Lord Chelford, leaning on the little wicket, put his arm over, and she gave him her hand again.

'Good-bye,' said Rachel.

'Well, I suppose I, too, must say good-bye; and I'll say a great deal more,' said he, in a peculiar, odd tone, that was very firm, and yet indescribably tender. And he held her slender hand, from which she had drawn the gauntlet, in his. 'Yes, Rachel, I will--I'll say everything. We are old friends now--you'll forgive me calling you Rachel--it may be perhaps the last time.'

Rachel was standing there with such a beautiful blush, and downcast eyes, and her hand in his.

'I liked you always, Rachel, from the first moment I saw you--I liked you better and better--indescribably--indeed, I do; and I've grown to like you so, that if I lose you, I think I shall never be the same again.'

There was a very little pause, the blush was deeper, her eyes lower still.

'I admire you, Rachel--I like your character--I have grown to love you with all my heart and mind--quite desperately, I think. I know there are things against me--there are better-looking fellows than I--and--and a great many things--and I know very well that you will judge for yourself--quite differently from other girls; and I can't say with what fear and hope I await what you may say; but this you may be sure of, you will never find anyone to love you better, Rachel--I think so well--and--and now--that is all. Do you think you could _ever_ like me?'

But Rachel's hand, on a sudden, with a slight quiver, was drawn from his.

'Lord Chelford, I can't describe how grateful I am, and how astonished, but it could never be--no--never.'

'Rachel, perhaps you mean my mother--I have told her everything--she will receive you with all the respect you so well deserve; and with all her faults, she loves me, and will love you still more.'

'No, Lord Chelford, no.' She was pale now, and looking very sadly in his eyes. 'It is not that, but only that you must never, never speak of it again.'

'Oh! Rachel, darling, you must not say that--I love you so--so _desperately_, you don't know.'

'I can say nothing else, Lord Chelford. My mind is quite made up--I am inexpressibly grateful--you will never know how grateful--but except as a friend--and won't you still be my friend?--I never can regard you.'

Rachel was so pale that her very lips were white as she spoke this in a melancholy but very firm way.

'Oh, Rachel, it is a great blow--maybe if you thought it over!--I'll wait any time.'

'No, Lord Chelford, I'm quite unworthy of your preference; but time cannot change me--and I am speaking, not from impulse, but conviction.

This is our secret--yours and mine--and we'll forget it; and I could not bear to lose your friendship--you'll be my friend still--won't you?

Good-bye.'

'G.o.d bless you, Rachel!' And he hurriedly kissed the hand she had placed in his, and without a word more, or looking back, he walked swiftly down the wooded road towards Gylingden.

So, then, it had come and gone--gone for ever.

'Margery, bring the basket in; I think a shower is coming.'

And she picked up her trowel and other implements, and placed them in the porch, and glanced up towards the clouds, as if she saw them, and had nothing to think of but her gardening and the weather, and as if her heart was not breaking.

CHAPTER LIII.

THE VICAR'S COMPLICATIONS, WHICH LIVELY PEOPLE HAD BETTER NOT READ.

William Wylder's reversion was very tempting. But Lawyer Larkin knew the value of the precious metals, and waited for more data. The more he thought over his foreign correspondence, and his interview with Lake, the more steadily returned upon his mind the old conviction that the gallant captain was deep in the secret, whatever it might be.

Whatever his motive--and he always had a distinct motive, though sometimes not easily discoverable--he was a good deal addicted now to commenting, in his confidential talk, with religious gossips and others, upon the awful state of the poor vicar's affairs, his inconceivable prodigality, the unaccountable sums he had made away with, and his own anxiety to hand over the direction of such a hopeless complication of debt, and abdicate in favour of any competent skipper the command of the water-logged and foundering ship.

'Why, his Brother Mark could get him cleverly out of it--could not he?'

wheezed the pork-butcher.

'More serious than you suppose,' answered Larkin, with a shake of his head.

'It can't go beyond five hundred, or say nine hundred--eh, at the outside?'

'Nine _hundred_--say double as many _thousand_, and I'm afraid you'll be nearer the mark. You'll not mention, of course, and I'm only feeling my way just now, and speaking conjecturally altogether; but I'm afraid it is enormous. I need not remind you not to mention.'

I cannot, of course, say how Mr. Larkin's conjectures reached so prodigious an elevation, but I can now comprehend why it was desirable that this surprising estimate of the vicar's liabilities should prevail.

Mr. Jos. Larkin had a weakness for enveloping much of what he said and wrote in an honourable mystery. He liked writing _private_ or _confidential_ at top of his notes, without apparent right or even reason to impose either privacy or confidence upon the persons to whom he wrote.

There was, in fact, often in the good attorney's mode of transacting business just a _soupcon_ or flavour of an _arriere pensee_ of a remote and unseen plan, which was a little unsatisfactory.

Now, with the vicar he was imperative that the matter of the reversion should be strictly confidential--altogether 'sacred,' in fact.

