go back to Urith—to Urith who had given to Fox the mandate to kill him! He had heard her words. It was a planned matter. She had brought Fox to Willsworthy, and had concerted with him how he, Anthony, was to be killed. And yet Anthony knew that she loved him. Her love had been irksome to him—so jealous, so exacting, so greedy had it been. If she had desired and schemed his death, it was not that she hated him, but because she loved him too much—she could not endure that he should be estranged from her and drawn towards another.

But one course was open to him. He must tear—cut his way through the entangled threads. He must free himself at one stroke from Urith and from Julian. He would join Monmouth.

He rode, thus musing, towards Peter Tavy, and halted on the old bridge that spanned in two arches the foaming river. The rain that had fallen earlier had now wholly ceased, but the sky remained covered with a dense grey blanket of felt-like cloud. A fresher air blew; it came from the north, down the river with the water, and fanned Anthony's heated brow.

His wound began now to give him pain; he felt it as a line of red-hot iron near his heart. It was due to pure accident that he was not dead. If matters had fallen out as Urith desired, he would now be lying lifeless on the hearthstone where he had dropped, staggered and upset by the force of Fox's blow, when unprepared to receive it.

Now he recalled that half-challenge offered on the moor when first he met Urith, and had wondered over her bitten hands. He had half-threatened to exasperate her to one of her moods of madness, to see what she would do to him when in such a mood. He had forgotten all about that bit of banter till this moment. Unintentionally he had exasperated her, till she had lost all control over herself, and, unable to hurt him herself, had armed Fox to deal him the blow which was to avenge her wrongs.

He could not go back to the house with the girl who had sought his life. No—there was nothing else for him to do than throw in his lot with Monmouth, and, at the moment, he cared little whether it should be a winning or a losing cause.

"Anthony?"

"Yes. Is that you, Luke?"

A dark figure stepped on to the bridge, and came to the side of the horse.

"I have been home," said the curate. "Urith is ill; she scarce wakes out of one faint to fall into another. I have sent your grandmother to Willsworthy to be with her."

"It is well," answered Anthony. "And, now that we have met here, I wish a word with you, Luke. I am not going back to Willsworthy."

"Not—to Urith?"

"No, I cannot. I am going to ride at once to join the Duke of Monmouth. You have the Protestant cause at heart, Luke, and wish it well; so have I. But that is not all—I must away now. I do not desire to meet Fox for a while."

"No," said Luke, after a moment of consideration; "no, I can understand that. But Bessie must not be left without some one to help her."

"There is yourself. What can I do? Besides, Bess is strong in herself. She will never go against what she believes to be right. She will never step into my shoes, nor will she help Fox to draw them on."

"You cannot ride now, with your wound."

"Bah! That is naught. You said as much yourself."

"Tony, there is something yet I do not understand," said Luke, falteringly. "Did you first strike Fox?"

"No—no. I had my hands behind me. I stood at the hearth."

"But the quarrel was yours with him, rather than his with you. If you did not strike him, why did he aim at you?"

"Luke, there were matters passed of which you need know naught—at least no more than this. My father had offered to receive me back into his good-will once more, to let the past be blotted out, no longer to insist on Bess being wed to Fox, and to return to live at Hall."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Luke, joyously. "Now can I see why Fox came to you, and why he struck you."

"It was on one condition."

"And that was——"

"That I should leave Urith, and never speak to her again."

"Anthony!" Luke's tone was full of terror and pain. "Oh, Anthony! Surely you never—never for one moment—not by half a word—gave consent, or semblance of consent, to this! It would—it would kill her! Oh, Anthony!"

Luke put up both his hands on the pommel of the saddle, and clasped them. What light there was fell on his up-turned, ash-grey face.

"Anthony, answer me. Has she been informed of that? She never thought you could be so cruel—so false; and she has loved you. My God! her whole heart has been given to you—to you, and to no one else; and you have not valued it as you should have done. Because you have had to lose this and that, you have resented it on her. She has had to bear your ill-humour—she has suffered, and has been saddened. And now—no! I cannot think it. You have not let her know that this offer was made."

The sweat drops poured and rolled off Luke's brow. He looked up, and waited on Anthony for a reply.

"She did know it," answered the latter, "but that was Fox's doing. He told her; and told her what was false, that I intended to accept the offer, and leave her. No, Luke, I have done many things that are wrong, I have been inconsiderate, but I could not do this. And now I bid you go to-morrow to my father, see him, and tell him my answer. That is expressed in one word—Never."

