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"Ee bees to come directly to Deane Hall, the master wants ee and no one else."

"Has Mr. Rivers had another attack?" asked Mr. Nash, perceiving that the animal showed. signs of haste, and that drops of perspiration stood on the lad's sunburnt face.

"Think he is the same as he was. Don't know nothing of another 'tack. Mr. Merry told me to ride for ee as fast as I could, and to break my neck whiles I was about it. I haven't done that quite," he added, with a grin.

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"Well, you can try again as you go back," returned the lawyer, only you had better give my message first. Say I will be there in less than a couple of hours."

The lad proceeded very willingly to the back. Mr. Nash, returning to the house, ordered his pony-chaise to be ready in an hour's time.

"I wonder what the old man wants now," he thought, as he munched a biscuit and sipped a glass of wine. "He made his will long ago. Perhaps he wishes to leave something to his nephew that is but fair-I told him so; but he would not listen to me. Not to provide for his own kith and kin is to be a heathen, says some one; and a heathen he is and has always been. He might have stood his ground and promised only half his estate, she would have married him all the same. Perhaps he repents, as many do when it is too late. However, it is but just to do something for Ernest Rivers. He is a good son and a fine fellow, sound at bottom, though with a full share of the family obstinacy; he is a little crazed, perhaps, so are most people where a special hobby is concerned. They say there is a soft place in every head, and heart too, if we knew where to find it. Even old Rivers has had one, though now it is healed over, if not scared. Well, we shall see. It is not for pastime that he has sent for Lawyer Nash, however willing he may be to see him as a friend."

After giving some directions to his clerk, visiting his family and chatting a little with his wife, Mr. Nash was ready to start as the chaise came round, and about the time he mentioned drove up to the door of Deane Hall.

A trim little figure was flitting about in front, and almost before he alighted came forward to speak to him. This was Etta, to whom the days were becoming tedious, so that the presence of a stranger was too pleasing a rarity to be lost.

"Miss Lacy, I think ?" said Mr. Nash, raising

his hat.

"Lawyer Nash, I suppose?" answered the young lady, making an exaggerated courtesy, and then springing forward, she put out her hand, saying, in a tone almost intimate, "I am so glad to see you."

Surprised at so warm a greeting from one of whom he knew scarcely anything, having only seen Etta once or twice when a little schoolgirl, he was rather puzzled what to answer, but she almost immediately saved him the trouble.

"I am so dull here, all alone, it is such a treat to see any one," she added, diminishing the value of the compliment by her sincerity.

"I never thought I could feel so dull; some

times I don't know what to do with myself;" and clasping her hands together she looked inquiringly into his face, as if expecting him to suggest some relief for her ennui.

"Is Mr. Rivers very ill?"

"No; he is just the same as usual, but he won't let me read to him, nor wait upon him, nor stay with him, and I have nothing to do but to amuse myself, and nothing to amuse myself with. See, I have been trying to dig in order to make some flower-beds, having no one to help me, but I soon get tired; and Etta pointed to a spot where the turf of a grass-plot had been disturbed, and lay about in disorder, along with a spade and hoe of too large dimensions for such small hands to use with any hope of success.

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"And I want to go into the town, but there is no one to take me," she said, looking wistfully at the smart little pony-carriage at the door.

"And may I ask what you especially want in the town?" inquired Mr. Nash, amused with the confidential naïveté of the girl.

"To buy some things and order others. I don't think Mr. Rivers would mind my having gardening tools that I could handle; those are of no use," she said, looking despondently at the heavy unsightly ones she had abandoned. "I must have something to occupy me; I should not mind so much if grandpa would let me wait upon him, but he won't. He always tells me to go about my business, and I have none," she continued, in a tone that was as much comic as pathetic. would be my business to put the house in order and make it nice and pretty, if he would let me."

