Chapter XL: All's Well That Ends Well (1)

Mrs. Harvey Middleton sat in her boudoir, trying to read a novel. But it failed to interest her. She felt uneasy, she scarcely knew why. The evening previous she had been at the Haymarket Theatre, and had been struck by a boy's face. Ten feet from her sat Tony, with his friend, George Spencer. He looked wonderfully like his father, as she remembered him, and she was startled. She did not know Tony, but Rugg's angry warning struck her.

"Was he right? Can this be the boy I have so much reason to dread?" she asked herself.

She was thinking of this when the servant entered the room with a card.

"C. Barry," she repeated, "wishes to see Mrs. Middleton on business of the greatest importance."

"Ask him to come up," she said, uneasily.

It was the lawyer, as the reader may have suspected.

"Mrs. Middleton," he said, with a bow, "I must apologize for my intrusion."

"You say your business is important," said the lady.

"It is--of the first importance."

"Explain yourself, I beg."

"I appear before you, madame, in behalf of your late husband's cousin, Anthony Middleton, who is the heir of the estate which you hold in trust."

It was out now, and Mrs. Middleton was at bay.

"There is no such person," she said. "The boy you refer to is dead."

"What proof have you of his decease?"

"I have the sworn statement of the man who saw him die."

"And this man's name?"

"Is Rudolph Rugg."

"I thought so. Mr. Rugg swore falsely. He is ready to contradict his former statement."

"He has been tampered with!" exclaimed Mrs. Middleton, pale with passion.

"That may be," said the lawyer; but he added, significantly, "Not by us."

"The boy is an impostor," said Mrs. Middleton, hotly. "I will not surrender the estate."

"I feel for your disappointment, madame; but I think you are hasty."

"Who will believe the statement of a common tramp?"

"_You_ relied upon it before, madame. But we have other evidence," continued the lawyer.

"What other evidence?"

"The striking resemblance of my young friend to the family."

"Was--was he at the Haymarket Theatre last evening?"

"He was. Did you see him?"

"I saw the boy I suppose you mean. He had a slight look like Mr. Middleton."

"He is his image."

"Suppose--suppose this story to be true, what do you offer me?" asked Mrs. Middleton, sullenly.

"An income of three hundred pounds from the estate," said the lawyer. "If the matter comes to court, this Rugg, I am bound to tell you, has an ugly story to tell, in which you are implicated."

Mrs. Middleton knew well enough what it meant. If the conspiracy should be disclosed, she would be ostracised socially. She rapidly made up her mind.

"Mr. Barry," she said, "I will accept your terms, on a single condition."

"Name it, madame."

"That you will give me six weeks' undisturbed possession of the estate, keeping this matter secret meanwhile."

"If I knew your motive, I might consent."

"I will tell you in confidence. Within that time I am to be married. The abrupt disclosure of this matter might break off the marriage."

"May I ask the name of the bridegroom?"

"Captain Gregory Lovell."

The lawyer smiled. He knew of Captain Lovell, and owed him a grudge. He suspected that the captain was mercenary in his wooing, and he thought that it would be a fitting revenge to let matters go on.

"I consent, upon my own responsibility," he said.

"Thank you," said Mrs. Middleton, with real gratitude.

She would not lose the man she loved, after all.

* * * * * * *

A month later the marriage of Captain Gregory Lovell, of Her Majesty's service, and Mrs. Harvey Middleton, of Middleton Hall, was celebrated. There was a long paragraph in the Morning "Post," and Mrs. Lovell was happy.

When, a week later, at Paris, the gallant captain was informed of the trick that had been played upon him, there was a terrible scene. He cursed his wife, and threatened to leave her.

"But, Gregory, I have three hundred pounds income," she pleaded. "We can live abroad."

"And I have sold myself for that paltry sum!" he said, bitterly.

But he concluded to make the best of a bad bargain. Between them they had an income of five hundred pounds, and on this they made shift abroad, where living is cheap. But the marriage was not happy. He was brutal at times, and his wife realized sadly that he had never loved her. But she has all the happiness she deserves, and so has he.

Rudolph drank himself to death in six months. So the income which he was to receive made but a slight draft upon the Middleton estate.

And Tony!--no longer Tony the Tramp, but the Hon. Anthony Middleton, of Middleton Hall--he has just completed a course at Oxford, and is now the possessor of an education which will help fit him for the responsibilities he is to assume. His frank, off-hand manner makes him an immense favorite with the circle to which he now belongs. He says little of his early history, and it is seldom thought of now. He has made a promise to his good friend, George Spencer, to visit the United States, and will doubtless do so. He means at that time to visit once more the scenes with which he became familiar when he was A POOR BOY.

WHITMARSH'S REVENGE.

Roger Blake and Belcher Whitmarsh were both called quite good boys, but for different reasons. As their friends used sometimes to put it, Belcher was liked _because_ of his temper, and Roger was liked _in spite of_ his temper.

Roger was quick to fly into a passion, and as quick to get over it, while Belcher was almost always good natured, but when once really offended remembered the offense like an Indian.

The broad play-green in front of the country schoolhouse, where the boys spent their term times together, was surrounded by trees and rocky pasture lots. A pretty brook ran through it. On the sides of the brook and in the rain-gulleys there were plenty of pebbles and small stones.

