A Woman's Glory E-Book

Sarah Doudney

• Herausgeber: Darolt Books
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Seitenzahl: 623

Beschreibung

A Woman's Glory is a message of meditation based on the Bible and written by Sarah Doudney (15 January 1841, Portsea, Portsmouth, Hampshire – 8 December 1926, Oxford) was an English novelist, short-story writer and poet, best known for her children's literature and hymns. Doudney's father ran a candle and soap-making business. One of her uncles was the evangelical clergyman David Alfred Doudney, editor of The Gospel Magazine and Old Jonathan.[1] Doudney was educated at a school for French girls, and started to write poetry and prose as a child. "The Lesson of the Water-Mill", written when she was 15 and published in the Anglican Churchman's Family Magazine (1864), became a well-known song in Britain and the United States. Doudney continued to live with her parents near Catherington until she was thirty. Doudney's first novel, Under Grey Walls, appeared in 1871. Success came with her third novel, Archie's Old Desk, in 1872. In the 1881 census Doudney described herself as a "Writer for Monthly Journals". She contributed poetry and fiction to periodicals including Dickens's All the Year Round, the Churchman's Shilling Magazine, the Religious Tract Society's Girl's Own Paper, the Sunday Magazine, Good Words and the Quiver.[2] By 1891, when she described herself in the census as a novelist, she had written around 35 novels, aimed in most cases at girls, although she also wrote some for adults. Many of them end tragically, but look forward to happiness after death. Anna Cavaye, or, The Ugly Princess tells of a dying child comforted by knowing she has brought other people together.  Doudney's hymns include The Christian's Good Night, set by Ira D. Sankey in 1884 and sung at Charles Spurgeon's funeral.  Sarah's mother Lucy Doudney died in 1891 and her father in 1893. Sarah Doudney then moved to Oxford, where she died in December 1926. 

Leseprobe

PREFACE

 Sarah Doudney (15 January 1841, Portsea, Portsmouth, Hampshire – 8 December 1926, Oxford) was an English novelist, short-story writer and poet, best known for her children's literature and hymns.

Doudney's father ran a candle and soap-making business. One of her uncles was the evangelical clergyman David Alfred Doudney, editor of The Gospel Magazine and Old Jonathan.[1] Doudney was educated at a school for French girls, and started to write poetry and prose as a child. "The Lesson of the Water-Mill", written when she was 15 and published in the Anglican Churchman's Family Magazine (1864), became a well-known song in Britain and the United States. Doudney continued to live with her parents near Catherington until she was thirty.

Doudney's first novel, Under Grey Walls, appeared in 1871. Success came with her third novel, Archie's Old Desk, in 1872. In the 1881 census Doudney described herself as a "Writer for Monthly Journals". She contributed poetry and fiction to periodicals including Dickens's All the Year Round, the Churchman's Shilling Magazine, the Religious Tract Society's Girl's Own Paper, the Sunday Magazine, Good Words and the Quiver.[2] By 1891, when she described herself in the census as a novelist, she had written around 35 novels, aimed in most cases at girls, although she also wrote some for adults. Many of them end tragically, but look forward to happiness after death. Anna Cavaye, or, The Ugly Princess tells of a dying child comforted by knowing she has brought other people together. 

Doudney's hymns include The Christian's Good Night, set by Ira D. Sankey in 1884 and sung at Charles Spurgeon's funeral. 

Sarah's mother Lucy Doudney died in 1891 and her father in 1893. Sarah Doudney then moved to Oxford, where she died in December 1926. 

A Woman's Glory

CHAPTER I

'OH THAT WE TWO WERE MAYING!'

The month was May; the time six o'clock in the evening; and the place a world forgotten piece of land, where the ruins of an old sea fortress were slowly crumbling away.

The tide was high, so high that it washed the sturdy Roman wall which had withstood its encroachments for many a reach of the waves, and were languidly watching the wave's advances on the shore.

A girl of twenty, and a man about six years older, were dreaming away golden hours in that quiet nook by the waterside.

The man, who lounged on the beach with a certain easy grace, could boast of little to distinguish him at a first glance from other men of his class. His face was oval, with delicate features and a sallow fair complexion; his figure, slightly made, did not rise above middle height. But, fragile as he seemed, the soldier was legibly stamped upon him; and you knew instinctively that the sleepy eyes, now shining softly in the evening sunlight, could be keen and watchful enough in front of the foe. Under that cheerful lack of concern lay the cool courage and ready daring which our drawing room triflers have so often displayed in the day of battle. But this was the day of peace; and Victor Ashburn was enjoying it after his own idle fashion.

'Nice old place, Seacastle,' he said lazily. 'I had no idea that I was going to get so fond of it. But then, of course, I didn't know'

'Didn't know what?' demanded his companion.

'That I should find you here, and be so jolly, and that sort of thing.'

'I haven't found it particularly jolly,' said the girl discontentedly. 'It's a dreadful place to live in year after year, I can tell you.'

'But you have not lived here many years, you sweet grumbler!'

'Four years, or rather four ages! It seems as if an indefinite number of dreary summers and winters had crawled by, while I've been getting "rusted with a vile repose." The first twelvemonth was not so bad; I had just left school, and any change was agreeable to the girlish mind. But after I had become intimately acquainted with everybody in the village, and they had all made themselves familiar with the weak points of my character, the torture began.'

'You shouldn't have got intimate with the people. In nine cases out of ten, intimacies are a mistake.'

'Ah, it is easy to see that you have never lived in a very small sphere! You may just as well tell the old castle wall that it shouldn't get intimate with the waves. Of course it shouldn't. They are gradually wearing away the masonry, and creeping a little farther into its crevices every day; but there it has got to stay, and be quietly worn out.'

'But why compare yourself with those inanimate stones?' asked Victor Ashburn, actually becoming so interested in the conversation that he propped himself upon his elbow for half a minute. 'You have got plenty of intelligence, and a strong will of your own.'

