The Pillars of the House; Or, Under Wode, Under Rode, Vol. 1 (of 2)

CHAPTER XXI
A KETTLE OF FISH

'Our Pursuivant at arms will show

Both why we came and when we go.'

Scott.

The place of the pic-nic was a good way off, being the point of the promontory that shut in the mouth of the river, a great crag, with a long reef of rocks running out into the sea, playfully called the Kitten's Tail; though the antiquarians always deposed that the head had nothing to do with cats or kits, but with the disposition to erect chapels to St. Christopher on the points of land where they might first greet the mariners' eyes. Beneath this crag, sheltered by the first and larger joints of the Kitten's Tail, was a delightful sandy nook, where appeared a multitude of smart hats, male and female, a great many strangers even to Captain Audley, who would fain have recognised none of them. In a strong access of his almost morbid silence, he devoted himself to Felix, and kept aloof from almost every one. Even at the dinner, spread on a very sloping bit of beach, pic-nic exigencies enabled him to be nearly tête-à-tête with Felix, who found himself almost back to back to a lady in a brilliant foreign pheasant's plume, with glass dew-drops at the points.

In a pause of their own conversation, they heard the inquiry, 'Do you know who that boy is—that fair delicate-looking lad just opposite, with the white muslin round his hat?'

'Oh—that!' answered the pheasant lady; 'that is young Lord Somerville, son to the Marquess of Liddesdale. He and his brother, Lord Francis, have been out yachting with Captain Audley.'

The Captain smiled as he looked at the boys. 'Ay,' he observed, with a flash of his bright dark eyes,' he has the advantage over Sum.'

For Lance had resumed his lark-like air, and it was perhaps the more striking from the fragility and transparency that remained about his looks; and he was full of animation, as he, with a reinforcement of boys, clustered round a merry sunny-faced girl, full of joyous drollery.

'Very queer and eccentric—quite a bear,' was the next thing they heard; whereat Captain Audley nodded and smiled to Felix. After the general turmoil caused by the change of courses had subsided, that penetrating voice was heard again. 'Yes, we came home sooner than we had intended. The fact was, we found that old Mr. Underwood was being beset by some of those relations. You remember? Oh, yes; they have sunk very low—got into trade, absolutely got into trade! One of them a mere common singing-boy. Mr. Underwood is getting aged—quite past—and we did not know what advantage might be taken of him.'

'Your turn now,' murmured Captain Audley, with a look of diversion calculated to allay the wounded flush on his neighbour's cheek.

'Do you mean Mr. Edward Underwood's sons?' said a voice on the other side. 'I always understood them to be very respectable and well conducted.'

'Oh, very likely! Only I do happen to know that one of them has been a great trouble and vexation to Tom Underwood; and we didn't want the same over again with the poor old Squire.'

'Did I understand you that any of them were here?' added the other voice; 'for I had just been struck by the likeness of that boy opposite, talking to my sister, to poor Mr. Edward Underwood, as I remember him.'

'Oh no, Mrs. Rivers; I assure you that's young Lord Somerville!'

Captain Audley made an effort, rather difficult in his Turkish position, to crane his head beyond the interposing figures, recognised and bowed to the speaker, who greeted him by name, and thus diminished the flow of Mrs. Fulbert Underwood's conversation by her awe of the high and mighty bear whom she scarcely knew by sight. He had no taste for scenes, and did not put either her or Felix to pain by mentioning his name; but when the last act of the meal was over, and people began to move, he made his way in the direction of the inquiring voice. 'Mrs. Rivers, let me introduce Mr. Felix Underwood.'

'I am very happy—' and there was a cordial smile and a hand held out. 'Are you here for long? My father would be so much pleased to see you.'

It was a rather worn pale face; but the ease and sweetness of manner, and the perfect fitness of the dress, made a whole that gave Felix a sense of the most perfect lady he had met with, except his mother and Sister Constance.

'I am at Ewmouth, with one of my brothers who has been ill.'

'Lord Somerville?' and all three burst out laughing. 'My sister has found him out, I see. She and your little boy are old friends, Captain Audley.'

'Yes, you have been very kind to him. But I am as much surprised to see you here as you can be to see my friend. Are you from home?'

'We go back this evening. We slept at the Crewes' last night. My husband had business there; and when they asked us to this pic-nic, it was a good opportunity for Gertrude to learn the beauties of her county.'

'Which she seems to be doing under full escort,' laughed Captain Audley, as the young lady and the young boy flock were seen descending to the rocks.