"It

Mr. Nash could scarcely repress a smile as he mentally contrasted the self-esteem and consequential air of the speaker with her youthful appearance and diminutive size; to him she was but a child, rather an interesting one, but still a child. She probably read his thoughts as she quickly added, "You know it is all to be mine when grandpapa dies," a, statement the lawyer received in silence, not a little surprised at the girl's cool assertion and the matter-of-fact way in which she expressed herself; yet there was an innocency about those large eyes, so steadfastly fixed upon him while she spoke, that made him feel more entertained than shocked.

Merry's appearance put an end to all further remark. Having heard the sound of carriage wheels he came to conduct Mr. Nash to his master's presence.

"Mr. Rivers is not worse, I hear," observed Mr. Nash, as he mounted the old-fashioned staircase. "I should rather say he is since he asks for his lawyer," replied Merry, with a sly twinkle of the eye. "The only good sign is that he has not yet asked for the parson."

On entering the room Mr. Nash found his client sitting in his accustomed chair, near the window, his face thinner than when he saw him last, and a little drawn on one side. His hands were folded, resting on the table, and seemed helpless.

"I am sorry to find you no better," said Mr. Nash, taking the chair brought forward by Merry. "Nearer, nearer; close to me," said Mr. Rivers, indicating with his eye where he wished him to

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"I want to alter it."

"To append a codicil, perhaps?"

A slight sign of satisfaction appeared in the cld man's face. Evidently the mention of the codicil gave him pleasure.

"Yes, a codicil may do all I want."

"You probably wish to remember your nephew, whom you had forgotten altogether," observed Mr. Nash, finding that Mr. Rivers had again relapsed into silence.

"I wish to leave him the estate."

"But, my dear sir, you cannot do that; it is already bequeathed, and by promise."

"Cannot! Who says I cannot do what I like with my own, even to the making ducks and drakes of it if such should be my desire? While I have life I have power to change my will; aye! to make twenty new ones if I please; who dare say to the contrary? I have the power, and I mean to exercise it. I-I-I-" he said, speakng at first more volubly than usual from wrath at eing opposed, and then completely breaking Jown.

"Be calm, my good friend; excitement is bad for you. I am here to take your instructions and to assist you, if necessary, by offering such suggestions as may recommend themselves to your mature consideration. I understand that you wish to do something for your nephew. That is only just. The man who does not provide for his own household-and by household I read kith and kin-is worse than a heathen, we are told on very good authority. You would like to charge the property with an annual income for Ernest Rivers ?"

"I mean to leave him Deane Hall and all belonging to it. He may not know how to manage the estate; but he is a man, and has a better chance than a poor, puling chit of a girl. does let everything go to rack and ruin I shall not be there to see it."

If he

"But I must again repeat, you have not the power to do so-morally I mean, of course."

"Morally!" retorted Mr. Rivers, disdainfully. "If I have the power practically what is to hinder me?"

"Your honour."

Mr. Rivers, incensed as he was, would have made his honour a pendant to his morality, had not displeasure now prevented his articulation, and given Mr. Nash the advantage of speaking uninterruptedly.

"When I made your will it was not without expostulating against your injustice," pursued the lawyer. "Having known you ever since I entered

upon my profession-from my youth, I may say, with which I remember you twitted me upon that occasion-I reasoned with you until you were out of patience, and put many objections before you. I pleaded for your nephews that they might not be overlooked entirely. One had disgraced the family-I allowed him to be thrown over with only a feeble remonstrance; the other had merely offended. His father wished him to go to college, his uncle desired to turn him into a farmer, and might-remember, there was no promise held out -and might, perhaps, leave him his property. Admit, for argument's sake, that his chances were good, they were but chances. What happened? He obeyed his father. Is that blameable?"

