Fenn George Manville
The Star-Gazers

Volume Three – Chapter Ten.
The Little Orb Turns Round

There was but one thought in the minds of father and uncle at Brackley, and that was to silence busy tongues, get Glynne sufficiently well to move, and go right away abroad; and in Oldroyd they had a willing coadjutor, and one who seemed not to have a thought beyond his profession.

The major had been half mad, and ready to follow the bent of his suspicions again and again; but robbery as well as outrage appeared to have influenced the man who had escaped unseen, since the greater part of the valuable jewels, including a diamond bracelet given by Marjorie to the bride, were missing, and he felt that he was wrong.

Sir John prevailed.

“Jem,” he said, “if I knew who it was I’d shoot him ike a dog – curse him! No: I couldn’t wait to fire, I’d strangle him; but I can’t have this published abroad if we can hush it up. I won’t have my child dragged into a witness box to give evidence against the devil who has wrought us this ill. We must bear it, Jem, and wait.”

“But, my dear Jack – ”

“But, my dear Jem – I am her father. What would our darling wish if she could speak to us – if we could speak to her upon what it would be best to do?”

The major bowed his head, and as far as possible a veil was drawn over the events of that night.

Rumour was pretty busy during the next month, during which period several stories were afloat, but only one bore the stamp of truth – that, out of despair some said, Captain Rolph obtained leave of absence, and went off to Norway, shooting, while Mrs Rolph and her niece accompanied him as far as Hull, and then continued their journey to Scarboro’.

That was perfectly true, Mrs Rolph having her hands pretty full with Marjorie, who also turned ill having bad, nervous, hysterical fits, and refusing absolutely to go outside The Warren door without having tight hold of Mrs Rolph’s arm; and even then she was constantly turning her eyes wildly round as if in expectation of seeing someone start out from behind bush or hedge.

“The shock to her system,” Mrs Rolph used to say to herself, and she became increasingly gentle toward the girl whose nerves had been shattered by the affair at The Hall.

By this time the shutters were all closed at Brackley, for, after Sir John had been severely blamed for not getting down some big physician when Glynne’s brain fever was at its worst, people came to the conclusion that he knew what he was about, for if ever a clever practitioner did settle down in a place, it was “Doctor” Oldroyd, who had cured the young lady in a wonderfully short space of time. For the month at its end found the Days in Italy, where Glynne had been recommended to go on account of her health.

Oldroyd consequently was on the road to fame – that is the fame which extended for a radius of six miles; but his pockets were very little the heavier, and he still looked upon men who kept banking accounts with a feeling akin to awe.

Change in the neighbourhood of Brackley extended no further. The blunt-eyed, resident policeman, somehow never managed to come across the poachers who made raids upon The Warren and upon Brackley during the absence of their owners; while over at Lindham, the doctor learned from old Mother Wattley, who grew more chatty and apparently younger, under her skilful medical man’s care, that Ben Hayle – ‘my son-in-law’ – had taken an acre of land, and was ‘goin’ to make a fortun’ there as a florist; but when Oldroyd met the ex-keeper one day, and went over the garden with him, it seemed improbable that it would even pay the rent.

“Better turn to your old business, Hayle,” said Oldroyd.

“Easier said than done, sir,” replied the man. “Old master gave me my chance when I was a young fool, and liked to do a bit o’ poaching, believing honestly then that all birds were wild, and that I had as good a right to them as anybody. But I soon found out the difference when I had to rear them, and I served him honest, and Mrs Rolph too, all those years, till she discharged me because of the captain’s liking for my Judith.”

“But surely there were other places to be found by a man with a good character.”

“Didn’t seem like it, sir. I tried till I was beat out, and then, in a kind of despairing fit, I went out with some of the lads, and you know what I got for my pains.”

“Yes,” said the doctor, “and it ought to be a lesson for you, Hayle.”

“Yes, sir, it ought; but you see, once a man takes to that kind of work it’s hard to keep from it.”

