Blind Love.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VI, Issue 38, 20 September 1890, Page 4

Blind Love.

By

WILKIE COLLINS.

[The Bight of Translation is Reserved.]

THE STORY

THIRD ZE 3 ZE ZR lOID .

C HAPTER XXXIX. THE MYSTERY OF THE HOSPITAL. V-PL';' ** t ' ie next morning Lord Hairy left the cottage, M accompanied by the doctor. "* After a long absence he returned alone. His •■AxP * wife’s worst apprehensions, roused by what Fanny bad told her, were more than justified, ' IV t, *‘ e change which she now perceived in him. fits eyes were bloodshot, his face was haggard, r’J'V.Lj’'' movements were feeble and slow. He looked r like a man exhausted by some internal conflict, which had vibrated between the extremes of anger and alarm. ‘ I'm tired to death,’he said ; ‘ get me a glass of wine.’ She waited on him with eager obedience, and watched anxiously for the reviving effect of the stimulant. The little irritabilities which degrade humanity only prolong their mischievous existence, while the surface of life stagnates in calm. Their annihilation follows when strong emotion stirs in the depths, and raises the storm. The estrangement of the day before passed as completely from the minds of the husband and wife—both strongly agitated —as if it had never existed. All-mastering fear was busy at their hearts ; fear, in the woman, of the unknown temptation which had tried the man ; fear, in the man, of the tell-tale disturbance in him, which might excite the woman’s suspicion. Without venturing to look at him, Iris said : ‘I am afraid you have heard bad news?’ Without venturing to look at her, Lord Harry answered : ‘ Yes, at the newspaper office.’ She knew that he was deceiving her ; and he felt that she knew it. For awhile, they were both silent. From time to time, she anxiously stole a look at him. His mind remained absorbed in thought. There they were, in the same room—seated near each other ; united by the most intimate of human relationships—and get how far, how cruelly far, apart ! The slowest of all laggard minutes, the minutes which are reckoned by suspense, followed each other taidily ami more tardily, before there appeared the first sign of a change. He lifted his drooping head. Sadly, longingly, he looked at her. The unerring instinct of true love encouraged his wife to speak to him. ‘ I wish I could relieve your anxieties,’ she said simply. ‘ Is there nothing I can do to help you ?’ ‘ Come here, Iris.’ She rose and approached him. In the past clays of the honeymoon and its sweet familiarities, he had sometimes taken her on his knee. He took her on his knee now, and put his arm round her. ‘ Kiss me,’ he said. With all her heart she kissed him. He sighed heavily; his eyes rested on her with a trustful appealing look which she had never observed in them before. ‘Why do you hesitate to confide in me?’ she asked. * Dear Harry, do you think I don't see that something troubles you ? ‘ Yes,’ he said, ‘ there is something that I regret.’ ‘What is it.’ ‘lris,’ he answered, ‘ I am sorry I asked Vimpany to come back to us.’ At that unexpected confession, a bright Hush of joy and pride overspread his wife’s face. Again, the unerring instinct of love guided her to discovery of the truth. The opinion of his wicked friend must have been accidentally justified, at the secret interview that day, by the friend himself ! In tempting her husband, Vimpany had said -something which must have shocked and offended him. The result, as she could hardly doubt, had been the restoration of her domestic- influence to its helpful freedom of control whether for tin.- time only it was not in her nature, at that moment of happiness, to inquire. ‘ After what you have just told me,' she ventured to say, ‘ I may own that I am glad to see you come home, alone.’

In that indirect manner, she confessed the hope that friendly intercourse between the two men had come to an eml. His reply disappointed her. ‘ Vimpany only remains in Paris,’he said, ‘to present a letter of introduction. He will follow me home.’ ‘Soon?’ she asked, piteously. ‘ln time for dinner, I suppose.' She was still sitting on his knee. His arm pressed her gently when he said his next wools. ‘ I hone you will dine with us to-day, Iris?’ ‘ Yes—if you wish it.’

‘ I wish it very much. Something in me recoils from being alone with Vimpany. Besides, a dinner at home without you is no dinner nt all.’

