CHAPTER XVIII.

AFTER FOUR YEARS.

Writing again--eternally writing! One would think it was Mrs. Jellyby. Confound the scribbling, I say. "Do, for Heaven's sake, put it down, Nellie, and let us have some dinner!"

Thus--impatiently, angrily--Mr. Laurence Thorndyke to the wife of his bosom. It is five o'clock, of a brilliant summer afternoon, a stiflingly close and oppressive afternoon, in the shabby street, in the shabby tenement wherein Mr. and Mrs. Thorndyke dwell. The scene is a dingy parlor--ingrain carpet, cane chairs, fly-blown wall paper, and a lady in a soiled and torn wrapper discovered at a table rapidly writing. A child of two years, a little boy, with Laurence Thorndyke's own blue eyes and curling locks, toddles about the floor. In a basket cradle there is coiled up a little white ball of a baby. The lady jogs this cradle with her foot as she writes. A lady, young and handsome, though sadly faded, her profusion of light hair all towsy and uncombed, her brows knit in one straight frowning line. She pauses in her work for a second to glance up--anything but a loving glance, by the by--and to answer:

"I don't know Mrs. Jellyby, Mr. Thorndyke. Did she write to keep herself and her children from starving, I wonder, while her husband gambled and drank their substance? As to dinner--couldn't you manage to get that meal in the places you spend your days and nights? There is some bread and butter on the kitchen table--some tea on the kitchen stove. Joanna will give them to you if you like. You are not likely to find champagne and ortolans in a tenement house."

And then, the pretty lips setting themselves in a tight, unpleasant line, Mrs. Thorndyke goes back to her work.

She writes very rapidly, in a bold, firm hand, heedless of the child who prattles and clings to her skirts. They are law papers she is copying, in that clear, legible chirography.

For in three years it has come to this. Four tiny tenement rooms in a shabby, crowded street, soiled and torn wrappers, bread and tea dinners, one small grimy maid of all work, a drunkard and gambler instead of her brilliant bridegroom, and law papers to copy all day and far into the night, for the friend of her girlhood, Mr. Richard Gilbert, to "keep the wolf from the door."

"D---- your catlap?" says Mr. Thorndyke, with a scowl of disgust. "I say, Nellie, do stop that infernal scribble, scrabble, and send out for oysters. I haven't eaten a mouthful to-day--I had such a splitting headache this morning, and I haven't a sou left."

"And how many sous do you suppose _I_ have left?" the wife demands with flashing eyes. "I paid the landlord the rent to-day, and I have to buy coal to-morrow. Oysters!" she laughs, scornfully. "I have forgotten what they are. As to your headache--probably if you had drank less whiskey last night, you would not have suffered so severely this morning. What there is in the house you are welcome to. I shall send for nothing."

The lips tighten still more--she goes resolutely on with her writing.

Mr. Thorndyke relieves his mind by an oath and a growl, as he flings himself heavily upon a lounge. His wife writes on and pays no attention. She has grown accustomed to be sworn at--it hardly affects her now.

He lies and watches her with gloomy eyes. Those three years have changed him deepening the reckless, dissipated look worn and aged him strangely. Handsome he is still, but haggard, the brilliant eyes dimmed and bloodshot, the hand tremulous, an habitual scowl on his brow.

"What does Gilbert pay you for that bosh?" he asked.

"About three times as much as he would pay any one else. You see he knew my father, and doesn't care to look on and see my father's daughter starve. Be kind enough not to talk to me, Mr. Thorndyke--I don't wish to make mistakes."

"Day has been when you liked to have me talk to you well enough," retorts, Mr. Thorndyke, with another sullen oath.

"Yes, I was a fool--no need to remind me of it. No one can regret it more than I do. Happily that day is past. _You_ have cured me signally of my folly."

There is a pause. Mrs. Thorndyke immovably writes. Mr. Thorndyke lies sullenly and looks on. At last--

"She has come," he says, abruptly.

His wife lifts her eyes.

"Mrs Liston-Darcy--devil take her! And I am a going to see her to-night!"

Still that silent questioning gaze.

"I met Allison out there--_he_ hasn't cut me if all the rest have; and she is to be at a party at his house. I am going."

"May I ask why? What can you possibly have to say to Mr. Darcy's heiress?"

"I shall see her, at least. They tell me she is pretty. I must own I always had a weakness for pretty and pleasant women. I must own also I never see one at home."

Her eyes flash at the sneer.

"I am quite aware, Mr. Thorndyke, of your predilection for pretty women. Haven't you paid rather dearly though for the fancy? Was the brief society of Miss Lucy West and Miss Norine Bourdon sufficient compensation for the loss of a fortune?"

He rises to his feet, his face flushing dark, angry red.

"_You_ know that?" he exclaims.

She laughs contemptuously.

"I know that; I know much more than that. You did not show me the letter left by Mr. Darcy for you at his death, but you did not destroy it. That