LITERATURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 3950, 15 December 1880, Page 4

LITERATURE.

BAB STBANGIR THAN FICTION. (london Society). (Continued.) A gentleman began to come often to the house. For tho first time I was parlour-maid in real earnest. I had also to trim and alter and make MUs Emily's dresses— things she had always- before done for herself. Sometimes I hero ws.-? v, person had in to cook the dinner, and every day a charwoman was ordered to blacklead and scrub and scour, and do all tie things that had kept my hands rough, an-l i-.ade them sometimes look not so clean as 1 1. * uid have liked. Ho wns a ymir-g gentleman who came, and very rioh, v.** toon found out. I should not havo oared •for hi in. much myself, and I am sure Miss Emily did not ; but her mamma was set upon the match, and whatever Mrs Wilkins set her mind upon was bound to b*oarried out <ooner or later. It was she made all tbe love, ar.d nofc the young gentk'inen or Miss Emily. Nothiiij.', Was too gooit for him. She made him thi- 1, tiiat every wori he spoke was wiser and funnier an 1 different from any word ever •spoken by iu-j body before. Sometimes when I »vim waitin ' afc tablo or taking up tea I ÜBed to turn hot all uver at the barefaced way she flattered him, nnd the untruths she told. I thought ho must find her out •*_ that no man in any station could be such a simpleton as not to Be ' what Bhe wanted. But he did not. Ue thought himself very sharp and clever, and perhaps he was in same ways ; but she was sharper and cleverer. He always said no ono could tako him in ; but she did. Ho was vain to an extent, and she played upon his vanity. So far as I could make out ho had not many friends, or indeed any friends, and no one could wonder at it ; for he was ill i**red and conceited, and selfish and dominee ing— a person no lady could have loved, or gentleman chosen for his companion. He was not gocd-tempered either : he had peevish fits ad sullen fits, un 1 j ealous fits anl angry fiU; lub Mra Wilkirs bore with him throug". tb*ni all. If sho sai been a saint she n-uld not have sho*.;* tl a better nature tha ■ ahe did when hu-nouring his contrariness. He was greatly Uken with her. He would have her to livo with him and Mjbb Emily af • r the marriage. The nice dinners ar. 1 little dishes did that, cook eaid, and I hive no doubt she was right ; for I never saw a gentleman so fond of eating, and who drove such a fu»s about it, as Mr Mason. And he was equally greedy as regards wine. My mistress bought some very good and very expensive, and told him it was a part of a purchase mado by her poor dear husband. "You know, Mr Mason," she said, "Emily and I never touch wine (that was quite true, for thoy could not afford it) ; and so we have only used a bottle or co now and then, when we havo wanted to give our best to a particular friend." r It suited him very well indeed to come to a house where the ladies ate little and drank nothing. All the more was left for him ; and he used to let himself be helped to the last scrap of a favourite dish" and finish the final drop in a decanter, as if then*' «as no one in all the world to bo considered except Harlesdon Mason, Esq. I never did believe he va* vory fond of Misa Emily ; but he was very fond of her mamma. Uo could have done, I fancy, without the young lady, but he could not dp without the house. He liked the easy -chairs and the warm firee, and the snug mealß, and tha good wine and the old brandy, aud tbe flattery, and the absence of all restraint, and tho way he was made muoh of and welcomed, and coddled up and fussed over. Goodness] if only his finger ached, the doctor had to be sent for immediately. Any one might have thought Mra Wilkins waa his mother, the way she went on about his health. He was not strong (" not likely to be, always eating and drinking," said cook), and the doctor told him he must be very careful, and avoid exertion and keep his mind quiet. "And I know you couldn't be in better hands," finished the dootor, meaning Mrs Wilkins' hands. The best friends, however, may quarrel sometimes, and Mrs Wilkins and he had a quarrel once, when I "thought all wasover, and that Mibb Emily woull ba left in the lurch. It was something abouf fho settlements. Miss Emily stayed in her room and cried, and l£n Wilkins' temper was so bad, cook vowed she would never come into the house again ,- and the charwoman was sent off at a minute's notice, and I did not know what to do. However, Mr Mason gave in (the wedding clothes had been bought, and everything arranged, and a day named for the wedding, before the