Johnny Ludlow Third Series Part 40

"He will never be any better," affirmed Mr. Foliott, "be very sure of that. He is innately bad, and the pain he has inflicted upon me for years has made me old before my time. But--forgive me, Sir John, for saying so--I cannot think you exercised discretion in accepting him so easily for your daughter."

"I had no suspicion, you see," returned poor Sir John. "How could I have any? Being your nephew, and Lord Riverside's nephew--"

"Riverside's nephew he called himself, did he! The old man is ninety, as I dare say you know, and never stirs from his home in the extreme north of Scotland. Some twenty years ago, he fell in with the sister of Richard's mother (she was a governess in a family up there), and married her; but she died within the year. That's how he comes to be Lord Riverside's 'nephew.' But they have never met in their lives."

"Oh dear!" bemoaned Sir John. "What a villain! and what a blessed escape! He made a great point of Helen's bit of money, three thousand pounds, not being tied up before the marriage. I suppose he wanted to get it into his own hands."

"Of course he did."

"And to pay his debts with it; as far as it would go."

"_Pay his debts with it!_" exclaimed Mr. Foliott. "Why, my good sir, it would take thirty thousand to pay them. He would just have squandered it away in Paris, at his gaming-tables, and what not; and then have asked you to keep him. Miss Whitney is well quit of him: and I'm thankful I came back in time to save her."

Great news to disclose to Helen! Deeply mortifying to have ordered a wedding-breakfast and wedding things in general when there was no wedding to be celebrated! The tears were running down Lady Whitney's homely cheeks, as Miss Deveen drove up.

Mr. Foliott asked to see Helen. All he said to her we never knew--but there's no doubt he was as kind as a father.

"He is a wicked, despicable man," sobbed Helen.

"He is all that, and more," a.s.sented Mr. Foliott. "You may be thankful your whole life long for having escaped him. And, my dear, if it will at all help you to bear the smart, I may tell you that you are not the first young lady by two or three he has served, or tried to serve, in precisely the same way. And to one of them he behaved more wickedly than I care to repeat to you."

"But," ruefully answered poor Helen, quietly sobbing, "I don't suppose it came so near with any of them as the very morning."

And that was the end of Helen Whitney's wedding.

HELEN'S CURATE.

I.

A summons from Mr. Brandon meant a summons. And I don't think I should have dared to disobey one any more than I should those other summonses issued by the law courts. He was my guardian, and he let me know it.

But I was hardly pleased that the mandate should have come for me just this one particular day. We were at Crabb Cot: Helen, Anna, and William Whitney had come to it for a week's visit; and I did not care to lose a day with them. It had to be lost, however. Mr. Brandon had ordered me to be with him as early as possible in the morning: so that I must be off betimes to catch the first train.

It was a cold bleak day towards the end of February: sleet falling now and then, the east wind blowing like mad, and cutting me in two as I stood at the hall-door. n.o.body else was down yet, and I had swallowed my breakfast standing.

Shutting the door after me, and making a rush down the walk between the evergreens for the gate, I ran against Lee, the Timberdale postman, who was coming in, with the letters, on his shaky legs. His face, shaded by its grey locks, straggling and scanty, had a queer kind of fear upon it.

"Mr. Johnny, I'm thankful to meet you; I was thinking what luck it would be if I could," said he, trembling. "Perhaps you will stand my friend, sir. Look here."

Of the two letters he handed to me, one was addressed to Mrs. Todhetley; the other to Helen Whitney. And this last had its envelope pretty nearly burnt off. The letter inside could be opened by anybody, and some of the scorched writing lay exposed.

"If the young lady would only forgive me--and hush it up, Mr. Johnny!"

he pleaded, his poor worn face taking a piteous hue. "The Miss Whitneys are both very nice and kind young ladies; and perhaps she will."

"How was it done, Lee?"

"Well, sir, I was lighting my pipe. It is a smart journey here, all the way from Timberdale--and I had to take the long round to-day instead of the Ravine, because there was a newspaper for the Stone House. The east wind was blowing right through me, Mr. Johnny; and I thought if I had a bit of a smoke I might get along better. A spark must have fallen on the letter while I was lighting my pipe, and I did not see it till the letter was aflame in my hand. If--if you could but stand my friend, sir, and--and perhaps give the letter to the young lady yourself, so that the Squire does not see it--and ask her to forgive me."

One could only pity him, poor worn man. Lee had had pecks of trouble, and it had told upon him, making him old before his time. Now and then, when it was a bad winter's morning, and the Squire caught sight of him, he would tell him to go into the kitchen and get a cup of hot coffee.

Taking the two letters from him to do what I could, I carried them indoors.

Putting Helen's with its tindered cover into an envelope, I wrote a line in pencil, and slipped it in also.

"DEAR HELEN,

"Poor old Lee has had a mishap and burnt your letter in lighting his pipe. He wants you to forgive it and not to tell the Squire. No real damage is done, so please be kind.

"J. L."

Directing this to her, I sent it to her room by Hannah, and made a final start for the train.

And this was what happened afterwards.

Hannah took the letter to Helen, who was in the last stage of dressing, just putting the finishing touches to her hair. Staring at the state her letter was in, she read the few words I had written, and then went into a pa.s.sion at what Lee had done. Helen Whitney was as good-hearted a girl as ever lived, but hot and hasty in temper, saying anything that came uppermost when put out. She, by the help of time, had got over the smart left by the summary collapse of her marriage, and had ceased to abuse Mr. Richard Foliott. All that was now a thing of the past. And, not having had a spark of love for him, he was the more easily forgotten.

"The wicked old sinner!" she burst out: and with emphasis so startling, that Anna, reading by the window, dropped her Prayer-book.

"Helen! What is the matter?"

"_That's_ the matter," flashed Helen, showing the half-burnt envelope and scorched letter, and flinging on the table the piece of paper I had slipped inside. Anna took the letter up and read it.

"Poor old man! It was only an accident, Helen; and, I suppose, as Johnny says, no real damage is done. You must not say anything about it."

"Must I not!" was Helen's tart retort.

"Who is the letter from?"

"Never you mind."

"But is it from home?"

"It is from Mr. Leafchild, if you must know."

"Oh," said Anna shortly. For that a flirtation, or something of the kind, had been going on between Helen and the curate, Leafchild, and that it would not be likely to find favour at Whitney Hall, she was quite aware of.

"Mr. Leafchild writes about the school," added Helen, after reading the letter; perhaps tendering the information as an apology for its having come at all. "Those two impudent girls, Kate and Judith Dill, have been setting Miss Barn at defiance, and creating no end of insubordination."

With the last word, she was leaving the room; the letter in her pocket, the burnt envelope in her hand. Anna stopped her.

"You are not going to show that, are you, Helen? Please don't."

"Mr. Todhetley ought to see it--and call Lee to account for his carelessness. Why, he might have altogether burnt the letter!"

"Yes; of course it was careless. But I dare say it will be a lesson to him. He is very poor and old, Helen. Pray don't tell the Squire; he might make so much commotion over it, and then you would be sorry.