 Volume 1, Chapter 1 of That Unfortunate Marriage by Francis Eleanor Trollop. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. That Unfortunate Marriage by Francis Eleanor Trollop, Volume 1, Chapter 1. Augustus Chepington had made an unfortunate marriage. That was admitted on all hands. When he was a cornet in a cavalry regiment quartered in the ancient cathedral city of Old Chester, he ran away with pretty Susan Dobbs, the daughter of his landlady. Augustus' friends and family, all the Chephingtons, the Dormersmiths, the Castlecombs, deplored this rash step. It was never mentioned, either at the time or afterwards, without expressions of deep commiseration for him. Nevertheless, from one point of view there were compensations. This unfortunate marriage was made responsible for a great many shortcomings which would otherwise have been attributed more directly to Augustus Chepington himself. For example, it was said to account for his failure in his profession. He had chosen it chiefly because he very much liked the brilliant uniform of a certain crack regiment. It was in the days before competitive examinations, and he had no other aptitude for it than a showy seat on horseback, and a person well calculated to set off the works of the regimental tailor. But when years had passed and he had remained undistinguished, his friends said, what could one expect after Augustus' unfortunate marriage? After a time he sold out of the army and went to live on the continent, where very shortly he had squandered nearly all his money, and fallen into shady paths of life, and again there was a chorus of I told you so, and a general sense that all this was due to the unfortunate marriage. Finally his wife died, leaving him with one little girl, the sole survivor of five children, and he came to England with the idea of securing some place which should be suited to his birth, his abilities, his habits, and his inclinations. No such place was found. Several members of the purge were applied to to exert their influence with government on behalf of so well connected a personage as Augustus Checkington. But government behaved very badly. Government was insensible to his claims. His claims it is true were not small. They required a maximum of remuneration for a minimum of labor. He was unable also to furnish any proofs of his fitness for one or two posts which happened to be vacant, except the undeniable fact of his cousinship with all the Checkington's and Castlecombs in England, and to this kind of qualification government it appeared attached no importance at all. He paid a round of visits at country houses, and renewed his long disused acquaintance with a score of more or less distant relations, but he was not popular. It has been observed that unsuccessful men very often are not popular. "'Cause Checkington has dropped out of the running,' men said. A fellow naturally gets forgotten when he has kept out of sightful years, and besides he makes himself so deucid disagreeable. He's always grumbling." This latter accusation was true. If England had shown no maternal affection for her long absent son, the son returned her hard-heartedness with interest. Indeed in his case it turned into active resentment. He got tired of country houses and town mansions, where he was received but cruelly. He was sarcastic and bitter on the failure of his connections to procure him a lucrative sinecure. He considered that the country was traveling downhill at breakneck speed, and for his part he did not feel inclined to move his little finger to impede that fatal course. Moreover the black coffee was nine times out of ten utterly undrinkable. One day he shook the dust of England's inhospitable shores from office feet and returned to his shady haunts on the continent. It's irresponsibility, it's cafes, it's boulevards, and it's billiards. And when he was fairly gone, all the Cheffingtons and the Dormersmiths and the Castlecombs were softened into sympathy, and with much shrugging of shoulders and shaking of heads declared that it was a heart-rending spectacle to behold such a man as Augustus Cheffinton, ruined, crushed, eclipsed, destroyed by his unfortunate marriage. When he went back to Belgium, he left behind him at school and brightened his little motherless girl Miranda, familiarly called May. The honorable Mrs. Cheffington, Augustus' mother, had advised her son to give the little girl a first-rate education, so as to mitigate as far as possible one disastrous effect of the unfortunate marriage, which was that May had a plebeian mother. Mrs. Cheffington, known throughout all the ramifications of the family, as the Dowager, was a hard-featured, selfish old woman with a black wig, a pale yellow skin, and frowning eyebrows. She lived on a pension which would cease at her death, and she was supposed by some of her relations to be making a purse. They thought it would turn out that the Dowager had considerable savings to leave behind her, and they founded this supposition on her never giving away anything during her lifetime. Mrs. Dormersmith, Augustus' Cheffington sister, declared that her mother made one exception to her rule of refusing assistance to any of them. She believed that Augustus, who had always been her favorite child, profited by the Dowager's indulgence and managed to extract some money from her tightly-closed purse. And it certainly was true that the old lady had paid May's school bills, as far as they had been paid at all. But one day the honorable Anne Miranda Cheffington took off her black wig for the last time and relaxed her frowning eyebrows. The announcement of her death appeared in the first column of the Times. There was a brief obituary notice in a fashionable journal, and her place knew her no more. Augustus hastened home to England on the receipt of a telegram from his sisters. That is to say he said he hastened, but he did not arrive in town until some hours after the funeral was over. Mr. Dormersmith was somewhat irritated by this tardiness and observed to his wife that it was just like Augustus to keep out of the way while there was any trouble to be taken, and only arrive in time to be present at the reading of the will. Any expectations that Augustus might have founded on his mother's reluctance to give during her lifetime were quite disappointed. The Dowager had no money to bequeath. She had spent nearly the last chilling of her quarter's income. In fact, there was not enough to cover the expenses of the funeral which were finally paid several months afterwards by Mr. Dormersmith. It seemed almost superfluous under the circumstances to have made a will at all, but the will was there. The chief item in it was a quantity of yellow old lace extremely dirty and much in need of mending, which was solemnly bequeathed by Mrs. Chuffington to her daughter, Pauline Augustus Clarissa Dormersmith. It was set forth at some length how that the lace, being an heirloom of the Chuffingtons, should have descended in due course to the wife of the eldest son, or failing that, to the eldest daughter of the eldest son, and how this tradition was disregarded in the present case by reason of peculiar and unprecedented family circumstances. This was the Dowager's party and dart at the unfortunate marriage. There was little other property except the dingy old furniture of Mrs. Chuffington's house at Richmond, and a few books treating chiefly of fortification and gunnery, which had belonged to Lieutenant General the Honourable Augustus Vane Chuffington, the Dowager's long deceased husband. What on earth my mother did with her money? I can't conjecture, exclaimed Augustus staring out of the window of his brother-in-law's drawing-room the day after the funeral. She didn't give it to us, Augustus, returned Mrs. Dormersmith plentifully, even when my boy Cyril went to see her at the end of the holidays, just before returning to Harrow, she never tipped him. Once I think she gave him five shillings, but it's a long time ago he was a little fellow in petticoats. Then what did she do with her money, repeated Augustus, with an increasingly gloomy scowl at the gardens of the Kensington Square, on which his eyes rested? I believe that, with the exception of what she paid for May's schooling, she spent it on herself. Spent it on herself? That's impossible! It was a very good income, indeed, for a solitary woman, and she lived very quietly. You may get through a good deal of money, even living quietly, when you don't deny yourself anything you can get. For instance, she never would drive one horse. She had been accustomed to a pair all her life. Augustus checked an oath on his very lips, and instead of swearing according to his first impulse, observed with solemnity, that he knew not how his mother had been able to reconcile such selfishness with her conscience, and hoped her last moments had not been troubled by remorse. Oh, I don't think my mom felt anything of that kind, said Mrs. Dormersmith in her slow, gentle tones. She was always complaining of other people's unreasonable expectations. The brother and sister fell silent for a while after this, each being immersed in private meditation. That very morning, the circumstance had occurred which had put the last touch to Augustus' disappointment and exasperation. The Brighton schoolmistress had sent Miss Miranda Chethington to London, in the charge of a maid servant, and the little girl had arrived at her aunt's house in a cab with her worldly possessions, namely a small black trunk full of clothes, and a canary bird in a cage. The schoolmistress wrote civilly but firmly to the effect that, after the lamented decease of the honorable Mrs. Chethington, she could not undertake to keep May any longer, feeling sure by repeated experience that all applications for payment made to Captain Chethington would be in vain and understanding that Mrs. Dormersmith declined to charge herself with her niece's education. Captain Chethington had been violently angry and had denounced the schoolmistress, Mrs. Drax, as an insolent, grasping, vulgar harpy. But Mrs. Drax was out of his reach and there was May, thirteen years old, with a healthy appetite, and limbs rapidly outgrowing her clothes. Augustus continued to glare mootily at the square for some minutes. His sister leaned her cheek on her hand and looked at the fire. At length, Augustus, composing his face to a less savage expression, turned away from the window, sat down opposite to his sister and said pensively, We must arrange something for May, Pauline. You must indeed, Augustus. We ought to consider her future. Yes, I think you ought, Augustus. The girl is at a hobbledy-hoi age. It's a perplexing position, so difficult to know what to do with her. There is no age at which it is so awkward to dress a girl. I have sometimes regretted not having daughters, but upon my word there must be a dreadful amount of harass about their clothes between twelve and fifteen, or in some cases sixteen. It's impossible for me to have her with me in Brussels, the way I live, I'm obliged to live malgré moi. She'd upset all my arrangements and habits. In short, you can see for yourself, Pauline, that it would be out of the question. No doubt it would be very bad for the girl. Of course that's what I mean. Wouldn't it be the best plan, after all, Pauline, to leave her here with you? She could have private masters. Mrs. Dormersmith shook her head. At my expense, of course, added Augustus. I must screw and scrape and make some sacrifices, no doubt, but it really won't do, Augustus. I assure you it won't do. Frederick will not have it. He talked to me after luncheon. It isn't the least use. Mrs. Dormersmith continued plaintively to shake her head as she spoke and to look with gentle melancholy at the fire. Frederick is very kind, but let us discuss the thing in a friendly spirit. If I pay for her clothing and education, surely the expense of her board wouldn't ruin you and Frederick. No, but the butcher and the baker are the least part of the matter. It isn't as if May were the daughter of one's housekeeper or one's governess. She's a Chevington, you know. So many things are required for a girl with her connections, and as to your paying for her masters, of course we know you wouldn't, Augustus. Upon my soul, you are civil and sisterly. Well, I daresay you would mean to pay, but you wouldn't. It would be sure to turn out so, don't you know? Things always have been like that with you, Augustus. Then what the devil do you think I'm to do? Pray, don't be violent. I really cannot bear any display of violence. You should remember that it is scarcely a week since poor Lamar was taken from us. I don't see what that has to do with it. Miranda hasn't been taken from us. That's the point. Mrs. Dormersmith making no answer. Her brother continued after a moment or two. You are fertile in objections, but you don't seem to have any plan to suggest. Well, an idea did occur to me. I don't know whether you would like it. Like it? Probably not, but I am used to sacrifice my inclinations. Well, I thought that you might put May into a school in France or Germany, or somewhere, letting her give lessons in English in return for her board, and so on. There are plenty of schools where they do that sort of thing. It wouldn't so much matter abroad, because people wouldn't know who she was. You might tide over a year or two in that way. Augustus got up from his chair. My daughter would drudge in a continental school, he exclaimed indignantly. If you chose a place little frequented by English, I don't think people would know. There was a short silence. Then Augustus said angrily, Oh, take the girl back with me. She must share my home such as it is. We will neither of us trouble you off, Frederick, much longer. I shall start for Austin by the morning mail tomorrow. And he dashed out of the room, emitting a muffled roll of oaths, and jarring the door in a way which made Mrs. Dormersmith clasp her forehead with both hands. And leaned back shrinkingly in her chair. But when the