Chapter 27

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_ CHAPTER XXVII

Anne Valery did not die. Agatha had said she would not; and the young heart's creed was true. It had its foundation in a higher law than that of physical suffering.

After a few days she was able to be moved to her own house, according to her earnest desire; after a few more, the energy of her mind seemed to put miraculous strength into her feeble body.

"I knew you would get well," said Agatha joyfully, as she watched her patient returning to ordinary household ways; only lying down a little more than Anne was used to do, and speaking seldom and low always, for fear of the bleeding at the lungs. "I knew you must get well, but I never saw anybody get well so fast as you."

"I had need," Anne answered. "I have so much to do."

"That you always have. What a busy rich life--rich in the best sense--yours has been! How unlike mine!"

"I hope so--in many things," said Anne, to herself. "But I must not speak much. I talked my last talk with poor Frederick in the bay-window. Where is Frederick?"

"He has been riding up and down the country day after day--he seems to find no rest."

Anne looked sorry. "And we are so quiet here!"

It was indeed very quiet, that sombre house at Thorn-hurst, through whose wintry rooms no one wandered but Agatha, excepting the old, attached servants. Yet this was of her own will. She had been jealous that any one should attempt to nurse Anne but herself. She left even her own home to do it. Yet--the bitter thought followed her ever--this last was small renunciation. No one would miss her there!

During the days when Miss Valery lay ill, the world without had been shut from Agatha's view. Woman-like, she lived within the four walls and beside the sick couch, and had only seen her husband for a few minutes each day, when, though he talked to her only of Anne, his manner had a soft, reverent tenderness, and a troubled humility, as if he began to see a different image in his young wife. She was different, and he too. Neither knew how or when the change came--but it was there.

She did so miss him, when, having taken them safe to Thornhurst, and told her "that she might stay there as long as Anne needed her, but no longer"--ah, that happy "but!"--he went away to his own little house at Kingcombe, and busied himself there for three days.

"Do you think Nathanael will come and see us this morning?" said Anne, looking up from the papers with which she was occupied, towards Agatha, who stood at the window watching down the road.

"Did you want my husband!"

"Oh, no! I can do my business myself now. But I think he will come."

"Why do you think so?"

"Why?--Child, come here." And as Agatha knelt by the sofa, Miss Valery leaned over her, twisting her curls and stroking down the lids over her brown eyes in the babyish, fondling ways which all good people can condescend to at times, especially when recovering from sickness.

"She is a foolish child! Did she fancy nobody loved her? Did she think everybody believed she was wicked (and so she was, now and then, very wicked). Does she suppose nobody sees her poor little goodnesses? Oh, but they do! They will find all out without my telling. It is best to leave things alone."

"You must not speak; it will do you harm."

"Not thus whispering. Nay, lay the head down again. Imagine it only a little bird in the air talking to my child. Some kind of characters--I once knew the like well!"--and Anne's whisper came through a half sigh--"are very proud and jealous over the thing they love. They cannot bear a breath to rest on it, or to go from it to any other than themselves. They are very silent, too; would die rather than complain. They are strong-willed and secret--and as for persuading them to anything against their will, you might as well attempt to cleave with your little hand to the heart of a great oak. You must shine over it, and rain softly on it, and cling close round it, and it will take you into its arms, and support you safe, and hang you all round with beautiful leaves. But you must always remember that it is a noble forest-oak, and that you are only its dews, or its sunshine, or its ivy garland. You must never attempt to come between it and the skies."

Anne ceased. Agatha looked up with moistened eyelids.

"I understand; I will try--if you will stay with me. I cannot do anything right without you."

Anne smiled. "Poor little Agatha! Not even with the help of her husband?"

"My husband! Oh, teach me to be a good wife, such a wife as you would have been--as you may be"--

Agatha felt a soft finger closing her lips, and knew that on _that_ subject there must still be, as ever, total silence. She hid her face, and obeyed.

At length Miss Valery started. "There is a horse coming down the road, I think. Go, look. It may be your husband."

Agatha rose, and ran to the window.

Anne half rose too. "I fancy I hear two horses. Is anybody with Nathanael?"

"Only Mr. Dugdale."

"Ah! well!" There was the slightest possible compression of eyelids and mouth, and Anne resumed her place again. "It is very kind of Marmaduke."

