The Adventures of an Ugly Girl

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VOL. XI., NO. 10. NOVEMBER 18, 1893. Subscription Price, $1.50

The Adventures Of An Ugly Girl

By Mrs. George Corbett

Author of “When the Sea gives up its Dead,” “Adventures of a Stowaway,” “A Sailor’s Life,” “The Child of the Wreck,” “The Mystery of Fellsmere,” “Tom Penn’s Derelict,” “Adventures of an Amateur Detective,” “Secrets of a Private Enquiry Office,” “The Missing Note,” “New Amazonia,” “Adventures of a Lady Detective,” etc., etc.

Issued Semi-Monthly. Entered at the Post-Office at New York as second-class matter. PETER FENELON COLLIER, PUBLISHER, 523 W. 13TH ST., N.Y.

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The Adventures Of An Ugly Girl

By Mrs. George Corbett

Author of “When the Sea gives up its Dead,” “Adventures of a Stowaway” “A Sailor’s Life,” “The Child of the Wreck,” “The Mystery of Fellsmere,” “Tom Penn’s Derelict,” “Adventures of an Amateur Detective,” “Secrets of a Private Enquiry Office,” “The Missing Note,” “New Amazonia,” “Adventures of a Lady Detective,” etc., etc.

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The Adventures Of An Ugly Girl.

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CHAPTER I. “As ithers see us.”—BURNS.

“COME, Dora! I shall never be ready, if you don’t make haste. They will be here in ten minutes, and my hair is not half so nice as it ought to be, thanks to your carelessness.”

“You are very good to ignore my own claims to attention so utterly. I have been helping you this half-hour and have barely time enough left to change my frock. To make my own hair presentable is impossible now.”

“Why, what does it matter how your hair is dressed, or what sort of a gown you put on? You may just as well spare your pains, for unfortunately nothing that you can do seems to mitigate your ugliness. I’m sure I cannot think where you get it. You are—”

But, somehow, I did not feel inclined to wait for the end of Belle’s encouraging lecture. Perhaps it was because I was so often treated to my beautiful elder sister’s homilies that they had lost the spark of novelty and had acquired a chestnuty flavor. Perhaps I failed to recognize any generosity in her persistent efforts to nip such latent buds of vanity as from time to time tried to thrust their poor little heads above the chill crust of ridicule and contumely. Perhaps I was really as bad-tempered as I was said to be. Anyhow, my behavior could not claim to be either quiet or elegant as I stormily quitted Belle’s room, slamming the door behind me with such violence as to elicit from my more well-bred sister a little shriek of affected dismay. So far from feeling sorry that I had given Belle’s nerves a shock, I wished viciously that her fingers had been jammed in the doorway, or that something equally disastrous had occurred to take off the edge of her conceit and self-satisfaction. In the corridor I met my brother Jerry, of whom I was devotedly fond. But, although he had evidently some interesting remark to make, I did not stop to speak to him, but hurried noisily to my own room, where I locked myself in, and threw myself on the bed, to give way to a storm of sobs and tears.

“And all for what?” it may be asked. “Surely a spiteful remark from one sister to another is hardly worth all this display of feeling.” Ah, well, perhaps _one_ such remark now and then might be treated with the cool contempt which spiteful utterances deserve. But does the reader know what it is to be perpetually and persistently snubbed from one year’s end to the other? Does he realize how hard it must be for a sensitive and love-craving girl to be reminded that she is ugly and unattractive? Not reminded once in a way either, but pretty nearly every day of her life. Or does any one doubt how the heart must needs ache to see all the love and flattery of friends and relations alike showered upon a being whom you know to be empty-headed and frivolous, while everybody seems to regard your plain exterior as sufficient reason why you should be snubbed and neglected?

If the reader has ever had any of these experiences, he will the more readily understand my inability to restrain my tears on the especial occasion just mentioned. For it really was a very especial occasion, and I had been more anxious to look well at this particular moment than I ever remembered to have been in my life. I had hoped that Belle, just for once in a way, would take a little interest in my personal appearance, and that she would help me to create as good an impression as possible upon the newcomer whose advent I had both dreaded and longed for.

But Belle was too self-engrossed, and too firmly convinced of my hopeless unpresentability, to give the slightest thought either to me or to my feelings. Nay, she had even claimed so much of my time in the task of enhancing her own beauty, that, as we have seen, I had only a few minutes left for myself, and even this morsel of time was not utilized by me, as things turned out.

The fact is, I was anxious and overwrought, and Belle’s unkind speeches had multiplied all day until they had utterly broken my composure. “Can it really be true,” I wondered in abject misery, “that nothing I can either do or wear will help to mitigate the first feeling of repulsion which my new mother must necessarily experience at the sight of my ugliness?”

The question was of very vital import to me, for I longed for the advent of at least one sympathetic woman in the house; and when I heard that my father, now three years a widower, was about to marry again, I hoped, with a fervor that was nearly akin to agony, that his second wife would be the friend I so sorely needed. True, she would be my stepmother, and she would naturally assume the direction of the household affairs, at once placing the daughters of the house in a subordinate position. This being the case, I believe it would have been more orthodox to have railed against the new invasion, and to have followed the prevailing social custom of resolving to make life miserable for the woman who had presumed to step into my mother’s place. But I always was terribly unorthodox in many things, and, considerably to my father’s surprise, I expressed my enthusiastic delight at the prospect of having a stepmother to reign over me.

He need not have been surprised, if he had ever taken the trouble to understand me. But he was wrapped up in Belle’s charms, and never looked at me without regretting either my ugliness or my temper, which all in the house, except dear little Jerry, pronounced unbearable. And yet I can truthfully say, that if I had experienced anything approaching to just treatment, I should have been infinitely sweeter-tempered than my much-bepraised sister, than whom none could have been more unfeeling to the motherless girl whose heart ached for a little love. I generally did Belle’s bidding, for she always contrived to make things unpleasant for me if I rebelled against her authority. But to Lady Elizabeth Courtney I felt ready to yield the most devoted service and obedience, if only she would love me just a little in return; and I had anxiously revolved every means of creating a favorable impression upon her. I meant to have taken considerable pains with my toilet, and to have welcomed the home-coming bride with radiant smiles.

And this was how my good resolves had ended. Just when—after working hard all day to see that everything was conducive to a warm and comfortable home-coming—I had begun to hurry through my toilet, I was summoned to Belle’s aid, with the result that instead of giving my stepmother a smiling welcome I was up in my own room, with a face red and swollen with weeping, and a heart full of angry feeling, when she arrived. Presently I heard a carriage approaching, and at the same instant Jerry knocked vigorously at my bedroom door.

“Be quick and come down, Dorrie,” he cried, in an eager, excited voice. “Papa and Lady Elizabeth are nearly here, and I want you to run down the avenue with me to meet them.”

“I’m not coming,” I answered, with a sob that was audible to Jerry and provoked him to quick wrath.

“I knew she would!” he exclaimed. “That horrid Belle’s been at her tricks again and said something nasty. But don’t let her have the best of you like that. Don’t you know that you promised to go with me to meet them, and if you don’t come they won’t believe you are glad about it.”

“I can’t help it, Jerry,” was my mournful reply. “I look so hideous just now that I could not possibly face a stranger. Run off quickly yourself. Say that I have a headache or something of the sort, and that I shall try to sleep it off. Run now, there’s a dear boy.”

And forthwith Jerry, whose real name, by-the-by, is Gerald Mortimer Courtney, ran along the corridor, down the wide, shallow stairs, across the tiled hall, and into the open air, just as the carriage containing the newly married pair drove into the large graveled space in which the chestnut avenue terminated. In spite of my discomfiture and unpresentable appearance, I possessed my due share of curiosity, and hastily jumped to my feet, crossed the room, and looked through the window at the prancing horses and elegant equipage which bore the newcomers. As soon as the carriage stopped, a liveried footman descended and opened the door with a flourish. By the time he had let the steps down, Belle and Jerry were at the carriage door, and I saw Mr. and Lady Elizabeth Courtney get out and exchange smiles and kisses with my sister and brother, while I, poor pariah, looked on with hungry eyes and an aching heart, and bewailed my luck in seeming ill-natured and inhospitable, after all my efforts to prove the contrary.

Lady Elizabeth, I must explain, had had some love passages with my father a long time ago. But their youthful desires had been taught to bow to the demands of fortune and position. Lady Elizabeth was the daughter of an earl, and could aspire to more material comforts than could have been provided for her by the penniless younger son of a country squire. True, the earl had no money, and what little land was still left him was mortgaged up to the hilt. But he had many friends who possessed sufficient influence to pitchfork his four sons into government sinecures. He had a cousin also, the Duchess of Lyndene, who chaperoned his handsome, clever daughter through two whole seasons, and eventually resigned her charge into the care of Samuel Chisholm, Esquire, once upon a time a shoeblack, now the proud possessor of twenty thousand a year, all made by the judicious advertisement of his prize patent blacking.

Upon the whole, the earl’s daughter was supposed to have done tolerably well for herself, and as her husband’s fortune steadily increased there was every reason for her to feel satisfied. Even the incumbrance which she had been compelled to take with the fortune was not especially disagreeable to her, for Mr. Chisholm was a very clever man, whose mental and social equipments kept pace with his fortunes, and, in spite of his low origin and antecedents, he was as courtly and well-bred as Lady Elizabeth’s nobly-born brothers. The pair therefore lived harmoniously enough together, at least to outward seeming, for many years. Then Mr. Chisholm died somewhat suddenly, and his will was read in due course.

It was during that important ceremony that the unexpectedly bereaved widow first felt real resentment against her late husband. For though he had died a millionaire, he had only willed his wife a life interest of five thousand a year, which was quite a paltry income compared with the princely revenue she had expected to be hers. To her father a like fortune was bequeathed, in addition to a sum of thirty thousand pounds wherewith to redeem his impoverished estate. The widow’s brothers each received a gift of five thousand pounds, and to the widow herself was willed all the personal property of the deceased.

All the rest of his vast fortune was divided among a swarm of poor relations, whose existence Lady Elizabeth had never acknowledged, but who no doubt showered blessings on the memory of the dead man who had thus befriended his own flesh and blood. The Earl of Greatlands, too, declared himself delighted with his son-in-law’s generosity. But his daughter did not hesitate to say that she had been treated shamefully, and at once proclaimed her intention of resigning the tenancy of the costly London establishment, which it would be a farce to attempt to keep up on five thousand a year. She retired to a pretty place in the country, declining to reside with her father, who, elated by his unwonted prosperity, was actually talking of taking a young wife to comfort his old age.

My father had, meanwhile, married my mother, whose memory I adore, for she loved me passionately, and while she lived I was never humiliated, as was perpetually the case after her death, which occurred some three years before my story opens. I do not remember hearing how my father came across Lady Elizabeth again, but I believe that their early attachment soon reasserted itself, and though he was much the poorer of the two, and encumbered with three children, the match was soon arranged.

Although Lady Elizabeth had been dissatisfied with her widow’s portion she was very much richer than we were, and her coming to Courtney Grange was likely to be a very important event to the previous humble inhabitants thereof. In addition to the Grange, which had been my maternal grandfather’s property, my father had just six hundred a year, derived partly from what his father had left him, partly from my mother’s small fortune. Our establishment consisted of two servants, in addition to the family. Their names were John and Martha Page. They had never seen any other service but that of my father and grandfather, and had lived seventeen years under the same roof before it entered their heads to amalgamate their interests by marrying. They were quite used to the constant scraping and economizing which we were compelled to practice, and did not look upon the arrival of a new mistress as an unmixed blessing, even though she was bringing a good income with her.

As for Belle, she was quite wild with delight at the gorgeous prospect which opened itself before her mental vision. London seasons, presentations at court, halcyon days of brilliant pleasure, and a swarm of dukes and earls sighing for the honor of her hand. These were some of the glowing visions in which she indulged.

“And I mean to get into Lady Elizabeth’s good graces, whether I like her or not,” she informed me. “She can do so much for me if _she_ likes, and I can be amiability itself when _I_ like. Besides, my looks will win her over at once. She will soon see what credit I can do to pretty gowns. As for you, you’ll be lucky if she tolerates you at all. I’m sure it’s a shame that our family’s reputation for beauty should suffer as it does through you.” And so on, _ad libitum_.

Of course, I was not surprised to see her warm, gushing welcome of my father and his wife, nor to note the glance of surprised admiration which the latter cast upon Belle and Gerald, for they were really both very beautiful, and both tall and well-grown, with lovely golden hair, rich deep blue eyes, and an exquisite complexion, united to perfect features.

Lady Elizabeth, too, I was sorry to see, was a tall, handsome woman, who by no means looked her forty years. When I say that I was sorry to observe this, it must not be imagined that I grudged her her good looks. But I had had a vague notion that if she were comparatively plain she would the more easily sympathize with my troubles, into which no one in the house except Jerry seemed able to enter. Now my hopes in that direction were upset, and I already knew instinctively that my own absence was being commented upon. I saw my father, the very picture of masculine comeliness, glance up at my window with an angry frown, and I knew almost as well as if I had been present what Belle and Jerry were saying about me.

After all, I thought, I had been very foolish to let Belle’s ill-nature and my own ill-temper spoil my resolve to make Lady Elizabeth’s home-coming as pleasant as possible. Apart from looks, my remaining upstairs would have already made me lose ground with my stepmother. Was it too late, I wondered, to rectify my error, and make my appearance before dinner was served? Answering the question in the negative, I resolved to complete my toilet as quickly as possible, and get over the ordeal of the first meeting without further loss of time.

So I began operations at once, wondering, while I brushed my hair, how it was that I was so different to Jerry and Belle. I pulled faces at my own ugly reflection in the glass, but as that only seemed to make matters worse, I desisted. But I could not banish the discontent which enhanced my ugliness, and made it almost perfect in its own way. Why was I so short and dumpy? I asked myself vainly. And why was my hair so black, and lank, and scanty? And how was it that my complexion was more like Thames mud than anything else? And why was my face covered with freckles? These freckles I always felt to be an especial aggravation of nature; for whoever heard of freckles on a dark, sallow skin? And then, how did it happen that my eyes were of a pale watery-brown hue, while I had hardly got either eyelashes or eyebrows that were visible? And why, oh, why! had my nose got that exasperating habit of looking skyward?

Even as I asked these questions of myself, I felt how hopeless it was to attempt to answer them. So I abandoned them and tried to console myself with the reflection that my mouth was well-shaped and that I had splendid teeth. But then my great red hands obtruded themselves upon my notice, and blotted out all consciousness of my redeeming features. I took considerable pains with my hair, and put on my best dress. Alas! the latter was of a curious brown shade which somehow only seemed to enhance my ugliness. Belle was dressed in a dainty pink cambric; but I was never allowed such a luxury, as it was considered that I was too untidy, and too plain, and altogether too unsuitable to indulge in pretty things. Besides, we had to be economical, and as I could never hope to captivate a lover, no matter how I was dressed, it would have been a shame to waste money upon my futile adornment. So Belle argued, and I had hitherto had no choice but to bow to her arguments.

