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SINK OR SWIM?

WHAT DID HONOR KNOW?

"O sir, pray don't talk in that way. I never said--I--I never thought--no, no; things would have been different, must have been different, if I had." And the flush on Mrs. Bainbridge's pale cheeks grew deeper still, through the violence of her protest.

"She died very quiet, poor dear," the woman continued sadly, while the Colonel stood passively near her, biting with an embarrassed air the silver knob of the cane that he had flourished so debonnairily such a very short time before. "She wasn't much put about, thank God; and it was a lonesome place, you know. Even the priest, Father Donovan, him as you may remember used to have stations twice a-year in the village, didn't come to anoint poor Winny when she was dying. You see, they send for him so often when there's no occasion; and--"

"But, tell me," said Norcott impatiently, "does this girl, John Beacham's wife, know anything about her parentage? Did the old people, your grandfather and grandmother, keep the child at Moyfeckan after poor Winny's death? I don't understand it all. Was there any money to support her--the girl, I mean? And where has she been living all these years?"

"Where has she been living?" retorted the woman, speaking for the first time in a very decided Irish accent, for she was excited, and in anger the old familiar brogue cropped out unchecked. "Are you asking me that? And are you thinking that my father's daughter's child would be wanting charity to bring her up?"

"No; not that. I know you were not poor people. Old Phil Moriarty was a 'snug man evermore;'" he quoted, with an abortive attempt to be facetious; "but, you see, I didn't know but what he--"

"Might have turned his granddaughter out of doors, and left her to starve, poor girl, because of your sin! Is that what's in your mind, sir? Faix, you should have thought of that before you took--but that's neither here nor there. My grandfather, respectable as he'd always kep himself, was not the man to turn his back on his own kith and kin, let 'em be never so unfortunate. It's not the way of our country-people, and it was not his. Says he, 'That grand jintleman was a schoundrel'--I beg your pardon, sir, I only repeat his words--'and he's brought throuble on as good a gurl as ever trod the ground; but it 'ull come home to him,' says he--'it 'ull come home to him one of these days;' and with that he'd groan, as he sat in the hearth, like a possessed man."

Again Colonel Norcott, who was growing very impatient, was about to interrupt her with a question, but she stopped him peremptorily.

Norcott endeavoured to conceal his annoyance by a laugh. "The vindictive old beggar," he said, "and he used to be such a jolly old boy, and an uncommon good twist at the whisky-bottle! So the young lady was an heiress after all, and left off bog-trotting, I suppose, pretty soon? Come now, Mrs. B., you used to be a good-natured soul yourself in those days, and I really want to know something about my old friends in those outlandish parts. In the first place, how did the ho-tel business thrive? and--about Bainbridge; it's so long ago since I saw him alive--never half alive enough, though, for such a fine woman as you--that its almost risky asking after him."

But although her eyes had been thus effectually opened, and albeit her anger against the destroyer of her sister's life and character partook even of the character of rancour, so deep was it, and so endurable, yet nevertheless the worthy woman could not resist the tempting offer of repeating to a fresh listener the epitomised history of her widowhood, and the migration from her native land which followed on her "good man's" decease.

"Well, and sure that's true, sir," rejoined Mrs. Bainbridge plaintively; "and die he did, poor fellow, like a lamb too, at last! Winny, poor girl, had kep up till then, doing what she could, which wasn't much, for she was never strong, for all the lovely colour that was in her cheeks; but when Tom died she just faded away as well. He was always kind to her was Tom, and she'd a grateful heart, the crathur. Little Honor was scarcely two months old then; but grandmother was a rare one to bring up a child by hand, and when Winny was taken, the child went to live altogether with the old people, till they died, that is to say; and after that--she was a pretty little gurl of seven years old then, and I'd been lady's-maid to my Lady Kilkenny for six years and more--I put her to an English school, and had her taught the pianner and poetry, and the branches, thinking as she'd make her living as a governess in a genteel family; and so indeed she did, for she was two years, to a month a'most, teaching the little ones at Clay Farm, and earning her twenty pounds a year, and they making as much of her all the time as if she had been a child of their own. It's little I've seen of the child, poor thing--I thought it was better not; girls will be asking questions, and what was I to say to her if she did? Best let her think she was an orphan; so, even when I have been in the country with 'the family,' I haven't let her know; for I couldn't have had such a young person as that in the housekeeper's room at Sir Richard's. So there it was--"

"Yes--and there it was--at that farm-house, I mean--that John Beacham fell in love with her pretty face and married her. I see it all now, and she is--let me see--not much over eighteen, eh?"

