The two curates became redder and redder as they passed the column of
young ladies. Miss Lindsay would not look to their side of the road, and
Miss Wilson's nod and smile were not quite sincere. She never spoke to
curates, and kept up no more intercourse with the vicar than she could
not avoid. He suspected her of being an infidel, though neither he nor
any other mortal in Lyvern had ever heard a word from her on the subject
of her religious opinions. But he knew that "moral science" was taught
secularly at the college; and he felt that where morals were made
a department of science the demand for religion must fall off
proportionately.

"What a life to lead and what a place to live in!" exclaimed Agatha. "We
meet two creatures, more like suits of black than men; and that is an
incident--a startling incident--in our existence!"

"I think they're awful fun," said Jane, "except that Josephs has such
large ears."

The girls now came to a place where the road dipped through a plantation
of sombre sycamore and horsechestnut trees. As they passed down into
it, a little wind sprang up, the fallen leaves stirred, and the branches
heaved a long, rustling sigh.

"I hate this bit of road," said Jane, hurrying on. "It's just the sort
of place that people get robbed and murdered in."

"It is not such a bad place to shelter in if we get caught in the rain,
as I expect we shall before we get back," said Agatha, feeling the
fitful breeze strike ominously on her cheek. "A nice pickle I shall be
in with these light shoes on! I wish I had put on my strong boots. If it
rains much I will go into the old chalet."

"Miss Wilson won't let you. It's trespassing."

"What matter! Nobody lives in it, and the gate is off its hinges. I only
want to stand under the veranda--not to break into the wretched place.
Besides, the landlord knows Miss Wilson; he won't mind. There's a drop."

Miss Carpenter looked up, and immediately received a heavy raindrop in
her eye.

"Oh!" she cried. "It's pouring. We shall be drenched."

Agatha stopped, and the column broke into a group about her.

"Miss Wilson," she said, "it is going to rain in torrents, and Jane and
I have only our shoes on."

Miss Wilson paused to consider the situation. Someone suggested that if
they hurried on they might reach Lyvern before the rain came down.

"More than a mile," said Agatha scornfully, "and the rain coming down
already!"

Someone else suggested returning to the college.

"More than two miles," said Agatha. "We should be drowned."

"There is nothing for it but to wait here under the trees," said Miss
Wilson.

"The branches are very bare," said Gertrude anxiously. "If it should
come down heavily they will drip worse than the rain itself."

"Much worse," said Agatha. "I think we had better get under the veranda
of the old chalet. It is not half a minute's walk from here."

"But we have no right--" Here the sky darkened threateningly. Miss
Wilson checked herself and said, "I suppose it is still empty."

"Of course," replied Agatha, impatient to be moving. "It is almost a
ruin."

"Then let us go there, by all means," said Miss Wilson, not disposed to
stand on trifles at the risk of a bad cold.

They hurried on, and came presently to a green hill by the wayside. On
the slope was a dilapidated Swiss cottage, surrounded by a veranda on
slender wooden pillars, about which clung a few tendrils of withered
creeper, their stray ends still swinging from the recent wind, now
momentarily hushed as if listening for the coming of the rain. Access
from the roadway was by a rough wooden gate in the hedge. To the
surprise of Agatha, who had last seen this gate off its hinges and only
attached to the post by a rusty chain and padlock, it was now rehung and
fastened by a new hasp. The weather admitting of no delay to consider
these repairs, she opened the gate and hastened up the slope, followed
by the troop of girls. Their ascent ended with a rush, for the rain
suddenly came down in torrents.

When they were safe under the veranda, panting, laughing, grumbling, or
congratulating themselves on having been so close to a place of shelter,
Miss Wilson observed, with some uneasiness, a spade--new, like the hasp
of the gate--sticking upright in a patch of ground that someone had
evidently been digging lately. She was about to comment on this sign
of habitation, when the door of the chalet was flung open, and Jane
screamed as a man darted out to the spade, which he was about to carry
in out of the wet, when he perceived the company under the veranda, and
stood still in amazement. He was a young laborer with a reddish-brown
beard of a week's growth. He wore corduroy trousers and a linen-sleeved
corduroy vest; both, like the hasp and spade, new. A coarse blue shirt,
with a vulgar red-and-orange neckerchief, also new, completed his dress;
and, to shield himself from the rain, he held up a silk umbrella with
a silver-mounted ebony handle, which he seemed unlikely to have come by
honestly. Miss Wilson felt like a boy caught robbing an orchard, but she
put a bold face on the matter and said:

"Will you allow us to take shelter here until the rain is over?"

"For certain, your ladyship," he replied, respectfully applying the
spade handle to his hair, which was combed down to his eyebrows.
"Your ladyship does me proud to take refuge from the onclemency of the
yallovrments beneath my 'umble rooftree." His accent was barbarous; and
he, like a low comedian, seemed to relish its vulgarity. As he spoke he
came in among them for shelter, and propped his spade against the wall
of the chalet, kicking the soil from his hobnailed blucher boots, which
were new.

"I came out, honored lady," he resumed, much at his ease, "to house my
spade, whereby I earn my living. What the pen is to the poet, such is
the spade to the working man." He took the kerchief from his neck, wiped
his temples as if the sweat of honest toil were there, and calmly tied
it on again.

"If you'll 'scuse a remark from a common man," he observed, "your
ladyship has a fine family of daughters."

"They are not my daughters," said Miss Wilson, rather shortly.

"Sisters, mebbe?"

"No."

