 CHAPTER 49 I Will Never Live Under His Roof The dreary wakefulness of Lizzie Hardman's first night in Milton Street, Blackford, was relieved only by feverish snatches of sleep. Her brain was perpetually picturing the scene of the previous day traveling over the same ground, recalling every word and every look of her tormentors, and then imagination went to work and pictured all that had occurred after she left tangly, and Dora would think her ungrateful. Morton would be disgusted at her abrupt departure. No one would say a good word of her. She must needs seem a traitor and an ingrate. His mental tortures would have been quite enough to keep her awake all night, but bodily discomfort added a last drop of bitterness to her cup. The small stuffy bedchamber, the lumpy flock bed, were a sore trial after her eerie room and comfortable spring mattress. Her bedroom had not been, by any means, one of the best at the Manor House. Its furniture consisted chiefly of old-fashioned articles discarded from the principal apartments, but it was large and airy, with windows that commanded a lovely vista in tangly wood. It was perfumed by the roses and jasmine that climbed up to the window sill. It was kept exquisitely clean, and it was brightened and adorned by Aunt Dora's numerous gifts. What a change to the second floor bedroom in Milton Street, with its hideous geometrical paper in orange and brown, its patches of gaudy kidder minster, its colored counterpane and flaring pink and green abdomination in the shape of a fire-stove ornament. Jesse, who had never seen anything better, was rather proud of her bower, and introduced her sister to it, with perfect satisfaction of mind. There's my Wilcox and Gibbs, she exclaimed, pointing to her sewing machine. Ain't it a beauty? I saved up my money to buy it, and it's paid for itself twice over since I've had it. How do you like them vases on the chimney piece? Jim gave them to me. That's Pauly's young man, you know. And now it was the first morning of Lizzie's life in her new home. She had been introduced to all her relations, to Uncle Hardman, otherwise father, which patriotic title was, in his case, an honorary distinction, like the freedom of a city to a prince of blood royal, as he had never had any children. To her brother William, who had told her she was a pretty girl, and had pledged himself to find her a good husband among his mates at the foundry, to Pauly and to Pauly's young man, who just looked in at breakfast time to acquire if his betroth would like to see Mr. Montmercy in Richie Lou. Lizzie found them all friendly, but all outrageously vulgar. The printer's reader was the best mannered and the best informed, but then, like many self-educated people, he was horribly conceited. He left openly at his betroth, bad grammar, and evidently considered her and a very inferior person. Breakfast was a scramble. Each member of the family provided for his or her own particular meal. Mrs. Hardman fried her rasher on the top of the fire, while Jesse toasted herrings in front of it. William and his uncle began with oatmeal porridge and wound up with cold hash mutton and potatoes. The mistress of the house had her teapot. The girls made cocoa for their own drinking. The combination of odors from the frizzling bacon and herrings was far from agreeable. There was no cloth on the table. The plates and cups and saucers were all odd and mostly cracked. Everybody was in a hurry. Everybody spoke with his or her mouth full. Lizzie recalled her breakfast of yesterday morning. The pretty room, the snowy damask, soft and rich as satin, the old Indian bowls of crimson and yellow roses, such roses as seemed to grow only atangly, the glittering silver, the pretty china, the homemade bread and butter, the fruit and honey, and daintiness of a breakfast designed to tempt delicate appetites. She fancied herself strong-minded, and yet the loss of these luxurious surroundings troubled her, even amidst her pain at being parted from her benefactress, that one great sorrow which she told herself ought to have been her only thought. The day was bright and sunny, and when breakfast was over and the family had dispersed, Jesse was eager for the proposed exploration of Blackford's best and busiest streets. But Lizzie begged to be excused for this particular morning. She had a headache, and she had a letter to write, two reasons for staying at home. You do as you like, my dear, said her aunt. Our Jess is always glad of any excuse for being idle. If you've got a letter to write, go into the parlor and write it, and don't let no one worry it you. You'd better be off to your sewing machine, Jess, and try and get them children's crocs done by Saturday night, as you promised the lady. How would you look? Her in the face. I should like to know if you can't keep your word. Lord aunt, I should say I have a morning order, of course. Lizzie was ushered into the parlor, a room which looked into the street, and which was somewhat larger and a great deal cleaner than the kitchen. Having lived in a house where daily life was spent in the best and biggest rooms, Lizzie wondered much why her uncle's family herded together in the hot kitchen. Instead of making use of the cool, clean parlor, she fancied the room must be unhealthy, or that there must be some cogent reason why it should be tabooed by the family. There was not a thread awry in the state apartment. Scarlet Maureen Curtains, edged with black velvet, draped the window, knitted anti-mackassats shrouded the horsehair chairs and sofa. There was a good deal of beadwork in the way of mats, and there was a good deal of primitive color in the way of carpet. The center table was of mahogany, sticky with much varnishing, and on it were disposed at mathematical intervals two photographed albums and three gift books. Lizzie seated herself before this table and in sheer languor of spirits explored one of the albums. Oh, what dreadfully common-looking people her sister's friends were, how badly their gowns hung, and how embarrassed they all seemed as to the disposal of their hands. Broad grins alternated with expressions of awful solimity. Every sitter seemed to have just laid down the same book on the same richly carved oak table in front of the same impossible combination of grecian architecture and tropical foliage. She closed the portrait gallery and opened one of the books. It was a cheap edition of Scott's poems in pearl type, and on the fly leaf was written to Polly with gems true love, hoping she may find improvement for her mind in these pages. It was no use to sit idling there. Her letter must be written sooner or later. Her letter of explanation to Aunt Dora. She did not want to lose the afternoon post, but she felt that the letter would be very difficult to write. She did not wish to accuse Clementine and Horatia of unkindness. She could not speak of the accusation they had brought against her, yet now else could she explain her own conduct. Jesse had brought her a blotting book with pens and paper, and a smart green glass ink bottle was staring her in the face. She had no excuse for doddling, but when she had dipped the pen in the ink, she paused at a loss how to express herself, and had lashed through down the pen with a sigh of disgust, and lent her head upon her hand in a deep dependency. What are they doing now, a tangly, she wondered? What was Morton doing? He was in his study, most likely writing a reading. Did he miss her? Of late she had spent much of her time in his study. He had been teaching her Latin in order that she might understand any quotation which she might meet with in the course of her reading, and partly that she might be able to talk him about Horace, whose olds were the only poetry which Morton thoroughly appreciated. Modern verse was too high strung and metaphysical for his taste. Thy Byronic school was too passionate, but Horace always satisfied him. He was a man for whom a little poetry of a plain straightforward character was sufficient. Vizy allowed her fancies to wander back to the home she had left, and to hang tenderly round the images of those who dwelt there. She thought