"I should think you ought to know as much of that as I do," said Mrs. Bainbridge, bridling. "It's nineteen year come September since you used to meet poor Winny of an evening in Lord Kilkenny's demesne--and more shame for you to be desaving an honest girl that way. I declare you're not worthy, that you ain't, to be the father of such a sweet gurl as that, no, nor of such a pretty gurl, neither, for I don't see that she favours you at all, while she's as like her blessed mother as two peas in a pod."

"Like! I should think she was! Why, it's the same face! The same hair and eyes, and the same--"

"But I didn't know," said the Colonel, reddening this time with legitimate shame and anger. "How was I possibly to know that--"

"No, no, in course you couldn't; I allow that. And now, having been forced, as it were--which I didn't want to--to say all this, all I have to ask is that you'll just hold your tongue about the matter. I've always kep a good deal out of her way, poor little thing, because I didn't want to be questioned either by her or by anyone else; she has heard I'm her aunt, and that's pretty well all. While as for John--though to be sure, Honor's pretty enough, God bless her! to make a man bear anything for her sake--yet it's my opinion he's just the sort not to be best pleased when he found out that his wife wasn't an honest woman's daughter. As for the old lady, I wouldn't be in Honor's shoes for a good deal, if the truth came out in her hearing."

She had no intention of making herself known as a relation to the Beachams. As she had said to the Colonel, she had no wish to be questioned regarding her niece's parentage. Honor had never seen her since she herself was a little child, and need never know that she had spent an hour or two with the upper servants from Sir Richard Pemberton's place at Danescourt. As far as Mrs. Bainbridge was concerned, she deemed that only shame could accrue to herself and her family from any mention of what had occurred in those old, old days at distant Moyfecken. Honor was happily married, and so it appeared was the man who seemed to entertain so small a share of parental feelings regarding his child. The interview with that unscrupulous gentleman had not been a pleasant one, but it was over now, and Mrs. Bainbridge saw no cause to regret that she had informed Colonel Norcott of the near ties of blood which bound him to the pretty wife of respectable, popular John Beacham.

THE COLONEL LAYS A PLOT.

Musing on this unexpected discovery, Colonel Norcott sauntered slowly onwards under the spreading lime-trees, now in their full gush of sweetness, to that portion of the Park where the scene which was the only one of interest to him in that day's programme of sports was to be enacted.

He had arrived at this decision when on emerging from the comparatively private lime-walk, he came suddenly face to face upon Arthur Vavasour.

"My dear fellow, I was never more surprised!" was his opening greeting. "Why, you told me three days ago that there was not the slightest chance of your being here."

"And there's a pretty face, eh? that would bring you, I suspect, a good deal farther than from the Pembertons' here to look at it. I say, old fellow, I hear you're devilish spoony, and, by Jove! I'm not surprised. That little wife of John Beacham's is a glorious girl. One wonders where such a creature was picked up. So deuced thoroughbred-looking, and all that kind of thing. I have been trying to find out something about her;" and linking his arm confidentially in that of his young friend, he drew him on in the direction of the course.

Glancing furtively at the young untutored countenance by his side, the man experienced in all the turns and twists, the vagaries and the madnesses of the master passion, read in Arthur Vavasour's face that the time had come for him when

"That draught of sorcery which brings Phantoms of fair forbidden things,"

had been freely drunk, and when all around seemed dark and lifeless that had not its root and being in the one fair woman that he loved.

"Whether his love loves him or no-- Whether his love loves him."

