CHAPTER XII.

THE 'interruption to our conversation came in the shape of a low knock at the door, given by a hesitating hand, as though the person knew that the room contained those who were not likely to be much pleased at the interruption. However, I said, "Come in!" and Mrs. Mivart appeared. In measured tones she apologised for her intrusion, saying, that she could not otherwise get rid of the importunity of a young lady who seemed to be in terrible distress; and, as far as she could collect from her broken and imperfect English, was most anxious to see a magistrate directly. Mivart added

Mrs.

"I tried to make her understand, miss, that Sir Henry Vernon and Mr. Willis were both gone several miles, to attend the sessions at and she then asked if she could see Lady Vernon. I told her, her ladyship was too much of an invalid to see a stranger; but the poor creature was trembling so, and appeared so afflicted, that I said I would just step this way, and ask if you would speak to her. Though, I daresay," continued the housekeeper, as if halfashamed of the involuntary compassion she had been betrayed into evincing-"I daresay, she is nothing but a regular impostor, being a foreigner too."

"You will see her, Caroline?" asked Arthur.

"Yes!" I answered; "she can come in here, Mrs. Mivart." Mrs. Mivart went to summon her, evidently pleased at my decision; and Arthur left me for a time, saying, we would resume our conversation later in the day, when both I would have had more time for reflection.

The stranger now stood before me, and I immediately recognised the person whom we had seen and conversed with for a few moments at her cottage gate, on the afternoon of

1

our visit to the Rectory. Her appearance, however, was considerably changed by the improvement in her attire, which had then consisted of old, and somewhat shabby, mourning; now she wore a gown, mantle, and bonnet of black silk, all deeply trimmed with crape, and all looking fresh and new. I have mentioned her before as about thirty, but this day I should have guessed the number of her years to be under that, so much was she altered by the change in her apparel, notwithstanding the agitation and distress visible on every feature. She was certainly not handsome; and when I had seen her before, so still and inanimate,- I had scarcely thought her good-looking; but now the flash of her dark eye, and the warm glow that came and went upon her cheek, mantling through her clear, dark skin, invested her with an interest which forbade all idea of her being plain.

1 addressed her in French, observing that this was not the first time we had met, and asking if I could be of any service to her.

"I believe you can, mademoiselle," she replied in the same language, which she spoke with tolerable fluency. "At all events, time presses; and, as Sir Henry Vernon and Mr. Willis are both away, I can but try your power and will to

serve me.

"Of the latter you need not doubt; of the former I can say nothing till I hear your story."

"It is on a point of law that I am seeking for information, mademoiselle. I know little of the regulations of my own land, and nothing at all of your's. But this is my case: The cottage in which I am living, I rent by the year of Mr. Kidd, whose property it is. I pay my rent regularly every quarter with my own money, and that money is honestly obtained. I am eight-and-twenty, and am leading the quietest possible life, no less from inclination than necessity. Now, under these circumstances, do the laws of your country authorize any one, no matter who it may be, to come and ring at my bell, ask for admittance into my house, and, on my refusing it, to attempt a forcible entry, and to make use of the most violent language, the party in question declaring that he would break in by violence in the dead of night, sooner than be baulked of his desire?"

Here she paused; and I said, I was sure that such proceedings as the person she spoke of threatened to put in

practice, could never be sanctioned by the law; but that, in case of his being able to establish any plea for entering her cottage, I believed his course would be to apply for a legal warrant for doing so.

“And would he obtain it?" she asked, while her faltering voice and quivering limbs bore witness to her deep anxiety.

"I hardly think he would to-day," I answered, the magistrates are gone to the sessions at

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as all

-; but I am sure you are tired and faint," and I rang the bell, and ordered some wine and refreshment.

She declined eating, but she swallowed half a glass of wine, and seemed touched by the kindness of my manner. sently she resumed—

Pre

"My illness, mademoiselle, is of the mind, not of the body; and, at times, I feel as if I could not alone sustain the heavy burden of my secret much longer. For I am incurring a fearful responsibility, but I had scarcely an alternative. Mademoiselle, you feel for me--I see it in your face—I hear it in the tone of your voice-and from the little I have heard from my village neighbours, I am convinced that your family might be safely intrusted with a matter of life and death. Would it be taxing your patience too much to listen to my sad tale?"

