"You want me to go now," said Vincent, rising, with disconcerted looks.

"Not because I am angry. I am not angry," she said, rising and holding out her hand to him. "It was a pity, but it was an inadvertence, and no dishonourable action. Yes, go. I am best to be avoided till I hear how this journey has been managed, and what your mother says. It was a sudden thought, that sending them to Lonsdale. I know that, even if he has not already found the right one, he will search all the others now.

And your Lonsdale has been examined and exhausted; all is safe there.

Yes, go. I am glad you know; but don't say anything to Alice, if you see her, as she is sure to seek you out. You know who I mean by Alice? Lady Western--yes. Good-bye. I trust you, notwithstanding the vestry window; but close it after this on January nights."

She had sunk into her seat again, and was absorbed in her needlework, before Vincent left the room. He looked back upon her before he shut the door, but she had no look to spare from that all-engrossing work; her thin fingers were more scarred than ever, and stained with the coa.r.s.e blue stuff. All his life after the young man never saw that colour without thinking of the stains on those poor hands.

He went about his work a.s.siduously all that day, visiting sick people, poor people, men and women, "which were sinners." That dark ocean of life with which he had frightened the Salem people last night, Mr.

Vincent made deeper investigations into this day than he had made before during all the time he had been in Carlingford. He kept clear of the smug comfort of the leading people of "the connection." Absolute want, suffering, and sorrow, were comparatively new to him; and being as yet a stranger to philanthropic schemes, and not at all scientific in the distribution of his sympathies, the minister of Salem conducted himself in a way which would have called forth the profoundest contempt and pity of the curate of St. Roque's. He believed everybody's story, and emptied his purse with the wildest liberality; for, indeed, visitation of the poor had not been a branch of study at Homerton. Tired and all but penniless, he did not turn his steps homeward till the wintry afternoon was sinking into night, and the lamps began to be lighted about the cheerful streets. As he came into George Street he saw Lady Western's carriage waiting at the door of Masters's. Alice! that was the name they called her. He looked at the celestial chariot wistfully. He had nothing to do with it or its beautiful mistress--never, as anything but a stranger, worshipping afar off, could the Dissenting minister of Carlingford approach that lovely vision--never think of her but as of a planet, ineffably distant--never----

"My lady's compliments," said a tall voice on a level with Vincent's eyebrows: "will you please to step over and speak to her ladyship?" The startled Nonconformist raised his eyes. The big footman, whose happy privilege it was to wait upon that lady of his dreams, stood respectful by his side, and from the carriage opposite the fairest face in the world was beaming, the prettiest of hands waving to him. Vincent believed afterwards that he crossed the entire breadth of George Street in a single stride.

"I am so glad to see you, Mr. Vincent," said Lady Western, giving him her hand; "I did so want to see you after the other night. Oh, how could you be _so_ clever and wicked--so wicked to your friends! Indeed, I shall never be pleased till you recant, and confess how wrong you were.

I must tell you why I went that night. I could not tell what on earth to do with my brother, and I took him to amuse him; or else, you know, I never could have gone to hear the poor dear old Church attacked. And how violent you were too! Indeed I must not say how clever I thought it, or I should feel I was an enemy to the Church. Now I want you to dine with me, and I shall have somebody to come who will be a match for you. I am very fond of clever society, though there is so little of it in Carlingford. Tell me, will you come to-morrow? I am disengaged. Oh, pray, do! and Mr. Wentworth shall come too, and you shall fight."

Lady Western clapped her pretty hands together with the greatest animation. As for Vincent, all the superior thoughts in which he would probably have indulged--the contrast he would have drawn between the desperate brother and this b.u.t.terfly creature, fluttering on the edge of mysteries so dark and evil, had she been anybody else--deserted him totally in the present crisis. She was not anybody else--she was herself. The words that fell from those sweetest lips were of a half-divine simplicity to the bewildered young man. He would have gone off straightway to the end of the world if she had chosen to command him. All unwarned by his previous failure, paradise opened again to his delighted eyes.

"And I want to consult you about our friend," said Lady Western; "it will be so kind of you to come. I am so pleased you have no engagement.

I am sure you thought us very stupid last time; and I am stupid, I confess," added the beauty, turning those sweet eyes, which were more eloquent than genius, upon the slave who was reconquered by a glance; "but I like clever people dearly. Good-bye till to-morrow. I shall quite reckon upon to-morrow. Oh, there is Mr. Wentworth! John, call Mr.