She thanked him for that little compliment by a look. At the same time, her grateful sense of her husband’s kindness was embittered by the prospect of the doctor’s return. ‘ls he likely to dine with us often, now?’ she was bold enough to say. ‘ I hope not.' Perhaps he was conscious that be might have made a more positive reply. He certainly took refuge in another subject —more agreeable to himself.

‘ My dear, you have expressed the wish to relieve my anxieties,’ he said ; • and you can help me, I think, in that way. 1 have a letter to write—of some importance, Iris, to vour interests as well as to mine- which must go to Ireland by to-day's post. You shall read it, and say if you approve •of what 1 have done. Don’t let me be disturbed. This

letter, I can tell you, will make a hard demand on my poor brains—l must go and write in my own room.’ Left alone with the thoughts that now crowded on her mind, Iris found her attention claimed onee more by passing events. Fanny Mere arrived, to report heiself on her return from Paris.

She had so managed her departure from Passy as to precede Lord Harry and Mr Vimpany, and to watch for their arrival in Paris by a later train. They had driven from the railway to the newspaper office—with the maid in attendance on them in another cab. When they separated, the doctor proceeded on foot to the Luxembourg Gardens. Wearing a plain blaek dress, and protected from close observation by her veil, Fanny followed him, cautiously keeping at a sufficient distance, now on one side of the street and now on the other. When my lord joined his friend, she just held them in view, and no more, as they walked up and down in the barest and loneliest part of the Gardens that they could find. Their talk having come to an end, they parted. Her master was the first who came out into the street ; walking at a great rate, and looking most desperately upset. Mr Vimpany next appeared, sauntering along with his hands in his pockets, grinning as if his own villanous thoughts were thoroughly amusing him. Fanny was now more careful than ever not to lose sight of the doctor. The course which he pursued led them to the famous hospital, called the Hotel Dieu. At the entranee she saw him take a letter out of his pocket, and give it to the porter. Soon afterwards, a person appeared who greeted him politely, and conducted him into the building. For more than an hour, Fanny waited to see Mr Vimpany come out again, and waited in vain. What could he possibly want in a French hospital ? And why had he remained in that foreign institution for so long a time? Battled by these mysteries, and weary after much walking, Fanny made the best of her way home, and consulted her mistress.

Even if Iris had been capable of enlightening her, the opportunity was wanting. Lord Harry entered the room, with the letter which he had just written, open in his hand. As a matter of course, the maid retired.

C HAPTER XL.

DIRE necessity. The Irish lord had a word to say to bis wife, before he submitted to her the letter which he bad just written. He had been summoned to a meeting of proprietors at the office of the newspaper, convened to settle the terms of a new subscription rendered necessary by unforeseen expenses incurred in the interests of the speculation. The vote that followed, after careful preliminary consultation, authorised a claim on the purses of subscribing proprietors, which sadly reduced the sum obtained by Lord Harry's promissory note. Nor was this inconvenience the only trial of endurance to which the Irish lord was compelled to submit. The hone which he had entertained of assistance from the profits of the new journal, when repayment of the loan that be had raised became due, was now plainly revealed as a delusion. Ruin stared him in the face, unless he could command the means of waiting for the pecuniary success of the newspaper, during an interval variously estimated at six months, or even et a year to come. ‘Our case is desperate enough,’he said, ‘to call for a desperate remedy. Keep up your spirits, Iris—l have written to my brother.’ Iris looked at him in dismay. ‘ Surely,’ she said, ‘you once told me you had written to your brothei, and he answered you in the cruellest manner through his lawyers ?’ ‘Quite tine, mv dear. But, this time, there is one circumstance in our favour—my brother is going to be married. The lady is said to be an heiress ; a charming creature, admired and beloved wherever she goes. There must surely be something to soften the hardest heart in that happy prospect. Read what I have written, and tell me what you think of it.’ The opinion of the devoted wife encouraged the desperate husband ; the letter was dispatched by the post of that day.