“But, my good fellow, you may be laid by the heels in gaol at any time. I wondered you were not taken over that affair.”

“So I should have been, if I’d had any other doctor, sir,” said Hayle, with a meaning smile, “and the police had been a little sharper. But you didn’t chatter, and our fellows didn’t, and so I got off.”

“But think, now; you, the father of a young girl like Miss Hayle, what would her feelings be if you were sent to prison like that young fellow – what’s his name – was.”

“Caleb Kent, sir?”

“Yes. What’s become of him? I haven’t seen him lately.”

“Racketing about somewhere, sir. Me and him had a quarrel or two about my Judith. He was always hanging after her; and it got so bad, at last, that I promised him a charge o’ shot in his jacket if he ever came anigh our place again. He saw I meant it, sir, and he has left the poor girl in peace.”

“Well, I must be off, Hayle.”

“Thankye for calling, sir. Been to see the old mother-in-law?”

“Yes; she keeps wonderfully well.”

“You mean you keep her wonderfully well, sir. Poor old girl, she’s not a bad one in her way.”

“No, and there’s nothing the matter with her but old age.”

“Hear that the missus is coming back to The Warren, sir?”

“Yes, and that the Brackley people are on their way too. Look here, Hayle, shall I put in a word for you to Sir John?”

“No thankye, doctor, let me bide; things ’ll come right in time. Think there’ll be a wedding at the Hall, now, sir? They tell me Miss Day’s got well and strong again.”

“I’ve enough to do with my people when they want me, Hayle,” said the doctor, drily, “and I never interfere about their private matters; but, as you ask me that question, I should say decidedly not.”

The ex-keeper smiled, as if the doctor’s words coincided with his own thoughts, and he stood watching Oldroyd, as he rode off, getting a peep at Judith seated by the window working hard as he went by, the girl’s face looking pale and waxen in the shade.

“Fretting a bit, by the look of her, and those dark rings,” said Oldroyd, as he rode away. “How much happier a place the world would be if there were no marrying and giving in marriage – no making love at all. Causes more worry, I think, than the drink.”

Volume Three – Chapter Eleven.
Drawn Together

“Well, dearest,” said Mrs Rolph, “have you been all round?”

Rolph, who was leaning back in his chair in the library at The Warren, reading a sporting paper, uttered a growl.

“Not satisfactory, dear?”

“Satisfactory! the place has gone to rack and ruin. I don’t believe those cursed poachers have left a head of game on the estate; but I know who’s at the bottom of it, and he’d better look out.”

“I’m very sorry, dear,” said Mrs Rolph, going behind her son’s chair to stroke his hair. “The garden looks very nice; both Madge and I thought so. Why didn’t you run over now and then to see that the keeper was doing his duty.”

“Run over?” cried Rolph, savagely; “who was going to run over here for every fool one met to be pointing his cursed finger at you, and saying, ‘There goes the fellow who didn’t get married.’”

“My dearest boy,” said Mrs Rolph, soothingly, as she laid her cheek on the top of his head, “don’t fret about that now. You know it’s nearly eighteen months ago.”

“I don’t care if it’s eighteen hundred months ago – and do leave off, mother, you know I hate having my hair plastered down.”

Mrs Rolph kissed the place where her cheek had been laid, and then drew back, showing that the complaint had not been merited, for, so far from the hair being plastered down, there was scarcely any to plaster, Rolph’s head being cropped close in athletic and on anti-Samsonic principles as regarded strength.

“It was very, very hard for you, my dearest, and it is most unfortunate that they should have chosen the same time to return as we did. You – er – heard that they are back?”

“Of course I did, and if you’d any respect for your son, you’d sell this cursed hole, and go somewhere else.”

“Don’t – don’t ask me to do that, Rob, dear,” said Mrs Rolph. “I know your poor father looked forward to your succeeding to it and keeping it up.”

