Part 9

Much relieved her mistress answered,—

“Of course. There ain’t much harm in ’em, is there?”

“Not to _look_ at,” replied the cautious handmaiden. “But I suppose the wickedness is in playing with them.”

“Not a bit. There never was a better man than my husband, and me an’ him played cribbage every night of our lives.”

Susan never took her eyes off the King and Ace which she still held. She was fascinated. She had even forgotten about her new bonnet. She said in a dreamy, half-conscious sort of way,—

“I believe it must be in the playing the wickedness is. I would like to see what it is. Will you show me—so that I may avoid it?”

Never in her life did Mrs. Gillison comply more willingly with a request.

“Of course, my dear, of course. Sit down opposite me there. Pick ’em all up. That’s right. Now hand ’em to me. This is the way we shuffle. D’ye see? And that’s the way we cut. There’s no harm in that, is there? Now run an’ fetch the cribbage board off my chest of drawers. It’s a long board with ivory in it, an’ a lot of little holes at the side. Run along.”

In another half hour Susan had begun to master the intricacies of the game, and was pegging away with an ardour which astonished even Mrs. Gillison, who was delighted at this new departure. The last words she said to herself as she turned into bed were,—

“What a treasure that girl is to be sure!”

Strange to relate the following evening found Mrs. Gillison and Susan Copeland sitting at the same table with the same cribbage board between them, evincing the same determined interest in the game. Susan had quite made up her mind that she had not yet arrived at the sinful phase of card playing.

“I suppose,” she ventured on this occasion, “that the sin of it is when you play for money.”

“I don’t see no sin in playin’ for money. Me an’ my husband always played sixpence a game.”

“Suppose—suppose,” said Susan, doubtfully, “that we try—just to see.”

Mrs. Gillison was delighted. She was at heart as determined a gambler as ever punted at Monaco. She had now discovered in her Paragon the only virtue in which she had considered her wanting. So they continued their game—only playing for sixpences. When Mrs. Gillison retired _that_ night her last observation was,—

“’Ow that gurl do improve in her card playin’ to be sure.”

And indeed Mrs. Gillison did not do her _protégée_ more than justice. She did improve with rapid strides. The same faculty which enabled her to take away the village school prizes from all comers, now gave her the power of acquiring the mysteries of the pack. In time she began to consider cribbage a somewhat slow amusement, and her mistress, nothing loath, undertook to open up for her the beauties of _écarté_. This Susan considered an altogether more agreeable pastime. And after she had played it a week her mistress on going to bed made _this_ remark,—

“The way that gurl turns up the King is astonishin’.”

It was astonishing. In fact, Susan turned the King up with such success that at the end of twelve months her mistress owed her five hundred pounds which she could not pay. Then it was that Susan discovered the sinfulness of cards. It consisted in playing and not paying. She told her mistress so, and considered that she was only doing her duty as a religious and well brought-up young woman in warning that abandoned person of the danger of giving way to habits of dishonesty. This little monetary difficulty occasioned unpleasantness between mistress and maid. Relations between them became strained. Mrs. Gillison was—to use her own expression—dying for a game of cards, and Susan Copeland refused to play except for ready money. Eventually it became so apparent that the unscrupulous old woman either would not or could not pay what she had lost, that Susan in the defence of her just rights was obliged to call in her legal adviser.

Thomas Ash, still true to his Susan, and pining at a separation so lengthened, had obtained a situation in the London police, and although he had not succeeded in getting put upon the Thornton Heath district he felt that he was near his sweetheart, and could occasionally have an interview with her when off duty. One evening Susan told her mistress that her friend had called, and the old lady, now looking worn and faded, followed her maid to the kitchen, where, to her great surprise and terror, she beheld a policeman of formidable size and severe aspect. She burst out crying and begged Susan to spare her—not to arrest her and she would pay all—she would indeed. Thomas Ash reassured the lady, informing her that he was present in his private capacity to advise, not in his public capacity to arrest. He was present to assist, not to alarm. The advice which he gave was simple and direct. He advised her to sell her house and furniture, and so settle Susan’s demand. The defaulting gambler at first refused, but Thomas Ash put the heinousness of her crime in such a very strong light that she at last consented, and Lambird Cottage with its contents became the property of strangers.

Ash left the police and took a beer house called the “Spotted Cow,” and in due course married Susan. They are greatly respected by their customers, and have shown unexampled kindness to the wretched woman, who tried to rob the gentle Susan. They have, for a consideration paid quarterly, given Mrs. Gillison a home, and she endeavours to prove her gratitude by doing all the kitchen work, mending the socks of the only child, and preparing the linen, for another which is daily expected. Sometimes Susan will lend her six pennies of an evening with which to play cribbage, and they play quite happily till the Paragon has won the pennies all back again.