The visitors came in softly. Duke Dugdale was the kindest, gentlest soul to any one that was ill--wise as a doctor, merry as a child. But now--though he strove to hide it--his countenance was overcast.

"It's no use, Anne," he said, after a brief greeting, during which he felt her pulse in quite a professional way, and pronounced it "stronger--much stronger--and too quick almost."

"What is of no use?"

"Brian Harper won't come home! All his abominable, con--yes, I'll out with it--his confounded pride." And Duke tried to look very savage, but couldn't manage it.

"Where is he?"

"Somewhere near Havre; we can't make out where. He will not write. Ask Nathanael."

"I am afraid it is too true," said Nathanael, leaving his wife, to whom he had been talking by the window. "I shall have to hunt him out, and use all my persuasions before he will come home; because he is too proud to return poor as he went out. What shall I say to him, Anne? I shall start to-morrow."

Agatha turned quickly round. Her husband did not see her anxious look--he was watching Miss Valery.

"Tell him, Nathanael, that his brother is dead, and his presence needed in the family. Once make him understand that it is right to come, and he will come. No one was ever more able to do or to suffer _for the right_, than Brian Harper."

Marmaduke shook her hand heartily. "Anne, you are as wise as a man, and as faithful as a woman. If poor Brian were going to be hanged for murder, I do believe-his old friend would find a good word to say for him!"

"Well," said Nathanael, after a silence, "I shall go to Havre to-morrow. You can spare me, Anne? And for my wife"--

Agatha hung her head. A vague dread smote her. She would have given worlds to have courage enough to beg him not to go.

"Havre is across the sea," she murmured. "Surely Uncle Brian would come home in time, if you waited."

Waited! she caught a sight of Anne's bent profile, marble-like, with the shut eyes. Waited!

Agatha crept to her husband's side. "No--no waiting," she whispered. "Go. I would not keep you back an hour. Bring him. Quick--quick."

Could Anne have heard, that she wakened up into such a life-like smile? "No, dear, you must not send your husband away so hastily. Let him sail from Southampton to-morrow; that will do. He wants to talk to you to-day."

Nathanael looked surprised. "It is true, I did; and I told my brother to meet me here this afternoon. Did you know that too?"

"I guessed it. You are doing right, quite right. I knew you would. I knew _you_, Nathanael."

She held out her hand to him, warmly.

"Dear Anne! But you forget--it is not I only who have to do it."

"Not a word! Go and tell her all. Let her be the first to hear it. Away with you! the sun is coming out. Run and talk in the garden-alleys, children!"

Her manner, so playful, yet full of keen penetration, drove them away like a battery of sunbeams.

"What does she mean?" said Agatha, looking up puzzled, as they stood in the hall.

"She reads people's minds wonderfully clear; she always did, but clearer than ever now. It is strange. Agatha, do you think"--

"I think all sorts of things about her--different and contrary every hour. But the chief thought of all is, that you must go to Havre at once. I long for Uncle Brian's coming. How soon can you return?"

"As soon as practicable, you may be sure of that. But you must relax your interest even in Uncle Brian just now; I want to talk to you. Shall we go, as Anne said, into the garden-alleys?"

"Anywhere that is sunny and warm," said Agatha, with a light shiver. Her husband regarded her with that serious pathetic smile which was one of his frequent moods.

"Must you always have sunshine, Agatha? Could you not walk a little while in the shade? Not if I were with you?"

She cast her eyes down, trembling with a vague apprehension of ill; then gazed in the kind face that grew kinder and dearer every day. She put her hand in her husband's without speaking a word. He folded it up close, the soft little hand, and looked pleased.

"Come now, let us go into the garden."

Agatha wrapped a shawl about her, gipsy-fashion, and met him there. It was one of those mild days that sometimes come near upon Christmas, as if the year had repented itself, and just before dying, was dreaming of its lost springtide. The arbutus-trees were glistening with sunshine, and under the high wall a row of camellias, grown in great bushes in the open air, the pride of Anne's gardener and of the whole county of Dorset, were beginning to show buds, red, white, and variegated, as beautiful as summer roses.

"I used to be so fond of this walk when I was a little lad," said Nathanael, "I remember, after I had the scarlet-fever, being nursed well here; and how every day when my brother came, he used to carry me up and down this sunny walk on his back. Poor Fred! he was the kindest fellow to children."

"Kindness seems his nature. I think that if your brother did any harm it would never be through malice or intention, but only weakness of character."