morrow came, Captain Sheffington and his daughter did not go to Austin. When they had got out of sight of the Dormersmith's house, he ordered the cabin to drive to the Great Western Railway Station and started by an express train for Old Chester. Amongst the minor grievances reckoned up by the deceased Dowager, as accruing from Augustus's unfortunate marriage, was the fact that his wife had borne the plebeian name of Dobbs. One of her most frequent complaints against poor little May was that the child was a thorough Dobbs, and when she was out of temper, which was very often, she would prefer this charge as indignantly as though Dobbs were synonymous with the most disgraceful epithets in the English language. And yet the sound of it awoke very different associations in the city of Old Chester, where Augustus's mother-in-law had lived all her life. Mrs. Dobbs was the widow of a tradesman. The ironmonger's business, which her husband had carried on, had long passed into other hands. But his name still met the eyes of his fellow townspeople in the inscription, J. Brown, late Dobbs, painted over the shop. Old Chester is a city in which two streams of life run side by side, mingling but little with each other. At a certain point in the existence of Old Chester, its ancient course of civil and ecclesiastical history had received a new tributary, a strong and ever-growing current of commerce. Commerce built wide suburbs with villa residences in various stages of detachment and semi-detachment from one another. Commerce strewed the pleasant country paths and lanes with coal dust, and blackened the air with smoke. Commerce set up art schools, founded hospitals, and furnished patients for them, multiplied railways for miles round, and scored all the new streets and some of the old with tramway lines. Commerce brought estates in the neighborhood, was conveyed to public worship in splendid equipages, sent its sons to Eaton, and married its daughters into the peerage. But for all that the fame of Old Chester continued to rest on its character as a cathedral city. The old currents surpassed the new one in length and dignity, if in nothing else. The gray cathedral towers rose up majestically, above the din and turmoil of four-gen lumen factory, with a noble aspiration towards something above and beyond these, while the vibrations of their mellow chimes shed down sweet suggestions of peace and goodwill among the homes of the toilers. Mrs. Dobbs particularly loved the sounds of the cathedral chimes, and she sat with closed eyes listening to them in the twilight of a certain autumn evening. Her house was in a narrow street called Friar's Row, which turned out of the high street. A monastery had once stood on the side of it, but all trace of the ancient conventional buildings had long since disappeared. The houses were solid brick dwellings from one or two hundred years old. Mrs. Hobbs's husband had bequeathed her a long lease of that which she occupied. Most of the other houses in Friar's Row were used as offices or warehouses, the wealthier kind of tradespeople who once lived in them having migrated to the suburbs. On her husband's death some of Mrs. Dobbs' friends had urged her to remove to a newer and a more cheerful part of the town, but she had resisted the suggestion with some contempt. I know what suits me, she would say, and that's a knowledge the Lord doesn't bestow on all in sundry. This house suits me. It's weatherproof for one thing, and you needn't be afraid of putting your foot through the floor if you walk a little heavy as I do. When I go to see the Simpsons in that band box they call Laurel Villa, I daren't lean my umbrella against the wall for Friar are bringing the whole concern down like a pack of cards. She might easily have increased her income by letting her house and removing to one in the suburbs, for its position was central and the tenements in Friar's Row were in great request for business purposes, but she resisted this temptation. There were reasons of a more impalpable kind than the solidity of its floors and roofs, which made Mrs. Dobbs constant to her old home. She had lived there all the days of her married life. Her daughter had been born there, her husband had died there. The somewhat narrow and dingy street had in her eyes the familiar aspect of a friendly face. She loved to hear the rattle and bustle of the high street, slightly softened by distance. Those common sounds were full of voices from the past. The common sights around were associated with all the joys and sorrows of her life. Mrs. Dobbs never said anything to this effect, but she felt it, and so she stayed in Friar's Row. The parlor in which she sat was comfortably and substantially furnished. A competent observer would have perceived evidences of permanence and respectability in the solid old-fashioned chairs and tables, the prints after Moreland on the walls, and the corner cupboard full of fine old china. The bookshelves, which filled one end of the room, contained the accumulations of successive generations. There was a square piano forte with a pile of old music books on the top of it, and a big family Bible in massive binding had a place of honor all to itself on a side table covered with green bez. On this special autumn evening, owing to the hour and partly to the narrowness of the street, which shut out some of the lingering daylight, the parlor was very dim, a red fire glowed in the grate, a large tabby-cat blinked and purred on the hearth rug, and in a spacious easy chair at one side of the fireplace sat Mrs. Dobbs, listening with closed eyes to the cathedral chimes. Presently the door was softly opened, and there came into the room Mrs. Dobbs' lifelong friend and crony, Mr. Joseph Weatherhead. This person was her brother-in-law and a childless widower. He had carried on the trade of bookseller and stationer in Birmingham for many years, but had sold his business on the death of his wife and come to live in Oldchester near the Dobbs. Mr. Weatherhead was a tall, lean man with a benevolent bald forehead and mild eyes. The only remarkable feature in his face was the nose, which was large, slightly aquiline, brownish-red in color, and protruded from his face at a peculiar angle. The forehead above and the chin below sloped away from it rather rapidly. The nose had thus a singularly inquisitive air of being eagerly in the van, as though it thrust itself forward in quest of news. As he closed the door behind him, Mrs. Dobbs opened her eyes. I thought you were asleep, Sarah, said Mr. Weatherhead. A sleep ejaculated Mrs. Dobbs with all the indignation which that accusation is so apt mysteriously to excite. Nothing of the kind. I was listening to the chimes. They always make me think. Of poor Susie, interrupted Mr. Weatherhead nodding, ah, and so they do me. Poor Susie, how pretty she was. She had better have been less pretty for her own happiness. The greatness fortune of her life wouldn't have happened but for her pretty face. Mr. Weatherhead nodded again and sat down opposite to Mrs. Dobbs in a corresponding arm-share to her own. He then took from his pocket a black leather case, and from the case a mirchon pipe, which he proceeded to fill and light and smoke. While on infatuation, sighed Mrs. Dobbs pursuing her own meditations, to think of Susie throwing herself away on that extravagant selfish good-for-nothing fellow, without any principles to speak of, when she might have had an honest tradesman in a first-rate way of business. She had only to pick and choose. Humpf, honest tradesmen are not as plentiful as blackberries, though, observed Mr. Weatherhead reflectively. Mrs. Dobbs ignored this parentheses and went on. It was a bad day for me and mine when he first came swaggering into this house. From which speech it will be seen that the Dobbs side of the family coincided with the Cheffingtons in considering Augustus' to have been an unfortunate marriage, only each party arrived at the same conclusion by a different road? Have you heard from him lightly, Sarah? asked Mr. Weatherhead after a pause. From my precious son-in-law, not I. Oh, not a word from him till he wants something. You may take your oath of that, Joe Weatherhead. Oh, I thought you might have heard from him because... Well? Well, because I see something has been putting old times into your head and I thought it might be that. Something been putting old times into my head? I should like to know when they are out of my head. What you know about it? Mr. Weatherhead apparently did know something about it for after another long silence during which he puffed at his pipe and stared into the fire. Mrs. Dobbs justified his penetration by saying, The truth is, I have been turning things over in my mind a good deal since yesterday. Mr. Weatherhead was too wary to expose himself to another snub, so he merely nodded two or three times in an oracular manner. I'm worried out of my mind about that child. She went off yesterday as bright and happy as possible, looking so pretty and gentile, fit for any company in the land. Ah, she went off, you say. To the hadlows. She's to stay there over Sunday. Oh, but I don't quite see. Go on. What is it that you don't quite see? I don't quite see what there is to worry you in that. The hadlows are a very good sort of people. I should think they were a very good sort of people. Cannon Hadlow is one of the best men in Old Chester, or in all England for the matter of that, and he's a gentleman to the marrow of his bones. But what sort of a position has my granddaughter among the hadlows and their belongings? A very nice position, I should say. A very nice position, exclaimed Mrs. Dobbs, who seemed determined to repeat all poor Mr. Weatherhead's speeches in a tone of disdainful irony. That's so like you, Joe. She thinks it a very nice position, too, poor lamb. She knows nothing of the world, bless her innocent heart. And for all her 17 years, she's the merest child in some things. But you might know better, you're not 17 years old, Joe Weatherhead. Certainly not, assented he emphatically. The fact of the matter is that, whether by good luck or bad luck, maid does not belong to my sphere or my class. She's a chaffington. She has the ways of a lady and the education of a lady. And she has a right to the position of a lady. If that father of hers gives her nothing else, he might give her that. And he shall, if I can make him. Perhaps it might have been better, after all, if you had not sent the child back to her old school, but just brought her up here, under your own eye in a plain sort of way. It would have been better for you, anyhow. I don't know that. Why, you'd have been spared a good many sacrifices. There's not another woman in England would have done what you've done, Sarah. Nonsense. There are plenty of women in England as big fools as me. Even that wooden old figurehead of a dowager. Lord, forgive me, she's dead and gone, had the grace to pay the child's schooling as long as she lived. She, exclaimed Joe Weatherhead, firing up suddenly, and tapping his muesharm sharply against the hob. That's a very different pair of shoes. She could afford it a precious sight better than you. What does she ever deprive herself of? I say there's not another woman in England would have done what you've done, and it's no good you're contradicting. There, bless the man. Don't ask Coral about it. But I shall Coral about it unless you give in. He is the case fairly put. A young spark runs away with your only daughter, and pretty well breaks your heart. He takes a wandering about into foreign parts, and you only get news of her now and then. And never good news. He's too fine a gentleman to do a stroke of work for his family, but as soon as he's run through his bit of money, he's not too fine a gentleman to fall into disreputable ways alive, nor yet to let who will look after his motherless little girl and feed and clothe and educate her. When his own mother dies, leaving two quarters school bills unpaid, which you have to settle by the by, the rest of the family, including his own sister, refuse to advance a sixpence to save the child from the workhouse. I say, Joe, let's put it a little too strong, my friend. There was no talk of the workhouse. Let me finish summoning up the case. I say they wouldn't spend sixpence to save that child from starvation. There now, when the dowager is dead, and the rest of them button up their breeches' pockets, and the school mistress sends away the poor little girl because she can't afford to keep her and teach her for nothing, what does my gentleman do? Does he try in any one way to do his duty by his only child? Nor he. He coolly shuffles off all troubles and responsibility on other folks' shoulders. He hasn't taken any notice of you for years, except writing once to borrow fifty pounds. Which he didn't get, Joe. She didn't get because an overruling providence had ordained that you shouldn't have it to lend him. Well, after years of silence and neglect, he turns up an old chester one fine morning and walks into your house, bringing his little girl on a visit to a dear grandmother. Talk of brass! What sort of material do you suppose that man's features are composed of? Got a perch, a very likely. Returned Mrs. Dobbs, who now sat resting her head against the cushions of her chair, and listening to Mr. Weatherhead's eloquence, with a half-humorous resignation. That's a good tough elastic kind of stuff. Tough? He had need have some toughness of countenance to come into this house as he did. And that's not the end. He swagger's about old chester for a week or two, using your house as an in, neither more nor less, except that there's no bill. And then one day he starts off for the continent, leaving little May here, and promising to send for her as soon as he gets settled. From that day to this, and it's four years ago, you have had the child on your hands, and her precious father has never contributed one shilling towards her support. You sent the child back to school. You pinched and