A Dozen Ways Of Love Part 33

Courthope received a message to the effect that the young ladies wished to see him. There was something in the formal wording of this message, coming after his solitary meal, which made him know that they were ill at ease, that they had taken their mistake more deeply to heart than he would have wished. He had no sooner entered the room where Madge stood than he wished he were well out of it again, so far did his sympathy with her discomfort transcend his own pleasure at being in her presence.

Madge stood, as upon the first night, behind her sister's chair. Eliz looked frightened and excited, yet as half enjoying the novel excitement. Madge, pale-faced and distressed, showed only too plainly that she had need of all the courage she possessed to lift her eyes to his. Yet she was not going to shirk her duty; she was going to make her apology, and the apology of the household, just as the judge, her father, would have wished to have it made.

It was a little speech, conned beforehand, which she spoke--a quaint mixture of her own girlish wording and the formal phrases which she felt the occasion demanded. Courthope never knew precisely what she said. His feelings were up and in tumult, like the winds on a gusty day, and he was embarra.s.sed for her embarra.s.sment, while he smiled for the very joy of it all.

Madge confessed with grief that Eliz had mistaken Xavier for Courthope.

She said the man from the village had shown them what folly it was to suppose that the gentleman could be Xavier's accomplice. She begged that same gentleman's pardon very humbly. At the end he heard some words faltered: she wished it was in their power 'to make any amends.'

Almost before she ceased speaking he took up the word, and his own voice sounded to him merry and bold in comparison with her soft distressful speech; but he could not help that, he must speak with such powers as nature gave him.

'There are two ways by which you can make amends, and first I would beg that none of our friends who were here last night should be told of it.

I should not like to think that Emma and Elizabeth, and Evelina or Marianna Alcoforado should ever hear that I was taken for a thief.'

'You are laughing at us,' said Eliz sharply. 'We know that you will go away and make fun of us to all your friends.'

'If I do you will have one way of punishing me that would give me more pain than I could well endure, you can shut me out next time I come to ask for shelter.'

'Oh, but you can't come again,' said Eliz, with vibrating note of fierce discontent; 'our stepmother will be here.'

He looked at Madge.

'I was going to say that the other way in which you could make amends would be to give me leave to come back; and if _you_ give me leave I will come, even if it be necessary, to that end, to get an introduction from all the clergy in Great Britain, or from the Royal Family.'

A ray of hope shot into Madge's dark eyes, the first glimmer of a smile began to show through her distress.

'It is an old adage that "where there is a will there is a way," and did I not walk on your most impossible snow-shoes and bring back your silver?'

Madge looked down, a pretty red began to mantle her pale face, and, as if the angels who manage the winds and clouds did not wish that the blush of so dear a maiden should betray too much, a ray of scarlet light from the sinking sun just then came winging through the dispersing storm-clouds and caused all the white snow-world to redden, and dyed the frost-flowers on the window-pane, and, entering where the pane was bare, lit all the room with soft vermilion light. So, in the wondrous blush of the white world, the girl's cheeks glowed and yet did not confess too much.

'You will allow me to send in your compliments and inquire after Mr.

Woodhouse as I pa.s.s?' This was Courthope's farewell to Eliz, and she called joyfully in reply:--

'You need not send back his message, for we shall know that they are "all very indifferent."'

Into the scarlet shining of the western sun, an omen of fair weather and delight, Courthope set forth again from the square tin-roofed house, 'leaving,' as the saying is, 'his heart behind him.' The large farm-horses, restive from long confinement and stimulated by the frost, shook their bells with energy. The Morin women displayed such goodwill and even tenderness in their attentions to the comfort of the second prisoner, in whom they had found an old friend, that, tied in a blanket and lying full length on the straw of a box-sleigh, he looked content with himself and the world, albeit he had not as yet returned from the happy roving-places of the drunken brain. The talkative clerk was glad enough to give Courthope the reins of the masterful horses; he sat on one edge of the blue-painted box and Courthope on the other; thus they started, bravely plunging into the drifts between the poplars. The drifts were all tinged with pink; the poplars, intercepting the red light upon their slender upright boughs, cast, each of them, a clear shadow that seemed to lie in endless length athwart the glowing sward.

Courthope looked back at the house which had been so dim and phantom-like the night before; the red sun lit the icicles that hung from eaves and lintels, tinged the drifts, glowed upon the windows as if with light from within, and turned the steep tin roof into a gigantic rose; but all his glance was centred upon his lady-love, who stood, regardless of the cold, at the entrance of the drift-encircled porch and watched them as long as the sunlight lay upon the land. Was she looking at the plunging sleigh and at its driver, or at the chasms of light in the rent cloud beyond? His heart told him, as he drove on into the very midst of the sunset which had embraced the glistening land, that the maid, although not regardless of the outer glory, only rejoiced in its beauty because the vision of her heart was focused upon him. His heart, in telling him this, taught him no pride, for had he not learned in the same small s.p.a.ce of time only to count himself rich in what she gave?