If blusterous good spirits can make a man agreeable at the dinner-table, then indeed Mr Vimpany, on his return to the cottage, played the part of a welcome guest. He was inexhaustible in gallant attentions to his friend s wife ; lie told his most amusing stories in his happiest way : he gaily drank bis host’s fine white Burgundy, and praised with thorough knowledge of the subject the succulent French dishes; he tried Lord Harry with talk on politics, talk on sport, and (wonderful to relate in these days) talk on literature. The preoccupied Irishman was equally inaccessible on all three subjects. When the dessert was placed on the table—still bent on making himself agreeable to Lady Harry—Mr Vimpany Jed the conversation to the subject of floriculture. In the interests of her ladyship’s pretty little garden, he advocated a complete change in the system of cultivation, and justified his revolutionary views by misquoting the published work of a gieat authority on gardening with such polite obstinacy that Iris (eager to confute him) went away to fetch the book. The moment he bad entrapped her into leaving the room, the doctor turned to Lord Harry with a sudden change to the imperative mood in look and manner. ‘ What have you been about,’ be asked, ‘since we had that talk in the Gardens to-day ? Have you looked at your empty purse, and are you wise enough to take my way of filling it ?’ ‘ As long as there's the ghost of a chance left to me,’ Lord Harry’ replied, ‘ I’ll take any way of filling my purse but yours.’ ‘ Does that mean you have found a way ?’ ‘ Do me a favour, Vimpany. Defer all questions till the end of the week.' ‘And then I shall have your answer?’ ‘ Without fail, I promise it. Hush I’ Iris returned to the dining-room with her book ; and polite Mr Vimpany owned in the readiest manner that he had been mistaken. The remaining days of the week followed each other wearily. During the interval, Lord Harry's friend carefully preserved the character of a mode) guest—he gave as little trouble as possible. Every morning after breakfast the doctor went away by the train. Every morning (with similar regularity) he was followed by the resolute Fanny Mere. Pursuing his way through widely different quarters of Paris, he invariably stopped at a public building, invariably presented a letter at the door, and was invariably

asked to walk in. Inquiries, patiently persisted in by the English maid, led in each case to the same result. The ditterent public buildings were devoted to the same benevolent purpose. Like the Hotel Dieu, they were all hospitals ; and Mr Vimpany’s object in visiting them remained as profound a mystery as ever. Early on the last morning of the week the answer from Lord Harry’s brother arrived. Hearing of it, Iris ran eagerly into her husband’s room. The letter was already’ scattered in fragments on the floor. What the tone of the Earl’s inhuman answer had been in the past time, that it was again now. Iris put her arms round her husband’s neck. ‘Oh, my poor love, what is to be done ?’ He answered in one reckless word : ‘ Nothing I’ ‘ Is there nobody else who can help us ?’ she asked. ‘ Ah, well, darling, there’s perhaps one other person still left.’ ‘ Who is the person ?’ ‘ Who should it be but your own dear self ?’ She looked at him in undisguised bewildeiment: ‘Only tell me, Harry, what I can do ?’ ‘ Write to Mountjoy, and ask him to lend me the money.’ He said it. In those shameless words, he said it. Sue who had sacrificed Mountjoy to the man whom she had married, was now asked by that man to use Mountjoy’s devotion to her, as a means of paying his debts ! Iris drew back from him with a cry of disgust. ‘ You refuse?’ he said. ‘ Do you insult me by doubting it ?’ she answered. He rang the bell furiously, and dashed out of the room. She heard him, on the stairs, ask where Mr Vimpany was. The servant replied : ‘ In the garden, my lord.’ Smoking a cigar luxuriously in the fine morning air, the doctor saw his excitable Irish friend hastening out to meet him. ‘ Don’t hurry,’ he said, in full possession of his impudent good-humour; ‘ and don’t lose your temper. Will you take my way out of your difficulties, or will you not ? Which is it—Yes or No ?’ ‘ You infernal scoundrel—Yes !’ ‘ My dear lord, I congratulate you.’ ‘ On what, sir ?’ ‘ On being as great a scoundrel as I am.’

CHAPTER XLI. THE MAN IS FOUND.

