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absence. He had been lying quite still until this moment, but now he wished to draw the curtain which screened the head of the bed. But how was this? His muscles no longer instinctively obeyed his will. He could move his arms and turn his head from side to side on his pillow; but no other movement seemed possible to him. He made a second effort, and a third, bringing into play all the force of his will, and all the nervous power he possessed; but he could not stir himself. He lay like a log. There was no longer the usual correspondence between his will, and the heavy framework of bone and flesh which formed its prison.

He could not understand it, or believe it. He was suffering, he thought, from a nightmare, of which the spasms of pain he had vaguely. felt were a part. If he waited a short time he would regain his wonted mastery of his own limbs. It was almost laughable to find himself so impotent. He lay quiet, picturing to himself the freshness of the air on the cliffs, and how pleasant a walk homeward would be under the starry sky, if he could only get out of the house without rousing any one. It was a queer thing to put him into Squire Lynn's own room. After all it would be best to turn over a new leaf, and give up these dangerous

indulgences. He knew what he would do -get the Bishop to find another living for Cunliffe, and persuade Justin to come back to Herford Vicarage. If Justin and Diana were living near to him, by George! he could, and he would, keep himself straight. Richard could use stronger oaths than " By George!" but he rarely did so in the presence of women; and he felt a restraint, something like that of a woman's presence, at this moment.

The nightmare must be over, or he could not reason so clearly. Who ever heard of a man forming schemes of reformation like these, when under the effects of a nightmare? He would get up now. But though the veins in his temples grew swollen, and drops of perspiration started to his forehead, with the vehement efforts, and the secret dread that was stealing over him, he could not bestir himself and rise from the bed. What was the matter with him? He groaned aloud, as he asked himself this question.

In an instant he heard a footstep cross the room, and Leah looked down on him nervously. She was dressed like a nurse, in a simple cotton gown, and her hair was tucked away under a white cap. Her face was pale, and full of care and sorrow. She looked very unlike the Leah he was used to

see.

"Am I ill?" he asked, in sudden terror. She nodded silently; and he could see the tears glistening in her eyes.

"What is the matter?" he inquired. "I feel as heavy as a log; I cannot move self. What on earth ails me?”

"Never mind now," she answered sadly. "He was lost!" he exclaimed; "he was quite beside himself. I know he was lost.” The tears fell fast from Leah's eyes, and she turned from the bedside to wipe them away, out of Richard's sight. Her husband was in every sense lost; even the poor drowned body had not been recovered, to be buried among his ancestors. "Leah!" Richard called' again. "I'm here," she answered.

"When did it happen?" he asked.

"That was Tuesday evening," she said, "and we're in the middle of Thursday night. I'm sittin' up with you, and Uncle Fosse is in the next room."

"Does Justin know, and Diana?" he inquired.

"Master Justin sat up with you all last night," she replied, "and Dr. Vye, and a doctor from London. The London doctor couldn't stay any longer, and he said it was no use him staying."

"Am I much hurt?" asked Richard with intense anxiety. "Tell me the truth, Leah. I must know the truth. What is it makes me feel as if I could not move a limb? I might be made of stone. Is it a very bad accident?"

Leah had come back again, and was looking down on him, with a strange look of deep, unutterable pity in her black eyes. Her lips trembled as she spoke, and her voice faltered.

"Master Dick," she said, "wait till Master Justin's here to tell you. He's gone my-back to London to tell Miss Di; nobody else could tell her how her poor father died. Try to think of God, and go to sleep."

"You've had an accident, and are hurt," answered Leah; "you musn't try to move yourself."

"An accident!" he repeated; "hurt!" Then with a vivid flash of memory there came back to his brain the terrible moment, when he was struggling with the drunken old man at the helm, whilst the jagged reef of rock was lying right across their track, and the breeze was blowing his little boat upon it. He could hear again the sharp ripping of the planks as the boat struck on a point, and the splitting of the slender mast; and he felt himself struggling in the sea. That was the last thing he could remember; but he was on the sea then, and it was evening. What was the time now? and how was it he found himself safe, and in Squire Lynn's bed?

"Leah," he said, in an awe-stricken tone, "where is your husband?"

