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A LORD OF THE CREATION.- - PART II.

CHAPTER IV.

MR HESKETH did not appear down-stairs, the next morning. He had caught cold it seemed, and was now paying the penalty for his chivalric politeness of the night before.

So Caroline announced at the breakfast table, at which she took her usual place only a little after the usual time. It was a lovely morning after the previous day's rain. The most gracious sunshine was making all things radiant out-of-doors; the softest clouds were wafted gently athwart the sky by a southern breeze, that just stirred the pine tops, and caused the silver birch to wave her graceful tresses. All the flowers glowed with redoubled brilliancy of colour; a spirit of cheerfulness seemed abroad.

Caroline looked out on the garden from the low study window, and smiled to herself delightedly.

'Oh, Vaughan, what a day for Crooksforth! The air is so soft, and the sunshine so pleasant! This sort of day makes me feel as if I could fly!'

'Well, you'll find wings very convenient in mounting Crooksforth,' observed Vaughan, who had entered the room with his hand full of letters, just arrived by the morning's post. Three for my uncle, one for you, George, two for me, andyes, this one is to Miss Maturin. Carry, surely I know that writing?' He deliberately examined the direction before giving her her letter. 'It is, isn't it, from Miss Kendal?'

'Yes,' said she, taking it.

She turned away to read it. It was a long letter apparently, and took more time to peruse than either Vaughan's or his friend's correspondence. The former, having tossed his letters aside, with muttered exclamations at their insipidity, strode to the distant window whither Caroline had betaken herself.

'We're waiting for our coffee,' he intimated.

She rose at once, crushed the letter into her pocket, and resumed her place at the urn. Vaughan seated himself close beside her, and the length of the table almost estranged them from Mr Farquhar, who sat at the further end. Breakfast commenced. Vaughan trifled with his

spoon, and made intensely earnest efforts to balance it on the edge of his cup. 'Have you read your letter all through?' at last he said.

'Yes. It is not a long one.'

A pause; during which the gentleman rapidly cut slices of ham, and distributed the same to his friend and himself.

'I was not aware you corresponded with Miss Kendal,' he resumed, in a low tone. (Carry, won't you have some ham?) Is it of long standing-the correspondence, I mean?'

'No, thank you. Miss Kendal has written to me several times since she left Redwood.'

'And you to her?'

'Once or twice. Oh, Vaughan, it is not courteous of you to go on talking like this.' 'Farquhar, try that pie. I particularly wish to know about Miss Kendal. What has her ladyship been doing all this time? What is she about now?'

'Wait a more fitting opportunity, and I will tell you,' said Caroline, colouring, as, with a slight and not ungraceful assumption of dignity, she turned from her questioner, and addressed some remark to Mr Farquhar.

Vaughan vexedly bent all his attention on his plate, and would not for some time join in the conversation of the others. At length, however, with a sort of magnanimous toss of the head, and a frank, half-apologetic smile, he pushed away his plate, in token of having finished his breakfast, leaned his head on his hand, and appeared to be listening with great interest to what they were saying. But somehow, Caroline was not her easy, natural self, and this evident scrutiny did not tend to increase her composure. She answered at random; she fell into reverie, in spite of her frequent self-corrections, when she would look round with a start, and eagerly begin to join in the conversation. It was a relief when she could rise from the table and quit the room.

But on the staircase Vaughan overtook and detained her.

'You slippery little thing, I want to speak to you.'

I am going to my uncle. He has a

cold.'

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'It isn't a mortal complaint. Now curiosity is-suspense is. With those two diseases I am suffering, and in a very bad way. Come into the drawing-room.' He took firm hold of her wrist, and compelled her in at the open door.

'You hurt me, Vaughan,' she cried, the tears starting to her eyes.

He looked intently on the pretty reddened mark his fingers had left on her wrist, then kissed it-once-twice, He glanced for a moment at her flushing face as he let the hand go.

'Is it well now?' he asked, audaciously. 'Or shall I

'Be silent, Vaughan! I am hurt, grieved, angry enough with you for one morning. I thought my cousin-my friend-my old playmate, was at least a gentleman.'

If he expected to be amused by her indignation, he was also involuntarily affected by it. The indescribable swagger was put off. In a subdued tone he addressed her.

'Sit down, then; I did not mean to offend you, Caroline. But you are very contrary this morning yourself; why couldn't you answer me just now at breakfast what I wanted to know? You are aware how keenly interested I am in anything that concerns your ancient gouvernante. Sanctimonious old soul, how comes she to write to you?'

'I dislike your way of speaking. Miss Kendal should be mentioned with respect at least.'