"I thought they mout be, acause I have a sister myself. Not that I would
make bold for to dror comparisons, even in my own mind, for she's only a
common woman--as common a one as ever you see. But few women rise above
the common. Last Sunday, in yon village church, I heard the minister
read out that one man in a thousand had he found, 'but one woman in all
these,' he says, 'have I not found,' and I thinks to myself, 'Right you
are!' But I warrant he never met your ladyship."

A laugh, thinly disguised as a cough, escaped from Miss Carpenter.

"Young lady a-ketchin' cold, I'm afeerd," he said, with respectful
solicitude.

"Do you think the rain will last long?" said Agatha politely.

The man examined the sky with a weather-wise air for some moments. Then
he turned to Agatha, and replied humbly: "The Lord only knows, Miss. It
is not for a common man like me to say."

Silence ensued, during which Agatha, furtively scrutinizing the tenant
of the chalet, noticed that his face and neck were cleaner and less
sunburnt than those of the ordinary toilers of Lyvern. His hands
were hidden by large gardening gloves stained with coal dust. Lyvern
laborers, as a rule, had little objection to soil their hands; they
never wore gloves. Still, she thought, there was no reason why an
eccentric workman, insufferably talkative, and capable of an allusion to
the pen of the poet, should not indulge himself with cheap gloves. But
then the silk, silvermounted umbrella--

"The young lady's hi," he said suddenly, holding out the umbrella, "is
fixed on this here. I am well aware that it is not for the lowest of the
low to carry a gentleman's brolly, and I ask your ladyship's pardon
for the liberty. I come by it accidental-like, and should be glad of a
reasonable offer from any gentleman in want of a honest article."

As he spoke two gentlemen, much in want of the article, as their
clinging wet coats showed, ran through the gateway and made for the
chalet. Fairholme arrived first, exclaiming: "Fearful shower!" and
briskly turned his back to the ladies in order to stand at the edge
of the veranda and shake the water out of his hat. Josephs came next,
shrinking from the damp contact of his own garments. He cringed to Miss
Wilson, and hoped that she had escaped a wetting.

"So far I have," she replied. "The question is, how are we to get home?"

"Oh, it's only a shower," said Josephs, looking up cheerfully at the
unbroken curtain of cloud. "It will clear up presently."

"It ain't for a common man to set up his opinion again' a gentleman wot
have profesh'nal knowledge of the heavens, as one may say," said the
man, "but I would 'umbly offer to bet my umbrellar to his wideawake that
it don't cease raining this side of seven o'clock."

"That man lives here," whispered Miss Wilson, "and I suppose he wants to
get rid of us."

"H'm!" said Fairholme. Then, turning to the strange laborer with the air
of a person not to be trifled with, he raised his voice, and said: "You
live here, do you, my man?"

"I do, sir, by your good leave, if I may make so bold."

"What's your name?"

"Jeff Smilash, sir, at your service."

"Where do you come from?"

"Brixtonbury, sir."

"Brixtonbury! Where's that?"

"Well, sir, I don't rightly know. If a gentleman like you, knowing
jography and such, can't tell, how can I?"

"You ought to know where you were born, man. Haven't you got common
sense?"

"Where could such a one as me get common sense, sir? Besides, I was only
a foundling. Mebbe I warn's born at all."

"Did I see you at church last Sunday?"

"No, sir. I only come o' Wensday."

"Well, let me see you there next Sunday," said Fairholme shortly,
turning away from him.

Miss Wilson looked at the weather, at Josephs, who was conversing with
Jane, and finally at Smilash, who knuckled his forehead without waiting
to be addressed.

"Have you a boy whom you can send to Lyvern to get us a conveyance--a
carriage? I will give him a shilling for his trouble."

"A shilling!" said Smilash joyfully. "Your ladyship is a noble lady. Two
four-wheeled cabs. There's eight on you."

"There is only one cab in Lyvern," said Miss Wilson. "Take this card
to Mr. Marsh, the jotmaster, and tell him the predicament we are in. He
will send vehicles."

Smilash took the card and read it at a glance. He then went into the
chalet. Reappearing presently in a sou'wester and oilskins, he ran off
through the rain and vaulted over the gate with ridiculous elegance.
No sooner had he vanished than, as often happens to remarkable men, he
became the subject of conversation.

"A decent workman," said Josephs. "A well-mannered man, considering his
class."

"A born fool, though," said Fairholme.

"Or a rogue," said Agatha, emphasizing the suggestion by a glitter of
her eyes and teeth, whilst her schoolfellows, rather disapproving of her
freedom, stood stiffly dumb. "He told Miss Wilson that he had a sister,
and that he had been to church last Sunday, and he has just told you
that he is a foundling, and that he only came last Wednesday. His accent
is put on, and he can read, and I don't believe he is a workman at all.
Perhaps he is a burglar, come down to steal the college plate."

"Agatha," said Miss Wilson gravely, "you must be very careful how you
say things of that kind."

"But it is so obvious. His explanation about the umbrella was made up
to disarm suspicion. He handled it and leaned on it in a way that showed
how much more familiar it was to him than that new spade he was so
anxious about. And all his clothes are new."

"True," said Fairholme, "but there is not much in all that. Workmen
nowadays ape gentlemen in everything. However, I will keep an eye on
him."

"Oh, thank you so much," said Agatha. Fairholme, suspecting mockery,
frowned, and Miss Wilson looked severely at the mocker. Little more was
said, except as to the chances--manifestly small--of the rain ceasing,
until the tops of a cab, a decayed mourning coach, and three dripping
hats were seen over the hedge. Smilash sat on the box of the coach,
beside the driver. When it stopped, he alighted, re-entered the chalet
without speaking, came out with the umbrella, spread it above Miss
Wilson's head, and said:

"Now, if your ladyship will come with me, I will see you dry into the
stray, and then I'll bring your honored nieces one by one."