saved, and denied yourself many little comforts to keep her there. You have never let her feel or guess that she has been a burden on you in your old age. And I say again, Sarah Dobbs, that considering all the circumstances of the case, there's not another woman in England would have done what you've done, no, nor in Europe. Well, well, having come to that, I hope you've finished Joe Weatherhead. I hope I have, return Mr. Weatherhead, mopping his flushed face with a very large red-pocket handkerchief. I hope I have for the present. But if you attempt to contradict a word of what I've been saying, I'll begin again and go still further. There, there, then that's settled. But I am thinking of the future. Supposing I died tomorrow, what's to become of May? I have nothing to leave her. My bit of property goes back to Dobbs's family, and all right and fair, too. I have nothing to say against my husband's will. But people like the Hadlos, who invite May and make much of her, have no idea that she has no one to look to but me. I don't say they'd give her the cold shoulder if they did know it, but it would make a difference. As it is, they talk to her about her aunt, Miss Dormersmith and her cousin, Lord This and her connection Lady Tother, and a kind of a, what shall I say, a sort of atmosphere of high folks hangs about her. She's Miss Miranda Chuffington with 50 relations in the peerage. If she was known only as the grandchild of Mrs. Dobbs, the ironmonger's widow, she would seem mildly changed in a good many eyes. Sometimes it comes over me as if I was letting May go on under false pretenses. Why, she has got 50 relations in the peerage, hasn't she? 100 for all I know, but folks are not aware that her father's family take no notice of her. She hardly knows it herself. But her aunt Miss Dormersmith writes to her, doesn't she? Oh, a line wants on a blue moon to say she's glad to hear May as well and to complain of the great expense of living in London. The selfish meanness of that woman is beyond belief. Well, I don't know, Joe. She's a poor creature, certainly, but I feel more a sort of pity for her than anything else. Do you? It's only out of contradiction, then. Not all together, said Mrs. Dobbs, laughing good humorously. I made her out pretty well that time I took May up to London before she went back to school. Ah, I remember. You tried if the aunt would do anything to help. Yes, I tried. It was right to try. But I very soon saw that there was nothing to be hoped for from that quarter. Mrs. Dormersmith has been brought up to live for the world and the world's ways. To be sure, her world is a funny artificial little affair compared with God Almighty's. Pretty much as though one should take a teaspoon full of epsom salts for the sea. But at any rate, I do believe she sincerely thinks ought to be worshipped and bowed down to. It's no use to tell such a woman that she could do without this or that useless finery and spend the money better. She'll answer you with tears in her eyes that it's impossible and what's more she'll believe it. Why, if some Tom Naughty or other belonging to what she calls the best people was to ordain tomorrow that nobody should eat his dinner unless he was waited on by the man with a long pigtail, that poor creature would know no peace, nor her meat would have no relish, until a man with a pigtail stood behind her chair. That's Mrs. Dormersmith, Joe Weatherhead. Mr. Weatherhead drew up his lips into the form of a round O, as his manner was when considering any matter of interest, and appeared to meditate a reply. But the reply was never spoken, for a brisk ring at the street door gave a new turn to his thoughts and those of his sister-in-law. Dear me, exclaimed Mrs. Dobbs, putting up her hands to settle her cap and stretching out her feet with a sudden movement, which made the old tatty on the hearth-rug arch her back indignantly. Why, that must be the Simpsons. I didn't think it was so light. Just let the candles will you, Joe. I hope Moffa has remembered the roasted potatoes. End of Chapter 2 Volume 1, Chapter 3 of That Unfortunate Marriage This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. That Unfortunate Marriage by Francis Eleanor Trollop. Volume 1, Chapter 3 The Simpsons were old friends of Mrs. Dobbs. Mr. Simpson was organist of the largest parish church in Old Chester, where his father had been organist before him. To this circumstance he owed his singular Christian name. The elder Simpson, whose musical enthusiasm had run all into one channel, insisted on naming his son Sebastian Bach. Some men would have felt this to be a disadvantage for the profession of organist and music teacher, as involving a suggestion of ridicule. But Mr. Sebastian Bach Simpson was not apt to be diffident about any distinguishing characteristic of his own. His wife had been a governess and still gave daily lessons in sundry respectable Old Chester families. By an arrangement begun during her late husband's lifetime, this couple came every Saturday evening to sup with Mrs. Dobbs and to play a game of wist for penny-points before the meal. The two guests entered the parlour just as Mr. Weatherhead was lighting the candles. Dear me! exclaimed Mrs. Simpson, are we too early? I had no idea! Surely the choir practice was not over earlier than usual, Bazzy! She was a large stout woman of forty, with a pink and white complexion and filmy brown curls, and she wore spectacles. She had once been very slim and pretty, and still retained a certain girlishness of demeanor. It has been said that a man is as old as he feels, and a woman as old as she looks. Mrs. Simpson had innocently usurped the masculine privilege, and not feeling herself to be either wiser or less trivial than she was at eighteen, had never thought of trying to bring her manners into harmony with her appearance. Her husband was a short dark man with quick black eyes and thick stubby black hair. His voice was singularly rasping and dissonant, which seemed an unfortunate incongruity in a professor of music. Such as he was, however, his wife had a great admiration for him, and considered his talents to be remarkable. Her marriage, she was fond of saying, had been a love match, and she had never got beyond the romantic stage of her attachment. Good evening, Mrs. Dobbs, said the organist, advancing to shake hands, and taking no notice of his wife's inquiry. How are you, weatherhead? I suppose you were napping, having forty winks in the twilight, eh? No, Mr. Weatherhead and I were chatting, said Mrs. Dobbs. Chatting in this kind of blind man's holiday, were you? I should have thought you could hardly see to talk. See to talk? Oh, Bazzi, what an expression you do say, the dronist things, exclaimed Mrs. Simpson with a giggle. Doesn't he, Mrs. Dobbs, did you ever hear? Mrs. Dobbs, for all reply, hospitably stirred the fire until it blazed, helping Mrs. Simpson to remove her bonnet and cloak, and placing her in a chair near her own. Mr. Simpson took as a custom seat, and the four persons drew round the fire. Whilst Martha, Mrs. Dobbs' middle-aged servant, set out a little card-table and disposed the candles on it in two old-fashioned spindle-shanked silver candlesticks. It was all done according to long-established custom, which was seldom deviated from in any particular. And how are you, dear Mrs. Dobbs, as Mrs. Simpson, taking her hostess's hands between her own? And, dear May, where's May? May has been away from home on a visit since yesterday morning. She won't come back before Monday. And may one ask where she is? It is not, I presume, a mystery of Udolfo. She's at the Hadlows. The Hadlows? Canon Hadlows, cried Mrs. Simpson, clasping her hands with a gesture of amazement. Then she added rather inconsistently. Well, I'm not surprised. I know they have lately taken a great deal of notice of her. Miss Hadlow, and she having been at school together, of course created an intimacy which are the friendships of early youth, where they are genuine, have a warmth, a charm. Now, Amelia, interposed her husband's rasping voice, this ejaculation was his habitual manner of recalling Mrs. Simpson's attention to the matter in hand, whatever it might be, for the good lady's mind was discursive. If you'll be kind enough to leave off your nonsense, we can begin our game. Come and cut for partners. An earnest wist player would have been outraged by the performance of the four persons who met weekly in Mrs. Dobbs's parlor. They chatted, they mistelt, they even revoked sometimes, and they overlooked each other's misdemeanors with unscrupulous laxity. In a word, they regarded the noble game of wist merely as a means and not as an end, and rescandalously bent on amusing themselves regardless of Hoyle. The only one of the party who had any pretensions to play tolerably was Mr. Weatherhead, but even his attention was always to be diverted from his cards by a new piece of gossip, and perhaps it was as well that he did not take the game too much to heart, especially on the present occasion, for the fair Amelia fell to his lot as a partner, and her performances with the cards were calculated to drive a zealous player into a nervous fever. The first hand or two proceeded in decorous silence, but by degrees the players began to talk, throwing out first detached sentences, and at last boldly entering into general conversation. Bazzy had a great deal of trouble with the choir this evening, said Mrs. Simpson plaintively. The sopranos were so inattentive, and inattention is so particularly, oh dear, I beg pardon, I have a diamond. Well, it does not much matter, for we couldn't have made the odd trick in any case. A nice business that Sheffield, with those trade unions, said Mr. Weatherhead. Some severe measures ought to be taken, but they won't be. That's what your precious liberalism comes to. Your lead, Simpson. Nonsense about liberalism, Joe Weatherhead, replied Mrs. Dobbs. I believe you'd like to accuse the liberals of the bad weather. There, did you ever see such a hand? One trump and that fell. Mrs. Simpson playing out her nave misled me. Oh, if you reckon on Amelia's having any sufficient motive for playing one card more than another, exclaimed Amelia's husband. Have you heard Mrs. Dobbs that Mr. Bransby is getting better? What Bransby is that? asked Mr. Weatherhead, thrusting his head forward inquiringly. Codell and Bransby solicit his to the dean and chapter. Oh, he's been ill, then. Very ill, but I hear he was pronounced out of danger on Wednesday. Is it not good news, cried Mrs. Simpson? Such a misfortune for his young family. I mean, if he had died, you know. But I suppose he's a warm man, isn't he? Codell and Bransby. It's a fine business, isn't it? asked Mr. Weatherhead. It had need be, rejoined the organist, to maintain that tribe of boys and girls and an extravagant young wife into the bargain. Oh, bassy, but they are such pretty children, and Mr. Bransby is so truly elegant and interesting. All her bonnets come from Paris, I am told, and indeed there is a certain style. Eh, you don't mean to say that spades are trumps? What a disappointment! I thought I had all four honours. This ingenuous speech might have called forth some remonstrance from Mrs. Simpson's partner, but that the latter was too much interested in the subject of the Bransbees to attend to it. The eldest son is provided for by his mother's fortune, isn't he? he inquired. Well, provided for, I don't know that it is very much, but it was all tightly settled. Otherwise Bransby's second marriage would have been a greater misfortune for the young man than it is, replied the organist. I don't see that it's any misfortune at all, observed Mrs. Dobbs. Theodore Bransby is quite well enough for a young fellow, and why shouldn't his father marry again if he liked it? He is an extremely gentleman-like young man, as Mr. Theodore Bransby said Mrs. Simpson, I have been imparting daily instruction to the younger children, and I saw him rather frequently when he was at home during the university vacation. He is now reading for the bar, you know, and I believe, was at your name, Mr. Weatherhead, really? Then I have thrown away my queen, however, smiling amably, one can but take the trick. I believe that Mr. Theodore Bransby means to go into Parliament later. There is really something of the statesman about him already. I think, a way of buttoning his coat to the chin, don't you know? Is Theodore Bransby an old chester now, asked Mrs. Dobbs, sorting her cards? Oh, yes, replied Mrs. Simpson. I wonder you didn't know, for he is a great deal at Cannon-Hadlows. They say he is making up to Miss Hadlow. Oh, but there is Mrs. Hadlow's nephew, Young Rivers, put in, Mr. Weatherhead. He is supposed to be dangling after his cousin, isn't he? I should think Young Rivers had better dangle after an employment that would give him bread and cheese. Miss Constance Hadlow won't have a penny. Oh, passy, but where there is real affection, mercenary considerations must give way. True love! True love is above all! As she uttered these words with great fervour, Mrs. Simpson flourished her arm enthusiastically, and in so doing swept off the table several coins which had served as counters to register her opponent's score. The silver discs rolled swiftly away into various inaccessible corners of the room, with the perversity usually observed in such cases. Fortunately the game had just come to an end, and Martha had announced that the supper was ready. This circumstance, and the fact that her husband was a winner, spared Mrs. Simpson a sharp reprimand. Mr. Simpson, indeed, uttered a few sarcastic croaks. Now, Amelia, there you go! Always up to some nonsense, a rather! But he watched Mr. Weatherhead and Martha as they crawled about on hands and knees to recover the missing shillings and sixpences with considerable equanimity, merely observing that Amelia ought to be ashamed of herself for giving so much trouble. When the supper was set on the table, three of the party, at least, were in high good humour and disposed