'I have no reason either to respect or to like her. There was not any love lost between us, I believe. I am sure she always behaved most unpleasantly to me. I wish you would have nothing to say to her, either by personal or postal in

tercourse.'

'It is unlucky for your wish,' Caroline remarked, 'that she is about to take up her residence so near Redwood. In a few weeks she is coming to live at Beacon's Cottage.'

"The deuce she is! I fancied something of the kind,' he added, with ire. 'Miss Kendal was always famous for making differences between you and me. It reminds me of the old days of cricketing and boating, when you used to put me off because you had to "go out with Miss Kendal." I never had any patience with your affection for that woman. If I could have helped it, it shouldn't have been.'

Caroline coloured, with many conflicting thoughts. The foremost of all was a highly sensible satisfaction that he did not know the real and effectual extent of his influence. She kept silence.

'What in the world brings her to this part of the country again?' he muttered. 'I thought when she left us she was going abroad with some East Indian family. I hoped she was comfortably disposed of.'

'But Mr and Lady Camilla Blair are about returning to Madras for two years, and meanwhile leave their children under Miss Kendal's care. And she has chosen to come here. The house is already taken.'

He stood pulling at the tassels of the sofa-cushion with a petulant air. At length, however, he looked up, laughing. 'It isn't worth being vexed about; and after all, Carry, I don't so much mind. She won't be your governess, and will have something better to do than lecturing you, and tugging you about, botanising and moralising, &c. So we won't talk about her any more. Just play me

Fra poco. You haven't forgotten it in all this while?'

He looked tolerably confident that she had not. He opened the piano, and then luxuriously extended himself on the sofa, while she played to him some of his favourite operatic morceaux; luscious, flowing music, dreamy even in its passion, dulcet in its pathos, such as one would naturally close one's eyes, physically and mentally, to enjoy. He lazily opened his, when, at last, she ceased playing, and rose from the instrument.

'Don't go yet, Carry; it's so pleasant.' 'But I must see my uncle now. You know the horses are ordered at twelve, and it is now past eleven.'

Her step was decisive, as she passed down the long room by his sofa, whence he gazed at her entreatingly and detainingly. He saw it was no use to protest or complain. She went out at the door, and he rose, yawned, and sauntered to the window, with his hands in his pockets, meditating after the manner of men.

'How handsome she is grown! No milk-and-water school-girl either. Something to interest as well as to attract, It is fun to see her angry, all the while knowing that her love is fifty times stronger than her indignation, Dear little soul, I prize her affection very much; it is worth anything to come back to it as a rest after Hum-hum!' The meditation floated off into vague

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She got no further. And very wistful and a little perplexed was her face as she thus paused, looking out on, but hardly seeing, the soft August sunshine, which seemed to rest in visible repose on the broad lawn. But her face grew clear again, and she went in to her uncle with her own fresh gaiety of aspect and manner. 'Oh, it is the fairest, sweetest morning,' she cried; 'it is dreadful to think of you in here, burrowing close to the fire, and with that fiery dressing-gown on. You will come down to lunch, won't you?'

'Surely. Come here, my child.'

She came, and knelt down beside his chair. He gently turned her face, so that he could look full into the clear eyes.

'Are you very happy this morning?' 'Happy!-I? Dear uncle, what do you mean?'

'Were you pleased with your birthnight ball?'

Oh yes!'

'And glad that Vaughan is at home again?'

She coloured vividly. He let her droop her face then, but she lifted it again the next minute, saying, but not quite so distinctly as before, 'Oh yes, I am always glad of that.'

"That is well.' In quite a changed tone he went on:- -'What do you think of Mr Farquhar ?'

'I did not like him at all, at first; but I do now.'

"That is right. I like him-I have confidence in him. He is much what his father was at that age.' Then, in a less thoughtful tone, 'You are going to Crooksforth this morning, are you not?'

'Yes. How pleasant it will be, uncle! Oh, I wish you could come too. Do you

think

'No, my pet. It will be pleasanter for me to rest quietly at home. I have some letters to write. By the way, tell Vaughan I will see him in the afternoon; he can come in to me after you return from your ride.' 'But won't you come down-stairs by that time?'

'I think not, dear. I have letters to write.'

'You look tired. Couldn't I write the letters, or Vaughan? Do let him.'

The old gentleman shook his head, and smiled reassuringly, in reply to her halfanxious look. She busied herself about the room for a little while, put fresh water to the nosegay with which she constantly supplied his table, stirred his fire, drew the blinds to a convenient height, all with the officious tenderness which it is alike so pleasant to give and to receive. Then she kissed him, and went to dress for her ride.

