Читать книгу: «Rossmoyne», страница 6

"I said nothing to annoy Mrs. O'Connor, at any rate," says Mr. Ryde. "She needn't have taken a simple word or two like that."

"You see, we are all so terribly thin-skinned," says Mr. Kelly, regretfully, "I quite blush for my country-people. Of course there are noble exceptions to every rule. I am the noble exception here. I don't feel in the least annoyed with you. Now do try some brandy, my dear fellow: it will do you all the good in the world."

"I don't know this moment whether you are laughing at me or not," says the marine, eying him doubtfully.

"I never laugh," says Mr. Kelly, reproachfully. "I thought even you could see that. Well, will you have that B. and S.?"

But Mars is huffed, and declines to accept consolation in any shape. He strolls away with an injured air to where his brother officer, Captain Cobbett, is standing near the hall door, and pours his griefs into his ears. Captain Cobbett being a very spare little man, with a half starved appearance and a dismal expression, it is doubtful whether poor Ryde receives from him the amount of sympathy required.

"Well," says Madam O'Connor, turning round as she sees him disappear, and addressing the three or four people round her generally, "'pon me conscience, that's the silliest young man I ever met in my life!" When disturbed, elated, or distressed, Madam O'Connor always says, "'Pon me conscience!"

"Don't be hard upon him," says Mr. Kelly, kindly. "Though very mad, he is quite harmless!"

"He plays tennis very well," says Miss Fitzgerald, the tall girl. "So nice, isn't it? to have these ancient games reproduced!" This with the learned air of one who could say more if she would.

"Ancient?" says Madam O'Connor. "Faith, I thought it was a game of yesterday."

"Oh, dear, no!" says the erudite Bella, with a lenient smile. "Tennis was first brought from France to England in the reign of Charles the Second."

"There now, Miss Beresford, don't forget that," says Madam O'Connor, turning to Monica with an amused smile: "it is essential you should remember it, as it is part of one's education." After which she moves away towards some other guests, having said all she has to say to those near her.

"May I see you to your carriage, Miss Blake?" says Desmond, finding she and Miss Penelope are bent on going; and Aunt Priscilla, who has taken quite a fancy to this strange young man, gives her gracious permission that he shall accompany them to the fossilized chariot awaiting them.

"Who is he, my dear Priscilla?" asks Miss Penelope, in a stage whisper, as they go.

"Don't know, my dear, but a vastly agreeable young man, very superior to those of his own age of the present day. He is marvellously polite, and has, I think, quite a superior air."

"Quite," says Penelope, "and a very sweet expression besides, – so open, so ingenuous. I wish all were like him." This with a sigh, Terence having proved himself open to suspicion with regard to plain dealing during the past few days.

Now, it so happens that at this instant they turn a corner leading from the shrubbery walk on to the gravel sweep before the hall door; as they turn this corner, so does some one else, only he is coming from the gravel sweep to the walk, so that consequently he is face to face with the Misses Blake without any hope of retreat.

The walk is narrow at the entrance to it, and as the newcomer essays to pass hurriedly by Miss Priscilla he finds himself fatally entangled with her, she having gone to the right as he went to the left, and afterwards having gone to the left as he went to the right, and so on.

Finally a passage is cleared, and the stranger – who is an amazingly ugly old man, with a rather benign though choleric countenance – speeds past the Misses Blake like a flash of lightning, and with a haste creditable to his years, but suggestive rather of fear than elasticity.

"My uncle?" says Brian Desmond, in an awestruck tone, to Monica, who literally goes down before the terrible annunciation, and trembles visibly.

It is a rencontre fraught with mortal horror to the Misses Blake. For years they have not so much as looked upon their enemy's face, and now their skirts have actually brushed him as he passed.

"Come, come quickly, Monica," says Miss Penelope, on this occasion being the one to take the initiative. "Do not linger, child. Do you not see? It was our enemy that passed by."

If she had said "it was the arch fiend," her voice could not have been more tragic.

"I am coming, Aunt Penny," says Monica, nervously.

Now, it is at this inauspicious moment that Mr. Kelly (who, as I have said before, is always everywhere) chooses to rush up to Brian Desmond and address him in a loud tone.

"My dear boy, you are not going yet, are you?" he says reproachfully. "I say, Desmond, you can't, you know, because Miss Fitzgerald says you promised to play in the next match with her."

