The Trials of the Tredgolds.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "A PRODIGAL SON," &c.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

A DEBT OF VENGEANCE.

THERE is always some risk of failure attendant upon a project which aims to give enjoyment to one's friends by taking them by surprise. Coming upon them suddenly after a prolonged separation, it is easy enough to succeed in startling, but we cannot be equally sure of conferring pleasure upon them. A safer plan is certainly to give timely warning and prearrange meetings, so that both parties to the treaty of friendship may come together having had opportunity to subside into a fitting state of mind, and prepared to resume their understanding with each other upon the same terms of intimate friendliness upon which they parted. This is so busy a world, events come crowding on in such quick succession, that men imperceptibly, and without intention, undergo an inevitable process of change, induced by the new crop which each day brings forth of hopes and thoughts and plans to occupy and divert ; and it is not, therefore, simply a question of time which has to be considered in the case of separation from our friends. Who has not felt the difficulty of taking up again, precisely at the point at which it was quitted, a friendship which unavoidable circumstances have for a long time suspended? Who has failed to perceive that, during the unfortunate interval, many ties that erst seemed substantial enough have completely worn away; others have become terribly unravelled, or tried to the uttermost by the strain put upon them; and that altogether there is very much work to be done over again? It is not a comfortable reflection, perhaps, that the love or the friendship which can withstand the trials of time and separation is exceedingly rare. We must carry the charge to the debit of our human frailty: although that side of the account is already heavy enough, in all conscience.

The meeting of Noel and his three friends, travellers from the northwest, was friendly enough; they interchanged cordial greetings; and yet on both sides was a feeling that verged in some way upon disappointment. Noel could not but be sensible that about the arrival of his old associates at such a moment there was something inopportune, all things considered; while, on the other hand, Mr. Puckle and his companions were conscious that their coming was to some extent a failure -had not conferred either upon themselves or the subject of their visit the gratification they had anticipated. The three excursionists agreed among themselves, grieving the while, that "the laddie" was rather constrained in manner; wore a preoccupied, a suffering air; had lost his old, bright, frank, gladsome look; that, in short, there was something decidedly wrong about him.

; one

"His hand was very feverish," Williams the doctor observed,— 'very feverish indeed. I noticed it directly. And he's lost flesh can see that at a glance. He's been working too hard, perhaps; and I don't like that sort of hungry look he's got-it's a bad sign; and he's no appetite, not a bit. I watched him at breakfast. He drank his tea eagerly, but he didn't touch a morsel of food. But I think I could soon put him right, if he'd let me. I could make him up a pill, to be taken at night—”

"I'm sorry we didn't keep him down in Wales," Cluny Puckle interrupts. "He was hearty enough there; but now he's very peakishlooking, certainly. He's as white and as lean as any Cockney of them all. But I never thought much good would come of his graving images up here in town. As for pills, Williams, no, thank you; I say, a stiff tumbler or two of whisky-toddy, real Glenlivat, boiling hot, the last thing before he gets into bed."

The curate said nothing, though perhaps he too had a remedy to propose, and was bethinking him of a chapter or two in a certain Book, full of sure and exquisite consolation, which he would have had Noel read diligently, and devoutly lay to heart. He had watched the young man with tender, thoughtful eyes, and had assured himself that his old pupil's malady was of the mind rather than the body.

The lofty-mannered footman in Cumberland Crescent was not much given to emotion; prided himself rather upon his apathy, and nonliability to external influences. Yet even he was much perturbed when a knock at the door, very late at night, summoned him to admit his master, faint and trembling, leaning for support against one of the pillars of the portico.

66

Help me into the library, Joseph. Is any one up?"

"Missus has retired, sir. Miss Clare is in the drawing-room."

"Tell her to come to me at once," Mr. Gifford said, speaking with a sort of gasp.

It was with difficulty he could walk across the hall to the library. He sank into his easy-chair, leaning back, panting for breath. Soon Clare was with him.

"What is the matter?" she inquired anxiously, as she twined her arms round him. "You are not well, papa; you are quite cold.”