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"His mother, rather!" growled Mr. Rivers. "His parents. We will not quarrel over words," resumed Mr. Nash. He went to college. Was it not his misfortune rather than his fault that his father's death cut short his career, and compelled him to return home without taking his degree? He was obliged to do what he could for himself and his mother, whose small income was inadequate to her maintenance. Surely his conduct is to be praised rather than censured. Would you have liked him better had he turned to you in his disappointment, and become a suppliant for your generosity to help him in a course of education of which he knew you disapproved? Is he not rather entitled to esteem when, asking nothing of others, he endeavours to gain his own bread by the best means he possesses?"

"And what do you suppose his brains produce after all?" inquired Mr. Rivers, secretly conscious that an application for help would not have propitiated him more than a spirit of independence.

"I cannot say; the pen is a precarious livelihood."

"He lacks the sense of a practical man. I wish Harold were alive. With all his follies he was a manly fellow."

"Were he living I should recommend you to remember him also, though I think Ernest Rivers the worthier nephew. We will not compare the two."

Mr. Rivers drew his shaggy brows together with a dogged expression that Mr. Nash knew well.

"Am I not telling you that I mean to make Ernest my heir for want of a better?" he continued, in a sour tone. "Is not that enough?"

"Your heir in one sense he cannot be, and I am sure your sober judgment agrees with me. Mrs. Lacy married you on condition that you settled your property upon her and her daughter; you consented, not ignorant of the injustice done your nephew, but with a determination to disown him. The compact was confirmed by a will made in their favour, through which Etta Lacy, if she survived her mother, inherits all. You did it with your eyes open, willingly or carelessly. Perhaps in robust health you did not foresee what might happen. The habit of living is so strong that it is difficult with most of us to realise that the end must come. Be that as it may, you cannot now violate your word and break faith with the dead.

Mrs. Rivers was a good, devoted wife to you while she lived. However reluctant I may have been to make the will in the first instance, incurring your anger and your wife's also by repeated expostulations, I cannot be a party to setting it aside now."

"And you would let that baby-girl inherit a property she can never manage, and bring ruin on the old homestead where our family have lived for generations? Why, she has already transformed it in her own imagination into a modern gingerbread villa, such as I should be ashamed of. What with one thing and another, if she had her own will, my poor ghost, if it ever came back, would not find its way from the parlour to the kitchen." "We might add a restraining clause to prevent such a catastrophe," said the lawyer, demurely.

"I won't trust to your patches and mendings. I'll have a new will at once, and if you will not undertake to make it, another will. Say out that you won't, and I know what to do. Etta Lacy shall never have Deane Hall."

"What do you propose to do for her?" Mr. Rivers looked angrily at his interrogator, but made no reply.

"And your wife, Mr. Rivers; are there no recollections of happy days to hold you back from unkindness towards her only child?"

"My wife only lived with me four years. Had it been a score there might have been something to think about; habit is second nature. And she might have been very useful now that I require help. But she was taken away early, and was a poor, ailing thing while she lived. I was always kind to her when she was here, no one can deny that, and I don't see that she had a right to expect more."

If Mr. Rivers from physical infirmity articulated slowly, there was no sign of hesitation on his hard face, but a stiff, dogged resolve to keep to his own opinions. There was no tenderness to be awakened, and his promise he utterly repudiated. He acknowledged no link that could bind him to Etta, and when Mr. Nash again endeavoured to speak for her, he lost all patience.

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"Do you wish her to become a prey to some adventurer?" he asked with a sneer; for nothing better could be expected."

A light came into the lawyer's eyes. Though prosaic enough by nature, the outline of a little romance spun itself at these words out of his active brain, assisted, it may be, by the vision of childish beauty that had greeted his arrival. Why could not a union of interests be brought about by a marriage between the young people? The knot of difficulty would then be cut, all parties might be satisfied, and there would be no breach of honour. The idea, once conceived, rapidly grew in importance. His client's stolid countenance showed plainly enough that no arguments would move him from the meditated treachery to his wife's child, and Mr. Nash was well aware that he had no power to prevent it. To a man whom no ties seemed to bind nor the voice of public opinion restrain, there was no further appeal. Whatever a short-lived selfish love had done to make Maggie's life happy at the Hall, it had not

survived her removal, nor passed into one of those sweet and hallowed memories which, like a golden sunset, often beautify the eventide of life.