I was at last ready to go downstairs, when once more Jerry came to look me up.

“Oh, you’re donned up, are you?” he remarked. “And, upon my word, you’re looking quite spry.”

But I was not to be soothed by such negative flattery as this, and sternly asked Jerry what he meant by “looking quite spry.”

“Why, spry, you know, spry means—at least, I mean—that you look as if you were going to a prayer meeting; that is, you look so prim, and tidy, and straight. But, Dorrie, dear, I like you far better as you were this morning, and as you generally are. You look real jolly then.”

Saying this, Jerry kissed me warmly, and I forthwith resigned myself to the hopelessness of attempting to improve my appearance. This morning I had worn an old lilac print that had originally been made for Belle. It was faded with much washing, and possessed sundry little adornments in the way of frayed edges and sleeves out at elbows. Truly, Belle had been right, after all, and it was sheer folly on my part to rebel against fate, since neither coaxing nor rebelling seemed to propitiate her. Seeing, therefore, how stern and uncompromising she was with me, I resolved to take less notice of her in future, and had no sooner made the resolve than I began to feel peaceful and self-possessed. What if the gift of beauty was denied me, had I not many other blessings to be thankful for? In all my seventeen years of life I had never had anything but the most robust health, and if my school record was anything to go by, I possessed a much more valuable property in the way of brains than Belle did. These should outweigh my physical defects, and prove my passport to the world’s good graces.

I dare say Jerry was rather surprised to see me suddenly straighten myself up, and assume a much more cheerful expression.

“What is Lady Elizabeth like?” I asked.

“Looks?”

“No, ways.”

“Well, I take her to be rather a brick, do you know. She was as pleasant and as much at home with Belle and me as if she had lived here all her life and had just been off for a holiday. She thinks we are just like pa, and that is high praise, I should fancy.”

“Very high praise, Jerry. I wonder what she’ll say about me. But it doesn’t matter. Is dinner nearly served?”

“Yes; but John was grumbling because you hadn’t helped to see that the table was all right, as you had promised to do.”

“Oh! Poor John. It was a shame of me to forget all about him. I’ll hurry down now and see what I can do. Come on, Jerry.”

A minute later we were both skipping nimbly downstairs, and while Jerry, at my earnest request, ran round to the stable to see how my bull-terrier, Bobby, was progressing, I ran into the kitchen to make my peace with John and Martha. As Martha was somewhat sulky, and protested that they had managed very well without me, I made my way to the dining-room, and began swiftly to re-arrange the flowers which I had culled for the table earlier in the day. John looked rather scandalized, and remarked that he thought he knew how to arrange a table as well as most folks. But I did not heed John’s grumbling much, for it was his chronic condition, and I had just completed my little task to my own satisfaction when John rang the second dinner-bell, the first not having been noticed by me.

Just then Jerry came back.

“Bobby will be all right in a day,” he said, whereat I expressed my satisfaction, for I had been greatly troubled when poor Bobby had come limping home with every sign of war about him.

“And, oh!” I said, with sudden remembrance, “what has been done with the wonderful carriage and pair, and those gorgeous servants?”

“They went straight home. They belong to the earl. He sent them to meet Lady Elizabeth at the station. Her own carriages are coming after she has seen what arrangements it will be best to make here. I fancy she doesn’t like the place very much.”

“Not like the Grange?” I exclaimed indignantly. “Why, she must be a veritable heathen—”

“Dora, I regret that you should think fit to behave so badly, but must demand a little of your attention, while I introduce you to the notice of Lady Elizabeth Courtney.”

Was ever luck like mine? Here had I quite lost sight of the fact that my father and his wife might enter the room at any time, and they had actually overheard me speak in tones of contempt of the one woman on earth whom I wished to propitiate! I turned hurriedly round, and saw my father, looking very irate, Lady Elizabeth, looking coldly critical, and Belle, looking ill-naturedly triumphant.

“I beg your pardon, papa. I did not mean it,” I stammered.

“No, I do not suppose you did mean us to overhear you,” he replied sternly. “But I have no doubt that you had resolved to be intensely disagreeable, and I tell you plainly that I will not have it. You see, my love,” he said, turning to his wife, “you will have a little temper and self-will to deal with, but I am sure you will know how to compel it to keep within due bounds.”

What could I do or say after that? Nothing, of course, and I sat miserably through the whole meal, while all but Jerry laughed and talked as if quite unconscious of my presence. I would fain have escaped to my own room when the dinner was over. But my father had taken it into his head that I merely wanted to be obstinate and disagreeable, and suggested that I should spend an hour in the drawing-room. I accordingly took refuge at the piano. But my music was so melancholy that I am not surprised that I was asked to desist, for, when you come to think of it, “Killigrew’s Lament,” and “The Dead March in Saul,” haven’t a very bridal sound about them.

So far Lady Elizabeth had not spoken directly to me, and whenever my eyes wandered in her direction, I could see that her glance was very critical, but I could not be sure that it was quite so disapproving as I had expected. Yet, although I neither spoke, nor was spoken to, there was no constraint between the others, for my father and Lady Courtney were both good conversationalists, and Belle could chatter by the hour, provided the talk was kept at a suitably frivolous level. Jerry, after being petted and praised a little, had been sent to bed primed with a quartet of kisses, and jubilant in the possession of a bright sovereign which papa had given to him in honor of the advent of a new mistress at Courtney Grange.

“Belle, dear, suppose you play us one of your pretty pieces,” said my father. Whereupon I vacated the music-stool, and took refuge near the big oriel window which overlooked the orchard, and which was my especial delight. For it was like a small room in itself, and I did not feel quite so lost among its cozy, faded draperies as I did in any other part of our drawing-room, which always seemed to me to be much too large for the furniture that was in it. Belle, after a great deal of fidgeting and looking round at herself, to make sure that her dress was falling in graceful folds, struck a few chords on what had been a very fine piano in its day, but which even I, who was partial to all that had belonged to my mother, was compelled to admit was getting out of date.

“I really don’t like to let you hear me for the first time on an old instrument like this, Lady Elizabeth,” said Belle. “If my music strikes you disagreeably, pray make all due allowance for the difficulties under which I labor.”

“Pray don’t apologize, my dear,” answered Lady Elizabeth. “I know how to separate the faults of the instrument from those of the player, and the quality of the piano need not trouble you long, as in all probability a grand of my own will be here in a day or two.”

“How delightful!” exclaimed Belle, and then she proceeded to give us a specimen of the skill which, times without number, I had been advised to emulate. She played “The Rippling Cascade” in a style that was faultless as regards time and precision, following it up with “The Musical Box.” But her playing was utterly devoid of expression. Pathos, tenderness, power, fire, were all unknown musical quantities to her, as they are, alas! to numbers of other conventional players; and whether it was “Home, Sweet Home,” or “The Soldier’s Chorus,” each and everything was played with the same clock-work insensibility to all the laws of expression. I watched Lady Elizabeth narrowly, as she listened to Belle’s efforts in the musical line, and (shall I own it?) I was maliciously glad to notice a distinctly bored expression steal across her features. There was one thing in which I could excel my usually all-conquering sister, of which the lady whom we both desired to please was evidently a judge, and I could not help rejoicing in the fact that I was not quite weaponless in the fight for favor, though I had certainly done anything but shine so far.

“What do you think of Belle’s performance?” asked my father, either forgetful of my presence, or not caring whether I overheard the conversation or not. Lady Elizabeth’s reply, though given in a low tone, and under cover of the music, reached my ears quite distinctly.

“She is just a trifle disappointing there, Gerald. I should imagine your younger daughter, Dora, to be much the better artist of the two. She seems to be a trifle wild and ungovernable, but would, I think, be amenable to reason, with judicious handling.”

“My dear Elizabeth, you don’t know her yet. Wait until you have seen more of her, and then you will agree with me that she is more than trying. Indeed, she is positively exasperating at times. Belle always has some complaint to make of her, and I am not surprised that this should be so, for it is a matter of impossibility to make her either look or act like a lady. No one would dream that she was a Courtney.”

Often and often I had felt my heart ache at the neglect and carelessness with which my father had always treated me, and I had grieved bitterly at the lack of outward comeliness which seemed to be the passport to his affection. But that he was actually so devoid of parental feeling as to show himself positively antipathetic to me had never occurred to me. Now, as I heard him saying things which must make me almost hateful in Lady Elizabeth’s eyes, I felt myself harden toward him, and the love which I had hitherto cherished for him fell from me like a worn-out mantle. What! oh, what had I ever done that he should do that which presumably only my bitterest enemy would do to me? Why should he try to prejudice me in the eyes of his wife? Had he no remembrance of the mother who loved me with a love equal to that which she bore for himself and his happier children? Was he quite forgetful of all the little efforts I had always made to increase his comfort? Did he really regard me as quite removed from the sphere of a lady, because I had worked hard, and made my hands red and unsightly, ever since I had realized how difficult it was for Martha and John to manage our big house efficiently without assistance? I, in my blindness, had hoped that he would commend me for my industrious habits, and it was a bitter awakening to discover that he only rated me on a par with, perhaps, a scullery maid.

I could feel my eyes begin to gain the fire they usually lacked, and the hot blood suffused my cheeks as I sat trembling with anger, and fighting madly to prevent myself from uttering the reproaches that forced themselves to my lips. It would be well, I thought, to keep quiet until the end of the play, and hear the verdict which Lady Elizabeth would pronounce upon me. I therefore listened for her answer with tightly clasped hands and motionless form, but with my attention strained to the utmost, Belle having meanwhile reached the most flourishy part of “Household Harmonies.”

“Do you think it quite fair to the child,” said my stepmother, “to give implicit credence to what one sister says to the detriment of the other, without giving the latter a chance to defend herself? Do not imagine for a moment I have a thought of reproaching you. But I cannot help contrasting the love and admiration you so openly display for Belle with the coldness and actual displeasure with which you look at Dora. May not this have much to do with the girl’s presumably bad temper and _gauché_ manners? You see, I want to make the best of all belonging to you, Gerald, and I am inclined to think that there is more in your younger daughter than you have given her credit for.”

“I should be only too glad to discover a single good quality in Dora,” replied my affectionate father. “But I repeat that she is really hopeless, and assure you, for your own future guidance, that her disposition is on a par with her looks, than which nothing could very well be more disappointing, considering the fact that she is the offspring of a house which for generations has been famous for its beauty.”

“But a beautiful body does not invariably hold a beautiful mind, and of course the obverse rule holds good. The fact is, I am not sure that I have not taken a fancy to Dora. I have an idea that she is a girl of great possibilities, under judicious management. Certainly, appearances are against her at present, but appearances are but very circumstantial evidence at best.”

“And how do you get over her rudeness to you on your arrival?”

“You mean her failure to meet me at the door?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I rather fancy that if I had been in her place I should have done the same. It is bad enough to be such a contrast in looks to her handsome sister, without having her plainness accentuated and aggravated by the most unbecoming attire that could possibly have been procured for her. Belle is beautifully dressed, and Dora’s frock is simply hideous. Her hair, too, is plastered down in as ugly a fashion as possible. I mean to alter all that, and the result will astonish you, I am sure.”

By this time Belle had noticed that she had an unappreciative audience, and was closing the piano, contriving to display, as she did so, a certain amount of well-bred annoyance, as I knew instinctively without looking at her, so well was I used to her little ways. Lady Elizabeth smiled pleasantly and said, “Thank you, my dear.” My father, considerably to Belle’s own wonderment, appeared quite oblivious of her beautiful presence, a thing she had never had to complain of before. He looked like a man suddenly confronted with a new and mysterious riddle, and as if he were not sure whether he ought not to doubt the sanity of any one who could deliberately say anything in favor of me. True, old Martha and her husband were sometimes quite ungrudging of their commendation, after I had been specially useful to them. But they were only servants, and it was perhaps natural that they should judge things in a different way to more educated people.

As for me, I sat like one in ecstasy, for I had at last found some one who was not only willing, but actually determined to see that I was treated in a manner equal to the other daughter of the house, and not relegated to the position of a menial. My father had evidently forgotten that I was in the room. Lady Elizabeth thought I had left it, as was evidenced by her parting words to Belle, as the latter was going up to her own bedroom.

“Good-night, Belle,” she said. “To-morrow we will have a talk about what we will do together in future, eh? And tell your sister that I hope she will be well enough to go on an exploring expedition with me. I’m sure she has a pretty garden and other interesting things of her own to show me. She looks like a real lover of nature.”

Had my heart not been so full of conflicting emotion I could have laughed at Belle’s stare of surprise. But laughter would have been horrible to me just then, and would have seemed a desecration of the purer sounds that rose to my lips.

Does the reader know how it feels to be in a state of joy so exquisite that it is difficult to restrain the voice from shrieking aloud and the limbs from dancing in wild abandonment? Even so did I feel when I rose from my chair as Belle left the room. But my excitement ran into the channels of gratitude and love, and I soon found myself kneeling at Lady Elizabeth’s feet, sobs shaking my frame, tears streaming down my cheeks, and broken words of feeling issuing from my lips.

“Dear, dear lady!” I cried. “Oh, how I bless you for your kind words! You don’t know how I have hungered for love! You don’t know what a grief it was to me to seem rude to you. You don’t know how grateful I can be. I will do anything for you. I will work my fingers to the bone, if you wish it. I will lay my life down for you, if you will only give me just a little corner of your heart, just a little of the sympathy for which my heart has been aching.”

“My dear child,” said my stepmother, as she clasped me warmly to her breast, while genuine tears of sympathy actually rolled down her cheeks. “My poor Dora! of course I mean to love you. And I want you to remember that I am your mother, to whom you must come in all your troubles.”

Then, with an affectionate kiss, she released me, and I fled to my bedroom, sobbing still with excitement, but proud, happy and exultant, as I had never been in my life.

“She is an angel!” I thought, rapturously. “Oh! how happy we shall be now!”

Alas, poor mortal! it is well for thee that the portals of the future are impervious to thy gaze, and that it is forbidden thee to know how small is perhaps thy destined share of happiness, the true elixir of life.

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CHAPTER II. “In the world there is no duty more important than that of being charming.”—VICTOR HUGO.

On rising next morning my first thought was that I must dress myself with more care than was usually the case with me before breakfast. Not that I was not always neat and tidy, as far as my personal toilet went. But the old dresses which had hitherto been deemed good enough for me to wear in the mornings would have to be discarded henceforth, and I felt quite proud of the suddenly accentuated importance of my personal appearance, as I rummaged my wardrobe in search of something that would be fit to wear in the presence of Lady Elizabeth Courtney.