to enjoy it. Mr. Simpson had won, and was content. Mr. Weatherhead paid his losses without a murmur, conscious, no doubt, that they were due as much to his own wandering attention as to his partner's aberrations. As for Mrs. Simpson, the sweetness of her disposition was proof against far more souring circumstances than having spoiled Joel Weatherhead's game. She was not the least out of humour with him. Mrs. Dobbs alone was a little more silent and a little less genial than usual. The talk that evening with her old friend had awakened painful thoughts of the past and anxieties for the future. She very rarely mentioned her son-in-law's name even to Mr. Weatherhead, who was thoroughly in her confidence, and whenever she did speak of him, the result was invariably to irritate and depress her. However, her hospitable instincts roused her to shake off her cares in some degree and to make her friends welcome to the fair set before them. When the more substantial part of the supper was disposed of, and a jug of hot punch steamed on the board, Mrs. Simpson delicately tapping with her teaspoon on the edge of her tumbler, observed with an air at once penetrating and amiable, well, I am sure it will be very gratifying to Mrs. Dormus Smith when she hears that dear May has been invited to the Hadlows. I don't think Mrs. Dormus Smith will lose her wits with joy, answered Mrs. Dobbs dryly. No—oh, but surely! She must feel it agreeable that her niece should be noticed by persons of such eminent gentility. Mrs. Dobbs would have dismissed the subject with a smile and a shake of the head, avoiding, as she always did, any discussion or even mention of her son-in-law's family, but Mr. Simpson interposed magisterially. If Mrs. Dormus Smith isn't gratified, it must be because she is ignorant of the position held by Cannon Hadlows' family in Old Chester. Mrs. Dobbs faced upon this and said bluntly, My dear good man, all the best society of Old Chester put together would seem mighty small beer to Mrs. Dormus Smith. Oh, really? returned Mr. Simpson, mortified and incredulous. Such a very fine lady, is she? Well, Dormus Smith doesn't sound very aristocratic, but it may be, of course. Mrs. Dormus Smith is a fine lady, and accustomed to mix with still finer ladies. It is no use shutting one's eyes to facts. If we won't look at them, we only bump up against them, because they are there all the same. As to opinions, that's different. I suppose I needn't say anything about mine at this time of day. I'm a staunch radical. Always was, and always will be. Poo-poo, call yourself a radical, said Mr. Weatherhead, laughing his peculiar laugh, which consisted of a series of guttural ho-ho-hoes. You're convicted out of your own mouth of not being one, whoever heard of a radical that cared about facts. Mrs. Simpson put out her hand and tapped him on the shoulder. Now know that's very naughty of you, she exclaimed. Politics are strictly forbidden on Saturday evenings by the ancient statutes of our society. Isn't it so, Mrs. Dobbs? Isn't it so, Mrs. Dobbs? I appeal to the chair, and she threatened Mr. Weatherhead playfully with her forefinger, at the same time casting an arch-look through her spectacles. Glasses are not favourable to any effective play of the eyes, and usually screen the most expressive of glances behind a ghastly glitter void of all speculation. But of this consideration Mrs. Simpson was habitually oblivious. Then, by way of turning the conversation into more agreeable channels, she continued, And apropos of May, dear Mrs. Dobbs, when did you last hear from her papa? This simple inquiry startled the company into absolute silence for a few moments. Mrs. Dobbs' resolute reserve on the subject of her son-in-law was so well known that none of her friends for several years past had ventured to mention him to her. Some refrained because they did not wish to hurt her, and many because they were afraid she might hurt them. For Mrs. Dobbs' uncompromising frankness of speech and force of character made her a hard-hitter when she did hit. But the specific levity of Mrs. Simpson's mind gave her a certain immunity from hard retorts, the immunity of a fly from a cannon-ball. On the present occasion, however, she received no rebuke. For greatly to Joe Weatherhead's surprise and somewhat to Mr. Simpson's, Mrs. Dobbs, after a brief pause, answered, I have not heard lately from Captain Checkington. He's a bad correspondent. But we shall soon be obliged to communicate with each other. May is seventeen, and various arrangements will have to be made about her future. Goodness! exclaimed Mrs. Simpson, clasping her hands. You don't mean to say that May isn't to remain with you. That will depend on what he's agreed on in the family. May must take her place in the world as Miss Checkington, you know, and not as my granddaughter. The Simpsons exchanged a glance of surprise. This was the first time they had heard Mrs. Dobbs assume any such position for her grandchild. Sebastian was inclined to resist her doing so now, but something in Mrs. Dobbs's manner checked him from expressing his feeling. It is generally found easier to criticize our friend's shortcomings when we are free from the disturbing element of their presence. The short remainder of the evening was past in talking of other things, but on their way home Mr. and Mrs. Simpson discussed this new turn of affairs with some eagerness. The organist considered that the notion of the Hadlows not being good enough company for the Dormersmiths was preposterous, and he feared that Mrs. Dobbs was giving herself airs. In reply to his wife's observations that Mrs. Dobbs was a dear old soul, he pointed out that dear and good though she might be, yet her husband had kept an ironmonger shop and publicly sold hardware therein behind his counter to the knowledge of all oldchester. This retort depended for its cogency on the understanding of an ellipsis, which however, Mrs. Simpson was perfectly able to supply for she answered immediately, Oh, I'm sure, Bassie, Mrs. Dobbs would never undervalue your position as professional man. She knows very well that the odds rank superior to trade. On the other hand, when Mrs. Simpson proceeded to opine that if May were taken up by her father's family, she would become quite a grand personage, Mr. Simpson declared with a good deal of heat that for his part he thought Mrs. Dobbs quite as good any day as the cheffingtons, about whom nothing certain was known in oldchester, except that they were shabby in their dealings and stuck up in their pretensions. Mr. Weatherhead lingered behind the organist and his wife to say a word to Mrs. Dobbs after their departure. I can tell you one thing, Sarah. What you said about May will be all over oldchester by Monday. So, I guess. Ah, oh, then you mean it to be talked about. I mean it to be known that May is to take her place in the world as Miss Cheffington. But is she? That's more than you can say, Sarah. I shall have a try for it, Joe. Now, whenever Mrs. Dobbs had said in that emphatic manner that she would have a try for anything, that thing, so far as Joe Weatherhead's experience went, had infallibly come to pass. But with all his faith in his old friend, he could not help doubting her success in the present case. He was eagerly curious to know how she intended to proceed, but Mrs. Dobbs refused to say any more on the subject, declaring that she must think things over quietly. I don't see it, said Mr. Weatherhead to himself, poking forward his nose and pursing up his lips as he walked homeward. Sarah Dobbs is a wonderful woman, but even she can't gather grapes from thorns, and in respect of justice or generosity, not to mention common honesty. I'm afraid all the Cheffingtons are rather thorny. It is in the immediate neighbourhood of the cathedral, and is divided into small tenements inhabited by clergy forming part of the cathedral body. At the back of the house is on the south side of the quadrangle, pleasant gardens slope down towards the river Wend. The cloister is a very beautiful piece of gothic work with fretted roof and springing pillars, peace and quiet rain within it. In summer there comes a sleepy sound of rooks from the bishop's garden close at hand, and towards sunrise and sunset the chirp of innumerable sparrows mingled with the richer notes of thrush, blackbird and nightingale in their season. At certain times of the day, too, the stillness is broken by the thrilling freshness of children's voices, as the scholars of the ancient grammar school scatter themselves over the cathedral green, shouting and calling in the shrill silvery treble of boyhood. But these sounds are softened and subdued by distance and thick masonry before they penetrate within the precincts of College Quad. In autumn and winter there is a chill dampness on the greenish-gray paving-stones of the cloister, and the rain drips heavily from carbon capitals into the resounding court. The very order and cleanliness of the place, its decorous clerical smooth-shaven air, seems sometimes under a watery sky, and when the winds are moaning and complaining or thrumming like ghostly fingers on the fine-resident gothic fretwork to fill the mind with melancholy. A rich contrasting note is seldom wanting, firelight and the glimpse of a crimson curtain seen through lozen-shaped windowpains, or an open door sending out a gush of warmth and spicy smells from the kitchen, and the sound of friendly voices. Yet even within doors there seems to be a haunting sense of the old, old times, when hands long crumbled into dust, built up that dainty cloister, and when patient, monkish feet, long-stilled forever, pasted stones. It is not a wholly sad feeling. It may even give zest to the glance of living eyes and the warm pressure of dear hands, but it has a particular pathos, a pathos which perhaps is felt peculiarly by northern people, as the sad sweet twilight belongs to northern climates, and which many of those, to the manor-born, would not exchange for the unbroken garishness of golden-blue days and silver-blue nights. The habitations on the south side of the college-quad are considered the most desirable of all by reason of the gardens before mentioned running down to the wind, although one or two houses on the west side may be a trifle larger. Cannon Hadlowe's family of three persons inhabited one of those coveted southern houses and found it roomy enough for their needs, yet it was a small, a very small dwelling. The front door opened on to the beautiful cloister. Immediately on entering the house you found yourself in a tiny entrance hall, to the left of which a steep and narrow staircase of dark oak conducted to the one upper story. On the right a massive oaken door gave access to a long, low parlor, whose three lattice windows darkened somewhat by a drooping fringe of jesemine and Virginia creeper, looked across the garden and the river to the wide meadows. Opposite to the front door a glass one, which in summer stood wide open all day long, led into the garden, in winter swinging double doors covered with dark bay, shut out the cold air and the chill damp mist which sometimes crept up from the river. The exterior of the houses in college-quad was co-evil with the gothic cloister. Within the passing centuries had somewhat modified their aspect. The main features, however, were ancient and most of the inhabitants had chosen to preserve this general air of antiquity. Only in some few cases had disastrous attempts at modernizing been made with paint and French wallpapers. It would have been needless to tell any old-chester person that no such sacrilegious innovations deformed the fine oak beams and wainscotting in Cannon Hadlow's house. There was a dark tone all through it which, however, was not chill. It was rather the rich darkness of Rembrandt's shadows which seemed to have a latent glow in the heart of them. A deep red curtain here and there, or a well-worn turkey carpet with its kaleidoscope of subdued tints relieved the general somberness. Flowers in all manner of receptacles, from a precious old china punch-bowl to the cheapest of glass goblets, adorned every room in the house throughout the year. Even in winter there was ivy-tubey had and red-buried holly and the coral clusters of the mountain ash and pale chrysanthemums. The garden furnished an ample supply of stalks, roses, carnations, hollyhocks, china asters, sweet-williams, wall-flowers, and the like old-fashioned blossoms with homely names. But as Mrs. Hadlow herself quaintly remarked, she cared more for the sight and smell of a flower than its sound. One sacrificed the flower's cost. The Hadlows had no lawn-tennis ground. Mrs. Hadlow declared she could not spare the space. Her neighbors to the right and left boasted of lawns which, with their white lines, looked like tables chocked on the pavement for the popular street game of hopscotch, and were very little bigger. But the Hadlow's garden was a mosaic of box-bordered flower beds, only quite at the lower end where a clipped hedge divided it from a footpath on the river bank. There was a strip of green sward like a velvet carpet, spread completely across the garden. At one angle stood a yew-tree of fabulous age and in its shadow were a garden bench and table and a few rustic chairs. This was Mrs. Hadlow's drawing-room whenever the weather permitted her to be out of doors. There she sewed and read and received visits. The oak parlor, which served also as a dining-room, was the ordinary family living-room. There was a small room called the study, lined with books from floors to ceiling. But drawing-room, properly so-called, there was none at all. Constance Hadlow was the only one of the family who regretted this circumstance. The canon was perfectly content with his abode, and as to Mrs. Hadlow, no one who valued her good opinion would have ventured to hint to her that her house lacked anything to make it convenient and delightful. An ill-advised stranger had once opined in her presence that the near-neighborhood of the river