"I shall come last," said Miss Wilson, irritated by his assumption that
the party was a family one. "Gertrude, you had better go first."

"Allow me," said Fairholme, stepping forward, and attempting to take the
umbrella.

"Thank you, I shall not trouble you," she said frostily, and tripped
away over the oozing field with Smilash, who held the umbrella over her
with ostentatious solicitude. In the same manner he led the rest to the
vehicles, in which they packed themselves with some difficulty. Agatha,
who came last but one, gave him threepence.

"You have a noble 'art and an expressive hi, Miss," he said, apparently
much moved. "Blessings on both! Blessings on both!"

He went back for Jane, who slipped on the wet grass and fell. He had to
put forth his strength as he helped her to rise. "Hope you ain't sopped
up much of the rainfall, Miss," he said. "You are a fine young lady for
your age. Nigh on twelve stone, I should think."

She reddened and hurried to the cab, where Agatha was. But it was full;
and Jane, much against her will, had to get into the coach, considerably
diminishing the space left for Miss Wilson, to whom Smilash had
returned.

"Now, dear lady," he said, "take care you don't slip. Come along."

Miss Wilson, ignoring the invitation, took a shilling from her purse.

"No, lady," said Smilash with a virtuous air. "I am an honest man and
have never seen the inside of a jail except four times, and only twice
for stealing. Your youngest daughter--her with the expressive hi--have
paid me far beyond what is proper."

"I have told you that these young ladies are not my daughters," said
Miss Wilson sharply. "Why do you not listen to what is said to you?"

"Don't be too hard on a common man, lady," said Smilash submissively.
"The young lady have just given me three 'arf-crowns."

"Three half-crowns!" exclaimed Miss Wilson, angered at such
extravagance.

"Bless her innocence, she don't know what is proper to give to a low
sort like me! But I will not rob the young lady. 'Arf-a-crown is no more
nor is fair for the job, and arf-a-crown will I keep, if agreeable to
your noble ladyship. But I give you back the five bob in trust for her.
Have you ever noticed her expressive hi?"

"Nonsense, sir. You had better keep the money now that you have got it."

"Wot! Sell for five bob the high opinion your ladyship has of me! No,
dear lady; not likely. My father's very last words to me was--"

"You said just now that you were a foundling," said Fairholme. "What are
we to believe? Eh?"

"So I were, sir; but by mother's side alone. Her ladyship will please to
take back the money, for keep it I will not. I am of the lower orders,
and therefore not a man of my word; but when I do stick to it, I stick
like wax."

"Take it," said Fairholme to Miss Wilson. "Take it, of course. Seven and
sixpence is a ridiculous sum to give him for what he has done. It would
only set him drinking."

"His reverence says true, lady. The one 'arfcrown will keep me
comfortably tight until Sunday morning; and more I do not desire."

"Just a little less of your tongue, my man," said Fairholme, taking
the two coins from him and handing them to Miss Wilson, who bade the
clergymen good afternoon, and went to the coach under the umbrella.

"If your ladyship should want a handy man to do an odd job up at the
college I hope you will remember me," Smilash said as they went down the
slope.

"Oh, you know who I am, do you?" said Miss Wilson drily.

"All the country knows you, Miss, and worships you. I have few equals as
a coiner, and if you should require a medal struck to give away for good
behavior or the like, I think I could strike one to your satisfaction.
And if your ladyship should want a trifle of smuggled lace--"

"You had better be careful or you will get into trouble, I think," said
Miss Wilson sternly. "Tell him to drive on."

The vehicles started, and Smilash took the liberty of waving his hat
after them. Then he returned to the chalet, left the umbrella within,
came out again, locked the door, put the key in his pocket, and walked
off through the rain across the hill without taking the least notice of
the astonished parsons.

In the meantime Miss Wilson, unable to contain her annoyance at Agatha's
extravagance, spoke of it to the girls who shared the coach with her.
But Jane declared that Agatha only possessed threepence in the world,
and therefore could not possibly have given the man thirty times that
sum. When they reached the college, Agatha, confronted with Miss Wilson,
opened her eyes in wonder, and exclaimed, laughing: "I only gave him
threepence. He has sent me a present of four and ninepence!"



CHAPTER IV

Saturday at Alton College, nominally a half holiday, was really a whole
one. Classes in gymnastics, dancing, elocution, and drawing were held
in the morning. The afternoon was spent at lawn tennis, to which
lady guests resident in the neighborhood were allowed to bring their
husbands, brothers, and fathers--Miss Wilson being anxious to send
her pupils forth into the world free from the uncouth stiffness of
schoolgirls unaccustomed to society.

Late in October came a Saturday which proved anything but a holiday
for Miss Wilson. At half-past one, luncheon being over, she went out of
doors to a lawn that lay between the southern side of the college and a
shrubbery. Here she found a group of girls watching Agatha and Jane, who
were dragging a roller over the grass. One of them, tossing a ball about
with her racket, happened to drive it into the shrubbery, whence, to the
surprise of the company, Smilash presently emerged, carrying the ball,
blinking, and proclaiming that, though a common man, he had his feelings
like another, and that his eye was neither a stick nor a stone. He
was dressed as before, but his garments, soiled with clay and lime, no
longer looked new.

"What brings you here, pray?" demanded Miss Wilson.

"I was led into the belief that you sent for me, lady," he replied.
"The baker's lad told me so as he passed my 'umble cot this morning. I
thought he were incapable of deceit."

"That is quite right; I did send for you. But why did you not go round
to the servants' hall?"