One noon, when the boys had begun a trial of skill in firing stones at a mark, an unlucky turn was given to this small "artillery practice" by the thoughtless challenge of one of the youngsters to a playmate:

"I stump you to hit _me_."

The stones soon began to fly promiscuously, and the play grew more lively than safe. The boys became excited and ran in all directions, exclaiming "Hit _me_, hit _me_!" The missiles were dodged with exultant laughter, and the shots returned with interest.

As must be supposed, some of the players were really hit, and sore heads, and backs, and limbs made the sham skirmish before long a good deal like a real battle.

Belcher Whitmarsh was about the only really cool fellow on the ground.

"Come, fellows," he remonstrated, "this is getting dangerous. What's the good of throwing stones when you're mad? It's poor play, any way."

"Ho, you're afraid," shouted Roger Blake, and in this he was joined by several others.

Roger had received one rather hard thump, and feeling quite fiery about it determined to be "even with somebody." He kept on hurling right and left reckless of consequences.

Belcher paid no attention to the derision with which his words were treated. He was preparing, with one or two companions, to leave the playground when he saw Roger near him with a heavy stone in his hand drawing back for a furious throw.

Partly in sport and partly out of regard for the lad aimed at, he stepped behind the excited boy and caught his arm.

Roger whirled about instantly in a great heat. As Belcher stepped quickly backward, laughing, he let fly the stone at him with all his force, crying:

"Take it yourself, then!"

The stone struck Belcher full in the face, breaking two of his front teeth and knocking him down.

Seeing what he had done, Blake sobered in an instant and ran to the aid of his fallen schoolfellow.

"I didn't mean to, Belcher," said Roger, bending over him remorsefully, and evidently afraid he had killed him.

The boys began to express their indignation quite loudly, but Blake made no attempt to defend himself, only hanging over the injured lad, and declaring how sorry he was.

"Come," pleaded he, "try to get up, and let me help you down to the schoolhouse--I'll pay the doctor anything in the world to make you well again."

But Whitmarsh, as soon as he recovered a little, showed that he resented his sympathy as bitterly as he did his blow.

Pushing away his hand spitefully, he staggered to his feet with the help of another boy, and holding his handkerchief to his bloody face moved off the green, sobbing with pain and revengeful rage.

By the time school commenced he had been assisted to wash and bind up his bleeding mouth, when he started for home, giving Roger a look which was very seldom seen on his face, but which meant plainly enough:

"I'll have the worth of this out of your skin some day, see if I don't!"

That afternoon the boys received a sound lecture from the teacher on the evil of throwing stones, and a penalty was imposed upon the leaders in the reckless sport, Roger among them, who, however, in consideration of his penitence, was only charged with a message to his parents, making full confession and submitting his case entirely to their judgment.

Days passed, and everything went on much as before at the school, save that Belcher Whitmarsh was missed, being at home healing his wound.

Every day that his absence was noticed was to Roger's quick feelings like a new condemnation.

No one was more pleased, then, than Roger Blake to see Belcher, after a little more than a week had passed, back at his place in school.

He soon found, however, that bygones were not to be bygones between them.

Belcher not only refused to respond to his hearty congratulations, but showed by his manner and words (hissed through his broken teeth) that so far from forgiving Roger's offense he meant to lay it up against him.

Several times when thrown in close company with him Blake tried to disarm his dislike.

"Come," he would say, "now, Belch, shake hands and say quits."

But Whitmarsh would only answer with a surly half threat, or grin significantly, to expose the notch in his gums where the teeth were gone.

The boys saw this unreasonable dislike, and gradually transferred their sympathy to Roger.

At last the school closed, and though Belcher was not cordial the whole affair between the two lads seemed likely to be soon forgotten.

One day during vacation, as Roger was picking whortleberries with two other boys in a lonely pasture, he was unexpectedly joined by Belcher, who had come thither on the same errand.

It was not noticed that they greeted each other very differently from the usual manner of boys, and during the whole time they were together Belcher behaved himself in a way that made neither Blake nor his companions feel any the less at ease for his company. Least of all had they any reason to suspect that he still harbored his old revenge.

A ruined house, many years deserted, stood in sight of the spot where the boys were picking, and growing tired of their work they agreed to go and examine the old building, and perhaps take a game of "hi spy" there.

As they went over the house they found a trap-door opening into a small vault, which had evidently once been used for the family cellar--for the ancient dwelling was rather cramped in size and accommodations--and, boy-like, they all went down into the moldy hole.

As the last boy was descending the rotten ladder tumbled to pieces under his weight, and the adventurous youngsters found themselves caught like the fox and goat in the well.

Philip Granger, however, being a lad of quick resources, soon hit upon the fox's plan of getting out, which was that each should climb the shoulders of a comrade, and when all but one were safely above ground these should join in pulling out the last.

The plan was varied a little in practice, as it was awkward business to decide who of them should be the "goat."

Phil got up first, climbing over Frank Staples, and then aided his helper out.

Belcher, who had made a ladder of Roger Blake, was performing the pulling of his generous companion toward the opening, when a sudden yell was heard outside, and crying out "There come Dirk Avery and Ben Trench!" Frank and Phil darted away, running as if for their lives.

Seized with their panic, Belcher instantly dropped Roger, and regardless of his terrified calls rushed from the hut in a twinkling.