must make the south side of the college-quad damp and unhealthy during the autumn and winter, and Mrs. Hadlow's indignation had been boundless. That it was sometimes cold in college-quad, she was willing to admit, just as it was sometimes cold on the Riviera or in Cairo, but that it could under any circumstances or for the shortest space of time be damp was what she would never be brought to acknowledge. And as to the wind, if any exhalations did arise from that gentle stream, they could not, she was sure, be unwholesome, above bridge. It was important to bear in mind this limitation since below bridge where the factories were, and where the poorer dwellings stood in crowded ranks, and the streets vibrated to the rumble of heavy wagons and tramway cars, the wind must naturally incur such corruption of its good manners as came from evil communications. Mrs. Hadlow loved and admired Old Chester with enthusiasm, but Old Chester, in her mind, meant the cathedral and its immediate surroundings. Her admiration was bounded by the cathedral precincts, and to judge from her words so was her love also, but her heart was not to be imprisoned within any such confines. Prejudice might rule her speech and warp her judgments, but her warm human sympathies went out towards those unfortunates who dwelt beyond the pale, even under the shadow of Bragg's factory chimney. Nay, even in those vulgar suburban villas with fine names which were particularly abhorrent to Mrs. Hadlow's soul. The sun shone brightly on a group of persons assembled in Mrs. Hadlow's garden on the Monday forenoon after Mrs. Dobbs' supper-party. It was a sun more bright than warm, and a little crisp breeze fluttered now and then among the scarlet and gold leaves of the Virginia creeper, which draped the back of the house. Constance Hadlow, wrapped in a fleecy shawl and sitting in a patch of sunshine outside the shadow of the yew-tree, declared it was bitterly cold. Her opinion was evidently shared by a black and tan terrier that shivered convulsively at intervals with a sort of ostentation, as though to hint to the less sensitive bipeds that it was high time to retire to the shelter of a roof and the comforts of the hearth-rug. Mrs. Hadlow's round rosy face seemed to shed a glow around it like a terrestrial sun, as she beamed from behind a great basket piled with gray wool and socks belonging to the cannon, which socks were never darned by any other than his wife's fingers. Her nephew, Owen Rivers, lounged on the bench beside her, seated on a low chair, made Sheffington was binding a ball of gray worsted for the socks, and standing opposite to her, with his shoulder against the trunk of the yew-tree, was Mr. Theodore Bransby. This young gentleman had just said something which had startled the assembled company. He was not given to saying startling things, he would probably have pronounced it bad-formed to do so, a phrase which to his mind carried with it the severest condemnation. He had merely observed, You will all be sorry to lose Miss Sheffington, shall you not, Mrs. Hadlow? Quite unconscious of saying anything to cause surprise. Surprise, however, was plainly expressed on every countenance, including that of Miss Sheffington herself. The fact was that rumors speaking by the voices of Mr. and Mrs. Simpson had already announced in Old Chester that May Sheffington was going away to live with her grand relations in London. The report had not yet penetrated College Quad, but it had been brought to the Bransby's house that morning by Mrs. Simpson when she came to give her daily lesson to the children. Lose her? What do you mean? asked Mrs. Hadlow. You're not going to be married, are you, May? cried Miss Constance, dropping her parasol in order to look full at the other girl, while Mr. Rivers, on the other hand, raised himself on his elbow and stared at young Bransby. May laughed and coloured at her friend's question. Certainly not that I know of, Constance, she answered. Are you going away, then? You must ask Mr. Bransby. He seems to know. I don't. As she spoke, May turned a pair of bright, hazel eyes full on the young man in question and smiled. The admixture of Dobb's blood with the noble strain of Chuffington had certainly not produced any physical deterioration of the race. Yet the Dowager had been discontented with her granddaughter's appearance, and had particularly lamented the absence of the Chuffington profile. Now the Chuffington profile was, handsome enough in his way, in certain subjects and at certain times of life, but with advancing years it was apt to resemble the profile of an owl, the nose being beaky and the orbit of the eyes very large, with eyebrows nearly semi-circular, while the chin tended to disappear in hanging folds and creases of throat. The Chuffington's moreover were sallow and dark haired. May inherited her mother's fair skin and soft brown hair. Her slender young figure, not yet fully grown, was rather below than above the middle height. She had the healthy though delicate freshness of a field flower. But like the field flower she might easily pass unnoticed. There was nothing of high or dazzling beauty about May Chuffington, but she had that subtle attraction which does not always belong to beauty. A great many persons, however, thought that she did not bear comparison with Constance Hadlow, her friend and school fellow. Besides a firm faith in her own beauty, which is a more powerful assistance to its recognition by others than is generally supposed, Miss Hadlow possessed a pair of fine dark eyes and eyebrows, a clear pale skin, regular features and white teeth. Those who were disposed to be critical observed that her face and head were rather too massive for her height, and that her figure, sufficiently plump at present, threatened to become too fat as she approached middle life. But at twenty years of age that would have appeared a very remote contingency to Constance Hadlow, supposing her to have ever thought about it. Although circumstances often prevented her from being dressed after the latest fashion, her hair, dark, wavy and abundant, was always skillfully arranged in the prevalent mode, whatever that might be. It happened just then to be a becoming one to Miss Hadlow's head and face. The crimson color of the shawl wrapped round her made a fine contrast with the creamy pallor of her skin and the vivid darkness of her eyes. Altogether she looked handsome enough to excuse Owen Rivers for finding it difficult to remove himself from her society, supposing Mr. Simpson's statement to be true that the young man was dangling after his cousin instead of minding his business. Theodore Bransby, on being called upon to explain himself, answered that he understood Miss Cheffington was shortly going to London to reside with her aunt, Miss Dormersmith. "'Oh, no, I'm not,' said May promptly, before anyone else could speak. "'That is quite a mistake.' "'Indeed?' "'Oh, yes, indeed it is. I'm going to stay with Granny.' "'Indeed,' said Theodore Bransby once more. Then he added, "'Are you quite sure, because I had it from a person who had it from Mrs. Dobbs herself?' "'From Granny!' In her astonishment May let fall the ball of worsted. It rolled across the grass under the very nose of the toy terrier, who snapped at it and then shivered more strongly than ever, with an added sense of injury. "'Very likely nothing has positively settled yet,' continued Theodore. Mrs. Dobbs was speaking of family arrangements for the future. "'Then I suppose,' said May, with an anxious look, that she has heard from Papa. "'Yes, I believe so, something was said about a communication from Captain Cheffington. "'There was a little pause. Then Mrs. Hadlow said, "'Well, of course we shall be sorry to lose you, my dear,' as Theodore says. "'But it is quite right that you should be amongst your own people, and be properly introduced.' "'Granny is my own people,' returned May in a low voice. "'Of course, and a most kind and excellent grandmother she is. But I mean in short, since it is Mrs. Dobbs' own plan, we must suppose she thinks it best for you to go to town, and I must say I agree with her. "'It is obviously necessary,' said Young Bransby. "'Miss Cheffington will have, of course, to be presented.' "'Why, you look quite glum, May,' cried Constance, laughing, "'Oh, you little goose, I only wish I had the chance of going to town to be presented.' Owen Rivers, who had hitherto been silent, now addressed May, and asked her if she disliked her aunt. "'Dislike, Aunt Pauline? Oh, no, I don't dislike her at all. But I—I don't know her very well. I thought,' said Bransby, that you had been in the habit of staying with Mrs. Dormismith during the school vacations. "'No, before Grand Mama Cheffington died, I used to go to Richmond, and I only saw Aunt Pauline now and then. Since that time I haven't seen her at all, for I've spent all my holidays with dear Granny.' Constance began to question Young Bransby as to who had given him the news about May's departure. What was it that had been said, whether the time of her going away were positively fixed, and so forth? May rose, and under cover of picking up her ball of worsted, walked away out of earshot. "'Are you that phenomenon? A young lady devoid of curiosity, Miss Cheffington?' asked Owen Rivers as she passed near him. "'Now there's nothing to be curious about,' returned the girl, fleshing a little. Granny and I shall talk it all over together this evening. I need not trouble myself about what other people may say or guess.' Miss Hadlow had apparently forgotten that it was bitterly cold, for she continued to sit on the lawn talking with Theodore, after the others had gone into the house. She moved at length from her seat at the summons of the luncheon-bell. Fox the Terrier, more consistent, had availed himself of the breaking-up of the little party to hasten indoors and establish himself on the dining-room hearthrug. A step which nothing but his unconquerable dislike of being alone had prevented him from taking long ago. When the two loiterers at length entered the dining-room, Mrs. Hadlow announced that May had gone home. Her grandmother had sent the servant for her a little earlier than usual, and May had refused to remain for luncheon. The young girl's absence gave an opportunity for discussing her and her prospects, and they were discussed accordingly, as the party sat at the table. Mrs. Hadlow expressed great satisfaction at hearing that May was to be received and accepted as a Cheffington. Constance inclined to think that May would not duly appreciate her good fortune, and theatre-brains be observed stiffly that Miss Cheffington's removal to town had always been inevitable, and that the date of it alone could have been matter for uncertainty to persons who knew anything of the Cheffington family. Well, said Rivers, I suppose Constance is the only one of us here present who possesses that knowledge. Now I never knew much of them, answered his cousin. I saw them occasionally when I was at school. Sometimes the Dowager came down to stay at Brighton, and she used now and then to call for May in her carriage, but she never entered the doors, and once or twice Mrs. Dormersmith came. I remember we girls used to make game of all Mrs. Cheffington with her black wig and her heirs. She was thoroughly grand-darm, I believe, said theatre-brains be. Very likely, the servants used to say she was dreadfully stingy and call her an old cat. Mrs. Dormersmith had nice manners, and was always beautifully dressed. Your information is somewhat sketchy, my dear Constance, but no doubt the outline is correct as far as it goes, observed Rivers. Decidely sketchy, said Mrs. Hadlow, who was helping her guest to minced mutton. Mrs. Hadlow, however, is not the only one of us who knows anything about the Cheffingtons, said Young Bransby with his grave-air. Oh, dear, I had forgotten, interposed Mrs. Hadlow, after a quick glance at the young man's face. To be sure, a Theodore has visited the family in town. The fact is, Theodore has been a stranger himself so long that we have had no opportunity of hearing his report. Tell us what the Dormersmiths are like Theodore, since you know them. Like? They are like people who move in the best society, like thoroughbred people, returned Theodore, drawing himself up stiffly. Poor little May, said Mrs. Hadlow thoughtfully. She's a sweet little thing. I hope they'll be kind to her. Do you know anything of Mrs. Dobbs, Aunt Jane, as Rivers? I mean, he added, of course you know of her, but do you know her? Oh, yes. Once many years ago, the cannon had a tough battle with Mrs. Dobbs when he was helping to converse for the city-member. We couldn't get her husband's vote for the right side, but he was a worthy man, and sold very good iron-mongery. When Constance first asked me to invite her school-fellow here, I had an interview with Mrs. Dobbs. She came to the point at once. She said, Mrs. Hadlow, you need not be uneasy. My friends and equals are not yours, but neither are they my grand-daughters. She belongs by her father's family to a different class. As for me, I am too old to make any mistakes about my place in the world, and too proud to wish to change it. Too proud, repeated Bransby with raised eyebrows. I thought it was very well said, answered Mrs. Hadlow. I only wish all the people of her class had the same honest pride, but Mrs. Dobbs is a woman of great good sense and of the highest integrity. All the same, of course, now that May is grown up. The girl's position in that house is too anomalous. Captain Chevington no doubt feels that. He probably left his daughter there so long out of tenderness to Mrs. Dobbs's feelings, and perhaps also to help out the old lady's income. But now, naturally, it must come to an end. He can't sacrifice May's future. That is how I explain the state of the case, and it seems to me to be creditable to all concerned. At all events, it is creditable to Mrs. Dobbs aunt Jane, said Rivers. And why not pray to Captain Chevington too, asked Constance, but