"Do

"Think of God?" he repeated. you think that would help me to sleep? There's no sleep in me now. Who could go to sleep if they were like me, and could not move a limb? Tell me all about it, Leah."

"I couldn't," she sobbed. "My husband was drowned, and lost altogether; and I can never, never speak kind to him again, nor him to me. I wish I'd only known! Wait till Master Justin comes back to-morrow."

"I cannot wait," he cried in an agony: "go, and send old Fosse to me."

Fosse came, and stood beside him as Leah had done, looking down on him with the same expression of deep pity, whilst Richard's eager, questioning eyes scanned his face. He did not ask old Fosse to tell him the truth; the truth would come from his lips, whether he wished to harken to it

or no.

He could not run away from it now, as he had done in old times.

"What is it, Fosse?" he asked. "Must I tell you all, Master Richard?" he said.

"Yes!" he answered, though the word was formed by his parched lips, rather than uttered by his voice. He held out his hand, and the old fisherman clasped it between both his own, and fell down on his knees beside the bed.

"Oh! dear Lord, dear Lord!" he cried, "I know Thou loves us every one, as if we were little, young children playin' around thy footstool. It is Thy footstool, Lordall this green earth, and fields, and woods; ay! and the troubled sea. All about Thy footstool we're sufferin', and toilin', and lovin', and livin' and dyin'; and Thou sees us, and loves us all. The mother watches her little babes playin' at her feet, and wilt Thou not see us, dear Lord? Ay! and if the children fret, and quarrel, and hurt each other, the mother does not drive 'em away wi' anger, from their safe hidin'-place at her feet. And wilt Thou drive thy sinful children away from Thee? We are far from thinkin' that of Thee, dear Lord.

"And now we lift up our eyes to Thy face, and we call to Thee. We know Thou knows what to do. There's one has died on thy footstool, drowned in th' sea; and one that's stricken down in his full strength and youth; but spared to live a while longer. Oh! help him to put his trust in Thee! Thou art always good, and lovin' and wise; and Thy ways are higher than our ways. Oh! give us strength; give us patience; give us faith in thee. We seem to feel Thee very near to us, Lord. We have only to wait a little while; and Thou'lt lift us up from Thy feet into thy bosom."

Old Fosse's voice ceased, but Richard did not open his eyes. He was passing through an agony of dread. There was a terrible solemnity to him in the old man's prayer, in its simple words and its broken accents.

"Tell me all," he murmured at last; "what is it?"

"The doctors say you'll never be able to get about again," he answered pitifully: "it's the back that's hurt. Your head's all right, and your mind clear; but you'll be a cripple for life. We found you lyin' near the rock the sea had tossed you on, after you had nearly swum ashore. But you're not goin' to die, thank God! you'll live many a year yet. You'd have died for certain if Leah and me hadn't been sent to save you. Squire Lynn

There's

was gone in an instant of time. been depths of mercy shown to you, Master Richard."

"To be a cripple for life!" he moaned, turning his face to the wall, and feeling, in the act of movement, how utterly helpless he lay. It seemed to him as if it would have been better to have been killed outright. He was a burden to himself. To have no power over his own limbs; to be bedridden; to be nothing but a living log, whilst the world was going on with all its interests, and pleasures, and he taking no part in them, though he was still in the world. Would it not have been better to have stepped over the boundary at once, and seen what lies on the other side of the great mystery of death?

But the choice was not given to him, whether he would die or live. We may long for death, and rejoice exceedingly when we can find the grave; but still life may be given to us, and the sun rise, and the darkness come for us, swinging us from day to night, and from night to day, in spite of all the bitterness of soul, and anguish of body which make the burden of living all but unbearable. Richard Herford lived to feel this. His merry life was over, but it was not to be a short one. Even while he loathed it, he could not but care for it, and obey the rules by which it could be prolonged. He was compelled to cherish his miserable existence more carefully than he had done whilst it was still full of vigour and the power of enjoyment. Henceforth his chief work in the world would be simply to keep himself alive.

CHAPTER XLV.-VILLAGE TALK.

