Lieutenant Louisa

by Julian Hawthorne

 

LIEUTENANT LOUISA

By Julian Hawthorne

 

An impecunious lover and a stern and wealthy parent are the adversaries in the old game of a love affair. The opportune discovery, by the hero, of the right of the mollified father to a dormant peerage, and the timely intercession of a providential aunt, bring the struggle to a happy and satisfactory issue. Copyright by the Louisville Commercial.

 

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Some years ago I occupied the set of chambers in the Temple, London, that are generally associated with the names of Pendennis and George Warrington. Four windows look out upon the Garden Court, the Fountain, and the Middle Temple Hall. The rooms are among the pleasantest in London. A Mr. James Burnett (a stranger to me) lived in the apartment ascribed to George Warrington; the remaining five rooms of the set accommodated two friends of mine—Edward Bold, a barrister in fair practice, and his younger brother, a student at Charing Cross Hospital, one of the brightest, cheeriest lads I ever knew. We had a small kitchen in common, and were ministered unto by a couple of venerable ladies—Mrs. Swatman, a globular spinster of about sixty, and her associate and assistant, a widow of mysterious age. Those two excellent personages were a source of vast entertainment to us. Mrs. Swatman would announce, with the greatest gravity: "We want some new shirts," or "We shall need a new great-coat this winter," or "Don't you think we'd better get in some coals?" Speaking of Edward Bold she once said to me, "We've been together seven years now!" I am afraid that Mrs. Swatman regarded me with mild contempt. She had "done for" barristers all her life, and was possessed with the notion that other men were for the most part suspicious characters. Her misgivings regarding me were somewhat allayed by the discovery that I wrote for one or two newspapers and magazines; many of "the gentlemen," as she phrased it, having engaged in similar pursuits. She was, at all events, a faithful, industrious, and admirable old creature, and, compared with the average Temple laundress, a jewel among washerwomen.

Her weekly "book" was a fearful and wonderful sight The handwriting required as much and as serious study as would have qualified me to decipher cuneiform inscriptions with ease; and the theory of orthography affected by the scribe was—whatever else might be said of it—delightfully straightforward and unsophisticated. "Kollurd bred," "stak," "shuger," "corfy," are examples that occur to me of her achievements in this direction; and there was also a mysterious item, which cropped up every now and then, under the name of "faggits." Regarding this last, curiosity and a proper sense of economy conspired at length to make me request an explanation. "Mrs. Swatman," I said, "how is it I burn so much wood? I see half a crown constantly for faggots; surely there must be some mistake!"

"Lor' bless you, sir," was her reply, with an indulgent chuckle at my opacity, "that ain't faggots, it's 'forgets!'"

One afternoon Edward Bold came into my room to ask me whether I cared to go to some private theatricals. Now, I hold private theatricals to be little better than public nuisances; nevertheless, after duly considering the possible contingent advantages of the enterprise, I decided that go I would; and in the course of a day or two I received a card from "Lady Barracoot, at Home Thursday, June 19th;" and when the Thursday in question came around, I presented myself at Lancaster Gate.

The performance was to consist of an opening farce—its name has escaped my memory—and Mr. Arthur Sketchley's comedy, "How Will They Get Out of It?"—and that I shall never forget. The farce bored me; the actors were imperfect; and in looking forward to the comedy which was to succeed, I rapidly came to the conclusion that it would be anything but a success, and that "they" never would "get out of it." But there is an end to all things, even to a farce played by amateurs; and after some tiresome delay, which an exhibition of pyrotechnic pianoforte-playing rendered still more intolerable, the curtain rose on the comedy.

I was familiar with the piece and remembered too well the original cast—Charles Matthews and his wife, Mrs. Stirling, Frank Matthews and his wife, Montague and Miss Wentworth. Indeed, I had been present at the rehearsal when the piece was originally produced at the St. Dennis Theatre in 1864, and learned every bit of "business" by heart, so that my forebodings on the present occasion were gloomy; and they were in a large measure justified. The piece was for the most part indifferently played; but one assumption was, as a well-known dramatic critic would say, "adequate." The part of Jessy Ashton, originally taken by Miss Wentworth, was brightly and intelligently rendered by a young and pretty girl whose name, the bill informed me, was Mary Bruce. A fair Scotch lassie she was, with a mass of auburn hair shot with gold; a broad, fair brow giving promise of good sense; dark eyebrows and eyelashes and serene blue eyes through which looked forth the soul of a frank and fearless maiden. The nose was small and straight, the upper lip short and sensitive, the complexion bright, and the whole woman wholesome, lightsome, and delightful. She seemed to me, in fact, the perfection of all that is feminine; and I made up my mind that when the performance was over I would seek an introduction to her, and I lost no time in asking Edward Bold whether he would act as my sponsor.

"Delighted, my dear fellow," was his reply; "I've known her ever since she was so high, and she's as good as the gold in her hair. And, by the by," he added, as he took my arm to lead me to her, "her father is Campbell Bruce the Q. C., a widower with two children; his chambers, you know, are on our staircase—first floor."