"I am at present in search of it, lady. I were looking for it when
this ball cotch me here" (touching his eye). "A cruel blow on the hi'
nat'rally spires its vision and expression and makes a honest man look
like a thief."

"Agatha," said Miss Wilson, "come here."

"My dooty to you, Miss," said Smilash, pulling his forelock.

"This is the man from whom I had the five shillings, which he said you
had just given him. Did you do so?"

"Certainly not. I only gave him threepence."

"But I showed the money to your ladyship," said Smilash, twisting his
hat agitatedly. "I gev it you. Where would the like of me get five
shillings except by the bounty of the rich and noble? If the young
lady thinks I hadn't ort to have kep' the tother 'arfcrown, I would not
object to its bein' stopped from my wages if I were given a job of work
here. But--"

"But it's nonsense," said Agatha. "I never gave you three half-crowns."

"Perhaps you mout 'a' made a mistake. Pence is summat similar to
'arf-crowns, and the day were very dark."

"I couldn't have," said Agatha. "Jane had my purse all the earlier
part of the week, Miss Wilson, and she can tell you that there was only
threepence in it. You know that I get my money on the first of every
month. It never lasts longer than a week. The idea of my having seven
and sixpence on the sixteenth is ridiculous."

"But I put it to you, Miss, ain't it twice as ridiculous for me, a poor
laborer, to give up money wot I never got?"

Vague alarm crept upon Agatha as the testimony of her senses was
contradicted. "All I know is," she protested, "that I did not give it to
you; so my pennies must have turned into half-crowns in your pocket."

"Mebbe so," said Smilash gravely. "I've heard, and I know it for a fact,
that money grows in the pockets of the rich. Why not in the pockets of
the poor as well? Why should you be su'prised at wot 'appens every day?"

"Had you any money of your own about you at the time?"

"Where could the like of me get money?--asking pardon for making so bold
as to catechise your ladyship."

"I don't know where you could get it," said Miss Wilson testily; "I ask
you, had you any?"

"Well, lady, I disremember. I will not impose upon you. I disremember."

"Then you've made a mistake," said Miss Wilson, handing him back his
money. "Here. If it is not yours, it is not ours; so you had better keep
it."

"Keep it! Oh, lady, but this is the heighth of nobility! And what shall
I do to earn your bounty, lady?"

"It is not my bounty: I give it to you because it does not belong to me,
and, I suppose, must belong to you. You seem to be a very simple man."

"I thank your ladyship; I hope I am. Respecting the day's work, now,
lady; was you thinking of employing a poor man at all?"

"No, thank you; I have no occasion for your services. I have also to
give you the shilling I promised you for getting the cabs. Here it is."

"Another shillin'!" cried Smilash, stupefied.

"Yes," said Miss Wilson, beginning to feel very angry. "Let me hear no
more about it, please. Don't you understand that you have earned it?"

"I am a common man, and understand next to nothing," he replied
reverently. "But if your ladyship would give me a day's work to keep me
goin', I could put up all this money in a little wooden savings bank I
have at home, and keep it to spend when sickness or odd age shall, in a
manner of speaking, lay their 'ends upon me. I could smooth that grass
beautiful; them young ladies 'll strain themselves with that heavy
roller. If tennis is the word, I can put up nets fit to catch birds of
paradise in. If the courts is to be chalked out in white, I can draw a
line so straight that you could hardly keep yourself from erecting an
equilateral triangle on it. I am honest when well watched, and I can
wait at table equal to the Lord Mayor o' London's butler."

"I cannot employ you without a character," said Miss Wilson, amused by
his scrap of Euclid, and wondering where he had picked it up.

"I bear the best of characters, lady. The reverend rector has known me
from a boy."

"I was speaking to him about you yesterday," said Miss Wilson, looking
hard at him, "and he says you are a perfect stranger to him."

"Gentlemen is so forgetful," said Smilash sadly. "But I alluded to my
native rector--meaning the rector of my native village, Auburn. 'Sweet
Auburn, loveliest village of the plain,' as the gentleman called it."

"That was not the name you mentioned to Mr. Fairholme. I do not
recollect what name you gave, but it was not Auburn, nor have I ever
heard of any such place."

"Never read of sweet Auburn!"

"Not in any geography or gazetteer. Do you recollect telling me that you
have been in prison?"

"Only six times," pleaded Smilash, his features working convulsively.
"Don't bear too hard on a common man. Only six times, and all through
drink. But I have took the pledge, and kep' it faithful for eighteen
months past."

Miss Wilson now set down the man as one of those keen, half-witted
country fellows, contemptuously styled originals, who unintentionally
make themselves popular by flattering the sense of sanity in those whose
faculties are better adapted to circumstances.

"You have a bad memory, Mr. Smilash," she said good-humoredly. "You
never give the same account of yourself twice."

"I am well aware that I do not express myself with exactability. Ladies
and gentlemen have that power over words that they can always say what
they mean, but a common man like me can't. Words don't come natural to
him. He has more thoughts than words, and what words he has don't fit
his thoughts. Might I take a turn with the roller, and make myself
useful about the place until nightfall, for ninepence?"

Miss Wilson, who was expecting more than her usual Saturday visitors,
considered the proposition and assented. "And remember," she said, "that
as you are a stranger here, your character in Lyvern depends upon the
use you make of this opportunity."

"I am grateful to your noble ladyship. May your ladyship's goodness sew
up the hole which is in the pocket where I carry my character, and which
has caused me to lose it so frequent. It's a bad place for men to keep
their characters in; but such is the fashion. And so hurray for the
glorious nineteenth century!"