The unworthy scheme, by means of which Lord Harry had proposed to extricate himself from his pecuniary responsibilities, had led to serious consequences. It had produced a state of deliberate estrangement between man and wife. Iris secluded herself in her own room. Her husband passed the hours of every day away from the cottage ; sometimes in the company of the doctor, sometimes amono his friends in Paris. His wife suffered acutely under the°selfimposed state of separation, to which wounded pride and keenly felt resentment compelled her to submit. No friend was near her, in whose compassionate advice she might have taken refuge. Not even the sympathy of her maid was ottered to the lonely wife. With the welfare of Iris as her one end in view, Fanny Mere honestly believed that it would be better and safer for Lady Harry if she and her husband finally decided on livim’ separate lives. The longer my lord persisted in keeping the doctor with him as his guest, the more perilously he was associated with a merciless wretch, who would be capable of plotting the ruin of anyone—man or woman, high person or low person—who might happen to be an obstacle in his way. So far as a person in her situation could venture on taking the liberty, the maid did her best to widen the breach be" tween her master and her mistress. While Fanny was making an attempt to influence Lady Harry, and only producing irritation as the result, Vimpany was exerting stronger powers of persuasion in the effort to prejudice the Irish lord against any pioposal for reconciliation which might reach him through his wife. I find an unforgiving temper in your charming lady,’ the doctor declared. ‘lt doesn’t show itself on the surface my dear fellow, but there it is. Take a wise advantage of circumstances say you will raise noinconvenientobjections, it she wants a separation by mutual consent. Now don’t misunderstand me. I only recommend the sort of separation which will suit our convenience. You know as well as 1 do that you can whistle your wife back again—’ Mr Vimpany s friend was rude enough to interrupt him ‘ I call that a coarse way of putting it,’ Lord Harry interposed. ‘ Put it how you like for yourself,’ the doctor rejoined. Lady Harry may be persuaded to come back to you, when we want her for our grand project. In the meantime (for 1 am always a considerate man where women are concerned) we act uelicately towards my lady, in sparing her the discovery of what shall I call our coming enterprise ?—venturesome villainy, which might ruin you in your wife’s estimation. Do you see our situation now, as it really is? \ ery well. Pass the bottle, and drop the subject for the present. The next morning brought with it an event, which demolished the doctor’s ingenious arrangement for the dismissal of Iris from the scene of action. Lord and Lady Harry encountered each other accidentally on the stairs. Distrusting herself if she ventured to look at him, Iris turned her eyes away from her husband. He misinterpreted tlie action as an expression of contempt. Anger at once inclined him to follow Mr Vimpany’s advice. He opened the door of the dining-room, empty at that moment, and told Iris that he wished to speak with her. \\ hat his villainous friend had suggested that he should say, on the subject of a separation, he now repeated with a repelling firmness which he was far from really feeling. The acting was bad, but the effect was produced. For the first time, liis wife spoke to him. ‘ Do you really mean it ?’ she asked. The tone in which she said those words, sadly and regretfully telling its tale of uncontrollable surprise ; the tender remembrance of past happy days in her eyes ; the quivering pain, expressive of wounded love, that parted her lips in the effort to breathe freely, touched his heart, try as he might in the wretched pride of the moment to conceal it. He was silent.

‘ If you are weary of our married life,’ she continued, ‘ say so, and let us part. 1 will go away without entreaties anil withoutreproaches. Whateverpain I may feel, you shall notsee