The necessary formalities were then gone through with, and in the course of the evening I had several opportunities of talking to Miss Bruce; and I succeeded (much to the disgust of several ineffective young whipper-snappers) in taking her down to supper. It turned out that her brother, who was in the navy, had once stopped a few days with me on my station in New Zealand—for I had been the victim of a disastrous speculation in sheep in that colony, and had succumbed, with hundreds of other unfortunates, to the hard times which commenced in 1868 and culminated in 1870. I may remark in this connection (though I said nothing about it to Miss Bruce) that, with the exception of a life interest in a sum of £5,000, I had lost every farthing I had in the world. Later in the evening I was presented to Mr. Bruce, a massive, stern-looking man of perhaps fifty-two. He had a judicial air with him which gave one the impression that his life had been passed in weighing evidence and finding it wanting. But when he found that Bold and I were old friends, and that his son had been my guest at Ruataniwha, he was good enough to ask me to call on him in Inverness Terrace.

"Come some Sunday afternoon," he said; "we are always at home then, and I shall be glad to have some conversation with the man who was hospitable to my boy in New Zealand."

I need not say that I felt sincerely grateful to Carnegie Bruce for having smoked my tobacco and drank my whiskey in the antipodes. I accepted Mr. Bruce's invitation, and a few Sundays afterward I went to Inverness Terrace. The afternoon passed away rapidly, and I was requested to stay to dinner. You will not be surprised to hear that I did so. The fact is that (as Bold had been thoughtful enough to tell me beforehand) Mr. Bruce had a foible. He had for years been endeavoring to establish his claim to the dormant peerage of Dunedin; and once mounted upon that hobby it galloped away with him. I was so successful in my encouragement of his amiable weakness that he took quite a fancy to me, and was pleased to declare that I was a man of sound sense and that it was a pity I had not studied for the bar. After dinner we reorganized the navy, reconstructed the ministry, settled the French question, placed the army on a proper footing, and solved the Irish land problem, all in the space of five-and-forty minutes—the quickest time on record—and then I cordially acceded to Mr. Bruce's suggestion that we should join Miss Bruce in the drawing-room. The worthy gentleman retired into a corner to read a book, and I was left to make myself acceptable to Miss Mary.

I flatter myself that few men are greater adepts than I at the twin arts of being agreeable or disagreeable. I soon discovered that my lovely hostess was by no means devoid of a certain spice of humor. In truth, she was overflowing with spirits and gayety; and I left the house that night as far gone in love as a man may be. On my walk to my chambers I made up my mind that Miss Bruce was a girl who, under any circumstances, could be trusted to "run straight;" that her past was an unsullied page; that she was as innocent as she was pretty and as clever as she was innocent.

Of course I had determined, long before I ever heard of Mary Bruce, that under no circumstances would I allow myself the luxury of falling in love. But love, unfortunately, is like measles; it comes and it goes, and there is no help for it. Accordingly I fell madly in love with Mary Bruce; we met at parties; I dined occasionally at Inverness Terrace; and at last, one day, at a water party, I came to grief; all my stern resolutions vanished—and I proposed.

We had gone by the G. W. R. to Henley, a party of eight. There were Miss Bruce and her aunt, a married sister of Mr. Bruce, two daughters, the two Bolds and myself. He had arranged to lunch at the Red Lion, Henley; thence to row leisurely to Marlow, dine at the Complete Angler, and go home by the last train. It was a baking July day, tropically hot, but bright and glorious, reminding me of Honolulu or Levaka more than of muggy England. After lunch we paddled quietly down through Hambledon Lock to Medenham, by which time the Bolds had developed strong, if not original views as to shandy-gaff. We strolled about the abbey, and made much fun of its bogus character; had a game at romps with the pretty children of mine host of the Ferry Hotel, and then rowed on to Henley Lock, which was then in a disgraceful state of disrepair. The Bolds went off to pay a flying visit to some friends of theirs who lived at the mill house, close to the lock. While the water was running off, Mary Bruce, who was in charge of the hitcher aft, allowed the boat to come too close to the sill, and suddenly the stern was lodged on the top of a broken pile.

In ten seconds the boat would have been overturned, and we should have been shot into the lock. But Mary retained her presence of mind. With a vigorous shove of the hitcher she pushed the stern of the boat off the pile, and by the greatest good luck we avoided what must have been a most serious catastrophe. Even as it was, we got athwart the lock and nearly came to grief. This episode has been thus particularly referred to because it was the one that settled me. I made up my mind as we rowed down to Bisham after exploring the backwater at Warleyford and the tumbling bay at New Lock, that I would that day ask Mary to be my wife. That she liked me I felt sure; but whether her liking had developed into love, whether she would entertain my proposal, or whether my proposal would entertain her, I knew not. But I was fully resolved to put the matter to the proof; I would risk it if I could get the opportunity to do so—and opportunities can be manufactured.