'True; but intelligence and will are but feeble barriers against the persistency of the Seacastle folk. They come in like a flood, and find their way into every cranny of your innermost life. You cannot have any good or evil happen to you without their knowledge. If you are seized with a fit of indigestion, they have seen the attack coming on, and have got a dose all ready for you to take. And they stand over you steadily until you do take it. The only way to be at peace here is to renounce independence of action and privacy of thought.'

'And is that what you have done? I can't believe that Gwen Netterville would submit tamely to such bondage!'

She smiled a little pensively.

'It is just because I cannot submit tamely, that I don't get on with my neighbors,' she answered. 'If I could only accept my fate, and let them have their will with me, all would go comfortably enough. But I must needs make a little show of resistance, and that accounts for my unpopularity. They don't like me.'

It would be very difficult to dislike her, he thought, gazing at her from under his heavy eyelids; that is, it would be very difficult for a man to dislike her. But then the population of Seacastle was chiefly composed of women.

Her straw hat lay beside her on the beach, and the golden atmosphere invested her head with a soft glow that reminded Victor of a portrait by Giorgione. Her hair, a warm brown shading off into ruddy gold, harmonized perfectly with the cream tints of her skin; but the eyebrows and lashes were very dark, adding a deep shadow to the large blue eyes. Those eyes seemed to be always musing, even when the mouth was faintly smiling; and faint smiles were more frequent with Gwen than any others.

Everything about this girl was delicate and refined, from the chiseling of her features to the shape of the little hands, lying loosely clasped in her lap. There was an unconscious stateliness, too, in her movements, and a peculiar quietness in her voice, oddly at variance, sometimes, with the sentiments that she uttered.

'Seacastle is a delusive old place,' she went on; 'it holds out all kinds of romantic possibilities, and perpetually disappoints you. For months I lived on the hope of discovering a subterraneous passage in the old castle; of course there ought to be one inside that grim square tower. But there isn't; and what do you find within its walls? Nothing but roughly boarded floors and bits of paper and orange peel traces of those excursionists whose "customs are nasty, and their manners, none."'

'But the village is really pretty; don't be too hard upon it!'

'Pretty if you only walk through it in the beginning of the summer, and are careful to hold your nose.'

'Why, there are big gardens, full of sweet smelling flowers!'

'And no drainage at all to speak of! Then, too, there is a scarcity of trees; and I can find no hawthorn save the pink sort that grows in the shrubberies.'

"Oh that we two were maying!"' chanted Victor, in his lazy tenor. 'Shall we go over the hills and far away?'

'We need not go over the hills to find hawthorn. There is plenty on that little island, and nobody goes to gather it.'

She pointed to an islet, rising out of the sunshiny sea, and showing its soft greenness above the surrounding blue. It was but a little way off just far enough to be glorified by distance; and the intervening space of water was asleep in a sunny calm, scarcely stirred by the gentle breath of a faint breeze. Victor's eyes followed the direction of her finger, and his face suddenly assumed a look of positive animation.

'By Jove, we'll go there!' he said, beginning to stir himself in earnest. 'The place isn't peopled with Calibans, or anything disagreeable, I suppose?'

'I have never been there,' she replied. 'But I know that there are neither people nor cattle on Hawthorn Island. There is a farm; but it is untenanted at present.'

'Then we'll take old Kumsey's boat, and be off at once. I've been wanting to give you a row.'

'We cannot take Kumsey's boat without telling him.'

'Nonsense! it would waste ever so much time to get to him, and the evening is slipping away. You have a shawl? That's right; it may be chill on the water.'

'I must not go,' said Gwen, still keeping her seat. 'Hannah will be expecting me, you know.'

'What does it matter about Hannah?' he asked, with a touch of fretfulness that was perfectly boyish. 'Your uncle and aunt are not at home, and there is no reason why you shouldn't enjoy yourself. We shall be back again very soon.'

'I think we had better not go.'

'Oh, why not? Why did you put the island into my head if you did not mean to go there?'

'Let us forget it,' she said, picking up a stone, and throwing it away. 'I did want to go; but people would talk if we chanced to be seen in the boat, making for an uninhabited spot.'

'No one can see us from the windows of the houses. Besides, everybody is gone to the party at Marsham; the village is delightfully empty. And we shall be back again in a very little while; long before we can possibly be missed.'

There was a silence; just one of those slight pauses in which lives are made or marred, reputations saved or blighted, Heaven itself won or lost.

'Come,' he pleaded, 'why will you lose golden moments? "It is not always May;" perhaps we shall never have another evening like this.'

The faint ring of sadness in his voice touched her, and called forth a long sigh.

'We shall want some pleasant memories to feed on by-and-by,' he added gently.

By-and-by! To him it might mean change, fresh pleasures, mirthful companions; but her 'by-and-by' would be poor and bare enough. A girl's colorless life and tame occupations; days made bitter with unsatisfied longings, or wasted in sweet foolish dreams: this was all that she had to look forward to.

'I will go,' she said, suddenly looking up, and rising from her seat.

His face instantly brightened, and they walked down the slope of the beach to old Kumsey's boat.

Not a single human being was to be seen, and no sound of village life met their ears; the world around them seemed to be lulled to sleep by the sweetness and stillness of the time. And it was with a strange thrill of freedom and delight that Gwen felt the boat moving, and gave herself up to the enjoyment of the hour.

It was an evening of pure lights and delicate shadows, with no deep colors in earth or sky. The scene was full of soft greys and greens, all touched with a tender shine of gold; and the tint of the water was a pale azure. Every object was distinctly outlined, and yet idealized in the 'saintly clearness' of the air; and Hawthorn Island, with its clusters of trees and farm buildings, became a veritable Eden in Gwen's eyes.

At first it was pleasure enough to let her glance wander from the little isle to the shining sea around it, and then to the adjacent shores, all green with summer grass. But presently her eyes rested on the slim oarsman, pulling with long, steady strokes; and then a faint color tinged her cheeks, and the smile that answered his was sweeter, yet shyer, than it had ever been before.

There was a change, too, in the face she gazed upon: a swift, subtle change that half troubled, and wholly gladdened her. The dark grey eyes looked deeply into hers; the old insouciant languor was gone. It was a moment of involuntary revelations, although both were silent; and both were trying to forget the word 'tomorrow.' Stern realities and hard facts were put away from their thoughts: what had they to do with the future while they were together, and the present was so entirely their own?