But I was not very successful in my search, and was obliged to content myself with a somewhat shabby green striped stuff, that had been bought for Belle, but was made up for me, because she took a dislike to it on seeing it at home. I remembered the remark Lady Elizabeth had made about my hair, and tried, with very indifferent success, to remove the objectionable sleekiness which was its distinguishing feature.

When quite ready to go downstairs I surveyed myself in the glass, but cannot say that I was delighted with the reflection which confronted me for a moment. It was only seven o’clock, and I went to the stable ere going elsewhere, to see after the wants of Bobby and of my dear old Teddy. Teddy was a shaggy pony, whose looks were anything but handsome, but in whose society I had hitherto spent my happiest hours. That I should be the proud possessor of a pony often struck me with surprise; but it was an established fact, nevertheless. My uncle Graham, protesting that no one would buy such an ugly animal, had given him to me, and as Belle would not have been seen on the back of such an inelegant steed, there was no attempt to subvert him to other uses than the donor intended.

Sometimes Jerry and I wandered for miles with him, taking turns at having a ride on his broad back over the wide expanse of moorland in which our county rejoices. Bobby, too, always went with us, and, next to Teddy, perhaps, was the dearest animal alive. I had bought him, for sixpence, from some boys who had been paid a shilling to drown him because he had the mange. He wasn’t handsome then, but he improved in looks when he recovered from his illness, and he was so loving, so merry, so clever, and such a jolly companion altogether, that it would have been a terrible grief to me to part with him. Then both Bobby and Teddy were such splendid confidants. To them I poured out all my sorrows, and I always felt better after we had talked things over. They would both look at me so earnestly and lovingly with their beautiful eyes, while I told them whatever I had to tell. And then, to prove that they understood me, Teddy would rub me with his head, and Bobby would first lick my fingers, and then give a short, sharp bark, and look defiantly round him, as if to challenge my enemies.

Both animals were nearly as fond of Jerry as they were of me. But he was only nine years old, and did not understand them quite as well as I did. Whenever we were bent upon a long excursion on the moors we would take a basket of provisions with us. Then, when we got to a suitable spot, we would prepare to enjoy our picnic. Teddy and Bobby would lie down for awhile, or would amuse themselves in their own way, the one by nibbling at such eatables as he might find, and the other by excursionizing in search of rats. But they knew what a certain whistle meant, and returned promptly to our side as soon as they heard it. Then, having unpacked our basket, we would distribute the luncheon. There was always a goodly bone for Bobby, and some apples and a few carrots for Teddy; and though we were no doubt a curious quartet, we were a very happy one, for I had no regrets when in the unrestrained company of my three chums. After lunch, we sometimes had a game at hide and seek among the stones and hillocks, Teddy in particular being very difficult to deceive. It was such fun to see his dear old nose come poking round a corner, and to witness him neigh and prance in his joy at having unearthed us, while Bobby complimented him on his skill by barking his admiration.

It seemed a pity that such beautiful days should have an end, and we were all sorry when it was time to go home again. As for me, I used to feel my spirits leave me as we neared home, for I was always sure to be in some scrape or other on my return. It was very easy for me to get into trouble at any time, but the head and front of my offending in connection with our picnics was my inability to distinguish between scraps and bones to which Bobby was welcome, since no one else could eat them, and the remains of a joint which Martha had intended to convert into _rissoles_. Teddy’s apples, too, had a knack of being of the choicest flavor, whereas the green windstrewn ones were supposed to be good enough for a pony.

As I now went to the stable, I could not help wondering how Lady Elizabeth would regard my pets. But I felt more assured about the matter than I would have done if I had thought about it yesterday. For if my stepmother could actually take a fancy to _me_, she was not likely to take exception to the ugliness of Teddy and Bobby.

“Hallo, Dorrie!” I suddenly heard a voice exclaim, and looking toward the kitchen-garden, whence the sound proceeded, I saw Jerry, hand-in-hand with Lady Elizabeth, to whom he was doing the honors of the place thus early.

“We’ve been getting some strawberries for breakfast,” smilingly said my stepmother, “or, rather, we were going to get some, but either Gerald or I ate all we gathered.”

“Well, it wasn’t me,” said Jerry. “I gathered them, and you ate them. But I can soon pull some more, after you have looked at my white rats and my rabbits.”

“And my pony,” I put in; adding, with no shade of reserve or shyness about me, “Do you always get up so early, Lady Elizabeth?”

“Not always, especially if I am in town. But I am fond of rising early in the country. Besides, I wanted to explore the Grange thoroughly to-day. I have been here before, but it is so long since that I have quite forgotten what it is like.”

“Do you know,” put in Jerry, “that I fancied yesterday you did not like the place?”

“And Dora thought I must be a heathen not to do so.”

“Oh, I beg your pardon,” I exclaimed hurriedly. “It was very presumptuous of me. But I have lived here all my life, and to me no place can be nicer than Courtney Grange.”

“That remains to be proved,” said my stepmother, with a smile. “I have an idea that the sanitary arrangements of this place are bad. Should this really prove the case, we shall vacate the Grange in favor of a pretty place of my own.”

“Leave the Grange!” I cried aghast. “Why, that would be awful! I should look uglier than ever anywhere else.”

“On the contrary, it is just possible, Dora, that this place is to blame for your unsatisfactory complexion. Perhaps your bedroom is a specially unhealthy one. Your father has promised to employ some sanitary engineers at once, to examine the place. Meanwhile I have left my maid at Sunny Knowe, and we are all going next week to pay a visit to that place. Your father is quite willing that you should all three accompany us, and I am sure you will enjoy your visit.”

“But I have no pretty clothes to be seen elsewhere in.”

“We will soon alter that. I am very glad that Ernestine did not come with me. I can manage very well for a week without her, and it is just as well that neither she nor any other servant of mine should criticise you at present. You will show to much better advantage in new clothes, and may as well create as good an impression as possible, even upon the servants, who can be very neglectful of people who do not strike them as important. I intend you to be considered as important as your sister, who is very lovely, but who must not monopolize all the attention due to you.”

“Indeed, I do not want attention or assistance. I am quite used to looking after both myself and others, and cannot expect the same politeness as Belle. See, these are my pets, and I love them dearly, for they both love me.”

Bobby always slept with Teddy, and it was no unusual thing to see the two friends come to meet me, as they did on this particular morning, Teddy brushing my arm by way of salute and uttering a delighted neigh, while Bobby barked his “good-morning” quite plainly.

“They have brought you to see some lovely animals,” said a voice at this juncture. It was my father, who had joined us, preparatory to going in to breakfast, and who gazed at me with manifest displeasure.

“I’m afraid, my dear,” he continued, “that you will be somewhat disgusted at being taken the round of stableyards and back premises. But I should have warned you as to what you might expect from Dora. Her tastes are inveterately low.”

“Then I am afraid I am low, too,” laughed Lady Elizabeth, “for I have actually been enjoying myself. I was always sorry that I had no children of my own, and a few fresh young spirits about me will complete my happiness in marrying you. Come along, children. We mustn’t keep your father waiting for his breakfast.”

My father was not severe or ill-natured, except when irritated by the sight of the child who was a veritable eyesore to him, and he would have had to be a churl indeed to resist his wife’s sunny ways. He was smiling pleasantly at her, and had turned to walk toward the house, having offered her his arm, when I hastily whispered to her: “Pray excuse Jerry and me for a moment, while we gather those strawberries.” And then I ran off, followed by Jerry, and knowing full well that my desire to procure Lady Elizabeth a plentiful supply of the fruit of which she seemed fond would provoke my father’s displeasure again, simply because it would strike him as another undesirable exhibition of my notoriously independent manners.

But I no longer felt any particular desire to please him, and only cared to be of service to the dear lady who would permit no prejudices to influence her treatment of me. As far as she was concerned, I meant to follow Victor Hugo’s advice, and be as charming and helpful as I could. If I could not make my appearance charming, I would charm her by a solicitous and persistent attention to her pleasures and comforts.

It did not take the two of us long to gather a good supply of “Queens” and “Presidents,” and we reached the morning-room before the others had sat down to breakfast. Belle was there, attired in a pretty pale blue print, and was admirably foiled by my altogether unprepossessing appearance. As I saw Lady Elizabeth’s glance wander from Belle to myself, I knew that she was wondering what I could possibly wear to make me look pretty; and though I could never really hope to embody such a pleasant adjective as “pretty,” I was happy in the knowledge that Belle’s unpleasant theories were upset, and that I might possibly show a marked improvement in my appearance ere long.

The rest of the day was chiefly taken up with explorations and consultations, and a good many new arrangements were made. Jerry, I was sorry to hear, was to be sent off to a French boarding school at the beginning of the next term. But when I heard that he was to spend all his holidays at home, just as if he were in an English school, I felt reconciled to the temporary absences of the bright, clever child who liked his ugly sister best. Jerry himself was quite overjoyed at the programme cut out for him, and promised to write us each and all a French letter from the first week of his residence in France.

Belle, who was now twenty, was enraptured by the promise of next season in town, while I was so delighted to hear that I was to have efficient instruction on my favorite instrument, the violin, that I burst into tears, and ran hastily up to my own room, where I might vent my emotion unrestrainedly. You see, my tastes had met with so little sympathy heretofore that I required some time to get used to unwonted indulgences. I was not sure that my happiness would not yet take unto itself wings and fly away, or that I was not dreaming; for I had never heard of the arrival of a stepmother being so conducive to the welfare of the junior branches of the family as promised to be the case with us.

My father, I noticed during the next few days, was so supremely contented and so happy in the society of his wife, that I contrasted the coldly conventional manner in which he had always comported himself in my poor mother’s presence, and was able to see that the feeling he had borne for her was but poor stuff compared to the love he felt for Lady Elizabeth. I remember also having heard that these two were lovers in their youth, and it amazed me to think that they could have deliberately thrown aside the heart’s most sacred feelings in order to make a worldly marriage.

I have since then become thoroughly conversant with the fact that Mammon is infinitely the more powerful god of the two, when it comes to a tussle with Cupid, and that even very estimable people lose their judgment when called upon to choose between them. And yet, how can they honestly utter their marriage vows, when the heart is given away from the one they are marrying? Truly, life has many mysteries, which it were unprofitable work to attempt to solve!

In a day or two quite an assortment of new clothes came for me, and it was astonishing to see how different I looked in the reds and yellows which I now wore. I was still the ugly girl of the family, but it was quite possible for strangers to overlook the unpleasant fact for a while, and I even caught myself hoping that I looked rather nice than otherwise, especially when callers began to pay their respects to the newly-married couple.

Both Belle and I were introduced to nearly all our visitors, among the first of them being the Earl of Greatlands. I was rather disposed to like him, until he put his eyeglass up, quizzed me attentively, and remarked: “You are unfortunately very like your mother, Miss Dora, though I believe she had much finer hair and eyes than you have. But everybody improves in the hands of my daughter, and I have no doubt you will be as handsome as your sister by the time you are her age.”

“I am only just twenty,” said Belle stiffly.

“So I suppose, my dear,” rejoined the earl. “But you will find in a year or two that even the slight margin of age there is between the two of you will land you considerably on the weather-side, in other people’s opinion.”

Belle flashed an angry glance from her beautiful eyes, being careful, however, not to let the earl see it, for did she not desire an invitation to Greatlands Castle? As for me, I felt nothing less than enraged, although I could not quite decide whether the old gentleman was deliberately rude, or only gifted with an unfortunate knack of making _mal-à-propos_ speeches. But he did not notice that he had hurt the feelings of either of us, having turned his attention to Jerry, who, faultlessly dressed in a new black velvet suit, was being introduced to his stepmother’s father.

“Ah! a very pretty boy,” he said. “But a perfect imp of mischief, I know. Boys who look like him always are. How many times have you gone out ratting?”

“Not so often as I would like, sir. Dorrie can’t always get away.”

“And does Dorrie go rat-hunting?”

“Of course she does. She has a splendid dog. Teddy is hers, too, and he’s just a brick.”

“Teddy’s a brick? But of what use is a brick on hunting expeditions?”

“Oh, you know what I mean. Teddy is the jolliest little pony in the world.”

“You seem fond of Teddy?”

“Rather.”

“And of Bobby?”

“I wonder who wouldn’t be!”

“And of Dorrie?”

“Why, of course!”

“And of Belle?”

“Belle? Well, yes, I dare say I am, when she doesn’t sneak on Dorrie.”

“Gerald, I think you are forgetting yourself,” interrupted my father angrily. “That girl has made you worse than herself. It is just as well that you are going to be parted. For the present, you have been long enough in the drawing-room.”

“Very well, sir,” said Jerry, and turned to leave the room at once. Lady Elizabeth, I could see, was more amused than vexed; Belle looked at both Jerry and me with angry disdain, and the earl just laughed as if Jerry had uttered a very good joke.

“Wait a bit, Jerry,” he said. “If the others will excuse me for a few minutes, I would like you to show me this wonderful dog and pony. And as they are Dorrie’s property she will perhaps be good enough to come with us.”

As nobody entered any objection to the earl’s proposals, I accompanied him from the room, and five minutes later he and Jerry and I were interviewing Teddy and Bobby, who had been having a gambol at the foot of the orchard. The orchard was not a place they were supposed to frisk about in. But somebody had carelessly left the wicket open, and it was not their fault, poor things, that a choice young “ribstone pippin” had been snapped in two during their frolics.

The earl was certainly a funny man. He was as different from what I had always supposed an earl to be as was possible. In fact, he was more like a jolly old farmer than anything else. But what a gossip he seemed to be! And how inquisitive he was! He laughed immoderately at sight of my pets, but immediately soothed my wounded feelings by stroking and patting them, and I could see that they both took a fancy to him at once. It wasn’t everybody that Teddy would sidle up to in the dear, winning way he had, or to whom Bobby would wag his approval. But perhaps they were both in a better humor than usual; for Bobby had uncovered one of the mushroom beds, and had helped himself to a few of the fungi, of which he was inordinately fond, while naughty Teddy, as several broken branches testified, had been feasting on unripe “Dutch mignonnes” and “Duke of Oldenburghs.”

“Nice animals,” said the earl. “Just the sort I would have expected your property to be, eh, Dorrie?”

“My name is Dora.”

“But Jerry calls you Dorrie.”

“He is privileged. He likes me.”

“And how do you know that I don’t like you?”

“You? I don’t see how you can. Very few people do.”

“Perhaps I am one of the few. At any rate, I mean to call you Dorrie. It sounds nicer between friends than ‘Miss Dora,’ doesn’t it?”

“Now you are making fun of me. And you would make even more fun of me, if I were to believe that the Earl of Greatlands wanted to be friendly with an ugly, uninteresting girl like me.”

“Isn’t Lady Elizabeth friendly with you?”

“Oh, she is an angel!”

“Well, please to remember that I am that angel’s father, and of the same species. Don’t you see my wings?”