The fatal name had been uttered clearly and distinctly. As though petrified the two old ladies, stand quite still and stare at Brian; then Miss Priscilla, with a stately movement, gets between him and Monica, and, in tones that tremble perceptibly, says to him, —

"I thank you for the courtesy already received sir; but we will no longer trouble you for your escort: we prefer to seek our carriage alone."

She sweeps him a terribly stiff little salute, and sails off, still trembling and very pale, Miss Penelope, scarcely less pale, following in her wake.

Desmond has barely time to grasp Monica's hand, and whisper, "Remember," in as mysterious a tone as the hapless Stuart, when she too is swept away, and carried from his sight.

Not until the gates of Aghyohillbeg are well behind them do the Misses Blake sufficiently recover themselves for speech. Terence, who has been a silent witness of the whole transaction, creating a diversion by making some remark about the day generally, breaks the spell that binds them. His remark is passed over in silence, but still the spell is broken.

"Whoever introduced you to that young man," begins Miss Priscilla, solemnly, "did a wrong thing. Let us hope it was done in ignorance."

At this Monica shivers inwardly and turns cold, as she remembers that no introduction has ever been gone through between her and "that young man." What if her Aunt Priscilla persists, and asks the name of the offending medium? Fortunately, Miss Blake loses sight of this idea, being so much engrossed with a greater.

"For the future you must forget you ever spoke to this Mr. Desmond," she says, her face very stern. "Happily he is an utter stranger to you, so there will be no difficulty about it. You will remember this, Monica?"

"Yes, I will remember," says the girl, slowly, and with a visible effort.

Then Moyne is reached in solemn silence so far as the Misses Blake are concerned; in solemn silence, too, the two old ladies mount the oaken staircase that leads to their rooms. Outside, on the corridor, they pause and contemplate each other for a moment earnestly.

"He – he is very good-looking," says Miss Penelope at last, as though compelled to make the admission even against her will.

"He is abominably handsome," says Miss Priscilla fiercely: after which she darts into her room and closes the door with a subdued bang behind her.

CHAPTER VIII

How Brian, having instituted inquiries, condemns his Uncle secretly – How Terry throws light upon a dark subject, and how, for the third time, Love "finds out his way."

It is the evening of the next day, and dinner at Coole has just come to an end. Mr. Kelly, who has been Brian's guest for the last fortnight, and who is to remain as long as suits him or as long after the grouse-shooting in August as he wills, has taken himself into the garden to smoke a cigar. This he does at a hint from Brian.

Now, finding himself alone with his uncle, Brian says, in the casual tone of one making an indifferent remark, —

"By the bye, I can see you are not on good terms with those old ladies at Moyne."

As he speaks he helps himself leisurely to some strawberries, and so refrains from looking at his uncle.

"No," says The Desmond, shortly.

"Some old quarrel I have been given to understand."

"I should prefer not speaking about it," says the squire.

"Twinges of conscience even at this remote period," thinks Brian, and is rather tickled at the idea, as he lifts his head to regard his uncle in a new light, – that is, as a regular Don Juan.

"Well, of course, I dare say I should not have mentioned the subject," he says, apologetically; "but I had no idea it was a sore point. It was not so much bad taste on my part as ignorance. I beg your pardon!"

"It was a very unhappy affair altogether," says Don Juan.

"Very unfortunate indeed, from what I have heard."

"More than unfortunate! – right down disgraceful!" says the squire, with such unlooked-for energy as raises astonishment in the breast of his nephew. ("By Jove, one would think the old chap had only now awakened to a sense of his misconduct," he thinks, irreverently.)

"Oh, well," he says, leniently, "hardly that, you know."

"Quite that," emphatically.

"It has been often done before: yours is not a solitary case."

"Solitary or not, there were elements about it inexcusable," says the old squire, beating his hand upon the table as though to emphasize his words.

"I wouldn't take it so much to heart if I were you," says Brian, who is really beginning to pity him.

"It has lain on my heart for twenty years. I can't take it off now," says the squire.

"You have evidently suffered," returns Brian, who is getting more and more amazed at the volcano he has roused. "Of course I can quite understand that if you were once more to find yourself in similar circumstances you would act very differently."

"I should indeed! —very differently. A man seldom makes a fool of himself twice in a lifetime."

("He's regretting her now," thinks Brian.)

But out loud he says, —

"You didn't show much wisdom, I daresay."

"No, none; and as for her, – to fling away such a love as that – " Here he pauses, and looks dreamily at the silver tankard before him.