Luke seized his hand, and wrung it. "That is my own dear cousin Anthony!" he said, and then added, "But why away at once, and Urith so ill?"

"I must away at once. I cannot return to her." Anthony hesitated for some while; at last he said, in a low tone, "I will tell you why—she thinks me false to her, and in a measure I have been so. She thinks I no longer love her—and it is true. My love is dead. Luke—I cannot return."

"Oh, Urith—poor Urith!" groaned the curate, and let his hands fall.

"Now I go. Whatever haps, naught can be worse than the state of matters at present. If you can plead in any way for me, when I am away, do so. I would have her think better of me than she does—but I love her no more."

Then he rode away.

Luke remained on the bridge, looking over into the rushing water—the river was full.

"Poor Urith! My God—and it was I—it was I who united them." Then he turned into the direction of Hall. "I will go there, and bear Anthony's message to his father at once."

CHAPTER XLIII. AN EXPIRING CANDLE.

When Squire Cleverdon arrived at Hall, he found there awaiting him a man booted, spurred, whip in hand, bespattered with mire. The old man asked him his business without much courtesy, and the man replied that he had ridden all day from Exeter with a special letter for Master Cleverdon, which he was ordered to deliver into his hands, and into his alone.

Old Cleverdon impatiently tore away the string and broke the seal that guarded the letter, opened it, and began to read. Then, before he had read many lines, he turned ghastly white, reeled, and sank against the wall, and his hands trembled in which he held the page.

He recovered himself almost immediately, sufficiently to give orders for the housing and entertainment of the messenger; and then he retired to his private room, or office, into which he locked himself. He unclosed a cabinet that contained his papers, and, having kindled a light, brought forth several bundles of deeds and books of accounts, and spread them on the table before him. Some of the documents were old and yellow, and were written in that set courthand that had been devised to make what was written in it unintelligible save to the professionals. Squire Cleverdon took pen and a clean sheet of paper and began calculations upon it. These did not afford him much satisfaction. He rose, took his candle, opened and relocked the door, and ascended the stairs to his bedroom, where he searched in a secret receptacle in the fireplace for his iron box, in which were all his savings. Thence he brought the gold he had, and, having placed the candle on the floor, began to arrange the sovereigns in tens, in rows, where the light of the candle fell. After the gold came the silver, and after the silver some bundles of papers of moneys due that had never been paid, but which were recoverable.

Having ascertained exactly what he had in cash, and what he might be able at short notice to collect, the old man replaced all in the iron case, and reclosed the receptacle.

In the mean while, during the evening, after darkness had set in, to Bessie's great annoyance, Fox appeared. Directly he left Willsworthy, he thought it advisable to visit Hall before going home, and forestall with old Cleverdon the tidings of what had occurred. He did not doubt that the story of his attack on Anthony would be bruited about—that Anthony, or Luke, or both, would tell of it, to his disadvantage, and he determined to relate it his own way at once, before it came round to the ears of the Squire, wearing another complexion from that which he wished it to assume.

"You desire to see my father," said Bessie. "He is engaged, he is in his room; he would not be disturbed."

"I must see him, if but for a minute."

Bessie went to the door and knocked, but received no answer. She came back to the parlour. "My father is busy; he has locked himself into his room. You had better depart."

"I can wait," said Fox.

"Then you must pardon my absence. There has come a messenger this evening for my father, with a letter that has to be considered. I must attend to what is fitting for the comfort of the traveller."

When left to himself, Fox became restless. He stood up, and himself tried the door of old Anthony's apartment. It was locked. He struck at the door with his knuckles, but received no answer. Then he looked through the keyhole; it was dark within. The old man was not there, but at that moment he heard him cough upstairs. He was therefore in his bedroom, and Fox would catch him as he descended. He returned to the parlour.

Presently Bessie entered with Luke; she had gone to the door, had stood in the porch communing with herself, unwilling to be in the room with her tormentor, when Luke appeared, and asked to see her father. "Verily," said she, with a faint smile, "he is in mighty request this night; you are the third who have come for him—first a stranger, then Fox——"

"Fox here?"

"Yes, he is within."

"I am glad. A word with him before I see your father, and do you keep away, Bessie, for a while till called."