it !’ A passing Hush crossed her face, and left it pale again She trembled under the consciousness of returning love—the blind love that hail so cruelly misled her ! At a moment when she most needed firmness, her heait was sinking; she resisted,- struggled, recovered herself. Quietly au< * even firmly, she claimed his decision. * Does your silence mean,’ she asked, ‘ that you wish me to leave you ?’ No man who had loved her as tenderly as her husband had loved her, could have resisted that touching self-control. He answered his wife without uttering a word—he held out his arms to her. The fatal reconciliation was accomplished in silence. At dinner on that day Mr Vinipany’s bold eyes saw a new sight, and Mr Vinipany’s rascally lips indulged in an impudent smile. My lady appeared again in her place at the dinner-table. At the customary time, the two men were left alone over their wine. The reckless Irish lord, rejoicing in the recovery of his wife’s tender regard, drank freely. Understanding and despising him, the doctor’s devilish gaiety indulged in facetions reminiscences of his own married life. * If I could claim a sovereign,’ he said, * for every quarrel between Mrs Vimpany and myself, I put it at a low average when I declare that I should be worth a thousand pounds. How does your lordship stand in that matter ? Shall we say a dozen breaches of the marriage agreement up to the present time?’ ‘ Say two—and no more to come !’ his friend answered cheerfully. ‘No more to come!’ the doctor repeated. ‘My experience says plenty more to come ; I never saw two people less likely to submit to a peaceable married life than you and my lady. Ha ! you laugh at that? It’s a habit of mine to back my opinion. I’ll bet you a dozen of champagne there will be a quarrel which parts you two, for good and all, before the year is out. Do you take the bet ?’ ‘ Done !’ cried Lord Harry. ‘ I propose my wife’s good health, Vimpany, in a bumpei. She shall drink confusion to all false prophets in the first glass of your champagne !’ The post of the next morning brought with it two letters. One of them bore the postmark of London, and was addressed to Lady Harry Norland. It was written by Mrs Vimpany, and it contained a few lines added by Hugh Mountjoy. ‘My strength is slow in returning to me ’ (he wrote) ; ‘ but my kind and devoted nurse says that all danger of infection is at an end. You may writeagain toyour old friend if Lord Harry sees no objection, as harmlessly as in the happy past time. My weak band begins to tremble -already. How glad I shall be to hear from you, it is, happily for me, quite needless to add.’ In her delight at receiving this good news Iris impulsively assumed that her husband would give it a kindly welcome on his side ; she insisted on reading the letter to him. He said coldly, ‘ I am glad to hear of Mr Mountjoy’s recovery ’ —and took up the newspaper. Was this unworthy jealousy still strong enough to master him, even at that moment ? His wife had forgotten it. Why had he not forgotten it too?

On the same day Iris replied to Hugh, with the confidence and affection of the bygone time before her marriage. After closing and addressing the envelope, she found that her small store of postage stamps was exhausted, and sent for her maid. Mr Vimpany happened to pass the open door of her room, while she was asking for a stamp ; he heard Fanny say that she was not able to accommodate her mistress. ‘ Allow me to make myself useful,’ the polite doctor suggested. He produced a stamp, and fixed it himself on the envelope. When he had proceeded on his way downstairs, Fanny’s distrust of him insisted on expressing itself. ‘ He wanted to find out what person you have written to,’ she said. ‘Let me make your letter safe in the post.’ In five minutes more it was in the box at the office. While these triHing events were in course of progress, Mr Vimpany had gone into the garden to read the second of the two letters, delivered that morning, addressed to himself. On her return from the post office, Fanny had opportunities of observing him while she was in the greenhouse, trying to revive the perishing Howers —neglected in the past days of domestic trouble. Noticing her, after he had read his letter over for the second time, Mr Vimpany sent the maid into the cottage to say that he wished to speak with her master. Lord Harry joined him in the garden—looked at the letter—and, handing it baek, turned away. Ihe doctor followed him, and said something which seemed to be received with objection. Mr Vimpany persisted nevertheless, and apparently carried his point. The two gentlemen consulted the railway time-table, and hurried away together, to catch the train to Paris. Fanny Mere returned to the conservatory, and absently resumed her employment among the Howers. On what evil errand had the doctor left the cottage ? And, why, on this occasion, had he taken the master with him ? The time had been when Fanny might have tried to set these questions at rest by boldly following these two gentlemen to Paris; trusting to her veil to her luck, and to the choice of a separate carriage in the train to escape notice. But, although her ill-judged interference with the domestic affairs of Lady Harry bad been forgiven, she had not been received again into favour unreservedly. Conditions were imposed which forbade her to express any opinion of her master’s conduct, and which imperatively ordered her to leave the protection of her mistress-if protection was really needed —in his lordship’s competent hands. ‘ I gratefully appreciate your kind intentions,’ Iris had said with her customary tenderness of regard for the feelings of others ; ‘ but I never wish to hear again of Mr Vimpany, or of the strange suspicions which he seems to excite in your mind.’ Still as gratefully devoted to Iris as over, Fanny viewed the change in my lady's way of thinking, as one of the deplorable results of her return to her husband, and waited resignedly for the coming time when her wise distrust of two unscrupulous men would be justified. Condemned to inaction for the present, Lady Harry's maid walked irritably up and down the conservatory, forgetting the Howers. Through the open back door of the cottage the ■cheap clock in the hall poured its harsh little volume of sound, striking the hour. ‘ I wonder,’ she said to herself, ‘if those two wicked ones have found their way to a hospital yet! That guess happened to have hit the mark. The two wicked ones were really approaching a hospital, well known to the doctor by more previous visits than one. At the door they were met by a French physician, attached ■to the institution —the writer of the letter which had reached Mr Vimpany in the morning.