He took off his coat, seized the roller, and began to pull it with
an energy foreign to the measured millhorse manner of the accustomed
laborer. Miss Wilson looked doubtfully at him, but, being in haste, went
indoors without further comment. The girls mistrusting his eccentricity,
kept aloof. Agatha determined to have another and better look at him.
Racket in hand, she walked slowly across the grass and came close to him
just as he, unaware of her approach, uttered a groan of exhaustion and
sat down to rest.

"Tired already, Mr. Smilash?" she said mockingly.

He looked up deliberately, took off one of his washleather gloves,
fanned himself with it, displaying a white and fine hand, and at last
replied, in the tone and with the accent of a gentleman:

"Very."

Agatha recoiled. He fanned himself without the least concern.

"You--you are not a laborer," she said at last.

"Obviously not."

"I thought not."

He nodded.

"Suppose I tell on you," she said, growing bolder as she recollected
that she was not alone with him.

"If you do I shall get out of it just as I got out of the half-crowns,
and Miss Wilson will begin to think that you are mad."

"Then I really did not give you the seven and sixpence," she said,
relieved.

"What is your own opinion?" he answered, taking three pennies from his
pocket, jingling them in his palm. "What is your name?"

"I shall not tell you," said Agatha with dignity.

He shrugged his shoulders. "Perhaps you are right," he said. "I would
not tell you mine if you asked me."

"I have not the slightest intention of asking you."

"No? Then Smilash shall do for you, and Agatha will do for me."

"You had better take care."

"Of what?"

"Of what you say, and--are you not afraid of being found out?"

"I am found out already--by you, and I am none the worse."

"Suppose the police find you out!"

"Not they. Besides, I am not hiding from the police. I have a right to
wear corduroy if I prefer it to broadcloth. Consider the advantages of
it! It has procured me admission to Alton College, and the pleasure of
your acquaintance. Will you excuse me if I go on with my rolling, just
to keep up appearances? I can talk as I roll."

"You may, if you are fond of soliloquizing," she said, turning away as
he rose.

"Seriously, Agatha, you must not tell the others about me."

"Do not call me Agatha," she said impetuously. "What shall I call you,
then?"

"You need not address me at all."

"I need, and will. Don't be ill-natured."

"But I don't know you. I wonder at your--" she hesitated at the word
which occurred to her, but, being unable to think of a better one, used
it--"at your cheek."

He laughed, and she watched him take a couple of turns with the roller.
Presently, refreshing himself by a look at her, he caught her looking
at him, and smiled. His smile was commonplace in comparison with the
one she gave him in return, in which her eyes, her teeth, and the golden
grain in her complexion seemed to flash simultaneously. He stopped
rolling immediately, and rested his chin on the handle of the roller.

"If you neglect your work," said she maliciously, "you won't have the
grass ready when the people come."

"What people?" he said, taken aback.

"Oh, lots of people. Most likely some who know you. There are visitors
coming from London: my guardian, my guardianess, their daughter, my
mother, and about a hundred more."

"Four in all. What are they coming for? To see you?"

"To take me away," she replied, watching for signs of disappointment on
his part.

They were at once forthcoming. "What the deuce are they going to take
you away for?" he said. "Is your education finished?"

"No. I have behaved badly, and I am going to be expelled."

He laughed again. "Come!" he said, "you are beginning to invent in the
Smilash manner. What have you done?"

"I don't see why I should tell you. What have you done?"

"I! Oh, I have done nothing. I am only an unromantic gentleman, hiding
from a romantic lady who is in love with me."

"Poor thing," said Agatha sarcastically. "Of course, she has proposed to
you, and you have refused."

"On the contrary, I proposed, and she accepted. That is why I have to
hide."

"You tell stories charmingly," said Agatha. "Good-bye. Here is Miss
Carpenter coming to hear what we are taking about."

"Good-bye. That story of your being expelled beats--Might a common man
make so bold as to inquire where the whitening machine is, Miss?"

This was addressed to Jane, who had come up with some of the others.
Agatha expected to see Smilash presently discovered, for his disguise
now seemed transparent; she wondered how the rest could be imposed on
by it. Two o'clock, striking just then, reminded her of the impending
interview with her guardian. A tremor shook her, and she felt a craving
for some solitary hiding-place in which to await the summons. But it
was a point of honor with her to appear perfectly indifferent to her
trouble, so she stayed with the girls, laughing and chatting as they
watched Smilash intently marking out the courts and setting up the nets.
She made the others laugh too, for her hidden excitement, sharpened by
irrepressible shootings of dread, stimulated her, and the romance of
Smilash's disguise gave her a sensation of dreaming. Her imagination was
already busy upon a drama, of which she was the heroine and Smilash
the hero, though, with the real man before her, she could not indulge
herself by attributing to him quite as much gloomy grandeur of character
as to a wholly ideal personage. The plot was simple, and an old favorite
with her. One of them was to love the other and to die broken-hearted
because the loved one would not requite the passion. For Agatha,
prompt to ridicule sentimentality in her companions, and gifted with an
infectious spirit of farce, secretly turned for imaginative luxury to
visions of despair and death; and often endured the mortification of the
successful clown who believes, whilst the public roar with laughter at
him, that he was born a tragedian. There was much in her nature, she
felt, that did not find expression in her popular representation of the
soldier in the chimney.

By three o'clock the local visitors had arrived, and tennis was
proceeding in four courts, rolled and prepared by Smilash. The two
curates were there, with a few lay gentlemen. Mrs. Miller, the vicar,
and some mothers and other chaperons looked on and consumed light
refreshments, which were brought out upon trays by Smilash, who
had borrowed and put on a large white apron, and was making himself
officiously busy.

