LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 201, 30 January 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

‘SO UNLADYLIKE.’

Concluded

‘ I must go !’ said Guy firmly. ‘ Cupid’s dart has -you don’t like chaff ? Ah, that’s one of the symptoms of the complaint. I can’t think why you go moping about like a jolly old lunatic. You haven’t said anything to her have you!’ ‘ Not a word; and have tried hard not to let her guess anything,’ Guy answered. * You don’t expect her to propose to you, do you ?’ Captain Aymer asked; and I felt sure they must be talking of me. ‘ Why don’t you speak ?’ ‘ Because I’m a poor beggar with barely £SOO a year, and she’s a girl with something over £2OOO. She, her people, every one, would think I wanted her money. No ! I’d rather lose her altogether than let her think me a mercenary brute. She may marry Lord Chatteris if she likes ; though,’ he said with a sob in his voice, which brought the tears to my eyes, * I don’t think he’ll love her as I do. »

I wiped away two years, and got rid somehow of a great, big, sympathetic sob which threatened to betray my hiding-place. I ought, of course, not to have remained without letting them know; only I did, and rising quietly I looked through the diamondshaped woodwork covered with ivy in the direction from which tha voices came. Guy —dear handsome Guy ! —was sitting on the low wall, resting his arms on his knees, looking at the ground. Captain Aymer had chosen a seat where he could lean back, and was slowly blowing the smoke from his cigar into the air.

‘ I am not a poet, old fellow’ continued the captain. ‘ With the exception of a version of ‘ How doth the little busy bee’—which I have reason to believe is incorrect —and the chorus to one or two convivial songs, I only know four lines of poetry. I came across them in a book I saw at a man’s rooms once, and they struck me as being so true that 1 bought a copy of the book and learned them. They are to the effect that * He either fears his fate too much, Or his deserts are small, Who dare not put it to the touch, To win or lose it all. ’ Now, old fellow, it’s absurd to suppose that your deserts are small; so the only thing left to suppose is that you fear your fate too much. So, to paraphrase the poet, ‘ Why not put it to the touch ? Go in and win it all. ’ ’

Guy did’nt Bay anything, only shook his silly head. As if I cared for money ! I loved Guy—l may say so now—and hated mj money if it was to be a barrier between us ; at least if he was so loaded with a weight of silly, stupid, mistaken pride that he could not leap the barrier. ‘ Seriously, Guy,’ Captain Aymer went on, ‘ take my advice and speak. Hetheriugtor is a gentleman, and won’t suspect you of un worthy motives, and I’m quite sure that thi girl won’t. As for money, you have yom profession to help you.’ ‘No, Aymer. It was foolish of me to come to the jicighbourhood at all, ano doubly, trebly foolwhto ohm® her*. I dare

not speak, and all 1 can do to repair the error of coming is to go at once and leave her, bless her darling little face !’ he said very slowly and softly ; and then he rose to his feet. ‘ I shall forget it all some day. I shall forget it, I tell you !’ he cried, and there was such passionate energy in his voice that his companion looked at nim with surprise. ‘ There, Aymer, give me a cigar; why should’nt a man smoke ?’ Captain Aymer produced a cigar case, and Guy lit a cigar; and linking his arm in his friend’s they strolled off across the lawn. Guy loved me, as I had felt quite certain that he did; but the pleasure which hearing this gave me vanished when I thought of his resolution of silence. It was worse than not being loved at all. But what coold Ido —except be very miserable ? I searched in vain for a little crumb of comfort, but it was not to be found in the summer-house ; so I returned to the Hall, determined to go and look at Sir Harry, my usual comforter, and see if I could not draw some consolation out of him. I entered the long gallery, and was rather surprised to see Guy there star ding at his easel before the picture. He turned on hearing my footstep, and taking the picture at which he was working from its resting place leaned it against the wall, showing me Sir Harry nearly finished. I was just on the point of forgetting myself vnd saying, ‘ I hope you are not really going ?’ or something of that sort, only I remembered just in time that to do so would have been to betray that I had overheard the conversation ; so I duly admired the copy, which was really worthy of admiration. 1 May I see that picture please, Mr Wrey!' I asked presently, pointing to the one he had put down, for he had removed it hastily as if he did not wish me to see it, bo I naturally wanted to, very much. ‘ It’s nothing ; it’s a sketch only for Yon see, Miss Hetherington, I have not given yon a full length of Sir Harry, as it would have made the picture larger than I thought yon would care about.’