This gentleman led the way to the official department of the hospital, and introduced the two foreigners to the French authorities assembled for the transaction of business.

Asa medical man, Mr Vinipany’s claims to general respect and confidence were carefully presenter). He was a member of the English College of Surgeons; he was the fiiend, as well as the colleague, of the famous President of that College, who had introduced him to the chief surgeon of the Hotel Dien. Other introductions to illustrious medical persons in Paris had naturally follower!. Presented under these arlvantages, Mr Vimpany announced his discovery of a new system of treatment in diseases of the lungs. Having receiver! medical education in Paris, he hat! felt bound in gratitude to place himself under the protection of ‘the princes of science,’ resident in the brilliant capital of France. In that hospital, after much fruitless investigation in similar institutions, he had found a patient suffering from the form of lung disease, which ottered to him the opportunity that he wanted. It was impossible that he could do justice to his new system, unless the circumstances were especially favourable. Air more pure than the air of a great city, and bed-room accommodation not shared by other sick persons, were among the conditions absolutely necessary to the success of the experiment. These and other advantages, were freely offered to him by his noble friend, who would enter into any explanations which the authorities then present might think it necessary to demand.

The explanations having been offered and approved, there was a general move to the bed occupied by the invalid who was an object of professional interest to the English uoctor. The patient's name was Oxbye. He was a native of Denmark, and bad followed in bis own country the vocation of a schoolmaster. His knowledge of the English language and the French had offered him the opportunity of migrating to Paris, where he had obtained employment as translator and copyist. Earning his bread, poorly enough in this way, he had been prostrated by the malady which had obliged him to take refuge in the hospital. The French physician, under whose medical care he had been placed, having announced that he had communicated his notes enclosed in a letter to his English colleague, and having frankly acknowledged that the result of the treatment had not as yet sufficiently justified expectation, the officers of the institution spoke next. The Dane was informed of the nature of Mr Vinipany’s interest in him, and of the hospitable assistance offered by Mr Vinipany’s benevolent friend ; ami the question was then put, whether he preferred to remain where he was, or whether he desired to be removed under the conditions which had been just stated ? Tempted by the prospect of a change, which offered to him a bed-chamber of his own in the house, of a person of distinction—with a garden to walk about in, anil Howers to gladden his eyes, when he got better—Oxbye eagerly adopted the alternative of leaving the hospital. ‘ Pray let me go,’ the poor fellow said ; ‘I am sure 1 shall be the better for it.’ Without opposing this decision, the responsible directors reminded hint that it bail been adopted on impulse, and decided that it was their duty to give hint a little time for consideration.