'She has a strong taste for little boys,' said the elder sister. 'You have the Somerville boys here, haven't you, though?'

'Yes; there had been scarlatina or something or other in their school, and their mother was afraid of them among their sisters, till I had purified them by a sea voyage.'

Probably Mrs. Fulbert never found out her mistake; for Lord Somerville reported that he had never been so pitched into in his life as by an old girl in a 'stunning tile,' who found him washing out an empty pie-dish for the benefit of some maritime monsters that he wanted to carry home to his sisters; but that when Lance came up, she was as meek as a mouse. Certainly, the two boys were little sturdy fellows, burnt lobster-like up to the roots of their bleached and rough hair; and their costumes were more adapted to the deck of the Kittiwake in all weathers, than to genteel society. Their sisters were in an aquarium fever, and their sport all through their expedition had been researches for what they had learnt in Scotland to call 'beasts;' and now the collection was to be completed from the mouth of the Ewe, and the scrambling and tumbling it involved were enchanting.

Kate Staples, who usually considered Lance her charge, was not sorry to see a croquet player disposed of among his own congeners; for the game seemed such a necessary of life, that it was actually prepared for on the sands, to the extreme contempt of the anemone hunters. 'Play at croquet, forsooth, when rocks aren't to be had to scramble on every day!' And scramble ecstatically they did, up and over slippery stone and rock festooned with olive weed, peeping into pools of crystal clearness, and admiring rosy fans of weed, and jewel-like actinias embellished by the magic beauty of intense clear brightness. The boys took off shoes and stockings, turned up trousers, and scrambled and paddled like creatures to the manner born.

'O dear! I wish I might!' sighed the young lady.

'Why don't you?' said Charlie Audley. 'Kate and Em and Annie always do—don't they, Frank?'

'Of course they do, or how would they ever get on!'

'Come along then, Miss Gertrude,' said Charlie. 'You can't think how jolly it is!'

And soon another pair of little white feet were dancing on the rocks. 'Oh dear! what a blunder of civilisation it is to wear shoes at all! How delicious a hold one gets!'

'I can't think why people do wear them! They never are anything but a bother,' said Lance.

'To play at foot-ball with,' suggested Somerville from the top of a rock.

'But women don't,' said Gertrude.

'I think women do it, and make us, that they may have something to worrit about,' said Frank. 'Damp stockings are the bother of creation till one goes to school; and then, isn't it jolly!'

'Except the chilblains,' called out Charlie.

'I believe,' said Lance, 'chilblains come of shoes.'

'No, they can't,' argued Charlie, 'for one has them on one's hands.'

'Well,' said Gertrude, 'let's form ourselves into a society for the suppression of shoes and stockings!'

'Hurrah!' cried Lance. 'I know one person at least that it would be a blessing to.'

The question was, how the five bold reformers were to begin. Frank suggested drowning all the present stock, and pretended to be about to begin, but was of course prevented by a scream.

'Public opinion must be prepared first,' said Lance.

'And that,' said Gertrude, 'we'd better do by a great example! Here, we'll show what can be done. Why shouldn't we get out to the end of the Kitten's Tail?'

'One can't to the end,' said Charlie; 'there's a place big enough for a gig to go through, half way out.'

'And about the tide?' said Lance.

'Tide,' said Charlie, looking at his watch—'tide wouldn't think of playing us such a dirty trick as turning for an hour and a half.'

'And the jolliest beasts of all always live in places like that,' added Somerville. 'Come on, President of the Society for the Suppression of Shoeses—to the front!'

On moved the august Society, now scrambling to a dry flat, now threading a mauvais pas, clinging to festoons of sea-weed; the three little boys climbed like monkeys or sailors; but Lance, agile as he was, had not had the same amount of training, and felt besides that it was requisite to be ready to give a helping hand to Miss Gertrude. She got on very well, being full of lightness and springiness, only she was a little inclined to be adventurous, and to chatter at critical moments.

'We must have got out a quarter of a mile.'

'Oh no, not that!'

'No? I'm sure it is! How small they look on the beach! I wonder if they can see us! Hark! they're singing—'

'"Drink to me only with thine eyes;" that's Felix's crack glee,' said Lance; 'what fun for him!'

'This is much better fun!' cried the general voice. 'They'll never see us if we wave now!'

'No, no; don't let's wave now! Wait till we get to the farthest point.'

'And there we'll plant our ensign!'

'What shall we do for a flag? We haven't got the Britisher here!'

