little hand no longer trembled, and that Nettie was absorbed by her own thoughts-thoughts with which her present companions had but little to do. Mrs Fred essayed another stroke. 66 66 Perhaps I was hasty, Nettie, last night; but Richard, you know, poor fellow," said Susan, was not to be put off. It won't make any difference between you and me, Nettie dear? We have always been so united, whatever has happened; and the children are so fond of you; and as for me," said Mrs Fred, putting back the strings of her cap, and passing her handkerchief upon her eyes, "with my health, and after all I have gone through, how I could ever exist without you, I can't tell; and Richard will be so pleased." "I don't want to hear anything about Richard, please," said Nettie-"not, so far as I am concerned. I should have taken you out, and taken care of you, had you chosen me; but you can't have two people, you know. One is enough for anybody. Never mind what we are talking about, Freddy. It is only your buttons-nothing else. As long as you were my business, I should have scorned to complain," said Nettie, with a little quiver of her lip. Nothing would have made me forsake you, or leave you to yourself; but now you are somebody else's business; and to speak of it making no difference, and Richard being pleased, and so forth, as if I had nothing else to do in the world, and wanted to go back to the colony! It is simply not my business any longer," cried Nettie, rising impatiently from her chair" that is all that can be said. But I shan't desert you till I deliver you over to to my successor, Susan-don't fear." "Then you don't feel any love for us, Nettie! It was only because you could not help it. Children, Nettie is going to leave us," said Mrs Fred, in a lamentable voice. "Then who is to be instead of Nettie? Oh, look here-I know— it's Chatham," said the little girl. "I hate Chatham," said Freddy, with a little shriek. "I shall go where Nettie goes-all my things are in my box. Nettie is going to take me; she loves me best of you all. I'll kick Chatham if he touches me." Why can't some one tell Nettie she's to go too?" said the eldest boy. "She's most good of all. What does Nettie want to go away for? But I don't mind; for we have to do what Nettie tells us, and nobody cares for Chatham," cried the sweet child, making a triumphant somersault out of his chair. Nettie stood looking on, without attempting to stop the tumult that arose. She left them with their mother, after a few minutes, and went out to breathe the outside air, where at least there were quiet and freedom. To think, as she went out into the red morning sunshine, that her old life was over, made Nettie's head swim with bewildering giddiness. She went up softly, like a creature in a dream, past St Roque's, where already the Christmas decorators had begun their pretty work-that work which, several ages ago, being yesterday, Nettie had taken the children in to see. Of all things that had happened between that moment and this, perhaps this impulse of escaping out into the open air without anything to do, was one of the most miraculous. Insensibly Nettie's footsteps quickened as she became aware of that extraordinary fact. The hour, the temperature, the customs of her life, were equally against such an indulgence. It was a comfort to recollect that, though everything else in the universe was altered, the family must still have some dinner, and that it was as easy to think while walking to the butcher's as while idling and doing nothing. She went up, accordingly, towards Grange Lane, in a kind of wistful solitude, drifted apart from her former life, and not yet definitely attached to any other, feeling as though the few passengers she met must perceive in her face that her whole fortune was changed. It was hard for Nettie to realise that she could do absolutely nothing at this moment, and still harder for her to think that her fate lay undecided in Edward Rider's hands. Though she had not a doubt of him, yet the mere fact that it was he who must take the first step was somewhat galling to the pride and temper of the little autocrat. Before she had reached the butcher, or even come near enough to recognise Lucy Wodehouse, where she stood at the garden-gate, setting out for St Roque's, Nettie heard the headlong wheels of something approaching which had not yet come in sight. She wound herself up in a kind of nervous desperation for the encounter that was coming. No need to warn her who it was. Nobody but the doctor flying upon wings of haste and love could drive in that break-neck fashion down the respectable streets of Carlingford. Here he came sweeping round that corner at the George, where Nettie herself