In the meanwhile, some of the gentlemen assembled at the bedside, looking at Oxbye and then looking at Lord Harry, had observed a certain accidental likeness between the patient and ‘ Milord, the philanthropist’ who was willing to receive him. The restraints of politeness had only permitted them to speak of this curious discovery among themselves. At the later time, however, when the gentlemen had taken leave of each other, Mr Vimpany—finding himself alone with Lord Harry—had no hesitation in introducing the subject, on which delicacy had prevented the Frenchmen from entering. ‘ Did you look at the Dane ?’ he began, abruptly. ‘ Of course I did !’ ‘ And you noticed the likeness ?’ ‘ Not 1 !’ The doctor’s uproarious laughter startled the people who were walking near them in the street. ‘ Here's another proof,’ he burst out, ‘ of the true saying that no man knows himself. You don’t deny the likeness, I suppose ?’ ‘ Do you yourself see it?’ Lord Harry asked. Mr Vimpany answered that question scornfully : ‘ls it likely that I should have submitted to all the trouble I have taken to get possession of that man, if I had not seen a likeness between his face and yours ?’ The Irish lord said no more. 'When his friend asked why he was silent, he gave his reason sharply enough : ‘ 1 don't like the subject.’

CHAPTER XLII. THE METTLESOME MAID. Ox the evening of that day Fanny Mere, entering the dining-room with the coffee, found Lord Harry and Mr Vimpany alone, and discovered (as soon as she opened the door) that they changed the language in which they were talking from English to French. She continued to linger in the room, apparently occupied in setting the various objects on the sideboard in order. Her master was sneaking at the time ; he asked if the doctor had succeeded in finding a bedroom for himself in the neighbourhood. To this Mr Vimpany replied that he had got the bedroom. Also, that he had provided himself with something else, which it was equally important to have at his disposal. ‘ I mean,’ he proceeded, in his bail French, ‘that I have found a photographic apparatus on hire. We are ready now for the appearance ot our interesting Danish guest? ■ Ami when the man comes,’ Lord Harry added, ‘ what am Ito say to my wife ? How am Ito find an excuse, when she hears of a hospital patent who has taken possession ot your bed-room at the cottage—and has done it with my permission, and with you to attend on him ?’ The doctor sipperl his coffee. ‘We have told a story that has satisfied the authorities,’ he said coolly. ‘ Repeat the story to your wife.’

‘ She won't believe it,’ Lord Harry replied. Mr Vimpany waited until he had lit another cigar, and had quite satisfied himself that it was worth smoking. ‘You have yourself to thank for that obstacle,’ be resumed. ‘lf you harl taken my advice, your wife would have been out of our way by this time. I suppose I must manage it. If you fail, leave her ladyship to me. In the meanwhile, there's a matter of more importance to settle first. We shall want a nurse for our poor dear invalid. Where are we to find her ?’