Slow was the progress of the great horses; they pa.s.sed the grove of high elms and birches that, dressed in the snowflakes that had lodged in boughs and branches when the wind dropped, stood up clear against the gulfs of blue that now opened above and beyond. Then the house was hidden, and after that, by degrees, the light of the sunset pa.s.sed away.

THE END.

THE LIFEGUARDSMAN.

ADAPTED FROM SCHIMMEL'S 'DE KAPTEIN VAN DE LIJFGARDE.'

'It is a work of remarkable power and sustained interest. Right to the end the interest is maintained, and it is not over-estimating the work to say that few historical novels published within recent years are superior to this adaptation of the Dutchman's story.'--_Scotsman._

'It is primarily a romance, a story of thrilling adventure, and moves forward with dramatic spirit from point to point.'--_Ill.u.s.trated London News._

'We have no other novel giving so intimate an account of how things fell out, and what obscure events and persons helped and hindered the overthrow of James II. But the chief interest of the book turns round the private person, the Lifeguardsman, not all a hero, mistaken, erring, unfortunate, yet a brave man, and of the kind that stirs our sympathies more than do immaculate heroes.'--_Bookman._

'The work is characterised by great dash and vigour, and the princ.i.p.al characters in the story are strongly drawn, while the incidents are woven so skilfully together that the reader is carried with absorbing interest to the close.'--_Western Times._

'English readers are under a considerable debt of grat.i.tude to the anonymous translator who has given them a version in the vernacular of Schimmel's "De Kaptein van de Lijfgarde." "The Lifeguardsman" is a historical novel of very unusual power and fidelity. In detail and habit the scenes and people of that troublous period are "reconst.i.tuted" here with remarkable skill.'--_Belfast Northern Whig._

'We do not often get the pleasure of handling such a lively and thrilling story, and can feel a due measure of grat.i.tude for the anonymous "mere adapter" to whose discernment and enterprise we are indebted for having brought it to our notice.'--_Literary World._

A. & C. BLACK, SOHO SQUARE, LONDON.

A j.a.pANESE MARRIAGE

BY DOUGLAS SLADEN.

FIFTH THOUSAND.

I. ZANGWILL, _Pall Mall Magazine_, says: 'Bryn, the heroine, is a charming creature, and some of the scenes with her half-crazed dying sister reveal strong imaginative power.'

MRS LYNN LINTON, in the _Queen_, says: 'Another Little Dear has for her main quality unselfishness, penetrated through and through by love. Such a character is Mary Avon in Douglas Sladen's striking novel, "A j.a.panese Marriage."'

SILAS K. HOCKING, in the _Family Circle_: 'The stupidity, not to say immorality, of the English law, which prevents marriage with the deceased wife's sister, has rarely been more strikingly ill.u.s.trated than in Mr. Douglas Sladen's clever novel, "A j.a.panese Marriage." I could wish the whole bench of bishops would read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest this sparkling and entertaining story.'

HELEN MATHERS, in the _Literary World_, writes: 'Philip and Bryn--these two are so interesting and so true to life, the j.a.panese background against which they move in such n.o.ble but intensely human fashion is so exquisite, that the dullest of us must feel keen pleasure when we mingle intimately with the little people who have quite recently a.s.serted their right to be reckoned with the greatest upon earth.'

G. A., in the _Westminster Gazette_, says: 'Mr. Douglas Sladen's first novel is a distinct success. To begin with, he has managed to capture a real live heroine, as charming and convincing a pretty girl as we have met with for years. Her flesh-and-blood reality is quite undeniable. She imposes herself upon one from the very first; she is winning and genuine, and as fresh as a daisy.'

GILBERT BURGESS, in the _Ill.u.s.trated London News_: 'This time it is the woes of the deceased wife's sister which are brought before us in a narrative that is invariably picturesque, and, especially as to the latter half of the volume, is of considerable humour and pathos.'

NORMAN GALE, in the _Literary World_: 'Bryn, a girl beautiful exceedingly, only a little past twenty years of age--"sweet and twenty"

indeed!--loving Philip purely, and purely loved by him in return, living alone with a young widower. The moment when Bryn proves her love is a most exciting one, and shows that Mr. Sladen is a master of vivid recital.'

JAS. STANLEY LITTLE, in the _Academy_: 'He writes with knowledge and freshness of a country and a people as full of interest as j.a.pan and the j.a.panese.'

MARION HEPWORTH DIXON, in the _Englishwoman_: 'A story strikingly told and animated with the doings of English residents in j.a.pan.'