of her horse, and pictured to herself Morton's morning visit to the stables. What will he do with my poor Paragon? she wondered. I hope he will ride or drive him. Dear Paragon, to think that such a well-behaved horse should be the indirect cause of my leaving Tangly, it was Morton's gift of the cob that made those girls so angry. While she sat idly thinking, a footstep sounded on the stairs. There was a murmur of voices just outside her door. Surely that was a voice she knew, a Tangly voice. The door opened as she started to her feet, and in the next moment she was sobbing on Dora Blake's shoulder. My darling, I have come to fetch you home. No, anti-dearest, I am not so weak as that, she answered, struggling with her tears. I have not been playing apart, not running away in order that I might be sent for or fetched. No, dear anti, I was very much in earnest, but I am so thankful you have come, for I can tell you a good deal that I could never have written. I don't want to hear anything. Put on your hat and bid your relations good-bye, and come with me. I have a cab at the door, and we shall catch the one o'clock train for High Clerk. Dear aunt, it is quite impossible. I shall never come back to Tangly. Absurd, ridiculous! Just because my nieces have given themselves airs, temper, Lizzy, temper. No, anti, it is not temper. I have put up with their airs. That kind of thing never worried me much. Had I not your love to make life sweet? No, it is not temper, but I would not stay in the queen's house, though it were high treason to leave it. If any one in that house thought, me a mean, designing woman, who ever thought you that, or pretended so to think? Your nieces, come, Lizzy, half-truth won't do. You must tell me the whole truth. I have a right to know. Lizzy could not deny that right, and she told Miss Blake the gist of the conversation which had driven her from Tangly Manor. You see, dear auntie, that my own self-respect forbids my return. I cannot see that, dear. What can it matter to you if these girls, in their jealousy, chose to think you are setting your cap at their brother? You should be able to laugh their insinuations to scorn, knowing your own straightforwardness. Yes, I might do that, but they would not hold their tongues. They would put the same notion into other people's minds. Perhaps even Morton himself might come to believe it, concluded Lizzy, turning crimson at the mere thought of such a thing. Morton is much too sensible. I hope he is, but I will never live under his roof while he is single. I will not give any one ground for thinking ill of me. Perhaps years hence, when he is married, and has a family, he will let me come to Tangly to take care of his house or his children. And what are you to do in the meantime while he is choosing his wife and growing his family? I have my plans all made, auntie. All I want is to carry them out. I am not going to tell you that I have a mission, or any nonsense of that kind. But I think that as I am a young woman, without any close ties or duties, except to love you and be grateful to you, dearest, I ought to do something for my fellow creatures. Now you know I have done a good deal of nursing among our sick poor, and that I am not a bad nurse. Bad? You are the best nurse I ever had anything to do with. But what has this to do with your future life? Everything. There is a society in London and at Blackford for nursing the poor at their own houses. And I am going to become a member of that society if I can get employed by it. I have read all about it in the newspapers, and I know pretty well what the work is, and what will be required of me. The nurses are ladies by birth and education. They live in a home provided by the society, and they receive a small salary. So you see, if I can get admitted to the Blackford home, I should be quite independent. And you will slave yourself to death. The other nurses have not died of the work. There are some who have been doing it for seven or eight years. I will not hear of such a thing, Lizzie. Philanthropy is all very well. But I will not hear of your youth being sacrificed to the miseries of other people. Oh, Auntie, why did you teach me to care for the poor if you didn't mean me to lead a life of usefulness among them? I did not want you to grow up like my nieces, frivolous and selfish to the core of your heart. But I meant you to have some pleasure in your life. And as yet you have had none. And now you desert me just when you are most necessary to my happiness. And you want to join a nursing sisterhood. If you have made up your mind not to return to Tangly, I will make myself a home elsewhere. I will take a house at Avonmore, and you and I will live there together. Force you to leave the house where you were born. No, Auntie, not for the world. It was in vain that Dora Blake urged and pleaded and expotulated. Lizzie was firm as a rock. She had told herself that she must be thorough, and she was thorough, proof even against the entreaties of the friend whom she loved as a mother. The end of it was that Miss Blake went back to Tangly, that afternoon completely baffled, and had to acknowledge her failure to Morton, whose disappointment at Lizzie's non-arrival was more intense than the occasion seemed to warrant. She is an obstinate girl, said Aunt Dora with the sigh. She has taken it into her perverse head that she ought to lead a life of usefulness, and she is going to join a nursing sisterhood. And she will wear a ridiculous bonnet, exclaimed Clementine. It all comes from an exaggerated idea of one's own importance in the world, and a desire to distinguish oneself from the ruck of mankind. That kind of ambition will never urge you to sacrifice your own comfort for the sake of other people, said Morton, with an angry glance at his pretty sister. No, I hope I should never be so silly, answered Tiny, with charming naivety. And now, as Lizzie is not coming back, I suppose I may ride the cob. He will splinter his stable into in lucifer matches if he doesn't get more exercise. You are very obliging. I shall send him out to grass for a month. Perhaps by that time Lizzie may have changed her mind and come home again. I shouldn't be much surprised if she were home by the end of the week, retorted Tiny. I dare say she is only trying to make a feature of herself by this absurd conduct. End of Chapter 49 Recording by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, BC. Chapter 50 of Just as I Am. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, BC. Just as I Am. By Mary Elizabeth Braden. Chapter 50 There was no thought of fair play then. A delicious sense of restfulness came over Dulcy's heart and mind after the evening of her betrothal, the never-to-be forgotten evening which gave a new color to her life, new courage and hopefulness to her soul. She was content to trust herself utterly to Arthur, Hellamon's care and guidance, to lean upon his strength as against a rock and to lay down her burden of fears and difficulties at his feet, knowing that he was strong enough to carry the load. As a foot sore mother, crawling dejectedly on the highway, faint under the weight of a fretful child, feels new life in her limbs when she has transferred her burden to the stronger arms of her husband. So Dulcy, having given up her load of care and doubt, was able to contemplate the journey of life under a new and brighter aspect. It was an unspeakable relief for her to know that her father had confided his dark secret to a spiritual advisor, that he had not gone on to the bitter end. Hardening his heart, unpenant, unconfessed, he had not shrunk from the self-homiliation involved in such a confession. He had not been too proud to own sinfulness to a fellow creature. Her first thought, even in that thrilling moment when she confessed her love for Arthur Hellamon, had been of her father. She had told him that he should always hold the first place in her heart, and she had been nobly faithful to that promise, and now, happy, in the love of a man whose nature seen to her higher, broader, and grander than Morton's, she could but remember the struggle it caused her to give up