"I perceive," Mr. Harper said, abruptly--"you have no bitter feeling against my brother Frederick."

"How could I? He never did me wrong. Except, perhaps, it was his carelessness that made me poor." Here Agatha hesitated, for she was touching upon a dangerous subject--one so fraught with present emotion and with references to past suffering, that hitherto both husband and wife had by tacit consent abstained from it. There had been no confidential talk of any kind between them.

"Go on," her husband said; "we must speak of these things some time; why not now?"

"Though he made me poor," she continued, "it was probably through accident. And I have no fear of poverty"--how simply and ignorantly she pronounced that terrible word!--"I do not mind it in the least, if you do not."

"Was there any need for that _if_, Agatha?"

"No," she replied, and was silent. Shame and remorse gathered over her like a cloud. She thought of those wicked words she had spoken--words which to this day he had neither answered nor revenged. He had even suffered the smooth surface of daily kindnesses to grow over that gaping wound of division. Was it there still? Did he remember it? Could she dare to allude to it, if only to implore him to forgive her? She would in a little time--perhaps when they were by themselves in their own house, when she would throw herself at his knees and weep out a confession that was beyond all words--words could but insult him the more. There are some wounds that can only be healed by love and silence.

"I think it is time," said the husband--"full time that you heard all, or nearly all, connected with this painful matter. It is mere business, which I will try to make intelligible if possible. You ought not to be quite so ignorant of worldly matters as you are, since, if anything happened to me--But I have provided against almost everything."

"What are you talking of?" said Agatha, holding him tight, with a faint intuition of his meaning.

"Of nothing painful. Do not be afraid. Only that I think it right to explain to you what has occurred to us since our marriage--in worldly things I mean."

"Yes. I am listening."

"Before we married," he continued, distinctly, and rather proudly, "I knew nothing whatever of your fortune--not even its amount. I made no inquiries, interfered in no way, except reading the settlement I signed. The settlement stated that your property was safe in the Funds. This was a"--his brow darkened--"it was--_not true_. The whole had been taken out, contrary to your father's expressed will, and embarked in a mining speculation in Cornwall."

"Those miners whom Miss Valery aided? Was it my money that was wasted at Wheal Caroline? Was it me from whom the poor miner came to seek redress?"

"No; the transaction was more blameable even than that. It was all carried on in my brother's name. He was made what they call 'managing director' of the company: Grimes being solicitor. There were a few shareholders--his clients--widows and unmarried women who had put by their savings, and such like poor people who wanted large interest, and some richer ones, important enough to make public their ruin--for everybody lost all."

"But the poorer shareholders--the widows--the old maids?"

"Ay, there's the pity--there's the wickedness," said Nathanael, beneath his breath. "People tell me such things are common in England, but I would have starved rather than have been mixed up in such a transaction, even in the smallest way, and with property that was bona fide my own."

"And," said Agatha, slowly understanding, "this property was not Major Harper's own. Also, his doing the thing secretly afterwards, and leading you to believe what was--not quite true. I must say it, I think it was very wrong of your brother."

"Don't let us talk of him more than we can help. Remember--a brother, Agatha!"

More light dawning on his strange conduct, his self-command, his secrecy even with her. His wife clung to his arm, her heart brimming with emotion that she dared not pour out. For he seemed inclined to be reserved even now.

"You see," he added, as they walked along, "I have had some few things to try me."

Agatha pressed his arm. Oh that she could break through that awe of him and his goodness, that shame of her own foolish erring self!

"Agatha," he said, stopping suddenly, "the thing that hurt me was my father. If only he had died a month ago, and never heard of this!"

If only now Agatha could speak! But she felt choking. They walked past the windows and looked in. "There is Anne sitting by herself as she used to sit, watching Fred and me in the garden. He was such a handsome, gay young man. I felt so proud of being his little brother. And my poor father--he had not a hope in the world that did not rest on Frederick."

He walked on rapidly back into the shadiest and darkest walk. There he stopped. "Agatha," taking both her hands, and reading her features closely--"Agatha, would you be very unhappy if we went back and lived, poor, in the little cottage?"

"Unhappy? I?"

"I would try that you should not be. I can earn quite enough to give you many comforts. We should not be any more content if we claimed our rights and lived in prosperity at Kingcombe Holm."

"Oh, no!"