'No; it must be the flag of the SSSS's.'

'That ought to be a bit of bare skin.'

'No, no—a pair of feet—motto, "Off, vile lendings!"'

'I say, I don't think you can get any farther,' interposed Somerville. 'I've been on four rocks farther, and I'm sure you will never get back again if you go on.'

'Oh, that's base! I'm sure this one isn't so hard.'

She was creeping along a ledge, holding the sea-weed with one hand and Lance by the other.

'I really don't think it passable,' he said; 'there's scarcely the width of one's foot beyond.'

'Hurrah!' shouted Frank. 'Here's the father of all the Daisianas!'

'Oh! oh! he's my cousin. I must see him!' cried Gertrude, with a scramble and a laugh, which ended in a sudden slip—luckily, not into the open sea, but into a very steep-sided bath-like pool; and Lance, whom of course she gripped hard, was pulled after her, both over head and ears; and though they scrambled on their feet in a moment, there they stood up to their shoulders in water.

'Get the Daisiana now you are there!' shouted Frank.

'How are we ever to get out?' said Gertrude, looking up the walls, six feet at least on the lowest side.

'If we had a rope,' said Charlie.

'Make signals—call,' said Somerville, all suiting the action to the word. 'No, they don't hear! they are all singing away. You, Franky, you're too little to be any good, make the best of your way to call somebody.'

'The tide will come in!' said Frank. 'Mamma and Aunt Emmie were once shut in by the tide, and Uncle Edwin. And there was a fellow who was quite drowned—dead—and that was why I was named Francis.'

'That's what you may call a cheering reminiscence at a happy moment,' said Lance, recollecting that he was far more nearly a man than any one present, and instinctively feeling the need of brightening all into cheerful activity, for the girl looked thoroughly frightened. 'Yes, Lord Frank, the best thing you can do is to go for somebody; but we'll be out long first. Can't we make a rope? Have you a sash or anything, Miss Gertrude? Don't fear, we'll soon be out.'

Happily she had both a sash and a broad ribbon round her hat; and Lance tore off his puggery.

'I can do it best,' called Charlie. 'I know all the sailors' knots.'

'It will never bear,' said Gertrude.

'Oh yes, it will. You'll not trust your whole weight to it. Is it done?'

'Besides, how can they draw me up?'

'We'd best get behind that rock, Sum,' suggested Charlie, 'then she won't pull us in.'

Charlie's sailor experience was very useful; and he shouted advice to Lance, who was tying the extemporary rope round Gertrude, not very easily, owing to the material, and to its being done under water.

'Now, then, you do your best at climbing—here,' he said. 'They'll pull you; and look! There, first my knee—yes—now my shoulder—now—' And standing for a moment on his shoulder, Gertrude was really able with a desperate grapple to surmount the wall of her prison, and scramble out beside the two cousins, whose pulls had been very helpful.

Lance's clambering was a harder matter, for he did not venture to trust much to the rope, though the girl's strength was added to that of the two boys; and it was a severe climb up the scarcely indented, slippery, moist, slimy rock, where his hands and feet could hardly find any hold; and when at length he reached the top, he was so panting and dizzy, that Somerville at first held him to hinder his slipping backward into the sea. No one could get at King or Queen Daisiana, so it was left in its glory; while the young people struggled back over rocks that seemed much steeper, and pools far deeper, than in their advance; Lance still trying to be helpful, but with a mazed sense of the same sort of desperate effort with which he had run back with Bill's verses; for not only had his small strength been overtaxed, but the immersion in water was affecting his head.