her first lover, and how in her despair she had believed that no ray of happiness could ever fall across her future life. She had obeyed her father blindly, uncomplainingly, and lo, she had her reward in a more romantic, more exalted love in the devotion of a lover who seen to her a king among men. Arthur, she said to him one day, a little while after they were engaged, looking shyly up at the tall figure and handsome head, I can't help thinking that Agamemnon must have been like you. She fancied he would feel complimented. My dearest, he replied, smiling at her enthusiasm, I should be sorry to resemble such a doubtful character. Perhaps I ought to have taken my comparison from the Bible, and said you were like soul. Not much better, dear love, those old heroes are infinitely picturesque, but neither history nor tradition can show us many examples of real beauty of character before Christ came to teach men the divinity of love. The grandeur of a just hatred, the splendor of a great vengeance, shine out grandly in the Old Testament, but charity is a flower of later growth. On the evening of her betrothal, Dulcy went straight from her lover's arms to her father's study. She wanted to hear from his own lips that he approved her choice, to see a new look of repose and even happiness in his face. She went quietly in, and found him seated in a thoughtful attitude by his writing desk, the lamp throwing its light upon his books, and leaving his face in the deepest shadow. Dulcy drew softly to his side, and knelt by his chair. As she had so often done in the days before, a sense of severance had arisen between them. Father, my beloved father, I am so happy and I have come to tell you of my happiness. I cannot believe that it is real till I am sure that you approve, that you are content. He clasped her in his arms and held her to his breast for some moments without a word. My dearest, I am more than content. I am happier than I ever hoped to be on this side of the grave. O Dulcy, I thought my sin had blighted your life, and now to hear from those dear lips that you are happy, that the future is not all dark to you. This is indeed comfort. It is the brightest page in the book of a darkened life. Dulcy, a life which your love alone has soullessed. Dear father, your life will be lengthened, please God, by our love and care, for you will let Arthur, her voice trembled a little as she pronounced her lover's name. You will let Arthur be like a son to you. He shall be as dear as ever a son was to a father if he make my darling happy. But my days are numbered, little one. I would not have you cherish in a vain hope. God has been very good to me. He has allowed me to see my beloved child's future, life lying before her like a fair open country. I can afford to part from her on the threshold of happiness. No, no, no, she cried, sobbing as she clung to him with despairing love. There can be no happiness for me without you. Dulcy, if you knew how weary I am of life, what a heavy burden my remorse has been to carry through all the long years. You have lightened it, love. You have lightened the load. But it has been heavy, and I am so tired that I can think of the grave as a pleasant place to rest. And I can hope, yes, Dulcy, I have taught myself to hope for peaceful days in a world beyond the grave where my darling's face may shine upon me like an angel's. Dulcy, there has been a gulf between us of late. Was it because you had discovered the one black spot in my life? Not because I loved you less, she cried eagerly. I loved you all the more after I guessed your sad secret, because I pitied you so much. And I know all about my poor mother, her unhappiness in not loving you as she ought to have done, and how cruelly you were wronged by the friend of your youth. Dearest Father, believe me, I have never loved you less. Thank God, I fancied I had lost my Dulcy's love. That could never be. And now there is little more to be done before I shall have laid down my load. I have written to Morton Blake. Oh Father, why have you done that? Because before I leave England for the last time I want to have all things settled between him and me. She tightened her arms about him, as if to hold him back from some danger. But the risk, the fear that he might, she faltered. Might do what? Hand me over to the law? I will risk that, Dulcy. I do not think he would bring shame upon you, my poor pet, or that even his revenge would ask for the brief remnant of a broken life. He has hinted at my guilt. In this room, in this room, and in your presence, he shall hear the whole story. Hark, was that the bell? Yes, perhaps it is he. Dulcy listened with fast-beating heart. The doors at Fairview were too substantial for her to hear more than a faint murmur of voices in the hall. Then Scroop opened the study door and ushered in Mr. Blake. Morton looked grave and anxious, but that vindictive light which had once sparkled in his eyes when he, speculated upon Sir Everett's guilt, had gone out for ever. He held out his hand to Dulcy, and their hands met for the first time since she had sat beside his sick bed. I'm about to leave England for ever, Morton, said Sir Everett quietly, and before closing the book of my life, for I shall have done with all interest in the world when I leave this place. I want you to learn the truth about your father and me. Do not trouble yourself, answered Morton, with a gloomy look. I think I know about as much as you can tell me in your tardy desire to be truthful. The knowledge has come to me in a fragmentary manner, and it has made my life miserable. Six months ago I meant to use that knowledge against you, if ever I should have the power to do so. But now, now perhaps you see that I am dying, and are content to let the last sands run out peacefully. I would sacrifice much for your daughter's sake, said Morton, with a compassionate glance at Dulcy. Do not you think we might as well spare her the pain of this conversation? I know all, Morton. I was in the next room when poor Mrs. Green told you about my mother. Your own words when you were ill, and perhaps half delirious, told me what you suspected. Do not mind me. I know all that can be known, and I shall never love my father less, because he has been one of the most miserable of men. Not by his own fault alone, remember, the sins of others have fallen heavily upon him. Yes, Morton, my pleading angel has spoken the truth. I was sinned against as well as sinning. I loved your father once as truly as one man can love another, with all my heart, and mind, and strength, thinking him the truest friend man ever had, admiring and respecting in him all the qualities I knew to be wanting in myself. Animal spirits, enterprise, a genial nature, a broad love of mankind. I loved him, and he perverted the heart of my wife. I trusted him, and he crapped into my paradise, and made it hell. He lied to me, as only the seducer of women can lie. He blighted my life as he blighted the life of the woman he pretended to love. A noble love would have spared her. A false and selfish love wrecked her and betrayed me. Do you want to hear the history of that fatal day, when I went out in the morning to meet your father, swearing to myself that before nightfall one of us, two, should be lying in the dust, resolve that the sun should not set upon us both living men? Sir Everard had risen, stood with his back to the hearth by which he had spent so many lonely hours. His arms folded on his breast. Dulcy stood beside him, one hand resting on his shoulder, as if, even by the light touched, she would assure him of her loving sympathy. I met your father surrounded with his friends, but false as he was, he could not face me with the old familiar smile. Perhaps he expected that I should let loose my passion, then and there, and make myself a spectacle for the men who knew him and me, and who may have guessed something of our relations. If this were his idea, he was disappointed. I held my peace all day, a long, slow day, during which he and I were often riding near each other. I was bidding my time, meaning always to overtake him on the road home, and settle the