Part 13

'What has become of your diamond necklace and tiara? Have you sold them?'

'No, Mr. Herring keeps them for me. I do not want them now. I mean--for wear.'

'Mr. Herring has them!'

'Yes; I asked him to take care of them--that was before I knew they were paste.'

'But, perhaps they are not paste, but real diamonds, Mirelle.'

'What I gave you formed part of the set, and that was certainly paste.'

'Yes, that is true; but it is possible that the rest may have been genuine stones, in which case the value must be great.'

'I do not know, Orange.'

'But, my dear, whence comes the money lodged in the bank? Whence the money that bought all this furniture?'

'I do not know. I have not asked.'

'You ought to know. It is imperative on you to ascertain. Do you think that Mr. Herring has sold your diamonds for this purpose?'

'I am certain he has not. He would not dare to dispose of my mother's jewels without consulting me. I gave them to him to keep for me. I did not authorise him to sell them.'

'Have you any means of which we know nothing?--money not given to my father which you trusted to Mr. Herring along with the diamonds?'

'No, Orange.'

'Has nothing been forwarded to you of his property from Brazil?'

'No, Orange.'

'Then, whence comes this money? I suppose Mr. Herring has spent a hundred and fifty pounds on the furniture. He has lodged a hundred pounds in the bank, and promises you as much quarterly.'

'Yes, it is so.'

'But, Mirelle, do you not see that, in this case, you are living on Mr. Herring's alms! He is not a rich man. I have heard from my father about him. I do not believe he is worth more than six to seven hundred pounds a year, and he is giving you four out of the six or seven--nay, he has given you more.'

Mirelle looked before her. She had not thought of this before. Brought up without care of money, everything she had being paid for by her father, it had not struck her that she was now living on the bounty of one who was no relative.

'It is very good of Mr. Herring,' she said.

'My dear Mirelle, this must not go on.'

'Why not?'

'What right have you to accept and spend the money of Mr. Herring? He is no relative. You have no claim on him.'

Mirelle was uneasy. 'Why, then, has he done so much for me?'

'That is what I ask. Realise what this means. He is impoverishing himself to support you? What will the world say? What must it say? That which Mr. Herring is doing for you he has no right to do for any woman except a _wife_.'

Then Mirelle sprang to her feet trembling; she could not colour over brow and bosom like Orange, but two rosy tinges came into her cheeks. Her whole delicate frame quivered, and her eyes became dull. She placed her hands over her heart, and looked at Orange speechlessly.

'Yes,' said the latter, 'you cannot; what is more, you must not receive all this from a young man without having a shadow of claim upon him. The only claim you can have to justify the receiving of so much is the legitimate claim of a wife.'

'Have done!' gasped Mirelle, holding out her hand entreatingly.

'No, Mirelle, I must be plain with you. In this town it will soon be known that you are being supported in comfort by a young officer, who is neither a brother nor even a cousin. What conclusion will be drawn?'

'Orange,' said the girl, pleadingly, 'I pray you to be silent.'

'I will not be silent,' answered Orange. 'One of two things must be done; must, I say. Do you hear me, MUST. Either you give Mr. Herring a legitimate right to maintain you, or my mother and I leave this place and do not speak to you again.'

'I do not understand you,' said Mirelle. 'Why should you cast me off?'

Orange looked at her, and a scornful smile played over her lips. She was unable to believe in the purity and guilelessness of the soul before her. She thought Mirelle a hypocrite, and as a hypocrite she despised her.

'Oh! you want further explanation, do you? Learn then that it is not the custom in England for a woman of character to live on the generosity of a gentleman who is neither a husband nor a kinsman.'

'I see that I have no right to expect this of Mr. Herring. But he is so good, so generous, and so thoughtful, that he has not considered himself, in his pity and solicitude for me. However, it shall not remain so. I will tell him that I cannot accept his liberality.'

'Or--that you can only accept it when he has given you legitimate claims on him.'

'I will not accept his liberality.'

'What is to become of us--of you--if he hears this from your lips? Remember, we have nothing. We must starve. You--what will you do?'

'I do not know.'

'Listen to me, Mirelle. There is only one thing that you can do. Next time Mr. Herring comes here, if he tells you that he loves you, and asks you to be his wife--accept him.'

'I cannot. Oh, I cannot!'

'You must do it. It is the only salvation for us and for you. Then, no one can say anything to his furnishing you with every penny of his income.'

Mirelle put her hands over her eyes. Orange watched her contemptuously. The girl was very still, but the tears oozed between her slender fingers and dripped on her lap.

'Have you been so blind as not to see that his heart is bound up in you? He has loved you from the beginning, and, you little fool, you have not known it. He has done so much for you because he loves you. He cares nothing for us--my mother and me. He is a good and worthy man. Make him happy. Repay him for what he has done for you. You are not likely to find another who would make as trustworthy a husband. Do not sigh after the man in the moon; he will not come down to you. Mr. Herring is a gentleman, an officer in His Majesty's army; has a private fortune, not large, but enough to support a wife in comfort; and he is honourable, truthful--and soft.'