At this we all three laughed, and we enjoyed each other’s society very well for about half an hour, during which time we had shown our visitor all sorts of things that I had never dreamed would interest an earl.

Suddenly he exclaimed: “And now I must go back to the house, or I shall be getting into hot water with the old people, eh? But look here, Jerry, what has Belle got to sneak about?”

“Now, Jerry, don’t _you_ turn sneak,” I warned.

“You don’t need to be afraid. But Belle is horrid, after that. She’s always saying that Dorrie’s ugly. And I’m sure she isn’t really ugly, is she?”

The latter question was addressed to the earl. But I did not wait to hear his answer, for I was thoroughly angry with Jerry, for once, and returned to the house unceremoniously, leaving them to go back when they liked. Of course I was not behaving politely. But I am afraid that very polished manners were really a little out of my line at that time, and, after all, it was too bad of Jerry to turn the conversation on to my unfortunate ugliness, just when we were having such a nice time of it. Instead of going back to the drawing-room, I went straight to the kitchen, where I was busily occupied for the next two hours in helping Martha to shell “marrowfats,” to prepare salad, to make a pudding and some cheesecakes, and in other ways to do my best toward making dinner a success. Belle never condescended to enter the kitchen at any time, nor would my father have liked her to risk spoiling the perfect loveliness of her hands. But Martha and John had never suffered from lack of work, and some help was absolutely needed by them. True, a strong girl from the village of Moorbye had been engaged now to do the rougher part of the housework, but even then there was plenty of room for my assistance.

That evening the Earl of Greatlands dined with us, as did also Lord Egreville, his son, who had ridden over to pay his respects to his sister and her husband. He was a widower, and resided with his father at Greatlands Castle, his two sons being at Oxford. I did not like him at all, and he took no pains to conceal the fact that he considered me to be very small fry indeed. But he was quite fascinated by Belle’s beauty, and flirted desperately with her. She seemed perfectly willing to receive his attentions, and certain amused glances which I saw exchanged between Lady Elizabeth, the earl, and my father, set my thoughts working in an odd direction.

What a queer thing it would be, I mused, if this Lord Egreville and Belle were to fall in love with each other, and make a match of it! How it would complicate relationships. Why, let me see, Belle would become her father’s sister-in-law, and would be a sort of aunt to Jerry and myself, while the old earl could call himself either her father-in-law, or her grand-father-in-law, if he liked. The situation presented so many funny aspects, that I felt it necessary to relinquish my dessert-spoon while I abandoned myself to a fit of laughter that obstinately refused to be repressed.

As there was apparently nothing to laugh at, my manners were again called into question, chiefly by the innocent and unconscious cause of my amusement.

A few days after this, the sanitary engineers were at work on Courtney Grange, and we were all domiciled _pro tem_ at Sunny Knowe, a lovely place in its way, but not nearly equal to what Courtney Grange would be when thoroughly restored. Oddly enough, a distant relation, from whom my father had never expected anything, died at this juncture, and bequeathed him several thousand pounds. His income had never been large enough to keep the place up as it ought to have been kept, and the Grange had therefore fallen considerably out of repair. Now that he was married to a lady with an ample income he could spare his newly acquired fortune for repairing purposes, and resolved to spend nearly the whole of it on that object.

Under the circumstances, we were not likely to return to the Grange much before Christmas. But we did not trouble about that, as the Knowe was a very pleasant place to live at. I had, very much to my sorrow, left Teddy under John Page’s care, for Lady Elizabeth desired me to ride a more presentable steed while at the Knowe. I was provided with a well-made habit, and had the use of a handsome horse. But the decorous rides I now took, in company with Belle, and with a groom following closely, were not to be compared with the delightful excursions Teddy and I had had together, though Belle enjoyed them, and the altered state of things was evidently regarded by her as a great improvement.

As it had been necessary to leave Teddy behind, I could not be cruel enough to bring Bobby away and leave him without a friend to talk to. John had promised to look well after them both, but I knew that they would miss me sadly, and longed for the time when I could comfort them again with my presence. Lady Elizabeth was very good to me, but at times I was not sure that I did not regret the old spells of unconventional freedom.

So true is it that we are prone to lose sight of the privileges and blessings of the present in the vain longing after a vanished past, in which we could find little to be joyful at, when it was with us. In my case, I was ready to let the memory of our halcyon days on the moors outweigh that of all the days of neglect and misery during which I had craved for the mother’s love which had once blessed me.

The Earl of Greatlands and his son spent a good deal of time at the Knowe, and we, in our turn, saw much of the castle, which had been thoroughly rehabilitated since Lady Elizabeth’s first husband had been good enough to furnish the money wherewith to do it. It was a fine old place, and it was pleasant to see what pride its owner took in all connected with it. Lord Egreville was very attentive to Belle, but it was difficult to decide how far the element of seriousness entered into the behavior of either of them. There was a prudent reticence on the part of Lord Egreville at times that annoyed Belle very much, because it argued that he was not quite so infatuated with her as she would have liked him to be.

And yet, I do not believe she cared for him one atom, although she gave him more than sufficient encouragement to proceed with his attentions—up to a certain point. Once, when in a very gracious mood, she became quite confidential with me.

“It would be a very good match, even for me, who have always meant to do well for myself,” she said. “The estate is quite unencumbered, and in first-class order. Lord Egreville is not very good-looking. But I would tolerate his looks if I cannot do better for myself. Though certainly it would be a great thing to become an English countess.”

“But Lord Egreville will not be an earl until his father dies.”

“His father, as you seem to forget, is close upon seventy, and cannot live forever.”

“How horrid it seems to count upon dead men’s shoes like that!”

“Don’t excite yourself, my dear. If Lord Egreville were to propose to me to-morrow, I would not give him a decided answer. I must see what my coming season in town brings forth. I might captivate a much richer nobleman, or even a millionaire pill or soap manufacturer. At any rate, I am not going to throw myself away in too great a hurry.”

“‘A bird in the hand—’ You know the rest.”

“Yes, I know the rest. But my motto is: ‘Look before you leap.’”

“Well, I hope you won’t leap into a big bog-hole, that’s all.”

“Well, no. I will leave that suicidal performance for those who can never hope to leap any higher. How do you like this brooch? Lord Egreville sent it this morning.”

“If I were you, I would tell him to keep his dead wife’s jewelry a little longer. He might require it for some one else, if you pick up a duke or a millionaire.”

Having had my parting shot, I judged it wise to leave Belle to her own devices, and went off to my little room, where I practiced industriously on my fiddle for an hour and a half. There were plenty of servants here, and I had no excuse for offering to help with the cooking, though I would have liked nothing better. Indeed, I had often thought that if I had not belonged to a family in which it was necessary to keep up appearances, I would have become a professional cook. But I had still a little congenial employment to turn to. Jerry was going off to school this week, and I had undertaken to mark all his things myself, besides making him sundry little knick-knacks that would prove useful to him.

I found it very hard to part with Jerry, when the time came for him to go, and was rather hurt to find that he cared less about leaving us behind, than he did about the delights of travel and school-life to which he was looking forward.

“I did think you would be sorry to leave me,” I murmured, reproachfully, just as he was being resigned to the charge of the tutor who was going to accompany him to the school, and afterward take part in teaching the boys.

“Well, what’s a fellow to do?” Jerry rejoined. “You wouldn’t have me to cry and look like a muff, would you? It isn’t the same as if I was a girl. It wouldn’t matter then if I cried my eyes red.”

“No more it would, Jerry. Good-by, dear. And you’ll be sure to write often to me?”

“Quite sure. Good-by, Dorrie. Good-by, pa. And, oh! Dorrie, I’ve forgotten my bag of marbles, and my new top. Will you send them to me?”

There was barely time to answer in the affirmative, and then the child was off. Then my father, having seen me comfortably seated in the waggonette in which we had driven to the station, flicked his whip, and off we started on our return drive, little dreaming of the terrible events which were to come to pass ere the dear boy from whom we had just parted came back to the home he left so blithely.

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CHAPTER III. “Tis the unlikely that always happens.”

My life seemed strangely quiet without Jerry for the next few days, and I longed all the more to console myself with Bobby and Teddy. But one gets used to the absence of anybody in time, and Lady Elizabeth’s arrangements were so promotive of the comfort and pleasure of all with whom she lived that it would have seemed ungrateful of me to suggest that I should be glad when the time came to go back to the Grange. Still, it was true that, apart from the loss of Jerry’s companionship, I had conceived a desire to leave Sunny Knowe. The Earl of Greatlands had become unpleasantly effusive to me. He was constantly paying me compliments, which were all the more galling as they were made with a perfectly grave mien. Had Belle been the recipient, there would have been nothing objectionable about them, as she could have received them in the full conviction that they were honestly meant. But for me, whose ugliness was proverbial, to be addressed as “pretty dear” and “dainty dove,” was very bitter indeed; for it was bad enough to be fully conscious of a total absence of all that was dainty and pretty, without being publicly satirized, and held up to the unfeeling laughter of Belle and her admirer, Lord Egreville.

One afternoon my temper, which of late had lain in abeyance, reasserted itself in a startling manner. We were all in the drawing-room, with several of the neighboring gentry, who had come over to confabulate about some _tableaux vivants_ that there had been some talk of getting up. Several satisfactory groups had been decided upon; but, apparently by common consent, nobody had suggested that I should take a part in the performances, until the earl remarked: “Look here, there seems to be a strange want of judgment among you. You have left the flower of the flock out of your calculations, and I propose that she and I represent ‘Beauty and the Beast.’ I can soon dress up as the ‘Beast,’ and she can fill her part satisfactorily.”

“And pray who is the ‘flower of the flock’?” said Belle, who was to represent “Guinevere.”

“Who else, but winsome Dora?” retorted the earl, whereat there was an undisguised laugh on the part of Belle and a few more of her caliber, while the rest smiled in good-natured toleration of so palpable an absurdity. Just for one instant I turned sick with humiliation. Then I walked up to the earl, and, with my eyes flashing angrily, hissed rather than said: ‘You are an old man, my lord. I am but a young girl. You think that you may hold me up to ridicule and laughter with impunity. But I vow you shall do so no longer. Shall I tell you what I will do if you dare to insult me in that manner again?’

“Dora, how dare you!” exclaimed my father angrily. “If you have forgotten how to behave yourself, I must request you to go to your own room at once.—I told you how it would be,” he remarked to Lady Elizabeth.

“Tut, tut!” put in the earl. “Let the girl alone, Courtney. This little bit of an outburst is my especial prerogative, and I would like to hear the whole of it. What will you do if I repeat the kind of conversation which seems to rouse your ire? Why shouldn’t I call you a beauty?”

“Because I have a right to demand that you should cease to satirize my unfortunate appearance, and because I will no longer submit quietly to listen to compliments which become insults when applied to me.”

“But you have not yet told me how you will prevent me from saying just what I please.”

“If you are so little of a gentleman as to repeat your conduct, I will—I will slap your face!”

“This is too disgraceful!” interposed my father again. “Once more, Dora—”

“I have to beg you once more to permit me to finish this little affair in my own way,” said the earl, who was actually laughing, so utterly insignificant and childish did he deem my anger. “So you would slap my face, eh? Well, there’s nothing would please me better. I like a girl with some go in her. And you know you really are the nicest, bonniest—”

Five minutes later I was in my own room, feeling thoroughly ashamed of myself. I had not permitted the Earl of Greatlands to finish his preposterous compliment. But I certainly had disgraced myself in the eyes of my father, of Lady Elizabeth, and of sundry other people who witnessed my exit from the drawing-room and its predisposing cause. For I had really slapped the old earl’s face, even as I had threatened to do. He would probably not annoy me in the same way again. Indeed, it was problematical if he would ever speak to me again; for, after all, my conduct must seem inexcusable in the opinion of all but myself. For how could I expect any one else to understand how bitter it was to me to have my lack of comeliness held up to the laughter and contumely of more favored mortals.

Next morning, when I came down to breakfast, I found my father awaiting my advent in the morning room, and braced myself for the reprimand which I knew to be inevitable. Said reprimand was even more severe than I had anticipated, but my affectionate parent displayed such a total lack of the consideration which I felt was the due of my own wounded feelings, that, somehow, I no longer felt sorry for what I had done, but maliciously resolved to adopt equally drastic measures if ever I should be insulted in like manner again.

“I was never so ashamed in my life,” supplemented Belle, who had come in while my father was talking, and had listened with a smile to his lecture.

“I am glad to hear you say so,” said the voice of Lady Elizabeth. “It really was a shame to laugh when you saw how Dorrie was being tormented.”

“Indeed, it is Dora I was ashamed of, not myself. It is not likely that I shall ever disgrace myself in like manner.” So said Belle, and then the very absurdity of the suggestion that she would ever be tormented for the same reason that I had been provoked the girl to irresistible laughter, and served to prove how utterly heartless she could really be where my feelings were concerned.

That afternoon the earl rode over to Sunny Knowe and surprised me by greeting me even more cordially than ever. Evidently he thought me too insignificant and childish to be offended with, while I considered that the best thing I could do would be to make no further allusion to yesterday’s _contretemps_. He did not seem inclined to tease me any more, and the remainder of that day passed pleasantly, as did many more ere we returned to the Grange.

When at last we were installed in our old home again, we were astonished at the wonderful improvements that money and taste had been able to effect in and around it. It was now a grand old place, worthy of the imposing view it commanded and the fine trees by which its grounds were dotted. My father both looked and felt like a rich landed proprietor, as he surveyed the realm which, thanks to Lady Elizabeth’s income, he would be able to support in a style becoming the dignity of the Courtneys, who had once owned all the land for miles around. A new wing had been added, for the comfort of Lady Elizabeth, whose rooms were situated here, and who had brought such a quantity of beautiful new furniture with her that the Grange was a veritable palace of delight to Belle and myself, who had never known anything but shabby surroundings. My bedroom was now of my own choosing, and had been furnished exactly like Belle’s.

I wrote glowing accounts to Jerry of all that was being done, and was especially careful to give him full details concerning Bobby and Teddy, and the rats and rabbits. Poor Jerry! he was to have come home for the Christmas holidays, and they were close at hand when a serious accident befell him. He had been too venturesome in some of the school sports, with the result that he had a severe fall and fractured his right leg. His father was telegraphed for at once and lost no time in reaching him. Meanwhile, the boy had been treated by a skillful surgeon, and there was every prospect of his progressing satisfactorily toward recovery. But it was deemed inadvisable to move him at present, so poor Jerry had to forego his anticipated holiday at home.

“I felt awfully sorry for Kendall,” he wrote in his weekly letter home, “because his father and mother were dead, and he would have to spend his holidays at school. Now I am jolly well glad, for he will be company for me.”

It must not be imagined that Jerry was particularly selfish in expressing himself thus. It was only his youthful vagueness that was at fault. The writing, under the circumstances, was hardly legible. But I thought it very brave of the child to write at all.