Lord Francis had made much quicker progress; and boy as he was, showed his breeding by not rushing open-mouthed on the party with his intelligence, but seeking the Captain, who was smoking the pipe of solitude upon a rock apart. He at once sent Frank to the servants, who were enjoying the relics of the feast, to fetch some wine, and tell the boat's crew to make ready at once, and then went off himself to seek Mrs. Rivers. Felix, who had spied the little messenger speeding up to the Captain, was already on his way to the rocks, and reached the party in good time; for draggled, drenched, and with clinging garments, they were so slow in getting on, that it was no delusion that the water was higher, and the rocks lower; and even Gertrude had neither breath nor spirits to gabble when that grave anxious face met her, and a strong careful hand lifted and helped, first her, then Lance, up and down every difficulty; and when she perceived how the new-comer avoided point-blank looking at the bare ankles that had sometimes to make long stretches, a burning red came up into her face, half of shame, half of indignation at being made ashamed. And after all, when the place where her hose and shoon had been left was reached, the niched shelf in the rock turned out to have been surrounded by the tide, so that they were quite unattainable either by herself or the little boys; and Felix, putting the arm by which Lance had held by him over Somerville's shoulder told them to go on before, and himself made two long strides and a scramble before he could reach the boots and stockings, and give them to the young lady, unable to help looking nearly as grave and vexed as if it had been Angela herself; indeed, he was vexed, for he had an ideal of the young ladyhood of his mother's old native region, and did not like it to be disturbed. He moved away far enough for her to think he had left her to her fate, till she was on her feet and coming on, and then there he was again, in a moment the attentive squire. Revived by her short rest, and on less perilous ground, she glanced at his face in readiness to disperse her discomfort with something saucy, but somehow it would not do; and she was tamely conducted to terra firma, where her sister saluted her with 'O Daisy! what a child you are to have charge of!'

That restored her enough to answer, 'I'm quite delighted something should have happened under your keeping! No harm done. Salt water never gives cold.'

'I don't mind it for you,' said the elder sister; 'you have not been ill.—But indeed, Mr. Underwood, I am very sorry,' she added. 'What will be best for your brother?'

'Here!' said Captain Audley, taking from Frank a flask of sherry, and over-ruling the objection made by the brothers that stimulants were forbidden. He further insisted on taking Lance at once to his own berth on board the yacht while Mrs. Rivers meant to conduct her sister to the preventive house.

'So,' said Lance, rather ruefully, as he shook hands, 'there ends the SSSS.'

'Not at all! Its use is proved. We should have been cooked by this time in the Daisiana cauldron, if we had had great cumbrous boots on.'

It was a valiant effort, and she cast a glance out of the corner of her eye at the elder brother, but it had not relaxed a muscle of his grave anxious face, which was in truth chiefly bent on watching Lance's involuntary shiverings; and she again turned crimson, perhaps from her share of the chill, and was dragged off, muttering, 'What intolerable folks guardian brothers are! Henry Ward was a mild specimen compared to this one!'

About noon on the following day, Mrs. Pettigrew's little girl abruptly opened the parlour door, and with 'Please, ye're wanted,' turned in a tall, thin, grey-haired, spectacled gentleman, who, as Lance started up from the sofa, exclaimed, 'Don't disturb yourself; I came to thank you, and inquire after you after the adventure my mad-cap daughter led you into.'

'I hope she is all right,' said Lance, solicitously.

'As right as Daisiana himself; more so than I fear you are. Let me see you comfortable. Lie down again, pray.'

'Oh, I don't care about lying down, thank you, Sir; I only sleep for want of something to do;' but though he did not put his feet up, he was feeling far too languid not to relax his bolt-upright attitude, and lean back on his pillows.

'That will do. Bad head-ache?'

'It is nearly gone off now, thank you, Sir; it was bad all night, but it is much better since I have been asleep.'

'Let me see,' laying his left hand on the wrist that hung over the edge of the sofa. 'Ay, I hope that wicked little siren has done no great damage. Pulled you below, true mermaid fashion—eh?'

'I meant to have pulled her out.'

'Instead of which she made a lad into a ladder to climb out on.' Which bad pun served the purpose of making the boy laugh enough to be at his ease. 'She is much indebted, and so am I. I like to meet an old friend's son. Are you alone?'

'My brother is only gone to the post-office. He will be in before long; but it saves a post to take the letters before twelve, and he ought to be out as much as he can.'

'Is he here on his own account, or yours?'

'He came down first, before I was ill. It was bother and overwork and a cough. Everything always does come to worry him, whenever he ought to have rest or pleasure.' And Lance, who was thoroughly weary and dispirited, was nearly ready to cry.

'Even when he goes out for a pic-nic, young ladies must needs drown themselves!'

This made Lance smile; but he added, with a quivering lip, 'He would not go to bed till I could go to sleep last night, and that was not till past two, and he looks quite done up this morning.'

'Is any one attending you?'

'Dr. Manby did at Minsterham—nobody here.'

'What's been amiss with you—fever?'

'Plenty of fever, but it was from sun-stroke.'

'Ah! you boys have thinner skulls than we used to have! How long ago?'

'Seven weeks yesterday,' said Lance, wearily.

'And you are sadly weary of weakness?'

'I don't mind that so much;' and the kindness of face, voice, and gesture, made the poor boy's eyes overflow; 'but I'm no good, and I can't tell whether I ever shall be again!'

