LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 822, 9 February 1877, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE PARSON’S PUPIL. ( Continued.) How Mr Roger Yarley had stuck to that bargain may be readily guessed from the ‘darling Eddy,’ ‘darling Roger,’ of the above lines, and from the warm embrace in which those two young persons forthwith engaged. Then Eddy, in her nervous fashion—nervous, yet the brown eye and the clean-cut lips told that there was behind it all courage and endurance sufficient for even great and vital emergencies—drew back with a little shudder, and asked if she had not seen that horrid Bouncing Barnes with Roger ? The latter laughed —she might have seen the follow, for they were arranging about a little rabbiting, and there was no harm in him.

No harm 1 Oh! she had heard such dreadful tales of him ; it was said that he was a poacher, a thief, a burglar ‘ A murderer 1 finish him off at once, Eddy, and hang the poor ruffian without benefit of clergy.’ And Master Yarley laughingly shut up the subject effectually by once more folding the timid girl m his arms, and smothering her pale face with kisses, as he drew her into the shade of a hollow brake. And she looked up into_ his dark handsome features; drank in the bright light of his roving, restless, perhaps uncertain, but surely all-loving eyes ; and her soul rose in her and went forth to meet his ; and she knew, and he knew, that henceforth and for ever there was but one spirit in the two bodies.

Then he sat down on the clamp bank of the thicket in which they were, dark and gloomy now with the fast falling eventide ; and she sat beside him, her white face gleaming ghost-like from its nestling-place on his bosom, as it fed on the contemplation of his passionate downward look ; and they whispered to one another the old old tale which Adam and Eve began, and the last woman and man alone will end ; love as burning as it was eternal, that undying fidelity which no time, no circumstances could ever, ever change—solemn vows, solemnly and loudly, and formally enunciated, and an engagement never to terminate save in the tomb.

Then the reaction—the practical part of the business dealt with by the practical man. Very practical indeed -he was very poor, cursed his poverty energetically, and must take, for money’s sake, to businesspromoting companies, swindling the public, robbing a bank, plundering a church, or even stealing Mr Hoyce’s fabulously valuable antique chalices from the Oratory - he would do anything, he said, in the bitter jest of the moment. But, shaking as though she had an ague fit, Eddy put her tiny hand on his mouth, and bade him for Heaven’s sake, not even in joke, speak of such awful things, lest he should kill her ; and whispered gently of her terror at his former wild deeds, now happily past and gone for ever ; at his rash scrapes; at (this in the mildest form of most delicate allusion) her knowledge of his blindness regarding the difference between his own poor belongings and those of wealthier persons ; and little trembling Eddy ended by pitifully begging of her heart’s lover to drive all such terrible ideas from him once and for ever, and to trust where trust alone could be confidently placed. But he laughed and kissed it all away ; he meant nothing, though he really did wish he had some of her father’s great wealth ; and then he began to plan and project for the future. He would capitalise his money ; he would go into business in London, and, indeed, had arranged to start the day after next; he would make a large fortune in a few years ; he would

What! Eddy in tears ? Why is this ? ‘ Oh, Roger, nay own precious Eager,’ she cried out, as though her heart would break, ‘ how can I bear to part from you, and how shall I know all this ? How can I know it ?’