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The ride proved a great pleasure. Part of the way lay along a broad ridge of road much elevated above the country on each side, and thereby commanding views at every turn, both extensive and various. The sweet English valleys were smiling their loveliest; little nest-like villages clustered below the brown hills, or shone out from amid soft foliage of the goldening trees. Park, and meadow, and moorland stretched out widely under the sunny sky, with cloud-shadows dappled upon them, and breaks of intense sunlight, making islands of glory in the broad landscape.

The south wind, fresh and gentle, was like the very breath of the sunshine, Mr Farquhar declared, while he turned his head to meet it, his face glowing with fulness of satisfaction. To-day I can understand what has so often seemed an enigma to me-the joy of living-the absolute pleasure of existence. Simply to be is a good thing, after all.'

'Did you ever doubt it?' Caroline asked. 'I never doubted-I disbelieved,' he answered; 'a much more satisfactory process,' he added, with a half-bitter smile. It saves much wear and tear of spirit. To temporise between the two points of belief and unbelief, strikes me as a dangerous waste of time and expenditure of energy. What we knowwe know. It is quite enough for us, very likely.'

Caroline did not reply, partly because she was not quite clear of his meaning. Had she thoroughly comprehended, she might have found rejoinder equally difficult.

'Come,' Vaughan impatiently interrupted, 'you may as well put metaphysics aside for once. My poor little cousin isn't used to be deluged with moral phi

losophy in this way, on week-days at least. You're interfering with Mr Turnbull's prerogative.'

Who is Mr Turnbull, may I ask?' 'Our vicar. He lives in that beautiful place we passed yesterday; he is a "pluralist," and has about £3000 a-year. You needn't ask any more about him. He'll speak for himself next Sunday. He always preaches at morning service.

'Exemplary man! It is not every wealthy divine would condescend to a village congregation. Such humility is quite apostolic.'

'Oh, he is an excellent person, gives the best dinner-parties in the neighbourhood. An enviable career, I always thought. A few years ago I greatly inclined to the church myself, and sometimes I regret heartily enough that I did not take to it.' 'You regret?' echoed Mr Farquhar, with an involuntary glance.

'Yes. It's better than the bar, I should imagine. Not a quarter the labour brings four times the result, in most cases. Oh, I know what you mean; of course there is less fame, less glitter obtainable. But then look at the solid advantages of a capital benefice. Say £1200 a-year; deduct £80 for your curate, and there you · are!'

'Exactly; there you are!' repeated his friend, looking at him meaningly.

Vaughan met his eye, and laughed, in some confusion.

'Of course,' he went on, you must not take what I say au pied de la lettre. Unluckily, I am troubled with a conscience,' he sighed, while pensively switching his horse's neck, and that stands confoundedly in the way on many occasions.'

'How so?'

'In this very case, for instance. There was preferment in the family-my uncle wished it—it would have been, in a worldly sense, an excellent thing. But

'Did my uncle ever wish you to be a clergyman?' asked Caroline, innocently. 'I thought

'Oh, it was before your time,' said Vaughan, hastily; 'you were not likely to hear of it. In fact, I have carefully avoided the subject with my uncle ever since. It is a sore point.'

'But why didn't you do as he wished,' persisted she, if it would have pleased him so much?'

'My dear Carry,' he answered, loftily, but affectionately, 'I would do much to

please my uncle, but a man must satisfy his own sense of right before everything.' She looked rather puzzled.

'You cannot understand? It is not to be expected that you should,' he said, looking down at her with an indulgent air. 'Life has many things in it that you would find incomprehensible at present.'

'At present, and always, let us trust,' said Mr Farquhar, earnestly. The tree of knowledge was always fatal to the daughters of Eve. Avoid it, Miss Maturin; don't stand under its shade, far less eat of its fruits.'

But Caroline did not approve of the doctrine. She always felt tenaciously inclined, when people asserted superior knowledge, seeming to shut her out from discussion as a child, or an ignorante, whether the subject were polemical, ethical, or a mere simple matter of social experience.

On the contrary,' she declared to Mr Farquhar, 'I shall take every opportunity of enlarging my information. I despise ignorance. If I could, I would like to know thoroughly all the good and evil in the world, and take my choice.'

Though he smiled at her energy, his eye kindled into a sympathetic fire with that which flashed over all her young face. 'You are ambitious,' he said.

'Are not you? Does not everybody that we should count worthy, aspire? I think to be easily contented is a very mean virtue.'