Knowing that Mr. Rivers would have no trouble in finding some one less scrupulous than himself to carry out his wishes if determined to pursue them, the lawyer mentioned his idea; and proposed to let the young people meet and see what would come of it, suggesting that the olď man's desire to put Ernest in possession of Deane Hall might thus accomplish itself.

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'Might, if there were no other in the way, for Ernest, I dare say, is weak and soft enough to be taken with a foolish little face," said Mr. Rivers, not scouting the notion as Mr. Nash half feared he would do; "but my sister tells me there is a cousin in the case. Besides, I can have no philandering going on here. I want Ernest to shut up his books and come and learn farming. The place will be his in the end," he added, with a cunning smile.

"Reports are not always true. Suppose I judge for myself by paying your nephew a visit before we talk further about making another will?"

To this, after some persuasion, Mr. Rivers assented, charging Mr. Nash at the same time to invite Ernest to the Hall without loss of time.

Mr. Nash went away partially satisfied. The making of a fresh will was postponed, and the advantages of the new scheme were too apparent to be overlooked. Ernest must be made acquainted with them. Mr. Nash did not allow himself to think that he might be putting temptation in the young man's way, and offering a premium for conduct as little honourable as that he had so unsparingly condemned. The proposition was in the interest of both parties. Carried out, it would secure their worldly prosperity, and why not their happiness also? Ernest was a nice personable fellow, honest and upright, and Etta a naïve, pleasing girl, who might be converted into a charming woman. Decidedly Ernest Rivers would be a fortunate man if he could succeed to a good estate on such easy terms. Mr. Nash forgot -as elderly people are apt to do-the feelings of his own youth, completely ignoring a fact, often stubborn to the highest degree, that the heart may have a romance of its own. His own intervention in the affair was, however, checked when submitted to the consideration of Mrs. Nash, whose practical good sense took another view.

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Say nothing to Mr. Ernest about it; give him his uncle's invitation and bring the young people together. Let them settle matters between themselves," was that astute matron's advice. 66 Recommendations from outsiders are likely to have an effect quite contrary to what is intended."

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laurel, and two or three well-grown shrubs. There were hundreds of similar ones in the neighbourhood, hundreds also where the comfort of the inmates depended on the daily toil of one breadwinner.

In this particular cottage it resulted more frequently from the oil of the midnight lamp. Ernest Rivers, the chief support of his mother, had no surer mode of living than by his pen. He was not without certain talent. He wrote articles for reviews and other magazines, sometimes successfully and sometimes not, having occasionally a difficulty in disposing of his wares-not, perhaps, because they were inferior, but because they did not hit the taste of the day. Early disappointment in the prosecution of his career had left him no other alternative than literature or a tutorship. He chose the former, undergoing, with a pretty equable temper, the alternations of success and failure. He was young. Deep down in his heart bubbled that perpetual spring of hope peculiar to his age, ever prophesying that a good time must surely come at last. A few years passed away without bringing any alteration in his life or views, and leaving him still contentedly grinding at the mill. But one day there came a change over his spirit.

Mrs. Rivers, a beauty in her day, still possessed the soft, winning manners that make a woman charming, but was little able to help herself, and her small income was insufficient for her wants. Nursed in luxury, she had never depended upon her own resources. Her husband petted her while he lived, and now her son, with very moderate means at his command, endeavoured to do the same-not very effectually, so far as depended upon him. In spite of all his exertions, their finances would have been pitiably meagre but for a circumstance which, though sorely distasteful to Ernest, added considerably to his mother's comfort.