‘ How ? Why, what d’ye mean, Ed ? ’ ‘ Has not papa forbidden us to write to one another ? ’ ‘ Pooh ! nonsense ! who would mind such an absurd restriction ? ’ And he set to work, as he well know how, to mould her views to his, to make hexplastic conscience take the impress of what did fluty for his, and to convince her that her father’s injunctions were as nothing compared to those of a lover whom Heaven itself—Eoger Varley was not modest—must have selected for her. But for all that she did not yield as readily as he could have wished, and the gloomy and dark mists of the September night lay already thick and heavy all around, blotting out the only feature of interest in the dreary landscape—quaint old square-towered Indolstone church —before alio gave her consent to receiving secret letters from him, directed by, or enclosed with, those of Millicent Hawlish, a distant cousin of both, and almost the only mutual friend they possessed— ‘ a fiiend, as words go,’ thought Eddy, who did not care very much for Milly—a wild, forward creature as unlike the Nun of ludolstouo (so poor Eddy was nicknamed) as tho man of the world is like the recluse. Hark ! The first dull fog bound boom of the hell of the ancient church, which stood close to the vicarage grounds, from which it was separated only by an antique wicket gate ; and Eddy sprang to her feet in dismay. He strained her to his bosom passionately, wildly; he held her there till the girl thought she must almost die under the wild beatings of her heart; and then, after several minutes had elapsed, he released her, tears in his black eyes, and his voice thick and gasping, as he told her lie would start fur Loudon immediately, and would write, through Milly, as soon as possible. One last, long embrace, one oath of eternal constancy from two pairs of lips, and Eddy Iloyce forced herself out on to tho pathway, from the tangled brake or hollow in which <

she had dreamed away such a delicious time, and in a moment was lost in the cold shroud Mka mists of the night, •jJu.vgQV Yarley shuddered all over with ?OMB undefinable dread lest he should never seedier again —a horrible, heart-freezing presentiment —and then, having mastered it, he made his way out into the deserted and grass-grown lane leading from the church to Elywich, and took the direction of that decayed town, wherein he had lodging. Yet Iris feeling could scarcely have been very deep, for he had hardly swung into his usual rattling pace when he pulled up short again, stood still, and began" to laugh bitterly laughed at the continuance of the Angelus hell, that popish jangling which kept the old church empty, which left its introducer, the vicar, without as much as one single educated friend in the thinly populated district; for the few gentry there were, living at great distances apart, hated the Rev Athansius heartily for his High Church practices, and drew the line of ‘cut-or-visit’ at the Angelus bell; the farmers, of course, followed the suit of their landlords in the No-Popery feeling, if not actual cry; and the wretched hinds —there is no slave like your English labourer of the agricultural districts —were perforce driven to Elywich, when they would much rather have slumbered peacefully in their own parish church, grey old weather-cocked Indolstone, with its stumpy Saxon tower, whose very stones breathed delicious somnolency, ■* «• * » ■ *