The mere sentiment of his adoration is sufficient for him when devotion alone, without any admixture of vanity, stirs the bright flame within. So Arthur Vavasour turned a deaf ear to the Colonel's libertine allusions. To him there seemed profanation of his purely fair divinity in thus chaffingly alluding to her delicate loveliness. Neither Colonel Norcott's age nor his character, to say nothing of the little real intimacy existing between him and Arthur, could justify, he felt, the former in claiming the privileges of a confidant; and this being so, Honor's devoted admirer, without much preamble or excuse, changed the conversation abruptly to one that happened to be sufficiently interesting to both; for so long as Rough Diamond was first favourite for the Derby, neither Colonel Frederick Norcott nor the heir-apparent of Gillingham could be troubled by any lack of a subject for conversation.

UNSTABLE AS WATER.

"I will not go near her, I will only watch her from a distance; my beautiful Honor! my sweet fairy rose! And it shall be the last time, the very last! In a short time--ah, how very short!--the die will be cast; my fate will be sealed, and I shall be hundreds of miles away, with only the memory of my darling to link me with the past."

Some such thoughts as these--selfish, self-pitying, wicked thoughts--were passing through Arthur Vavasour's mind when Colonel Norcott met him on the course, and lightly talked to him of his love. And since that moment,--while joining groups of acquaintances, uttering unmeaning love-speeches into the ear of his betrothed, or endeavouring to assume an interest which he felt not in the fate of Farmer Scroop's rat-tailed trotter--he never for many moments together lost mental sight of Honor Beacham, never ceased to remember that at any turn of the road, under any spreading tree--where smiles and merriment, and the ringing sounds of youthful voices, and the pretty colouring of woman's dress gave life and animation, he might chance to see his lovely Honor, and there perchance betray, by an unguarded word or look, to other eyes than Norcott's the secret of his heart.

Such a "good time," as the Yankees say, they had of it! Honor, the happiest of the happy, looking, as she stood there with her croquet-mallet in her hand, and stamping her small foot in playful petulance at the stupidity of her partner , the impersonification of bright youth and unreflecting joy.

How pretty and animated she looked, while thus--acting on past experience of his character--exciting the recreant Tommy to rational behaviour by a bribe! That young gentleman seemed very far from amenable to reason. A merry, dark-eyed, gipsy-looking boy he was, bent upon tyrannous rule, while Honor, laughing at his tricks, was, with her two little gloved hands upon his shoulders, holding him back with playful determination that the other little ones, as this judicious umpire said, might have a chance. She was for the moment entirely absorbed in the childish game. Tommy, though an especial favourite, was, Honor laughingly declared, "so naughty;" and then her womanly love of protecting the weak had been called into play by the piteous appeal of a blue-eyed girl of six, who tearfully claimed her championship against the encroachments of that wicked Tom.

This noble maiden, who was ten years of age, possessed a turn for satire ; and it being gratifying, as we all know, to find anyone performing anything worse than we are capable of executing it ourselves, the little Lady Margaret was well-pleased to act as show-woman of the plebeian sports, as they were conducted that day. The approach of the party, walking slowly along the greensward, was not noticed by the croquet-players till it was too late to look conventionally demure, was not noticed, in short, till Lady Margaret and her convoy were almost in the midst of Honor's not very promising scholars. She was the first to perceive them, and after a hurried glance, one of the bright sudden blushes that was the most engaging of its attractions spread over her beautiful face.

The appearance on their playground of the formidable strangers, but more especially the unlooked-for advent of their little ladyships, produced a very serious effect on the spirits of the children. Suddenly, and as though struck by the wand of some mysterious fairy, their laughter was hushed, their little hands hung down, and even their round bright faces seemed lengthened and less rosy.

"Go on; pray don't let us stop you," Sophy said good-naturedly. But it was of no use, the spell was broken; and in spite of Honor's smiling attempts to restore tranquillity, and to make them feel at home, the tenants' ruddy-cheeked children refused to listen to the voice of the charmer, even though that charmer was an affable young lady in one of Mrs. Heath's prettiest hats, and who was heiress to some eighty thousand pounds per annum.