Meanwhile, Christmas approached and passed with comparative uneventfulness. True, Lord Egreville had proposed to Belle. But she had declined to give him a definite answer, on the plea that she was too young to be engaged just now; the truth being that she was determined not to labor under the disadvantage of being already out of the running when she went to London for the season.

A house in town had been rented for us, and in due course we all migrated thither. I had hardly expected to be introduced to London society yet, and Belle openly grumbled at the idea. But Lady Elizabeth generally got her own way in everything, and when she intimated that there was no reason why I should not enjoy myself like the rest there was no opposition from my father. Arrived in London, however, I found that people were by no means inclined to make a fuss over me, while the “beautiful” Miss Courtney was fêted and courted to her heart’s content.

Still, the proposals she had confidently expected were somewhat chary in realizing themselves, and when they did come they were not as superlatively tempting as they might have been. The fact was, it was pretty generally known that Belle would have no dowry to speak of, and though plenty of young aristocrats admired her immensely, they deemed it advisable to offer their affections and society at the shrine of Mammon. There were a couple of millionaires in the market. But, incredible as it seemed to Belle, there were other girls in London whose physical charms equaled her own, and to these other girls the millionaires succumbed.

Belle fumed. Belle raged. Belle almost anathematized. Belle hated her victorious rivals. But Belle was wily, and presented an unruffled front in the presence of Lady Elizabeth and her relatives. She made the most of the proposals she did get, but professed her inability to love the proposers. Love, indeed! Could such a beautiful sentiment find an entrance into her cold breast? Impossible! What she coveted was wealth and station, and when, toward the end of the season, Lord Egreville’s proved to be the most eligible offer, she accepted him, and had the felicity of seeing her engagement recorded in all the society papers.

I had an idea that the Earl of Greatlands did not care much for Belle, but had never presumed to give utterance to my suspicion. Lady Elizabeth, however, was not quite so reticent.

“I wish you every happiness, dear,” she said to Belle, kissing her warmly, “and I think that you and Cyril will prove very congenial companions; but I am not sure that my father will like to see any mistress at the castle, other than his own wife, so long as he lives.”

“But your father has not got a wife!” exclaimed Belle, with rising resentment at what she considered Lady Elizabeth’s presumption; for, by her engagement to her brother, she was prospectively lifted to the same plane of relationship, and but for the favors which her stepmother could bestow upon her, she would at once have merged the respect due to a mother in the aggressive equality which she deemed a sister-in-law’s meed.

Lady Elizabeth’s reply startled us all.

“He has no wife at present,” she said, “but I have good reason for asserting that he contemplates marriage at an early date, provided the lady of his choice condescends to accept him.”

“Condescends to accept him!” I knew very well what was the gist of Belle’s thoughts, as she sat with a sullen and dismayed face, without making even a pretense of eating the dainty fare which lay on her breakfast plate.

Who wouldn’t condescend to accept him? Wasn’t he nearly seventy years old? And wasn’t he likely to die ere many years were over, leaving his widow in the untrammeled possession of a title that would give her the _entrée_ to any society? He was sure, too, to scrape and save all he could to provide for his widow after his death, and that would mean a considerable curtailment of the allowance which Lord Egreville looked for on his marriage. Besides, if the earl brought a countess to the castle, and Lord Egreville was asked to retire to the dower-house with his bride, her position would be by no means so imposing as she had expected it to be. Residence at the castle, as its nominal mistress, had been one of Lord Egreville’s special pleas when urging his suit, and, next to the acquisition of the secondary title, with the prospect of a succession to the primary one, had been one of her chief reasons for considering him much more of an eligible _parti_ than her other suitors.

And then, oh, horror! suppose the earl’s new wife should be young! Suppose there should actually be a child born! Why Cyril would be still further despoiled to provide for the bringing up of the little brat. True, he could not be robbed of his prospective right to the earldom, as he was the eldest son. But an active fancy could easily picture no end of humiliations for him and his wife, if the foolish old earl were permitted to bring his infatuation for some pretty face into fruition.

That these thoughts flew through Belle’s brain in the sequence in which I have recorded them is more than I am able to vouch for. But I knew her temperament and disposition so well that I had no hesitation in guessing the direction of her reflections.

“I believe you are just saying all this to try me,” she said at last, looking up at Lady Elizabeth with a face from which she was trying to banish some of the shadows. “Now I come to think of it, he spends the greater part of his time with us, and if he were attracted by anybody in London, he would be more likely to seek her society than ours.”

Lady Elizabeth smiled very mysteriously, but did not vouchsafe a more explicit reply.

“Papa,” said Belle, impatiently, “suppose you look up from that stupid paper and take a little intelligent interest in what is going on around you. It’s perfectly exasperating to see you absorbed in an account of a shooting or fishing expedition, when the future of your eldest daughter is being discussed.”

“My eldest daughter, eh? To be sure, I have two daughters, but the future of one of them is considerably in embryo yet, I should imagine. And what do you wish me particularly to say?”

“Have you known anything of the earl’s intention to get married?”

“Well, really, now you mention it, I did hear some time ago that he was on the lookout for a suitable spouse, but I fancy the old party hasn’t turned up yet.”

“Just what I think. Lady Elizabeth has simply been teasing me.”

“Why, my dear, do you happen to know anything definite about the matter?”

Appealed to thus directly, Lady Elizabeth replied guardedly, “I have really been given to understand that my father would like to get married. But I am not at liberty to disclose the name of the lady whom he would like to marry.”

“At least tell me whether she is old or young,” appealed Belle, anxiously.

“Oh, she is several years younger than my father, I believe.”

With this answer Belle was forced to be satisfied, and shortly afterward we all left the breakfast-room.

As for me, I had listened to the foregoing conversation with considerable interest, but not with the absorbed attention which might perhaps have been aroused in me, if I had had the least idea that the doings of the Earl of Greatlands could possibly affect myself. After all, I was really sorry for Belle. But perhaps the earl’s marriage might not affect her so adversely as she feared.

At eleven o’clock Lord Egreville came to see Belle. I do not know the exact purport of their conversation with each other, but I do know that when Belle’s _fiancé_ left the drawing-room he looked much less pleasant than when he entered it, and hardly seemed to have time to speak to the earl, who was announced at this juncture. Thinking I would have an hour’s uninterrupted practice on my violin, I went up to my own room, but was summoned thence by-and-by.

“Please, Miss Dora,” said Lady Elizabeth’s maid, “you are wanted in the library.”

“_I_ am wanted in the library!” I echoed, in surprise. “Why, who can possibly want me?”

“I do not know. It was milady who sent me to ask you to go down to the library.”

“Is Lady Elizabeth there?”

“No, she is in her boudoir. Mr. Courtney is with her.”

At first it struck me as very singular that there should be a caller who wished to see me alone, and then I reflected that my music-master had perhaps found it inconvenient to give me my music lesson at the usual hour, and had come to ask me to change the time. Full of this thought, I hurried downstairs, but was very much surprised to be confronted, not by Signor Tringini, but by the Earl of Greatlands.

“My dear child, how astonished you look,” he said, as, coming forward and taking my hand, he conducted me courteously to a seat.

“Well,” I replied, “I cannot conceive what can be your object in desiring an interview with me. But perhaps there has been a mistake, and it is Belle you want.”

“Indeed, it is not Belle I want, but your very own self.”

“I hope I have not been doing anything to call forth your particular displeasure. I have really tried to be on my best behavior with everybody since I came to London.”

“You have not displeased me yet. But you will displease me very much, if you refuse to grant the request I have come to make of you.”

“Then I will do the best I can to avert your threatened displeasure by promising to grant your request beforehand.”

“Ah, my dear, if I were inclined to take an unfair advantage, I would rejoice exceedingly over that promise. As it is, I am terribly afraid that you may retract it. Do you happen to have heard of my intention to get married, if I can persuade a certain lady to accept me?”

“Yes, Lady Elizabeth spoke of it this morning. But she would not give us any clew to the lady’s identity, and I, at least, am very curious about her. I hope she is a nice old lady, and that she will like me. You see, she will be a sort of grandmother-in-law to me—with your permission.”

“Grandmother fiddlesticks! She isn’t old enough to be anybody’s grandmother. Can’t you guess who it is?”

“Why, no. How should I? I do not know so very many of your friends, and I really do not know anybody that would seem to be a suitable Countess of Greatlands.”

“Well, it seems to me that for all-round obtuseness you beat everything! Do you think it likely that I would seek a private interview with you, in order to tell you of my intention to ask some one else to marry me?”

“Then why have you come to see me?”

“Why? Only to ask you to take pity on a lonely old man, and marry him. Look here, child, don’t jump up and look angry, for I really mean it. You are the only woman I would care to marry, and if you refuse to marry me I will have nobody else.”

“Good gracious! how can a girl marry her grandfather? Do you forget that you are my stepmother’s father?”

“And what of that? We are not really related. Now don’t be hasty, my dear. Think of all I can do for you, and of all you can do for me. You shall have anything and everything you want, and be presented at Court. As the Countess of Greatlands you will be courted and sought after. But you can do much more for me than that. You can make the short span of life which yet remains to me perfectly happy. Say yes, my dear, and my love and gratitude will know no bounds.”

But I could not say yes for a while. Yet neither could I say no. My astonishment was almost too great for words. Still, I was not displeased at the dazzling prospect held out to me. Reflect, dear reader, before you blame, that I had always been told that I need never hope to win the affection of any man, and that, while those around me basked in the sunshine of family joys, the man did not exist who would care to cast in his lot with mine. True, this man was old, and he was almost decrepit. But he had singled me out from the many others who would gladly have become Countess of Greatlands. In doing so, he had done me an honor of which I was fully sensible, and it was such a joy to me to have become the best beloved of even an old man that my heart prompted me to say “yes,” as he desired.

Still, certain scruples would obtrude themselves upon my notice, and counseled a little hesitation.

“Belle?” I faltered at last. “I cannot! It would make such a difference to Belle.”

“It will not make the slightest difference to Belle, I assure you, Dorrie. She is too vain and frivolous for me to care about living in the same house with her. Whether I marry or not, Cyril and she will have to content themselves with the dower-house during my lifetime. It is the same with the title. They cannot have it until I am gone, and your present possession of it will not keep them out of it one day after it accrues to them. Come, my dear, end my suspense, and keep the promise you made me a while ago.”

“My father? And Lady Elizabeth?”

“Have no solid objections to offer.”

Neither had I after that. But, somehow, the enraptured kiss with which my old lover sealed our engagement was not the sort of thing I had pictured in my day-dreams, and I involuntarily shivered under his caresses.

“What is it, my little pet, are you cold?” he asked solicitously.

“Just a little,” was my evasive answer. “This room always seems chilly. But that does not matter. Tell me, for it seems so strange, how it is that you actually want to marry _me_, of all people in the world. Look how ugly I am!”

“You are not ugly to me, my dear. Besides, I am past thinking outward appearance the sole recommendation and guarantee of a happy life. I need more than mere outward beauty.”

“And you think you have found it?”

“I am sure I have found it! And now, my love, with your permission, I will remain here until your father comes. I shall see you again later in the day.”

Having thus virtually received my dismissal, I sped up to my own room, but not before my ardent lover had claimed another kiss as his due.

Did I feel glad?

Or did I feel dismayed?

I was really unable to tell myself which sensation predominated. I met Belle on the landing, and was conscious of a strange feeling of trepidation, which made me slink into my own room like some one guilty of a mean action.

Oh, dear! how could I ever face them all? I thought. How could I ever have the presumption to pose as the superior in rank and family prestige to my beloved stepmother? Why, if I married her father, I should be _her_ stepmother. And my sister’s mother-in-law! And my father’s mother-in-law, too! And—could it be possible?—my own step-grandmother! There were no end of complications involved in the new arrangement; and, as I pondered over them, I became more and more doubtful as to the propriety of accepting the grand future held out to me. And yet, if I could do so without repugnance on my part, and with an honest determination to prove that the earl had acted wisely in selecting me as the wife of his old age, why should I not become a great lady? Why—

But my conjectures were interrupted at this juncture by a very unusual event. Belle had actually come to visit me in my own room! I knew instinctively, however, that her visit boded me no good, and when I looked up into her face, I saw that she was in a demoniacal temper.

“Is it true?” she cried, as she flung herself on a chair just in front of me. “Is it true that you have actually deluded that old imbecile into offering marriage to you? My father has just told me that you are to become the Countess of Greatlands at a very early date. But the news is too monstrous for belief! A hideous little reptile like you to lord it over me! A shrimp of a girl, whose _gauchérie_ and ill-manners are proverbial, to dare to assume airs of superiority over me! I tell you it shall not be. I will not have it. Sooner than endure such a humiliation I would—I would—”

“And pray what would you do?” I asked, not with the compunction I had felt a while ago at the idea of relegating my beautiful sister to a secondary position. Nor yet with the anger which had blazed up in me on hearing the commencement of her virago-like harangue. But with the cool contempt of one who feels that her position is impregnable, and that her assailant is beneath consideration. “And how will you prevent an arrangement with which you are not of sufficient importance to be permitted to interfere?”

Perhaps it was astonishment at the unwonted courage with which I met her assault. Perhaps it was a sudden access of prudence. But whatever the cause, the effect was the same. Belle declined to tell me how she would prevent my marriage with the earl. But she continued to revile me for some minutes as treacherous, deceitful and scheming, and wound up by saying that I need not congratulate myself upon my seeming triumph, as Lord Egreville would certainly not permit his father to perpetrate the folly he contemplated, even if he had to swear that he was no longer responsible for his actions.

To all this I steadfastly refused any further reply, and, becoming tired of leveling abuse which seemed to make no impression, Belle left the room as suddenly as she had entered it. Once alone, I found that my own feelings with regard to the coming event had undergone a complete revolution. I no longer entertained the slightest doubt as to the propriety of having consented to accept the earl. On the contrary, I was strongly determined to fulfill my promise, and to remove myself forever from the tyranny of Belle’s reproaches and airs of superiority. Very much to my own surprise, too, I felt very indignant at the slights cast upon the earl, and found my heart warm considerably toward him. For, when I came to think of it, he had always treated me kindly, and even when I thought he was deliberately insulting me, he must really have meant what he said. That his taste was peculiar, to say the least, was patent even to myself, but that was all the more reason for gratitude and love on my part.

Gratitude? Yes, that was undoubted. Love? Why not? Surely it is not so very hard for the one to engender the other.

Presently Lady Elizabeth came to my door and asked my permission to enter. This was readily given, though I already felt very much overwrought, and dreaded the coming interview. But I need not have been uneasy about that; for, as usual, my good stepmother had only my welfare at heart.