We landed at Bisham to look at the church and inspect the fine old monuments of the Holy Family and others, for which Bisham is celebrated. Then I proposed that the Bolds should scull Mrs. Macfarlane, who was tired, down to Marlow while I took the girls through the quarry woods to the point, and back over the meadows to Marlow. L'homme propose. He does indeed! I, for example, proposed to ask Miss Bruce to be my wife, and that was the only proposition that came off. Whether Mary had given the Macfarlane girls a hint, or whether those young ladies (how I hated them!) acted of their own volition, I do not know; but they were limpets. Or rather, taking into consideration their lanky and flaccid structure, they were barnacles. They stuck to us with the pertinacity of ungorged and unsalted leeches, and gave us no chance of a moment's uninterrupted talk, until at length they landed us at the Complete Angler. Fortunately the dinner was a good one, or my faculty for making myself unpleasant would have been abundantly exercised.

After dinner I persuaded the Macfarlanes and the Bolds to go up to the town to see the house where Shelley lived, and where he was visited by Byron. Mary had once before made a pilgrimage to that shrine, and so had I. Mrs. Macfarlane's view inclined more to forty winks than to poetical associations, and she at last fell asleep in her arm-chair. Mary and I sat on the lawn for some minutes and watched the passing boats. Neither of us seemed to have many remarks to offer. Finally I asked her whether she would cross the road and inspect Mr. Borque's garden. She consented with some diffidence.

"It isn't right to leave aunty," she said. "What will she say if she wakes up and finds that we are gone?"

I felt inclined to say, "Oh, bother aunty!" Instead of that I explained that five or six minutes would serve to walk around the garden, so that our absence was not likely to be noticed. We crossed the road and entered the inclosure.

When a man does a thing for the first time in his life he is apt to be awkward about it. For the life of me I did not know how to begin. I was as nervous as a recruit under fire for the first time; my heart thumped away as if it didn't like the business, and was anxious to get out and away. What I did possessed, at all events, the charm of unconventionality.

I grasped Mary's hand suddenly, and before she had time to utter a word I said, looking her staight in the face:

"Mary, will you give me a kiss?"

She blushed violently; she returned my point-blank look, and what she saw in my eyes apparently satisfied her, for in a moment I was hugging her to my breast, and sealing our troth with a loving kiss.

How happy I was! Happy? I felt as if Heaven itself had been opened to me. And she?

"Charlie," she said (I had always hated the name before, but how sweet it sounded now), "Charlie, my darling! I never thought you—do you really love me?"

One more kiss—the last I got for many a long and weary day—and we went back to the hotel. The others had not returned. Mrs. Macfarlane was just awake.

"I should like some tea, Mary," «he said.

Tea! Ambrosia—nectar—was more in my way. I could scarcely realize that Mary cared for me. But I was happy beyond measure. As to the future—what was to come of it all—a fico for the future! How we got back to town I have no recollection. A four-horse coach, perhaps, or a balloon was our vehicle. All I know is that Mary was sitting opposite me, her blessed eyes ever and anon meeting mine and giving me assurance of love. The Bolds and I saw them off at last in Mrs. Macfarlane's carriage, and then we returned to the Temple. I must have been very incoherent.

"What jolly girls the Macfarlanes are!" Edward remarked.

"She is lovely!" I replied.

"She? Who?"

"Why, all of them," I ventured.

And then, in fear lest I should betray myself, I suddenly remembered an appointment at the Lotus Club, and went off on a long walk. Involuntarily I found myself in Inverness Terrace, gazing up at the drawing-room windows. They were up, but there was no sign of Mary. I trudged away down the Bayswater Road, across Addison Road to Kensington, and so back to the Temple. I shut myself into my room, lighted my lamp, and tried to read.

Suddenly a grim shadow crossed my mind. Mr. Campbell Bruce. What would he say to all this?

He was reputed to be wealthy, and I knew he was proud. What would he think? Was it likely that he would give his daughter to a man whose miserable income was but two hundred and fifty pounds a year and what he could earn as a guerilla of the press? Was it likely?

It was not. No use blinking the fact. It was improbable in the highest degree. Expectations, even, I had none. The only person who was at all likely to leave me any money was my aunt Johanna; and she, good soul, was as tough as a grenadier and as long-lived as a parrot. Her personal appearance, moreover, reminded one of that beaky fowl. Out of a clear three thousand a year she spent about five hundred, so that her accumulations must, I knew, be large, and her income increasing year by year. But would she make me an allowance? that was the question. Or would she—— But no! I knew the old lady too well. She was as tenacious of her money as a dog of a bone, and as proud of it as a cook of her copper. Once, when I was in a scrape at Oxford, I had applied to her. Her reply was characteristic.

"Villa Campanare, Nice.

"My Dear Charles: If I were to accede to your request for £30, I should be doing you a great wrong. By having to get out of your scrapes yourself, you will learn to avoid them and acquire self-reliance. Thirty pounds, my dear Charles, is a sum of money. Avoid debt and you will be spared what cannot but be painful to you. Read the inclosed.

"Your affectionate aunt,
"Johanna."

The "inclosed" was some horrible trash about a man who came to London with twopence and died with a million. As to £30 being a sum of money—what did she suppose I imagined it to be—a sack of potatoes?