JUSTIN and Diana had found their happiness weighted with an unexpected burden. They were very happy; happier than they had either of them ever been. The life they led was very different from life at Herford or Rillage Grange. They were brought into contact with many minds, and many interests; and they thoroughly entered into the new intellectual current which was flowing around them. To Diana it was perfectly new. Her life-long seclusion at Ril lage gave a charm to all the varied incidents which every day brought to her. The companionship existing between herself and her husband was even more complete than she had anticipated in her brightest day-dreams. He seemed to understand her thoughts and desires without words.

It was Pansy who was tasting the bitter

ness of real loneliness; she, who had never Sometimes Diana fancied she heard in the known what it was to be alone. Until a still hours of the night moans and sobs few months ago there had not been a reaching her through the thin walls of their thought in her simple heart which she could cottage. But when she stole into Pansy's not have told to her father; but now an ab- room with her softest footstep, she would solute dumbness had come over her. She find her sleeping apparently, with the quiet, could not tell him how desolate she felt. regular breathing of girlhood. | Pansy She had so long believed herself to be first smothered her crying, half-ashamed and halfin her father's heart, that it was a profound frightened. What could she tell Diana? though wordless grief to her to find Diana How could she find words to express the there, in the place she had considered her morbid sorrows that were poisoning the own. It was no wonder, she thought, that sources of life? Diana would reason with he should prefer Diana to her; for Diana her, and talk to her of submitting to God, was full of life, and animation, and a beauti- of trusting to His love. As yet, Pansy could ful happiness, which embellished everything do neither. she said and did. Pansy looked on with a sore and sorrowful heart. It was Diana now who was her father's companion; not the little daughter, whose house had been built on sand, and had been swept down in the great storm that had beaten against it.

This was the cloud over Justin's happiness; at first scarcely more than the thin, fine mist, which scarcely dims the sunshine, and which is most clearly recognised when it has passed away, and the true brightness shines. He would not own to himself that Pansy's presence was a restraint, yet when Diana and he were alone together, he felt a freedom that was wanting while her sad young face was beside them. How to bring the smiles back to that face grew a serious problem to both Diana and himself.

This spring was a very different season from the last to all of them. Justin was fully as much occupied with public meetings; for he was a good speaker, apart from any consideration of position or influence, and his services were requested by several committees, in their arrangements for their respective meetings. But he found himself a person of much less social importance, as the secretary of a small charity, than he had been as the possible candidate for parliamentary membership. As to Pansy, the season was a miserable counterfeit of the last. She heard of the same things, read of them in the newspapers, was near enough to catch the echo of them, and that was all her share. No one mentioned the Fortescues in her hearing -those summer friends of hers, who had won her girlish heart, and tossed it away as a worthless bauble. It was the bitterness of this which crushed Pansy's spirit. She envied Jenny Cunliffe, who had always envied her. Why had not her father been content to remain the humble vicar of Herford, when she would have grown up as his daughter unnoticed and uncourted?

It was just such an evening in May, as the one when Pansy and Justin had driven homewards the year before, through the cool and quiet lanes lying between Lowborough and Herford. All the village was astir. By this time every person in it knew that the great London doctor, as well as Dr. Vye, had pronounced solemnly that there was no hope of Master Richard ever getting about again. The place had been in a tumult of agitation, almost as great as if every household shared personally in the calamity that had happened. This evening they were scattered in groups of three and four all along the valley, upon the road which Richard had tramped down, footsore and weary, but in vigorous health and strength, only a year ago. Leah and his mother were watching and weeping beside him now at Rillage Grange. It was known that Justin was coming back with his wife and Miss Pansy, and all the villagers had turned out to catch a glance at them, though it was felt to be inopportune to give them any other welcome. All the Lynns who were in England were also coming, to stay at Herford Court while their affairs were settled, for Richard could neither be moved from Rillage Grange nor bear the noise of a number of visitors there.

"Please God," said old Fosse, "we shall have Master Justin and Miss Pansy back among us for good. Herford's never like itself with them away."

"But Master Dick's the master still," objected one of his hearers, "Master Justin 'ud be nought but a bailiff.”

"Master or bailiff," answered old Fosse, "Herford 'ud be a different place wi' Master Justin in it."