At length the boat grated on the shallows, close to a spot which had evidently been often used as a landing place, and Gwen sprang lightly on shore.

'It is even prettier than I thought!' she cried, climbing up a rough bank, and finding herself on a piece of level ground.

Away to right and left stretched the greensward, dotted with little bushes here and there, and mirthful with the profusion of wildflowers which early summer always scatters over untrodden ways. The sod was sweet with those wild herbs which grow where human footsteps seldom come; and thymy scents were crushed out by the light pressure of Gwen's little feet.

After making fast the boat, Victor followed her; and the pair strolled slowly along a beaten track that led straight to the farm.

The house was simply one of those substantial old farm houses which are built to stand the test of time and weather: quaint little casements peeped out of the gambrel roof, and twinkled in the westering sun; but the lower windows were shuttered, and the door securely closed. There was a garden, which was fast becoming a wilderness: large moon daisies had sprung up among the rosebushes; wild camomile choked the paths, and buttercups flaunted over modest tufts of white pinks and pansies. Around the farm buildings, and all over the island, flourished the hawthorns which gave the place its name, and made it a very paradise of sweetness and bloom. Stately trees grew there too: oak and ash whispered the old lore of the merry greenwood, and the leaf music was as sweet as the ripple of the tide.

The pair who had come to this spot were only cut off from the neighboring shores by a little space of water, and yet they felt themselves completely severed from the world. The sense of isolation, in its earliest stages, is generally sweet; both were young enough to delight in anything that had the flavor of an adventure; and both were willful enough to enjoy the consciousness of being truants, escaped from the school of propriety and conventionalism. They laughed together over little incidents with the gaiety of children; broke off boughs of hawthorn, and piled them in a scented heap upon the grass; and crept on tiptoe to a bush to peep into a bird's nest. It was like breaking into the prose of life with an idyl, as fresh and pastoral as ever was sung in olden times.

At last the deepening gold in the west warned them that their little poem must come to an end. The sky colors were growing warmer; the shadows had gained in depth, and gathered soft purples as the day waned; and the transparent sea tints caught the mellow amber of evening. Even the grim tower of Seacastle took a touch of glory from the sinking sun, and a faint mist began to creep along the old walls, and dim the outlines of the shore.

'I have been so happy!' sighed Gwen, looking westward with wistful eyes.

Victor drew closer to her side. It was their last moment on this enchanted island, the last golden drop left in their cup of delight.

'Gwen,' he said, taking her hand in his, 'I have been happier than words can say; and I want to thank you now, dear, for all the pleasure you have given me. A man has worries and difficulties in his life that a woman can never know. But I will not talk about my troubles; I will only tell you that you have helped me to bear them. There are unspoken sympathies, Gwen, affinities that comfort one unawares.'

'I know it,' she answered.

'We have known each other six weeks,' he went on; 'and yet we are better acquainted than some couples who have lived under one roof for six years. I feel that you have taken root in my very life.'

'You are going away in a few days,' she said, in a low voice.

'Yes, I am going, going to scramble out of my sea of perplexities as well as I can. If it were not for all these bothers of mine, there should be no goodbye between us. I love you, Gwen.'

The last words escaped his lips in spite of an effort to keep them back. Just for one moment his arms closed round her, and he kissed her cheek, and felt her tremble in his clasp.

'Let us go now,' she said earnestly. 'I am afraid we have stayed too long. It is growing late.'

In silence they walked away from the hawthorns, leaving their fragrant spoils forgotten on the grass. A soft wind was rising, setting the trees rustling and the wildflowers quivering, as they hastened down the slope to the landing place.

The little wavelets were washing over white stones and masses of silky green weed, and the sea was getting more and more golden in the low sunlight. But the boat was gone.

CHAPTER II

'SHE LOOKIT EAST, AND SHE LOOKIT WEST.'

'The deuce!'

Any woman who has heard that exclamation uttered in a low tone by an undemonstrative man must surely know what it portends. It is his way of admitting that he has pulled up in front of a barrier that he cannot overleap, and that the demon, who so often thwarts 'the best laid schemes of men and mice,' has been too much for him at last. And Gwen, although inexperienced in masculine nature, had not spent six weeks in daily fellowship with Victor Ashburn without learning something from the companionship.

She made no despairing outcry; but her lips whitened in a moment, and a shiver passed over her frame. A woman of slower understanding would have poured forth a hundred suggestions, all equally valueless; but this girl took in the hopelessness of the situation at a glance, and accepted it in silence.

'Could I swim there, I wonder, and bring back a boat?' said Victor, after a moment's pause.

He could not. A stout swimmer, trained to his work, might have braved the strong current, and gained the opposite shore in safety; but Victor was wholly out of training, and the feat was beyond his powers.

'You would only drown yourself,' remarked Gwen, in the quietest of tones; 'and that would not mend the matter at all.'

'I almost think it would,' he muttered. 'Only that drowning is too good for me.'

She looked at him with all the womanly sweetness stealing back into her face.

'It is as much my fault as yours,' she said generously. 'Didn't I put the island into your head?'

The golden lights were fast changing into dusky saffron, and the sunset glitter was dying off the waves. As the glory faded, the chill breath of night came sighing over the sea, bringing a fresh sense of helplessness and misery to Gwen Netterville, and blanching her face once more.

She thought of old Hannah, watching patiently through long hours, and then going forth in desperation to give the alarm to the village. She pictured the shocked looks, the clamor of voices, and the general consternation that poor Hannah's tidings would call forth; and then, last of all, the inevitable construction that would be put upon her disappearance. She had been last seen in his company. Well did she remember the peculiar nod of disapprobation bestowed upon her by a certain Mrs. Goad, who had met her walking with Victor through the village street.

The absence of her uncle and aunt, too, gave a darker color to the affair. It must appear to everyone as if she had purposely slipped off while her lawful guardians were away; and altogether it seemed to Gwen that all 'the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune' were turned against her at that moment. Unconsciously her hands met; and the slim fingers were interlaced in an anguish which was denied any other form of expression.