An orphan niece of Mrs. Rivers lived with them, and to her was committed the housekeeping. She was kind, clever, and devoted. Under her management the cottage was made attractive by more than neatness. Mrs. Rivers had the cosiest drawing-room imaginable, with furniture of the most tasteful description; books and flowers in abundance, and her easy-chair in the pleasantest corner of the room. Such a home could not be the product of Ernest's pen. He knew it well, and chafed under the knowledge.

His cousin, Miss Bellair, possessed an income of £600 a year, and being a dutiful niece as well as the manager of the household, with only an occasional and diplomatic reference to her aunt, she was in a position to contribute largely to that lady's well-being, and did so, drawing freely upon her own money. Ernest was aware of the fact, yet saw no feasible way of avoiding a state of things which to him was galling. There were moments when, thoroughly discouraged, he asked himself if this could be called life. Labour he did not mind, but if the future had nothing better in store for him than his present scanty laurels and ill-supplied purse, it was time to turn to something else. Yet, after all, he could maintain himself,

and literature was his favourite pursuit. He did not like to give it up.

It was not, however, the narrowness of his income that fretted him so much as the source from which the luxuries of the home were derived. If he could supply one-half of the annual expenditure he would not have minded so much, but he well knew how far, with the strictest personal economy, he fell short. However little he contributed, there was no lack, no diminution of comfort, no visible change. They had an excellent cook, a well-spread table, where the silver always sparkled brightly; the damask was always fine, and the dinners were always of the best. He paid the rent, and was never asked for money. Whatever he gave his mother professed to put into the general fund, but was always ready to produce it again if ever it was required. As far as her comfort was concerned, he was glad of every aid, but the sense of indebtedness troubled him.

About this time appeared a challenge for the best essay on "Civilisation, and its effects upon the happiness of mankind." He had not long since obtained a hundred pounds for a compilation on a subject of current interest. Emboldened by his success, Ernest entered the lists. reward fixed was one hundred and thirty pounds, an important sum to one whose talent hitherto had been but little remunerative.

The

"If I win," thought Ernest, "it may establish my name," and the thermometer of his spirits rose at the prospective idea of larger and frequent demands on his pen in the future. He only wanted to insure his mother's independence as well as his own, he said to himself, but in reality he thought more about closing a certain account of obligation that irritated his pride. He set to work, sparing neither study nor painstaking.

Late one evening towards the end of July, he sat at the window of the small room set apart for his use. The others of the family had retired to rest, leaving him with his lamp and papers as usual. Two uninterrupted hours he was in the habit of allowing himself after they were gone to bed, and then it was that his best articles were sketched, if not written. But to-night he was idle. As soon as the house was quiet, the last footfall silent, and the last door closed, he extinguished his lamp and petulantly pushed his papers on one side. Two or three times his thin white fingers put back his long dark hair with a gesture of impatience as he thrust his head out of the window. It ached and wanted cooling, but there was no breeze; the air, heavy with the scent of honeysuckle and clematis, did not refresh him. The stillness was oppressive, the result of a hot exhaustive summer's day. But Ernest's present depression was not in consequence of the weather. The evening post had brought him a letter. He had received it from the postman at the gate unknown to the others, and said nothing about it. It was from the umpire of the essays, and though it accorded him a fair medium of praise, it also told him that, of twenty competitors, he stood only fifth in merit. But Ernest was disappointed. There were so many reasons why it seemed necessary for him to succeed that he could not take his

present failure philosophically, nor yet be willing to impart the news to his mother and cousin. Mortification had also its share in his regrets.

"But why should failure in a mental contest cut deeper than in a physical?" mused Ernest, trying to reason against his feelings. "All our powers, whether of mind or body, are gifts irrespective of merit." But argue as he would, he could not get away from the conviction that mental power more immediately represented himself, such as he was, that inner being which no man shares with another, the beginning, centre, and end of life, and therefore defeat or disappointment in intellectual rivalry was the harder to bear.