"Th' old squire has well nigh ruined Rillage," said Dan Popham, from the home farm at Rillage; "they say Captain Lynn 'ill find himself up to th' neck in mortgages. He'd no share in his mother's fortune, bein'

his father's heir, and he can't afford to live at the place now it's come to him. It's many a year since any one of us has clapped eyes on any o' th' Lynns, except Miss Di. What 'ill they do with th' Grange, thinks-ta ?" "It 'ill be many a long week ere Master Dick can be moved, if all's true," said another.

"What 'ill Leah Dart do now?" asked a third; "she's not been a fine lady for long. Folks say there won't be a brass farthin' for her when all's over-not a farthin'. She'll be sorry she turned up her nose at thee, Dan Popham."

"I'd marry Leah Dart any day she'd have me," said Dan; "she's a brave lass."

"Leah's made up her mind to stay wi' Master Dick, as long as he needs her," answered old Fosse. "She's saved his life, and now she'll take care of it, and she's a rare good nurse. Master Dick 'ill have every comfort nursin' can give him. And Leah has repented herself sore for all her folly and sin, and, please God! she'll make a good woman yet."

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If Master Justin comes back for good," said the woman who had spoken of Leah, "which 'ill be mistress at Herford Court, the old madam or the new one?"

Two carriages were coming down the valley, and the villagers stood aside under the hedgerows, the men taking off their caps and the women curtseying in silence as they passed. There was a gravity and a sadness about this return, that struck painfully upon Pansy, who was looking eagerly from side to side at the old familiar faces. When the carriages were out of sight the people dispersed slowly to their own homes.

Didst-ta see Miss Pansy?" they asked one another. "She looks like as if she was struck for death? It was like a funeral, their comin' back."

"God forbid !" said Mrs. Fosse and the other mothers in the village.

CHAPTER XLVI.-WILLING SERVICE.

THE Lynn family had met under somewhat strange circumstances. Their father's death had brought them together, yet there were no funeral rites to be attended. It would have been a relief to go through the ordinary ceremonies which follow death. For a day or two, until some idea had been gained as to the state of old Squire Lynn's affairs, the sons passed away their time in rambling over the neglected estate, and the badly cultivated fields of the home-farms, whilst Diana and one of her eldest sisters, the only daughters living in England, were occupied in promis-viding their mourning dresses. Diana alone mourned over her father, to whom she had given the best of her life, and for whom she had hoped against hope. The catastrophe she had always dreaded, and which she had averted during many years by a complete self-sacrifice, had overtaken him as soon as she had left him to other guardianship. Ought she then to have remained with him?

That was a question none of them could answer. It was well known that Mrs. Herford set great store on her position as tress of Herford, and had frequently declared that no new mistress could or should depose her.

"Mrs. Cunliffe 'ill miss gettin' her own way this time," remarked the same woman, who was notorious as a gossip in Herford. "There's no chance of Master Dick ever gettin' married now, so Miss Jenny is safe. I thought as all Mrs. Cunliffe's eggs 'ud never get hatched; she'll have to put up wi' a few addled ones.'

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There was a general titter, understood by all but old Fosse himself, who was the only person in Herford that did not know the history of Mrs. Cunliffe's chickens.

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"Hush! hush! hush!" he said, in a kindly tone, we must all put up wi' addled eggs. Let's take care we don't hatch cockatrice eggs. There's a many sins have got a smooth white shell outside 'em, but when they're hatched, they sting. I don't know what eggs Mrs. Cunliffe has to do with; but poor Leah has hatched hers, and a pretty brood o' sorrows are come of it. And we're all the same, all the same; silly creatures that don't know what they're wishin' for."

"Here they come," shouted Dan Popham.

Her father's widow was an encumbrance and embarrassment. There was, of course, no provision for her; and none of Diana's brothers and sisters were willing to do anything for Leah, who kept herself out of sight as much as she could, with an instinctive feeling that they all blamed her for the sudden death of their father. When Diana saw her first, she was startled at the paleness of her face, and the traces of long, continuous weeping about her eyes. Justin had sent Leah across to Herford Court to get over the inevitable meeting with his wife, which had been put off from day to day, and she fell down on her knees before Diana.

"Oh, I shall never forgive myself for leavin' him!" cried Leah; "but I thought Master Dick was safe away, and there'd be nobody to come and tempt him. I did my

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