'My poor child!' said Victor, with a world of tenderness in his sad voice. 'I little thought that I should ever have brought you to such a pass as this. If only I could save you from their confounded tongues'

'You cannot,' she interrupted mournfully. 'As I said before, the fault is as much mine as yours, and I must decry my word. But oh, Captain Ashburn, I have been a willful girl from beginning to end!'

The words died away in a sob, and wrung a bitter groan from the man by her side.

'You must not stay here,' he said, after a pause of troubled thought. 'The wind is blowing up cold from the sea; we will go back to the farm, and find a sheltered spot. Poor child, how white and chilled you look already!'

'It will be only a short night,' she answered, plucking up spirit again. 'There will be boats putting out from Seacastle at early morning; and we can make signals. Something is sure to turn up for us, you know.'

'I hope so,' he replied, with a sigh.

They retraced their steps, slowly mounting the rugged bank again, and crossing the flowery green.

The little island, with the night softly descending upon it, was as sweet, or sweeter than it had been in the sunshine. Every perfumed thing that grew upon the spot sent out its fragrance, from the faintly scented elder to the mint and balm in the neglected garden. A smothered chirp or two came from a sleepy bird. Leaves whispered those mysterious secrets which they never reveal by day; a few white petals drifted down from the abundant bloom of the hawthorn. Then a nightingale was heard. Clear trills and shakes came trembling through the twilight, and Gwen's troubled heart began to yield to the spell of melody and peace.

'Isn't it lovely here?' she said. 'I could fancy myself in a bit of fairyland, and I think I feel something like a damsel spirited away by the elves.'

'I wish we could make the Seacastle people believe that you had been spirited away. It would be such a splendid way of accounting for the adventure,' said Victor gloomily.

'If I could only be Bonny Kilmeny!' sighed Gwen. 'They wafted her off to "the land of thought," and gave her the gift of eternal bloom.

'"When seven long years had come and fled,

When grief was calm, and hope was dead,

When scarce was remembered Kilmeny's name,

Late, late in the gloomin' Kilmeny came home."

Victor Ashburn looked down into the beautiful face, pale in the dusky light. It was almost too fair at that moment, he thought, to belong to a mortal maiden. Her voice, naturally plaintive, deepened the pathos of the quaint old lines, and toned well with the soft sounds around them. An everyday life, such as his had been, does not always quench the faculty of imagination. This girl's fanciful talk had a singular charm for him.

'Who are you, Gwen?' he asked, between jest and earnest. 'There is something a little unearthly about you something that makes me believe you are half a fairy.'

'I wish I could end our difficulties by dissolving into the night mist,' she answered lightly. 'But there is a touch of mystery in my life, I confess.'

'You must tell me all about yourself; more than you have ever told me yet. It will help us to forget our misfortunes. But first let us examine the farm before it grows darker; I will find a roof to cover you if I can.'

They walked slowly round the old house, but doors and windows were found to be well secured. The dwelling had not been untenanted long enough for rust and decay to begin their work, and no way of ingress could be found.

'I am glad we can't get in,' said Gwen, with a little shudder; 'empty houses are always full of ghosts. Let us try the outbuildings; they don't look quite so eerie.'

Here their investigations were carried on with better success. The doors of barn and stable were padlocked; but there was a long low shed which had no door at all, and Victor, on entering, was glad to see the floor littered with hay, and a couple of bundles of straw in a corner.

'I can find no fitter resting place for you, poor child!' he said regretfully. 'Anyhow it will be better for you to sleep here than to stay out of doors all night, and I will mount guard outside.'

'But I am not in the least drowsy,' replied Gwen.

'Not yet; but you will be very tired before morning, and faint with hunger, I am afraid. As for myself, I wish I could forget the vulture that gnaws within me.'

'Let me sing to you,' she suggested, with ready cheerfulness. 'I am sure you are in a worse case than I am; it is such a dreadful thing for a man to miss his dinner. We will sit here, just within the shelter of the doorway, and you shall hear some of my old ballads.'

'You shall sing me one song,' he answered. '"Kathleen Mavourneen;" it will be sweet enough to drive dull care away.'

Never, perhaps, had Gwen's rich voice been heard to greater advantage. She sang as only those can sing who delight in their own music; and when at last her clear notes died away, the sea and the trees took up the melody, and murmured it all night long to Victor Ashburn. It haunted him, too, through many other nights when the singer was far off, and the little island had become only a shadowy remembrance. He knew, as he listened, that there is always one 'voice of the heart' that is never silenced until the heart itself is still.

'Talk to me about yourself, Gwen,' he said, breaking the pause that followed the song. 'Begin with your earliest recollections. You have often told me that you did not belong to Seacastle.'

'I was born near London,' she replied. 'Uncle Andrew was minister of a Presbyterian chapel there, and my mother died in his house soon after my birth.'

'And your father?'

'Ah, that is my little mystery! I have never once seen him, and he does not even write to me. Aunt Margery hears from him sometimes, and he sends her money, I suppose; but she never tells me anything about him. She even contrives to baffle the Seacastle people by simply saying that he is in bad health, and lives abroad. Nobody can get any more out of her than that; and Uncle Andrew is quite as reserved as she is.'

A very natural suspicion found its way into Victor Ashburn's mind; but her next words put it to flight.

'Hannah was present at my mother's marriage,' she went on. 'But when I ask her questions I can never get any satisfactory answers. I used to think that my father must be a pirate captain, like Cleveland, but I have quite given up that notion. Pirates always send home pearls and massive gold ornaments to their families, and I have never had even a coral necklace.'

'Too bad,' said Victor sympathizing. 'He ought to send you presents, of course; but I should object to see you bedizened with gold and coral. Flowers are the most fitting ornaments for you to wear.'

'Well, I don't care much for jewelry, you know, but I should like to have a token of remembrance. For years and years I used to expect my father's return; it was a favorite dream of mine. I always pictured him a tall dark stranger, wrapped in a cloak, and standing at the door in the moonlight. At the sight of me he started, extended his arms, and exclaimed: "Ha! my child; behold your long lost sire!"'