reckoning between us somehow. I had no deliberate plan of vengeance, but I meant to punish him. I was as willing to fling away my own life, as I was determined to try for his. I had not thought a murder, but I wanted the life which, by every law of honor, it was mine to claim. The days of dueling were past. You will say, perhaps, I answer, no, the right of a man against his friend, who had betrayed him against the traitor who had corrupted his wife, can never cease while the word honor has any meaning in the minds of men. He paused for a few moments, exhausted by the passion which with he had spoken those last words. But neither of his listeners broke the silence, and he went on presently in lower and more deliberate tones. I overtook him in the twilight, a little way from the pollured oak beneath which he was found. I led my horse for some distance, after I passed the crossroads, and I stomped on the way to pluck a stake out of a hedge. A heavy, murderous-looking stake, with a sharply pointed end. Vargas's counsel hit the right nail on the head, when he tried to show a distinction between a blow from a cudgel and from a stake. When I had proved myself with this weapon, I mounted my horse and rode sharply after your father, who was walking his horse lazily along in front of me. You must have meant to murder him when you tore up that stake, said Morton. I meant to kill him fairly or foully. It was for him to choose the manner of his death. I overtook him and reigned my horse up at his side. There was no need for me to repeat our conversation. He lied to me, though thick and thin at first, as I suppose men always do in such cases. When he found I was not to be hoodwinked, he turned sullen and defied me, told me that my wife had been sold to be an innocent sacrifice, that there was less guilt in her loving him than in her pretending to love me, told me that he should go on loving her as long as his heart beat, that he would never give her up, that I might as well try for a divorce at once. He had made up his mind to take her away from me. Would he go over to Belgium with me tonight and meet me tomorrow at Blankenburg? No, ten thousand times no. He would give me nothing but legal satisfaction. A divorce was the only way out of our difficulty. He had the audacity to speak to me in his old manner, as if we had been friends without a cloud between us. Look this thing in the face, Everett, he said. Be reasonable. We have both made a mess of our lives, but other people are to blame for it. There is only one way out of it. You are wrong, I cried. There is another way. And I caught him by the collar and swung him round in the saddle. Then the devil got hold of us both, and we fought like devils. But my rage was stronger than his. He would have compromised matters, and thought himself happy with my cast off wife. I wanted nothing but revenge. Do you mean to kill me, he gasped, when I struck him across the head with the stake? Yes, that is just what I mean, I told him. He struck at my face with the cane of his hunting whip. But I caught it and twisted it out of his hand. Then I had him at my mercy, reeling in his saddle, ghastly white, with a slow rivulet of blood trickling down his face, unarmed, helpless. Then and for the first time I felt, myself a murderer. There was no thought of fair play, then, no thought of life against life. I wanted only to kill him. I thirsted for his blood. I struck him on the head for the second time with all the might of my arm. He dropped sideways off his horse, and the animal galloped away through Blatch Martin Wood. I dismounted and knelt by your father's side, and laid my hand upon his breast, waiting for what I had no expectation of finding, some sign that life was not extinct. He was quite dead, that last blow had been fatal. I dragged him to the ditch, and lay him there among the weeds and rushes, and then mounted my horse, jumped the hedge, and rode off across country. God knows where, as if Satan had been hunting me, three or four hours of purpoless riding, and then I went home, in time to hear my wife accuse me of her lover's murder, and to see her die, loving him and hating me. That, Martin Blake, is the history of my crime. If you want a life for a life, you have but to denounce me. The evidence you have pieced together may be strong enough to hate me, in spite of all that has gone before. No, answered Martin after a pause. I shall not denounce you. Six months ago I felt so strongly upon this matter, that I should have been capable of the most desperate step. I would have sacrificed my own happiness, docile even, to avenge my father's death. But I have learnt to think differently. He, too, was a sinner. His sin bore its bitter fruit. I shall never lament him less, never feel less excretion for the crime, and cut short his life. But his murderer's death on the gallows would not make his last rest more peaceful, his hope of pardon and heaven more secure. You are safe, sir Everett, from any future pursuit of mine. But you had better do something to son this vargas' daughter, who has gone back to America, brokenhearted, because she could not clear her father's name from the stain of a crime he never committed. I will do whatever I may be in my power to do for her, answered sir Everett quietly. Good night, Dulcy, said Martin, gently pressing his old love's icy hand. Come what may, I shall always think of you with affection. And so he left them alone together. Father and daughter, no gulf between them now, reunited, united in spirit, for ever by perfect confidence and love. Chapter 51 Lizzie's Failure Lizzie Hartman found that the entrance to her new career as a nursing sister was not free from difficulty. She had, first and foremost, to produce testimonials to character and capacity, and the obtaining of these from Miss Blake and Mr. Jeb occupied time. Then, when she had proved her respectability to the satisfaction of the lady superintendent of the home which she wished to enter, she had to go through a preliminary course of hospital nursing, her duties being of the humblest, hardest kind, in order to prepare her for the higher grade to which she aspired. This hospital work was to last a month, during which time Miss Hartman, as a day nurse, would be allowed to sleep at the house in Milton Street. She began her work bravely, but despite her enthusiasm, the work proved much more arduous, much more painful than she had anticipated. Hitherto, her life had been spent among familiar faces. She had enjoyed the consideration and respect of her little world. There had been thorns in her cushion at the manor house, but all the cottages, whose wants she had ministered to, round and about tangly, had honored her as Miss Blake's adopted daughter, and as the medium through which they received Miss Blake's bounty, she had never gone anywhere empty-handed, and she had always been sure of her welcome. But in this big city hospital, where nobody knew her, or cared for her, how different life seemed, the doctors were always in a hurry when they came in contact with her. They spoke curtly, they took no interest in her work, they treated her as a machine. Then the cases were so various and so complicated. The suffering around her was so terrible, that soul and sense sickened as she felt how little she could do to help or to comfort. It had been one thing to sit beside a dying peasant's bed in some quiet cottage chamber, listening to his hopeful talk about the better land to which he was journeying, but it was another thing to look along the dreary ward, where pain-tortured creatures were ready to curse God in their agony, while disease in its most hideous form disgusted the eye that would feign have expressed only sympathy. Vizzy had put her hand to the plow, and she meant to persevere. But there were times when her courage failed utterly, when she walked weirdly home to Melton Street, with a heart heavy as lead, and shut herself in her little room, the room which she shared with Jesse, to shed bitter tears over her weakness and incapacity. I am afraid it is not in me, she said to herself sometimes, in these moments of despondency, but I must