“I am afraid Belle has been giving you an uncomfortable time of it,” she said, drawing a chair toward me and kissing me affectionately. “She is fuming in the drawing-room, and has sent for Cyril to consult with him as to what is best to be done in this remarkable crisis.”

“And you?” I asked beseechingly. “Do you think I have been a scheming, wicked girl, and that I have done wrong in accepting the earl?”

“Certainly not, my child. I have known for some time that my father wished to make you his wife. Indeed, he consulted me as to the wisdom of doing so, and I gave my unqualified approval to his project. Seeing that he had set his heart on having a young wife, I preferred to see you in that capacity rather than any one else. But I hope that you are fully alive to the duties that will be expected of you.”

“Indeed yes,” I answered soberly. “I mean to do all in my power to make the earl happy.”

“That is right. If you think only of promoting his happiness, your own will come, as a matter of course. But tell me, have you any idea that the ceremony is expected to take place almost immediately?”

“Oh no! how can it? I am too young yet to marry.”

“My dear, in a case like this the bride’s youth counts for nothing, and the bridegroom’s age carries all other considerations before it. Your father also agrees that it is best to make immediate arrangements, and there is really no reason why you should not be married next week.”

And somehow it was all decided, almost without referring again to me, that on the following Wednesday I should be transformed into the Countess of Greatlands. I have no doubt that society partially echoed Belle’s sneers and voted the earl half crazy. But if it did, its criticisms did not trouble me, and I was supremely happy as I reveled in the lavish preparations that were being made for the great event. Belle’s wedding was indefinitely postponed, although it had at first been spoken of as an almost immediate event.

So far as I could judge, Lord Egreville was as bitterly opposed to the earl’s wedding as Belle was. He was just distantly civil to me, and I took no trouble to ingratiate myself with him. Sometimes, when the couple sat whispering in a corner, I surprised an occasional glance that was positively malignant in its intensity of hatred. Once or twice I remembered my sister’s assertion that she would prevent my marriage, and wondered vaguely if she were really hatching some plot against me. Then a certainty that it was out of her power to harm me consoled me once more, and I pursued the happy tenor of my way, all my time occupied either by the earl’s visits or by my initiation into further gayeties of attire.

The wedding itself was to be a very quiet affair, and as soon as it was over my husband was going to take me into Derbyshire for a week. Then we were to go to the castle, which was being rapidly prepared for my reception.

And so the time flew on, until Tuesday came round once more. To-morrow was to be my wedding day.

To-morrow! Oh, that dreadful to-morrow! Shall I ever forget it as long as I live?

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CHAPTER IV. “There will be no wedding to-day.”

That night I went to bed hoping to the last that Belle would relent and say a kindly word to me. For after all, she was the only sister I had, and I would have been thankful to have been reconciled with her. But she was as implacable as ever, and never uttered one kindly word to me amid all the congratulations of others; although Lady Elizabeth had, I know, remonstrated with her on her unsisterly behavior. My father did not care to interfere in the matter, especially as his sympathies were all in favor of his eldest daughter.

I was up betimes, for we were to be at the church at ten o’clock. I had been sorely exercised about the choice of a wedding dress, as I feared that white would make me look more hideous than usual. But Lady Elizabeth had persuaded me to have a creamy satin, and, somehow, as I surveyed myself in the glass, I was not quite so dissatisfied with the result as I had expected to be. The freckles had found the London atmosphere uncongenial, and had departed, I fervently hoped forever. My complexion too had changed from a muddy hue to a clear dark olive which, though far from being satisfactory, was a considerable improvement on its former condition. My hair, thanks to the skillful treatment of Lady Elizabeth’s maid, had grown much thicker, and looked rather nice than otherwise.

But, in spite of these improvements, I was still an ugly, insignificant-looking slip of a girl, and I lost myself in wonderment at the thought of such great good fortune coming to me. There were to be no bridemaids, only a few personal friends having been invited to church, though there was to be a reception at the house afterward. Belle had at first declared her intention of refusing to accompany us to church. But perhaps the thought that she would, by holding herself aloof, betray to the world at large how deeply chagrined she was, induced her to alter her mind.

Still, when I saw her in the hall, just before we started, I could not account for her unusual appearance. She was positively livid, and shook every now and then in the strangest manner. Both my father and Lady Elizabeth conceived the idea that she must be ill, but she assured them that there was nothing the matter with her.

“But of course one feels a little excited at seeing one’s sister so suddenly raised to splendor,” she said, with a side glance at me which displayed so curious a mixture of fear and hatred that I lost all my good spirits, and was driven to church in an unaccountable state of nervousness and trepidation, which was increased when I saw that the bridegroom and Lord Egreville, who was to officiate as best man, were not here first, according to arrangement.

“I am surprised they are not here yet,” whispered Lady Elizabeth. “Never mind, dear, they are sure to come soon.”

So I thought, too. But for the life of me I could not hinder the tears which came to ease my head and my heart, both of which were in a state of painful tension. By-and-by, I looked up to see Belle’s eyes fixed upon me once more. But what had wrought a change in her again? Her expression was no longer one of fear, but of victory. The hatred was there yet, and that did not surprise me. But how to account for the unmistakable triumph which I had seen manifest itself on her face for a moment?

Like a flash her words recurred to me: “I tell you, it shall not be! I will not have it! Sooner than endure such a humiliation I would—”

Ah! what would she do? What _had_ she done? I asked myself anxiously. Something decisive. Something disastrous to me, I knew, or her face would not have worn that momentary impress of a purpose accomplished. Somehow, through all the weary waiting that followed, my powers of observation and deduction seemed strung to their highest pitch. I noticed that as the moments dragged on without bringing the two gentlemen, Lady Elizabeth and my father grew momentarily more anxious. And I also noticed that Belle no longer looked expectantly toward the door, as every one else kept doing, but that she bore all the appearance of one whose desires were accomplished.

At last, unable to bear the suspense any longer, my father rose from his seat, and, whispering to Lady Elizabeth that he was going to the earl’s temporary town residence, to ascertain the cause of the strange delay, he left the church without further preamble, my acutely attuned ears shortly afterward hearing the rattling of his cab-wheels down the street.

Lady Elizabeth, who sat next to me, put a caressing hand upon my own, and whispered: “Do not look so frightened, child. I do not suppose they will be long in coming now.”

“They will never come!” was my reply, intended only for my comforter’s ears. “They will never come! Something dreadful has happened, and Belle knows it. See how calm and self-satisfied she is now. Remember the state she was in before she came. She vowed that my marriage should not take place. She has made her vow come true!”

Lady Elizabeth cast a startled glance at Belle, but had no time to comment upon my words, for at this moment we heard an excited hubbub near the door, and Marvel, the earl’s valet, came down the aisle with a face which advertised bad news.

“Will your ladyship please leave the church as quickly as you can?” he said to my stepmother. “And take the bride with you. _There will be no wedding to-day._”

“For God’s sake, tell me what is the matter!” she exclaimed. “Something dreadful has happened to my father!”

“An accident has occurred to him,” said Marvel, with an attempt to speak as if it were nothing serious. But his voice broke in the endeavor, and he sobbed forth: “Oh, my poor master! it is too dreadful!”

“What is the matter with him?” cried Lady Elizabeth, fairly shaking the man in the intensity of her excitement and dread. “Tell me at once.”

When I heard Marvel’s reply, I neither shrieked nor fainted. For I had felt sure that he would say what he did.

“He is dead!” he said, and my eyes, flaming and accusing now, at once sought Belle’s, flashing my conviction of her guilt in her face. Under that glance she reeled as if from a blow.

I hardly know what else happened that morning. I went home as in a dream, feeling somehow more sorry for Lady Elizabeth than for myself, and wondering if they would hang Belle when it was discovered that she had murdered the earl; for my mind refused to disabuse itself of a conviction of her guilt, although reason pointed to the conclusion that it was impossible for her to have injured the earl, seeing that she had not seen him, or spoken to him, for twenty hours.

The wedding guests returned to their own homes, there to discuss the sensational interruption to what some of them had voted the most sensational wedding of the season. My father reached home soon after we did, and confirmed Marvel’s story in every detail. The Earl of Greatlands had been found by Marvel, who had grown alarmed when he did not rise at eight o’clock, lying in ghastly rigidity in the bed which he had sought some hours earlier in apparently unusually buoyant health and spirits. A glance convinced Marvel that life was quite extinct, and a moment later he was rousing the household with shouts and cries. Of course everybody came rushing up to the earl’s room. And of course several doctors were summoned at once. But it was only too patent from the very first that there was no hope, and though there was much loud lamentation on the part of the servants, and quite a touching display of sorrow on the part of Lord Egreville, or, rather, the new Earl of Greatlands, it was not of the slightest avail, and the fiat speedily went forth to the world that Lionel, ninth Earl of Greatlands, being in an unusually excited state, owing to his prospective marriage, had succumbed to unsuspected heart disease.

Nearly all the world accepted this explanation of the tragic event which had, at one blow, deprived me of husband, wealth, title, position and influence, and had converted Lord Egreville into the peer he longed to be.

But not for one moment did I believe that the doctors had given anything like a true diagnosis of the cause of the late earl’s death. There is a fashion in everything, even in matters of life and death, and nowadays it seems to be an epidemical fashion with medical men to ascribe every sudden death of which they do not understand the cause to unsuspected heart disease. The explanation is plausible, and, in all likelihood, more often than not correct, although there is a strong element of guess-work about it. Post mortem examinations are horrible and unpleasant contingencies to contemplate, and the feelings of relatives and friends are apt to be cruelly wounded by the bare mention of such a _dernier resort_.

Of course it would have been extremely painful for all parties concerned if an inquest over the remains of the Earl of Greatlands had been suggested; but I never doubted for one instant that such a course would have resulted in the discovery of foul play, such as only I—and one other, as subsequent events proved—suspected.

Suspected! do I say? It was no mere suspicion with me. It was a firm and rooted conviction, that nothing but absolute proof to the contrary could ever dispel. And that proof, since no one broached the advisability of an inquest, was not likely to be afforded me. No doubt there was considerable marvel in some people’s minds concerning my manner of bearing the sudden reverse of fortune which had befallen me, but their opinion troubled me little, and it was not likely that I would occupy the minds of sensation-mongers long after I had been relegated to my former status of insignificant obscurity. Tears did not often come to relieve the aching weight which oppressed me, as I pondered in what perhaps struck those who were unable to gauge my real feelings as a hard and defiant mood.

How could they tell, however, that the grief I felt for the loss of the man who had loved me outweighed my regret for my lost glories, since I let very few words of sorrow escape me? Indeed, I dared not indulge in comments with any one, for I feared lest the horror and loathing which I now felt for my sister and her _fiancé_ should break the bounds in which I had resolved for the time being to entrammel them, and overflow in a torrent of bitter denunciation and invective. I should imagine that there are few girls of stronger passions for love or for hatred than myself, and I sometimes caught myself wondering how I managed to refrain from publicly denouncing those whom I firmly believed to be the deliberate murderers of my dear old earl; for I hated them with a hatred that was consuming in its wild intensity. Yes, my hatred was of fearful force. But I was swayed by an even stronger passion, which held it at bay.

This was my love for Lady Elizabeth, the first being who, since my mother died, had opened her heart to me, and who was now prostrated by a nervous attack, due to grief at the loss of her father, between whom and herself the strongest sympathy had always existed. She had of late admitted me largely into her confidence, and I had gained so much knowledge of her nature that I knew what a bitter blow such family disgrace would be to her as would overtake us all were my convictions shared by others. For my father’s sake I would not have repressed my wild longing for vengeance. For Lady Elizabeth’s sake I could have submitted to make an even greater sacrifice.

But even my great love for her could not induce me to hold friendly intercourse with Belle, or to withhold the fierce glances of accusation under which the new Earl of Greatlands writhed in impotent rage. He saw that I suspected evil-doing of some sort on his part, and he resented my glances at first by frowns of defiance. But somehow, when I continued to maintain steadfastly the antagonistic attitude I had assumed, he grew manifestly uneasy, and even went so far as to presume to address words of sympathy to me, which implied that he imagined me to cherish animosity against him merely because he was occupying the place of the man who was to have been my husband, and suggested that he hoped I would no longer hold aloof from him and Belle as if I thought they had done me an injury.

To this misjudged attempt to induce me to bury the hatchet I vouchsafed no response but a cold stare of contempt and a curl of the lip which spoke volumes. Indeed, so potent was this mute answer of mine that the earl almost ceased to visit our house, and my father was informed by Belle that my violence and ill manners had succeeded in depriving her to a great extent of her lover’s society.

“Dora,” said my affectionate parent to me one morning after breakfast, “I am sorry to observe that you have lapsed into your former ill-conditioned state of selfish ill-breeding. I have made all due allowance for the disappointment you must have felt at being prevented from becoming the great lady you expected to be. But I have noticed with growing displeasure that you are venting your spleen in an unjustifiable manner upon Belle. Certainly, she is going to occupy the position you thought would be yours, but she is doing you no personal injury thereby, for your chances are irrevocably gone, and she was engaged to the present Earl of Greatlands before the marriage between yourself and his father was arranged. It is therefore abominable that you should try to make her life miserable by driving her lover from the house, and doing your best to produce an estrangement between them; and if you continue your present behavior, I shall insist upon your going to live at the Grange until we are ready to leave London.”

Lady Elizabeth was too ill to come downstairs, and was, therefore, not present during this harangue. Otherwise it would probably not have been made; for, even in things that wholly and solely concerned me, my father was wont to show that consideration for his wife, who loved me, that he would never have displayed toward me for my own sake, and he treated me with tolerable politeness when in her presence. But when she was not there, he showed the same unbounded partiality for Belle and the same lack of sympathy for me which had always distinguished our intercourse in the past; and it is not surprising that my lately acquired self-reliance prompted me to retort that I was best aware of the motives of my conduct, and that Belle was not likely to lose her lover through me, since their destiny would henceforth be ruled by the promptings of an evil conscience.

“You miserable little wretch!” exclaimed my father. “How dare you speak to me in that tone? And how dare you cast innuendoes against Belle and Cyril which virtually amount to an accusation?”

“An accusation of what, sir?” I asked, with a calm deliberateness which surprised even myself, and caused my father to stagger as if he had received a blow. And, indeed, he had received such a blow as is to be hoped falls to the lot of few fathers. For my looks and manner, more than my words, had struck him with the sudden conviction that his favorite child was suspected of having at least been accessory to a mortal crime. That the suspicion emanated from the brain of another of his children mattered little to him, for he already disliked me too intensely to feel any heart-pangs on my account. It was quite sufficient, however, to cause him to cast aside the last shred of conventionality as regarded his treatment of myself.

What transpired during the next five minutes I prefer not to relate. There are events in the lifetime of most people which possess either too sacred or too painful an interest for discussion with others. The memory of my last interview with my father awakes in me no emotion but that of resentment at the constant injustice with which he had always treated me, and which culminated on this occasion in my expulsion from his house.