'There is no mystery in the matter,' said Victor, laughing. 'You may rely upon it, that he is merely a confirmed invalid with roving habits. But you are fond of the Ormistons?'

'Very fond of them, especially of Uncle Andrew. You can't imagine what a charming companion he is, and what delightful stories he can tell  —  stories of fairies and witches, and sanguinary tales of the Covenanting days.'

But Victor did not want to hear about Covenanters.

'I wish this was the Island of Monte Cristo,' he said, suppressing a yawn. 'Ah, Gwen, if we could only return to the opposite shore with our pockets stuffed with diamonds, we might set all the tongues at defiance!'

She was silent, and he gazed moodily out into the gloaming, until he heard a stifled sob by his side.

'Poor pet! poor darling!' he murmured sadly. 'I knew that brave spirit would break down at last! You don't know what it costs me, dear, to see you suffer, and have no power to help you!'

'I have been willful,' sighed Gwen. 'Aunt Margery said that people would talk if you and I were always mooning about together. But I went on in spite of warnings, and this is the end of it.'

He stretched his arms towards her, and then drew back again.

'Your words sting me,' he muttered. 'It's the old story: "evil is wrought by want of thought." We began our fellowship just to pass away the time in a dull place, and then it grew too sweet to be given up.'

She had stayed her sobs, but dared not trust her voice to speak.

He rose hastily, and paced up and down with quick strides before the doorway of the shed.

'You are a mere girl, dear,' he said, stopping in his hurried walk at last, 'and you are all the sweeter for that girlishness. A woman of the world would understand my position without any explanations. I am fettered with embarrassments, Gwen; mean fetters, that are more like brambles than anything else. They cling to me always, and if I tear one away, another clasps me. Of course, they grew out of my early recklessness and self indulgence, and I have never been able to get rid of them.'

'Oh,' she sighed, 'I did not dream that you had any troubles! I have quite envied your life sometimes; it seemed so pleasant and free.'

'I believe I am as happy as most men of my class,' he answered, more composedly. 'That is, I was tolerably comfortable until I got fond of you; life is becoming almost unendurable now! But I must not talk nonsense, pet: it will only make us both wretched. Try to get some rest. "You are inclined to sleep; 'tis a good dullness."'

But poor Gwen's sleep was not so sound as the slumber of Miranda. She retired in silence to the corner of the shed to court repose on her couch of straw; and youth and weariness so far prevailed over a troubled spirit, that she did indeed fall into a doze.

Her dreams were of that uncanny kind that often visit us when we lie down burdened in soul. Now she was in a boat gliding over smooth waters, while Victor, a drowning man, besought her in vain for aid. With a miserable sense of helplessness, she stretched out her hands towards him. And then the vision vanished, and another came in its place.

She saw herself arrayed in white robes, and wearing an orange blossom wreath: a bride, waiting at the altar for a bridegroom who never came. Fingers were pointed at her, as if in scorn; strange voices rang in her ears; and she looked around for familiar faces, and only saw the cold eyes of strangers turned upon her in disdain.

Waking up with a start, she found the soft light of a summer dawn stealing into the shed. Victor was at the doorway, speaking in a quick, eager tone.

'A boat is coming to us!' he cried. 'It's one of the Seacastle fishing boats. We shall get back before the village is astir!'

Still dreamy and bewildered, Gwen crept out into the sweet morning air, to find that the hopes of last night were realized. A waterman and his boy had put off from the opposite shore to cast their nets near Hawthorn Island, and Victor's signals had been quickly perceived. The boat, rowed by two sturdy pairs of arms, was rapidly nearing the landing; the time of relief had come indeed, and suspense and anxiety were at an end.

The man and his son were no strangers to Gwen. Aunt Margery Ormiston had often bought the fish that they brought to her door, and both were perfectly well acquainted with Miss Netterville. A few words from Victor explained the predicament; and then, in utter silence, the pair were rowed back to Seacastle, and landed at the very spot from which they had pushed off before sunset.

They parted at the landing place, with scarcely any form of leave taking. Victor lingered to pay the watermen for their services; and Gwen, like a scared, half guilty creature, hurried desperately along the silent street of the village.

A walk of a few minutes brought her to the gate of a thatched cottage, standing back from the road, and half smothered in creepers and roses. An elderly woman, shading her weary eyes with her hand, stood waiting at the open door.

'Thank God!' she murmured, as the girl hastened towards her. 'It's been an awful night, my dearie; and I was all alone, and knew not what to do! Ah me! you are as pale as a Spirit, poor child!'

But the strength which had nerved Gwen until she had gained her home failed her suddenly when she found herself safe within its walls. She tottered as she entered the little breakfast room, and was caught in Hannah's strong arms before she fell.

Some minutes elapsed before consciousness came back; and when at last she was able to sit up and take food, it was no easy task to tell her story. Hannah's face grew graver and graver as she listened; but while her faithful heart sank within her, she strove to comfort her nursling.

'It will never be forgotten while I live in this place!' the girl sobbed. 'Years may come and go, but it will still be remembered against me. Oh, Hannah, what is to be done?'

'Take courage, dearie,' the good woman answered. 'You must just live your daily life as usual, Miss Gwen, and let folks talk until they are tired of the matter. The longest tongue will stop wagging at last.'

'If I could only go away from Seacastle!' said Gwen, in a despairing tone.

'No, dearie, that wouldn't be the best way. There are gossips who would say worse things behind our backs, than they would dare to say if we stayed and faced them. Be quiet and calm; and if people speak to you about the mishap, just answer them straightforwardly, and tell them how it happened, that's all. But now try to get a little rest before the master and mistress come home; it would grieve them sorely to see you look so worn and white.'

And Gwen allowed herself to be soothed, and lay quietly on her little bed, watching the dance of leaves about the casement, and the sunbeams at play upon the broad windowsill.

Sheltered, consoled, and caressed, it was hard to realize that a heavy price must be paid for the folly of last night. Youth is slow to believe in the consequences of its misdoings; but middle age is always deploring its mistakes, and looking out feverishly for evil results. While Gwen, lulled by a sense of safety, sank into a peaceful sleep, Hannah was vexing the spirit with the fear of ill to come.