Well, the recollection of this incident failed to dispel my present misgivings, and that night I wrote to Mary telling her that I would see her father at once, but that, until I had done so, she was to keep our engagement secret, and I went to bed with despair at my heart.

I tossed about all night, and had but short and fitful intervals of sleep. In the morning I was in a high state of fever, varied by fits of shivering, and pains all over me. I sent a telegram to my doctor and then went back to bed.

For three months I was laid up with a dangerous rheumatic fever. In the early stage I had found it necessary to take Edward Bold into my confidence, and he had regularly conveyed tidings of me to Mary, who, poor girl, suffered grievously for my sake. Her messages gave me heart and strength, but my prostration was great and the paroxysms of pain frequent; at last the muscles of the throat were affected, and I could neither eat, drink, nor sleep. Laudanum was administered in large and increasing doses, and brought me some temporary relief, but I overheard my dear friend George Vivian, my doctor, say one day: "If he is not better in forty-eight hours, it is all over with him."

My aunt Johanna was not the sole possessor of the parrot constitution. It ran in the family. Therefore, near to death as I was, I made up my mind that I would pull through.

I began to mend; slowly but surely the improvement went on, and in due time I became so far convalescent as to be able, with assistance, to get from one room to another. A new trouble now loomed in my horizon. On looking into the state of my finances I made the unpleasant discovery that, after settling various liabilities incurred by my illness, I should be left with a balance of not more than ten or twelve pounds at Praedi, out of which there would be a heavy chemist's bill to pay. My dividends were not due until December, and I was debarred from forestalling them by the provisions of the will under which I obtained them, and which forbade me to "assign, charge, or encumber" the property under penalty of seeing it depart into the clutches of a distant connection. Not without much reluctance, therefore, I resolved to write to my aunt Johanna and ask her to come to my assistance. After I had done this, a feeling of conditional resignation came over me. I had swallowed my pride; and such a dose, after all the other nostrums I had been taking, ought to bring about some improvement in my unlucky state.

The same day on which I wrote this letter to my aunt I was enlivened by a call from Mr. Bruce. He had looked in on me several times during my illness, and had made the kindest inquiries as to my progress. He now sat down on the other side of my fireplace, and we had a long conversation about genealogies, and before he took his leave I had become tolerably well acquainted with the story of the famous Dunedin peerage, and with the efforts Mr. Bruce had made during twenty years past to make good his claim to the title. One link, however, and only one, was still wanting to the completion of the chain of evidence forged with so much perseverance. It was necessary to prove the marriage of Dalrymple Bruce and Tryphena Maddams, a runaway couple who were supposed to have been united in matrimonial bonds somewhere about the year 1794. Their marriage certificate had been advertised for, and a large reward offered for it in every newspaper in the three kingdoms. Hundreds of registers had been personally inspected; but the much-desired entry had never been discovered. Gradually, as I listened to my visitor's narrative of his baffled but still hopeful efforts, something of his own enthusiasm and eagerness in the pursuit communicated itself to me; probably I was in a more than usually impressionable state, owing to the bodily weakness caused by my illness; but, at all events, when I put my hand in his at parting, I felt that I sympathized with him heartily, and that, had it been in my power, I would have assisted him so far as in me lay.

"And who knows but I might be able to assist him?" I said to myself after he had gone. "There are more reasons than one why it would be desirable to put Mr. Bruce under an obligation. Mary! Mary! what if the discovery of your great-great-grandmother's marriage register were to bring about the creation of our own! O Mary! I wish I might see you now! I shall never be quite my own man again until the light of your sweet eyes has shone on me once more. Ah, me! if it were possible! well, and why not?"

This last thought made me sit upright in my chair and draw quicker breath. Why not, indeed? I never did have overweening respect for the proprieties and conventionalities of Mrs. Grundy. Mary's face and figure, Mary's voice, and Mary's eyes as I had seen them that last happy day at Marlow haunted me ever. It was really intolerable that we should be kept apart. I could not muster up courage to speak to her father now, since my worldly prospects were even more unpromising than before; and since moreover, the long sickness which had reduced me to a skeleton had taken out of me the greater part of such audacity as I had ever possessed. No, I could not speak to Mr. Bruce, though it was certainly my duty to do so. But, after thinking over the matter all night and part of the next day, I did something which, from one point of view, requires more audacity still. I wrote to Mary. I wrote her a long, passionate letter, begging her to come to see me if only for five minutes. It was wrong but I could not help it. Mrs. Crump posted the letter.

The following day I sat beside my fire in a state of feverish expectation. Every knock at the door sent the blood flooding to my heart, and of course every one who had any business message or parcel for me must needs choose that day of all days to call. But at three o'clock precisely Mrs. Swatman came in with a mysterious air.

"A lady to see you, sir."

At last! Oh, it was too much happiness to be true! With the help of my two sticks I raised myself up and hobbled to the door in an ecstasy of delight. The green baize screen was pulled aside, and in a moment I was in the arms of—my aunt Johanna.