Captain Chevington has the misfortune to be born a gentleman, so, of course, Owen disapproves of him. Not at all, of course, but I agree with you as to the misfortune, for the other gentlemen, at all events. I think you're a little mistaken about Captain Chevington Rivers, said Theodore. He's a friend of mine. In that case, I'm very sorry, answered Owen dryly. Mrs. Hadlow here interposed, rising from the table with a show of cheerful bustle. Come, she said, you children must not loiter here all day, the cannon comes home from Wentus by the 340 train, and I am going to meet him. Constance has an engagement with the Bertons, and as for you two boys, I shall turn you out without ceremony. The kind lady's intention had been to break off the discourse between the two young men which threatened to become disagreeable, but as Brandsby and Rivers walked away side by side through the fretted cloister of College Quad, the former, with a certain quiet doggedness which belonged to him, returned to the subject. You must understand, he said, that I am not very intimate with Captain Chevington, but I know him, and am his debtor for some courteous attentions, and I think you are a little rash, if you don't mind my saying so, in condemning him. I don't at all mind your saying so. You see, there are a great many circumstances to be taken into account, in judging of Captain Chevington's career. In the first place, there was his unfortunate marriage. When Augustus Chevington had paid that sudden visit to his mother-in-law, which resulted in leaving May on her hands, Theodore Brandsby happened to be at home during a university vacation, and was flattered by Captain Chevington's notice. The fact was that Augustus found himself greatly bored and out of his element in Old Chester, and was in a very difficult situation, and was in a very difficult situation, and was in a very difficult situation, and was in a very difficult situation, and was in a very difficult situation, and was in a very difficult situation, and was glad to accept a dinner or two for Mr. Brandsby, the solicitor to the dean and chapter, for Mr. Brandsby's port wine was unimpeachable. He had also condescended to play several games of billiards with Theodore upon a somewhat mangy old table in the Green Dragon Hotel, and to smoke that young gentlemen's cigars without stint, and to hold forth about himself in the handsomeness terms, pleased to be accepted apparently pretty much at his own valuation. Theodore Bransby was no fool, but he was young, and he had his illusions. These were not of a high-flown, ideal caste. He would have shrugged his shoulders at anyone who should set up for philanthropy or poetry or socialism or chivalry. But he was subdued by a display of nonchalant disdain for all the things and persons which he had been accustomed to look up to from childhood. Mr. Bragg, the great Tintac manufacturer, his father's wealthiest client, was dismissed by Augustus Cheffington in two words, damned snob, and even the bishop he pronounced to be a prosen-old prig, and spoke of the bishop's wife as that vulgar fat woman. These indications of superiority, together with many references to the noble and honorable Castlecombs and Cheffingtons, who composed Augustus's Kith and Kin, had greatly fascinated Theodore, and Augustus had completed his conquest over the young man by giving him a letter of introduction to his sister, Mrs. Dormersmith, which letter was delivered when young Bransby went to London to read for the bar. Although the brother and sister had parted not on the best terms with each other, yet Augustus had not hesitated to give the introduction. He believed that his sister would be willing to honour his recommendation by showing civilities which cost her nothing, and, moreover, he was quite indifferent, being then on the point of saying a long farewell to Old Chester as to whether the Dormersmith snubbed young Bransby or not. They did not snub him. Mrs. Dormersmith rather approved of his manners, and it was quite clear that he wanted neither for means nor friends. She was therefore inclined to receive him with something more than politeness, and, in justice to Pauline, it must be said that she was really glad of the opportunity to please her brother. She was not without fraternal sentiments, and she strongly felt that an introduction from a Cheffington to a Cheffington was not a document to be lightly dishonoured. As for Mr. Dormersmith, although his feelings towards his brother-in-law, never very cordial, had been exacerbated by having to pay the bill for the Dowager's funeral expenses, yet his resentment had been to some degree soothed by Augustus's abrupt departure and by his withdrawal of May from her aunt's house. For many years past the attachment of Augustus's relations for him had increased in direct proportion to the distance which divided him from them. In Belgium he was tolerated and pitied. Had he gone to the antipodes he would doubtless have been warmly sympathised with, and it might safely be prophesied that, when he should finally emigrate from this planet altogether, the surviving members of the family would be penetrated by a glow of affection. I think he's rather nice, Frederick, said Mrs. Dormersmith, with a little sigh of relief after young Gransby's first visit. We may be thankful, returned her husband, that Augustus has sent us a possible person. One never can reckon on what he may choose to do. Mr. Gransby is quite possible. Indeed, I think he is nice. He shall have a card for my Thursdays. In this way Theodore had been received by Mrs. Dormersmith and had established himself in her good opinion on further acquaintance. He was, she said, so quiet and so safe. At this time May Cheffington was still at school, being maintained there as has been recorded by her grandmother Dobbs, and Pauline would occasionally speak of her niece to young Gransby. She always spoke kindly, though plaintively, of the girl over whom there hung the shadow of the unfortunate marriage. Theodore Gransby was an old Chester person and could not, therefore, be supposed to be ignorant of that lamentable event. The fact was, however, that he had never heard a word about it until he made Captain Cheffington's acquaintance in his native city. It had taken place before he was born, and indeed, old Chester had been less agitated by the marriage, even at the time when it happened, than any Cheffingtons would have believed possible. But Pauline found young Gransby's sentiments on the subject all that they should be. No one could have expressed himself more shocked at the idea of a gentleman's marrying a person in Susan Dobbs' rank of life than did this solicitor's son. And Mrs. Dormersmith had not the least suspicion that he would have considered such a marriage quite as shocking a mesalliance for himself as for Captain Cheffington. Misunderstanding is used as a synonym for discord, but perhaps a great deal of social harmony depends on misunderstandings. Theodore could not, of course, have the slightest personal interest in a schoolgirl whom he had never seen, but his sympathies were so entirely with the Cheffingtons on the question of the unfortunate marriage as to inspire him with an odd feeling of antagonism against Mrs. Dobbs and a sense that she ought to be firmly kept in her place. He secretly thought Mrs. Dormersmith weakly indulgent in allowing Miss Cheffington to associate so freely with her grandmother and was indignant of the idea of that plebeian exercising any authority over Lord Castlecombe's great niece. However, all that would doubtless come to an end when the girl left school and was introduced into society under her aunt's protection. Theodore flattered himself that he thoroughly understood the position. As for Viscount Castlecombe, he certainly knew all about him or at least what was chiefly worth knowing for he had read about him in the peerage. Primed with this varied knowledge, young Bransby held forth to Owen Rivers as they walked together through College Quad across the open green beyond it and up to the house of Mr. Bransby Sr. in the cathedral close. Here they parted. Rivers declined a polite invitation from the other to enter and pursued his way alone towards the high street and Bransby, as he waited for the door to be opened, stood looking after him for a few moments. The two young men had known each other more or less all their lives, but theirs was a familiarity without real intimacy. The years had not made them more congenial to each other. People began to say that they were rivals and Constance had no good graces. But whether this were so or not, the latent antagonism between them had existed long before they grew to be men. They had never quarreled. The air is always still enough in a frost. They did not even know how much they disliked one another. As Theodore watched Owen's retreating figure, the thought uppermost in his mind was that his friend's shooting coat was badly cut, and that he did not remember ever to have seen him wear gloves. The home of Mr. Martin Bransby of the old established firm of Cadel and Bransby was a luxurious one. The house was an ancient substantial stone building with a spacious walled garden behind it, contiguous to the bishops. The present occupant had made considerable additions to it. It is perhaps needless to say that he had been severely criticized for doing so. There being no point on which it is more difficult to content public opinion than the expenditure of one's own money. Several of Mr. Bransby's acquaintances were unable to reconcile themselves to the fact that he was not satisfied with that which had satisfied his father and grandfather. For Martin Bransby was the third of his family who had successively held that house and the business of solicitor to the dean and chapter of Old Chester. It would have been better, they opined, if instead of building new rooms he had saved his money to provide for the young family rising around him. If it were observed to this irreconcilable party that the presence of a numerous family necessitated more space to lodge them in than the original house afforded, they would triumphantly retort. Very well, then, what business had Martin Bransby to marry a second time? Or if he must marry, why did he choose a young girl without a penny instead of some person nearer his own age and with a little property? Mr. Bransby, however, marrying rather to please himself than to earn the approval of his friends, had chosen a remarkably pretty girl of twenty, a Miss Louisa Lutier, of a good Shropshire family whom he had met in London. They had now been married twelve years, during which time five children had been born to them, and they had lived together in the utmost harmony. Those persons who disapproved of the match, solely in Mr. Bransby's interests, of course, could find nothing worse to say than that Martin was absurdly in love with his wife and treated her with weak indulgence. In short, the irreconcilables were driven year by year to put off the date at which their unfavorable judgments were to be corroborated by facts, much as sundry popular preachers had been compelled by circumstances over which they had no control to postpone the end of the world. Laterally they had had the mournful satisfaction of observing that Martin Bransby was looking far from well, harassed and aged, and when he was attacked by the severe illness which threatened his life, they solemnly hinted that the malady had been aggravated by anxiety about his young family, for although Martin had made and was making a great deal of money yet, with three boys to put out in the world, two daughters to provide for, and an extravagant wife to maintain, even the excellent business of Caddell and Bransby must be somewhat strained to supply his needs. At any rate the evidence of wealth and comfort were as abundant as ever in the home which Theodore entered when he parted from his friend. There was plenty of solid furniture dating from the Dark Ages before modern aestheticism had arisen to reform upholstery and teach us the original sinfulness of the prismatic colors, but these relics of the earlier part of the century were not to be found in the two spacious drawing rooms which had been arranged by the fashionable lists of fashionable house decorators from London. These rooms, together with a tiny cabinet behind them which was styled the boudoir, were Mrs. Bransby's special domain, and here Theodore found her seated by the fireside, a book lay on her knees, but she was not reading it. She was resting in a position of complete repose with her head leaning against the back of the chair, her hands carelessly crossed on her lap, and her feet supported on a cushion. She was enjoying the sense of bodily and mental rest which comes from the removal of a keen edged anxiety, for during several weeks Mrs. Bransby had been the most devoted of sick nurses and had scarcely left her husband's room. But now the doctors had pronounced all danger to be over. The children's active feet and shrill voices were no longer hushed down by warning fingers. The housemaid sang over her brooms and dusters, and the mistress of the house had unpacked and put on a new teagun which had lain neglected for more than a fortnight in its brown paper wrappings. From the golden brown clusters of hair on her forehead to the tip of her dainty shoe, every detail of her appearance was cared for minutely. Yet there was nothing of stiffness or affectation. She reminded one of an exquisitely tended hot house flower, and carried her beauty in her toilette with as perfect an air of unconscious refinement as the flower itself. Certainly old Chester held no more lovely and graceful figure than Mrs. Bransby presented to the eyes of her stepson. Yet the eyes of her stepson rested on her with a glance of cool disapprobation. His manner of addressing her, however, was not more chilly than his manner of addressing most other persons, perhaps rather less so, and he was scrupulously polite. Did Hatch give a good account of my