"I cannot go on like this much longer; I shall have to solicit a clerkship or emigrate," ran the tenure of his thoughts. "Perhaps I have mistaken my calling, and should do better in that line. My mother would be cared for at home; but how can a fellow succeed who has nothing to start with ?— or I may look out for a tutorship."

Of the three courses Ernest would have preferred the last had he been serious in his desire for change, but he was not. He was only cross and fretful under his failure, because it left domestic affairs as they were before.

The window of his study being near the ground was a frequent and easy mode of exit to him åt all times when he wished to avoid his womankind, whose affection often showed itself in a too careful investigation of his movements and pursuits. This evening it served as an escape, he fondly hoped, from himself into the road, where he might walk off his restlessness unperceived. The gravel crunching under his feet, he was thoughtless enough to tread on the flower-bed border, which ought to have produced no sound, but there was a rustle somewhere, something stirred and broke the general silence. As he was about to open the gate a hand touched his arm.

"Ernest, you have some secret grief; how can we be a happy household if you keep it to yourself?"

"You are mistaken, I have no particular grief," he answered shortly, vexed to see his cousin, whom he thought safe in bed, at his side.

"You had a letter this evening and said nothing about it. I saw the postman give it you. Was it bad news? Have you failed in the competition? Do tell me, Ernest."

To be questioned, examined, and expected to communicate all that concerned him was his home annoyance, and one perpetually recurring. He scarcely felt his own master, and yet he knew not how to thwart these loving women, who were only moved to their unwelcome catechisms by real solicitude.

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the desire of his mother's heart to see Lucy Bellair converted into a daughter; he knew also that such a marriage would save him from many anxieties, and that it was expected of him; nor had he any fear of opposition from the lady herself. But the idea was not agreeable; it had never smiled upon him, and he could give himself no satisfactory reason for his hesitation, except that there was lacking just that difficulty which gives a charm to pursuit, and makes a man value most what is least easily obtained.

"Have you lost the prize? I know you have," continued Miss Bellair, pertinaciously, rightly interpreting his silence.

"I will tell you to-morrow.

Go indoors, Lucy,

and, if you wish to please me, do endeavour to leave me a little more to myself, and try and persuade my mother to do the same. It will make my home happier. You mean well, but I find perpetual interference in my affairs unpleasant."

He spoke roughly, but when she turned meekly away without a word of remonstrance, he quickly repented and tried to efface the effect of his illhumour.

"You are a dear, good, unselfish girl, Lucy, and I am a bear. Forgive me; I am not myself to-night. Go back to bed and dream that you are an angel."

He laid his hand gently on her shoulder, turning her towards the house, and then passed through the garden-gate into the road, at heart as angry with her for such intrusive anxiety as with himself for his unkindness.

Comforted by his words of praise, she returned to her room, resolving to be more careful not to offend.

Notwithstanding late hours the previous evening, Ernest was up early, and chanced again to meet the postman at the gate, and again received a letter in an unfamiliar handwriting. His pulse quickened in spite of himself. What might it be? Some literary proposal? On opening the letter the contents were yet more unexpected. They ran thus:

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Dear sir,-I am deputed by your uncle, Mr. Rivers, of Deane Hall, to request you to pay him a visit as soon as you conveniently can. He is ill and, in a measure, paralysed. He requires some one to assist him in certain matters concerning his property, and has turned his thoughts to you as the person best qualified to give him the necessary aid. The long estrangement that has existed between you will not, I think, operate otherwise than to induce you to accept the olive-branch now held out, and lead you to comply with your uncle's wishes as far as may be in your power. I hope there will be no unnecessary delay in obeying his summons, and that you will set his mind at rest by writing to him when you are able to fix the day of your arrival. Will you kindly apprise me of it also, and call at my house before proceeding to the Hall? The Deanton Station is within twenty minutes of my office. I remain, dear sir, yours truly, GEORGE NASH."

When Ernest had finished reading the letter he was almost overcome with surprise. Of all things that could possibly happen this was the most.

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