Wentworth to speak to me. Good morning--remember, half-past six--now, you must not forget."

Spite of the fact that Mr. Wentworth took his place immediately by the side of the carriage, Vincent pa.s.sed on, a changed man. Forget! He smiled to himself at the possibility, and as he walked on to his lodging, a wonderful maze of expectation fell upon the young man's mind.

Why, he asked, was he brought into this strange connection with Her relations and their story? what could be, he said to himself with a little awe, the purpose of that Providence which shapes men's ends, in interweaving his life with Hers by these links of common interest? The skies throbbed with wonder and miracle as soon as they were lighted up by her smile. Who could predict what might be coming, through all the impossibilities of fact and circ.u.mstance? He would not dissipate that delicious haze by any definite expectations like those which brought him to sudden grief on a former occasion. He was content to believe it was not for nothing that all these strange circles of fate were weaving round his charmed feet.

In this elevated frame of mind, scarcely aware of the prosaic ground he trod, Vincent reached home. The little maid at the door said something about a lady, to which he paid no attention, being occupied with his own thoughts. With an unconscious illumination on his face he mounted the stair lightly, three steps at a time, to his own rooms. The lamp was lighted in his little sitting-room, and some one rose nervously from the table as he went in at the door. What was this sudden terror which fell upon the young man in the renewed glory of his youthful hopes? It was his mother, pale and faint, with sleepless tearful eyes, who, with the cry of an aching heart, worn out by fatigue and suspense, came forward, holding out anxious hands to him, and dropped in an utter _abandon_ of weariness and distress into his astonished arms.

CHAPTER XII.

"What has happened? For heaven's sake tell me, mother," cried Vincent, as she sank back, wiping her eyes, and altogether overpowered, half with the trouble which he did not know, half with the joy of seeing him again--"say it out at once, and don't keep me in this dreadful suspense.

Susan? She is not married? What is wrong?"

"Oh, my dear boy!" said Mrs. Vincent, recovering herself, but still trembling in her agitation--"oh, my affectionate boy, always thinking of us in his good heart! No, dear. It's--it's nothing particular happened.

Let me compose myself a little, Arthur, and take breath."

"But, Susan?" cried the excited young man.

"Susan, poor dear!--she is very well; and--and very happy up to this moment, my darling boy," said Mrs. Vincent, "though whether she ought to be happy under the circ.u.mstances--or whether it's only a cruel trick--or whether I haven't been foolish and precipitate--but, my dear, what could I do but come to you, Arthur? I could not have kept it from her if I had stayed an hour longer at home. And to put such a dreadful suspicion into her head, when it might be all a falsehood, would have only been killing her; and, my dear boy, now I see your face again, I'm not so frightened--and surely it can be cleared up, and all will be well."

Vincent, whose anxiety conquered his impatience, even while exciting it, kneeled down by his mother's side and took her hands, which still trembled, into his own. "Mother, think that I am very anxious; that I don't know what you are referring to; and that the sudden sight of you has filled me with all sort of terrors--for I know you would not lightly take such a journey all by yourself," said the young man, growing still more anxious as he thought of it--"and try to collect your thoughts and tell me what is wrong."

His mother drew one of her hands out of his, laid it on his head, and fondly smoothed back his hair. "My dear good son! you were always so sensible--I wish you had never left us," she said, with a little groan; "and indeed it was a great thought to undertake such a journey; and since I came here, Arthur, I have felt so flurried and strange, that I have not, as you see, even taken off my bonnet; but I think now you've come, dear, if you would ring the bell and order up the tea? When I see you, and see you looking so well, Arthur, it seems as if things could never be so bad, you know. My dear," she said at last, with a little quiver in her voice, stopping and looking at him with a kind of nervous alarm, "it was about Mr. Fordham, you may be sure."

"Tea directly," said Vincent to the little maid, who appeared just at this crisis, and who was in her turn alarmed by the brief and peremptory order.

"What about Mr. Fordham?" he said, helping his mother to take off the cloak and warm wraps in which she had been sitting, in her nervous tremor and agitation, while she waited his return.