father this morning, he asked, seeding himself by the fire opposite to Mrs. Bransby. Excellent, thank goodness, he is to drive out on Wednesday if the weather is favorable. I felt so soothed and comforted by Dr. Hatch's report that I thought I would indulge myself with half an hour of perfect laziness, added Mrs. Bransby with a deprecating glance at Theodore. She constantly reproved herself for assuming an apologetic attitude towards her stepson, but constantly recurred to it. She was so keenly conscious of his always unexpressed criticism. Mrs. Hadlow desired to send word that the canon means to call on my father this afternoon, if he is well enough to see him. Oh yes, a talk with canon Hadlow will do him good. Then, after an instant's pause, Mrs. Bransby asked, have you been in college quad then? I launched with Mrs. Hadlow. Rivers was there, I parted from him just now, and Miss Chettington. Oh really? Mrs. Hadlow was very kind to that little May Chettington. Theodore made no answer but looked stiffly at the fire. Mrs. Bransby went on. I saw her in the cathedral at afternoon services yesterday with the Hadlow's. It struck me she was growing quite pretty. Don't you think so? I should not call her pretty, began Theodore slowly. Mrs. Bransby broken. Well of course she is eclipsed by Constance. Constance is so very handsome, but still. I should not describe Miss Chettington as pretty, pursued Theodore in an inflexible kind of way. She is something more than pretty. She looks thoroughbred. But that's exactly what she's not, isn't it? exclaimed Mrs. Bransby impossibly. I am not sure that I apprehend you. I mean her mother was quite a common person, was she not? A woman ticks her husband's rank. Yes, but she doesn't inherit his ancestors. Besides, one really doesn't know much about the father for that matter. To be sure, Simmy was making a great flourish about May's grand relations in London this morning, but then all poor dear Simmy's geese are swans. The name of Simmy had been bestowed on Mrs. Simpson by the youngest little Bransby but one, and although the elder children were reproved for using it, the appellation had come to be that by which she was most familiarly known in the Bransby family. Mrs. Simpson is a silly person, but her information happens in this case to be correct, returned Theodore. The relations with whom Miss Chettington is going to live in London are friends of mine. Oh, then what Simmy said is true, said Mrs. Bransby simply. Theodore proceeded with scarcely perceptible hesitation. I think you might invite Miss Chettington here before she goes to town. I should be obliged to you for the opportunity of showing her some attention in return for the dormist miskindness to me in London. Yes, I can ask the girl if you like, answered Mrs. Bransby, not quite as warmly as Theodore thought she ought to have answered such a suggestion from him, but it would be rather stupid for her, I'm afraid. At the Hadlows there is a young girl near her own age, but here, unless she likes to play with the children, I don't see how we are to amuse her. I did not contemplate Miss Chettington's playing with the children. I mean that you should invite her to a dinner party or something of that sort. Invite May Chettington to a dinner party, replied Mrs. Bransby, opening her soft brown eyes in astonishment. My father spoke of giving a dinner before I go back to the temple, and he said he thought he should be well enough to see his friends by the end of next week. Yes, he talked of inviting the Pipers and the Hadlows and perhaps Mr. Bragg. Could you not include Miss Chettington? Perhaps if you allowed me to see your list, I might help to arrange it. Oh, I suppose one could, but wouldn't it seem a very strange thing to do? A little colour came into Theodore's pale fair face, and his chin grew visibly more rigid above his cravat, as he answered. I don't know, but the social covenants are not to be measured by old Chester's provincial ideas as to their strangeness, and pardon me, I don't think you quite understand Miss Chettington's position. And then he entered on an explanation of the position, much as he had explained it to Owen Rivers with only such suppressions and variations, chiefly regarding the private history of Augustus Chettington, as he thought the difference between his hearers demanded. Well, I'm sure if your father has no objection, I have none, said Mrs. Bransby at length, and so Theodore got his own way. It was a matter, of course, that he should get his own way so far as his stepmother was concerned. Mrs. Bransby had indeed successfully resisted him on many occasions, but always through the medium of her husband. If Theodore attacked her face to face, she never had the courage to oppose him. Not that in the present case she very much wished to oppose him, nor in truth had their wills ever clashed seriously. But the secret consciousness of her weakness and timidity was mortifying. For Mrs. Bransby, although too gentle to fight, was not too gentle to wish she could fight. And after Theodore had left the room, she sat for some time imagining to herself various neat and pointed speeches, which would doubtless have brought down her stepson's sententious, supercilious tone, if she had only had the presence of mind to utter them. End of Chapter 5 Volume 1, Chapter 6 of That Unfortunate Marriage This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. That Unfortunate Marriage by Frances Eleanor Trollop Volume 1, Chapter 6 May Cheffington went back to her grandmother's house very eager to understand the origin of the rumors about herself which she had heard at the Hadlows. Mrs. Dobbs had not calculated on this and would have preferred to break the project to May herself and in her own fashion. However, as it had been mentioned, she spoke of it openly. She merely cautioned her granddaughter against rashly jumping at any conclusions, the future being very vague and unsettled. There's one conclusion I have jumped at, Granny, said the girl, and that is that I don't mean to give you up for any aunts or uncles or cousins of them all. They are strangers to me and I don't care a straw about them. How should I? Whilst you are Granny. There is no question of giving me up, mate. Perhaps I should not like that much better than you would. But if your father should think it right for you to stay for a while with his family, we mustn't oppose him, and I must tell you that I should think it right, too. Oh, if it's only staying for a while. Well, at all events, we needn't look beyond a while and a short while for the present. Mrs. Dobbs found it more difficult than she had anticipated to put before May the prospect of being removed from Old Chester altogether, and now that the idea of losing May out of her daily life fully presented itself, she felt a grip at the heart which frightened her, but she had one of those strong characters whose instinct it is to hide their wounds and suffer silently, and she resolutely put aside her own pain at this prospect, or rather put it off to the solitary hours to come. During the four years since her father had left her at Old Chester, May's life had been passed between her school at Brighton and her holidays in Old Chester. These had certainly been the happiest years she could remember in all her young life. Her grandmother's house had been the first real home she had ever known. Her recollections of their life on the continent were dim and melancholy. She remembered fragmentary scenes and incidents in certain dull Flemish towns, their strong-smelling gutters, their toppling gables, the carolons sounding high up in some ancient cathedral belfry. She had a vision of her mother's face very pale and thin, with large bright eyes and streaks of gray in the brown hair. May, as the youngest of Susan Checkington's children, had come in for the worst part of their continental life. The earlier years, when there was still some money to spend, and fewer debts to be run away from, had not been quite devoid of brightness. But poor little May's conscious observation had little to take note of at home, save poverty, sickness, domestic dissensions, and frequent migrations from one shabby lodging to another. Then her mother died and some six or eight months afterward she was brought to England, and fate and the dowager so willing it was sent to school to Mrs. Drax in Brighton. The choice of this school proved to be a very fortunate one for the little motherless stranger and perhaps the creditor that ought fairly to be assigned rather to destiny than the dowager. The latter would have selected a more fashionable pretentious and expensive establishment had she consulted merely her idea of what was becoming and suitable for Ms. Miranda Cheffington. But she soon found out that whatever was paid for that young lady's schooling must sooner or later come out of her own pocket. And she therefore preferred to honor Mrs. Drax with her patronage rather than Madame Lebrech who had been governess for years in a noble family and was supposed to accept no people who could not show sixteen quarterings or of course their equivalent in cash. The choice made was as has been said very fortunate for May. Mrs. Drax had the manners of a gentle woman and more amiability than could perhaps have been reasonably expected to survive a long struggle with her special world a world of parents and guardians who held for the most part a liberal view of her duties and a niggerly one of her rights. Here Little May Cheffington remained as a pupil for nearly eight years during the first half of that time she sometimes spent her holidays with the Dowager at Richmond and sometimes in Brighton under the care of Mrs. Drax. She preferred the latter. Old Mrs. Cheffington did not treat the child with any active unkindness but she showed her no tenderness. The little girl was usually left to the care of her grandmother's maid an elderly woman to whom this young creature was merely an extra burden not considered in her wages. The child passed many a lonely hour in the garden or beside the dining room fire with a book unheeded. Her aunt Pauline she only saw it rare intervals. She had a confused sense of innocently causing much sorrow to Mrs. Dormersmith who seemed always to be afflicted. Why may did not for several years understand by the sight of her clothes and who used to complain softly to the Dowager that the poor dear child was lamentably dressed but on the whole she retained a rather agreeable impression of her aunt as being pretty and gentle and kissing her kindly when they met. Then came the Dowager's death the sudden journey to Old Chester and the first acquaintances with that unknown Grandmother Dobbs whose very name she had heard uttered only in a reproachful tone by the Dowager or in a hushed voice by the Dowager's elderly maid speaking as one who names a hereditary malady. And to this taboo Grandmother Dobbs the neglected child soon gave the warm love of a very grateful and affectionate nature. May did not know or guess that she was a burden on her Grandmother's means nor would the knowledge have increased her gratitude at that time. It was the fostering affection which the child was thankful for. She nestled in it like a half fledged bird in the warm shelter of the mother's wings. She was not timid or reserved by temperament but the circumstances of her life had given her a certain repressed air. That disappeared now like whore frost in the sunshine. She was like a young plant whose growth had been arrested by a too chilly atmosphere. She burgeoned and bloomed into the natural joyousness of childhood which needs above all things the warmth of love and cannot be healthily nurtured by any artificial heat. In her school there was no influence tending to diminish May's attachment to her Grandmother or her perfect contentment with a simple bourgeois home in Old Chester. Plain Mrs. Dobbs who paid her bills punctually and listened to reason stood far higher in the school Mistress's esteem than the honorable Mrs. Chethington who was never contented and required to be done for the payment of her just debts. As to her noble relations May had no acquaintance with them and never sighed to make them. She was ignorant of the very existence of many of them when at 17 years of age she was removed from school she looked forward to living in the old house in Friar's Row and she certainly desired no better home. Mrs. Drax it has been said had the manners of a gentle woman and she had not vulgarized May's natural refinement of mind by misdirecting her admiration towards ignoble things. The provincialisms in her Grandmother's speech and the homely style of her Grandmother's household although she clearly perceived both neither shocked nor mortified May. On the other hand she accepted it as quite a natural thing that she should be invited to Cannon Hadlow's house as a guest on equal terms. As Mrs. Dobbs had said to Joe Weatherhead May was very much of a child still and understood nothing of the world. Her unquestioning acceptance of the situation as her Grandmother presented it to her had something very childlike. She did not inquire how it came to pass at her Aunt Pauline who had taken very little notice of her during the past four years should now desire to have her as an inmate of her home. She did not ask why her father, after so long a tour poor on the subject had suddenly awakened to the necessity of asserting his daughter's position in the world. Neither did she even in her private thoughts reproach him for having delegated all the care and responsibility of her education to Granny. A healthy-minded young creature has deep wellsprings of unquestioning faith in its parents or those who stand in the place of parents. But there was one person not so easily contented with the first statement offered and that person was Mr. Joseph Weatherhead. Mr. Weatherhead was very fond of May and admired her very much. His social and political theories ought logically to have made him regard her with peculiar interest and consideration as