The jar of the hurried departure of the boys over the rickety floor brought down the trap-door with a bang, and Roger was left a prisoner indeed.

Dirk Avery and Ben Trench were two bad characters who lived a sort of half-vagabond life, rarely doing any honest work, and whose savage looks and cruel natures made them the terror of all the children of the neighborhood.

Their appearance in any place was the signal for a general stampede of the young people who happened to be about. There was not one in our little whortleberry party who was not as much afraid of them as if they had actually worn horns and hoofs.

On this occasion they were out on a fishing tramp, and the contents of a bottle of cheap rum that each of them carried had made them more wicked than usual.

Accordingly, they were in just the mood to take all possible advantage of the fright they had caused, and when the boys fled so precipitately from the ruined house they pursued them with horrible threats and shouts of hoarse laughter.

Frank and Phil ran toward the lot where they had hidden their baskets, the loud voice of Dirk crying, "Skin the rascals! Wring their necks!"

Dirk, however, soon overdid himself, for the two boys were fleet of foot, and saved their breath. They finally got away, with their berries.

Belcher struck a bee-line for home, forgetting his basket, and though Ben gave him a hot chase he succeeded in distancing him.

Poor Roger! For some minutes after he found himself shut fast in the vault his mortal fear of being found by the two roughs left him no courage to cry out, and gave him no time to think whether he ought to blame Belcher or not.

Judging his act by his own feelings then, he could not say but he should have done the same.

But the immediate fright soon passed, and he began to feel the real misery of his situation.

Nobody but Whitmarsh knew where he was. What if he _should_ leave him there, for the old grudge? And then it came to him how singular it was that the one on whom he depended to help him out should be just _he_--the boy who had threatened him.

Wearily enough passed the time to Roger down there in the dismal hole.

Neither shout nor scream would help him. No one lived within half a mile of the house; or if his cries should chance to be heard it might be Avery and Trench, and they would certainly bring him more hurt than good.

Suddenly he heard footsteps. A hand seized the trap-door and lifted it. Belcher Whitmarsh's face looked into the vault.

"Hollo," said Roger joyfully, "I thought you'd be back before long. Now let's get out of this--I've had enough of it, I'm sure."

But Belcher only grinned, showing the vacancy in his front teeth, and replied coolly:

"Want me to help you out?"

"Of course. Don't be fooling now," pleaded Roger.

"Well," said Belcher, "I've thought it over, and seeing you're in there so nicely _I've concluded I won't_. I've an old score against you. Perhaps you'd like to pay it now."

With that he dropped the trap-door, and made off.

He had come after his basket of berries. Would he be heartless enough to go home now and leave his schoolmate in that damp hole, pestilent with mildew and haunted, perhaps, by sliding adders and loathsome creatures?

Meantime the parents of Roger, when the hour passed at which he was expected home, began to make inquiries for him. Frank Staples and Philip Granger, who both supposed he had climbed out of the vault and ran away with Belcher from the hut, were much surprised when asked where he was, and told that he had not returned.

Their story of the encounter with Dirk Avery and Ben Trench made the parents still more anxious.

Possibly their boy had come to some harm at the hands of those drunken ruffians. Would Philip mind going over to the pasture again and showing just where it all happened?

Philip gladly consented, and getting leave from home accompanied Mr. Blake to the lot where they had gathered their berries.

Roger's basket was found untouched, precisely where he had been seen to hide it. Mr. Blake looked pale and Phil began to feel frightened.

"Let's go down to Mr. Whitmarsh's," said Mr. Blake, "and see Belcher."

It was now about sundown, but as the old house lay not far out of the way it was decided to visit it.

No sooner had they reached it and looked in than Phil exclaimed, "The trap-door is shut. I'm sure 'twas open when we left it."

In a moment more they had uncovered the vault and found poor Roger.

Overjoyed, they helped him out, a good deal the worse for the hunger and fear he had undergone.

The story of Belcher's mean revenge was soon noised abroad. He excused himself by saying he meant to leave Roger only a little while for a joke, but his father made him go to Mr. Blake's and apologize for his wanton trick.

We must do Belcher the justice to say that he performed the duty promptly and with apparent frankness and sincerity. There is no doubt, however, that he meant harm--not such serious harm as might have occurred--but sufficient injury to his playfellow to satisfy his malignant feelings and glut his revenge. The spirit he exhibited was the same in kind, although not in degree, as that which makes a man a murderer.

A true man never allows anger to get the permanent control of his feelings. He knows its mean and dangerous tendencies, and remembers the words of Him who spake as never man spake: "If ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."

THE BOY IN THE BUSH.

"The impudent scoundrel! Just look at this, mamma. I should like to see him at it," exclaimed Sydney Lawson in great wrath, as he handed his mother a very dirty note which a shepherd had brought home. On coarse, crumpled grocer's paper these words were written in pencil:

"Master Sidney i Want your Mare the chesnit with the white starr,
soe You Send her to 3 Mile flat first thing Tomorrer Or i Shall
Have to cum an Fetch Her.

"WARRIGAL."

"Sam says," Sydney went on to say, "that the fellow was coward enough to give it him just down by the slip-panels. He wouldn't have dared to talk about sticking us up if he hadn't known father was away. Send him my mare Venus! I seem to see myself doing it!"