"Besides, I am not sure that these are our rights, morally speaking. I think, if my father had lived long enough, he would have undone what he did in a moment of passion, and let the first will stand. This is what I have said to myself, when considering that I have duties towards my wife as well as towards others, and that this would restore what was taken from her. 'An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.' But, Agatha, we would not urge that law?"

"Never! God forbid! And Major Harper was so kind to me when I was an orphan."

"_Only_ kind? Did he never--No, I am getting foolish. Say on, Agatha. Come, sit here; we can talk, and nobody can see or hear us." And he led his wife to a sheltered arbutus-bower. "Well, was my brother so kind to you?"

"He was, indeed. For the sake of that time I would forgive him anything; I have already forgiven him a good deal."

"Indeed? Tell me or not, as you choose; I urge no right to pry into your secrets."

"Oh, don't look, don't speak in that way! Why should I not tell you? I would have told you before, had you asked. It was nothing--indeed nothing. But I was a proud girl, and he made me angry with him."

"For what cause?"

She grew confused--hesitated; the shamefacedness of girlhood came over her. "I will tell you," she said at last boldly. "It is surely no harm to tell anything to my husband:--Major Harper once said to Emma Thornycroft, that he thought I was 'in love' with him."

"Well!"

"It was cruel, it was wicked, it insulted my pride. And more than that--it wounded me to the heart that _he_ should say so."

"Was it--don't speak if you don't like--was it _true_?"

"No," cried Agatha, the blood rushing in a torrent over her face. "No, it was not true. I liked, I admired him, in a free girlish way; but I never, never loved him."

There was a minute's hush in the arbutus-bower, and then Nathanael sank down to his wife's side--down, lower yet, to her very feet. He wrapped his arms round her waist, laying his head in her lap. His whole frame shook convulsively.

"Oh Heaven! You surely did not think _that?_" cried Agatha, appalled.

"I did, ever since the day we were married. I heard him say so in the church.--He repeated it to me afterwards.--And it was a lie! Curse"--

"No, no, forgive him!" And Agatha sobbed on her husband's neck, clasped by him as she never thought he would clasp her in this world.

At last he rose, pale and sad. "There is other forgiveness needed. I have been very cruel to you, Agatha. I had made him a promise, and to it I sacrificed myself and you too, without remorse. But now you see how it was. I could have judged my brother that I loved; I dared not _slay my enemy._"

The only answer was a soft hand-pressure.

"I hardly know what I am about, Agatha,--not even whether or no my wife loves me; she did not when we were first married, I fear?"

Agatha drooped her head.

"Never mind, she shall love me yet; I am quite fearless now." He stood up, holding her tight in his arms, as if daring the whole world to wrest her from him. His whole aspect was changed. It was like the breaking up of an Arctic winter, when the trees bud, and the rivers pour sounding down, and the sun bursts out, reigning gloriously. For a long time they remained thus, clasped together, so motionless that the little robin of the arbutus-trees hopped on to a bough near them and began a song.

"We must go in now," said Agatha.

"Ay; we must not forget Anne, or anybody. One can do so much good when one is happy!"

"I feel so." She rose, hanging on his arm, but trembling still, almost frightened by the insanity of his joy, whirled dizzily in the torrent of his overwhelming love.

"You understand now what I had to say to you! You can guess how I mean to act as regards my brother?"

"I think I can."

"And you will give your consent? Without it I would have done nothing. I would not have taken from my wife these worldly goods, and left her only me and my love, unless she willed it so."

"I do will it."

"God bless her." He lifted Agatha from her feet, rocking her in his arms like a baby. "I always said God bless her! even when I was most wretched--most mad. I knew she was one of His angels--a woman worthy of all love, though she had none for me. I was not very cruel to her, was I?"

"No--no."

"I will never be cruel to her any more. I will smother down all my pride, my reserve, the horrible suspiciousness which is rooted in my nature. I will never doubt or wound her--only love her--only love her."

Breathless, Agatha trembled to her feet again. Her husband stood by her side--calmer now, and radiant in the beauty of his youth. Manly as he was, there was something about him which could only be expressed by the word "beautiful"--a something that, be he ever so old, would keep up his boyish likeness--his look of "the angel Gabriel."

"Let us go into the house now."

They went--those two young hearts thrilling and bounding with life and joy--into the darkening house, the hushed presence of Anne Valery.