Mirelle made no response.

'Now, suppose that you refuse him, and tell him, as you are bound to do, that because you refuse him you will no longer burden him for your support. What then? Why, you and we are placed in precisely the same predicament we were in before. We shall have a sale here after all; have to leave this house, and be adrift in the world. Will you hire yourself to be cook to Mrs. Trelake, or shall I recommend you as parlour-maid to Miss Bowdler, for her John Thomas to flirt with in the pantry? This is not all. After everything that Mr. Herring has done for you, you cannot refuse him without being guilty of black ingratitude. Now, what do you say? There seems to me no option as to what your choice should be. But some persons do not know on which side their bread is buttered. Are you prepared to go into service? Shall I write you a character to Sophy Bowdler? clean, obliging, and steady; understands glass and china. There is really no alternative. Remember, also, that my mother and I depend on your election likewise. Reject Mr. Herring, and when you go to Miss Bowdler as parlour-maid, my mother becomes cook, and I, barmaid at an inn.'

Mirelle rose; she did not speak, but left the room with tottering feet, and her eyes so full that, to find her way, she felt about her with trembling hands. When she was gone, Orange laughed.

'Now,' said she, 'the next thing to be done is to bring that other fool here.' Then she wrote a note to Herring, requesting him to come to Launceston, as her mother and she wished to consult him on important business. She added in a postscript, 'Mirelle will be most happy to see you.'

*CHAPTER XXXVIII.*

*A VIRGIN MARTYR.*

In the privacy of her own room, by night, in the little garden house, her favourite refuge by day, Mirelle considered what Orange had said to her. She was hurt and offended by the manner in which Orange had spoken, without quite understanding why. Her refined nature winced before the rough touch of one coarse as Orange, not only because the touch was rude, but because it sullied.

Mirelle believed that Orange was her friend, a rude friend, but sincere. What had she done to convert her into an enemy? She was not a friend to whom she could open her heart, and she had no desire to receive the outpourings of that of Orange. They were friends so far as this went, that each wished well to the other, and would do her utmost to promote each other's happiness.

Orange was the interpreter of the world's voice to Mirelle, the guide through its mazes. That voice was odious to her, nevertheless she must hear it. Its ways were distasteful, nevertheless she must tread them. She knew nothing of the world, except what she had been taught in the convent. She believed it to be wicked and ungodly. The virgin martyrs had been cast to wild beasts, some had been devoured by leopards, others hugged by bears. The world was an arena in which she was exposed, and Orange the rough but kindly executioner who offered her a choice of martyrdom. An angel, a captain of the heavenly militia, with eyes blue as the skies of paradise, had been sent to stand by, and guard many a virgin; but she, Mirelle, must endure her agony undefended, and see the angel stand by one who seemed rude and dauntless enough to fight the battle unaided.

King Alphonso X. of Castile said that, if he had been consulted at the creation of the universe, he would have made it much better; the sisters of the Sacred Heart had intimated as much in their instructions. In the first place they would have made a world without men, and that world would have remained a paradise. Men are the cankers that corrode the roses, the thorns that strangle the lilies in the garden of the Church, the moths that fret the garments of the saints, the incarnation of the destructive principle.

Mirelle remembered how her mother had suffered through union with Mr. Strange. She thought of Mr. Trampleasure, of Sampson--she really knew very few men, and those she knew were not of the best type. There was the Captain, indeed, but he was unattainable, and Herring was at least inoffensive and well-meaning. If she must be thrown to beasts, let her be cast to such a gentle beast as this. Hereafter, only, will there be no marrying nor giving in marriage, and women will be at peace; there, into that blessed country, the men, if admitted at all, will be like priests, wear petticoats and be shaven; above all, will be in such a minority that they will be obliged to keep their distance and adopt a submissive manner. Mirelle had a good deal of natural shrewdness, but no experience of life. Brought up in a convent, the only world she knew was the little world within four walls, in which the wildest hurricane that raged was occasioned by a junior appropriating the chair properly belonging to a senior, and the fiercest jealousies blazed when a father director addressed four words to Sister Magdalen of S. Paul, and only three to Sister Rose of the Cross. When she had gone out, it was on visits to her mother, and there she had met very artificial old gentlemen, and still more artificial old ladies, persons who looked like pictures in illustrated story-books, and talked like the people she read of in the same books. She supposed that her board and education were paid for at the Sacre Coeur. She supposed so, she took it for granted. She considered it probable that those pupils who could afford, paid, and those who could not afford, were received gratuitously. The sisters never mentioned such matters, her mother never alluded to them, and Mirelle had scarce accorded such sordid cares a passing thought. Bread and instruction came to her as food and light to the birds; the birds take what is sent, and do not trouble their feathery heads about the how and whence. Now she was driven to consider how she might live, and whether it was right for her to subsist on alms, and those the alms of a gentleman who was no relation, and how, if these means were withdrawn or rejected, she was to live at all.