 

I must confess that I wished my aunt Johanna at Nice, or even in some warmer climate; and my welcome of her (when I had realized the situation) was as unenthusiastic as if she had been a pressing dun or a defaulting washerwoman. Nevertheless, my aunt turned up trumps—turned up, in fact, what is styled a "regular fistful." Her address and behavior were tender and even caressing to a degree that I had never expected from her; she had compassion for my past miseries and sympathy for my present condition. She quietly upbraided me for having kept her so long in ignorance of my misfortune; she declared that I ought to have some one who belonged to me to look after me, and, in short, she showed herself in a light so different from that in which I had heretofore regarded her that I took shame to myself for the hard thoughts that I had sometimes harbored against her.

"And now, my dear Charles," said this excellent woman, after about half an hour's conversation, sitting up and feeling in her pocket, "and now I have brought you one or two things which I am sure will do you good. Dear me! where is it? Oh, in my reticule, of course! No, don't get up, Charles; I prefer to get it myself. There! What do you think of that?"

"It looks like a—like a raw potato," I said, after examining the object which she smilingly handed to me.

"A kidney potato—yes; and I am certain it is one of the right sort, for I got it out of my own garden. I got it especially for you."

"That was very good of you, aunt," I replied, in as cordial a tone as my surprise would permit me to assume. "Is it to be roasted, or am I to eat it boiled?"

"Eat it! Good gracious Charles, do you suppose I brought you that potato to eat?" cried my aunt in undisguised astonishment. "It is a kidney potato, I tell you—a sovereign remedy against rheumatism! You are to keep it in your pocket night and day." (I infer from this that my maidenly relative was under the impression that men slept in their trousers, and possibly that they were born in them.) "If you had only applied to me in time, you see, you would have been spared all this dreadful illness. But put it in your pocket. It will at all events secure you against the future."

And hereupon my aunt went into a long disquisition on the merits of the kidney potato from a medicinal point of view, and recapitulated innumerable cases of cures effected by it which had come under her own personal observation. At least I believe she talked about these things, but truth compels me to admit that I listened to as little of it as I could. Finally, however, I became aware that she had paused, and was searching in her reticule for something else. This time she produced a check-book.

I now regarded her movements with a respectful interest which was no longer feigned. What a methodical woman she was, to be sure! I am convinced that nobody ever took so long a time to perform so simple a function as my aunt Johanna took to write that check. She got her spectacles out of the case, rubbed them with her handkerchief, settled them and resettled them upon the lofty bridge of her aristocratic nose. Then she carefully opened the magic volume in which indefinite wealth lay latent, and heedfully smoothed down the slender pink leaves. With suspicious scrutiny she selected a pen from among the bundle which I placed at her hand, dipped it cautiously in the ink bottle, squared herself at the table, with straight back and corrugated brow, and so began to trace the few but pregnant words that were to place me on even terms with the world.

It was precisely at this juncture that a brisk knock came at the door, and the door was opened. I felt that I turned pale. But, no—it was not Mary; it was the doctor. He was just the man for the occasion—quick-witted, audacious, and intrepid. My horizon cleared again. I saw my way.

I presented him to my aunt, whispered a word to him aside, and he sat down. After exchanging half a dozen general remarks he turned to me and exclaimed briskly:

"Now, my dear boy, are you ready?"

"Quite ready, doctor."

"Madame, I presume, has no objection?" continued the doctor, as he extracted an imposing-looking case of instruments from his pocket.

"Eh?" said my aunt, settling her spectacles inquisitively.

"Only the examination," returned the doctor, "a mere nothing; now, then, my boy, off with your shirt—quick!"

"Eh!" cried my aunt, jumping up in dismay, "his shirt?"

"Oh, the back and chest will, I think, be sufficient; if we need to look at the legs we can——"

"Gracious goodness!" gasped my aunt, reddening to the forehead, "let me go—show me the way out at once—I never could think of being present at—my dear Charles, why didn't you tell me? how could you suppose——"

"This way, aunt, this way," said I, with difficulty maintaining my gravity, while at the same time taking shame to myself for the ruse I was playing off on her. "A thousand thanks to you, aunt; it is unfortunate that the interruption should have come at this time; but doctors, you know——"

"I understand, of course," she answered, pressing through the doorway and venturing to face me only when she was on the landing outside. "And I was going, at any rate, in a moment, and I only wanted to tell you, my dear nephew, that—that I am your aunt, and that I intend—that is, that you may expect—I mean, that you need not fear—in short, it will be all right! And so, my dear, good-by and God bless you!" And with this the best of relatives kissed my unworthy cheek and hurried down-stairs.

"Fine old lady, that!" observed the doctor, when I hobbled back to the room.

"The world does not contain her equal—for her age!" I replied. "And now, my dear doctor, all I have to ask of you is to follow her example."

"What! write you a check for £50!" exclaimed he. "Not me!"

"I expect nothing so sensible of you. What I want is to be left alone. Solitude is to be my medicine for this afternoon."