"Oh, my dear, my dear," cried poor Mrs. Vincent, wringing her hands, "if he should not turn out as he ought, how can I ever forgive myself? I had a kind of warning in my mind the first time he came to the house, and I have always dreamt such uncomfortable dreams of him, Arthur. Oh! if _you_ only could have seen him, my dear boy! But he was such a gentleman, and had such ways. I am sure he must have mixed in the very highest society--and he seemed so to _appreciate_ Susan--not only to be in love with her, you know, my dear, as any young man might, but to really appreciate my sweet girl. Oh, Arthur, Arthur, if he should turn out badly, it will kill me, for my Susan will break her heart."

"Mother, you drive me frantic. What has he done?" cried poor Vincent.

"He has done nothing, my dear, that I know of. It is not him, Arthur, for he has been gone for a month, arranging his affairs, you know, before the wedding, and writes Susan regularly and beautiful letters. It is a dreadful scrawl I got last night. I have it in my pocket-book. It came by the last post when Susan was out, thank heaven. I'll show it you presently, my dear, as soon as I can find it, but I have so many papers in my pocket-book. She saw directly when she came in that something had happened, and oh, Arthur, it was so hard to keep it from her. I don't know when I have kept anything from her before. I can't tell how we got through the night. But this morning I made up the most artful story I could--here is the dreadful letter, my dear, at last--about being determined to see you, and making sure that you were taking care of yourself; for she knew as well as I did how negligent you always are about wet feet. Are you sure your feet are dry now, Arthur? Yes, my dear boy, it makes me very uncomfortable. You don't wonder to see your poor mother here, now, after that?"

The letter which Vincent got meanwhile, and anxiously read, was as follows--the handwriting very mean, with a little tremor in it, which seemed to infer that the writer was an old man:--

"MADAM,--Though I am but a poor man, I can't abear to see wrong going on, and do nothink to stop it. Madam, I beg of you to excuse me, as am unknown to you, and as can't sign my honest name to it like a man. This is the only way as I can give you a word of warning. Don't let the young lady marry him as she's agoing to, not if her heart should break first. Don't have nothink to do with Mr.

Fordham. That's not his right name, and he has got a wife living--and this I say is true, as sure as I have to answer at the judgment;--and I say to you as a friend, Stop it, stop it! Don't let it go on a step, if you vally the young lady's charackter and her life. I don't add no more, because that's all I dare say, being only a servant; but I hope it's enough to save the poor young lady out of his clutches, as is a man that goeth about seeking whom he may devour.--From a well-wisher, though

A STRANGER."

Mrs. Vincent's mind was easier when this epistle was out of her hands.

She stood up before the mirror to take off her bonnet, and put her cap tidy; she glided across the room to take up the shawl and cloak which her son had flung upon the little sofa anyhow, and to fold them and lay them together on a chair. Then the trim little figure approached the table, on which stood a dimly burning lamp, which smoked as lamps will when they have it all their own way. Mrs. Vincent turned down the light a little, and then proceeded to remove the globe and chimney by way of seeing what was wrong--bringing her own anxious patient face, still retaining many traces of the sweet comeliness which had almost reached the length of beauty in her daughter, into the full illumination of the smoky blaze. Notwithstanding the smoke, the presence of that little woman made the strangest difference in the room. She took note of various evidences of litter and untidiness with her mind's eye as she examined the lamp. She had drawn a long breath of relief when she put the letter into Arthur's hand. The sense of lightened responsibility seemed almost to relieve her anxiety as well. She held the chimney of the lamp in her hand, when an exclamation from her son called her back to the consideration of that grievous question. She turned to him with a sudden deepening of all the lines in her face.

"Oh, Arthur dear! don't you think it may be an enemy? don't you think it looks like some cruel trick? You don't believe it's true?"

"Mother, have you an enemy in the world?" cried Vincent, with an almost bitter affectionateness. "Is there anybody living that would take pleasure in wounding you?"

"No, dear; but Mr. Fordham might have one," said the widow. "He is not like you or your dear father, Arthur. He looks as if he might have been in the army, and had seen a great deal of life. That is what has been a great consolation to me. A man like that, you know, dear, is sure to have enemies; so very different from our quiet way of life," said Mrs.

Vincent, holding up the chimney of the lamp, and standing a little higher than her natural five feet, with a simple consciousness of that grandeur of experience: "some one that wished him ill might have got some one else to write the letter. Hush, Arthur, here is the maid with the tea."