“I hate the place,” growled Rolph rustling his paper; and Mrs Rolph looked pleased, but she said nothing for some time. Then, very gently, —

“Rob, dearest, you are going to stay now you are here?”

“No; I’m going to Hounslow to-morrow.”

“Not so soon as that, dear,” said Mrs Rolph, pleadingly, as she laid her hand upon his shoulder.

“Why not? What’s the good of staying here?”

“To please your mother, dearest, and – Madge, who is in a terribly weak state I had great difficulty in getting her back here.”

Rolph moved angrily, and crumpled up the paper, but Mrs Rolph bent down and kissed him.

“There, all right,” he said, “only don’t bother me about it so. I can’t forget that other cursed muddle, if you can.”

“No, my dear, of course not, but you should try to. And, Rob, dear, be a little more thoughtful about dearest Madge. She has, I know, suffered cruelly in the past, and does so now at times when you seem neglectful – no, no, don’t start, dear; I know you are not, but girls are exacting, and do love to spoil men by trying to keep them at their feet.”

“Like spaniels or pugs,” growled Rolph, the latter being the more appropriate.

“Yes, dear, but she will grow wiser in that direction, and you cannot be surprised at her anxiety. Rob, dearest, you must not blame her for her worship of one whom she looks upon as a demigod – the perfection of all that is manly and strong.”

“Oh, no; it’s all right, mother,” said Rolph, who felt flattered by the maternal and girlish adulation; “I’ll behave like a lamb.”

“You’ll behave like my own true, brave son, dearest, and make me very happy. When shall it be, Rob?”

“Eh? The marriage?”

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs Rolph, kneeling at his side and passing an arm about him.

“Has Madge been at you about it?”

“For shame, dearest! She would die sooner than speak. You know how she gave up to what you fancied would make you happy before. Never a word, never a murmur; and she took that poor unfortunate girl, Glynne, to her heart as a sister.”

“Damn it all, mother, do let that cursed business rest,” cried Rolph impatiently.

“Yes, dearest, of course; pray forgive me.”

“Oh, all right! But – er – Madge – she hasn’t seen her – hasn’t been over there?”

“No, my love, of course not. There must be no further communication between our families. It was Sir John’s own wish, as you know. No one could have behaved more honourably, or with more chivalrous consideration than he did over the horribly distressing circumstances. But that’s all dead, past and forgotten now, and you need not fear any allusions being made in the place. It was quite wonderful how little was ever known outside the house. But there, no more past; let’s have present and future. Time is flying, Rob, dearest, and I’m getting an old woman now.”

“And a deuced fine, handsome old woman, too,” said Rolph, with an unwonted show of affection, for he passed his arm about her, and kissed her warmly. “I tell you what it is, old lady, I only wish I could meet with one like you – a fine, handsome, elderly body, with no confounded damn-nonsense about her. I’d propose in a minute.”

“My dearest boy, what absurd stuff you do talk, when the most beautiful girl for miles round is waiting patiently for you to say, – ‘Come, and I will recompense you with my life’s devotion for all your long suffering, and the agony of years.’”

“Just what I’m likely to say, mother,” said Rolph, grimly.

“But you will in your heart.”

“All right, I’ll try. She will let me have my own way. But I say, mother, she has grown precious thin and old-looking while you have been on the Continent.”

“What wonder, dearest boy. Can a woman suffer, as she has about you for two years now, without showing the lines of care. But what of them. It will be your pleasant duty to smooth them all out, and you can, dearest, and so easily. A month after she is yours she will not look the same.”

Mrs Rolph’s words were spoken in all sincerity, and there was a great deal in them as to their probabilities, but not in the direction she meant.

“Rob, dearest,” she whispered caressingly, soon after, “when shall it be?”

“Don’t know.”

“To set your mother’s heart at rest – and hers.”

“Oh, very well, when you like; but hold hard a minute.”

“Rob!” cried Mrs Rolph in dismay, for her heart was beating fast with hope, and his words had arrested the throbbing.