go on, to fail now would be, too, contemptible. I should despise myself for my cowardly weakness. She could have borne the trials of her daily life better, perhaps, if she could have shut out of her mind all memory of the past. But unhappily that past was perpetually in her mind. Her soul yearned for her lost home, as Eve may have yearned for the Eden she had forfeited. In the sultry, sickly august days, amid the crime and foulness of the great overgrown, manufacturing town, Vizzy's fancy return to the coal shrubberies, the velvet lawns attangly to the sweet companionship, the sympathy and guidance of her one devoted friend. Yet she had no right to complain of being shut out of that paradise. She had left it of her own free will. She had refused to go back, or even to make any compromise with the situation, when Aunt Dora came to fetch her. What could I do, she asked herself sometimes, to have gone back would have been to lay myself open to the imputation of having only acted apart. I must justify the step I took in my anger that day. I must show those cruel girls that I can live my own life. I could not go back without forfeiting my self respect. Self respect, that was the idol she had set up for herself. A stern, exacting deity which had to be propitiated by the sacrifice of her heart's tenderest feelings, and which gave her very little in return. When the harvest moon glorified the dinginess of Milton Street, when the breath of harvest was in the very air of Tangly, poor Lizzie sat at her bedroom window late into the night, watching the light clouds drifting across the round gold moon, and thinking how the same soft light was shining on Tangly Common, with its far away glimpses of glittering water, and the calm expanse of stubble and meadow rising and falling in gentle undulations to the base of distant hills. I'm afraid I shall have to run away from my work, she thought, in her despondency, feeling health and energy ebbing day by day, till each day the allotted task became more difficult, the viaded atmosphere more stifling. I shall die if I stay in this horrid town. And then she thought that if she found herself actually incapable of the career she had planned, she would advertise in the local paper for the situation of national school mistress, in some quiet village where she might nurse the sick in her own way, and where health and strength and the power to work would come back to her in the pure air and quiet rustic life. But she had not broken down yet, and she meant to struggle on, so long as success seemed possible. Only when my strength completely fails will I give up, she said to herself. Her relations saw the gradual change in her, and saw that the hospital work was doing her harm. Mrs. Hartman remonstrated vehemently. I never did see such nonsense as a young woman turning her back on a comfortable home where she was quite the lady to moil and toil in a hospital, bringing home smallpoxes and typhoid fevers to her family. If you are afraid of that aunt, I can get a lodging, answered Lizzie Meekly. Who said I was afraid? exclaimed her aunt, somewhat inconsistently. I ain't one of that sort, child. I ain't a soft road one, but for all that you might find something better to do with your life than mixing poultices and rubbing in linnings. If you must do something for your living, why not join Jess in the dressmaking business? You ought to be tasty. After having lived all your life with gentle folks, and with her machine, you might both do splendid. Lizzie did not attempt to explain to her aunt that it was a philanthropic career, and not mere money making upon which she had set her heart, least that severely practical matron should ridicule the idea. I think I have a knack for sick nursing, aunt, she said, and I'm sure I have no taste for dressmaking. Why, didn't you make the gown you got on? Yes, but I couldn't sit at work all day, as Jessi does. It would drive me mad, I think. That's because you ain't used to it. Lizzie went on till nearly the end of her probation. She had worked so well, and had shown herself so skillful and intelligent, that Lady Superior of the home to which she wished to be admitted had gladly accepted her services. She was to finish her work in the hospital in a few days, and was to take up her abode in the home, which was a fine old fashion house in a dull old fashion street, in that deserted quarter of Blackford where a hundred years ago, members of parliament, wealthy bankers, and justices of the peace had made their abode. The change from the close quarters of Milton Street to the spacious, airy rooms at the home would be a welcome one, and Lizzie was looking forward to it with pleasure, though she had grown honestly attached to her family, whose good hardiness went as far as virtue can go to atone for extreme vulgarity. She was, as it were, on the very threshold of her new life, and she felt proud of having held on through all difficulties, and of having conquered at last when she went home from the hospital one evening with a raking headache. She had suffered a good deal from headache lately, but this pain in her head was unusually severe. She was half-blind with the agony of her throbbing temples, and groped her way along the familiar streets and lanes as if she had been walking in a November fog. Her limbs were so heavy that she could scarcely move them, and it was with the utmost difficulty that she dragged herself to Milton Street, hoping all the time that some stray cab would pass her way so she could get herself driven home. But no cab appeared. Milton Street was out of the beat of such vehicles, and she was obliged to get home without help. Why, Lizzie Child, you look that bad, cried Mrs. Hartman, who was sitting on her favorite stool, reading one of those thrilling serials which beguiled her leisure with lofty fancies. You've been looking like a ghost more or less for the last fortnight, but you look ever so much worse tonight. I have rather a bad headache, Lizzie admitted feebly, as she sank upon the ancient horse-hair couch, which gave to the kitchen something of the luxury of a drying room. Bill, yes, I daresay, said Mrs. Hartman, have a cockle. No, thank you, aunt. Have a cup of tea, then. I stood the pot on the oven top, a purpose for you, and there's a nice bit of cake in the oven. I couldn't take anything, aunt, not even tea. I think I'll go to bed. She rose to leave the room, but staggered, and would have fallen, but for her aunt's aid. Mrs. Hartman assisted her upstairs and put her to bed, as if she had been a little child, and when Pauly's young man came in presently, he was sent straight off for the hospital doctor, who had been most concerned in Lizzie's work. He came that evening, and the next day, and on many days and evenings, during which Lizzie lay helpless and prostrate in the stuffy little bedroom, where the sewing machine pursued its noisy career, and where Jesse divided herself between her duties as nurse and dressmaker. Happily for the family in Milton Street, it was neither smallpox nor typhoid which had stricken poor Lizzie. It was none of those fatal scourges at whom's name poor humanity trembles. The girl had only broken down under a strain which she was unable to bear. With depressed spirits and desponding soul, she had tried to do work which required all the vigor and vivacity of a happy nature and a hopeful mind, and she had fallen under a burden too heavy for her weakness. Those distracting thoughts about Tangly, that unconquerable longing for the home she had left, had affected her as the love of country affects a Swiss peasant. She had sickened for the lost home, and was nigh to death. She had been feverish in the early part of her illness, but never out of her senses, and when Mrs. Hardman suggested that Jesse should write and tell Miss Blake of her sister's illness, Lizzie intreated that no such letter might be written. The doctor does not say that I am in any danger, does he, she asked? Lord, know my dear, answered her energetically. No fear of that. You're very low, and he says it'll take you a long time to get around, and that you'll never be strong enough for this