XXI. _LOVE AND A DIARY_.

YOU will find recorded in a hundred places the history of the flirt, who, carrying her affectation of coldness too far, is misunderstood at last by her lover. He, devoted man, leaves her presence to wander about the world, while she atones for her indiscretion by a life-long repentance. This capricious maiden figures in comedy, tragedy, and farce. She is the heroine of innumerable novels, and her folly and fidelity form the theme of at least one popular song. In this Tale she figures once again; and the only excuse for presenting her is that she appears in connection with a circumstance or coincidence so strange as to appear incredible. It is nevertheless absolutely true.

Those who have followed the red deer on Exmoor need not be told that Dulverton is a hunting centre, situated on the border of Somerset. Such readers will recall, not unpleasantly, the morning bustle in the yard of the “Lion” when there has been a meet in the neighbourhood. The rubbing down of nags, the excitement of grooms, the greetings of red-coated sportsmen. Among those who most enthusiastically supported the Devon and Somerset Stag hounds at the date of this story’s commencement were Squire Arbery and his daughter Kate. She was an excellent horsewoman, and understood the long, precipitous coombes, and knew how to take the deceptive moor-bog, which showed as solid ground to the uninitiated, and was generally in at the death, when the stag, with glassy eye, outstretched tongue, and quivering flank, fell beneath the fangs of the pack.

Kate Arbery had performed in such scenes, times without number, and had invariably succeeded in exciting the admiration of the field. The admiration of one unfortunate wight had developed into a passion. His name was Chilcott. The Chilcotts were hunting men from all time, and Henry Chilcott valued his accomplishments because he believed they would give him favour in the eyes of Miss Arbery. Henry was young and enthusiastic. His brother Arthur, who was two years his senior, regarded the infatuation of Henry as one of the heaviest misfortunes which could have befallen him.

“Take my word for it, Harry, she has no heart,” he would say to him at times.

But the other replied lightly that he couldn’t see how such an anatomical omission was possible, and fell more and more hopelessly in love every day. These people belonged to the same sphere, and opportunities for the interchange of sentiment were frequent. Upon Henry Chilcott the effect of such interchanges of sentiment with Kate Arbery varied. Sometimes he would return to his home elated, beaming, and hilarious. At other times he would come back down-hearted, misanthropic, and despairing. And his brother, interpreting the symptoms, knew that Kate had given him high reasons for hope, or that she had treated him with studied coldness and hauteur. Harry’s nature was a singularly simple and unsuspecting one. He attributed her varying moods to anything but the right cause. But after a year of assiduous attention and of much love-making of the kind when no word of love has been spoken, Harry Chilcott determined to know the worst.

There had been a meet at Anstey Barrows, and after a long and exciting chase the stag was killed at the Water’s-meet on the Lynn. But few of those who saw the stag break were in at the death. Among those few were Kate Arbery and her admirer. After they had witnessed the agreeable spectacle of disembowelling “the stag of ten,” an operation completed with great nicety and despatch by the huntsmen, they rode together slowly in the direction of home—for their horses were by no means so fresh as when they streamed away towards the water from Anstey Barrows. Then he spoke. And she, full of high spirits and the keen sense of enjoyment born of sport, at first bantered her gallant, and then snubbed him. She was simply borne away by a fine flow of animal spirits. He accepted her answers seriously and in silence. He had received his sentence, and he had no right to question the wisdom of the judge. Though she might, he thought, have been less cruelly severe in her manner of awarding it.

The grey shades of evening were closing in by the time they reached her father’s gates. As they were flung open, Kate saw that Harry held his horse in.

“You’ll come up to the house, will you not?” she said.

He answered sorrowfully,—

“No, I wish to say good-bye.”

“Oh! good-bye, then.”

“But I mean,” he said, “shake hands with me. For it is good-bye for ever.”

Had he been a close observer of human nature he would have seen that Kate reddened and then turned white. She recovered herself in a moment, however. He approached her. She held out her hand. He bent over it and said “Good-bye.” She felt a hot tear fall that seemed to burn through her glove. But she only said with supreme airiness of manner, “Good-bye,” and galloped up through the avenue of chestnuts.

Harry was as good as his word. He took the portion of goods that fell to him, and went into a far country. And now Miss Arbery began to evince an interest in Arthur Chilcott, which she had never before exhibited. She made all sorts of excuses for seeing that gentleman, and at last she did what she might have done before, confessed her love for Harry, and commanded his brother to bring him back to her. Ladies do occasionally make preposterous demands of this sort, imagining that it is the duty of Society at large, to repair the evil of their own making. But Arthur was cynical. He professed himself unable to reconcile Kate’s expressions with Kate’s actions.