I felt strangely interested in the fate of the young woman who stood before me, especially when I connected it in my mind with that of the beautiful boy with whom I had previously seen her; and her situation, as a stranger in a foreign land, apparently unprotected and forlorn, could not but inspire me with compassion. Besides, there was about her a je ne sais quoi, which assured me that, let her former life have been what it might, she was not now imposing upon me. So, after a minute's hesitation, I expressed my willingness to be the confidant of her story. I will relate it in my own words, as her manner of telling it was naturally hurried and disjointed; and I will give in their proper order many additional particulars, which I was not made acquainted with until a later period, and which at that time were unknown to my informant herself.

Between seven and eight years ago, there resided in a small house, near a market town in one of the midland counties, a gentleman, his wife, and their daughter. The

gentleman, Mr. Protheroe by name, had formerly been a partner in a house of considerable business in London, and had received, as his share in the profits, an income of about ten thousand a-year. But adverse times came-suddenly, as it appeared to those unconcerned in, or unconnected with, merchandise-but not altogether unexpectedly to the merchants themselves. Many an anxious day, many a sleepless night, as his wife could testify, had Mr. Protheroe spent for many months before his ruin was finally consummated; while from the world he strove to hide the slightest suspicion of the real state of affairs. And so his style of living, which had always been on a scale that caused his income to be rated at rather above than below its real amount, remained unaltered. They still inhabited a handsome mansion in a fashionable part of London-Mr. Protheroe still drove to his counting-house each morning in his own well-appointed equipage with its dashing pair of horses-and Mrs. Protheroe's drawing-rooms were still thrown open for the reception of her numerous, and often titled, guests. For Mrs. Protheroe had a little sprinkling of nobility in her blood, being niece to a very poor Scottish lord; and her grand acquaintances, many of them not more abounding in this world's wealth than her own family, agreed, with a condescending kindness, to accept of her merchant husband's hospitality.

At last the crash came; the house was declared insolvent, with scarce a hope that either of the three partners would be able to bring things around, and start afresh. The creditors were clamorous, and imperative in their demands; and six weeks had not elapsed before Mr. and Mrs. Protheroe and their child found themselves cast upon the wide world, with about four hundred a-year for their future subsistence; that small sum being secured to the wife by her marriage settlement.

What was to be done? Mrs. Protheroe was for migrating to the continent, and there combining as much as possible of pleasure and gaiety with the economy, from the exercise of which not even a residence in Germany could save them; but on this one point her husband was inflexible. He would not quit his native country-he hated and detested foreign parts and foreigners; and his future life was likely to be miserable enough, without the additional vexation of being constantly surrounded by a set of fools and

scoundrels. In vain Mrs. Protheroe represented that, by taking up their residence in another land, he would not be exposed to the hard trial of meeting in his fallen state with those who had only known him in the day of his prosperity; that abroad it was no disgrace for English people to be poor; and that, in the countries he despised, wealth was not the only test of merit-the only standard by which human beings were valued. Finding him insensible to all her eloquence, she brought forward her last, and what she hoped would prove her strongest, plea (for she knew Mr. Protheroe's devoted attachment to his child); namely, the education of their daughter, now a girl of about thirteen. This, she urged, could not be properly attended to in a secluded valley in Devonshire, or amid the mountain fastnesses of Wales; but at a foreign town they could procure her the best masters at a moderate expense, and, in a few years' time, introduce her into a higher class of society, than with their scanty means they could ever hope to attain in their own country. If any thing had been wanting to confirm Mr. Protheroe in his former decision, it was supplied by this last argument of his wife's. His daughter to be brought up abroad-taught to detest the land of her birth, the only land in the world worth belonging to-made a foreigner of, and ending all by marrying some penniless scamp of a German count, and breaking his heart in his old age! No! that he could prevent that should never be!

Then what were they to do? Mrs. Protheroe's family were too needy themselves to afford any assistance; and her fashionable acquaintances, who had frequented the house merely because the master was wealthy, and could give costly banquets, and contribute to their amusement, showed not the slightest disposition to come forward now, and ere long appeared to have forgotten the very name and existence of the fallen Protheroes. But they were unexpectedly rescued from this dilemma by the gratitude of a man for whom Mr. Protheroe had once done a trifling service-trifling it then seemed, and performed at little cost or trouble to himself, but it had been the means of giving Mr. Barton a fresh start in life; and, although he had for some years past been a prosperous man, he had never forgotten his obligations to his benefactor. He wrote to Mr. Protheroe, saying, that he was reluctant to intrude himself upon him at a time when he