She was lying on her sofa, very still and death-like. The white cap tied under her chin, the hands folded--the perfect silence in and about the room--it was like as if she had lain down to rest, calmly and alone, in her solitary house, and in her sleep the spirit had flown away;--away into the glorious company of angels and archangels, never to be alone any more.

But it was not so. Hearing footsteps, Anne opened her eyes, and roused herself quickly. She looked from one to the other of the young people--at the first glance she seemed to understand all A great joy flashed across her; but she said nothing. She as well as they were long used to that peculiarity of nature--which especially belonged to the Harper family--a conviction of the uselessness of talk and the sacredness of silence.

"Has my brother arrived?" said Nathanael.

"Not yet."

"Marmaduke is gone?"

"Yes; he wanted to get up a Free-trade dinner for the welcoming"--here she smiled--"of one whom he says all Dorset will be delighted to welcome--your Uncle Brian. Worthy Duke! It is his hobby, and one likes to indulge him in it."

"Most certainly. And where is the dinner--Uncle Brian's grand dinner--to take place?"

"I persuaded him to change it into a public meeting, and give the clay-cutters--many of them Mr. Locke Harper's former people, and some now old and poor--a New Year's feast instead. You will see to that, Nathanael?" And she laid her hand on his arm with rather more earnestness than the simple request warranted.

Nathanael assented hastily, and spoke of something else.

"I am rather sorry I asked my brother to meet me here; I forgot he has not been to Thornhurst for so many years."

"It is time then that he came," said Anne, gently. "I shall be very glad to see him."

While she was speaking, her old servant entered, with the announcement of "Major Harper."

Just the Major Harper of old--well-dressed, courtly, with his singularly handsome face, and his short dark moustache, sufficient to mark the military gentleman without degrading him into the puppy; Major Harper with his habitual good-natured smile and faultless bearing, so gracefully welcomed, so gaily familiar in London drawing-rooms.--But here?--

He paused at the door, glanced hastily round the old familiar room, with the known pictures hanging on the walls, and the windows opening on the straight alley of arbutus-trees. His smile grew rather meaningless--he hesitated.

"Will you come to this chair near me? I am very glad to see you, Major Harper."

"Thank you, Miss Valery."

He crossed the room to her sofa, Nathanael making way for him. He just acknowledged his brother's presence and Agatha's, then took Miss Valery's extended hand, bowing over it with an attempt at his former grace.

"I hope I find your health quite re-established? This change to your own pleasant house--pleasant as ever, I see"--he once more glanced round it--paused--then altogether broke down. "It seems but a day since we were children, Anne," he said, in a faltering voice.

Agatha and her husband moved away. They respected the one real feeling which had outlasted all his sentimentalism. For several minutes they stood at the far window apart. When Anne called them back, Major Harper had recovered himself, and was sitting by her.

"Nathanael, our old friend here says you wished to speak with me?"

"I did."

"Make haste, then, for I am going to London to-night I have made up my mind. I cannot settle here in Dorsetshire."

"Not if it were your father's wish--his last longing desire?"

"Anne, for God's sake don't speak of my father." He leant his elbow on the table and covered his eyes.

Nathanael and Agatha exchanged looks, then both smiled--the happy smile of a clear conscience and a heart at rest. "Tell him now," whispered the wife to her husband.

"Brother!"

Major Harper lifted up his head.

"My elder brother!" And Nathanael offered the hand of peace, which, in spite of all outward and necessary association, neither had offered or grasped since Frederick's return to Dorset.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that you are my elder brother--my father's favourite always. If he had lingered but another day he would doubtless have proved that, and have done--what I intend to do, just as if he had himself accomplished it. Do you understand me?"

"No!" And Major Harper looked thoroughly amazed.

"Do you see this? which you, either from forgetfulness, or trust in me--I had rather believe the latter--left in my hands on that day." And he drew from his pocket the will which had been read. "You spoke of throwing it into Chancery, and there would be scope for a century of Chancery business here. But I choose rather to respect the honour and unity of the family. Therefore, with my wife's entire consent in her presence, Anne's and yours, I here do what my father, had he lived, would certainly have done."

He took up the codicil, separated it from the will to which it was fastened by seals, and quietly, as if it had been a fragment of worthless paper, put it into the fire.

"Now, Frederick, the original will stands."

Frederick sat motionless. He seemed hardly to believe the evidence of his own eyes. He watched the curling, crackling paper with a sort of childish curiosity. When at last it was completely destroyed, he shut his eyes with a great sigh of satisfaction.