Fox started to his feet when Luke came in, but said nothing till Bessie left the room, then hurriedly,

"You, raven—what news? But mark you. I did it in self-defence. Every man must defend his own life. When he knew that I was to take his place in Hall, he rushed on me, and I did but protect myself."

"Anthony's wound is trifling," said Luke, coldly.

"So! and you have come to prejudice me in the ear of his father."

"I am come with a message from Anthony to his father."

"Indeed—to come and see his scratch, and a drop of blood from it; and then to clasp each other and weep, and make friends?"

"The message is not to you, but to his father."

"And—he is not hurt?"

"Not seriously hurt."

"I never designed to hurt him. I did but defend my own self. I treated him as an angry boy with a knife."

"No more of this," said Luke. "Let the matter not be mentioned. I will say naught concerning it, neither do you. So is best. As for Anthony, he is away."

"Away? Whither gone?"

"Gone to-night to join Monmouth. Your father is gathering men for the Protestant cause, Anthony will be with him and them."

Fox laughed. His insolence had come back, as his fears abated.

"Faith! he has run away, because I scratched him with a pin. At the first prick he fainted."

Luke went to the door, and called in Bessie. He could not endure the association with Fox.

"Bess!" he said, "can I see your father?—I have a message for him from Tony."

"He is upstairs—in his bedroom," said Bessie. "I will tell him you are here when he descends."

"Come here," exclaimed Fox, who had recovered all his audacity, and with it boisterous spirits. "Come here, Bess, my dear, and let Cousin Curate Luke know how we stand to each other."

"And, pray," said Bessie, colouring, "how do we stand to each other?"

"My word! you are hot. We shall be asking him ere long to join our hands—so he must be prepared in time—he will have a pleasure in calculating the amount of his fee."

"Cousin Luke," said Bessie, "I am not sorry that he has mentioned this, for so I can answer him in your presence, and give him such an answer before you as he has had from me in private, but would not take. Never, neither by persuasion, nor by force, shall I be got to give my consent."

In spite of his self-control, Fox turned livid with rage.

"Is that final?" he asked.

"It is final."

"We shall see," sneered he. "Say what you will, I do not withdraw."

"For shame of you!" exclaimed Luke, stepping between Bessie and Fox. "If you have any good feeling in you, do not pester her with a suit that is odious to her, and after what has happened to-night, should, to yourself, be impossible."

"Oh!" jeered Fox, "you yourself proposed silence, and are bursting to let the matter escape."

"Desist," said Luke. "Desist from a pursuit that is cruel to her, and which you cannot prosecute with honour to yourself."

"I will not desist!" retorted Fox. "Tell me this. Who first sought to bring it about? Was it I? No. Magdalen Cleverdon was she who prepared it, then came the Squire himself. It's the Cleverdons who have hunted me—who try to catch me; not I who have been the hunter. You call me Fox, and you have been hue and tally ho! after me."

"There is my father!" gasped Bessie, and ran from the room. She found the old man in the passage with his candle, unlocking his sitting-room door.

"Oh, father!" she said, breathlessly, for the scene that had occurred had taken away her breath, "here is Luke come—he must see you."

"What! at night? I cannot. I am busy."

"But, father, he has a message."

"A message? What, another? I will not see him."

"For a moment, uncle. It is a word from Anthony," said Luke, entering the passage. "One word, shall I say it here, or within?"

"I care not—if it is one word, say it here; but only one word."

He was fumbling with the key in the lock. His hand that held the candle shook, and the wax fell on his fingers and on the cuff of his coat. He had the key inserted in the door, and could not turn it in the wards.

"Very well," said Luke. "You shall have it in one word—Never."

The old man let the key fall—he straightened himself. His voice shook with anger. "It is well. It is as I could have wished it. I take him at his word. Never. Never—let me say it again. Never, and once again, never; and each never shuts a door on him for all time. Never shall he have my forgiveness. Never shall he inherit an acre or a pound of mine. Never will I speak to him another word. Nay, were he dying, I would not go to see him; could I by a word save his life, I would not do it. Go tell him that. Now go—and Elizabeth, hold the candle. I will open the door; go in before me to my room; I'll lock the door on us both. Now all is plain. The wind has cleared away the mists, and we must settle all between us this night, with the way open before us."

He managed to unfasten the door, and he made his daughter pass in, carrying the light. Then he turned the key in the lock.