CHAPTER III

'WHEN I LOOK EAST, MY HEART GROWS SAD'

Mrs. Collington, of Verbena Lodge, was aunt to Captain Ashburn, and might, if she had cared about the honor, have been the leading lady of the village. But having once queened it as belle and beauty through two seasons in town, she was utterly indifferent to any distinction that could be conferred upon her by Seacastle. A general's widow, with ample means, she had stayed in the world long enough to marry her daughter satisfactorily, and had then come down to the country with a good cook and a strong desire to end her days in peace.

She had lived twelve months in Verbena Lodge, and there was only one person in Seacastle with whom she had condescended to associate. That person was the Vicar, an amiable bachelor of seventy, who found her so agreeable that he was quite ready to excuse the quiet haughtiness that excluded his flock. She was really delicate, he declared; her doctors had enjoined perfect repose, and she had entirely given up going into society.

But as months passed on, it was found that Mrs. Collington frequently had people to stay with her. Men and women, utterly unknown to the Seacastle world, came to Verbena Lodge and reveled in its roses. And the guest who stayed longest and attracted most notice, was a certain Miss Wallace, a beautiful woman of four or five and twenty. Seacastle girls secretly envied her dress and style, and would have been grateful for the smallest chance of beginning an acquaintance. But the beauty appeared to be tranquilly unconscious of their existence; and even Mrs. Goad, the most dauntless matron in the village, would hardly have ventured to brave the calm stare of Miss Wallace's splendid hazel eyes.

It was through the simpleminded Vicar that Captain Ashburn had obtained an introduction to the Ormistons and their young niece. He had persuaded the clergyman to take him to the old minister's cottage, under the pretense of examining some rare books; and then he had followed up his advantage with true military tact and skill. To the rest of Seacastle he was as calmly indifferent as Mrs. Collington herself. But Gwen, singled out as an object of special attention, had incurred a good many animosities, and not a few unpleasant speeches, from the neglected fair ones of the place.

After parting with Miss Netterville at the landing place, Victor Ashburn had struck across the fields to Verbena Lodge, and had let himself in with a latchkey. Before breakfast was over, everyone in the house was made acquainted with the adventure of the preceding night, and Victor read the knowledge in the face of the servant who brought his coffee upstairs.

It was three o'clock in the afternoon when he left his room. The luncheon hour had found him too sleepy to come down, and cutlets had been benevolently sent to his chamber. But it was impossible to stay up there all day. The world had to be faced; yet, with genuine masculine cowardliness, he put off facing it as long as he could.

The garden was a place of refuge. There all one's troubles might be brooded over in delightful silence.

Mrs. Collington, seated in her most luxurious chair, with her feet upon her favorite footstool, was bewailing herself with gentle sighs to her friend, Miss Wallace.

'This is a very unpleasant affair, Cora,' she said. 'I am sorry now that I invited Victor here; but how could one suppose that a man would do any mischief in a place like this? I'm sure I didn't know that there was a pretty girl to be found in the village. In fact, I had a general impression that the women were all ugly and dowdy to the last degree. And I'm really fond of Victor, don't you know.'

'He is agreeable,' admitted Cora Wallace.

'Yes; he has nice, soft, lounging ways, which make him pleasant in a house. I never could endure a loud man with a great fund of animal spirits. That is why it is such a trial to have Maud's husband down here; he will talk perpetually in a comic strain, and be so dreadfully bluff and hearty! However, he was an excellent match for my poor darling.'

'I don't think there is any harm done,' said Cora, reverting to the subject first started. 'The whole thing will be merely a nine days' wonder. And after all, as the girl is not in society, it doesn't matter much. It will not affect her future prospects in the least.'

'Have you ever noticed her?' inquired Mrs. Collington languidly. 'She is good looking, I suppose? Has the charm of youth, and that sort of thing?'

'The charm of youth is absurdly overrated,' replied Miss Wallace, with rather a grim smile. 'Everybody talks of it, and nobody admires it. Girls never know how to make a good use of youth until it has fled; as soon as they have got over their young gawkiness they are stayed women. It takes half a lifetime to learn how to wear a frock properly, and sit down and get up in good style.'

'Perfectly true, Cora. But about this poor Miss Butterworth?'

'Netterville. It is by no means a plebeian name. Yes, I have noticed her with some interest. She is pretty indeed, more than pretty. A little careful training and dressing would make her a beauty of the first order.'

'Good gracious, Cora! I had no idea that she was so awfully attractive. Of course, I wouldn't have exposed Victor to danger on any account. Why, she has had no end of opportunities! They have been meandering together every day since he has been here. A seashore always does lead to so much nonsense; I have known some most undesirable matches come to pass through dreaming among seaweed and shells. Think of all the trouble that Maud gave me in the Isle of Wight picking up mussels, and hiding behind rocks with Captain Ludlow! And the perils I went through in scrambling after them, to see what they were about!'

'Don't excite yourself, dear Mrs. Collington,' said Miss Wallace, tranquilly amused. 'I was merely speaking of the possibilities latent in Miss Netterville. She isn't at all dangerous in her undeveloped state, and your nephew is too sensible to'

'Oh, yes, poor fellow! And too much embarrassed. It was quite too ridiculous of me to get frightened; but my nerves are unstrung. When Penton told me abruptly, this morning, that Victor and Miss What's her name had been alone on a desert island all night, I was terribly upset. Servants are so inconsiderate.'

'And they do so delight in a scandal,' said Cora. 'Feminine nature in the servants' hall is much the same as it is in the drawing room. We don't pull characters to pieces so roughly as our maids, perhaps; but our work of destruction is quite as effectual. It is the sole amusement of which women never tire. They may get sick of husbands, lovers, and children, and fancy themselves weary of life. But give them a hint of a reputation to be demolished, and they will fly to the task as if the very thought of it gave them fresh strength.'

Mrs. Collington's eyes sought her friend's face inquiringly for a moment. Cora had spoken with more energy than usual, and, perhaps, with a little more bitterness.

'You are right in the main, my dear,' she answered. 'But there are good women in the world; women who would rather patch up a character than tear it to shreds.'