"Oh!" ejaculated the doctor, smiling with an arch twinkle in his eye. "Well, I'm off; but mind you, no more aunts of an age, or I'll order you mustard-plaster and tartar-emetic!" And, with this threat and a laugh, he took his leave.

"And now," said I to myself, sinking back in my chair, "of course Mary won't come, after all."

But I was mistaken; she did come, and she came in the most natural and unsensational way in the world. She came—she was in the room—for a moment she was in my arms, and then all my doubts and troubles were forgotten, and I felt as if our long separation had been but a weary dream.

"My own darling Mary!"

"Charlie, my love! how thin you are! I am so glad!"

"That I am so thin?"

"O Charlie——"

Well, we were very happy. I was almost afraid to love her as much as I did, and yet I knew that I could never love her as much as she deserved. We were together and we were happy; that was all that either of us knew or cared. But at last Mary decided that I must light the gas.

"For," said she, "how can you pretend to say you love me if you cannot see my face?"

"I do not love you for your face."

"Do you really love me?"

"Love you! I—O Mary!"

"But I am so stupid."

"You must be the cleverest of women."

"Why?"

"Because you can find something worth loving in me."

"Light the gas, sir!"

"First, then, one more. The matches are on the mantelpiece; you can light the gas yourself, if you will. I wash my hands of it."

The gas was lighted. Soon after the Middle Temple clock struck five in its most aggressive tone.

"My father is dining at the Freemasons' Tavern to-night," said Mary, "and he is going to dress at his chambers: so I can stay ever so long yet—if you will let me."

"If you stay here till I ask you to go, Mary, you may make up your mind to leave as an old woman."

The words were scarcely out of my mouth when I heard the outer door open. There is a series of four doors between my rooms and the outer passage. A heavy footstep sounded between the first door and the second. Mrs. Swatman or her assistant imbecile had evidently neglected to safeguard the approaches, and here was some intruder forcing himself in.

"Mary," I cried, "for Heaven's sake—into my bedroom—quick!"

She appreciated the urgency of the occasion and vanished. Just as the door was closing upon her, in walked her father.

"Come, I'm glad to see you looking so much better," said he in a hearty voice. "Why, you've quite a color!"

Not a doubt of it. In fact I felt as though my face might be the tint of a tomato. Luckily Mary, when she came in, had not taken off any of her things except her sealskin jacket, and that she had snatched up and carried away with her when she escaped.

"Thank you. Yes, I'm getting better," was my reply.

"That's right! I'm very glad to hear it. I've something to talk to you about—something I think you can do for me when you're able to get about, which will give you what I'm sure will be beneficial to you—change of air and scene."

Then, talking a chair beside the fire (the very one in which Mary had just been sitting), Mr. Bruce proceeded to unfold his plans. He must have thought that my illness had rendered me extremely fidgety, for it was with the greatest difficulty that I could keep still, or even pretend to be listening. I was on tenter-hooks for poor Mary. The weather was cold, and there was neither fire nor fireplace in my bedroom. I knew, moreover, that she would be able to distinguish the tones of her father's voice, and the discomfort and distress of her position worried me so much that every other consideration was dwarfed in the comparison. All this, however, did not prevent Mr. Bruce from stating his belief that the marriage of Dalrymple Bruce and Tryphena Maddams had been solemnized in the county of Berkshire, and most probably in the vicinity of Abingdon. At any rate, the information gained led to the inference that the ceremony in question had taken place at a church in one of the riverside towns of Berkshire. His proposal to me was that I should undertake to make a thorough search among the parish registers, Mr. Bruce paying all the expenses and compensating me for my labor at the rate of a guinea and a half a day.

While he was talking, Mr. Bruce had involuntarily taken up an old woollen glove, which I kept on the top of the coal-box by the fireside to put on when shovelling out coal for the fire. It was as grimy as Mrs. Swatman's hands—the ne plus ultra of honest dirt; and before I noticed what he was about, his fingers were as soiled as those of a finance agent.

"Oh, what a nuisance!" exclaimed Mr. Bruce. "Dear me! I'll just step into your bedroom and wash." He rose and approached the door.

"No! No!" said I hurriedly, and laboring out of my chair under the influence of abject terror. "No! Here! Let me fetch the basin in here for you!"

"Nonsense; couldn't think of troubling you; know my way!" he answered amicably, motioned me back to my seat with one hand, while he opened the door with the other, and before I could say or do anything further to prevent him Mr. Bruce had entered the bedroom.

If a benevolent earthquake would kindly have made a meal of me at that moment how grateful I should have been. In a state of mind which I do not care to analyze I waited the inevitable explosion. A long second passed away—an everlasting minute—and there was no sign. What had happened? Could Mary have contrived to hide herself anywhere? I tried to reflect. There was a large, deep cupboard in the room that served as a wardrobe. Surely Mary had not had the presence of mind to conceal herself there? Yet it was the only place I could think of into which she could have retired; there was no other solution of the mystery. In a few minutes Mr. Bruce returned with clean hands and unruffled demeanor. Manifestly he had seen nothing and suspected nothing. He resumed the conversation where he had left it off, and after some further talk it was agreed that I should start for Berkshire as soon as the doctor would authorize me to leave the house; first, however, calling on Mr. Bruce to receive his written instructions and a check on account for whatever I thought I should need. Then, at last, my benefactor took his leave, and I hailed his departure as I should that of the gout. I hastened to the bedroom.