A wine merchant’s is a very pleasant calling, highly respectable, pleasant, profitable, gentlcmany, and altogether flowery—provided the merchant sells wine. Otherwise the business is apt to be dull, not productive of aught save bankruptcy, while the tradesman is likely to be despised by his friends as a poor charlatan trying to sell what he would never drink. But there is, as will be found in most mundane matters, a middle course that may eventuate in one of the other two, and it is mainly recognisable from the fact of wine being sold, but no money received therefor. That was, unfortunately, the branch of the business adopted by Mr Roger Yarley when he established himself in Screw Lane, City, with his ninety-five pounds a year transformed into capital. He certainly sold a good deal of wine, but he saw a remarkably small share of cash coming back in its place. At first that did not matter in the least, and Roger was rather inclined to boast that a credit trade was by far the most respectable, and in every way the best—an undoubted fact, provided people .pay ; but Roger’s customers were not addicted to that process in any immoderate degree, and capital had to do duty for income, with, of course, an additional expenditure, for what did a pound or two more or less matter ? Thus things went on gaily enough in the early months of the winter, even into the spring of the new year; but with mid-April there came showers rather than sunshine, and Roger Yarley began to think that the credit trade was quite a mistake. That was the pith of many month’s experience, and it became certain that something must be done if ruin was to be staved off. There were still left a few hundred pounds of his money, and the sanguine young man resolved to make a bold stroke that would bring fortune or . He heard of a lot of first-class wines that were to be sold cheaply and quietly in a famous old French chateau in the Bordeaux district, whose owner had over speculated ; and Roger Yarley resolved to;secure them for ready money, advertise their virtues largely, thus leaping a splendid profit which would be the foundation of his fortune, So he left the premises in Screw Lane in charge of his clerk —a sort of ‘innocent,’ or ‘softy,’ rvho could be trusted to any amount—and went oft to Bordeaux, made his investment, had the valuable liquors shipped on a wine lugger, saved the life of one of those wandering Englishmen who are always trying to cross unfordable rivers or to scale impossible mountains, and returned to London to find that the softy had bolted with the cash-box, and that the office had not been opened since he left. ‘ Never mind,’ said Roger Yarley to him self; ‘itis a loss certainly, but not ruinous ; and my Bordeaux speculation will cover ten times the missing amount,’ He took up the Times and read— ‘ Dreadful gale on the South-western coast,’ followed by a list of wrecks, among them the wine lugger with Roger’s consignment (of course, uninsured: what was the use of going to that expense?) and Mr Roger Yarley found himself in the narrow end of Queer street, and driven to all kinds of dubious resorts to keep his head above water, or rather to prevent himself sinking forthwith like a lump of stone. And all this time lioav fared it with his love for poor Eddy. Badly. Of course ho had not peeu her; equally of course, ho had not heard from her directly ; and the solitary two. letters which had come to him soon after Iris departure from Elywich, through the bands of Milly Dawlish, had been icy cold. That did not surprise him much, for he know that Eddy distrusted their confidante ; but he was thunderstruck when the correspondence suddenly ceased ; when Miss Dawlish cut him dead in Oxford street, after returning one of his letters (with enclosure) unopened; and when, on presenting himself at that young lady’s abode, ho was told by an impudent footman that strict orders had been given not to admit him !

Then Roger Varloy began to go to—best leave Hie person or locality a blank —in earnest, and it would be of little use or interest to set forth Ida follies, hia vices, his escapades, in this record; suffice it to say that he traversed the Road to Ruin at headlong speed, and it became plain that unless maney, or perhaps Eddy with money, intervened, the goal would bo reached before long. For, in all his mad, wild career, he clung to the [thought of her, innocence, her parity, and her love—if it (dill exited— for himself; and in his deep:at excesses and wrong-doings of all sorts, he never quite lost sight of a vision he had witnessed one early summer morning when residing at Indoistoue Vicarage—that _ of Eddy gliding at daybreak along the chilly passages leading from her own little bedroom to the Oratory, where, es he after wards forced her to confess, _ it was her morning habit to pray. But with The lapse of time, under the blighting influence, so totally incomprehensible, of the cessation of their vowed correspondence, and the drying up of its channel in the shape of Milly Dawlish, his lone seemed to his few friends to change to fierce resentment, and he was heard one day to passionately swear—certainly lie had been tasting some of his own unsaleable wines—while a real or sham sauloaic smile twisted across his clafk face,

that it was her money than herself he wanted, and that he would dip his fingers in some of the parson’s gold yet. That was when it had become certain that his ruin could not be much longer staved off unless something wonderful, and all out of the common, turned up ; and three weeks afterwards, when with a couple of roystering companions Roger Yarley was again taking stock in Screw Lane, a prim solicitor’s clerk walked into the office with the pleasant intimation that the drawer of a large bill which Yarley had accepted in the way of business, had absconded, and that the latter would have to take it up, and no renewal or delay could bo hoped for. ‘ Good heavens !’ cried Roger, his face becoming lividly white as the desperate situation forced itself all at at once on his mind ; ‘Good heavens I when is the last day of grace ?’ ‘ The third from this,’ was the clerk’s answer. ‘ May I tell Messrs Roseneau and Co that it will be taken up ?’ ‘ Taken up ? No—l mean, yes—certainly. The money shall and must be got—l’ll get it if I die for it. I’ll go—-oh, heavens ! this is terrible !’