Miss Valery softly touched him. "Major Harper, every brother would not have acted thus."

"No, indeed. Just Heavens, no!" he cried, as the whole fact burst on him, touching his impressible nature to the quick. "My dear Nathanael! My dear Agatha! God bless you both."

He wrung their hands fervently, and walked to the window, strongly affected. The husband and wife remained silent. Anne Valery lay on her sofa, and smoothed her thin fingers one over the other with a soft, inward smile.

"How nobly you both act towards me! and I--how have I acted towards you?" said the elder brother, in deep and real compunction. "I would give half I possess to undo what has been done, and all through my cursed folly and weakness. Do you know that I have lost every penny of your fortune, Agatha?"

"Mr. Grimes told me so lately."

"What, only lately? Did you not know before? Did not your husband"--

"No," she cried, eagerly. "My husband never betrayed you, even by a single word. I am glad he did not. I had far rather he had broken my heart than his own honour."

Anne turned to look at the young face, flushed with feeling; and her own, caught something of the glow, though still she spoke not.

"But," said Major Harper, eagerly, addressing his sister-in-law--for Nathanael sat in one of those passive moods which those who knew him well alone could interpret--"but my honour must not be broken either. I must redeem all I lost; and I will, to the very last farthing. Only wait a little, and you shall have no cause to blame me, my poor Agatha!"

"Nay, _rich_ Agatha," was the murmur that Nathanael heard, as two little hands came from behind and alit on his shoulders, like two soft white doves. He caught them, and rose contented, cheerful and brave.

"No, Frederick, you must dismiss that idea. It is untenable, at least for a long time. My wife and I are going to play at poverty." He smiled, and drew her nearer to him.

"Besides," said Miss Valery, putting in her quiet voice, to which every one always listened now, "I think there are perhaps stronger claims than Agatha's on Major Harper."

"Indeed? Anne, tell me what I can do. Anything," he added, much moved, "so that my old friends may think well of me. Speak!"

She did so, raising herself, though with some exertion, and re-assuming the sensible, straightforward, business-like ways which through her long life of solitary independence had caused Anne Valery to be often called, as Duke Dugdale called her, "such a wise woman!"

"I should like very much to see all things settled in the Harper family. Your sisters are provided for; Eulalie will be married next year; and you will keep Mary and Elizabeth always with you at Kingcombe Holm. Promise that, Frederick."

He assented most energetically.

"There is no need to fear for these," looking affectionately at Nathanael and his wife. "Work is good for young people; and I--or others--will always see that they have work enough supplied to bring in wherewithal to keep the wolf from their door. For the present, they are a great deal better poor than rich."

"Thank you, prudent Miss Valery," said Nathanael laughing.

She responded cheerfully, and then turning to Major Harper, went on with seriousness:

"In other instances, much suffering has been caused by your means; and I would not have it said that any suffered through the Harper family. I have done what I could to prevent this. Matters are mending at Wheal Caroline. Nathanael tells me I shall have--that is, there will be--a fine flax-harvest there next year."

Speaking of "next year," Anne's voice faltered, but the momentary feebleness passed.

"Still, there is one thing, Frederick, which nobody can do but you; and it is necessary not only to save yourself but to redeem the honour of your house. It will not cost you much--only a few years' retrenchment, living with your sisters at Kingcombe Holm."

Again Major Harper protested there was nothing in the world he would not do for the sake of virtue, and Anne Valery. She drew her desk to her, and gave him paper and pen.

"Write here, that you will pay gradually to certain shareholders I know of, the money they lost through trust in your name, and in that of the family. It is hardly a legal claim, or if it be, they are too poor to urge it--but I hold it as a bond of honour. Will you do this, Frederick? Then I shall be happy, knowing there is not a single stain on the Harper name."

In speaking, she had risen and come beside him, looking faded, wan, and old, now that she stood upright, in her black dress, and close cap. Her beauty was altogether of the past, but the moral influence remained.

Frederick Harper took the pen, hesitated, and laid it down. "I do not know what to write."

Anne wrote for him a few plain words, such as a man of honour must inevitably hold as binding. He watched idly the movement of the hand that wrote, and the written lines.

"You have the same slender fingers, Anne, and your writing looks just as it used to do," he said, in a subdued voice.

"There, now--sign."