After much thought, little sleep, and many tears, she decided that she would accept John Herring.

She had made up her mind. Now, she must obtain command of herself to go through the approaching ordeal with dignity.

As Orange had anticipated, her letter brought Herring to Launceston. He had gone to Welltown, his house in Cornwall on the coast, to look after his business there. He had let the farm, but he had a slate-quarry in the cliffs overhanging the sea, and he liked to keep an eye on it. This slate-quarry had been worked in a desultory manner, chiefly to supply local requirements, but Herring's ideas had expanded since he had seen the rise and fall of Ophir, and since he had embarked in silver lead, and he saw his way to an extension of the business. He knew that Bristol was a port where he could dispose of any amount of slate, if he were able to convey it thither. Below Welltown the cliffs rose sheer from the beach; that beach was a thin strip of sand, only to be reached by a dangerous path cut in the face of the rock. Welltown cove was to some extent sheltered from the roll of the Atlantic by a reef from Willapark, as a headland was called, which started out of the mainland into the ocean, and was gnawed into on both sides by the waves, threatening to convert it into an island.

Herring had a scheme in his head; he thought to construct a breakwater on a continuation of the reef. Then he would be able to bring boats under the face of his slate-quarries, and lower the roofing stone upon their decks. The idea had not occurred to him before, because he had been poor and unable to command a few thousand pounds. But now he had Mirelle's diamonds to draw upon. He could invest her capital in his own slate-quarry as well as in Upaver lead mine, and benefit himself as well as Mr. Battishill. He would look after both investments himself. He would hold both the slate and the lead in his own hands. Mirelle's money would not only be safe, but would bring in rich dividends. Was he justified in acting thus--in speculating with the fortune of another without her knowledge and consent? He asked himself this question, and answered it in the affirmative. Without his seeking, Providence had thrust on him the charge of Mirelle's fortune, and he must do the best he could with it. Her father had done what he thought best, and every penny that had been intrusted to her guardians had been lost. Then Providence had overruled matters so as to constitute him her guardian. He would act justly by her. He was not self-seeking. It was true that the development of the Welltown slate-quarry would improve his own fortune, but this thought influenced him far less than consideration how best to dispose of Mirelle's money. He would sink her diamonds in his slate, not because it was his slate, but because he knew the security and value of the investment. He was working for her, not for himself, to increase her fortune, not his own, to insure her a future, not himself. Thus it was for Mirelle that he was erecting machinery at Upaver and planning a breakwater at Welltown. In the midst of his schemes he received the letter of Orange, and the postscript made his heart leap. He had been too humble-minded to hope. Mirelle stood aloof from him, high above his sphere. She was to him the ideal of pure, beautiful, and saintly maidenhood, to be dreamed of, not aspired to, to be venerated, not sought. She had of late received him with more kindliness than heretofore, had put away her early disdain, and had treated him as an equal. There had transpired through face and manner something even of appeal to him. Was it possible that she had begun to regard him with liking, perhaps even with love? He was so modest in his estimation of himself that he blushed at the thought--the audacious thought--that this was possible.

Herring posted to Launceston, and went at once to Dolbeare. Mirelle was in the little garden house as he passed. She saw him, and knew that the crisis in her life was come. He was admitted to Dolbeare, and sat with Mrs. Trampleasure and Orange for half an hour. The latter had discovered some important business requiring advice, and this was discussed; yet Herring saw plainly enough that this was not of sufficient importance to have made Orange summon him. Mr. Flamank could have advised her equally well. There was something behind. What that was Orange let him understand.

'And now,' said she, 'we must detain you no longer. Mirelle is in the summer-house. She likes to be alone, dear girl, and she wants to see you. You slipped away, on the occasion of our return hither, without awaiting her thanks. She has been troubled at this; she knows she owes you some return. Go and see her; she is expecting you, and angry with us for keeping you from her so long over our own poor affairs.'

Herring coloured. Orange had not a delicate way of putting things. He knew that Mirelle had not asked Orange to act as intermediary between them, yet this was what the words and manner of Orange implied.

He bowed and withdrew.

Mirelle was awaiting him, She had been given time to school herself for the trial. Twilight had set in, and but for the fire that glowed on the hearth it would have been dark in the little room. The fire was of peat, without flame, colouring the whole room very red.