This last speech rather annoys Brian; to gloat over the remembrance of a love that had been callously cast aside to suit the exigences of the moment, seems to the younger man a caddish sort of thing not to be endured.

("Though what the mischief any pretty girl of nineteen could have seen in him," he muses, gazing with ill-concealed amazement at his uncle's ugly countenance, "is more than I can fathom.")

"Perhaps it wasn't so deep a love as you imagine," he cannot refrain from saying a propos to his uncle's last remark, with a view to taking him down a peg.

"It was, sir," says the Squire, sternly. "It was the love of a lifetime. People may doubt as they will, but I know no love has superseded it."

"Oh, he is in his dotage!" thinks Brian, disgustedly; and, rising from the table, he makes a few more trivial remarks, and then walks from the dining-room on to the balcony and so to the garden beneath.

Finding his friend Kelly in an ivied bower, lost in a cigar, and possibly, though improbably, in improving meditation, he is careful not to disturb him, but, making a successful detour, escapes his notice, and turns his face towards that part of Coole that is connected with Moyne by means of the river.

At Moyne, too, dinner has come to an end, and, tempted by the beauty of the quiet evening, the two old ladies and the children have strolled into the twilit garden.

There is a strange and sweet hush in the air – a stillness full of life – but slumberous life. The music of streams can be heard, and a distant murmur from the ocean; but the birds have got their heads beneath their wings, and the rising night-wind wooes them all in vain.

Shadows numberless are lying in misty corners; the daylight lingers yet, as though loath to quit us and sink into eternal night. It is an eve of "holiest mood," full of tranquillity and absolute calm.

 
"It is that hour of quiet ecstasy,
When every rustling wind that passes by
The sleeping leaf makes busiest minstrelsy."
 

"You are silent, Priscilla," says Miss Penelope, glancing at her.

"I am thinking. Such an eve as this always recalls Katherine; and yesterday that meeting, – all has helped to bring the past most vividly before me."

"Ah, dear, yes," says Miss Penelope, regarding her with a furtive but tender glance. "How must he have felt, when he thought what grief he brought to her young life!"

"You are talking of mother?" asks Kit, suddenly, letting her large dark eyes rest on Miss Penelope's face, as though searching for latent madness there.

"Yes, my dear, of course."

"He would not have dared so to treat her had her father been alive or had we been blessed with a brother," says Miss Priscilla, sternly. "He proved himself a dastard and a coward."

"Perhaps there was some mistake," says Monica, timidly, plucking a pale blossom and pretending to admire it.

"No, no. We believe he contracted an affection for some other girl, and for her sake jilted your mother. If so, retribution fit and proper followed on his perfidy, because he brought no wife later on to grace his home. Doubtless he was betrayed in his turn. That was only just."

"There seems to be reason in that conjecture," says Miss Penelope, "because he went abroad almost immediately. I saw him shortly before he left the country, and he was then quite a broken-down man. He must have taken his own misfortune greatly to heart."

"Served him right!" says Miss Priscilla, uncompromisingly. "He deserved no greater luck. Your mother suffered so much at his hands that she almost lost her health. I don't believe she ever got over it."

"Oh, yes, she did," says Terry, suddenly; "she got over it uncommonly well. We didn't know who Mr. Desmond was then, of course; but I know she used to make quite a joke of him."

"A joke!" says Miss Priscilla, in an awful tone.

"Yes, regular fun, you know," goes on Terence, undaunted. "One day she was telling father some old story about Mr. Desmond, a 'good thing' she called it, and she was laughing heartily; but he wasn't, and when she had finished, I remember, he said something to her about want of 'delicacy of feeling,' or something like that."

"I was there," says Kit, in her high treble. "He said, too, she ought to be ashamed of herself."

"Oh, that was nothing," says Mr. Beresford, airily. "Father and mother never agreed for a moment; they were always squabbling from the time they got up till they went to bed again."

The Misses Blake have turned quite pale.

"Terence how can you speak so of your sainted mother?" says Miss Penelope. "I'm sure, from her letters to us, she was a most devoted mother and wife, and, indeed, sacrificed her every wish and pleasure to yours."

"I never knew it cost her so much to keep away from us," says Terence. "If she was dying for our society, she must indeed have sacrificed herself, because she made it the business of her life to avoid us from morn to dewy eve."

"Doubtless she had her duties," says Miss Penelope, in a voice of suppressed fear. What is she going to hear next? what are these dreadful children going to say?