"Mary!" I called. "Mary!"

No answer. I searched the cupboard.

She was not there.

I looked behind the curtain, in a forlorn hope that she might have hidden herself there. No Mary. By what magic had she disappeared? I went down on my hands and knees and peered under the bed. Two overland trunks and a boot-jack, but still no Mary.

I summoned Mrs. Swatman.

"Miss Bruce—where is she?" I demanded.

"Do you mean the lady, sir?"

"Yes—the lady—Miss Bruce."

"She's gone, sir."

"I see she's gone, but how did she go?"

"I let her through Mr. Burnett's chambers, sir."

"Through Mr. Burnett's chambers!" I repeated in amazement. "How did you manage that?"

"Why, sir, through the door——"

"What door?" I interrupted impatiently.

"The door that leads from your bedroom into his sitting-room, sir."

There was a door, by my bedside, which was always locked, and for the key of which I had always been going to ask, thinking it was another cupboard. Through this door Mary had escaped. How thankful I was now that it had not been a cupboard. It turned out that Mrs. Swatman occasionally used the door when Burnett was away and I was engaged; and that in this instance, the laundress having called, Mrs. Swatman had gone in that way, and had happily been in time to release Mary from her embarrassing predicament.

I blessed Mrs. Swatman, and did not, as I had fully intended, give her a good blowing up for admitting Mr. Bruce when she knew I was engaged. She did not know, by the way, that I was "engaged" in the common acceptation of that term. I blessed her, therefore, and furthermore presented her with a sovereign, which made her happy for the rest of the week—honest old descendant of Cinderella that she was!

Next morning by the first post I had a letter from Mary. She had been "terribly frightened," poor darling; she had not fully realized the impropriety of coming to my chambers until her father had come upon the scene, and she had felt the dread of discovery. I must "never again ask her to be so foolish and wicked," she said. In my answer I promised not to be selfish any more, acquainted her with her father's plans, and pointed out that if I were successful we might perhaps hope to approach Mr. Bruce.

In about a fortnight I received my instructions and proceeded to hunt up the Berkshire registers; and a more wearisome task I never undertook. In some cases the registers were well enough kept and were easy of access; in some they had been sold as waste-paper or were altogether imperfect; while in a few instances they were so ill cared for that they had become well-nigh valueless; and one I found in a decayed old box in a loft over the vicar's cow-shed. At Abingdon, and more especially at St. Nicholas, the registers had been admirably preserved, and it was here that I spent the longest time; but I failed to find the least trace of what I wanted—not a word either of Dalrymple Bruce or of Tryphena Maddams. Once, at Bray, and again at Wallingford, I thought I was upon the track; while at Cookham a whole colony of Maddamses appeared to have been born, married, and buried; but not a Tryphena among them all. At St. Lawrence, Realing, there was a record of the marriage, in 1793, of a certain Theodosia Maddams to Robert Bruce; and this bothered me a good deal till I discovered that Theodosia was the widow of one Kezekiah Maddams, "butcher of this towne." After a laborious and painstaking search I came to the conclusion that I was on the wrong search, and I returned to London in a gloomy and dejected mood.

But Mr. Bruce was very kind, and not only thanked me heartily for the trouble I had been at, but marked the genuineness of his satisfaction by presenting me with a check considerably larger than I was entitled to or expected. Mary, who had taken the deepest interest in the investigation, told me one evening, when I was dining at their house, that she felt certain—she could not tell why—that I should yet, somehow—she could not tell how—unravel this Gordian knot; nay, that it was to be the means whereby we should attain the fulfilment of our hopes. I hoped with all my heart she might be right, but confessed to some scepticism on the point, for which unbelief I received the most delightful scolding from Mary; and "You are not to laugh at me, sir! I will not be laughed at!" (Oh, the way she emphasized that "not!") "It is very rude of you to laugh at me, and you shall do penance!"

Seeing that Mr Bruce was nodding over his book, I did penance, though perhaps not just in the way that Mary had anticipated. It was a very rash act on my part, but the temptation was irresistible. You have never seen Mary, or you would understand. Mary blushed horribly, and was both scared and indignant, but I pleaded eloquently for absolution, and finally appeased her. At parting she said:

"You will see, Charlie; you will find the thing out, depend upon it. Women know things, you know, that men don't know. Well, I know, I don't know how I know, but I do know that you will discover this Dalrymple Bruce's marriage. I'm as certain of it as I am that we—well, as of anything. So good-night, and be a good boy and don't contradict. No! not one, I declare!"