“I can’t have two of my important meetings interfered with. I’ve the Bray Bridge handicap, and a glove fight I must attend.”

“Rob, my darling!”

“But I must go to them. The confounded service takes up so much of my time, that I’ve neglected my athletics shamefully.”

Marjorie came in from the garden just then, and as she appeared at the French window, the careworn, hunted look in her eyes, and a suggestion of twitching about the corners of her lips, fully justified her athletic cousin’s disparaging remarks.

“Ah, my darling!” cried Mrs Rolph, rising.

“I beg pardon, aunt dear. I did not know you and Rob were engaged.”

“Don’t go, dearest,” said Mrs Rolph, holding out her hands, her tone of voice making Marjories eyes dilate, and as she began to tremble violently, a deathly pallor overspread her cheeks, and she tottered and then sank sobbing in Mrs Rolph’s arms.

“My darling – my darling!” whispered her aunt. “There – there! Rob, dearest, help me!”

Rolph rose from his chair, half-pleased, half-amused by his mother’s action, as she shifted the burden to his great muscular arms.

“Help her to the couch, my love. Why, she is all of a tremble. I’ll go and fetch my salts. Rob, dearest, can’t you bring back the colour to her cheeks?”

She moved slowly toward the door in quite a stage exit, smiling with satisfaction as she saw her son make no effort to place the trembling woman upon the couch, but holding her to his breast, while, slowly and timidly, her hands rose to his neck, gained faith and courage, and by the time the door closed upon the pair, Madge was clinging tightly, and for the first time for two years felt that the arms which encircled her held her firmly.

“Rob!” she cried wildly, as she raised her head to gaze wildly in his eyes.

“All right, pussy,” he said. “The mater says we are to forget all the past, and forgive, and all that sort of thing, and the event is to be a fixture, short notice and no flam.”

“You mean it, Rob – darling?”

“Of course,” he cried; and his lips closed upon hers.

“There,” he said, after a time; “now let’s go and have a quiet walk and talk.”

“In the garden? Yes!”

“Hang the garden! outside. I don’t want the old girl to be hanging about us, patting us on the back and watching for every kiss.”

“No, no,” she whispered, as she clung to him, as if fearing to lose him before she had him fast. “Except for this, Rob, dear, I wish we had not come back to The Warren.”

“Hallo!” he cried, boisterously; “jealous of Judy, pet? Why, I haven’t seen her for months? That’s all over, and I’m going to be your own good boy.”

“It wasn’t that, Rob. I was afraid.”

“What of? Losing me? Oh, you’re safe now,” he cried, with a boisterous laugh.

“No, dear Rob; it was not that, but of something else.”

“What, Brackley?” he said roughly, and with an angry scowl.

“Oh, no, Rob,” she cried, with a frightened look and a shudder as she covered his lips with hers. “Don’t, pray, speak of that. It is too horrible. I didn’t mean that.”

“What then?”

“It was nothing about you, Rob, dearest. It was about myself. I was frightened, but no, not now,” she whispered caressingly, as she nestled to him. “I shall always have your brave, strong, giant’s arms to be round me, to protect me against everybody.”

“Of course,” he said, complacently, as he smiled down at her. “But what are you afraid of?”

“Oh; nothing,” she whispered; “it’s because I’m weak and foolish. Oh, Rob, how grand it must be to feel big, and strong and brave. It was some time before we went away, I was out walking, and a man came out from among the hazel bushes.”

“Eh?” growled Rolph.

“It was that dreadful poacher who used to be about, and he asked for money, and I gave him some, dear, and then he became insulting, and tried to catch me in his arms, but I shrieked out and he ran away.”

“Caleb Kent?” growled Rolph.

“I think that is what he was called,” said Marjorie timidly; “but I need not be afraid of him now, need I, Rob?”