Sidney Lawson, who made this indignant speech, was a tall, slim lad of fourteen. He and his mother had been left in charge of the station while his father took some cattle to Port Philip.

Sydney was very proud of his charge; he thought himself a man now, and was very angry that Warrigal, a well-known desperado, should think he could be frightened "like a baby."

Warrigal was a bushranger who with one or two companions wandered about in that part of New South Wales, doing pretty much as he liked. They stopped the mail, and robbed draymen and horsemen on the road by the two and three dozen together. The police couldn't get hold of them.

The note that Sydney had received caused a great deal of excitement in the little station.

Miss Smith, who helped Mrs. Lawson in the house, and taught Sydney's sisters and his brother Harry, was in a great fright.

"Oh! pray send him the horse, Master Sydney," she cried, "or we shall all be murdered. You've got so many horses one can't make any difference."

Mrs. Lawson was as little disposed as Sydney to let Mr. Warrigal do as he liked. She knew that her husband would have run the risk of being "nabbed," if he had been at home, rather than have obeyed the bushranger's orders; and that he would be very pleased if they could manage to defy the rascal.

Still it was a serious matter to provoke Messrs. Warrigal & Co. to pay the house a visit. She felt sure that Sydney would fight and she meant to fire at the robbers herself if they came; but would she and Sydney be able to stand against three armed men?

Not a shepherd, or stockman, or horse-breaker about the place was to be depended on; and Ki Li, the Chinaman cook, though a very good kind of fellow, would certainly go to bed in his hut if the robbers came by day, and stay in bed if the robbers came by night. John Jones, the plowman, whose wife was Mrs. Lawson's servant, slept in the house, and he was too honest to band with the bushrangers in any way; "but then, he's such a _sheep_, you know, mamma," said Sydney.

There was time to send word to the police in Jerry's Town; but who was to go?

Ki Li would be afraid to go out in the dark, and John Jones would be afraid to ride anything but one of the plow horses, and that only at an amble. It wouldn't do for Sydney to leave the place, since he was the only male on it who was to be depended upon, so what was to be done?

Little Harry had heard his mother and brother talking; and as soon as he made out their difficulty he looked up and said:

"Why, mamma, _I_ can go. Syd, lend me your stock-whip and let me have Guardsman."

Neither mother nor brother had any fear about Harry's horsemanship, but they scarcely liked to turn the little fellow out for a long ride by night.

However, he knew the way well enough, and if he did not fall in with any of the Warrigal gang nobody would harm him.

So Sydney put the saddle and bridle on Guardsman and brought him round to the garden-gate, where Harry stood flicking about Sydney's stock-whip very impatiently, while his mamma kissed him and tied a comforter round his neck.

Harry shouted "Good-night," gave Guardsman his head, and was off like a wild boy.

Sydney stabled Venus, his favorite mare, and--an unusual precaution--turned the key in the rusty padlock; and when he had given a look about the outbuildings it was time for him to go in to supper and family prayers.

He read the chapter and Mrs. Lawson read the prayers. She was a brave woman, but with her little girls about her and her little boy away she couldn't keep her voice from trembling a little when she said, "Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord; and by Thy great mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night."

Sydney went into his mother's bedroom and looked at the blunderbuss that stood by the bedhead (Mrs. Lawson had selected the blunderbuss as her weapon, because she thought she "must be sure to hit with that big thing") and he showed her once more how to pull the trigger.

Then he bade her "good-night," and went along the veranda to his own little room at one end, where he locked himself in, and drew the charge of his rifle and loaded it again, and looked at the chambers of his revolver, and put the caps on, and laid it down on a chair, ready to his hand.

When his preparations were completed he said his prayers and tumbled into bed with his clothes on.

Harry wasn't expected home until the next day. He had been told to sleep at the tavern in Jerry's Town, when he had left his message at the barracks, and come home at his leisure in the morning.

About four miles from Wonga-Wonga, the dreariest part of the road to Jerry's Town, begins a two-mile stretch of dismal scrub. Harry put his heels into Guardsman's sides to make him go even faster than he was going when they got into the scrub, and was pleased to hear a horse's hoofs coming toward him from the other end.

He thought it was a neighbor riding home to the next station; but it was Warrigal. As soon as Harry pulled up Guardsman to chat a minute, Warrigal laid hold of the bridle and pulled Harry on to the saddle before him.

"Let's see, you're one of the Wonga-Wonga" (that was the name of his father's station) "kids, ain't you?" said the robber. "And where are you off to this time of night? Oh, oh, to fetch the traps, I guess; but I'll put a stop to that little game."

Just then Harry gave a _coo-ey_. He couldn't give a very loud one, for he was lying on a sack on the robber's horse; but it made Warrigal very savage.

He put the cold muzzle of a pistol against Harry's face and said, "You screech again, youngster, and you won't do it no more."

And then Warrigal took Harry and the horses into the scrub, and gagged Harry with a bit of iron he took out of his pocket, and tied him up to a crooked old honeysuckle-tree with a long piece of rope he carried in his saddle-bags.

"Don't frighten yourself, I'll tell yer mar where you are, and you'll be back by breakfast," said Warrigal, as he got on Guardsman and rode off, driving his own tired horse before him.

Next morning, just as the day was breaking, Warrigal and his two mates, with crape masks on, rode up to Wonga-Wonga.

They made as little noise as they could; but the dogs began to bark and woke Sydney.