"Perhaps she had," said Terence. "If so, they didn't agree with her, as she was always in a bad temper. She used to give it to papa right and left, until he didn't dare to call his soul his own. When I marry, I shall take very good care my wife doesn't lead me the life my mother led my father."

"Your wife! who'd marry you?" says Kit, scornfully, which interlude gives the discussion a rest for a little time. But soon they return to the charge.

"Your mother when here had an angelic temper," says Miss Penelope. Miss Priscilla all this time seems incapable of speech.

"Well, she hadn't when there," says Terence; and then he says a dreadful thing, as vulgar as it is dreadful, that fills his aunt's heart with dismay. "She and my father fought like cat and dog," he says; and the Misses Blake feel their cup is indeed full.

"And she never would take Monica anywhere," says Kit; "so selfish!"

It is growing too terrible. Is their idol to be shattered thus before their eyes?

"Monica, was your mother unkind to you?" says Miss Penelope, in a voice full of anguish. After all these years, is the Katherine of their affections to be dragged in the dust?

Monica hesitates. She can see the grief in her aunt's face, and cannot bear to add to it. The truth is that the late Mrs. Beresford had not been beloved by her children, for reasons which it will be possible to conceive, but which would be tiresome to enumerate here. Perhaps there seldom had been a more careless or disagreeable mother.

So Monica pauses, flushes, glances nervously from right to left, and then back again, and finally rests her loving, regretful eyes full upon Miss Penelope's agitated face.

Something she sees there decides her. Sinking to her knees, she flings her arms around the old lady's neck, and lays her cheek to hers.

"I will say nothing, but that I am happy here," she says, in a low whisper.

Miss Penelope's arms close round her. The worst has come to her; yet there is solace in this clinging embrace, and in the dewy lips that seek hers. If she has lost one idol, who can say she has not gained another, and perhaps a worthier one?

Yet beyond doubt the two old ladies have sustained a severe shock: they hold down their heads, and for a long time avoid each other's eyes, as though fearing what may there be seen.

"Let us walk round the garden, Aunt Priscilla," says Monica, feeling very sorry for them. "The evening is lovely, and the roses so sweet."

"Come then," says Miss Priscilla, who is perhaps glad to escape from her own thoughts. And so they all wander to and fro in the pretty garden, bending over this flower and lingering over that in a soft, idle sort of enjoyment that belongs alone to the country.

Terence had disappeared, but, as he is not great on flowers, his presence is not indispensable, and no one takes any notice of his defection.

Presently they come upon the old gardener, who is also the old coachman, upon his bended knees beside a bed. The whole garden is scrupulously raked and scrupulously weeded till not a fault can be found. But Miss Priscilla is one of those who deem it necessary always to keep a servant up to his trumps.

Stooping over the bed, therefore, she carefully adjusts her glasses upon her nose, and proceeds to examine with much minuteness the earth beneath her. A tiny green leaf attracts her notice.

"Corney, is that a weed?" she asks, severely. "I certainly remember sowing some seeds in this place; but that has a weedy look."

"It's seeds, miss," says Corney, "Ye'd know it by the curl of it."

"I hope so, I hope so," says Miss Priscilla, doubtfully, "but there's a common cast about it. It reminds me of groundsel. Corney, whatever you do, don't grow careless."

"Faix, I'm too ould a hand for that, miss," says Corney. "But, to tell the truth, I think myself, now, not to desaive ye, that the leaf ye mentioned is uncommon like the groundsel. You ought to be proud of yer eyes, Miss Priscilla; they're as clear as they were twinty years ago."

Greatly mollified by this compliment, Miss Priscilla declines to scold any more, and, the groundsel forgotten, moves onward to a smooth piece of sward on which a cartload of large white stones from the seashore has been ruthlessly thrown.

"What is this?" she says, indignantly, eying the stones with much disfavor. "Corney, come here! Who flung those stones down on my green grass?"

"The rector, miss. He sent his man wid a load of 'em, and 'tis there they left 'em."

"A most unwarrantable proceeding!" says Miss Priscilla, who is in her managing mood. "What did Mr. Warren mean by that?"

"Don't you think it was kind of him to draw them for our rookery, my dear Priscilla?" says Miss Penelope, suggestively.

"No, I don't," says Miss Priscilla. "To bring cartloads of nasty large stones and fling them down upon my velvet grass on which I pride myself (though you may think nothing of it, Penelope) is not kind. I must say it was anything but nice, – anything but gentlemanly."