coming of such very blue blood, at least on one side of the house. But it so happened that these theories had nothing on earth to do with his attachment to May. That arose firstly from her being Sarah Dobbs' grandchild. Joe would have loved and championed any creature, biped or quadruped that belonged to Sarah Dobbs and secondly from her being very lovable. The poor man was often embarrassed by the conflict between his curiosity and his principles. His curiosity, which was as insatiable and omnivorous as the appetite of a pigeon, would have led him to cross-question May minutely about all she knew or guessed respecting her own future and the probable behavior of her father's family towards her. But his conscience told him that it would not be right to put doubts and suspicions into the girl's trusting young soul. Certainly he himself cherished many doubts and suspicions as to the future conduct of May's papa. He questioned Mrs. Dobbs, indeed, but there was neither sport nor exercise for his sharp inquisitiveness in that. When Mrs. Dobbs did not choose to answer him, she said so roundly and there was an end. She had told him that she was in correspondence with Captain Sheffington and that she believed he would share her views about his daughter. Joe, however, entertained a rooted disbelief as to Captain Sheffington's holding any views which had not himself for their supreme object. And this Mrs. Dormersmith now, Sarah, said he, what reason have you to suppose that she will be willing to take charge of her niece now when she would have nothing to say to her before? A pretty girl of 17 is a different charge from a lanky child of 12, Joe. Mrs. Dormersmith couldn't have taken a school girl in short frocks out into the world with her. You don't know that she will take May out in the world with her. I have written. I shall have an answer in a few days, I dare say. I don't expect matters to be settled like a flash of grease lightning, as Mrs. Simpson says. There's a deal to be considered. Hold your tongue now, here's May. Similar conversations took place between them nearly every day, and when they were not interrupted by any external circumstance, Mrs. Dobbs would resolutely put an end to them by declining to pursue this subject. One afternoon, about a week after May's return from her visit to the Hadlows, the young girl was seated at the old fashioned square piano forte, singing snatches of ballads in a fresh untrained voice. Mr. Weatherhead had just taken his accustomed seat by the fireside, and Mrs. Dobbs was opposite to him in her own armchair, with the old tabby purring in the firelight at her feet. When Martha opened the parlor door softly, shut it quickly after her and announced, with a slight tone of excitement in her usually quiet voice, that there was a gentleman in the passage asking for Miss May. For me, Martha, exclaimed May, turning round at the sound of her own name, with one hand still on the keys of the piano forte, who is he? He said, Miss Checkington, I doubt now him, not by sight, but he is his card. Mrs. Dobbs took the card from the servant and put on her spectacles, bending down to read the name by the firelight. Bonne, Bronne, oh, Bransby, Mr. Theodore Bransby, asked the gentleman to walk in Martha. As Martha left the room, Mr. Weatherhead pointed to the door with one thumb and whispered, Wonder what he wants? To which Mrs. Dobbs replied by lifting her shoulders and slightly shaking her head as much as to say, I'm sure I can't guess. The next moment Mr. Theodore Bransby was ushered into the parlour. The room was rather dim and Theodore did not immediately perceive May, who still sat at the piano. Miss Checkington, he said, interrogatively, with a stiff little gesture of the head toward Mrs. Dobbs, which might pass for a bow. Mrs. Dobbs had risen from her chair and now motioned her visitor to be seated. My granddaughter is here. Praise it down, Mr. Theodore Bransby, she said. Then May got up and came forward and shook hands with him. I don't think you know my grandmother, Mrs. Dobbs, she said, presenting him. Theodore upon this began to hold out his hand rather slowly, but as Mrs. Dobbs made no answering gesture but merely pointed again to a chair, he was feigned to bow once more, a good deal more distinctly this time, and to sit down with a sense of having received a little check. I hope I have not interrupted you, Miss Checkington, said he, clearing his throat and settling his chin and his shirt collar, you were singing. Oh, no, you haven't interrupted me at all, and even if you had, it wouldn't matter. My singing is not worth much. Pardon me if I declined to believe that, from some sounds which reached me through the door. I am sure you sing charmingly. May laughed. Ah, she said, the other side of the door is the most favorable position for hearing me. I really don't know how to sing, asked Granny. No, May doesn't know how to sing, said Mrs. Dobbs quietly, but very decisively, for she had caught an expression on Mr. Theodore Bransby's pale, smooth face, which seemed to wonder, superciliously, what on earth she could know about it, or upon his pale, smooth eyebrows waged themselves a hair's breath more, but he said nothing. My grandmother is a great judge of singing you must know, went on May innocently. She has had all the best singers in the old Chester musical festivals the years and years passed, and she used to sing herself in the choruses of the oratories. Oh, I see, said Theodore, with a little contemptuous air of enlightenment. Joe Weatherhead looked across at him uneasily. He had a half-form suspicion that this young spark with a smooth, rather closely cropped blonde head, severe shirt collar, faultlessly fitting coat, and slightly pedantic utterance, showed a tendency to treat Mrs. Dobbs with impertinence. But he checked the suspicion, for he argued with himself. Young Bransby had had the training of a gentleman, and what gentleman would be impertinent to a worthy and respected woman, and in their own house, too. He thought, as he looked at him, that Theodore bore very little resemblance to his father, Martin Bransby, who was altogether of a different and more massive type. You don't favor your father much, sir, said Joe Blandly. The young man turned his pale blue eyes upon him, with a look studiously devoid of all expression. I had the honour of knowing your worthy father, well, some five and twenty, or it might be thirty years ago. Theodore, continuing to stare at him stonely, said, Oh, really, in a low monotone. Yes, I knew him in the way of business. He was a customer of mine when I was in the book-selling business at Brummergum, as we called it. Your father was, even at that time, very highly thought of by some of the leading legal luminaries. We had no assizes at Birmingham, as no doubt you're aware, but I used to go over to Warwick Assizes pretty regularly in those days, having some dealings there in a stationary line, which I afterwards gave up altogether, though that isn't to the point. And I used to frequent a good deal of legal company. Mr. Morton Bransby was thought a good deal of among them, I can tell you, and was taken a great deal of notice of by some of the county families, quite the real old gentry. Added Mr. Weatherhead pursing up his mouth and nodding his head emphatically like a man enforcing a statement which his hearers might reasonably hesitate to accept. Oh, how is Mr. Bransby asked me? Thanks, my father is going on very well indeed. He has driven out twice, and in fact is nearly himself again. He proposes asking some friends to dine with him next week. Indeed, that furnishes the object of my visit here. I, Mrs. Bransby of course, you understand that my father's long illness has given her a great deal to do. Truly, it must broke in Mrs. Darbs thinking at once sympathetically of the wife and mother threatened with so cruel a bereavement, and now almost suddenly relieved from overwhelming anxiety. I'm sure most folks in Old Chester have been feeling greatly for Mrs. Bransby. And so continued Theodore addressing himself exclusively to May. She has not really been able to see as much of you as she would have liked, Ms. Cheffington. May looked at him in surprise. Why, of course, said she. Mrs. Bransby hasn't been thinking about me. How should she? That is the reason I mean my father's illness and all the occupations resulting from it, which has induced Mrs. Bransby to make me her ambassador on this occasion. As he spoke, Theodore took a little note from his pocketbook and handed it to May. She glanced at it and exclaimed with open astonishment, It's an invitation to dinner. Look, Granny. Mr. Weatherhead poked forward his head to see. It was, in fact, a formal card requesting the pleasure of Ms. Cheffington's company at dinner on the following Saturday. Mrs. Darbs once more put on her spectacles and read the card. I hope you will be disengaged, said Theodore, severely ignoring Granny. Oh, I couldn't go to a grand dinner party. It would be ridiculous. May, that's not a gracious fashion of receiving an invitation anyhow, said Mrs. Darbs, smiling a little. It's very kind indeed of Mr. and Mrs. Bransby, but I would much rather not please, said May, endeavouring to amend her phrase. Oh, that's dreadfully cruel, Ms. Cheffington. You don't think out to go, do you, Granny? That, replied Mrs. Darbs, depends on circumstances. I assure you, said Theodore, turning round with his most imposing air, that it would be quite proper for Ms. Cheffington to accept the invitation. I should certainly not urge her to do so, unless that were the case. Joe Weatherhead's suspicions as to this young spark's tendency to impertinence were rather vividly revived by this speech, and his forehead flushed as dark red as his nose, but Mrs. Darbs, looking at Theodore's fair young face, made up into an expression of solemn importance, smiled a broad smile of motherly toleration, and answered in a soothing tone, No, no, to be sure, you mean to do what's right and proper. Only young folks don't look at everything, as has to be considered. But youth has the best of it in so many ways, it can afford to be not quite so wise as its elders. This glimpse of himself as Mrs. Darbs saw him was so totally unexpected, as completely to dumb founder of Theodore for a moment, never since he left off round jackets. Had he been so addressed, for the behavior of our acquaintances towards us in daily life is generally modified by their idea of what we think of ourselves. I—I can assure you, he stammered, and then stopped at a loss for words in most unaccustomed embarrassment. There, there, we ain't bound to say yes and no all in a minute, pursued Mrs. Darbs. Anyway, we couldn't think of making you postman. That's all very well for your stepmother, of course, but I must send her answer in a proper way. Meanwhile, will you stay and have a cup of tea, Mr. Bransby? It's just our tea time. The trial will be here in a minute. Theodore had risen as if to go. He now stood hesitating and looking at May, who certainly gave no answering look of encouragement. She wanted him gone that she might talk over the invitation with her grandmother. With a pleasant clinking sound, Martha now brought in the tea tray, and in another minute had fetched the kettle and placed it on the hob, where, after a brief interval of wheezing and sputtering, consequent on its sudden removal from the kitchen fire, it resumed its gurgling sound and made itself cheerfully at home. If Mrs. Darbs had urged him by another word, if she had shown by any look or tone that she thought it would be a condescension in him to remain, Theodore would have refused. But she began placidly to scoop out the tea from the caddy and awaited his reply with unfamed equanimity. There was an unacknowledged feeling in his heart that to go away then and so would be to make a flat kind of exit disagreeable to think of. He would like to leave this obtuse old woman impressed with a sense of his superiority, and apparently it would still require some little time before that impression was made. Thanks, he said, if I am not disturbing you, dear now, how could it disturb me? Martha, bring another cup and salsa. Then Theodore, laying aside his hat and gloves, drew a chair up to the table and accepted the proffered hospitality. Having found the method of supercilious reserve, rather a failure, the young man now adopted a different treatment for the purpose of awakening Mrs. Dobbs, and that objectionably familiar person with a red nose, to a sense of his social distinction and general merits. He talked, not voluably indeed, for that would have been out of his power even had he wished it, but he talked in a succession of short speeches, beginning for the most part with I. His efforts were not, however, exclusively aimed at Mrs. Dobbs and Joe Weatherhead. He watched May a good deal and spoke to her of the Dormersmiths, as though that were a topic between themselves, from which the profane vulgar, especially profane ex-booksellers with red noses, were necessarily excluded, as the others said very little with the exception of an occasional question from Joe Weatherhead. Theodore's talk assumed the form of a monologue spoken to a dull audience. He was conscious, as he walked away from Friar's Row, of being a little surprised at his own conversational efforts and half repentant of his condescension. He had been obliged to take his leave without obtaining any definite answer to the dinner invitation, but perhaps the feeling uppermost in his mind was irritation at May's perfectly simple acceptance of her position as Mrs. Dobbs' granddaughter and her perfectly filial attachment to her grandmother. It is really too bad! Cheffington ought never to have allowed his daughter to be got hold of by those people. Mrs. Dormersmith cannot have the least idea what sort of a milieu her niece lives in, he said to himself. The worst was that May was so evidently contented. If she had been at all distressed by her surroundings, Theodore could have better borne to see her there.