When he woke, however, Warrigal had got his little window open, and was covering him with a pistol.

Sydney put out his hand for his revolver, and though Warrigal shouted, "Throw up your hands, boy, or I'll shoot you through the head," he jumped out of bed and fired.

He missed Warrigal, and Warrigal missed him; but Warrigal's bullet knocked Sydney's revolver out of his hand, and one of Warrigal's mates made a butt against the bedroom door and smashed it; and he and Warrigal rushed into the room, and threw Sydney down on the bed, and pinioned his arms with a sheet.

The other bushranger was watching the horses.

By this time the whole station was aroused. The men peeped out of their huts, half frightened, half amused; not one of them came near the house. John Jones and his wife piled their boxes against their room door, and then crept under the bed.

Miss Smith went into hysterics; and Gertrude and her sisters couldn't help looking as white as their night-dresses.

Mrs. Lawson had fired off her blunderbuss, but it had only broken two panes of the parlor window, and riddled the veranda posts; so Wonga-Wonga was at the bushrangers' mercy.

They ransacked the house, and took possession of any little plate, and jewelry, and other portable property they could find. When the robbers had packed up what they called the "swag," and put it on one of their horses, they pulled Ki Li out of bed, and made him light a fire, and cook some chops and boil some tea.

Then they marched Mrs. Lawson, and Miss Smith, and Sydney, and his sisters, and Mr. and Mrs. Jones, and Ki Li, into the keeping-room, and sat down to breakfast, with pistols in their belts, and pistols laid, like knives and forks, on the table.

The bushrangers tried to be funny, and pressed Mrs. Lawson and the other ladies to make themselves at home, and take a good meal. One of the robbers was going to kiss Miss Smith; but Sydney, pinioned as he was, ran at him, and butted him like a ram.

He was going to strike Sydney; but Gertrude ran between them, calling out, "Oh, you great coward!" and Warrigal felt ashamed, and told the man to sit down.

"We call him Politeful Bill," Warrigal remarked, in apology; "but he ain't much used to ladies' serciety."

When breakfast was over, Warrigal asked Sydney where the mare was.

"Find her yourself," said Sydney.

"Well, there won't be much trouble about that," answered Warrigal. "She's in the stable, I know; and you've locked her in, for I tried the door. I suppose you are too game to give up the key, my young fighting-cock? But since you're so sarcy, Master Sydney, you shall see me take your mare. You might as well ha' sent her instead of sending for the police, and then I shouldn't ha' got the bay horse too;" and he pointed to Guardsman, hung up on the veranda.

There was no time to ask what had become of Harry.

Warrigal hurried Sydney by the collar to the stable, while the other men mounted their horses, and unhooked Guardsman, to be ready for their captain.

Warrigal blew off the padlock with his pistol; but Venus was fractious, and wouldn't let him put on her halter. While he was dodging about the stable with her, Sydney heard hoofs in the distance. Nearer and nearer came the _tan-ta-ta-tan-ta-ta-tan-ta-ta_.

Four bluecoats galloped up to the slip-panels, three troopers and a sergeant; the sergeant with Harry on his saddlebow.

In a second Harry was down, and in three seconds the slip-panels were down too.

The waiting bushrangers saw the morning sun gleaming on their carbines, as the police dashed between the aloes and the prickly pears, and letting Guardsman go, were off like a shot.

Sydney banged to the stable door; and, setting his back against it, shouted for help. His mother, Gertrude, and even John Jones, as the police were close at hand, ran to his aid; and up galloped the troopers.

Warrigal fired a bullet or two through the door, and talked very big about not being taken alive; but he thought better of it, and in an hour's time he was jogging off to Jerry's Town with handcuffs on, and his legs tied under his horse's belly.

If Warrigal had not taken up little Harry, most likely he would not have been caught; for when Harry had got to Jerry's Town, he would have found all the troopers away except one. In the scrub, however, Harry heard the sergeant and his men returning from a wild-goose chase they had been sent on by the bush telegraphs; and managing at last to spit the gag out of his mouth, he had given a great _co-oo-oo-oo-oo-ey_.

After that night Miss Smith always called Sydney _Mr._ Sydney; and Sydney let Harry ride Venus as often as he liked.

THE MIDNIGHT RIDE.

It was half-a-dozen years before the war that Godfrey Brooks made a visit to his Cousin Sydney in Virginia. It was his first glimpse of plantation life, and he was not sparing of his questions or comments. Boys in a strange place find it hard to carry about with them the politeness or reticence which are such easy fitting garments at home.

The two boys were standing on the piazza one sunny morning looking down to the distant swamp.

"You mean to tell me," said Godfrey hotly, "that gentlemen hunted their runaway slaves out of the swamp with bloodhounds? Bloodhounds?"

"No, I don't. Gentlemen, of course, do no such dirty work. In the first place, our people (we don't call them slaves) never run away. Why, bless you, old Uncle Peter there, was a boy with my grandfather, and I'm sure I like him a deal better. Of all the hundreds of men and women my father owns, there's not one that don't respect and love him. But there's a class of whites who are not so respected, and when their people escape they bring them back--that's all."

"It's brutal," muttered Godfrey.

"A man has a right to reclaim his property," said Syd coolly.