"It is nothing, Clare-nothing; a little cramped and chilled, that's all. I hardly thought I should find you up, Clare."

"I could not go to bed until I had seen you. What is the matter? Tell me. Have you had bad news of—of Herbert? Have you any news of him ?"

Not unnaturally she attributed Mr. Gifford's state of agitation to some new discovery touching the misconduct of his son. Of Herbert's unfortunate marriage she was well aware. The runaway had left behind him a letter addressed to Clare; it informed her in tolerably coherent

terms of the rash step he purposed to take, beseeching her, his “dearest sister," as he called her, to do all in her power in the way of intercession on his behalf to obtain Mr. Gifford's pardon, or at least his forbearance. Clare had not hesitated to undertake, for Herbert's sake, the painful duty imposed upon her. But Mr. Gifford had stopped her peremptorily at the outset; he declined all conversation with regard to Herbert's flight and clandestine marriage. The subject, therefore, had been a sealed one in the drawing-room. Not so in the kitchen, you may be sure, although there was not in that region much genuine information. about the matter. Still, Mr. Herbert's absence had been canvassed freely enough, with a vivid appreciation of the mysterious and marvellous, on the part of the lofty-mannered footman and his fellow-domestics, that did them infinite credit.

"Yes, I can tell you, now," said Mr. Gifford. "I knew before, but I wished to spare you. It little avails now, however. Herbert has brought shame upon us, as you know, Clare. He has fled, after contracting a disgraceful marriage; he is in Paris with his wife, the daughter of William Moyle, my discharged servant. He has brought shame upon usshame; yes, and worse than that,—ruin !”

"Ruin ?" cried Clare.

"Yes, Clare. He has committed a forgery upon the firm; he has given acceptances to a large amount-larger than, at such a time as this, I can possibly hope to meet. But justice shall be done; the law shall take its course. It is due to my other creditors that this should be so. He must prepare to pay the penalty of his crime. He is no longer a son of mine; he has disobeyed me, and I cast him off. He is no more to me now than any other man who has committed an offence against justice. He has sinned; and he must suffer."

“No, no, papa; not so.

him ?"

"It is not possible, Clare.

You will be more merciful; you will spare

It is due to others—”

“But I am rich, papa; I have a fortune. Count it as yours, or Herbert's. Let it go to meet these forgeries, and spare him. Think how young he is. He has been the victim of others; he has fallen into some cruel snare. He would not have done this of himself, be sure he would

not."

"My poor Clare," Mr. Gifford said, in a low hoarse voice, "you have a noble heart; but this money of yours-can you bear to hear it? indeed I did not mean to wrong you-but-it has gone with the rest; it has been swept away, involved in my misfortunes. The firm has stopped payment. Ruin has been impending some time. Do what I could, this was not to be averted. Pity me, Clare, if you can. I am bankrupt !” And he covered his face with his cold, thin, shaking hands. “I am bankrupt, Clare,” he repeated; “and I have robbed you, my poor child, of every thing that you possessed. All has gone.”

She was silent for a moment, pale, frightened by his deep emotion;

then she gently drew away his hands from his face, and kissed him, as she said, in a low voice,

"You did rightly; it was yours, papa. If you had spoken a word, I should have given all up to you. But there was no need to speak Let it go. I wish it could have been of more service to you.

about it. Let it go.

I wish I had more to give you. Don't speak of this again; don't think of it."

"You can pardon me, Clare ?"

"Do not ask me; do not think of asking me. You know I do." "God bless you, Clare!"

"But Herbert? You will not bring this dreadful charge against poor Herbert? You will be silent? You will not accuse your own son ?" He did not speak; indeed, it seemed that he could not. He was leaning back, with closed eyes, gasping for breath, with the waxen whiteness of death upon his face.

Clare was terribly alarmed; she rang the bell for assistance; for a moment she feared that he was dying. Presently, however, he rallied a little.