'Dear Mrs. Collington, you are far more good natured than most of the gender.'

'Perhaps I am; but mine is merely that kind of good nature which proceeds from laziness. It costs me no effort to be amiable. Yet there are women who can really be influenced by a high motive; I mean, by the desire to support and save.'

'That is religion, I suppose,' said Cora coldly.

'It is the essence of religion. We recognize it as such when we have forgotten half the creeds.'

There was a brief pause, and the widow's placid face looked unusually grave. Even the most serene spirits are sometimes troubled with sudden glimpses of duties left undone. There are swift lights that flash in now and then upon our selfish natures, and show us things that we would rather hide from our own eyes.

'Shall I go and hunt up our Don Juan?' asked Miss Wallace gaily. 'He is loafing dismally in the garden, and keeping his back to the windows.'

'Yes, do go,' responded Mrs. Collington with gratitude. 'Make him tell you how it all happened; and then come back and tell me what he says. I am so puzzled to know where they could possibly have found a desert island! It must have been heaved up out of the sea on purpose for them.'

'It is evident that you have not studied the coastal scenery,' said Cora, laughing, and taking a shady hat from the table. She was a queenly woman, dark haired, but hardly brown enough to be termed a brunette. Her complexion had that faint tinge of olive which brings out the bright red of ripe lips and the soft carmine of the cheek. There was a cluster of yellow roses in the black lace that covered the hat; and all the advantages derived from dress, and careful choice of colors, were used to set off Miss Wallace's remarkable beauty.

Seacastle was marvelously rich in gardens, and Verbena Lodge had its paradise of bloom, shut in by moldering brick walls. May held a feast of roses in this favored spot; sheltered from sharp winds, and nourished by a kindly soil, they came early to perfection. Lilacs had flowered themselves to death, but laburnums swung golden tresses in the soft air; it was a time that made you forget yourself, and become a part of this little world of blossoms.

Victor, after vaguely enjoying perfume and sunshine for some minutes, looked about for an object to divert him from unpleasant meditations, and fixed upon a spider's web.

'What are you doing?' asked a clear voice behind him.

'Good day, Miss Wallace,' he said, wheeling sharply round and lifting his hat. 'I'm disappointing this brute by taking away his flies; that's all. Look, here goes another!'

'A sweet and kindly sport. The Humane Society ought to give you a medal.'

'I am too modest to make my merits known. But I flatter myself that with practice I might become the most successful baffler of spiders that the world has yet seen. How is my aunt today?'

'Very much concerned about you, and longing to hear the true history of last night,' replied Cora, smiling. 'But I tell her it will all be forgotten in a month. You are going off to India, and there will be nothing to revive an interest in the adventure.'

Victor's sallow cheek flushed. Those lightly uttered words, - 'You are going off to India,' fell like a sharp stroke upon his aching heart. There had never been anything deeper than ordinary acquaintance between Cora and himself. Yet, as a man and woman of the world, they had thought that they perfectly understood each other. How could she suppose that the idea of leaving England had now become an agony? Two months ago he would himself have laughed at anyone who had talked of regrets and sorrowful farewells.

'It was the most unlucky affair I ever knew,' he began, rather awkwardly. 'I thought I'd made the boat fast'

'Old Kumsey's boat, wasn't it? He'll demand a fabulous sum for compensation.'

'He's always good natured when he's a little screwed. I shall be base enough to ply him with liquor before we discuss the subject. It was an old brute of a boat that couldn't have held together much longer. But this is a wretched business. I am sorry for her sake, you understand?'

'Take my advice and treat the whole thing lightly,' said Cora. 'Nothing is ever gained by being too serious. Laugh yourself, and others will laugh too. You know how easy it is to start a joke.'

Victor's brow cleared a little.

'Miss Netterville is awfully upset,' he said; 'and the fault was all mine. She didn't want to go to that confounded island at all. She only consented out of good nature. I must have been a greater fool than usual when I took her there, poor child!'

Cora gave him a keen glance. Was this distress nothing deeper than the chivalrous regret of a gentleman who feels that he has unwittingly compromised an innocent girl? She could not quite fathom his feelings yet; but she spoke with the ready tact of a clever woman.

'I dare say she was terribly worried; it was a most disagreeable position to be placed in. I will call at her house by and by, and ask how she is.'

'Will you really be so good?' exclaimed Victor eagerly. 'It would be the best and kindest thing! I was going there myself; but I'm afraid Mr. and Mrs. Ormiston will hate the sight of me now. The old lady has never encouraged my visits.'

'All prudent dowagers frown on danglers,' remarked Cora lightly. 'I should be a perfect dragon, myself, if I had to be chaperon to a young girl. But we will make a call together, Captain Ashburn.'

Again Victor looked and spoke his gratitude. He was perfectly aware that any mark of attention coming from Verbena Lodge would help to set Gwen beyond the reach of slanderous tongues.

'There is no need for delay,' said Miss Wallace, moving towards the house. 'I will tell Mrs. Collington what we are going to do. She is so good natured that she is sure to approve of our plan.'

The widow had not changed her attitude of luxurious repose, and looked, as she always did, the very impersonation of matronly dignity. If, in the course of her life, she had ever known a trouble, it had not left the slightest mark upon her face. Serene, comfortable, and admirably dressed in the quietest taste, she was still quite handsome enough to give one a fair idea of the beauty that she had possessed in her prime.

She read little, worked less, and appeared to pass most of her time in a state of pleasant reverie. 'There is no joy but calm,' was her motto; and so perfectly trained were her servants, that guests came and went without giving her any trouble. Her house was always in order, her table always supplied with the fare she liked best, and her home sedulously guarded from the small worries that beset less fortunate establishments. To feel disturbed was such a new sensation, that she was disposed to regard herself as personally injured by Victor's misadventure.

And yet, as she sat in her shady room, with her favorite flowers around her, she could not help thinking a little about the young girl who had been compromised by her nephew's thoughtlessness. The Ormistons and their niece were retiring people. They had never made efforts to force their acquaintance upon her, as Mrs. Goad had done, and they were, moreover, respected and liked by Mr. Bassett, the Vicar. It was too provoking to think that Victor had brought discomfort into such a quiet family, and Mrs. Collington began to feel that she should like to do something to make amends.