At a quarter past the hour a message came from Miss Wilson, requesting
Miss Wylie's attendance. The visitors were at a loss to account for the
sudden distraction of the young ladies' attention which ensued. Jane
almost burst into tears, and answered Josephs rudely when he innocently
asked what the matter was. Agatha went away apparently unconcerned,
though her hand shook as she put aside her racket.

In a spacious drawing-room at the north side of the college she found
her mother, a slight woman in widow's weeds, with faded brown hair, and
tearful eyes. With her were Mrs. Jansenius and her daughter. The two
elder ladies kept severely silent whilst Agatha kissed them, and Mrs.
Wylie sniffed. Henrietta embraced Agatha effusively.

"Where's Uncle John?" said Agatha. "Hasn't he come?"

"He is in the next room with Miss Wilson," said Mrs. Jansenius coldly.
"They want you in there."

"I thought somebody was dead," said Agatha, "you all look so funereal.
Now, mamma, put your handkerchief back again. If you cry I will give
Miss Wilson a piece of my mind for worrying you."

"No, no," said Mrs. Wylie, alarmed. "She has been so nice!"

"So good!" said Henrietta.

"She has been perfectly reasonable and kind," said Mrs. Jansenius.

"She always is," said Agatha complacently. "You didn't expect to find
her in hysterics, did you?"

"Agatha," pleaded Mrs. Wylie, "don't be headstrong and foolish."

"Oh, she won't; I know she won't," said Henrietta coaxingly. "Will you,
dear Agatha?"

"You may do as you like, as far as I am concerned," said Mrs. Jansenius.
"But I hope you have more sense than to throw away your education for
nothing."

"Your aunt is quite right," said Mrs. Wylie. "And your Uncle John is
very angry with you. He will never speak to you again if you quarrel
with Miss Wilson."

"He is not angry," said Henrietta, "but he is so anxious that you should
get on well."

"He will naturally be disappointed if you persist in making a fool of
yourself," said Mrs. Jansenius.

"All Miss Wilson wants is an apology for the dreadful things you wrote
in her book," said Mrs. Wylie. "You'll apologize, dear, won't you?"

"Of course she will," said Henrietta.

"I think you had better," said Mrs. Jansenius.

"Perhaps I will," said Agatha.

"That's my own darling," said Mrs. Wylie, catching her hand.

"And perhaps, again, I won't."

"You will, dear," urged Mrs. Wylie, trying to draw Agatha, who passively
resisted, closer to her. "For my sake. To oblige your mother, Agatha.
You won't refuse me, dearest?"

Agatha laughed indulgently at her parent, who had long ago worn out this
form of appeal. Then she turned to Henrietta, and said, "How is your
caro sposo? I think it was hard that I was not a bridesmaid."

The red in Henrietta's cheeks brightened. Mrs. Jansenius hastened to
interpose a dry reminder that Miss Wilson was waiting.

"Oh, she does not mind waiting," said Agatha, "because she thinks you
are all at work getting me into a proper frame of mind. That was the
arrangement she made with you before she left the room. Mamma knows that
I have a little bird that tells me these things. I must say that you
have not made me feel any goody-goodier so far. However, as poor Uncle
John must be dreadfully frightened and uncomfortable, it is only kind to
put an end to his suspense. Good-bye!" And she went out leisurely.
But she looked in again to say in a low voice: "Prepare for something
thrilling. I feel just in the humor to say the most awful things." She
vanished, and immediately they heard her tapping at the door of the next
room.

Mr. Jansenius was indeed awaiting her with misgiving. Having discovered
early in his career that his dignified person and fine voice caused
people to stand in some awe of him, and to move him into the chair
at public meetings, he had grown so accustomed to deference that any
approach to familiarity or irreverence disconcerted him exceedingly.
Agatha, on the other hand, having from her childhood heard Uncle John
quoted as wisdom and authority incarnate, had begun in her tender years
to scoff at him as a pompous and purseproud city merchant, whose
sordid mind was unable to cope with her transcendental affairs. She
had habitually terrified her mother by ridiculing him with an absolute
contempt of which only childhood and extreme ignorance are capable. She
had felt humiliated by his kindness to her (he was a generous giver
of presents), and, with the instinct of an anarchist, had taken
disparagement of his advice and defiance of his authority as the signs
wherefrom she might infer surely that her face was turned to the light.
The result was that he was a little tired of her without being quite
conscious of it; and she not at all afraid of him, and a little too
conscious of it.

When she entered with her brightest smile in full play, Miss Wilson and
Mr. Jansenius, seated at the table, looked somewhat like two culprits
about to be indicted. Miss Wilson waited for him to speak, deferring to
his imposing presence. But he was not ready, so she invited Agatha to
sit down.

"Thank you," said Agatha sweetly. "Well, Uncle John, don't you know me?"

"I have heard with regret from Miss Wilson that you have been very
troublesome here," he said, ignoring her remark, though secretly put out
by it.

"Yes," said Agatha contritely. "I am so very sorry."

Mr. Jansenius, who had been led by Miss Wilson to expect the utmost
contumacy, looked to her in surprise.

"You seem to think," said Miss Wilson, conscious of Mr. Jansenius's
movement, and annoyed by it, "that you may transgress over and over
again, and then set yourself right with us," (Miss Wilson never spoke of
offences as against her individual authority, but as against the school
community) "by saying that you are sorry. You spoke in a very different
tone at our last meeting."

"I was angry then, Miss Wilson. And I thought I had a
grievance--everybody thinks they have the same one. Besides, we were
quarrelling--at least I was; and I always behave badly when I quarrel. I
am so very sorry."

"The book was a serious matter," said Miss Wilson gravely. "You do not
seem to think so."