The little table was strewn with deeds and papers and books. Bessie cast a glance at it, and saw no spot on which she could set the candle. She therefore held it in her hand, standing before her father, who threw himself into his chair. She was pale, composed, and resolved. He could have nothing further to urge than what had been urged already, and she had her answer to that. The candle was short, it had swaled down into the tray, and could not burn for more than ten minutes.

"Elizabeth," said her father, "I shall not repeat what has been said already. I have told you what my wishes, what my commands are. You can see in Anthony what follows on the rebellion of a child against the father. Let me see in you that obedience which leads to happiness as surely as his disobedience has brought him to misery. But I have said all this before, and I will not now repeat it. There are further considerations which make me desire that you should take Anthony Crymes without delay." He drew a long breath, and vainly endeavoured to conceal his agitation. "I bought this place—Hall—where my forefathers have been as tenants for many generations; I bought it, but I had not sufficient money at command, so I mortgaged the estate, and borrowed the money to pay for it. Then I thought soon and easily to have paid off the debt. The mortgagee did not press; but having Hall as mine own was, I found, another thing to having Hall as a tenant. My position was changed, and with this change came increased expenditure. Anthony cost much money, he was of no use in the farm, and he threw about money as he liked. But not so only. I rebuilt nearly the whole of the house; I might have spent this money in paying off the mortgage, or in reducing it, but instead of that I rebuilt and enlarged the house. I thought that my new position required it, and the old farmhouse was small and inconvenient, and ill-suited to my new position. But I had no fear. The mortgagee did not require the money. Then of late we have had bad times, and I have had the drag of the mortgage on me. A little while ago I had notice that I must repay the whole amount. I did not consider this as serious, and I sought to stay it off. The messenger who has now come from Exeter, comes with a final demand for the entire sum. The times are precarious. The Duke of Monmouth has landed. No one knows what will happen, and the mortgagee calls in his money. I have not got it."

"Then what is to be done?"

Bessie became white as the wax of the candle, and the flame flickered because the candle shook in her hand.

"Only one thing can be done. Only you can save Hall—save me."

"I! Oh, my father!" Bessie's heart stood still, she feared what she should hear.

"Only you can save us," pursued the old man. "You and I will be driven out of this place, will lose Hall, lose the acres that for three centuries have been dressed with our sweat, lose the roof that has covered the Cleverdons for many generations, unless you save us."

"But—how, father?" she asked, yet knew what the answer would be.

"You must marry Anthony Crymes at once. Then only shall we be safe, for the Crymes family will find the money required to secure Hall."

"Father," pleaded Bessie, "ask for help from some one else! Borrow the money elsewhere."

"In times such as this, when we are trembling in revolution, and none knows what the issue will be, no one will lend money. I have no friend save Squire Crymes. There is no help to be had anywhere else. Here"—said the old man, irritably—"here are a bundle of accounts of moneys owed to me, that I cannot get back now. I have sent round to those in my debt, and it is the same cry from all. The times are against us—wait till all is smooth, and then we will pay. In the mean time my state is desperate. I offered to Anthony but this day to forgive the past and receive him back to Hall—but the offer came too late. Hall is lost to him, lost to you, lost to me, lost forever, unless you say yea."

"Oh, Luke! Luke!" cried Bessie; "let me speak first with him;" then suddenly changed her mind and tone,

"Oh, no! I must not speak to him—to him above all, about this."

"Bessie!" said the old man; his tone was altered from that which was usual to him. He had hectored and domineered over her, had shown her little kindness and small regard, but now he spoke in a subdued manner, with entreaty. "Bessie! look at my grey hairs. I had hoped that all future generations of Cleverdons would have thought of me with pride, as he who made the family; but, instead, they will curse me as he who cast it forth from its home and brought it to destruction."

Bessie did not speak, her eyes were on the candle, the flame was nigh on sinking, a gap had formed under the wick, and the wax was running down into the socket as water in a well.

"I have hitherto commanded, and have usually been obeyed," continued the old man, "but now I must entreat. I am to be dishonoured through my children, one—my son—has left me and taken to himself another home, and defies me in all things. My daughter, by holding out her hand, could save me and all my hopes and ambitions, and she will not. Will she have me—me, an old grey-headed father, kneel at her feet?" He put his hands to the arms of his seat to help him to rise from the chair that he might fall before her.