had once mounted the drag, and plunged down Grange Lane in a maze of speed which confused horse, vehicle, and driver in one indistinct gleaming circle to the excited eyes of the spectator, who forced herself to go on, facing them with an exertion of all her powers, and strenuous resistance of the impulse to turn and escape. Why should Nettie escape it must be decided one way or other. She held on dimly, with rapid trembling steps. To her own agitated mind, Nettie herself, left adrift and companionless, seemed the suitor. The only remnants of her natural force that remained to her united in the one resolution not to run away. It was well for the doctor that his little groom had the eyes and activity of a monkey, and knew the exact moment at which to dart forward and catch the reins which his master flung at him, almost without pausing in his perilous career. The doctor made a leap out of the drag, which was more like that of a mad adventurer than a man whose business it was to keep other people's limbs in due repair. Before Nettie was aware that he had stopped, he was by her side. "Dr Edward," she exclaimed, breathlessly, "hear me first! Now I am left unrestrained, but I am not without resources. Don't think you are bound in honour to say anything over again. What may have gone before I forget now. I will not hold you to your word. You are not to have pity upon me!" cried Nettie, not well aware what she was saying. The doctor drew her arm into his; found out, sorely against her will, that she was trembling, and held her fast, not without a sympathetic tremor in the arm on which she was constrained to lean. "But I hold you to yours!" said the doctor; "there has not been any obstacle between us for months but this; and now it is gone, do you think I will forget what you have said, Nettie? You told me it was impossible once- "And you did not contradict me, Dr Edward," said the wilful creature, withdrawing her hand from his arm. "I can walk very well by myself, thank you. You did not contradict me! You were content to submit to what could not be helped. And so am I. An obstacle which is only removed by Richard Chatham," said Nettie, with female cruelty, turning her eyes full and suddenly upon her unhappy lover, "does not count for much. I do not hold you to anything. We are both free." What dismayed answer the doctor might have made to this heartless speech can never be known. He was so entirely taken aback that he paused, clearing his throat with but one amazed exclamation of her name; but before his astonishment and indignation had shaped itself into words, their interview was interrupted. An irregular patter of hasty little steps, and outcries of a childish voice behind, had not caught the attention of either in that moment of excitement; but just as Nettie delivered this cruel outbreak of feminine pride and self-assertion, the little pursuing figure made up to them, and plunged at her dress. Freddy, in primitive unconcern for anybody but himself, rushed headforemost between these two at the critical instant. He made a clutch at Nettie with one hand, and with all the force of the other thrust away the astonished doctor. Freddy's errand was of life or death. "I shan't go with any one but Nettie," cried the child, clinging to her dress. "I hate Chatham and everybody. I will jump into the sea and swim back again. I will never, never leave go of her if you should cut my hands off. Nettie Nettie !-take me with you. Let me go where you are going! I will never be naughty any more! I will never, never go away till Nettie goes! I love Nettie best! Go away, all of you!" cried Freddy, in desperation, pushing off the doctor with hands and feet alike. "I will stay with Nettie. Nobody loves Nettie but me." Nettie had no power left to resist this new assault. She dropped down on one knee beside the child, and clasped him to her in a passion of restrained tears and sobbing. The emotion which her pride would not permit her to show before, the gathering agitation of the whole morning, broke forth at this irresistible touch. She held Freddy close and supported herself by him, leaning all her troubled heart and trembling frame upon the little figure which clung to her bewildered, suddenly growing silent and afraid in that passionate grasp. Freddy spoke no more, but turned his frightened eyes upon the doctor, trembling with the great throbs of Nettie's breast. In the early wintry sunshine, on the quiet rural highroad, that climax of the gathering emotion of years befell Nettie. She could exercise no further self-control. She could only hide her face, that no one might see, and close her quivering lips tight that no one might hear the bursting forth of her heart. No