The first news that greeted me on my return to my city chambers was that Mrs. Swatman's mummified assistant, Mrs. Crump, was seriously ill. Of course I lost no time in seeing that she had proper attendance and any little comfort that the doctor might think good for her. The doctor gave a poor account of her. Few men in chambers ever know anything of the inner life of their "laundresses," and from what I learned of Mrs. Crump's surroundings I should say their ignorance is bliss.

In a wretched room, in a disreputable-looking building, in a court off Drury Lane, the poor old creature had her home.

In this delectable apartment Mrs. Crump lay, and there my doctor attended her. She wanted for nothing that we could provide her; and one evening at Mr. Bruce's I managed to interest him and Mary in the old woman, insomuch that Mr. Bruce not only permitted Mary to visit her, but himself sent to her at various times a quantity of port out of his own cellar. He had his reward.

On Christmas Day I was dining at his table, and during dinner Mary found an opportunity to tell me that she had a Christmas present for me up-stairs, but she refused, notwithstanding my urgent inquiries, to tell me what it was. I had visions of smoking-caps and slippers and other ornamental and useless rubbish that girls usually think appropriate gifts for men. It turned out to be something much more to my liking. I had, and have, a weakness for old books, and my chambers were almost lined with them. Mrs. Crump, it appeared, desirous of testifying her gratitude for my little attentions, had commissioned Mary to present to me in her own name one of the mouldy volumes I had noticed on the chest of drawers. This bibliomania of mine was shared by Mr. Bruce, who had a magnificent collection; but while he issued semi-royal mandates to Quaritch and Toovey, to Ellis and Pickering, I had to content myself with an occasional prize from a book-stall or at a country auction. Mrs. Crump's Christmas present was an old folio copy of Ambrose Pavi, in fair preservation, except as to the old calf binding, which needed repair. I was turning over the leaves and showing Mary some of the least eccentric of the old woodcuts.

"Ha!" said Mr. Bruce, "a copy of old Pavi, and a nice clean copy, too. Let me look at it, Mary, and let me have some coffee."

He and I turned over the book together, and had some talk about the author. As I was closing it, the fly-leaf fell to the ground and fluttered to Mr. Bruce's feet. He picked it up and was about to hand it to me, when he suddenly exclaimed with some excitement:

"This is extraordinary! Did you not notice this?" On the fly-leaf was written in a straight, stiff handwriting: "Dalrymple Bruce, his booke, 1790."

We looked at it together in silence for about a minute. Mr. Bruce spoke first.

"Who was your Mrs. Crump? Do you know her maiden name?"

"I know nothing about her, except that she once told me she was in service at Chicksands Priory, in Bedfordshire."

"In what part of Bedfordshire is Chicksands Priory?"

"Really I don't know; my acquaintance with the place is confined to Aspley Guise and Woburn, and it certainly is not in that neighborhood."

"Do you mind my keeping this? I must see Mrs. Crump in the morning, and you had better perhaps come with me. Come to my chambers about eleven and we'll go together."

I willingly agreed to be with him at the hour named, and the next day accordingly we interviewed Mrs. Crump, who by this time was well enough to be up, though not to be about. Poor old woman! She was quite frightened at Mr. Bruce's somewhat professional method of cross-examination. He, however, elicited the information that her maiden name was Medlock; her father had been a laborer in Lord Ongley's employ at Warden, in Bedfordshire. Her mother's maiden name she did not know. Both her father and mother were dead. They had both died while in service at Chicksands Priory, and were both buried at Warden. She was the only child, and on her parents' decease she had sold the few things they possessed except two or three books which she had played with while a child and did not like to part with. There was no family Bible among them. There was an old almanac. There they were on the drawers, and we were quite welcome to look at them, or for that matter to take them away. The almanac was not among the books on the drawers; it was in her "box." Her box was under the bed, and if we wanted the almanac she would get it for us.

We did want to see that almanac very particularly indeed, but I made Mrs. Crump sit in her chair while I pulled the box out from under the bed and dragged it up in front of her. She opened it, revealing a strange, heterogeneous collection of articles, whence derived and wherefore treasured only Mrs. Crump—and possibly not even she—could have explained. All three of us—even the dignified Mr. Bruce, too—united in ransacking the ancient receptacle. It seemed as if there was no end of things, except the one thing that we wanted. I began to fear that the almanac had gone to the limbo of almanacs, and that we were destined to another and a final disappointment. I took up an aged pair of stays, to look underneath them, and a dingy pamphlet dropped out of them. I caught up the pamphlet and examined it—it was an almanac of the year 1794. With trembling fingers I turned to the date of the marriage. Opposite it, in faded ink, were written the words, "This daye I was united to my beloved Tryphena Dalrymple Bruce." I turned to the cover. There was a pocket in it; in the pocket was a folded document. I drew it out and unfolded it, and there was the long-sought marriage certificate that established the Dunedin peerage.

There is not much more to my story. Mrs. Crump—otherwise Lieutenant Louisa—got well and passed the rest of her days in peace and plenty. My aunt, who is still living, made over to me half her property, with a reversionary interest in the remainder of it. I had a private interview with Mr. Bruce and he is now my father-in-law, and Mary and I are as happy as a wife and husband can ever expect to be.