Perhaps he thought that I would not take him at his word, and that at the end of the hour which he had named as the limit of time he would allow me in which to pack up my belongings and rid my family of my presence, I would weepingly sue for mercy and promise to be polite and conciliatory to Belle and the Earl of Greatlands. The mere supposition that I, whose passions were of the strongest, could thus do violence to my feelings, and acknowledge the superiority of two people whom I hated and despised with all my heart, for the sake of retaining a home in which I could never hope to be happy again, still serves to excite my indignation and to provoke me to a feeling of resentment which I would fain repudiate in my calmer moments.

For, after all, my father, poor man, was blinded by his partiality for Belle; and although he fully grasped the deadly import of my unspoken suspicions, he never for a moment doubted his beautiful darling’s goodness, but accepted my attitude merely as a convincing proof of the monstrosity of nature of one to whom had been denied that outward fairness which in his eyes was equal to the strongest proof of inward purity. Thus I sometimes reason, in attempted palliation of his harshness to me. But, somehow, my reasoning has an awkward knack of doubling upon itself and transforming my would-be kindlier leanings into the old imbittered resentment.

My preparations for departure were soon made, although as yet my brain was in too great a turmoil to permit me to make a definite plan for my future guidance. I must remove myself and my belongings quickly. And I must take my leave of Lady Elizabeth without permitting her to be pained by a knowledge of the permanent nature of the estrangement between myself and my family. The latter was a difficult feat for me to perform. But I succeeded in going through the interview in a manner which it pleased me to recall during my subsequent sufferings; for my dear stepmother was spared the pain which would have been hers, if she had realized the anguish of mind which my love for her caused me to hide.

I found her in her dressing-room, reclining on a couch which was drawn up to the fire, the day being somewhat chilly for the time of year. I noted with a sudden foreboding dread the change which the last few weeks had wrought in Lady Elizabeth’s appearance. She was paler, thinner, and altogether much more fragile-looking than when, so short a time ago, she had assisted me to select the trousseau for my own marriage with her father. There was, however, a light in her eyes which had, until lately, been a stranger to them, and which had caused me considerable uneasiness. For it gave me the impression that it had its origin in a feeling deeper even than the grief which an affectionate daughter would naturally feel at the loss of a beloved parent.

Could it be that—oh, no! perish the thought! Why should she be tortured by such suspicions as had fixed their scorpion-fangs in my brain? She could scarcely be so fully convinced of Belle’s capacity for evil as I was, since she had never known her until the glamour of her artfulness and beauty was such as to cause nearly every one who knew her to take a fancy to her. Nor had she such deep reason to distrust one of her own mother’s children as was the case with me. Some hidden sorrow was sapping her life’s strength. But I fervently and sincerely prayed that it might not be the hideous phantom of suspicion which was bidding fair to wreck my own life.

“I have come to say good-by for a time,” I said, speaking with wonderful quietness for one whose brain was in a whirl of stormy emotion. “As you know, things are not as pleasant as they might be between Belle and myself, and father and I have agreed that it will be best for me to return to the Grange for a while. The change will do me good, but I shall be grieved to part from you.”

“But, my dear, we are all going to the Grange shortly,” said Lady Elizabeth, casting upon me a look of anxious scrutiny. “Come here. Kneel beside me, and tell me all about this sudden arrangement. Have Belle and you been quarreling?”

“Belle and I have not been quarreling,” I answered, as I dropped on my knees beside the only woman in the world who loved me, and stroked her white hand between my much less shapely ones. “But you may have noticed that, whether rightly or wrongly, I cannot feel happy in her presence. The earl, your brother, too, seems to be kept away from the house through the antagonism which he and I feel for each other. I feel as if it were wicked to dislike any one nearly related to you. But, indeed, I cannot help it. So you must forgive me, and let me go from you now with nothing but the kindest and most loving words from you; for, believe me, I am more sorely in need of your sympathy than ever I was, and could not bear to think of an estrangement between you and me.”

“Dorrie, I have learned to love you, and I know that you are not likely to form violent antipathies without a cause. I also feel convinced that your treatment of—of—my brother is dictated by the strongest feeling on your part. The nature of that feeling must remain unknown to me, for I dread confirmation of certain thoughts which fill my days and nights with terror. Even should you prove to be actually unjust to my brother, it will make no difference between us. But, if you are really leaving town before the rest of us do, you must promise me one thing.”

“I will promise anything to you.”

“I know your willingness to serve me, and I think I can gauge your love for me, but I am about to exact a great proof of both. Listen. All my life I have yielded to the dictates of family pride. I have been proud of my ancient lineage and unsullied family escutcheon; so proud, indeed, that I did not hesitate to ally myself with one who had once been one of the humblest sons of the people. I never dreamed of the possibility of my being lowered to his family level by marrying him, but was sure that the prestige of my own connections would over-shadow the possible vulgarity of his antecedents. In marrying a wealthy commoner, of whose personal worthiness I felt thoroughly convinced, I hoped to be able to assist my family to a financial position more commensurate with their social status than the aristocratic impecuniosity which had been our lot for many years, owing to the extravagance of my grandfather, who had mortgaged the greater part of the estate. My expectations were fully justified. My husband was kind and generous, and whatever my original feelings toward him may have been, I can truthfully say that his upright nature won my complete loyalty and respect. I was certainly disappointed to find myself comparatively poor after his death. But I have had time to think the matter over since then, and believe that the people to whom he left the bulk of his money must have needed it more than I did. I see that you wonder why I am telling you all this. I assure you I have a strong enough motive, for I want you to realize that I would sacrifice everything to the honor of my family—love, happiness, even life itself. This being the case, can you picture how terrible it would be to me to see even the shadow of public disgrace fall upon our name? That you have ample provocation for a certain course of conduct which would materially affect the interests of my brother, and of your sister, I know. I also know that you return the love I bear you. Let that love outweigh the resentment you feel at the conduct of others. If you are not inclined to spare _them_, for God’s sake spare _me_ the anguish which a disclosure of your—of your suspicions would cause me! You are leaving us for a time. I implore you to have mercy upon an ancient name.”

By the time Lady Elizabeth had got thus far, she was sobbing in uncontrollable excitement, and clung to me with convulsive apprehension. As for me, I was filled with grief at this disclosure of the suffering which my dear one was undergoing. I could no longer doubt that she shared all my own painful suspicions, and that to her distressed state of mind her recent physical prostration was attributable. And I was stabbed by the remorseful thought that I had been the one to originate the dread suspicions which were doing so much mischief. Was it too late to undo the mischief? Could I hope to remove the terrible burden of dread which oppressed Lady Elizabeth? It was doubtful. But there was too much at stake to warrant hesitation on my part, and my course of conduct was instantaneously mapped out.

“Mother,” I said, as quietly as my emotion would permit, “I cannot pretend not to understand the meaning of what you have just said. But, oh! my dear, how could you think I meant all that I implied to you on that terrible morning, when I was beside myself with anxiety and grief? Put away such thoughts from your mind. It is the misfortune, not the fault, of Cyril and Belle, that all the circumstances attending recent events have seemed as if specially guided for their interests. But if even I, who am so great a loser by their advancement, can say that my first suspicions were unjustifiable and wicked, surely you can no longer think them capable of a crime too atrocious for even ready-dyed criminals to think of.”

Lady Elizabeth suddenly raised her head and literally gasped with mingled relief and amazement.

“Is it possible,” she cried, “that I have been tormenting myself needlessly? That I have foully wronged Cyril and Belle? That I have mistaken your dislike to them for a stronger sentiment—that of a thirst for justifiable revenge for a deadly injury?”

“Quite possible. Think. Our dear old earl could not have been expected to live very much longer. He was happy. So happy, that he was naturally excited. Excitement is not good for weakly old people, and the skillful doctors who were summoned were sure to be able to judge of the real cause of death. You cannot tell how much I regret having given audible expression to a cruel suspicion. But you can do as I have done—and repudiate it.”

“Do you repudiate it?”

“Most certainly I do.”

“Thank God for that! You have lifted a nightmare from my mind. Do you know that the promise I wished to exact from you was that you would at least spare me the suffering which a denunciation of my brother Cyril would cause me?”

“A denunciation! Ah, well—I don’t like him. I never shall like him. But as there is nothing to denounce, I can safely promise you, nay, swear to you, that never, so long as you live, will I, by word or deed, do aught that can injure any member of your family or in any way jeopardize its good name.”

“You swear this?”

“I swear it!”

“You have given me a new lease of life, my darling, and by the time we join you at the Grange you will see me almost as vigorous as ever.”

“I hope so. But I must be off now, or I shall not be ready when the cab comes round for me. Good-by.”

“Good-by, my dear. I hope the change will do you good. You too have been drooping lately.”

“I suppose I have. But country air will work wonders, eh?”

Another minute, and I had hurried out of Lady Elizabeth’s room, with breaking heart and whirling brain. Should I ever see her again? To what had I pledged myself? I had, for her sake, forsworn all my dreams of punishing those whom I firmly believed to be the murderers of the Earl of Greatlands. Certainly, I had never intended to invoke the vengeance of the law upon them, for I also had some regard to the maintenance of the esteem in which the two families were held by the world at large. But I had meant to elucidate, by some means, the extent of their culpability, and to show them up to their relatives in all their hideous criminality, leaving them to continue their career stripped of the misplaced love and confidence that had hitherto been so charily bestowed upon me.

Surely this was but a feeble ideal of the punishment due to a great crime which had deprived me of everything that made my life worth living. But I was now bereft of even this small satisfaction, for I had, for the sake of Lady Elizabeth, pledged myself to do nothing that would reflect discredit upon her family. I had even gone so far as to repudiate all my suspicions, and so long as she lived I must do nothing to re-awaken the terrors which had been tormenting her of late.

Does any one doubt that I found this sacrifice of my personal inclinations very hard to bear? or that it was not a real sacrifice to leave my enemies to gloat unrestrainedly at the success of their evil plotting? Or do they imagine that the feelings I harbored were unjustifiable? If so, let them imagine themselves in my position. Let them picture all that I had lost and suffered, and contrast my lot with what would have been my condition had the earl’s life not terminated when it did. True, I had as yet not the slightest practical evidence to support my opinion of the culpability of the new earl and his _fiancée_; but as my personal conviction never admitted the slightest doubt on that score, I found its virtual abandonment all the harder to bear, though nothing would now make me disregard Lady Elizabeth’s wishes. And this I mention, not for the sake of demonstrating my powers of self-sacrifice, but to show how gratefully I reciprocated the kindness of my stepmother, and to show how my heart hungered for love, since the lavishment of a little of it upon me had power to arouse in me a feeling so passionate as to be almost akin to worship.

And now I was about to leave, probably forever, the one being who cared for me. Small wonder that the hard feelings which had hitherto enabled me to keep my composure should break down, and that the quick tears of utter lonesomeness should chase each other down my pale cheeks as I hurriedly gathered my belongings together, and began to pack them in the substantial trunks which had been provided by Lady Elizabeth to hold the trousseau with which her loving liberality had provided me.

“Excuse me, Miss Dora, but my lady has sent me to see if I can be of any use to you. You are packing everything up? Then pray let me do it for you.”

I looked up through my tears, and saw Agnes, my stepmother’s maid, standing ready to relieve me of my task. She was in such evident sympathy with me that at sight of her kindly face my last shred of composure left me, and I wept in such an abandonment of grief as only a feeling of utter desolation can produce. Agnes was frightened at the violence of my emotion and did her best to console me. But I presently became calmer, and thanking her for the trouble she was taking, gladly availed myself of her help in packing my boxes. I felt no hesitation in taking everything that belonged to me, for all I had worth having was due to the generosity of Lady Elizabeth or of her father. To my own father I owed nothing of which I was now possessed, the last item of the unbecoming garments which he had so grudgingly bestowed upon me having disappeared long ago.

In another half an hour I was ready to go, and a few moments later the cab for which I had sent was at the door. As I stepped into it I glanced at the upper windows of the house which was no longer a home for me. I saw Lady Elizabeth, who had come to her window to wave me a smiling good-by. Evidently no one had yet told her that I was permanently banished from my father’s house. I smiled and kissed my hand to her, resolved that her last glimpse of me should be as pleasant as possible. Then my eyes sought the level of the drawing-room windows, to see—what? My sister standing there by the side of the Earl of Greatlands, both of them displaying the greatest delight at my departure, and both of them casting contemptuous glances of triumph on a poor, homeless girl whose presence near them was a continual reproach.

But their malevolence did not get all the satisfaction it sought, for my glance wandered swiftly upward again, and rested on my stepmother’s smiling face, until I was driven out of sight altogether, with such apparent unconsciousness of their presence that they could not know I had seen them. And thus I entered upon the battle of life on my own account.

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CHAPTER V. “A maiden’s fancies.”

In spite of the turmoil of mind under which I had labored since my interview with my father, I had already formed somewhat definite plans for my future.

I had made all my arrangements as if I were really going to the Grange, and had had my boxes labeled accordingly. Thus Lady Elizabeth had not alarmed herself about me, knowing that my comfort would be looked after at the Grange. My father, if he had taken the trouble to make any inquiries about me, would also think he knew whither I was bound; and, even if visited by a faint feeling of compunction on my behalf, would consider that I was as well off in one place as in another.

But since he had ordered me from his house, I meant to take him literally at his word, and had resolved never to cast my shadow within any threshold of his again. I was but ill equipped for earning my livelihood, but I had a certain determination of purpose at whose bidding I was prepared to cast aside all false pride, such as might possibly throw obstacles in the way of my progress. Thus I realized that it might become necessary for me to adopt a means of living perfectly honest and honorable in itself, but which had hitherto never entered into the calculations of a Courtney.

Circumstances had precluded my having many friends to whom I could turn in my present need. But I felt that I could rely upon the vicar of Moorbye and his kindly wife. Both the Rev. Horace Garth and Mrs. Garth had always shown some interest in me and in my doings, and they were among the few people who seemed to be uninfluenced by the physical disadvantages which were such a sore source of trouble to me. It was to the Moorbye vicarage, therefore, that I resorted for aid and counsel in this my great extremity. I felt some trepidation as I was swiftly whirled along in the second-class compartment, for which a sense of the necessity of economizing the money I had at my disposal had induced me to take a ticket. As to what kind of traveling companions I had, it is impossible for me to say, for I was too much engrossed with my troubles to take notice of my surroundings.

“Will the Garths welcome me, and do their best for me; or will, they consider me to blame, and wash their hands of me?”

This was the question that was uppermost in my mind, and I could scarcely refrain from putting it into so many words, when, on alighting at Moorbye Station, whom should I see but the vicar himself welcoming two ladies who had evidently traveled from town by the same train which had conveyed myself.