For once in his life he gave way before his acquaintances, flinging himself across the desk as though the agony of his thoughts was unbearable ; and they had the decency to leave him in his grief; at all events they "went, but whether it was on the principle of the rats deserting the sinking ship, or otherwise, there is no means of knowing.

Poor Eddy Eoyce ! had she but known what was about to happen, would she have sat out there in her usual desolate fashion in the long tangled grass of the neglected lawn of her home, gazing at nothing, thinking of nothing ?—for the idea of Roger Yarley had become so fixed, that it formed a part of her own mind, and could hardly be called separate thought. She often sat that way now, for the trials that she had gone through—was actually going through—seemed to have left her more dead than alive ; and she often longed for rest in a quiet corner of the grey old church standing inside the rough stone wall which alone separated it from the vicarage : longed for rest, for peace, for the past, for the future, for the old childish days when Roger Yarley used to try and scramble up the knotted and twisted ivy clinging to the buttresses and round the windows of the Oratory, while she stood by and clapped her hands at his courage and daring—longed for anything to replace the misery of the present, the killing misery which was driving her into the tomb. For she was in despair ; her heart was like unto death within her bosom ; the light of her life was gone, for Roger Yarley was unfaithful. Never a letter from him, but two though Miss Milly Dawlish, and then a sudden pause and total silence. She had written to question Millicent as to whether or not Roger sent her any more letters, as to whether or not she had seen him, or could see him, in London ; but the only replies were affectionate yet stiff notes, to say that he was quite unworthy of any lady’s love, and that the writer would rather not have anything- more to say to him, or to his correspondence. Those notes, two of them —and they really were nothing more—she showed, her eyes streaming with tears to the Rev Athanasius ; and he, too, seemed affected by them no little, and more perhaps by his daughter’s unmistakeable grief. But he ou'y confirmed their views ; unfortunately he had, from other sources, heard nrach the same himself, and he never ceased counselling total oblivion as regarded such a depraved young man as his ward, Roger Yarley. Indeed, her reverend father improved the occasion in every way that would tend to the advantage of his own views regarding poor Eddy’s future ; not scrupling to tell "her that it was the chastening hand of God; that she was marked out for the devout life, as her sufferings proved ; that these troubles were sent as the best means of breaking off her affections from Mundane love; that she would find her reward in the service of the True Bridegroom. Eddy wept all the more. She might turn into a sort of nun, but it certainly would not be from choice ; and when she thought of Millicent Dawlish, who probably had captured Eddy’s lover for herself, she ground her teeth in fierce rage, and her tender frame quivered with the intensity of her wrathful passion. But the days went by, and the weeks, and the months, and the girl fell into a blank despair, felt herself the counterpart of that ill fated Mariana of the Moated Grange, wasted visibly away, and abandoned heisclf to a despair which her stupid, and cruel, and—not that he intended to be even unkind—unnatural father mistook for the spirit of holiness, and congratulated himself upon it as a thing for which Heaven must be thanked, for now at last Eddy would fulfil the darling wish of his heart by formally consecrating herself to the service of the Lord as a professed holy woman.

But ho was mistaken, Eddy was a miracle of enduring courage, and, despairing though she undoubtedly was, she could not persuade herself to abandon Roger Yarley until she had at last heard something of him ; and she lived in the hope that, even in the desertion of her, he would still have enough of kind memory of the past to make him write to her, send to her, or in some way ask her for a release from his solemn vows. That hope was to be crushed, trampled out of existence ; and the man to perform the operation—again, it must be said, without deliberate intention, or knowledge that his words were poison killing the life out of his daughter—-was the Rev Athanasius Royce himself. He went into her room one day—her boudoir on the long passage leading to the Oratory where she offered up so many fervent orisons from dawn to night, and he told her to be strong, for the nows he had, though not unexpected, was bad as bad could be. The girl, always, pale, grew corpse like in the intensity of her fear, and when he had finished reading to her tiro newspaper cutting which had been enclosed to him in a letter, her heart stopped and she fainted away. {To be continued.')