sick nursing fad of yours. It is not within the compass of your constitution, he says, so you'd better give that up at once. Yes, I fear I must give it up, just as I had learned the work, and was going to begin my career. It is very hard. I shall try and get a situation in a village school. I have done a good deal of teaching at Tangly, and I know what the work is. Don't you bother about schools nor nothing, tell your strong. Here our pole wants to be married early next month, and for you to go with her and Jim to the seaside for their honeymoon. He'll only be able to get a week's holiday, but you can get a good mothful of sea air in a week, and it will do you a world of good. It is very kind of Polly, but she ought not to be burdened with an invalid sister during her honeymoon. She won't think you know burden. Ain't she your own sister? Blood's thicker than water, you know. I think I'd better go somewhere with Jesse, if I am obliged to have change of air, said Lizzie, with a faint sigh. She was wondering how long her little stock of money would hold out, and whether she could afford the luxury of a seaside trip with Jesse. She had insisted upon paying Mrs. Hartman a pound a week for her maintenance, although that hospitable matron would willingly have fed and lodged her gratis. She had spent a little money in fees at the hospital, and the five and twenty pounds with which she had left Tangly were reduced by about half. And now she was having strong beef tea and other things which must cost money, and it would be her duty to pay Mrs. Hartman more than a pound a week for this period of illness. I'm afraid you are spending a great deal of money for me, she said, one day when her aunt brought her a glass of public house-port, which was both sweet and fiery, and tasted like elderberry wine enriched with the juice of a damson tart. You've no call to worry about that child. Your uncle ain't so poor that he can't afford a bottle of good old port for his niece. I dare say if you'd let me write to Miss Blake, she'd send you an amper of choice wine, but you must have your own way. Thank you, dear aunt. I'd rather be under an obligation to you than to Miss Blake dearly as I love her. When I left Tangly I made up my mind to fight the battle of life without any help from rich friends. Lizzie was nearly three weeks confined to her bed, and when she was strong enough to get up again and lie on the sofa in the parlor, she'd look like the shadow of her former self. It was useless to think of taking a situation yet a while. It would be a week or two before she could be strong enough for the change of air which the doctor declared indispensable to her recovery. She could only lie on her sofa and read a little, and think a great deal, and look forward wonderingly to a future that was wrapped in shadow. And now, August was nearly ended, and the Blackford election was in full progress. The great busy overgrown town was in a state of profound excitement, a fever which penetrated even as far as Quiet Milton Street. Party feeling ran high, and there was a kind of infection of opinion in the air which people caught unwares. Men and women who had no political opinions at any other time became suddenly veniment and even angry partisans. Coster-mangers who herded in the vilest slums of the town declared themselves good ol' Tories, and proclaimed their intention of shedding their blood, if needed, for church and state and a hereditary peerage. The virulent radical and the hardened conservative met on the common ground of the public house and the Chandler's shop. Women paused at their wash tubs with arms akimbo to give utterance to their views as how the country should be governed. Men who had never invested a five pound note aired their theories about national defiance. Everybody concurred in the one leading idea that the country was going to ruin and that a total change was required in all existing institutions. Lizzie, sitting in an armchair by the open window of the Milton Street parlor, too weak to venture out of doors, was dependent upon her kindred and the newspapers for all information about the election. But her interest in its progress was intense. She had read every line of the reports of meetings held here and there. By this party or that, she read all Morton's speeches twice over, weighing their effect upon his hearers. She read all that had been said by rival candidate in order that she might be able to estimate the strength of Morton's opponent. Her brother William brought her tidings of how things were going. He was able to tell her how the current of popular opinion was setting and what chance Morton had. I think he'll get in, said William, who was an advanced liberal. But Paulie's young man was a staunch conservative, attached to the old established Tory paper, who had begun its career fifty years ago as a six penny weekly and had reluctantly transformed itself into a penny daily when Mr. Gladstone abolished the paper duty. Paulie's young man opined that Morton had a very poor chance. He would not give a twenty pound note for his chance. And though there's no such thing as bribery now a days, his election will cost him a pot of money, said the printer's reader. I don't think he'll care about the money, answered Lizzie with a sigh. Is he so monstrously rich? I believe he has three or four thousand a year, and he is not particularly fond of money. Egad, I shouldn't mind spending a thousand or two if I had such an income as that to fall back upon, but I believe his election will cost him three or four thousand. I heard that his agent said he would have his own way and do things as he likes, this time, that it was Mr. Blake's folly in setting his face against treating and such like that lost his election at High Clair last winter. Do you know where Mr. Blake is staying, asked Lizzie? Oh, at the Royal, of course, these men of the people always put up at the best hotel and live on the fat of the land. If you knew Mr. Blake as well as I do, you would know how little he cares about the fat of the land, said Lizzie, with a faint smile. She wondered a little that Morton had not come to see her. He must know from Ms. Blake where she was living, and it would have cost him very little trouble to put himself into a cab and be driven to Milton Street, to see him only for a few minutes, to hear how his work was prospering, and to hear from his own lips that he was interested in her new life would have been very sweet to her. Was it not rather unkind of him who had called himself her adopted brother, to be so near and yet not come to see her, more especially when she was so interested in his political career, and when it had been in some measure through her persuasion that he had allowed himself to be nominated for Blackford? Perhaps he is offended with me for leaving tangly, just when I was beginning to be useful to him, she thought, or perhaps those cool girls have said something that has set him against me altogether. Oh, if they were to make him believe that when I was his nurse, and am you an sissis, I was trying to catch him for a husband, how he would despise me, how I should loathe my life if I knew there was such an idea in his mind. The fancy that this was possible tormented her cruelly during those eventful days of the election. It was better perhaps, she argued with herself, that she should not see Morton better for her own peace, since it must be the chief effort of her mind to forget how dear he had been to her, yet it was unkind of him not to come, and it was unlike Morton to be unkind. And now came the decisive day on which the result of the balloting was to be made known. Every vehicle in Blackford had been brought into use for the occasion, and the tag rig and bobtail of the place were disporting themselves and coaches. Flags were flying, drums beating, the joy bells of half a dozen churches peeling with distracting vivacity. To Lizzie, sitting by the window with her weary head supported by pillows, and an unread novel lying in her lap, this day seemed the longest in her life. Mrs. Hartman was the only member of the family who made any pretense of staying at