'You see, the fact is, my dear Mr. Wylder, I never meddle in speculative things. It is not a cla.s.s of business that I like or would touch with one of my fingers, so to speak,' and he shook his head gently; 'and I may say, if I were supposed to be ever so slightly engaged in these risky things, it would be the _ruin_ of me. I don t like, however, sending you into the jaws of the City sharks--I use the term, my dear Mr. Wylder, advisedly--and I make a solitary exception in your case; but the fact is, if I thought you would mention the matter, I could not touch it even for you. There's Captain Lake, of Brandon, for instance--I should not be surprised if I lost the Brandon business the day after the matter reached his ears. All men are not like you and me, my dear Mr. Wylder. The sad experience of my profession has taught me that a suspicious man of the world, without religion, my dear Mr. Wylder,' and he lifted his pink eyes, and shook his long head and long hands in unison--'without religion--will imagine anything. They can't understand us.'

Now, the fifty pounds which good Mr. Larkin had procured for the improvident vicar, bore interest, I am almost ashamed to say, at thirty per cent. per annum, and ten per cent. more the first year. But you are to remember that the security was altogether speculative; and Mr. Larkin, of course, made the best terms he could.

Annual premium on a policy for 100 [double insurance } _s._ _d._ being insisted upon by lender, to cover contingent ex- } 10 0 0 penses, and life not insurable, a delicacy of the lungs } being admitted, on the ordinary scale] }

Annuity payable to lender, clear of premium, the } 7 10 0 security being unsatisfactory } -------------- 17 10 0

Ten pounds of which (the premium), together with four pounds ten shillings for expenses, &c. were payable in advance. So that thirty-two pounds, out of his borrowed fifty, were forfeit for these items within a year and a month. In the meantime the fifty pounds had gone, as we know, direct to Cambridge; and he was called upon to pay forthwith ten pounds for premium, and four pounds ten shillings for 'expenses.' _Quod impossibile._

The attorney had nothing for it but to try to induce the lender to let him have another fifty pounds, pending the investigation of t.i.tle--another fifty, of which he was to get, in fact, eighteen pounds.

Somehow, the racking off of this bitter vintage from one vessel into another did not seem to improve its quality. On the contrary, things were growing decidedly more awful.

Now, there came from Messrs. Burlington and Smith a peremptory demand for the fourteen pounds ten shillings, and an equally summary one for twenty-eight pounds fourteen shillings and eight pence, their costs in this matter.

When the poor vicar received this latter blow, he laid the palm of his hand on the top of his head, as if to prevent his brain from boiling over. Twenty-eight pounds fourteen shillings and eight pence! _Quod impossibile._ again.

When he saw Larkin, that conscientious guardian of his client's interests scrutinised the bill of costs very jealously, and struck out between four and five pounds. He explained to the vicar the folly of borrowing insignificant and insufficient sums--the trouble, and consequently the cost, of which were just as great as of an adequate one. He was determined, if he could, to pull him through this. But he must raise a sufficient sum, for the expense of going into t.i.tle would be something; and he would write sharply to Burlington, Smith, and Co., and had no doubt the costs would be settled for twenty-three pounds. And Mr. Jos.

Larkin's opinion upon the matter was worthy of respect, inasmuch as he was himself, under the rose, the 'Co.' of that firm, and ministered its capital.

'The fact is you must, my dear Mr. Wylder, make an effort. It won't do peddling and tinkering in such a case. You will be in a worse position than ever, unless you boldly raise a thousand pounds--if I can manage such a transaction upon a security of the kind. Consolidate all your liabilities, and keep a sum in hand. You are well connected--powerful relatives--your brother has Huxton, four hundred, a year, whenever old--the--the present inc.u.mbent goes--and there are other things beside--but you must not allow yourself to be ruined through timidity; and if you go to the wall without an effort, and allow yourself to be slurred in public, what becomes of your chance of preferment?'

And now 't.i.tle' went up to Burlington, Smith, and Co. to examine and approve; and from that firm, I am sorry to say, a bill of costs was coming, when deeds were prepared and all done, exceeding three hundred and fifty pounds; and there was a little reminder from good Jos. Larkin for two hundred and fifty pounds more. This, of course, was to await Mr.

Wylder's perfect convenience. The vicar knew _him_--_he_ never pressed any man. Then there would be insurances in proportion; and interest, as we see, was not trifling. And altogether, I am afraid, our friend the vicar was being extricated in a rather embarra.s.sing fashion.

Now, I have known cases in which good-natured debauchees have interested themselves charitably in the difficulties of forlorn families; and I think _I_ knew, almost before they suspected it, that their generous interference was altogether due to one fine pair of eyes, and a pretty _tournure_, in the distressed family circle. Under a like half-delusion, Mr. Jos. Larkin, in the guise of charity, was prosecuting his designs upon the vicar's reversion, and often most cruelly and most artfully, when he frankly fancied his conduct most praiseworthy.

And really I do not myself know, that, considering poor William's liabilities and his means, and how many chances there were against that reversion ever becoming a fact, that I would not myself have advised his selling it, if a reasonable price were obtainable.

'All this power will I give thee,' said the Devil, 'and the glory of them; for that is delivered unto me, and to whomsoever I will I give it.'