one was there either to hear or see -nobody but Edward Rider, who stood bending with sorrowful tenderness over the wilful fairy creature, whose words of defiance had scarcely died from her lips. It was Freddy, and not the doctor, who had vanquished Nettie; but the insulted lover came in for his revenge. Dr Rider raised her up quietly, asking no leave, and lifted her into the drag, where Nettie had been before, and where Freddy, elated and joyful, took his place beside the groom, convinced that he was to go now with the only true guardian his little life had known. The doctor drove down that familiar road as slowly as he had dashed furiously up to it. He took quiet possession of the agitated trembling creature who had carried her empire over herself too far. At last Nettie had broken down; and now he had it all his own way. When they came to the cottage, Mrs Fred, whom excitement had raised to a troublesome activity, came eagerly out to the door to see what had happened; and the two children, who, emancipated from all control, were sliding down the banisters of the stair, one after the other, in wild glee and recklessness, paused in their dangerous amusement to watch the new arrival. "Oh! look here; Nettie's crying!" said one to the other, with calm observation. The words brought Nettie to herself. "I am not crying now," she said, waking into sudden strength. "Do you want them to get killed before they go away, all you people? Susan, go in, and never mind. I was not-not quite well out of doors; but I don't mean to suffer this, you know, as long as I am beside them. Dr Edward, come in. I have something to say to you. We have nowhere to speak to each other but here," said Nettie, pausing in the little hall, from which that childish tumult had died away in sudden awe of her presence; "but we have spoken to each other here before now. I did not mean to vex you then-at least, I did mean to vex you, but nothing more." Here she paused with a sob, the echo of her past trouble breaking upon her words, as happened from time to time, like the passion of a child; then burst forth again a moment after in a sudden question. "Will you let me have Freddy" she cried, surrendering at discretion, and looking eagerly up in the doctor's face; "if they will leave him, may I keep him with me?" It is unnecessary to record the doctor's answer. He would have swallowed not Freddy only, but Mrs Fred and the entire family, had that gulp been needful to satisfy Nettie, but was not sufficiently blinded to his own interests to grant this except under certain conditions satisfactory to himself. When the doctor mounted the drag again he drove away into Elysium, with a smiling Cupid behind him, instead of the little groom who had been his unconscious master's confidant so long, and had watched the fluctuations of his wooing with such lively curiosity. Those patients who had paid for Dr Rider's disappointments in many a violent pre scription, got compensation to-day in honeyed draughts and hopeful prognostications. Wherever the doctor went he saw a vision of that little drooping head, reposing, after all the agitation of the morning, in the silence and rest he had enjoined, with brilliant eyes half-veiled, shining with thoughts in which he had the greatest share; and, with that picture before his eyes, went flashing along the wintry road with secret smiles, and carried hope wherever he went. Of course it was the merest fallacy, so far as Nettie's immediate occupation was concerned. That restless little woman had twenty times too much to do to think of rest-more to do than ever in all the suddenly-changed preparations which fell upon her busy hands. But the doctor kept his imagination all the same, and pleased himself with thoughts of her reposing in a visionary tranquillity, which, wherever it was to be found, certainly did not exist in St Roque's Cottage, in that sudden tumult of new events and hopes. CHAPTER XVIII. "I always thought there was good in him by his looks," said Miss Wodehouse, standing in the porch of St Roque's, after the wedding-party had gone away. "To think he should have come in such a sweet way and married Mrs Fred! just what we all were wishing for, if we could have ventured to think it possible. Indeed, I should have liked to have given Mr Chatham a little present, just to mark my sense of his goodness. Poor man! I wonder if he repents "It is to be hoped not yet," said Lucy, hurrying her sister away before Mr Wentworth could come out and join them; for affairs were seriously compromised between the perpetual curate and the object of his affections; and Lucy exhibited a certain acerbity under the circumstances which somewhat amazed the tender-hearted