Honor was half-amused and half-provoked by the bashfulness which induced this signal failure. "They are such tiresome little things," she said, with a shy smile, but not in the least awkwardly, and addressing herself more to Miss Duberly than to Horace. Her own natural good taste whispered to her that it was better not to stand there like a person either waiting for an introduction, or conscious of being too lowly placed to dare to speak before her superiors. "They are so little used to strangers; they can be merry enough though when they are by themselves."

Horace was rather taken aback by Mrs. John's proceeding; for he had seen little of the world, and entertained rather old-fashioned ideas on the subject of caste. That pretty girl's relations too with his brother were, or rather had been, peculiar; and Horace, as the wise head of the family , felt it incumbent on him--a false position entails so many false moves--to be on this momentous occasion dignified and formal.

Lifting his hat gravely from his fair curls , Horace Vavasour said, with a mingled stiffness and urbanity, worthy of the future "public man:"

"I believe that I have the honour of speaking to Mrs. John Beacham?"

On hearing this semi-interrogation, Miss Sophy Duberly, young lady of the world though she was, made a slight, though very perceptible, start of surprise. Although, woman-like, she had kept the feeling closely concealed within the impregnable fastnesses of her own breast, this young heiress had nevertheless experienced some of the jealous pangs which female flesh is heir to, on becoming acquainted--in a partial degree--with her lover's frequent visits to John Beacham's farm. That she, an heiress, and, consequent on that favoured condition, a petted beauty, should really be slighted for the farmer's wife, or indeed for any wife, was an idea that never entered simple little Sophy Duberly's head; but there nevertheless was a soreness--if anyone had dared to call the feeling by the ugly name of jealousy she would have repelled the charge indignantly--about that spot in the young girl's memory, which was connected with that beautiful Honor Beacham, and therefore it was that she had not been able to repress that foolish little start, which would have betrayed to any keen observer a mind not entirely at ease. But although this was so, the kind feeling of the indulged heiress towards a person so unmistakably her inferior induced the bride-elect to attempt a task, in which, however, nature had been beforehand with her--the task, that is to say, of preventing Mrs. John Beacham from either looking or feeling, under these exceptional circumstances, awkward or ill at ease.

"We have been interrupting Mrs. Beacham, who was good-naturedly amusing the children," said Horace. "They were as merry as any little beggars could be, weren't they, Lady Margaret? before we came, and now they look as if butter wouldn't melt in their mouths."

"Won't it?" said Arthur, laughing--he was always good-natured to children, and especially to those that he had seen Honor pet. The little Clays he was acquainted with, both personally and individually, and it was even on record at the farm that the young Squire had given that ne'er-do-weel boy Tommy his first lesson in the noble game of cricket. "What, tired already! I never saw such idle brats! Here, you Tommy, run and fetch the balls."

"You are very kind, Mr. Vavasour," she said; "but I think that the little ones must be tired; and Tommy," stroking his swarthy cheek kindly as he leant against the skirt of her fresh muslin dress, "is a bad boy, and mustn't be spoilt."

Perhaps Arthur understood her, for he said no more about the croquet game, nor did he, beyond a parting bow, respectful and commonplace, take any notice of her departure, with little Tommy clinging to her skirt, and the small blue-eyed girl, whose champion she had been, holding with all the force of her tiny fingers Honor's hand in hers.

"How pretty she is," said Sophy, when they were out of hearing, "and so well dressed and well behaved, too! She made quite a graceful curtsey as she went away. I wonder where she learnt it."

THE HALF-REBUKE.

Neither the absence of moral courage, the dread of giving offence, nor the very natural objection to the loss of an agreeable admirer, are diminished by the fact that the admirer in question is the lady's superior in the social scale; and it is more than possible that had Arthur Vavasour been a farmer's son, Honor would have found comparatively little difficulty in expressing the indignation which she was well aware she ought to feel on listening to words which were scarcely less than a declaration of love.

He stopped; it was such dangerous ground that on which he had begun to tread: he on the very verge of matrimony; and, as it appeared on the face of things, so entirely guided to that verge by his own wishes and inclinations. Honor looked up at him in surprise.

"You are going to be married," she said coldly. "You told me so yourself, and I have seen the young lady that is to be your wife. She is rich and pretty, and looks nice and kind. Why do you say that you are strangely situated?"

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