home, and even she spent half the day gossiping at the little general shop, over the way, or at the milkman's round the corner. The clamor of the bells was almost maddening. Were they ringing in Morton or his opponent? Would they peel just as joyously for one as for the other? I hope he will not be disappointed a second time, thought Lizzie. He has had so much sorrow within the last year. The polling place was long way from Milton Street. Mrs. Hartman brought in stray scraps of intelligence, but they were of a totally irrevolent character, and were of no use to Lizzie. How much Morton's opponent was supposed to have spent upon bribing one particular foundry, how he had given his bespeak to the theatre, and Mr. Mont Morrissey was to act Claude Melnock, with a new Pauline brought espressly from the Surrey Theatre, London, for the occasion. Thisie longed for her brother's return from work. He would know the result of the election. She languished for a visit from Pauline's young man, even though he was politically unfriendly to Morton. But there was no hope of either of them appearing before seven o'clock, and the long blank day, with its clamor of church bells, hung heavily on Lizzie's dejected soul. At five Mrs. Hartman brought some tea and thin bread and butter, with a small plate of water-cresses, all neatly and daintly arranged to temp and evalid. How good you are to me, Aunt, said Lizzie, looking up at her gratefully. My dear, I do my best, but this must seem a poor place to you, after that there manner ose. You didn't ought to have come away, and to see the wreck you are. It's enough to make anybody cry to look at you. You looked ten years older than you did the night you came from the country, and that pinched and eggered. I can't think what you've done with your good looks. This was meant kindly, but it was not comforting. Vanity had never been Lizzie's vice, and she was able to smile at her aunt's speech. My looks won't matter when I am a national school teacher, Aunt, and perhaps I may get on all the better if people think me older than I am. Perhaps you will, my dear. You set your heart on a queer kind of life, and it's no use trying to argue you out of your fancy. All I can say is that, if Providence had given me good friends and a good home, I shouldn't have took and run away from them. I should have put my pride in my pocket. You know the old proverb, and no one but the person who has to wear it can tell you where the shoe pinches. That's true, child. I suppose your shoe pinches somewhere, but never mind now. Take your tea like a deer. Refreshed by her first cup of tea, Lizzie rose from her chair and went over to the chimneypiece to look at her reflection in the cheap glass above it. She wanted to see if she were indeed as much changed as her aunt said she was if she had lost all pretension to good looks. Yes, Mrs. Hartman was quite right. All the brightness and freshness was gone from her face. Pinched cheeks, hollow eyes, a palette complexion were reflected in the looking glass, no flatter at the best of times. Perhaps I ought to be glad that Morton did not come to see me, she said to herself. He would have been disgusted at my altered looks. And what would he have thought of this poor little room, with its cheap vulgar furniture and the afternoon sun glaring in upon it after the shady drawing room at Tangly? Yes, it is better for me that he has kept aloof. I have gone out of his life forever. Anything that took my mind back to the past would make me more miserable than I am. She closed her eyes, exhausted by the long anxious day, her brain addled by the continued ringing of the bells. She let her head fall back upon the pillow and sank into a gentle dose. Soothed by the warmth of the western sun, it was the most refreshing sleep she had enjoyed for a long time, and a slumber in which her fancies wandered away from Blackford into the rural scenery of her past life. She seemed to have been sleeping for a long while, to have lived a lifetime in dreamland, when the sudden opening of the door awoke her, and she started up, flushed with sleep, exclaiming, Is he elected William? Is Mr. Blake elected? Her back was turned to the door, but it was near the usual hour of her brother's coming home, and she had no doubt that it was he. Yes, answered a voice just behind her chair, Morton Blake is a member for Blackford, and he has come to tell you of a success which he owes to a great measure to you. It was Morton's voice. Morton, not ungrateful or forgetful, was standing beside her. She rose to her feet, but in her surprise and agitation was too weak to stand, and fell back in her chair half fainting. Good heavens! How changed you are! cried Morton, leaning over her and supporting her head with his arm. The person who opened the door to me just now told me you had been ill, but I had no idea it was so serious. You must have been very ill, Bizzy. Yes, I have been very ill, dangerously ill, and you never let me know. There was no danger. I was only weak and worn out. I have been working too hard, I suppose. I had my idea of a useful career, just as you have. You see, Morton, only I broke down at the very beginning. The spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak, and now I have chalked out a humbler path for myself. Oh, you still hold to your idea of a useful career, don't you? He asked, smiling at her with unspeakable tenderness, my poor Lizzy, so weak and worn and pale. Never mind, dear, Tangly and Aunt Dora will soon bring the roses back to your cheeks, the happy light to your eyes. You are very good, but I am not going to Tangly. I shall go into the country with my sister and get strong and well, and then I shall begin my new life far away from Tangly. You will. You have a finely developed organ of firmness, Lizzy. Take care that that unfeminine virtue does not degenerate into the vice of obstinacy. I would rather be obstinate than weak and wavering. Yes, and you are seriously ill. You have had a long illness in this small home, where so little can be done for you, and you keep your old friends in ignorance of your state. That was very cruel, Lizzy. All was done for me that affection could do. When I left Tangly, I made up my mind to break altogether with the old life in which I had been so happy. Half measures would not do. I must make a new beginning, and accept life as Matthew Hartman's granddaughter. Why this sudden resolution? Why did you leave Tangly? I can never tell you that. Suppose I found it all out for myself. I think I have, Lizzy. You say you would rather be obstinate than weak, yet you were weak enough to abandon your natural and proper home because two foolish, underbred girls took it into their heads to be jealous of you. I only did what self-respect obliged me to do. Very well. We will say no more about that. You are coming back to Tangly tomorrow, and Dora is coming to fetch you. I have refused to go back, even for her sake. Simply because you have been insulted by my sisters. You need fear no further annoyance from them. They are now at the seaside, and they are never coming back to the manor house except as visitors. They have taken a pretty little villa on the outskirts of High Claire. The laurels, perhaps you remember it, and they have engaged a duima. I believe I am to give them a new pony carriage and to furnish their house. I think I committed myself so far. So you see, Lizzy, there is no impediment to your return. You are very, very kind, answered Lizzy, full of thought, but I have set my heart upon a useful career. Where could you be more useful than at Tangly? I am so surprised at your sisters leaving you. Did they go of their own accord? Not quite. It was I who proposed the laurels as a suitable home for them, closest to High Claire, so much more lively than Tangly Common. I told them that, as I was going to be married, they might find their position at the manor house rather less independent than it had been. Lizzy looked a little startled by this announcement. Her pallid cheeks had flushed as she talked to Morton, but the feverish tinge faded out now and left her deadly white. You will come home, Lizzy, said