quarrel) ; he signed whatever it was Mrs Wilkins' lawyers wanted him to sign. I dressed Miss Emily on the marriage morning ; and when she came back from church sho was Mrs Mason, and he looked sulky and she afraid. It was not a happy marriage ; it might have been unhappier, only that Mr Mason took ill a few months after they returned from the •wedding tour, and, though everything was done for him that could be done, died within the year. No person could have had more attention or better care. He never seemed to give nip completely till he ceased to relish hia food. Before that, it appeared to us all as if ho might linger on for years ; but quite suddenly he took a distaste to chicken -md fish and jellies anc grapes and beef tea ; thenhe began to loathe me eight and smell of wines and spirits. A little lemonade, a small quautifcy of bread acd milk, these and such like were the only things he would touch. Ono day the doctor said eomethiog to him aboufc arranging his affairs, bufc he answered they were all settled long before. "My wifo will have everything she can want during her lifetime," he explained, " and that is suroly enough for any woman." After that, however, Mrs Wilkins wanted him to mala: a will ; but all he said in answer was, .*"- There is n > vol. to leave her mor# thon tV.e law wili j:ive her and my own folly has already giv. u!• -r. 1 shall sign nothing for the lawyers to fig!^ over after lam gone. Hal ought to •• *>vc a c.i ance now. I wish I had done son.-. :! *Jng fo.* him sooner." I heard it all. I was in the room well-nigh constant. < . but they never minded me. My m - tor acemed to like my being about him. One* he said to Mrs Wilkins, ! "BriarthiH been a good girl. I'd liko her to have something. , " How much ?" asked my old mistress. She did not say, "How kind, how noble, how generous !" in those days, as she had done before the marriage. Ho thought a minute, and ana ivered " Ten pounds." " Very well, I will take caro she has it," agreed Mrs Wilkins j but he did not seem satisfied. ' "I will give ifc to her myself now," he declared ; and they had to fetch him his purse and open it, and lot him put the money in my hand, beforo he rested content. " You will send somo of it to you mother, I know," !io said to me, looking up in my face with a weary smile. " Ah, had mine lived!" Now I never thought ho had heard anything about poor -Mother till then, aud it seemed strango in any caee he should think of her ; but many things were Btrange about him then. In the evoning?, whon Mrs Wilkins and his wifo were at dinner, he would tell me about tho pranks hn had played when he was a boy stopping afc his uncle's, and speak of a young cousin called Hal. " I served him a scurvy trick, I am afraid," ho said once ; " but it might have been wrr-ie. You'll toll him, won't you, it might Inve been worse ? " I said I would if ever I saw tho gentleman ; but beforo I had finished saying so ho wandered off ngain. Towards the last ho was light-headed moro than half his time. Somehow that ten pounds made a cuolr.es-) between mo and Mrs Wilkins ; why, I cannot toll, for ten pounds was nofc as much to her as ten shUhngs had bennin the old days ; ond besides, it did not come out of her monoy. Perhaps ahe wished he had spoken lo her about it alone, and that she might havo given it to me from hersolf, or at any rate, as if it resulted from somo asking of hers. Perhaps she felfc the end was so near, there was no uae in keeping up appearances any longer j perhaps she was not pleased because I told her I meant soon to bo married ; perhaps sho felt tired oufc. Whatover might be the caueo, she never seemed quite the same to me after, though sho let me take my turn in the nursing as usual. He woidd not havo been best pleased if she had not, perhaps, for evon to the last ho tried to be mister ; and besides, it was not ior long. 3eforo tho year was out he died ; and very shortly after the funeral my mistress and

her mother started for tho Continent. Martinly Hall, 'n Yorkshire, where Mr Mason resided tho last fow months of his life, went to his cousin, that Hal about whom he raved in his illness. .It could not have been left away from him, beoauso of Borne entail thafc kept it and a few farms adjacent in the Mason family; but I heard tho old butler say it would have to bo let or stay empty. "Mr Henry," he said, " will never bo able to keep it up. All the land that goes with the HaU," he went on, " would not bring in (wo hundred a year. Ifc is a pity, a greab pity, Mr Harlesdon was so foolish, but the mistake he made cannot be mended now." (To be continued.)