“You may be afraid for him,” said Rolph, fiercely; “for so sure as ever we meet any night, and he is poaching, I shall have an accident with my gun.”

“But you won’t kill him, Rob. Don’t do that, dearest; it would be too dreadful.”

“No; I won’t kill him if I can help it. That would be too bad, eh? I won’t nail his ears to the pump.”

“Ah, my darlings! here still,” said Mrs Rolph, who entered, smiling, but with the tears trickling down her cheeks. “Madge, my child, what has become of my salts – you know, the cut-glass bottle with the gold top.”

“Never mind the salts, mother,” said Rolph, boisterously; “sugar has done it. I’ve quite brought Madge to – haven’t I, pussy?”

“Oh, Rob, dearest,” cried Madge, hiding her face upon his breast, and shuddering slightly as she nestled there, as if a cold breath of wind had passed over to threaten the blasting of her budding hopes.

“It’s all right, mother, and – there as soon as you like. Come, little wifey to be, begin your duties at once. Big strong husbands want plenty of food when they are not training. They are like the lawyers who need refreshers. I’m choking for a pint of Bass. No, no, mother; let her ring. Satisfied?”

“Rob, my darling, you’ve made me a happy woman at last – so proud, so very proud of my darling son.”

“All right,” cried Rolph, gruffly; “but, look here, I’m not going to figure at Brackley over a business like this. I’m off back to barracks.”

“So soon, Rob,” cried Madge, and the scared look came into her eyes again, as she involuntarily glanced at the window as if expecting to see Caleb Kent peering in.

“Madge, my darling! Look at her, Rob.”

“Bah! what a cowardly, nervous little puss it is,” cried Rolph, taking her in his arms, and she clung to him sobbing hysterically. “Look here, mother; you’d better take a house, or furnished apartments in town at once, and we’ll get the business done there. Madge is afraid of bogies. Weak and hysterical, and that sort of thing. Get her away; the place is dull, and the poachers are hanging about here a good deal.”

Marjorie uttered a faint shriek which was perfectly real.

“Take us away at once, Rob, dear,” she whispered passionately; “I can’t bear to be separated from you now.”

“All right,” he said. “I’ll stop and take care of you till you’re ready to start, and see you safe in town. You can go to a hotel for a day or two. Will that do?”

“Yes, dear; admirably,” cried Mrs Rolph, eagerly; and Marjorie uttered a sigh of consent that was like a moan of pain.

Volume Three – Chapter Twelve.
Re the Focus

News reaches the servants’ hall sooner than it does the drawing-room, and before long it was known at Brackley that a wedding was in the air.

Cook let it off in triumph one day at dinner. She had been very silent for some time, and then began to smile, till Morris, the butler, who had noted the peculiarities of this lady for years, suddenly exclaimed, – “Now then, what is it? Out with it, cook!”

“Oh, don’t ask me; it’s nothing.”

“Yes, it is,” said the butler, with a wink directed all round the table. “What are you laughing at?”

“It does seem so rum,” cried cook, laughing silently till her face was peony-like in hue.

“Well, you might give us a bit, cook,” said the major’s valet. “What is it?”

“They’ve – they’ve found the focus again,” cried cook, laughing now quite hysterically.

“Eh? Where?” cried Morris.

“Over at The Warren.”

“What,” cried the butler severely; “made it up? Cook, I should be sorry to say unpleasant things to any lady, but if you were a man, I should tell you that you were an old fool.”

“Well, I’m sure!” cried cook, “that’s polite, when I heered it only this morning from the butcher, who’d just come straight from The Warren, where he heered it all.”

“What? That Captain Rolph had made it up with our Miss Glynne? Rubbish, woman, rubbish! After the way he pitched the poor girl over and went off shooting, that could never be.”

“If people would not be quite so clever,” said cook, addressing the assembled staff of servants round the table, “and would not jump at things before they know, perhaps they’d get on a little better in life. As if I didn’t know that she’d never marry now. I said as the captain had made up matters with his cousin, that carrotty-headed girl who came to be bridesmaid.”