The maid with the tea pushed in, bearing her tray into a scene which looked very strange to her awakened curiosity. The minister stood before the fire with the letter in his hand, narrowly examining it, seal, post-mark, handwriting, even paper. He did not look like the same man who had come up-stairs three steps at a time, in the glow and exhilaration of hope, scarcely half an hour ago. His teeth were set, and his face pale. On the table the smoky lamp blazed into the dim air, unregulated by the chimney, which Mrs. Vincent was nervously rubbing with her handkerchief before she put it on. The little maid, with her round eyes, set down the tray upon the table with an answering thrill of excitement and curiosity. There was "somethink to do" with the minister and his unexpected visitor. Vincent himself took no notice of the girl; but his mother, with feminine instinct, proceeded to disarm this possible observer. Mrs. Vincent knew well, by long experience, that when the landlady happens to be one of the flock, it is as well that the pastor should keep the little shocks and crises of his existence studiously to himself.

"Does it always smoke?" said the gentle Jesuit, addressing the little maid.

The effect of so sudden and discomposing a question, at a moment when the person addressed was staring with all her soul at the minister, open-mouthed and open-eyed, may be better imagined than described. The girl gave a start and stifled exclamation, and made all the cups rattle on the tray as she set it down. Did what smoke?--the chimney, or the minister, or the landlady's husband down-stairs?

"Does it always smoke?" repeated Mrs. Vincent, calmly, putting on the chimney. "I don't think it would if you were very exact in putting this on. Look here: always at this height, don't you see? and now it burns perfectly well."

"Yes, ma'am; I'll tell missis, ma'am," said the girl, backing out, with some alarm. Mrs. Vincent sat down at the table with all the satisfaction of success and conscious virtue. Her son, for his part, flung himself into the easy-chair which she had given up, and stared at her with an impatience and wonder which he could not restrain.

"To think you should talk about the lamp at such a time, or notice it at all, indeed, if it smoked like fifty chimneys!" he exclaimed, with a tone of annoyance; "why, mother, this is life or death."

"Yes, yes, my dear!" said the mother, a little mortified in her turn: "but it does not do to let strangers see when you are in trouble. Oh, Arthur, my own boy, you must not get into any difficulty here. I know what gossip is in a congregation; you never would bear half of what your poor dear papa did," said the widow, with tears in her eyes, laying her soft old fingers upon the young man's impatient hand. "You have more of my quick temper, Arthur; and whatever you do, dear, you must not expose yourself to be talked of. You are all we have in the world. You must be your sister's protector; for oh, if this should be true, what a poor protector her mother has been! And, dear boy, tell me, what are we to do?"

"Had he any friends?" asked Vincent, half sullenly; for he did feel an instinctive desire to blame somebody, and n.o.body seemed so blamable as the mother, who had admitted a doubtful person into her house. "Did he know anybody--in Lonsdale, or anywhere? Did he never speak of his friends?"

"He had been living abroad," said Mrs. Vincent, slowly. "He talked of gentlemen sometimes, at Baden, and Homburg, and such places. I am afraid you would think it very silly, and--and perhaps wrong, Arthur; but he seemed to know so much of the world--so different from our quiet way of life--that being so nice and good and refined himself with it all--I am afraid it was rather an attraction to Susan. It was so different to what she was used with, my dear. We used to think a man who had seen so much, and known so many temptations, and kept his nice simple tastes through it all--oh, dear, dear! If it is true, I was never so deceived in all my life."

"But you have not told me," said Arthur, morosely, "if he had any friends?"

"n.o.body in Lonsdale," said Mrs. Vincent. "He came to see some young relative at school in the neighbourhood----"

At this point Mrs. Vincent broke off with a half scream, interrupted by a violent start and exclamation from her son, who jumped off his seat, and began to pace up and down the room in an agitation which she could not comprehend. This start entirely overpowered his mother. Her overwrought nerves and feelings relieved themselves in tears. She got up, trembling, approached the young man, put her hand, which shook, through his arm, and implored him, crying softly all the time, to tell her what he feared, what he thought, what was the matter? Poor Vincent's momentary ill-humour deserted him: he began to realise all the complications of the position; but he could not resist the sight of his mother's tears. He led her back gently to the easy-chair, poured out for her a cup of the neglected tea, and restrained himself for her sake. It was while she took this much-needed refreshment that he unfolded to her the story of the helpless strangers whom, only the night before, he had committed to her care.