Now neither of the boys knew much of the intrinsic merits of the question. They only echoed the words and arguments their elders threw back and forth unceasingly. When Syd began to give the details of the late hunt after a runaway horse-thief in the swamp, therefore, Godfrey's moral indignation cooled in the borrowed ardor of the chase.

"You see," Syd said in conclusion, "Boosey was really a criminal of the worst sort, as well as a slave, and he belonged to old Johnson. Johnson's the man that owns the hounds. That's his place beyond the hill. He's a whiskey distiller, and raises slaves for the market. Oh, of course he's tabooed. Even a decent laborer looks down on a man that raises slaves for the market."

The boys went out fishing presently, and Godfrey looked with a thrill of horror into the dark thicket of laurel and poisonous ivy as they passed where Boosey was still hidden. Down in his secret soul there was an idea of the fierce and terrible zest of hunting anything--even a man--with a bloodhound, through that tragic dusk and quagmire. It would be akin to the gladiatorial combats between man and beast of old Rome, or the bull-fights of the plaza, which his gentle Cousin Anne had learned to relish in Madrid.

"What do you say to riding over to Col. Page's to-night?" said Syd at supper. "The girls want to practice some new music before the next party. It's only six now. We can ride over in an hour."

"All right," said Godfrey.

"Remember, boys," said Dr. Brooks, "you are to be at home and in bed by ten." For Syd's father, while he bestowed horses, guns, every accessory to pleasure upon his son with an unstinting hand, yet held a tight rein on him and never allowed him to fancy that he was a man and not in reality a child.

"We'll be home by ten, sir," the boys said promptly.

Now Godfrey was but a schoolboy, and at home only snubbed and kept in place by a half-dozen grown brothers and sisters. This riding out at night, therefore, on a pony, which for the time was his own; this calling on young ladies to whom he was known as Mr. Brooks, of New York, was an ecstatic taste of adult freedom which almost intoxicated the boy. When nine o'clock came, and Syd beckoned him from the sofa, where he was reading "Locksley Hall" to Miss Amelia Page, he rose so unwillingly as to cause Joe Page to look from his game of backgammon.

"It's too bad in the doctor to put your cousin into strict prison regulations, Syd," he said. "I'll go, however, and see about your horses."

He came back with a queer twinkle in his eye. "Sam declares he hitched them securely; but they're gone now. Sit down, boys, sit down. You may as well make the best of it. The fellows are after them. They'll be here by and by."

Syd looked annoyed. "I believe Joe unhitched them, himself. I promised father I'd be back early." However he sat down quietly and waited. Godfrey had no annoyance to hide.

It wanted but ten minutes to eleven o'clock that night when the ponies were brought to the door, and the boys, after many hand-shakings and cordial invitations, were allowed to depart for home.

Then the glow of gallantry and manhood began to cool in Godfrey's bosom, and the unpleasant tremor to take its place which was wont to overcome him when he was late at school.

"I say, Syd, I wish we were at home," he said, mounting.

"I wish we were," gloomily.

"Will your father be very angry?"

"It isn't that. But I never broke my word to him before, never. I know what he thinks of a man that breaks his word. The road is heavy. It's a good ride for an hour and a half," shutting his watch with a snap.

"Is there no short cut?"

"Yes, there's one," looking at him dubiously; "but it's through Johnson's place."

"The dogs--they're not loose, eh?"

"That I don't know. He keeps them chained in daytime, of course, but whether the scoundrel looses them at night or not I never heard. It would be just like him."

The boys rode on in silence. Suddenly Syd drew up with a jerk. "Here's the gate into Johnson's, and I tell you what it is I must go this way, dogs or no dogs. I'm in honor bound to try to keep my promise as nearly as I can, no matter what lies in the way. You can ride down the hill; I'll wait for you at the house."

"No, sir; I'm with you," feeling himself every inch a man at the chance of an adventure. "Open the gate, Syd. Now come on!" and giving their horses the rein they struck into a gallop down the road leading close by Johnson's house and stables. It was so heavily covered with tan-bark that the sound of the hoofs was deadened, and the boys spoke in whispers, afraid to stir the midnight silence.

Syd nodded toward a low kennel, back of the stables.

"There!" he motioned with his lips. "There's where they were when they took them to hunt Boosey."

But kennel and stables were silent and motionless in the cold moonlight.

The tan-bark was replaced by pebbles near the house. The boys took their ponies up on the short velvet turf, on which their swift feet fell with a crisp, soft thud, a noise hardly sufficient to rouse the most watchful dog, but which drove the blood from Godfrey's cheeks. His short-lived courage had oozed out.

"A man one could fight," he thought. "But to be throttled like a beast by a dog." The gladiatorial fights of Rome did not thrill him so much now as the thought of them had sometimes done.

Thud--thud. Every beat of the hoofs upon the grass sounded through the boys' brains. They were up to the kennels--past them--safe. Two minutes passed and not a sound. Godfrey drew a long breath, when--hark!

A long, deep bay, like thunder, sounded through the night.

"God save us! They're loose and are after us," gasped Syd.

Glancing back they saw two enormous black shapes darting from behind the shadow of the porch, and coming down the slope behind them.

"Now, Pitch and Tar!" sang out Syd, "it all rests on you." He shouted as cheerily, Godfrey thought, as though he were chasing a hare. Chasing and being chased were different matters, both the boys thought; though there was a reckless, gay defiance about the Southern boy which his cousin lacked, courageous as he was.

