LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2504, 18 April 1882, Page 4

LITERATURE.

MR FITZGESALD’3 MARHIAGE. The Honorable Lnciua Fitzgerald walked np and down the breakfast-room at Abbotsoraitbie with his hands in his trousers’ pocketr, jingling his money. Well, he was perhaps hardly as yet re-accustomed to the sound. His young wife—they had only been married six months —sat at a table, behind the tea and coffee paraphernalia, watching him while she very assiduously knitted a coarse knickcrbocker stocking. Something had evidently produced a twist in the skein of their hitherto unentangled bliss ; for the breakfast was untasted, and was getting cold. ‘ It is the first request you have refused me; but I suppose you do not think mo good enough for your swell acquaintances,’ said the lucly at fast, swallowing a little sob.

* Really, Amelia, the way you put things is too ridiculous, Rot good enough, because I object to Lady Constsnlia Verulam and her daughter being Invited to Abbotscralthie. What can they have to do wita you ? 1 simply do not want them.’ ‘ yet they were your most intimate friends before your marriage.’ * t'erhapa I have quarrelled with them. ’ ‘Nonsense! I saw an envelope addressed to yon in Miss Vorulam’a writing, only a week or two ago. ’ ‘lt was merely a line of congratulation. The Verulama we;e abroad when wo married.’

And Mr Fitzgerald, a deep flush mounting all over his face, sat down opposite his wne, and began to busy himself by uncover* iug the dishes. ‘Well,’she persisted, ‘let them come and congratulate you in person. It is very illnatured of you not to have them here. VTon know I want to find a nice wife fo> Percy, and ho Is coming for the shooting on the 10ch.’

‘Confound Percy!’ muttered Mr Fitzgerald behind his moustache. ’Well, do as you Hue, I’Jl make no further opposition.' And flattering himself with the Idea that he had striven his utmost to do right, he now resigned himself delightedly to wrong doing. Amelia Fitzgerald is the daughter of a north country manufacturer, who left her many thousands of pounds In hard cash, with part of which Abbotscralthie has lately been purchased. It is a ban‘some stone house, in the centre of a fair Lowland estate, bocnie with moor and forest. Riches apart, she is a lovable little woman enough; yet Lacius does not love her, and for no more valid reason than that she is not somebody else. Then why have married h-r? The question is only too pregnant, the answer too obvious. When a mutual friend, a matchmaking woman, had first broached the subject to him, he answered at once : * Can you ask me ? If the young lady is fool enough to marry me, here I am, and let’s waste no more words about it,’

Amelia Huggins was not long from the schoolroom and fall of sweet schoolroomish views of love. The younger ton of an earl, five feet eleven, handsome, and apparently charmed with her) what more could she want ?

•Now, Lucius was no abandoned wretch ; he was simply a young man whose i-ix or eight years of life had akposses cd him of about double the number of thousands which had ever belonged to him—oh, a very vulgar miracle as times go—and ha had latterly—that is, for the past year or two —saddled himself with a desperate passion for Bertha Vetulam, and which, alas, the fully le turned. Ae neither of these ill-starred lovers had any money, or oven a reasonable expectation of being left some, Lnclns felt no sort of scrapie in offering his heart to the willing Amelia. Calmly considered by an impartial observer, the transaction might look very like selling an estate, with a heavy undeclared mortgage upon it. To the Honorable yet impecunious Fitzgerald however it appeared bnt in the light of that time-honored course, ‘ The only thing to do, by Jove ! 1 Ah, and he would do his duty like a man, ho would. No more fitting now. Of oourse it they met much it would ha awkward—deuced dangerous (with another ‘ by Jove I 'j Well, they mustn't meet, that’s all. You see, Lucius thought himself quite a good man. I don’t want to say a word against him, only If he is one, then there are plenty of good men about, that is all. Fo much the better that there should be, of course.

His youcg wife, though hardly of what you would call strong character, inherited from the laie Huggins a krgo share of that pertinacity which he had turned to such good account; and she pours out the coffee this morning with an air of innocent triumph in her blue eyes at having carried her point.

‘And so Mre Fitzgerald insists on lady Vernlam and her daughters blng invited,’ mured her husband. ‘ The Verulama of r. 11 people in tho world ! For Percy, too ! As if Birdie Yerulam (as she was called, her real name being Bertha) would marry Percy I ’ Percy is Amelia’s brother, older than she is by four or five years. Eich, of course, Huggins senior left his thousands equally divided. But the son had not acquired any of that gentleness and good breeding which seem to have come to the sister as if by magic. In Lucius Fitzgerald’s mental phrase ‘He is an insufferable young cub, talking slang by tho yard, and only fit to herd with bagmen and shopboys, ’ ‘Yet he Is his brother-in law, must be made the best of, and is even now coming on the 10th to meet Lady Constantin the fastidiona and her delightfully fine daughter. If only they would send an excure. Bat no Circumstances would never go and risk their cherished old reputation for spitofulness. How they must smile now—that is, if they ever do smile.’

