The Duchess of Rosemary Lane. A Novel. Farjeon Benjamin Leopold

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      "I don't know whether I have a right to speak-"

      "That is candid of you."

      The arrow misses its mark.

      "But it may be," proceeds the young fellow, "that I have, for the reason that I love her."

      His voice trembles, but his earnestness imparts power to it.

      "I am obliged to you for your confidence," observes Mr. Temple, watching for Nelly Marston as he speaks, "unsolicited as it is. A pretty young lady generally inspires that passion in many breasts."

      "But not in all alike," quickly retorts the gardener's son.

      "That is fair philosophy. Proceed."

      "You speak lightly, sir, while I am serous. It stands in this way, sir. People are beginning to talk-"

      "People will talk," interrupts Mr. Temple, with malicious relish; "as in the present instance."

      "And Miss Marston's name and yours have got mixed up together in a manner it would grieve her to know."

      "You forget, in the first place," says Mr. Temple haughtily, with an ominous frown on his face, "that Miss Marston is a lady; and in the second, you forget to whom you are speaking."

      "Truly I am not thinking of you, sir," replies the gardener's son quietly and simply, "I am thinking of her. A young lady's good name is not a thing to be lightly played with."

      "Therefore," says Mr. Temple impatiently, "I would advise you to take that very lesson to heart, and to tell those persons who are, as you say, making light of her good name-you are evidently acquainted with them-that it will be wise for them to choose other topics of gossip. I cannot acknowledge your right to address me on this matter, and this conversation must come to an end. Young ladies nowadays are perfectly well able to take care of themselves, and as a rule choose for themselves. We rougher creatures are often more sensitive than they, and more particular on certain points. And now let me tell you, my man, it is a dangerous thing for you to seek me out at night and address me on such a subject in the tone and manner you have assumed. You are speaking to a gentleman, remember. You-"

      "Are not one," interposes the gardener's son, with sad significance; "I know it, sir."

      "I will waive that, however, and say this much to you. If Miss Marston had constituted you her champion and had authorised you to speak, I should be willing to listen to you. But that is not the case, I presume, and I wish you goodnight."

      The gardener's son twines his fingers convulsively. Were Mr. Temple his equal in station, it would have fared ill with him, smarting as the man is with passionate jealousy and the sting of unrequited love. He controls himself sufficiently to say,

      "I must ask you one question, sir. Do you remain at Springfield?"

      "No; I leave to-night, and I shall probably be absent for weeks. Ah, I perceive that answer is satisfactory to you. I see a lady approaching. Shall you or I retire?"

      The gardener's son, casting one glance at the advancing form, walks slowly away, and his shadow is soon swallowed up by other shadows, among which he walks in pain and grief.

      Nelly Marston is in no holiday humour; she is trembling with shame at the thought of what passed in the sick-chamber of her peevish mistress, and she approaches Mr. Temple with downcast head. Love and humiliation are fighting a desperate battle within her breast, and she does not respond sympathetically to her lover's glad greeting. He uses his best arts to soothe and comfort her; he addresses her by every endearing title, saying she is dearer to him than all the world, and beseeching her to throw all the rest aside. She listens in silence at the first, as he pours this sweet balm of Gilead upon her troubled soul. He is in his brightest mood, and his speech which tells the oft-told tale flows sweetly and tenderly. They stand beneath the stars, and he calls upon them to witness his love, his truth, his honour. Every word that falls from his lips sinks into her soul, and her heart is like a garden filled with unfading flowers. Humiliation and unrest melt into oblivion, never more to rise and agonise her. He loves her; he tells her so a hundred times and in a hundred ways. He will be true to her; he swears it by all the beautiful signs around them. Fairer and more lovely grows the night as he kisses away her tears. The moon rises higher in the heavens and bathes them in light. Softly, more tenderly he speaks, and she, like a child listens, listens-listens and believes, and hides her blushing face from him. Ah, if truth lives, it lives in him-in him, the symbol of all that is good and manly, and noble! She is so weak, he so strong! She knows so little, he so much! The sweet and enthralling words he whispers into her ears as her head lies upon his breast, form the first page of the brightest book that life can open to her; and the sighing of the breeze, the sleeping flowers, the hushed melody of the waving grass, the laughing, flashing lights of heaven playing about the dreamy shadows in the waters of the brook, are one and all delicious evidences of his truth, his honour, and his love.

      "I love you-I love you-I love you!" he vows and vows again. "Put your arms about my neck-so! and whispers to me what I am dying to hear."

      "You are my life!" she sighs, and their lips meet; and then they sit and talk, and, as she gazes into the immeasurable distances of the stars, she sees, with the eyes of her soul, a happy future, filled with fond and sweet imaginings,

      PART THE THIRD

      The season of England's loveliest sunsets is here. The golden corn, ripe and ready for the sickle, bows gracefully beneath the lavender-perfumed breeze, and whispers to bountiful earth, "My time has come. Farewell!"

      In a garden attached to a cottage situated twenty miles from Springfield stands Nelly Marston, by the side of an old apple-tree loaded with fair fruit, and looking, with the white moss gathered about its limbs, like an ancient knight clothed in silver armour. The cottage has many rooms of delightfully odd shapes, is tastefully furnished, and is built in the centre of an acre of land so prettily laid out and so bright with colour that few strangers see it without pausing a while to admire.

      Nelly Marston is more beautiful than when we saw her last at Springfield, and to the poetical mind presents a fine contrast to the gnarled and ancient tree, which, could it speak, might honestly say, "Old I am, but am yet fair to the eye and can produce good things. Come, my girl, gather sweetness from me, and wisdom too, if you need it."

      She gathers sweetness and that is enough for her. From where she stands, she has a broken view of the winding lane which, from distant wider spaces, leads to the front of the cottage. Often and again her eyes are directed towards this lane, with a look which denotes that her heart is in them. She is like fair Rosamond waiting for her prince. He comes! A horseman turns into the winding path and waves his hand to her. She replies with the gladdest of smiles and with a waving of her own pretty hand, and her heart beats joyfully to the music of the horse's hoof. Her prince draws rein at the cottage-door, and she is there to meet him. A lad with face deeply pock-marked takes the horse to the stable, casting as many admiring glances towards Nelly as time will permit of.

      "Now, Nelly," says the prince gaily, as he throws his arms about her and kisses her again and again, "was ever lover more punctual than I?"

      "How can I tell?" she answers, "I never had but one."

      "Ah, Nelly, Nelly!" he exclaims, with uplifted finger and an arch smile; "do you forget the gardener's son?"

      "No, I do not forget him; he was very good to me. But I do not mean in that way."

      "In what way, then, puss?"

      "You'll СКАЧАТЬ