Mirelle rose from her seat and stepped forward to meet Herring. He looked her in the face. She was very pale; the colour had deserted even her lips, but the light of the burning turf disguised her death-like whiteness. As he took her hand he felt how cold it was; it trembled, and was timorously withdrawn the moment it had touched his fingers. His heart was beating tumultuously. Hers seemed scarce to pulsate; it was iced by her great fear and misery, and the strong compulsion she exerted to keep herself calm.

'I am glad to see you, Mr. Herring,' she said. She spoke first, and she spoke, as on a former occasion, like one repeating a lesson learned by heart. 'I was told that you were coming, and I have prepared myself to speak to you, and say what has to be said. You have been good to me, very good. You have done more for me than I had any right to expect. I have no claim on you, save the claim which appeals to every Christian heart, the claim of the friendless and helpless. That is a great claim, I have been taught, the greatest and most sacred of all. But the world does not recognise it; it does not allow you permission to pour on me so many benefits. You have bought everything the house contains with your own money--for me. You have taken the lease of the house, and paid the rent out of your own purse--for me. You have undertaken to find me an income on which I can live in comfort; you rob yourself--for me.'

She paused a moment.

A conflict woke up in the mind of John Herring. Should he tell her all? Should he say that this was not true--he had used her money, not his own? If at that moment he had done so, that event which was to trouble and darken both their futures would not have occurred. Herring was young; he was without strength of character to decide in a moment what to do. He let the occasion slip. He would wait; the revelation could be made later. He did not understand the supreme importance of the moment. He did not realise to what Mirelle's words led.

'Countess,' he said----

'No,' she interrupted hastily, 'do not speak. You must let me say what I want. Il me faut me decharger le coeur. If I had been a nun at the head of an orphanage, I would have said, Give all, and God on high will repay you. Give; no one will deny you the right, and I will accept with joy. I will be your almoner to the little ones of Christ. But, alas! it is not so. I can spend what you provide only on myself, and I do not find that this is right. In the world is one fashion, in religion is another fashion. You see well yourself it cannot be.'

'Countess, will you allow me to explain?'

'No; I need no explanation. One only question I ask, for there is one thing I desire greatly to know. That neck-chain and that coronet of diamonds, have you sold them?'

'No, I have them yet. You intrusted them to me.'

'They are false. Do you know the brooch you sent me for Orange was all of false stones--of paste? I doubt not the rest of the set is the same. Did you know this?'

'Certainly not. I have not examined and proved the stones. I had no suspicion that they were not genuine.'

'My father sent the set as a present to my mother,' said Mirelle, 'and they were of paste.'

Herring was surprised.

'This cannot be, Countess; your father was a diamond merchant, and knew perfectly the false from the true. He could not have sent your mother what was worthless. The stones must have been changed later.'

'They were in my mother's keeping,' said Mirelle.

That was answer enough. Her father might be guilty of a mean act; her mother, never.

Herring had his own opinion, but he had the prudence not to express it.

'But enough about this,' Mirelle went on. 'I only asked for this reason. If you had sold my stones, supposing them to be real, and had used them to relieve me and the Trampleasures in the moment of our need, when we had not a house to cover our heads, I should have been very, very thankful.'

She said this with an involuntary sigh, and with such an intense expression of earnestness that Herring caught the words up, and said eagerly:--

'Do you mean this? Do you mean that you would have thanked me if I had sold your diamonds and used the proceeds to relieve your necessities?'

'Yes, I do mean this.'

'Why did you not ask me to do this?'

'Because I supposed the stones were paste, and worthless.'

'Tell me, dear Countess Mirelle, if you had confided diamonds to me, knowing them to be diamonds, you would not be angry with me for selling them for this very purpose--to provide you with the means of living yourself, and of returning the kindness shown you by Mrs. Trampleasure and her daughter?'

'I would go down on my knees to thank you. I would be full of gratitude to you.'

He breathed freely; he had received his absolution. He had been justified in acting as he had done; Mirelle had approved of his conduct with her own lips. He had carried out her wishes. It was unnecessary for him to tell her all, now that he was certain that he acted as she would have him act.

But he did not read her heart. He did not understand the real significance of her words. She would indeed have been thankful to know that she had received her own money, so as to be free from all obligations to him--so as not to be forced to take the step the thought of which killed the life out of her heart. That hope was gone--a poor hope, but still a hope. Nothing remained for her but the surrender; she must become a sacrifice.

'It was not so,' she went on sadly, 'I knew it was not so, for you would not have parted with my mother's set of stones without consulting me. No, Mr. Herring, I have not the poor pride of knowing I am my own mistress, and independent of every one. You have been to me a generous friend and a guardian when I needed assistance and protection.'

'Dear Countess Mirelle, I am ready still to act as your friend, your guardian, and your protector.'

'I know it, Mr. Herring, and I frankly accept your offer. I am willing that you should continue such for the rest of my life.'

'Countess!' Herring's voice shook; 'how happy, how proud you make me!'