"I understand Agatha to say that she is now sensible of the folly of her
conduct with regard to the book, and that she is sorry for it," said Mr.
Jansenius, instinctively inclining to Agatha's party as the stronger one
and the least dependent on him in a pecuniary sense.

"Have you seen the book?" said Agatha eagerly.

"No. Miss Wilson has described what has occurred."

"Oh, do let me get it," she cried, rising. "It will make Uncle John
scream with laughing. May I, Miss Wilson?"

"There!" said Miss Wilson, indignantly. "It is this incorrigible
flippancy of which I have to complain. Miss Wylie only varies it by
downright insubordination."

Mr. Jansenius too was scandalized. His fine color mounted at the idea
of his screaming. "Tut, tut!" he said, "you must be serious, and more
respectful to Miss Wilson. You are old enough to know better now,
Agatha--quite old enough."

Agatha's mirth vanished. "What have I said What have I done?" she asked,
a faint purple spot appearing in her cheeks.

"You have spoken triflingly of--of the volume by which Miss Wilson sets
great store, and properly so."

"If properly so, then why do you find fault with me?"

"Come, come," roared Mr. Jansenius, deliberately losing his temper as a
last expedient to subdue her, "don't be impertinent, Miss."

Agatha's eyes dilated; evanescent flushes played upon her cheeks and
neck; she stamped with her heel. "Uncle John," she cried, "if you dare
to address me like that, I will never look at you, never speak to you,
nor ever enter your house again. What do you know about good manners,
that you should call me impertinent? I will not submit to intentional
rudeness; that was the beginning of my quarrel with Miss Wilson. She
told me I was impertinent, and I went away and told her that she was
wrong by writing it in the fault book. She has been wrong all through,
and I would have said so before but that I wanted to be reconciled to
her and to let bygones be bygones. But if she insists on quarrelling, I
cannot help it."

"I have already explained to you, Mr. Jansenius," said Miss Wilson,
concentrating her resentment by an effort to suppress it, "that Miss
Wylie has ignored all the opportunities that have been made for her to
reinstate herself here. Mrs. Miller and I have waived merely personal
considerations, and I have only required a simple acknowledgment of this
offence against the college and its rules."

"I do not care that for Mrs. Miller," said Agatha, snapping her fingers.
"And you are not half so good as I thought."

"Agatha," said Mr. Jansenius, "I desire you to hold your tongue."

Agatha drew a deep breath, sat down resignedly, and said: "There! I have
done. I have lost my temper; so now we have all lost our tempers."

"You have no right to lose your temper, Miss," said Mr. Jansenius,
following up a fancied advantage.

"I am the youngest, and the least to blame," she replied. "There
is nothing further to be said, Mr. Jansenius," said Miss Wilson,
determinedly. "I am sorry that Miss Wylie has chosen to break with us."

"But I have not chosen to break with you, and I think it very hard that
I am to be sent away. Nobody here has the least quarrel with me except
you and Mrs. Miller. Mrs. Miller is annoyed because she mistook me for
her cat, as if that was my fault! And really, Miss Wilson, I don't know
why you are so angry. All the girls will think I have done something
infamous if I am expelled. I ought to be let stay until the end of the
term; and as to the Rec--the fault book, you told me most particularly
when I first came that I might write in it or not just as I pleased, and
that you never dictated or interfered with what was written. And yet the
very first time I write a word you disapprove of, you expel me. Nobody
will ever believe now that the entries are voluntary."

Miss Wilson's conscience, already smitten by the coarseness and absence
of moral force in the echo of her own "You are impertinent," from the
mouth of Mr. Jansenius, took fresh alarm. "The fault book," she said,
"is for the purpose of recording self-reproach alone, and is not a
vehicle for accusations against others."

"I am quite sure that neither Jane nor Gertrude nor I reproached
ourselves in the least for going downstairs as we did, and yet you did
not blame us for entering that. Besides, the book represented moral
force--at least you always said so, and when you gave up moral force,
I thought an entry should be made of that. Of course I was in a rage at
the time, but when I came to myself I thought I had done right, and I
think so still, though it would perhaps have been better to have passed
it over."

"Why do you say that I gave up moral force?"

"Telling people to leave the room is not moral force. Calling them
impertinent is not moral force."

"You think then that I am bound to listen patiently to whatever you
choose to say to me, however unbecoming it may be from one in your
position to one in mine?"

"But I said nothing unbecoming," said Agatha. Then, breaking off
restlessly, and smiling again, she said: "Oh, don't let us argue. I
am very sorry, and very troublesome, and very fond of you and of the
college; and I won't come back next term unless you like."

"Agatha," said Miss Wilson, shaken, "these expressions of regard cost
you so little, and when they have effected their purpose, are so
soon forgotten by you, that they have ceased to satisfy me. I am very
reluctant to insist on your leaving us at once. But as your uncle has
told you, you are old and sensible enough to know the difference between
order and disorder. Hitherto you have been on the side of disorder, an
element which was hardly known here until you came, as Mrs. Trefusis
can tell you. Nevertheless, if you will promise to be more careful in
future, I will waive all past cause of complaint, and at the end of the
term I shall be able to judge as to your continuing among us."

Agatha rose, beaming. "Dear Miss Wilson," she said, "you are so good! I
promise, of course. I will go and tell mamma."

Before they could add a word she had turned with a pirouette to the
door, and fled, presenting herself a moment later in the drawing-room to
the three ladies, whom she surveyed with a whimsical smile in silence.

"Well?" said Mrs. Jansenius peremptorily.

"Well, dear?" said Mrs. Trefusis, caressingly.