'It is a great deal too soon to trouble yourself about that.'

'That's what they all tell me!' cried Lance, impatiently, and the tears rushed forth again. 'Manby only laughs, and tells me I shall be a Solon yet if I don't vex myself; and how can I tell whether he means it?'

'Well, dear boy, have it all out; I promise to mean whatever I say.'

'You are a doctor then, Sir?'

'What! the boy doesn't know me, as sure as my name's Dick May!'

'Oh!' cried Lance, 'that was what I heard Felix saying to Captain Audley—that he did so wish Dr. May could look at me!'

'That's all right, then. Come, then, what is weighing on you—weakness?'

'Just not weakness,' said Lance. 'I didn't care so much when I could scarcely get about; but now I can walk any distance, and still I have not a bit more sense!'

'Is your memory gone?'

'I don't think so; only, if I fix my mind to recollect, and it doesn't come by chance, I'm all abroad, and perfectly senseless and idiotic!'

'And it brings on pain?'

'Yes, if I try five minutes together.'

'You don't try to read or write?'

'I can't—and—' then came the tears again—'music is just like red-hot hammers to me.' There was a great fight with sobs, rather puzzling to one who did not know what music was to the chorister. 'And what is to be the end of it?'

'That rest and patience will make you as well as ever.'

'Do you really think so? But, Sir, I have a little brother seven and a half years old, with no understanding at all—not able to speak; and if there were two of us on Felix's hands like that! If I could only be put away somewhere, so that Felix should not have the burthen of me!'

'My poor little fellow! Is this what is preying on you all this time?'

'Not always—only when I am doing nothing, and that is most times,' he said, dejectedly; but the Doctor smiled.

'Then you may take the very anxiety as a proof that your brain is recovering. You cannot expect to shake off the effects quickly; but if you are only patient with yourself, you will do perfectly well. Are you a son of the clergy?'

'No, I am a chorister at Minsterham. I have another year there, when I can go back, if ever—'

'Don't say if ever! You will, if you only will keep from fretting and hurrying, and will accept that beautiful motto of the Underwoods.'

Lance smiled responsively, and said more cheerfully, 'You are quite sure, Sir?'

'As sure as any man can be, that there is no reason to anticipate what you dread. It is quite possible that you may be more or less liable to bad head-aches, and find it needful to avoid exposure to summer sunshine; but I should think you as likely to do your work in the world as any one I ever saw.'

The light on Lance's face did not wholly spring from this reply. With 'There's Felix!' he had bounded out of the room the next moment, and his incautious voice could be heard through the window—'Fee, Fee, here's her father! that brick of a Miss Gertrude's, I mean. He's as jolly as he ought to be, and knew all our people. But just—I say—how's Cherry?'

'All well; here's a note from the dear little thing herself,' said Felix; and in another moment, with his bag strapped over his shoulder, he had brought the bright sedateness of his face into the little parlour. 'Dr. May! how very kind in you!'

'Not kindness, but common propriety, to come and see how much mischief my naughty child had done.'

'I don't think there's any real mischief,' said the elder brother, looking at the much-refreshed face.

'I think not, and so am free to be glad of the catastrophe that has brought me in the way of an old friend. Yes, I may say so, for I must have known you!'

'Yes,' said Felix, 'we used to watch for you when you came to my uncle. You always had some fun with us.'

'I remember a pair of twins, who were an irresistible attraction. I hope they have grown up accordingly. You look as if you ought to have pretty sisters.'

Felix laughed, and said the twins were reckoned as very pretty.

'How many of you are there—was it not thirteen? Did not those boys get the clergy-orphan?'

'One did, thank you. He is on a farm in Australia now, and I am thinking whether to try for little Bernard; but I am afraid his case would be a stale one, being of seven years' standing.'

'If you want it done, my daughter, Mrs. Rivers, is a dragon of diplomacy in canvassing; but why not send him to Stoneborough? Cheviot takes a selection of cleric's sons at £30, and we would have an eye to him.'

'Thank you, if we can only manage it; but I must see what my sister says—our financier.'

'One of those little apple-blossom twins? Let me look at you. Do you mean to tell me that this fellow has been the whole stand-by of that long family these seven years?' he added, turning to Lance.

'To be sure he has!' cried Lance, eagerly.

'Lance!' said Felix, rather indignantly. 'You forget Wilmet. And Thomas Underwood entirely educated two of us.'