old maid. "When people do repent, my be lief is that they do it directly," said Miss Wodehouse. "I daresay he can see what she is already, poor man; and I hope, Lucy, it won't drive him into bad ways. As for Nettie, I am not at all afraid about her. Even if they should happen to quarrel, you know, things will always come right. I am glad they were not married both at the same time. Nettie has such sense! and of course, though it was the very best thing that could happen, and a great relief to everybody concerned, to be sure, one could not help being disgusted with that woman. And it is such a comfort they're going away. Nettie says” "Don't you think you could walk a little quicker? there is somebody in Grove Street that I have to see,' said Lucy, not so much interested as her sister; "and papa will be home at one to lunch." "Then I shall go on, dear, if you 66 have no objection, and ask when the doctor and Nettie are coming home," said Miss Wodehouse, " and take poor little Freddy the cakes I promised him. Poor child! to have his mother go off and marry and leave him. Never mind me, Lucy, dear; I do not walk so quickly as you do, and besides I have to go home first for the cakes." had but been settling in Grange Lane, in good society, and with Dr Marjoribanks's practice, this marriage would have been perfection indeed! But when the doctor brought Nettie home, and set her in that easy-chair which her image had possessed so long, he saw few drawbacks at that moment to the felicity of his lot. If there was So saying the sisters separated; one particular in which his sky and Miss Wodehouse took her gen- threatened clouds, it was not the tle way to the doctor's house, where want of Dr Marjoribanks's practice, everything had been brightened up, but the presence of that little inand where Freddy waited the return terloper, whom the doctor in his of his chosen guardians. It was still heart was apt to call by uncomplithe new quarter of Carlingford, a mentary names, and did not regard region of half-built streets, vulgar with unmixed favour. But when new roads, and heaps of desolate Susan and her Australian were brick and mortar. If the doctor fairly gone, and all fear of any inhad ever hoped to succeed Dr Mar- vasion of the other imps, which Dr joribanks in his bowery retirement Rider inly dreaded up to the last in Grange Lane, that hope now- moment, was over, Freddy grew adays had receded into the darkest more and more tolerable. Where distance. The little surgery round Fred once lay and dozed, and filled the corner still shed twinkles of red the doctor's house with heavy fumes and blue light across that desolate and discreditable gossip, a burden triangle of unbuilt ground upon the on his brother's reluctant hospiother corner houses where dwelt tality, little Freddy now obliterated people unknown to society in Car- that dismal memory with prayers lingford, and still Dr Rider con- and slumbers of childhood; and sented to call himself M.R.C.S., and where the discontented doctor had cultivate the patients who were grumbled many a night and day afraid of a physician. Miss Wode- over that bare habitation of his, house went in at the invitation of which was a house, and not a home, Mary to see the little drawing-room Nettie diffused herself till the fawhich the master of the house had miliar happiness became so much a provided for his wife. It had been part of his belongings that the doconly an unfurnished room in Dr tor learned to grumble once more at Rider's bachelor days, and looked the womanish accessories which he out upon nothing better than these had once missed so bitterly. And same new streets-the vulgar sub- the little wayward heroine who, urb which Carlingford disowned. by dint of hard labour and sacriMiss Wodehouse lingered at the fice, had triumphantly had her own window with a little sigh over the way in St Roque's Cottage, loved perversity of circumstances. If her own way still in the new house, Miss Marjoribanks had only been and had it as often as was good for Nettie, or Nettie Miss Marjoribanks! her. But so far as this narrator If not only love and happiness, but knows, nothing calling for special the old doctor's practice and savings, record has since appeared in the could but have been brought to heap history of the doctor's family, thus up the measure of the young doctor's reorganised under happier auspices, good-fortune! What a pity that and discharging its duties, social one cannot have everything! The and otherwise, though not exactly in friendly visitor said so with a real society, to the satisfaction and apsigh as she went down-stairs after proval of the observant population her inspection. If the young people of Carlingford. |