“I will prove to you that I love him. You are his brother. You shall see my diary. You shall read my confessions. And then you will bring him back, will you not?” she pleaded.

To a woman in her present state of mind, Arthur Chilcott knew that he might as well say “Yes” as anything else. Besides which “yes” is more easily said than any other word in the language. So he said it; and received, with many injunctions as to strict secrecy, the precious diary. It was folded up in brown paper. He put it into his pocket; took leave of Miss Arbery and the Squire, and went home.

Arthur Chilcott, though capable of advising well when consulted about the affairs of others, was not triumphantly discreet in the conduct of his own. And soon after the departure of his brother, he became very badly afflicted with the mania for that species of gambling, which goes by the name of speculation. He dabbled in all sorts and conditions of stocks, and in the course of a couple of years, had muddled away his whole fortune. Chilcott Manor, with the fine grounds attached, had to be brought to the hammer. The pictures, books, plate, and wines were duly entered in the unsympathetic pages of the auctioneer, and Arthur came up to London, to live in chambers, heartily wishing that he had never indulged in any sport more hazardous than hunting the red-deer of Exmoor.

Harry Chilcott, after many wanderings in foreign lands, during the course of which he had never forwarded an address, or any indication of the course of his aimless adventures, arrived in London. He was tolerably well cured of his passion—or fancied that he was, which is perhaps not exactly the same thing. Happening to pass through Holborn one day, he stopped at the second-hand bookshop of Mr. Whalley, and began turning over the volumes that lay higgledy-piggledy in a deal box bearing the intimation, “All these at fourpence.” Of course this intimation did not mean that the whole boxful would be sold for that ridiculously inadequate sum, but that each volume could be purchased for a simple groat. The box contained a miscellaneous and somewhat battered assortment of literary works. There was an odd volume of Swift’s “Letters to Stella;” a “Euclid” minus the title page; volume the fourth of Rollin’s “Ancient History;” three or four numbers of “Blackwood;” a “Book of Common Prayer” with one clasp, an incomplete copy of “The Whole Duty of Man” and—

And! what is this?

Harry Chilcott took up a little book of manuscript. His hand trembled as he opened it and gazed at the handwriting. He turned eagerly to the flyleaf. One word was written there—

“KATE.”

It was enough. He ran into the shop, deposited fourpence, and rushed with his prize to the Charing Cross Hotel, at which establishment, probably for economical reasons, he was staying. He locked himself into his room, and as he read page after page, uttered that scrap of autobiographical intelligence, which at some time or other most of the sons of Adam have felt impelled to repeat—“What a fool I have been!” Against the dates of an entire twelve months were entries in which Kate Arbery confessed her affection; entries in which she admitted regret that she should have teased her lover; entries in which she vowed that she would never marry mortal man unless Harry Chilcott asked her to be his.

Finally he turned to the date of the day following that upon which he had bidden her “good-bye for ever.” And he read thus,—

“(Date.) I have not slept all night thinking of my darling. How could I have been so cruel? He is so patient—so kind. But he did not _mean_ ‘good-bye.’ It cannot be. I _must_ see him. You will come back to me, Harry, I _know_ you will. I could cry my eyes out with vexation.”

And so on.

The infatuated man shut the book, and absolutely shouted with exultation,—

“Yes! Kate, I have got your message, and I fly to your arms.”

Before carrying into effect this resolution he purchased garments more suitable to the accepted lover than the rough, and, indeed, eccentric clothes which he had picked up on his travels. Then he wrote to his brother Arthur, believing that unhappy speculator still to be in the neighbourhood of Dulverton, and the following evening he and his portmanteau were delivered safe and sound at the door of the “Lion.” There was great commotion in the principal room of that famous inn. Indeed, a high carousal was being carried on, and loud songs and louder laughter filled the establishment. Harry was in high spirits himself, and would have joined the hilarious farmers had it not been that the waiter, who conducted him to his room, informed him that the roysterers downstairs were celebrating the marriage of Miss Kate Arbery to Parson Snowe, a ceremony which had been performed that morning in the parish church.

For about an hour the disappointed lover sat silent. Then he took the Diary and wrote in it, “A wedding present for Parson Snowe.” He wrapped the volume up, addressed it to the reverend bridegroom, and trudged to the post-office with it. Arrived there, however, his better nature triumphed. He went back to the “Lion,” and undoing the packet turned once more to the page in which Kate commanded him to come back. He reverently kissed the entry. Then he thrust Kate’s Diary into the flames, and silently watched it burn away to white ashes.

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