“You don’t mean it,” cried Morris.

“It’s a fact,” said cook, “and it’s to come off at once.”

“What, her? Disgraceful!”

Cook smiled again, with the quiet confidence of knowledge, and ignoring the butler’s remark, she fixed the maids in turn with her eye.

“Mrs Rolph has taken a furnished house in London for three months, and they’re going to it next week, and as Perkins’ man says, it do seem hard, after getting on for two years without delivering regular joints at the house for them to be off again.”

“Well,” said Mason, Glynne’s maid, contemptuously, “I wish the lady joy of him. A low, common, racing and betting man. I wouldn’t marry him if he was made of gold.”

“Right, Mrs Mason,” said Morris. “I don’t know what Nature was thinking about to make him an officer. No disrespect meant to those in the stables, but to my mind, if Captain Rolph – and I saw a deal of him when he was here – had found his – his – ”

“Focus,” suggested cook, and there was a roar in which the butler joined, by way of smoothing matters over with his fellow-servant.

“I meant to say level, cook. He would have been a helper, or the driver of a cab. He was never fit for our young lady.”

The servants’ hall tattle proved to be quite correct, for within a week The Warren was vacant again, Rolph being back at barracks, and Mrs Rolph and her niece at a little house in one of the streets near Lowndes Square, busily occupied in preparing the lady’s trousseau, for the marriage was to take place within a month.

It was not long after that the news reached The Firs, and Lucy became very thoughtful, and ended by feeling glad. She hardly knew why, but she was pleased at the idea of Captain Rolph being married and out of the way.

And now, by no means for the first time, a great longing came over Lucy to see Glynne Day again. She knew that the family had been for a year and a half in Italy, and only heard by accident that they had returned to Brackley, so quietly was everything arranged. Then, as the days glided by, and she heard no more news, the longing to see Glynne again intensified.

She felt the tears come into her eyes and trickle down her cheeks as she thought of the terrible catastrophe – never even alluded to at The Firs – a horror which had saved her from being Rolph’s wife, but at what a cost!

“Poor Moray!” she sighed more than once in her solitary communings. “Poor Glynne! and they might have been by now happy husband and wife. It is too horrible – too dreadful. How could Fate be so cruel!”

Lucy shivered at times as she mentally called up the careworn, beautiful, white face of her old friend, who had never been seen outside the walls of the house, so far as she could learn, since her return. And at last, trembling the while, as if her act were a sin, instead of true womanly love and charity, she wrote a simple little letter to Glynne, asking to see her, for that she loved her very dearly, and that the past was nothing to them, and ought not to separate two who had always been dear friends.

She posted the letter secretly, feeling that mother and brother would oppose the act, and that day the rustic postman was half-a-crown the richer upon his promising to retain and deliver into her own hands any letter addressed to her which might arrive.

Then she waited patiently for days in the grim, cheerless home, where her brother seemed to be settling down into a thoughtful, dreamy man, who was ageing rapidly, and whose eyes always looked full of some terrible trouble, which was eating away his life, while, if possible, Mrs Alleyne looked older, thinner, and more careworn than of yore.

Oldroyd came at intervals professionally, but there was a peculiar distance observed between him and Lucy, who treated him with petulant angry resentment, and he was reserved and cold.

But his visits did no good. There were no walks with the doctor, no garden flowers bloomed at the astronomer’s touch. Alleyne studied harder than ever, and his name rose in reputation among the scientific, but he received no visitors, paid no calls, and only asked for one thing from those of his household – to be let alone.

A week had elapsed before the postman, with a great deal of mysterious action, slipped a note into Lucy’s hand, making her run to her room trembling and feeling guilty, to hold the letter open, illegible for the tears which veiled her eyes.

At last, though, she read the few brief lines which it contained: —

“Think of the past, Lucy, as of happy days spent with one who loved you, and who is now dead. Better that we should never meet again. Better, perhaps, if I had never lived. God bless you, dear. Good-bye.”