'And,' said the Doctor, looking oddly but searchingly from one to the other, 'you've been the bundle of sticks in the fable. Never gone together by the ears? Ah!' as both brothers burst out laughing at the question, 'I'd not have asked if I had not seen how you could answer. I've seen what makes me so afraid of brothers in authority that it does me good to look at you two.'

Felix looked up. The Stoneborough murder case was about two years old, and of course he had to study and condense the details, and had come on the names of Dr. May and his son in the evidence.

The further words met his sudden conjecture. 'Ay, boys, you little know what you may be spared by home peace and confidence! Well, and what may you be doing, Felix? Your bag looks as if you had turned postman to the district.'

'There's my chief business, Sir, coupled with bookselling and stationery,' said Felix, as he pushed across a copy of the Pursuivant that lay on the table. 'I have been well paid from the first, and am in partnership now, so we have got along very well.'

'Ay, ay! Very good trade, I should think? You must send me your paper, Felix; I want one I can trust to lie about the house.'

'You will find it very stupid and local, Sir.'

It was curious how what from Mr. Staples was answered with an effort, seemed from Dr. May to draw out confidence. One point was, that Mr. Staples never seemed sure how to treat him, and often betrayed a fear of hurting his feelings; while with Dr. May he was himself and nothing else. The Doctor stayed to share their dinner, such as it was in consideration of their being lodgers as didn't give trouble—i.e. some plain boiled fish, fresh indeed, but of queer name and quality, and without sauce, and some steak not distantly related to an old shoe; but both seemed to think so little about it, that the Doctor, who was always mourning over the daintiness of the present day, approved them all the more.

Just as they had finished, Captain Audley came in with his boys, on their way to start off the Somervilles by the train, and it was agreed that when he took his son back to school at Stoneborough, Felix and Lance should come with him and spend the day.

And a pleasant day it was, as pleasant as the unsettled wanderings of a long day in a strange place could be, and memorable for one curious fact—namely, that for the first time in her life Gertrude May was shy!

Not with Lance. She had a good deal of pastime with him in the cool garden, while Felix was being walked over the school-yards in the sun; and they were excellent friends, though Ethel certainly had a certain repugnance to the discovery of how big a boy it was with whom Gertrude had danced bare-footed on the rocks. Of course Ethel was the kindly mistress of the house as usual, but she was worn and strained in spirits just then, and disinclined to exert herself beyond the needful welcome to her father's guests. So she let them all go out, and went on with her own occupations, thinking that it was well that Daisy should take her part in entertaining guests, since 'that boy' was evidently a thorough little gentleman; and then shrinking a little as she heard their voices over Aubrey's museum, including the Coombe Hole curiosities.

No, it was not towards Lance that Daisy was shy; but when all sat round the dinner-table, she was unusually silent, and listened to the conversation far more than was her wont, though it was chiefly political. When Felix spoke to her, she absolutely coloured rosy red and faltered, unable to conquer the shamefacedness that their encounter had left her; and when the party had taken leave, and she was standing in the twilight, Ethel, to her great surprise, found the child quietly crying.

'Nothing!' she said, angry at being detected.

'It can't be nothing.'

'Yes, it is. Only I do so hate—hate myself for being a tom-boy!'

'One often does go on with that a little too long; and then comes the horrible feel.'

'And that it should have happened with him of all people in the world!'

'Ah, Daisy, I wish I had come out with you!'

'Fudge, Ethel! Not to-day. Do you think I care about that boy? I should think not! But—but—I wanted to think him a nasty prig, but I can't!'

'Who?'

'Why, that eldest brother. When he found me scrambling about with my stockings off, he didn't speak, but he looked, as Richard might, surprised and sorry. I thought it was impertinent—at least I wanted to, but— And now he'll always think me—nasty!'

'My dear, if one must have a lesson of that kind, it is as well it should be from some one that one is never likely to see or hear of again.'

'Oh! but not from the very best and noblest of people one ever will hear of. Yes, Ethel, I'm not gone mad! That boy has been telling me all about his brother; and indeed I never did hear or know about any one who was a real hero in a quiet way! No; whenever I hear of a hero, I shall think of Mr. Underwood. And, oh dear, that I should have made such a goose of myself!'

It was quite unaffected—a spark of real reverence had lighted at last on Gertrude's mind. 'To turn tradesman for the sake of one's brothers and sisters, that I do call heroic!' she said; and maintained his cause, even to putting down F.U. as her 'favourite hero' in lists of likes and dislikes.