Leaving the porter, who gave me a respectful recognition, to see after my luggage for the present, I hurried up to the vicar and accosted him.

“Mr. Garth, can you give me a moment’s private conversation? If these ladies will kindly excuse you, I will not keep you long.”

“Why, Dorrie! What brings you here just now?” Mr. Garth exclaimed, as he, fortified by the permission of his friends, walked along the platform with me. “And how do you happen to be traveling alone?”

“My father has turned me out of his house. Until I can find some means of earning my living, I have no one to whom I can go for counsel but yourself. I hoped to have been able to stay with you to-night, but I see you already have visitors.”

“Tut, tut, child! As if that mattered. You would always be welcome. Now, not a word of all this until we can talk the matter over later on. Meanwhile, come and be introduced to my friends.—Oh, I say, Thompson, see that Miss Courtney’s luggage is sent up to the vicarage with the rest.—Ah, here we are! Mrs. Marshall, I am glad to introduce to your notice Miss Dora Courtney, who has kindly come to cheer her old friends up a bit. Miss May, you will be pleased to have a clever companion of your own age while you are down here. Dorrie, these are old friends and near relatives of ours, Mrs. Frank Marshall and Miss May Morris.”

What wonderful power there is in generous good nature combined with tact! Five minutes before I reached Moorbye Station I was among the most miserable upon earth, wondering whether even a civil welcome awaited me. Five minutes after my arrival I was being bowled toward the vicarage in Mrs. Garth’s funny little governess car, and was laughing merrily with the others at the small space at our individual disposal.

“My dear, I have an unexpected pleasure in store for you. Here are our cousins, and here is Dora Courtney, also come to favor us with a visit.”

Thus said the vicar, on our arrival at his home. There was a warm welcome from Mrs. Garth, supplemented by a somewhat boisterous one from Master Vincent Garth, who betrayed great curiosity concerning my outward appearance.

“Do come right into the middle of the hall, just for one minute,” he demanded, “while we have a real good look at you.”

Quite unconscious of the purport of his impetuosity, I laughingly obeyed him, the rest meanwhile standing by in indulgent amusement. For some seconds the child looked at me gravely. Then his face became quickly clouded with disappointment, and, considerably to the surprise of us all, he burst into loud lamentations, of which it was some time before we could gather the meaning.

“We don’t like her any better,” he sobbed. “Susie said Miss Dora was to be a grand countess, and we’ve looked at her, and she isn’t turned grand. She’s just ugly.”

I believe Mrs. Garth hoped and fancied that I had not been able to understand Vinnie’s comments. But I had not found it very difficult to do so, and felt quite as much hurt as if this little stab to my vanity had proceeded from a responsible individual, instead of from an impulsive child, though I strove to hide my humiliated feelings as much as possible.

“What a horrid child,” whispered Miss Morris, as we passed up the fine old staircase, in the wake of our hostess, on the way to the rooms allotted to us. “He ought to be whipped for insulting any one like that.”

For a moment I was tempted to second her remark. Then my better nature prevailed, as I remembered how frank and generous Vinnie really was.

“I do not blame him,” I answered, somewhat soberly, it must be confessed. “Vinnie was only giving way to a natural disappointment, and did not dream of hurting my feelings, I am sure.”

“Now look at the accommodation I have for you, and tell me if you think it will do,” called out Mrs. Garth’s rich voice from a room which she and Mrs. Marshall had just entered. “I have only two spare bedrooms, which open out of this dressing-room,” she continued. “I had intended the large room for Madge, and the small one for May, but I am afraid I must ask two of you to use one bedroom jointly.”

“Oh, how delightful!” exclaimed May, who was evidently a very impulsive young lady. “Madge can have the small room, and Dora and I will sleep in the other. I may call you Dora, mayn’t I? I hate ceremony, and, do you know, I have taken quite a fancy to you.”

Of course all Miss May’s propositions were cheerfully acquiesced in, and we were all three soon occupied in unpacking our dinner-gowns. In the dressing-room a cozy little fire shed its comforting rays upon the pretty furniture and draperies, and gave an aspect of cheerfulness to the place which was by no means reflected in my own heart, though I strove to banish all outward semblance of dejection.

“Fancy a fire in June!” laughed May, as she insisted I should at once call her. “It strikes a Londoner as rather odd; but, do you know, I’m not at all sure that it isn’t quite cool down here. I gather that you are a native of these parts, Dora. Is it a usual thing to need fires in summer?”

“At the Grange,” I replied, as I fastened the dinner-dress which I would rather have been excused from wearing this evening, as I was both tired and overwrought, and would gladly have gone to bed, “at the Grange we seem to need fires all the year round in some of the rooms. Some parts of the neighborhood are inclined to be rather marshy and damp, and as coals are cheap about here, nearly everybody keeps the chills off in the only possible way.”

“Good gracious! I hope it isn’t a fever-and-ague sort of a neighborhood! What shall we do if it is? We are invited down here for a month, but if there is any danger in that direction, I shall betake myself off again. Fancy jerking your limbs first in one direction and then in another, and pulling grimaces at people just at the very moment when you want to be most polite! It’s too awful to think about, and I dare not risk it.”

“Why, you goose,” exclaimed Mrs. Marshall, “you are mixing up fever-and-ague with an entirely different complaint, called St. Vitus’s Dance. It is a nervous affection, not likely to be brought on by a chill.”

“And,” I added, “I don’t think you need alarm yourself about fever-and-ague, either. None of the Garth household have ever been troubled with it, and we have always enjoyed the same immunity at the Grange.”

“The Grange. That’s where you live, isn’t it?” inquired May. “It sounds quite old-worldish and jolly. I can fancy all sorts of spirits and hobgoblins disporting in its interminable corridors and secret chambers. What is the ghost like? Is it a woman dressed in gray silk, and with a heartbroken look on a beautiful face? And does she wring her hands, and cry, ‘Woe is me!’ Or is it a man, looking fierce and vengeful, and dragging clanking chains after him? They are mostly either one or the other, and oh! I forgot, the woman turns into a cat sometimes, and stands mewing over a place where there is a buried treasure. Isn’t it delightful to think of? Dora, you must take me to the Grange, and let me sleep with you one night. Then we’ll watch for the ghost, and perhaps we may solve the mystery of the treasure and become rich beyond the wildest dreams of avarice. And then I’ll write the ghost’s history. Mr. Stoach is great on ghosts lately, but our ghost tale will be much better and much more thrilling than any he has got hold of. I wonder if there are heaps of rubies and pearls and diamonds and sapphires among the treasure. It always is the case. Oh, won’t they be gorgeous! Dora, we must go not later than to-morrow night! I really cannot bear the suspense any longer. What do you say?”

But for a little while I was beyond saying anything, for every time I tried to speak a fit of laughter prevented the utterance of a single intelligible word. Mrs. Marshall, too, though she laughed like one who was more familiar with Miss May’s flights of fancy and vagaries than I was, enjoyed the situation thoroughly.

“That’s the way with May,” she smiled. “You will get used to her by-and-by, no doubt. She pictures the wildest things, and accepts the freaks of her own imagination as gospel truth.”

“But,” interrupted May, whose face looked comically anxious. “There is a ghost, isn’t there? And there is a treasure, isn’t there?”

“I’m afraid that the Grange possesses neither of those hall-marks of antiquity,” I responded, as gravely as I could. “At least, I have never heard of them.”

“That’s just it!” cried May, renewed hope sparkling in her eyes. “Perhaps you are rather nervous, and they didn’t like to tell you about the ghost. But it’s there, all the same. Have you never heard it pattering along the deserted corridors, or tapping gently against the window panes, to attract your attention, or sighing mournfully through the keyhole, or—”

“May, do be less absurd,” pleaded Mrs. Marshall. “You will not be ready to go down with us to dinner if you do not hurry up, instead of standing chattering about rubbish.”

“Rubbish, indeed! Ghosts are not rubbish. Treasure is not rubbish. I wish I had some of the latter now, so that I could have a maid to dress me. Dora, you must, you really must, let us make a start at solving the mystery to-morrow.”

“But there is no mystery.”

“That remains to be seen. At any rate, you will take me to the Grange to-morrow, will you not?”

I was glad that just at this moment we were summoned to dinner, as May’s persistence about visiting the Grange worried me a little, and I did not want to commit myself in any way until I had had the private talk with Mr. Garth that had been agreed upon. So “We will see about it” was all the reply on the subject which May received just then. But it satisfied her for the time being, for she immediately went off into ecstasies of thanks and speculation, which bubbled over even after we had sat down to dinner.

“What do you think?” she exclaimed to Mr. and Mrs. Garth. “I’m in for no end of adventure. Dora has promised to take me to the Grange, to exorcise the ghost and recover the buried treasure. And we’re going to spend our wealth abroad. We shall wear our diamonds at the foreign courts, and I intend to marry nothing under a duke. And my children will be princes, and perhaps—Good gracious! who’s the next heir to the throne of Germany?”

By this time the whole company was convulsed with laughter, which Miss May did not seem to appreciate; for she froze up immediately, cast a withering look of scorn at the callously inappreciative company, and spoke not another word for at least two minutes, at the end of which time her tongue was languishing for exercise.

“And how did you leave Lady Elizabeth?” inquired Mrs. Garth, during this momentary break in the conversation.

“I do not like her present condition at all,” was my reply. “She has fretted a good deal ever—ever since the earl died.”

It cost me much to utter these words quietly, for the mere thought of my poor old lover’s mysterious death always moved me to sudden anger.

“But surely she is not fretting herself ill?” said Mr. Garth, in some surprise. “We know that she was much attached to her father; but, after all, he was really old, and she has many compensating blessings, if I am not mistaken.”

“You are not mistaken,” was my answer. “But Lady Elizabeth’s grief is not selfish or unreasonable, though it may be incomprehensible to all but herself and me.”

“Then you think you understand fully why she is allowing it to prey on her health?”

“God help me, yes!” I cried passionately. “Why do you torture me like this? Cannot you understand that the whole subject is too bitter for me to talk of more than can be helped?”

“Poor child!” exclaimed Mrs. Garth penitently. “Of course it is. I ought to have known.”

“No, no, I am the one to blame. How can you possibly know all that occupies my mind? Forgive my hasty words, they were foolish and unwarrantable.”

Mrs. Garth protested against this last assertion of mine, but I need hardly remark that our party was not quite so cheerful as it had been, and that we were all somewhat relieved when it was time to adjourn to the drawing-room.

“Dorrie,” said Mr. Garth, “can you spare me a few moments before we join the others?”

“Certainly.”

“Then we will have a chat in my study.”

And to Mr. Garth’s study we went. Here, so far as it was advisable for me to do, I confided the details of my history and perplexities to my host, who listened with the greatest attention to all I had to tell him.

“Do you think I am much to blame?” I asked at last.

“I cannot think that you have much to reproach yourself with, as, though somewhat impulsive at times, I believe you to be very fair and just. But, to be candid, I do not quite realize the necessity for all this extreme feeling. That, I suppose, is because I do not know all the workings of the case. Is that so?”

“You are quite right. But I cannot be more explicit than I have been. I have no right to press the subject further on any one’s notice. But I can assure you honestly that I have done nothing of which I need be ashamed, and that it would be utterly impossible for me to live in the same house with my sister again. Not that she need be blamed much, either. But we seem to be naturally antagonistic to each other and are best apart.”

“But what will you do with yourself, child? That you should earn your own living has never been contemplated for you, and you are consequently handicapped at every point.”

“I am not afraid of work. Teaching is not much in my line. I believe I can play the fiddle sufficiently well to perform at an occasional concert, but that would not do much toward keeping me.”

“You might teach the violin—”

“Oh, dear no. I am afraid I should find myself rapping the knuckles of my pupils if they should turn out extra stupid. That wouldn’t do at all. I could go out as amanuensis, or companion, or something of that sort; for I write a neat hand, have more than a smattering of French and German, and am A1 at making Everton taffy and pickled cabbage.”

“Two very indispensable acquisitions for an amanuensis! Still, your other qualifications might fetch somebody. What do you say if we advertise? Would you mind going abroad?”

“Just what I would be best pleased to do at present.”

“Now about Mrs. Marshall and Miss Morris. It will be necessary to tell them something—”

“We will just tell them that I have had a deal of trouble, that I wish to turn my back on the scenes of my trouble for a time, and that while away from home I have a fancy for earning my own living. Such part of my troubles as are already public property you may of course confide to them.”

“Then things are settled so far. I will see about the advertisement being sent off for you, and you must understand that we are by no means in a hurry to get rid of you. You will be more than welcome to stay here until you find something to your liking to do.”

Somehow all this kindness robbed me of the composure which a strict business-like attitude on Mr. Garth’s part might have helped me to preserve. I could only thank him brokenly, and beg him to excuse my appearance in the drawing-room, as I felt fit for nothing but solitude and bed. He readily promised to do what I wished, and at length I felt at liberty to retire for the night. But by this time I had a distracting headache, and though I bathed my forehead with eau-de-cologne, and tried various other infallible specifics, I found it impossible to go to sleep, or even to subdue the pain which tormented me. From below I could occasionally hear the sound of singing, though I was unable to judge whether the vocalist was the elder or the younger of the two visitors.

About twelve o’clock, as judged from the periodical chiming of the little clock in the dressing-room, it became evident that the other visitors were coming up to bed, and I forthwith feigned the sleep which refused to come at my bidding, lest voluble Miss May might expect me to talk with her. The two ladies made as little noise as possible in the dressing-room for a while, and I was just thinking that my bedfellow would soon join me, when I heard the most blood-curdling shriek imaginable, and a white figure fairly flew into the bedroom, jumped into the bed, drew the clothes frantically over her head and ears, and moaned in a state of shuddering terror. My own natural alarm was speedily quenched by the appearance of Mrs. Marshall, bearing every evidence of extreme anger.

“I do believe you are losing your senses altogether!” she exclaimed, giving her sister’s shoulder a vigorous shake, which, so far from pacifying the young lady, only sent her into a fresh paroxysm of terror, and caused her to give a louder shriek than the first. By this time Mrs. Garth had run into the room, to see what was the matter, while at the door could be heard the voices of a startled group of people, composed of the vicar, the cook and the housemaid, all of them wondering what on earth the commotion was about. Inside the bedroom, the tableau was not without interest. Mrs. Garth stood with a lighted candle raised above her head, looking almost as frightened as May seemed to be. Mrs. Marshall was trying to convince her sister that there was nothing to be afraid of. May was steadily trying to bury herself under the bedclothes, and I was sitting up in bed, vainly struggling to wrest my legitimate share of sheets and blankets from the frantic clasp of their unceremonious appropriator.

After a while May grew calmer and popped her head from under the clothes with a sudden jerk, which caused it to come into contact with the chin of her sister, who was bending over her, in an attempt to pacify her. The result was somewhat painful for Mrs. Marshall, and caused May to scream out again in terror.