"My dear, he is quite a gentleman, and a very good man."

"That may be. I suppose I am not so uncharitable as to be rebuked for every little word; but to go about the country destroying people's good grass, for which I paid a shilling a pound, is not gentlemanly. Katherine, what are you laughing at?"

"At the stones," says Kit.

"There is nothing to laugh at in a stone. Don't be silly, Katherine. I wonder, Monica, you don't make it the business of your life to instil some sense into that child. The idea of standing still to laugh at a stone."

"Better do that than stand still to cry at it," says the younger Miss Beresford, rebelliously. Providentially, the remark is unheard; and Monica, scenting battle in the breeze, says, hastily, —

"Do you remember the roses at Aghyohillbeg, auntie? Well, I don't think any of them were as fine as this," pointing to a magnificent blossom near her. It is the truth, and it pleases Miss Priscilla mightily, she having a passion for her roses. And so peace is once more restored.

"It grows chilly," says Miss Penelope, presently.

"Yes; let us all go in," says Miss Priscilla.

"Oh, not yet, auntie; it is quite lovely yet," says Monica, earnestly. She cannot go in yet, not yet; the evening is still young, and – and she would like so much to go down to the river, if only for a moment. All this she says guiltily to herself.

"Well we old women will go in at least," says Miss Penelope. "You two children can coquet with the dew for a little while; but don't stay too long, or sore throats will be the result."

"Yes, yes," says Miss Priscilla, following her sister. As she passes Monica, she looks anxiously at the girl's little slight fragile figure and her slender throat and half-bared arms.

"That dress is thin. Do not stay out too long. Take care of yourself, my darling." She kisses her pretty niece, and then hurries on, as though ashamed of this show of affection.

A little troubled by the caress, Monica moves mechanically down the path that leads towards the meadows and the river, followed by Kit. By this time the latter is in full possession of all that happened yesterday, – at least so much of it as relates to Monica's acquaintance with Mr. Desmond (minus the tender passages), his uncle's encounter with her aunts, and Brian's subsequent dismissal. Indeed, so much has transpired in the telling of all this that Kit, who is a shrewd child, has come to the just conclusion that the young Mr. Desmond is in love with her Monica!

Strange to say, she is not annoyed at his presumption, but rather pleased at it, – he being the first live lover she has ever come in contact with, and therefore interesting in no small degree.

Now, as she follows her sister down the flowery pathway, her mind is full of romance, pure and sweet and great with chivalry, as a child's would be. But Monica is sad and taciturn. Her mind misgives her, conscience pricks her, her soul is disquieted within her.

What was it she had promised Aunt Priscilla yesterday? Aunt Priscilla had said, "For the future you will remember this?" and she had answered, "Yes."

But how can she forget? It was a foolish promise, for who has got a memory under control?

Of course, Aunt Priscilla had meant her to understand that she was never to speak to Mr. Desmond again, and she had given her promise in the spirit. And of course she would be obedient; she would at least so far obey that she would not be the first to speak to him, nor would she seek him – nor – But why, then, is she going to the river? Is it because the evening is so fine, or is there no lurking hope of —

And, after all, what certainty is there that – that – any one will be at the river at this hour? And even if they should be, why need she speak to him? she can be silent; but if he speaks to her, what then? Can she refuse to answer?

Her mind is as a boat upon a troubled sea, tossed here and there; but by and by the wind goes down, and the staunch boat is righted, and turns its bow toward home.

"Kit, do not let us go to the river to-night," she says, turning to face her sister in the narrow path.

"But why? It is so warm and light, and such a little way!"

"You have been often there. Let us turn down this side of the meadow, and see where it will lead to."

That it leads directly away from Coole there cannot be the least doubt; and the little martyr treading the ground she would not, feels with an additional pang of disappointment that the fulfilment of her duty does not carry with it the thrill of rapture that ought to suffuse her soul. No, not the faintest touch of satisfaction at her own heroism comes to lighten the bitter regret she is enduring as she turns her back deliberately on the river and its chances. She feels only sorrow, and the fear that some one will think her hard-hearted, and she could cry a little, but for Kit and shame's sake.

"Monica, who is that?" exclaims Kit, suddenly, staring over the high bank, beside which they are walking, into the field beyond. Following her glance, Monica sees a crouching figure on the other side of this bank, but lower down, stealing cautiously, noiselessly, towards them, as though bent on secret murder. A second glance betrays the fact that it is Terence, with – yes, most positively with a gun!