The ponies seemed to catch the meaning of Syd's call. They looked back. Their feet scarcely touched the sward, their nostrils were red, their eyes distended.

After the first fierce howl the dogs followed in silence. They had no time to give tongue; they had work to do.

A long stretch of pebbly road lay before the boys, then there was a thick patch of bushes, and beyond, the gate.

There was no doubt of the horses keeping up their pace. Terror served them for muscle and blood. But the hounds were swifter of foot at any time. They gained with every minute. The distance was about fifty yards.

"Can we do it?" Godfrey asked. His tongue was hot and parched.

"Of course we'll do it, unless the gate is locked."

After this new dread came they were silent. Godfrey thought of home, his mother, and poor little Nell; wished he had not snubbed her as he used to do.

Syd felt desperately in his pockets, where he found only a penknife. Why would not his father let him carry firearms as the other boys?

Suddenly turning to Godfrey he made a gesture, and turned his horse full on the hedge of privet. It leaped boldly--Godfrey's followed. But the hounds followed, relentless as fate, and dashed through the lower branches. They were closer than before.

"The gate! the gate!" cried Syd. He had reached it and fumbled for the bolt. Godfrey, a dozen paces behind, fancied he felt the tramp of the powerful beasts shake the ground. He turned, saw them coming with open jaws, closer, closer.

Would the gate never open? There was a creak and crash, and it rolled back on its rusty hinges. The horses darted through so violently as to throw Godfrey on the ground. When he looked up Syd was standing beside him, and from the other side of the iron bars came the baffled roar of the angry beasts.

The boys rode home without a word.

"What about reclaiming property by means of bloodhounds, Syd?" asked Godfrey.

"It's brutal," cried Syd vehemently, and then he laughed. "I tell you, Godfrey, one must actually take another man's place before he can be quite just to him, eh?"

A THOUSAND A YEAR.

"I am afraid Daniel must give up his studies," Mrs. Brooks said, sadly. "I've been thinking how we are to meet the expenses of another year, and it seems quite impossible to get money enough to do so."

"Oh, it would be such a pity, and brother so nearly through," Susan said, looking up in a distressed way. "He mustn't leave college now, when he is so near graduating! There _must_ be a way of helping him through."

Mrs. Brooks stooped to kiss the pale, tender face upturned to hers.

"You have a wise little head, Susan, but I am afraid there is a problem here you cannot solve," said the widow, mournfully.

"How much will be needed?"

"At least a hundred dollars besides what he will earn himself. You know there are always extra expenses for the graduating class."

Susan's countenance fell. It was a great sum in her estimation, and it was already difficult for them to meet their weekly expenses.

"Everything depends upon brother's success," Susan said, presently. "We must give up everything for him."

"I cannot forget I have _two_ children," the mother said, kissing the girl again more tenderly than before.

"Two children; but only one that will be a blessing to you," Susan said, brushing away a tear.

"Don't say that, Susie. I am proud of Daniel, I do not deny that--but I love you, too, all the same."

"But you never can be proud of me, weak and deformed as I am! Oh, mother, why are some flowers made so beautiful and fragrant, and some so dark and noisome? Why was my brother so fair, so talented, and I so repulsive?"

"No, no, no, not repulsive; don't say that," the widow cried, putting her arms around the girl in a sheltering way.

"Do you think Daniel will let me go to see him take his diploma, mother?"

"You would not be able, dear."

The girl laughed bitterly.

"No; brother would say I was not able, too. But I should be glad, so very glad to see him graduate. I think I would be willing to die then."

"Hush, my darling," the mother cried, with a sharp pain in her voice. "When you are gone I shall soon follow. Daniel will be satisfied with his laurels, but women--ah, my child--women must love something, and you are all that is left me to love."

Susan nestled her head in her mother's bosom without speaking, and lay there so long that her mother thought she was sleeping. Suddenly she opened her eyes and said:

"I have thought it all out, mother. Daniel can graduate, and we will go see him take his diploma. Mr. Green needs girls to braid straw hats. You know I am nimble with my fingers, and I could braid a thousand a year, and that would be how much?"

"But it would be wicked for me to allow you to overtask yourself in that way, darling. I am not sure but it might ruin your health, feeble as you are. No, no, it is not to be thought of."

"How many might I undertake, mother?"

"Not half that amount; not a third, even."

"Would Daniel be willing for me to braid, do you think?"

"I don't know. We will ask him."

"Mother," Susan said, looking into her eyes, "I believe this is my mission, to educate Daniel. You know we have given him everything--my portion of the property and yours. I think I could hold out to do this last, and you will consent when you come to reflect upon what it will be to brother, and to you, when I am gone. But he must not know it. It would wound his pride, and he would get some false notion in his head that he could not use money I had earned in that way. Now, promise me, that let what will come, you will never tell him that I braided straw hats that he might complete his education."

"I cannot promise _never_ to tell him, darling, because I cannot foresee the future, but I should not like him to be humbled and wounded, more than yourself. I am too old to learn readily, but perhaps I, too, could earn something by braiding."

The determination was now fully settled in the mind of each, that the young man must graduate, and that the bills must be met by them. The patronage of Mr. Green was solicited, and it was agreed the work should be taken home, and that a thousand hats should be braided for ten cents each, which he assured them was more than he would think of paying to any one else, and only to Susan in consideration of her infirmity.