'Excelsior!' cried Vaughan, enthusiastically. 'Carry, we always liked that story, you remember?'

She nodded, her eyes beaming at the dear old memory he knew so well how to evoke.

'Nevertheless,' said Mr Farquhar, more drily than he had before spoken, 'to be easily contented is a comfortable faculty, greatly longed for by older persons than yourself, Miss Maturin.'

'Comfortable!' she echoed, with profound scorn.

Even so; man must have something. He sees nearly all his ambitions crushed, his dreams dissolved, his hopes, aims, and ends, dwarfed, distorted, or destroyed, by the time he is forty; so he even falls back on what you contemn, and when he can neither be great nor happy, he finds it very convenient to be comfortable.'

She did not understand the bitter irony with which he spoke: she took all he said

literally, and in the uncompromising insolence of her youth and inexperience, disdained it as mean and unworthy. Yet the next minute a glance at his face obtained from her instinct, what it would have been vain to ask from her reason and justice. She could not help compassionating this man, nay, she could not help a certain involuntary trust in him. His reality and truth magnetically appealed to her own. So the curl of the rosy lip waved into a smile, half sad, half sweet, and wholly womanly, with which she turned to him, saying, 'Let us, at least, wait till we are forty, before we believe in such a dreary doctrine.'

'Are you so happy as to be able to command your belief?' he asked her, smiling also, but with a curious earnestness in the midst of his jesting tone. 'What a benefactor to his species would he be who should impart such a gift to the world at large! "Belief taught in six lessons!" They professed to teach memory in that way, some time since, why not Faith? which, after all, is to the future very much what memory is to the past.'

'But, though artificial memory might be of some service,' said Caroline, amused, 'artificial faith would be a very frail, useless thing, I am afraid.'

'From flowers, upward or downward, Caroline scorns simulations,' cried Vaughan; 'let us have the real article, or none. It is the genuine British disdain of shams.'

He laughed, and so did Caroline, because she was too young and too happy to feel at all deeply in the matter they were discussing. Like many another, she thought and talked ignorantly of Faith, as one who had never been in deep waters might think and speak of a life-boat.

Mr Farquhar looked at their laughing faces, silently. They rode onward at an increased pace, and conversation was checked for a time. When they drew rein, it was to dismount from their horses, and leaving them in charge of the groom, to ascend the much-talked-of Crooksforth Hill.

Caroline, in glee, ran forward. Vaughan linked his arm within his friend's, and they followed more deliberately.

'Well, what do you think of my cousin? Isn't she pretty?"

'She is pretty,' returned Mr Farquhar, with an unusually sententious air.

Vaughan was surprised; and oddly too, felt both relieved and annoyed at the moderation of the reply.

'Is that all you have to say? Why, I myself was struck when I saw her last night. She was a mere school-girl when I left Redwood-a child, comparatively.

'She is little more now, I think.' And the speaker's eye followed the lithe figure of Caroline, as she bounded up the somewhat steep ascent.

Once she turned back to look at them, and her laughing face and golden hair flashed on them for a moment, like a sudden light upon the bare, brown hill. But, presently, in its dusky crest of pines she was lost to their view.

'She is very young still; her manner is unformed, and so forth,' Vaughan then resumed. 'She has little of what you would call "style," or l'air de societé. But all that will come.'

'Will it ?'

'Of course it will. Miss Maturin is not likely to lack those necessary graces when they become necessary. At present, in this country circle, their absence may pass unnoticed; but trust me,' added the young man, evidently somewhat chafed by the other's indifference, 'you'll hear of her yet in London.'

Mr Farquhar seemed amused.

'You defend Miss Maturin's claims as a belle and a woman of the world with most creditable zeal,' he remarked.

But even while Vaughan looked at him, a little puzzled as to his meaning, the unconscious subject of their talk came towards them, back from the summit of the hill. She was arranging some sprigs of heather, purple, pink, and white, into a little bouquet.

'Are not these lovely? Look, Vaughan, this is a peculiar kind of heather which does not grow on the moorlands.'

'I see; it is very pretty. How carefully you have arranged them. Are they for me?'

'No, indeed; I gathered them for my uncle. He has a mountaineer's love of heather.'

Vaughan detected Mr Farquhar's slight smile, and was annoyed thereat.

'Carry, do give them to me; I want them,' he whispered. 'I will get some more for my uncle-give me these.'

She gave them, looking half-wonderingly at him. He bestowed them with much empressement in his button-hole, and then turned to Mr Farquhar.

'We may as well descend, I suppose. The horses will be impatient.'

'And we have sufficiently enjoyed the

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