"Where on earth did he get it?" says Kit; and, unable to contain her curiosity any longer, she scrambles up the bank, and calls out, "Terry, here we are! Come here! Where did you get it?" at the top of her fresh young lungs.

As she does so, a little gray object, hitherto unseen by her, springs from among some green stuffs, and, scudding across the field into the woods of Coole beyond, is in a moment lost to view.

"Oh, bother!" cries Terry, literally dancing with rage; "I wouldn't doubt you to make that row just when I was going to fire. I wish to goodness you girls would stay at home, and not come interfering with a fellow's sport. You are always turning up at the wrong moment, and just when you're not wanted! – indeed you ever are!"

These elegant and complimentary remarks he hurls at their heads, as though with the wish to annihilate them. But they haven't the faintest effect: the Misses Beresford are too well accustomed to his eloquence to be dismayed by it. They treat it, indeed, as a matter of course, and so continue their inquiries uncrushed.

"Terry, where did you get this gun?" asks Monica, as breathless with surprise as Kit. "Is it" – fearfully – "loaded? Oh! don't! – don't point it this way! It will surely go off and kill somebody."

Here she misses her footing and slips off the high bank, disappearing entirely from view, only to reappear again presently, flushed but uninjured.

"What a lovely gun!" says Kit, admiringly.

"Isn't it?" says Terence, forgetting his bad temper in his anxiety to exhibit his treasure. "It's a breech-loader, too; none of your old-fashioned things, mind you, but a reg'lar good one. I'll tell you who lent it to me, if you'll promise not to peach."

"We won't," says Kit, who is burning with curiosity.

"Guess, then."

"Bob Warren?" says Monica. Bob Warren is the rector's son, and is much at Moyne.

"Not likely! Pegs above him. Well, I'll tell you. It's that fellow that's spoons on you," – with all a brother's perspicacity, – "the fellow who saw us on the hay-cart," – Monica writhes inwardly, – "Desmond, you know!"

"The enemy's nephew?" asks Kit, in a thrilling tone, that bespeaks delight and a malicious expectation of breakers ahead.

"Yes. I was talking to him yesterday, early in the day, at Madam O'Connor's; and he asked me was I your brother, Monica, to which I pleaded guilty, though," with a grin, "I'd have got out of it if I could; and then he began to talk about shooting, and said I might knock over any rabbits I liked in Coole. I told him I had no gun, so he offered to lend me one. I thought it was awfully jolly of him, considering I was an utter stranger, and that; but he looks a real good sort. He sent over the gun this morning by a boy, and I have had it hidden in the stable until now. I thought I'd never get out of that beastly garden this evening."

"Oh, Terence, you shouldn't have taken the gun from him," says Monica, flushing. "Just think what Aunt Priscilla would say if she heard of it. You know how determined she is that we shall have no intercourse with the Desmonds."

"Stuff and nonsense!" says Mr. Beresford. "I never heard such a row as they are forever making about simply nothing. Why, it's quite a common thing to jilt a girl, nowadays. I'd do it myself in a minute."

"You won't have time," says Kit, contemptuously. "She – whoever she may be – will be sure to jilt you first."

"Look here," says Terence, eyeing his younger sister with much disfavor; "you're getting so precious sharp, you know, that I should think there'll be a conflagration on the Liffey before long; and I should think, too, that an outraged nation would be sure to fling the cause of it into the flames. So take care."

"Terence, you ought to send that gun back at once," says Monica.

"Perhaps I ought, but certainly I shan't," says Terence, genially. "And if I were you," politely, "I wouldn't make an ass of myself. There is quite enough of that sort of thing going on up there," indicating, by a wave of his hand, the drawing-room at Moyne, where the Misses Blake are at present dozing.

"You shouldn't speak of them like that," says Monica; "it is very ungrateful of you, when you know how kind they are, and how fond of you."

"Well, I'm fond of them, too," says Terence, remorsefully but gloomily; "and I'd be even fonder if they would only leave me alone. But they keep such a look-out on a fellow that sometimes I feel like cutting the whole thing and making a clean bolt of it."

"If you ran away you would soon be wishing yourself back again," says Monica, scornfully. "You know you will have no money until you are twenty-one. People pretend to be discontented, at times, with their lives; but in the long run they generally acknowledge 'there is no place like home.'"