Poor Lucy was too ill to appear at dinner that day, and for several more she did not stir out. Then Mrs Alleyne insisted upon her going for a walk, and, as if drawn by fate, she went straight toward the fir mount to climb to the top, where she could sit down and gaze at Brackley, and try to make out Glynne, who might be walking in the garden.

No: she saw no tall white figure there, and she felt that unless she borrowed some “optick tube” from her brother’s observatory, she was not likely to see her friend a mile away, and she stood there low-spirited and tearful.

“If I could only see her, and say, – ‘Glynne, sister, what is all that terrible trouble to us? You are still the only friend I ever loved,’ and clasp her in my arms, and let her tears mingle with mine. Oh, please God,” she said, softly, speaking like a little child, as she sank upon her knees amongst the thickly-shed pine needles, and clasped her hands, “let there be no more sorrow for my poor, dear friend; make her happy once again.”

That fir-clad hill became Lucy’s favourite resort by day, as it had been her brother’s in the past, by night; and she went again and again, till one afternoon, following out an old habit, she was stooping to pick a plant from where it grew, when she became aware of someone approaching, and she started and coloured, and then recovered herself, and rose erect and slightly resentful, for Major Day, looking very sad and old stood before her, raising his hat.

“May I see what you have there?” he said gravely.

“I think it is an Amanita,” said Lucy, trying hard to speak firmly, as she held out the whitish-looking fungus toward the old botanist, as if it had been a tiny Japanese parasol.

Major Day fixed his pince-nez on the organ it was made to pinch, and, taking the curious vegetable, carefully examined it, turning it over and over before saying decisively, —

“Yes, exactly; Amanita Vernus, a very poisonous species, Miss Alleyne. I – er – I am very glad to see that you keep up your knowledge of this interesting branch of botany. I have been paying a good deal of attention to it in Italy this past autumn and winter.”

“Indeed,” said Lucy.

“Yes, my dear – Miss Alleyne,” said the major, correcting himself. “The Italians are great eaters of fungi. My brother found Rome and Florence very dull. Of course he was longing to be back amongst his farming stock. Great student of the improvement of cattle, Miss Alleyne. I found the country about Rome and Florence most interesting. It would have been far more so if I had had a sympathetic companion.”

“I must – I will tell him everything,” thought Lucy; and then the colour came, and she felt that it would be impossible, and that her only course was to allow time to smooth away this little burr.

“Are you finding truffles?” she said, with assumed cheerfulness.

He looked at her in a curiously wistful manner for a few moments, and that look was agony to Lucy, as her conscience told her that she had had a fall from the high niche to which she had risen in the major’s estimation.

“Yes,” he said, slowly, and there was an unwonted coldness and gravity in his manner; “at my old pursuit, Miss Alleyne – at my old pursuit. So you have not quite given it up?”

“Oh no,” cried Lucy, trying to pass over the coldness, which chilled her warm young heart. “I have been collecting several times lately, and – ”

Lucy stopped short, for the major was looking at her keenly, as if recalling the fact that when she had been mushrooming she had encountered Rolph sauntering about with a cigar in his mouth.

“Yes,” said the major, quietly; “and were you very successful?”

It was a very simple question, just such a one as anyone might ask to help a hesitating speaker who had come to a standstill; but to Lucy it seemed so different from what she had been accustomed to hear from the major’s lips. His manner had always been tenderly paternal towards her; there had been such openness and full confidence between them, and such a warm pressure of hand to hand. Now this was gone, and there was a cold and dreary gap.

“Successful?” said Lucy, with her voice trembling and her face beginning to work. “Yes – no – I – Have you many truffles, Major Day?”

This last with an effort to master her emotion, and its effect, as she spoke sharply and quickly, was to give her time to recover herself, and the major a respite from what had threatened to be a painful scene.