"My poor Clare," he said faintly, speaking with great difficulty, "whatever you may be told of me, whatever rumours you may hear, think as well of me as you can. Promise me you will. The world will raise its voice against me: will you be deaf to all that it may say? Try, Clare dearest, try to think well of me always."

"Indeed, indeed, I will!"

"Dear Clare, you have been as my own daughter to me. We have always been friends, Clare; haven't we? God bless you, Clare; you are a dear, good girl. God bless you, Clare!"

He tried to raise her hand to his lips. He was not equal to the effort, however; a dead faintness came over him.

A doctor was at once sent for; but his presence gave Clare no great comfort. She read upon his face too sure evidence of anxiety and alarm. The patient was to be carried up-stairs as gently and tenderly as could be, to his bedroom on the second-floor; yet even this order could not be wholly complied with. It was thought more prudent to stop half way, at the drawing-room; and a bed was made up on Mrs. Gifford's sofa. The motion of the journey up-stairs was more than the sufferer could bear. The least shock, one accidental jolt, and the pulsing of his poor, fluttering, aching heart might be stopped for ever. That piece of human mechanism was cruelly out of gear. He was insensible, yet still he breathed-ever so feebly. His eyes were closed; his face was of an ashen gray; his lips, parted as though gasping for breath, were of a faint purple hue; his hands were stone cold, and his finger-nails of a blue tinge.

The doctor could do nothing but prescribe extraordinary care. The patient was not to be disturbed in any way; was not to be spoken to or seen by any one; the house was to be kept as quiet as possible; no noise whatever was to be permitted, not so much as the loud closing of

a door or the creaking of a shoe; the knocker was to be tied up, and tan or straw laid down thickly in the street; all organs were to be sent away at any cost, and the neighbours were to be entreated not to play their pianos, and to stir their fires as gently as might be. In his present condition the very slightest excitement might be fatal to the invalid.

The night brought no change. Clare sat by the side of the sofa, wearily watching, speaking never a word, but now and then wiping the sufferer's clammy forehead with her handkerchief, or touching, with a light caress, his thin, cold, relaxed hands. The golden head was bowed beneath a deep sorrow. She had until quite recently lived so happily, had had so slight an experience of grief, that now the sunshine seemed to have gone from her path in life, and a dense cloud overshadowed it.

She had loved Richard Gifford. She had felt to him ever as a daughter to a father. He had been cold, distant, harsh even, to others; but not to her. From the first he had rendered homage to her beauty and her goodness. Disappointed in his son Herbert, in his dulness, his vacillation, his feebleness of character, it indeed seemed as though Mr. Gifford had revenged himself in a way by the increase of his affection for Clare. He had thoroughly appreciated her. He had taken a pleasure in submitting himself almost absolutely to her will, in indulging ever her caprices, in abandoning even his wonted rigidity and sternness in her presence. This may have arisen from a sort of involuntary estimation of what was graceful and refined and elegant; or it may have been from a human longing to attach to himself, in spite of all the want of principle, the selfishness, the shameful cruelty that had marked his career, the calm, strong affection of one good, pure, Christian heart. He had sought to compound for much wrong done to others by the kindliness of his treatment of Clare. True, he had planned her marriage with Herbert; at one time he would possibly have sanctioned her union with Clement Buckhurst, convinced the while of his worthlessness. But he was inclined greatly to underrate the disadvantages of marriages which were the result of convenience rather than love; he deemed the reputed miseries of such unions a matter of sentimental exaggeration. He had been twice married himself, each time for interested and commercial motives, and had not been unhappy; and he had had an object to serve in procuring for Clare a husband who would have been of an accommodating nature; who would have made no very strict inquiries as to certain dealings with the trust-moneys in which she was interested, -dealings which would not bear very close investigation. This was all altered now, however. The crash had come. Clare's fortune had disappeared for ever, drawn in and lost in the total wreck and sinking of the old-established firm of Fordyce and Fordyce.

He had stood between her and Noel Tredgold. Never had he been so cruel to her as then. But could she remember this when he lay beside her senseless, dying; when perhaps from those pallid lips sound would never issue more? Could she now weigh this one act of severity