We ought, perhaps, to explain that Susan had been early afflicted with a curvature of the spine, which had sadly deformed her. She would never have been a beautiful girl, Daniel having inherited not only all the family talent, but its beauty as well. But her eyes were wondrously attractive, with their loving, yearning persuasiveness, and few could remember her deformity who had felt the warmth of her generous nature.

In due time, the anticipated letter of inquiry came from Daniel, asking what the prospects were for the coming year. It was full of dismal forebodings and egotistical complaints of the hard fortune that made him dependent upon his mother, but there was no regret that she suffered too; no longing to be a man that he might take this lonely couple in his strong arms and bear them tenderly over the rough places of life; only vague, ambitious dreamings of what he was to be to the world, and the world to him.

The widow laid down the letter with a sigh. Susan read the pages over and over again. So grounded was she in her love for this earthly idol that the selfishness was less apparent to her than to her mother.

Its sadness seemed like tenderness, and he could not speak too often or too much of the genius which she believed he possessed, and which would some time break upon the world like the meteor to which he rather tritely compared himself.

"Ah, we shall be so proud of him!" Susan said, folding the letter and laying it away near her heart, where it rested many and many a day, while she wove the strands of straw in and out, thinking how ten times ten made one dollar, and how the dollars would some time count up to a hundred, and that sum, which her fingers had wrought out, would save her brother from discouragement, if not from despair.

The first twenty-five dollars was earned, and the money was sent the brother.

"He was very glad of it," he said. "He had begun to fear lest they would fail him." There was no inquiry how it had been obtained; no solicitude lest those who loved him had deprived themselves of luxuries, perhaps necessities, to meet his demands.

The next twenty-five dollars was earned, with greater difficulty. The widow was awkward at braiding, and her work unsatisfactory, and so some of it was returned to Susan. She sat up later nights, that her mother should not see how hard the work pressed upon her; but the twenty-five dollars came at last, and was sent to the student. Then there was another letter of thanks.

"If you would but rest, darling," the mother would say, when some look more wan than another startled her into keener anxiety.

"When it is done we will rest together," was all the reply the solicitude brought.

It was too late to retract now, the mother thought; and Daniel so nearly through! So they pinched a little from their daily meals, a little from the store of candles, a little from the evening fire, and prayed that every penny might be multiplied like the widow's meal.

One night Mrs. Brooks had gone to bed exhausted and hysterical with overlabor. Susan pressed the blankets tenderly around her mother's shoulders, and having given her the good-night kiss, and quieted her with many promises of soon following her, she went back to the kitchen fire and resumed the weary braiding.

She had not completed her usual task that week, and the idea occurred to her that her mother having fallen asleep, she could braid another hat before retiring. So she set up new strands and the thin fingers wove them patiently in and out, until sharp pain clutched her with merciless teeth, and she leaned forward, her head falling upon the table, in a dead faint.

It was long past midnight when Susan found herself in this position. Shivering with cold, she crept to her mother's side and lay the remainder of the night, racked by alternate fevers and chills.

How could the poor child tell her mother of what she knew was creeping so steadily toward her? Would she make a final effort to save her own life and let Daniel struggle with his fortunes as he best could?

Poor, brave little heart, with the chill of the grave stealing over it, but warmed back into life and renewed suffering by the wonderful strength of its undying love!

Another twenty five dollars was forwarded to Daniel, and a few lines came flying back by the return post, for Daniel was a man of business habits, and punctual in all things.

Susan looked it all over carefully for some loving message to her; some sign answering to what she felt in her own heart toward him, but there was nothing there but "_With love to Susan, I remain, etc., Daniel._"

A dry sob escaped the poor child as she laid it by, and took up the weary, rustling braids. The sound rasped upon her nerves now. The very odor of the strands nauseated her. Every kink in the braids fretted her; and when one hat was finished and laid aside, it seemed such a mountainous task to commence another.

Sometimes hours would pass by without a round being accomplished, then again the nimble fingers would be inspired, and the work would grow as of old.

"If I could only go and see Daniel take his diploma," she would say, "I think it would make me strong again. I would wear my white muslin frock, with the blue sash, and he would not be ashamed of me."

But it was not to be. The one thousand hats were braided, and Susan's task was done. Nothing remained for her but to lie down in her modest casket and sleep with folded hands until the blessed Saviour shall bid her approach to receive His welcome--"Well done, thou good and faithful servant."

Daniel returned with his collegiate honors only to listen to the sad story of her labors and death. His mother told it as they stood by the coffin. There were the worn letters she had cherished, blistered all over with tears.

He was conscience stricken when he looked them over, and saw how cold and egotistical they were, and how thoughtless he had always been of the treasure that death had taken. He took the thin hands in his--the hands that had braided and plaited while he slept, and wrought out the treasure-trove that molded the key to his success, and he made solemn resolutions for the future. Let us hope that, in her broken life, he learned how beautiful in the sight of God and angels is the self-sacrifice of the lowly in heart: and how much better it is to die in the struggle to bless others than it is to live to a selfish, unloving, unsanctified old age.

THE END.

A. L. BURT'S PUBLICATIONS For Young People BY POPULAR WRITERS. 97-99-101 Reade Street, New York.