So cogitated Lucius, snd his little burst of wicked exaltation at losing the battle rapidly gave way to ever-increasing doubts and fears. He wss sufficiently grand seigneur to remain nnornshed by the Percy trouble. Va pour le beau frere : but the other matter seemed, as he rtflioled upon it, to hourly contain leas and Jess of what was sweet, and more and more of what Is bitter.

Granting that there is always something of rapture in meeting our soul’s Ideal once again, so long that is, as she is not on the arm of a successful rival, what good could possibly come out of this untoward encounter? And for a momentary thrill o, joy that was first cousin to a sorrow, was it worth while to jeopardise even such very grey -cole red domestic felicity as now belonged

to him ? Yes, the more ho thought of it the | less ho liked the prospect. Visions of strange, heart rending scenes, 1 tragic duets, and more tragio trio,, began to flit across his brain by night and day. After all, he had suffered marvellously lifct.e for his want of Miss Verulam’s society sln-e hia marriage. Indeed, this had often been a subject of wonder to fcim. Ho was real y comfortable enough with Amalia, and ss to romance, passion, ecsticy—was the whole thing worth while ? Was he not getting just a shade tco old, or, to put it plainly, too fat and lazy for these fatiguing toys ? All this time Amelia was perfectly happy and serene, for when Lucius was with her he was more than ever aux petits soins ; and then had she not gained her own way in the matter of Inviting these Verulama ? And they were coming, too. ‘We are goiog to pay other visits in the neighborhood, and should bo so delighted,’ Lady Constantia’s note had said. For some days before they arrived Mr Fitzgerald had a good deal of spare time on his hands, with which hia wife did not interfere. She was so engrossed in her first hospitable preparations, and in adding touches of beauty to the somewhat hastily furnished rooms, that she had little leisure to bestow on her husband. The quittance would have been perhaps something of a msroy at any o'her lime; but as hour after hour passed on, and the time approached nearer for the arrival of the Verulams, Mr Fitz gerald grew more and more dejectad till at last even Amelia was compelled _ to notice it, and she inquired with some solicitude what ailed him. Of course he brisked up suddenly and said ‘nothing.’ How could he own that he either looped for or feared the arrival of these people? In point of fact ha was abndutely beginning to dread it, ‘ You will go and meet them at the station, Lucius ? It will bo so uncivil to_ let them come up here all alone. But I think I had better stay and receive them in the ball; that is the war, Is It not, in your world ? ’ ‘ Yes, yea. You always hit the right mark, love •* which was more than he did, for he bobbed down and kissed her plump on the nose and barely smiled at bis mistake. With this he dashed out of the room leaving Amelia a little bit disconcerted at hia ill-concealed excitement. A moment later she heard the sound of wheels, and looked out cf the window. Mr Fitzgerald, In a wbiteohapel, was going down the drive.

‘Gone to meet the Verulama in that thing 1 Impossible! ’ cried his wife. ‘ I ordered the carriage.’ But Lucius Fitzgerald had gone to meet the Verulams, and so had the barouche. He would just drive hlms..lf to the station, and see them into it, he thought ; after all, it would only be courteous. 3.30, and the 1 ttle station at Abbotts craithie is in a state of flu ter, for the train from the south io due ; visitors, too, are expected up at ‘the house, ’ and porters are running hither and thither, each more anxions than the other to show assiduity and attention. And natural enough, too. Other people may be looking out for friends who may be false, for relations whom they may not love, bus those honest fellows are welcoming silver charms moat unlikely to prove false, and of whoso claims upon the heart not oven sceptics are sceptical. No one, however, empresse though they all seem, is in so great a stato of real fluster as the master of ‘ the house * himee f, Impassive as he looks, standing thorn on the platform, hia usually long, pale fa e just a little longer and paler than ever, hia large, dark eyes burning just a little more brigutly in their deep setting of heavy lash. At last the bell has rung, and the train pants with slow dignity into the station. Still Lucius Fitzgerald does not move, but leans on as though watching to be recognised, against the office door. A second more and the bright color mounts to hia brow, then suddenly fades away into a sort of blue pallor. H-. walks forward to a carriage, but with no haste; yet, from that carriage window is gazing cn him a fair, young, girlish face, a face such as even an indifferent passer-by in a crowded thoroughfare would turn to look at; such af me as a painter might have chosen for a Calypso when looking seaward from the shores of Ithaca. It had the stamp of a blighted love upon it. A busy porter opened the carriage door, and Lady Constantia, fat, rubicund, and fifty, came tumbling out. ‘ How do you do ’ ing Luc.us with easy familiarity. He gave his hand to the girl. She did not attempt to speak as she stepped down on the platform, though her hand seemed to linger iu his just a moment longer than was necessary. (To he continued,)