‘ As he stated that difficulty, he finished his coffee, and looked alsiut him for the bottle of brandy which always stood on the dinner-table. In doing this he hap|>eiied to notice Fanny. Convinced that her mistress was in danger, after what she had already beard, the maid's anxiety and alarm had so completely aosorlied her that she had forgotten to play her part. Instead of still busying heiself at the sideboard, she stood with her baek to it, palpably listening. Cunning Mr Y'impany, possessing himself of the brandy, made a request too entirely appropriate to excite suspicion. ‘ Some fresh cold water, if you please,’ was all that he said. The moment Fanny left the room, the doctor addressed his friend in English, with his eye in the door: ‘ News for you, my boy ! We are in a pretty pickle, Lady Harry's maid understands French.’ ‘ Quite impossible !' Lord Harry declared. ‘ M e will put that to the test,’Mr Y'impany answered. ‘ YVatch her when she conies in again.’ ‘ What are you going to do ?’ ‘I am going to insult her in French. Observe the result.’ In another minute Fanny returned with the fresh water. As she placed the glass jug before Mr Y'impany he suddenly laid his hand on her aim and looked her straight in the face. ‘ Vous nous avez mis dedans drolesse !’ he said. ‘ Vous entendez le Francais.’ * An uncontrollable look of mingled rage and fear made its plain confession in Fanny's face. She had been discovered ; she had heard herself called ‘drolesse;’ she stood before the two men self-condemned. Iler angry master threatened her with instant dismissal from the house. The doctor interfered. ‘ No, no,’ he said ; ‘ you mustn't deprive Lady Hairy, at a moment's notice, of her maid. Such a clever maid, too,' he added with his rascally smile. ‘An accomplished person, who understands French, and is too modest to own it !' The doctor had led Fanny through many a weary and unrewarded walk when she had followed him to the hospitals : he had now inflicted adelibeiate insult by calling her ‘drolesse and he had completed the sum of his offences by talking contemptuously ot her modesty and her mastery of the French language. The woman s detestation of him which under ordinary circumstances she mieht have attempted to conceal, was urged into audaciously asserting itself by the strong excitement that now possessed her. Driven to bay, Fanny had made up her mind to discover the conspiracy of which Mr Vimpany was the animating spirit, by a method daring enough to be worthy of the doctor himself. ‘My knowledge of French lias told me something.'she said. ‘ I have just heard, Mr Y'impany, that you want a nurse for your invalid gentleman. With my lord's permission, suppose you try Me ?’ Fanny's audacity was more than her master's patience could endure. He ordered her to leave the room. The peace • making doctor interfered again: ‘My dear lord, let me beg you will not be too hard on the young woman.’ He turned to Fanny with an effort to look ind.nl gent, which ended in the reappearance of his rascally smile. ‘ Thank you, my dear, for your proposal,'he said ;‘ I will let you know if we accept it, to-morrow.’ Fanny’s unforgiving master pointed to the door; she thanked Mr Vimpany, and went out. Lord Harry eyed his friend in angry amazement. ‘ Are you mad ?’ he asked. ‘ Tell me something first,’ the doctor rejoined. ‘ls there any English blood in your family ?’ Lord Harry answered with a burst of patriotic feeling : ‘ I regret to say my family is adulterated in that manner. My grandmother was an Englishwoman.' Mr Y’impany received this extract from the page of family history with a coolness all his own. ‘ It's a relief to hear that,’ he said. ‘ Y’ou may be capable (by the grandmother’s side) of swallowing a dose of sound English sense. I can but try, at any rate. That woman is too bold and too clever to be treated like an ordinary servant —I incline to believe that she is a spy in the employment of your wife. YVhether lam right or wrong in this lat ter case, the one way 1 can see of paring the cat’s claws is to turn her into a nurse. Do you find me mad now ?’ ‘ Madder than ever !’ ‘Ah, you don't take after your grandmother ’ Now listen to me. Do we run the smallest risk, if Fanny finds it her interest to betray us? Suppose we ask ourselves what she has really found out. She knows we have got a sick man from a hospital coming here does she know what we want him for? Not she ! Neither you nor I said a word on that subject. But she also heard us agree that your wife was in our way. YVhat does that mattei ? Did she hear us say what it is that we don't want your wife to discover ': Not she, 1 tell you again ! Y’ery well, then if Fanny acts as Oxbye's nurse, sly as the young woman may be. she innocently associates herself with the end that we have to gain by the Danish gentleman's death ! < Hi, you needn't look alarmed ! 1 mean his natural death by lung disease - no crime, my noble friend ! nocrime!’ The Irish lord, sitting near the doctor, drew his chair back in a hiury. ‘ If there’s English blood in my family,’ he declared, ‘ I‘Jl tell you what, Y'impany, there’s devil s blood in yours !' ‘Anything you like but Irish blood,’ the cool scoundrel rejoined. As he made that insolent reply, Fanny eame in again, with a sufficient excuse for her reappearance. She announced that a person from the hospital wished to speak to the English doctor. The messenger proved to be a young man employed in the secretary’s office, Oxbye still persisting in his desire to lie placed under Mr Y'impany's care one last responsibility rested on the official gentlemen now in charge of him. They could implicitly trust the medical assistance and the gracious hospitality offered to the poor Danish patient ; but before he left them, they must also be satisfied that he would be attended by a competent nurse. If the person whom Mr Vimpany proposed to employ in this capacity could be brought to the hospital, it would be esteemed a favour : and, if her account of herself satisfied the physician in charge of Ox bye's case, the Dane might be removed to his new quarters on the same day. The next morning witnessed the first in a series of domestic incidents at the co'tage which no prophetic ingenuity could have foreseen. Mr Y'impany and Fanny Mere actually left Pussy together, on their way to Paris ! In English. ‘Y’ou have taken us in, you jade! Y'ou underH tand French.’ (TO HE CONTINUED.)