Verner's Pride. Henry Wood
since then. Mr. Verner is not sixty, and he thinks that age is young for the disorder that has fastened on him. It is no hurried disorder; he may live for years yet; but the end, when it does come, will be tolerably sudden: and that he knows. It is water on the chest. He is a little man with light eyes; very much like what his father was before him: but not in the least like his late brother Sir Lionel, who was a very fine and handsome man. He has a mild, pleasing countenance: but there arises a slight scowl to his brow as he turns hastily round at a noisy interruption.
Some one had burst into the room—forgetting, probably, that it was the quiet room of an invalid. A tall, dark young man, with broad shoulders and a somewhat peculiar stoop in them. His hair was black, his complexion sallow; but his features were good. He might have been called a handsome man, but for a strange, ugly mark upon his cheek. A very strange-looking mark indeed, quite as large as a pigeon's egg, with what looked like radii shooting from it on all sides. Some of the villagers, talking familiarly among themselves, would call it a hedgehog, some would call it a "porkypine"; but it resembled a star as much as anything. That is, if you can imagine a black star. The mark was black as jet; and his pale cheek, and the fact of his possessing no whiskers, made it all the more conspicuous. He was born with the mark; and his mother used to say—But that is of no consequence to us. It was Frederick Massingbird, the present Mrs. Verner's younger son.
"Roy has come up, sir," said he, addressing Mr. Verner. "He says the Dawsons have turned obstinate and won't go out. They have barricaded the door, and protest that they'll stay, in spite of him. He wishes to know if he shall use force."
"No," said Mr. Verner. "I don't like harsh measures, and I will not have such attempted. Roy knows that."
"Well, sir, he waits your orders. He says there's half the village collected round Dawson's door. The place is in a regular commotion."
Mr. Verner looked vexed. Of late years he had declined active management on his estate; and, since he grew ill, he particularly disliked being disturbed with details.
"Where's Lionel?" he asked in a peevish tone.
"I saw Lionel ride out an hour ago. I don't know where he is gone."
"Tell Roy to let the affair rest until to-morrow, when Lionel will see about it. And, Frederick, I wish you would remember that a little noise shakes me: try to come in more quietly. You burst in as if my nerves were as strong as your own."
Mr. Verner turned to his fire again with an air of relief, glad to have got rid of the trouble in some way, and Frederick Massingbird proceeded to what was called the steward's room, where Roy waited. This Roy, a hard-looking man with a face very much seamed with the smallpox, was working bailiff to Mr. Verner. Until within a few years he had been but a labourer on the estate. He was not liked among the poor tenants, and was generally honoured with the appellation "Old Grips," or "Grip Roy."
"Roy," said Frederick Massingbird, "Mr. Verner says it is to be left until to-morrow morning. Mr. Lionel will see about it then. He is out at present."
"And let the mob have it all their own way for to-night?" returned Roy angrily. "They be in a state of mutiny, they be; a-saying everything as they can lay their tongues to."
"Let them say it," responded Frederick Massingbird. "Leave them alone, and they'll disperse quietly enough. I shall not go in to Mr. Verner again, Roy. I caught it now for disturbing him. You must let it rest until you can see Mr. Lionel."
The bailiff went off, growling. He would have liked to receive carte-blanche for dealing with the mob—as he was pleased to term them—between whom and himself there was no love lost. As he was crossing a paved yard at the back of the house, some one came hastily out of the laundry in the detached premises to the side, and crossed his path.
A very beautiful girl. Her features were delicate, her complexion was fair as alabaster, and a bright colour mantled in her cheeks. But for the modest cap upon her head, a stranger might have been puzzled to guess at her condition in life. She looked gentle and refined as any lady, and her manners and speech would not have destroyed the illusion. She may be called a protégée of the house, as will be explained presently; but she acted as maid to Mrs. Verner. The bright colour deepened to a glowing one when she saw the bailiff.
He put out his hand and stopped her. "Well, Rachel, how are you?"
"Quite well, thank you," she answered, endeavouring to pass on. But he would not suffer it.
"I say, I want to come to the bottom of this business between you and Luke," he said, lowering his voice. "What's the rights of it?"
"Between me and Luke?" she repeated, turning upon the bailiff an eye that had some scorn in it, and stopping now of her own accord. "There is no business whatever between me and Luke. There never has been. What do you mean?"
"Chut!" cried the bailiff. "Don't I know that he has followed your steps everywhere like a shadder; that he has been ready to kiss the very ground you trod on? And right mad I have been with him for it. You can't deny that he has been after you, wanting you to be his wife."
"I do not wish to deny it," she replied. "You and the whole world are quite welcome to know all that has passed between me and Luke. He asked to be allowed to come here to see me—to 'court' me, he phrased it—which I distinctly declined. Then he took to following me about. He did not molest me, he was not rude—I do not wish to make it out worse than it was—but it is not pleasant, Mr. Roy, to be followed whenever you may take a walk. Especially by one you dislike."
"What is there to dislike in Luke?" demanded the bailiff.
"Perhaps I ought to have said by one you do not like," she resumed. "To like Luke, in the way he wished, was impossible for me, and I told him so from the first. When I found that he dodged my steps, I spoke to him again, and threatened that I should acquaint Mr. Verner. I told him, once for all, that I could not like him, that I never would have him; and since then he has kept his distance. That is all that has ever passed between me and Luke."
"Well, your hard-heartedness has done for him, Rachel Frost. It has drove him away from his native home, and sent him, a exile, to rough it in foreign lands. You may fix upon one as won't do for you and be your slave as Luke would. He could have kept you well."
"I heard he had gone to London," she remarked.
"London!" returned the bailiff slightingly. "That's only the first halt on the journey. And you have drove him to it!"
"I can't help it," she replied, turning to the house. "I had no natural liking for him, and I could not force it. I don't believe he has gone away for that trifling reason, Mr. Roy. If he has, he must be very foolish."
"Yes, he is foolish," muttered the bailiff to himself, as he strode away. "He's a idiot, that's what he is! and so be all men that loses their wits a-sighing after a girl. Vain, deceitful, fickle creatures, the girls be when they're young; but once let them get a hold on you, your ring on their finger, and they turn into vixenish, snarling women! Luke's a sight best off without her."
Rachel Frost proceeded indoors. The door of the steward's room stood open, and she turned into it, fancying it was empty. Down on a chair sat she, a marked change coming over her air and manner. Her bright colour had faded, her hands hung down listless; and there was an expression on her face of care, of perplexity. Suddenly she lifted her hands and struck her temples, with a gesture that looked very like despair.
"What ails you, Rachel?"
The question came from Frederick Massingbird, who had been standing at the window behind the high desk, unobserved by Rachel. Violently startled, she sprang up from her seat, her face a glowing crimson, muttering some disjointed words, to the effect that she did not know anybody was there.
"What were you and Roy discussing so eagerly in the yard?" continued Frederick Massingbird. But the words had scarcely escaped his lips, when the housekeeper, Mrs. Tynn, entered the room. She had a mottled face and mottled arms, her sleeves just now being turned up to the elbow.
"It was nothing particular, Mr. Frederick," replied Rachel.
"Roy is gone, is he not?" he continued to Rachel.
"Yes, sir."
"Rachel," interposed the housekeeper, "are