"Sign!--It is like witnessing a will," said Major Harper, laughing.

"I wish you to consider it so," returned Anne, in a low voice. "Consider it my last will--my last desire, which you promise to fulfil for me?"

He looked at her, took the pen, and signed, his hand trembling; then kissed hers.

"Anne, you know, you were my first love."

The words--said half jesting, yet with a certain mourn-fulness--were scarcely out of his lips, than he had quitted the room. They soon heard the clatter of his horse along the avenue. Major Harper was gone out into the busy world again. He never set foot in quiet Thornhurst more.

The three that were left behind breathed freer--perhaps they would hardly have acknowledged it, but it was so.

"Well, now it is all done," said Nathanael, as he drew closer to the sofa where Anne lay--with Agatha performing all sorts of little unnoticed cares about her. "And now I must think about going."

No one asked him where, but Agatha glancing out of the window, thought, with a shiver, of the dreadful sea curving over into boundlessness from behind those hills.

"I find I must start at once," he continued, "if I would catch the next boat to Havre. It sails from Southampton to-morrow morning. I have just time to ride back to Kingcombe and catch the mail train. No, I'll not let you come home with me," he added, answering a timid look of Agatha's, which seemed to ask, should she come and help him? "No, dear, I can help myself--such a useful-handed fellow doesn't want a wife even to pack up for him. And, possibly, if you were with me, I should only find it the harder to go. It is rather hard."

"But it is right"

"I think," said Anne--they had not known she was listening--"I think it is right, or I would not let Nathanael go. And Heaven will take care of him, and bring him safe home to you, Agatha. Be content."

"I was content," she said, somewhat lightly. It was a strange thing, but yet human nature, that her husband's fits of passionate tenderness only seemed to make her own feelings grow calm. Whether it was the shyness of her girlhood, or the variableness of a love not spontaneous but slowly responsive, or whether--a feeling wrong, yet alas! wondrously natural--it was the mere wilfulness of a woman who knows herself to be infinitely beloved, certain it was that Agatha appeared not quite the same as a few hours before. Affectionate still, and happy, happier than it is the nature of deep love to be; yet there was a something wanting--some strong stroke to cleave her heart, and show beyond all doubt what lay at its core. The heart often needs such teaching; and if so, surely--most surely it will come.

Agatha followed her husband to the hall. He was grave with his leave-taking of Anne Valery, who had looked less cheerful, and had breathed rather than spoken the last "God bless you!--Come back soon." The young man did not again say, even to himself, anything about his journey being "hard."

But as he stood in the hall with his wife, he lingered. Youth is youth, and love is love, and each seems so real--life's only reality while it lasts. No human being, while drinking the magic cup, ever looks or listens to those who have drank, and set it down empty. Be the history ever so sad, each one thinks, smiling, "Oh, but I shall be happier than these."

Nathanael took his wife in his arms to bid her good-bye. She stood, looking down; bashful, reserved, but so fair! And so good likewise--all her girlish whims could not hide her heart-goodness. In her whole demeanour was the germ of that noble womanhood which every good man wishes his wife to possess, that she may become his heart of hearts, the desired and honoured of his soul, and remain such, long after all passion dies. There was one thing only wanting in her--the light which played waveringly in and out--sometimes flashing so true and warm and bright, and then disappearing into clouds and mist. The husband could not catch it--not though his eyes were thirsting for the blessed ray.

"These few days will seem a long time, Agatha."

"Will they?"

Nathanael took the smiling face between his hands, and looked down, far down, into the brown depths of her eyes.

"Do you"--He hesitated. "I never asked the question before, knowing it vain; but now, when I am going away--when"--

He paused, the deep passion quivering through his voice.--"Do you love me, Agatha?"

She smiled--some insane, wicked influence must have been upon her--but she smiled, hung her head in childish fashion, and whispered, "I don't quite know."

"Well--well!" He sighed, and after a brief silence bade her good-bye, kissed her once, and went towards the door.

"Ah--don't go yet. I was very foolish. I never, never can be half so wise as you. Forgive me."

"Forgive you, my child? Ay, anything." And he received her as she ran into his arms, kissing her again tenderly, with a sad earnestness that almost increased his love.

"Now I must go, my darling wife. Take care of yourself, and good-bye."

So they parted. Agatha went in dry-eyed; then locked herself in the library, and cried violently and long. _

Read next: Chapter 28

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