'Captain Ashburn is quite miserable,' said Cora, coming to her side, and speaking in a low tone. 'He says it was all his fault, and I believe it was. So I think, Mrs. Collington, that I will call on the poor girl, and let the village know that I feel kindly towards her. Don't you see that it will be the right thing to do?'

'Certainly, my dear Cora. And I wish you to ask her to dine here tomorrow. It is Victor's last day; there can be no harm in sanctioning an intimacy that is so soon to be ended.'

'Then Captain Ashburn and I will go to the Ormistons' house this very afternoon. He will not be happy until we have shown them some civility.'

A few minutes later Miss Wallace and Victor Ashburn were walking through the village street on their way to the old minister's dwelling. Eager eyes surveyed them furtively through lace curtains, for the Seacastle ladies were adepts in the art of seeing without being seen, and feminine curiosity had now reached its height.

Mr. Ormiston's house, known as The Nest, was one of the smallest cottages in the place. So thickly was it covered with ivy and creepers, that the color of its walls could scarcely be seen; and the boughs of chestnut and walnut trees stretched far over its low thatched roof.

Seen in the afternoon sunshine, and muffled up in the luxuriance of May flowers and foliage, it was a perfect bower of blossom and greenery. It could boast of only two stories, and under its broad eaves the swallows found a comfortable shelter year after year. There was always a flutter of wings about the little house; an endless chirping and twittering went on from dawn until dusk, for the inhabitants of The Nest were on the best of terms with the birds. Small latticed casements, set deep in ivy, were opened to admit the soft air; and the door stood open too, under a porch that was laden with a mass of green.

Cora regarded this rustic cottage with an amused smile, and wondered how it was possible for anybody to live in it.

'It must be full of earwigs and snails,' she said, as Victor opened the gate. 'I should not like to pass even a single night under that dreadful thatch; but I suppose there are people who can get used to anything!'

CHAPTER IV

'SHY SHE WAS, AND I THOUGHT HER COLD'

What melancholy faces greeted Miss Wallace and her companion in the dim little parlor. The minister and his wife had come home, and Gwen had related her unlucky adventure with much fear and trembling.

Mrs. Ormiston had been severe in her censures. All her disregarded warnings were brought up against the ill starred Gwen; and the girl had not a word to throw at a dog.

But when the good lady's wrath had nearly spent itself, her niece stole timidly to the minister's side, and, sitting down on a low stool, laid her head upon his knee. There were no words, but the attitude was eloquent. It spoke plainly of a wounded and humbled spirit, and Davie Deans himself might have been melted by the mute self abasement expressed in that bowed head.

A slighter sign of penitence would have moved Mr. Ormiston to condemn a girlish indiscretion. He was one of those men in whom a stern creed was happily neutralized by a most gentle nature and a daily practice of charity. His sermons had been marred by 'hard sayings' that few could hear and receive. But his life was so full of sweetness and gracious deeds, that men forgot the harsh doctrines he preached, and thought only of the perfect gospel that he lived. And when his voice failed, and he gave up his church, there were few who missed his wearisome elaboration of theology, but many who felt the loss of his everyday example and never failing kindness.

His wife understood the look that came into his eyes when Gwen cast herself at his feet. Angry and excited as Mrs. Ormiston was, that look had power to seal her lips and soften her heart.

'We will speak no more about this matter, my child,' he said, laying his hand gently on the bright hair. 'Maybe you will be guided by our wisdom in future, seeing that you cannot trust your own. But be happy now, dear, and shed no more tears.'

There was still a Scotch accent lingering, in the minister's speech. To listen to him was to think of the scent of heather hills. His simple words came fresh from an unworldly heart, always tender and true. Gwen looked at him with grateful eyes, and kissed his cheek in silence.

The agitation of that little scene had left its traces on Mr. Ormiston and his wife. They were too unskilled in acting to receive their callers with a show of cheerfulness. But there was nothing churlish in their gravity. Miss Wallace found her task easier than she had expected, and seated herself in the dim little room quite at ease.

A furtive glance at Victor convinced her that he was far from feeling self possessed. Never, perhaps, had that illustrious baffler of spiders been so desperately uncomfortable or so utterly dependent on the tact of a companion. But Cora, knowing all that was required of her, was equal to the occasion.

'We came chiefly to inquire for Miss Netterville,' she said frankly. 'Mrs. Collington has been quite anxious. She persists in thinking that there has been a really dangerous adventure.'

'There was no danger, I think,' said the minister, in his quiet voice. 'The child was only frightened and distressed.'

'Ah, I suppose so. I have come to ask her to dine with us tomorrow. We want, you see, to hear the whole story from her own lips. Captain Ashburn does tell it so stupidly,' added Cora, smiling at him playfully.

'It is very kind,' replied Mrs. Ormiston, brightening. 'Gwen is well, quite well. But she has been nervous and overtired. I was almost afraid of an illness.'

Victor, flushed to the temples, and looking abjectly wretched, was incapable at that moment of uttering a single word. But Cora sustained the conversation with never failing ease and grace.

'The whole thing was so exquisitely absurd, wasn't it, Mrs. Ormiston?' she said lightly. 'To be so near home, and yet to be cut off from all communication with human beings! And to be obliged to fast all those hours, just because a stupid old boat got loose and drifted away! Is Miss Netterville very hungry? As to Captain Ashburn, he has been steadily consuming food ever since he returned to Verbena Lodge.'

The spell of gravity was broken. The minister's face gave way first, and then Aunt Margery permitted herself to smile. If the little world of Seacastle would take a comic view of the matter, surely no great harm could come of it. And why should not Seacastle look at the case with Miss Wallace's eyes? A heavy weight seemed to be suddenly lifted from Mrs. Ormiston's heart. A little while ago she had told herself that her niece's good name was blighted, and no one would ever get over the miserable escapade. Now it no longer seemed such a terrible thing that had taken place. Miss Wallace could treat the mishap as a mere joke, and they might all hold up their heads again.