* Yes, I see, thank you ; it is a very nice size now. Is that a copy from anything here ?’ inquired, for I was determined to see it, and Guy appeared determined that I should not.

‘No ; an unfinished sketch —a simple study. I have omitted the background, you will notice, as I supposed it was only the face you wanted, Miss Hetherington, Guy continued.

* It’s beautifnl! I can’t tell you how pleased lam with it. But please do let me see that, Mr Wrey !’ There was no escape for him ; so very un. willingly he placed it on the easel. I recognised the subject at once. It represented a scene from Tennyson’s Maud; she and her lover meeting, when

* The sunset bum’d On the blossom’d gable ends At the head of the village street ’ {I wonder how many times I’ve read it since}; and the reason that Guy had been so reluctant to let me see it was because the two figures were exact portraitures of himself and me.

I don’t think that he was very comfortable as I stood gazing at it for a long time. * What is it called ? ’ I asked at length. Of course Guy knew that I must have recognised the likenesses, and perhaps ho took courage from my not being displeased; at any rate his resolution of not letting me guess anything vanished as he quoted the lines which his picture illustrated. There was a look in his eyes which made my heart beat quickly, as he said very softly:

* If Maud were all that she seem’d.

And her smiles were all that I dream’d, Then the world were not so bitter But a smile could make it sweet.’

He turned his face from as be spoke, but not before I had seen an expression of suffering upon it which I could not bear should remain.

As a well-brought-up young lady, it waa, without doubt, my duty to say, * It’s sweetly pretty, I’m sure ! ’ or, * I can’t think how you do it! ’ or else to make a remark about the weather, and go on my way; but I did neither, because I loved Guy and beloved me, and I did not want us both to be unhappy and miserable. So I put my hand on his arm, and when he turned to me looked him straight in the eyes, and said ; ‘ Isn’t there something in the poem a little further on about a "man’s own stupid pride’ ?’ The smile on Sir Harry’s face seemed to heighten as he looked down on me in Guy’s arms, and seemed to encourage me to tell Guy what he wanted so much to know. My cousin Tom, who is at school at Harchester, says that if any boy has been doing wrong, and no one else can find out who it is, they can tell the mathematical master, who is so wonderfully clever, that he simply puts down on a scrap of paper, *uet x== —,’ works out a little sum in algebra (I think it is), and in two minutes the culprit ‘ comes out in the answer.’ Uncle Edward seems to find things out in an equally extraordinary manner, without having recourse to ‘x,’ which I always supposed had something to do with beer. I thought I had better tell him everything at once, so I went to his study as soon as luncheon was over. ‘ What is it, my little girl ? ’ he inquired. I rarely enter his special fortress, so he knew that I had something to say. ‘ I want to be married, please, Uncle Edward,’ I answered, looking down very modestly, but still glancing at his face. It went very grave, ‘ Have you heard frem Lord Chatteris ? lig ftslicd ‘No, Uncle Edward, it is not he. It’s Guy—Guy Wrey! ’ and then I told him all about it quite from the beginning. I’m sure I’m not in the habit of crying, but 1 had commenced during the morning with Guy in the picture-gallery, and finished up now on Uncle Edward's shoulder. He took it beautifully, and said a lot of kind things about not standing in the way of my happiness if I was quite sure about being fond of Guy; and it seemed that be had been an old friend of Guy’s father, which impressed him favourably about the son. So I left the study as happy as it was possible to be. It is all settled now, and in a very short space of time Kate Hetherington will no longer exist. Guy is very jubilant just at oreseut, for a picture of his has been a great success, and he has sold it for £6OO, and is ousy calculating how much he can make a year by an impossible amount of industry, which I certainly shall not allow him to undergo. My prospect of happiness is very bright; though it is certainly most deplorvble and unfortunate that it should nave been brought about by conduct which of course all right-minded people can only term *So unladylike! ’