Mrs. Wylie stifled a sob and looked imploringly at her daughter.

"I had no end of trouble in bringing them to reason," said Agatha, after
a provoking pause. "They behaved like children, and I was like an angel.
I am to stay, of course."

"Blessings on you, my darling," faltered Mrs. Wylie, attempting a kiss,
which Agatha dexterously evaded.

"I have promised to be very good, and studious, and quiet, and decorous
in future. Do you remember my castanet song, Hetty?

"'Tra! lalala, la! la! la! Tra! lalala, la! la! la! Tra!
lalalalalalalalalalala!'"

And she danced about the room, snapping her fingers instead of
castanets.

"Don't be so reckless and wicked, my love," said Mrs. Wylie. "You will
break your poor mother's heart."

Miss Wilson and Mr. Jansenius entered just then, and Agatha became
motionless and gazed abstractedly at a vase of flowers. Miss Wilson
invited her visitors to join the tennis players. Mr. Jansenius looked
sternly and disappointedly at Agatha, who elevated her left eyebrow and
depressed her right simultaneously; but he, shaking his head to signify
that he was not to be conciliated by facial feats, however difficult
or contrary to nature, went out with Miss Wilson, followed by Mrs.
Jansenius and Mrs. Wylie.

"How is your Hubby?" said Agatha then, brusquely, to Henrietta.

Mrs. Trefusis's eyes filled with tears so quickly that, as she bent her
head to hide them, they fell, sprinkling Agatha's hand.

"This is such a dear old place," she began. "The associations of my
girlhood--"

"What is the matter between you and Hubby?" demanded Agatha,
interrupting her. "You had better tell me, or I will ask him when I meet
him."

"I was about to tell you, only you did not give me time."

"That is a most awful cram," said Agatha. "But no matter. Go on."

Henrietta hesitated. Her dignity as a married woman, and the reality of
her grief, revolted against the shallow acuteness of the schoolgirl. But
she found herself no better able to resist Agatha's domineering than
she had been in her childhood, and much more desirous of obtaining her
sympathy. Besides, she had already learnt to tell the story herself
rather than leave its narration to others, whose accounts did not,
she felt, put her case in the proper light. So she told Agatha of her
marriage, her wild love for her husband, his wild love for her, and his
mysterious disappearance without leaving word or sign behind him. She
did not mention the letter.

"Have you had him searched for?" said Agatha, repressing an inclination
to laugh.

"But where? Had I the remotest clue, I would follow him barefoot to the
end of the world."

"I think you ought to search all the rivers--you would have to do that
barefoot. He must have fallen in somewhere, or fallen down some place."

"No, no. Do you think I should be here if I thought his life in danger?
I have reasons--I know that he is only gone away."

"Oh, indeed! He took his portmanteau with him, did he? Perhaps he
has gone to Paris to buy you something nice and give you a pleasant
surprise."

"No," said Henrietta dejectedly. "He knew that I wanted nothing."

"Then I suppose he got tired of you and ran away."

Henrietta's peculiar scarlet blush flowed rapidly over her cheeks as she
flung Agatha's arm away, exclaiming, "How dare you say so! You have no
heart. He adored me."

"Bosh!" said Agatha. "People always grow tired of one another. I grow
tired of myself whenever I am left alone for ten minutes, and I am
certain that I am fonder of myself than anyone can be of another
person."

"I know you are," said Henrietta, pained and spiteful. "You have always
been particularly fond of yourself."

"Very likely he resembles me in that respect. In that case he will grow
tired of himself and come back, and you will both coo like turtle doves
until he runs away again. Ugh! Serve you right for getting married. I
wonder how people can be so mad as to do it, with the example of their
married acquaintances all warning them against it."

"You don't know what it is to love," said Henrietta, plaintively, and
yet patronizingly. "Besides, we were not like other couples."

"So it seems. But never mind, take my word for it, he will return to you
as soon as he has had enough of his own company. Don't worry thinking
about him, but come and have a game at lawn tennis."

During this conversation they had left the drawing-room and made a
detour through the grounds. They were now approaching the tennis courts
by a path which wound between two laurel hedges through the shrubbery.
Meanwhile, Smilash, waiting on the guests in his white apron and gloves
(which he had positively refused to take off, alleging that he was a
common man, with common hands such as born ladies and gentlemen could
not be expected to take meat and drink from), had behaved himself
irreproachably until the arrival of Miss Wilson and her visitors, which
occurred as he was returning to the table with an empty tray, moving so
swiftly that he nearly came into collision with Mrs. Jansenius. Instead
of apologizing, he changed countenance, hastily held up the tray like a
shield before his face, and began to walk backward from her, stumbling
presently against Miss Lindsay, who was running to return a ball.
Without heeding her angry look and curt rebuke, he half turned, and
sidled away into the shrubbery, whence the tray presently rose into the
air, flew across the laurel hedge, and descended with a peal of stage
thunder on the stooped shoulders of Josephs. Miss Wilson, after asking
the housekeeper with some asperity why she had allowed that man to
interfere in the attendance, explained to the guests that he was the
idiot of the countryside. Mr. Jansenius laughed, and said that he had
not seen the man's face, but that his figure reminded him forcibly of
some one; he could not just then recollect exactly whom.

Smilash, making off through the shrubbery, found the end of his path
blocked by Agatha and a young lady whose appearance alarmed him more
than had that of Mrs. Jansenius. He attempted to force his tray through
the hedge, but in vain; the laurel was impenetrable, and the noise
he made attracted the attention of the approaching couple. He made no
further effort to escape, but threw his borrowed apron over his head and
stood bolt upright with his back against the bushes.