Morton affectionately. You will not consider my wife an impediment, I hope. For the moment she was unable to answer him. Her lips trembled, but gave no sound. Is it Dulcy? She asked faintly after a pause. No, Dulcy has found happiness elsewhere. She is going to marry Mr. Hallamond. I am glad of that, for I believe Mr. Hallamond is a good man. But who is it that you are going to marry? Yes, I know. It is Lady Frances. What a brilliant idea! Do you think she would have me if I asked her? I don't know. I can't venture to say, Faulted Lizzy. Don't you think our tastes are out of harmony? She is so fond of field sports, and I don't care a straw for them. Then her penmanship is horrible, the various flies legs, and if I wanted to dictate a pamphlet she would never have patience to write for me. No, Lizzy, I don't think Fanny Grange would be a happy woman as my wife, or that I should be altogether blessed as her husband. A man's wife should be really and truly a help-me to him, able to sympathize with him in all that is best and holiest in his life, to lead him upward and not downward. But we'll talk more of this by and by. I want you to promise to come back to Tangli tomorrow, if you can bear the journey. I shall never go to Tangli again. I thank you with all my heart for your goodness in asking me to return, but I know that I shall be happier in the act of life that I a plan for myself. My mind is quite made up. Then you are a cruel girl, and you will make today's triumph gole and wormwood to me. Do you know why I have kept aloof from you so long, Lizzy? I waited till I had won my election. I thought you would be proud of my success, the success in which you have had so great a part. For without your sympathy I should have given up all idea of getting into Parliament for the next ten years, after my defeat at Highclair, and I wanted to come to you directly after my election. Here I am, and you are going to spot everything by being disagreeable. I am not disagreeable, Morton. I am only reasonable. Your wife will not want me at Tangli. To you I may be like a sister, but I should be a stranger to her, and before long she would begin to think of me as an intruder. It would be hard for me to find myself humiliated by her, as I have been humiliated by your sisters, and to have to turn my back upon that dear place a second time. Very well, Lizzy, if you refuse to make Tangli your future home, you will place me in a very awkward dilemma with my sisters. How so? Because I have told them that I am going to marry, and you are the only wife I will ever take home to Tangli. Morton, you left my house because you were insulted in it. You must come back, as it's mistress. Morton, you are laughing at me. I was never so much an earnest in my life. I have lived for nearly two months without you, and the time has been long enough to teach me that you are necessary to my happiness. Your friendship first cured me of the old love. Your many virtues and sweet unconscious charms taught me a new love. It is for you to make it a happy one. I shall never regret anything I have lost in life if I can but win you. Morton, I am so unworthy of you, a penniless dependent, owing everything to your aunt's charity. Just look round this room, and remember that the only relations I have in this world live in it, or rather do not live in it, for they think it too good for daily use. Remember that they are ignorant people, good and kind and true-hearted, but vulgar in all their habits and ideas. I am not ashamed of them because I belong to them, but what would you feel if my uncle and aunt were to come to Tangly Manor to see their niece, or if my brother and sisters expected to be received by me, and once having come back to them and being cared for by them, I can't go away and turn my back upon them forever. Don't you see, Morton? I do see, I do understand, dearest, and your brother and sisters and uncle and aunt shall be welcome at Tangly Manor, whenever they may please to come. Do you think I am so base a hound that I can profess a regard for the working classes and their interests, and yet blush to own that my grandfather and my wife's grandfather were working men? Fortune favored by grandfather, and he climbed to the top of the ladder, while your grandfather, who must have been an honest man, or mine, would not have loved him so well, stayed at the bottom. The only difference between your pedigree and mine is success, and you shall share the fortune that success brought, darling, if you will, if you only will. Oh, Morton, I have loved you ever since I was a child. I wish you were a pauper, that you might know how true my love is. But I don't, Lizzie, I take your love upon trust, and now may I call your aunt in and tell her. She looked very suspicious just now when I asked to see you. I shouldn't wonder if she were listening at the door. Oh, Morton, don't be shocked, dear. A duchess might do as much on such an occasion. Morton, I'm afraid you will be disgusted with them. They talk in a dreadfully vulgar style, but they are very good. Never mind their talk, dear. Your brother and sisters are not too old to learn a better style. We'll get them polished a little, just to make you happy. He opened the door in a leisurely way, and found Mrs. Hartman in the kitchen, looking out of the window with an abstracted air. Her arms folded on the window sill. Her voice uplifted in a popular melody. By all which signs and tokens he concluded that she had been listening. William and his sister, Jesse, were both at home. Mary was out with her young man, and it is to be observed that a young woman engaged to a young man is rarely to be found in the domestic circle. It was very cruel of you not to let me know that Lizzy was so ill, said Morton, when he had been induced to the family. It was all her fault, answered Mrs. Hartman. She was so set against my writing that I didn't dare to do it for a fear she should fret and make herself worse. But it laid heavy on my conscience. I can tell you, ain't she a wreck? She is looking very ill, but my aunt will be here tomorrow, and I shall send them both off to Scarborough for a month, and then there will be a wedding, and you must be Bridesmaid, Miss Hartman. Jesse clasped her hands and gave a hoidish jump in the exuberance of her delight. Didn't I say there was a lover at the bottom of it all, exclaimed Mrs. Hartman? Well, Mr. Blake, I wish you joy, and I think, though Lizzy's a lucky girl in getting such a husband, you're a lucky man in getting such a wife, for though I says it, that there never was a sweeter young woman than my niece, sir, and now I suppose we shall see no more of her. She'll never come to Milton Street no more after she's married. Indeed she will, Mrs. Hartman, answered Morton Hardley. She shall come to see you, wherever you are, and you must come to see her. No thank you, sir, said the matron bridling. It's very kind of you to mention it, but I know when I'm in my element. I'm very fond of Liz, but I shouldn't feel easy in a fine home, and I'll never go where I ain't in my own element. That's the only kind of pride I've got left in me. I know my element, and I'd like to keep it. I think we could make you comfortable at Tangley, said Morton Smiling. Yes, if I could come and help to cook a great dinner, or give a hand in your spring cleaning, and sit down to my meals free and easy with your servants. But you and Lizzy wouldn't like that, and as to sitting on satin-covered chair and twiddling my thumbs, I couldn't do it for no one. Well, I hope you'll change your mind when you come to know us better. Lizzy's brother and sisters must come and see what kind of place Tangley is, and then they may be able to tempt you. I'll come and glad, said Jesse, for I think Liz is too good a sort to be ashamed of me. Morton winced a little, adhering his betroth described as a good sort, but he came through the whole ordeal nobly, and he sat down, by and by, to a scrumptious spread of tea, hotcakes, watercresses, and shrimps in the bosom of his new family. End of chapter fifty-one, recording by Linda Mary Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C.