CHAPTER VIII

New Zealand Tablet, Volume V, Issue 246, 18 January 1878, Page 5

CHAPTER VIII

THE NEW DUKE. Ox the following Monday the duke returned, and next day T received a brief note from him, hewing me to come up to the lark, to dine and sleep, and begin the settlement of the Queensland business the next morning. 1 went up accordingly, was shown to my room, dressed and descended to the drawing-room, where for tho best part of an hour I waited alone, but Lcveii himself appeared not. As I afterwards ascertained, the hour preceding dinner was the one hour iii the day he claimed for privacy, and no one then ever ventured to disturb him. At last the door opened, and he stood before me. I grasped his hand looked into thai lace, the and yet so altered.

Aged not by ten but twenty years ; no longer with the vigorous ruddy bloom of fivc-and-twenty, but pale and transparent, and sweet _bey_ond expression. 1 stammered r>nt something about " waiting on bis Grace," but at once lie stopped me. " I have enough of that elsewhere/ lie said ; "let you and me be always Grant and Aubrey." We went in *o dinner, ltemem boring all I had heard of his eremitical habit-, J was. cu rii ins what there might be to notice,, and I noticed nothing. There was no gold plate, certainly: but noither j was their any affectation uf extravagant simplicity. I He talked uf old times in Australia, and of Scotland, whence he j had just return -d. an.l oE Homchester, where he had been inspecting some new engines for his mine*. Oswald was right ; he certainly had v liking for business. After dinner we stepped out on the terrace. How delicious this I is, after a week of Homcbester ; how it reminds me of that happy evening at the Grange, Jack, when you all made me so at home. I couldn't say the feeling it gave me to sec your mother with her cap and her crotchet, and her sweet motherly ways. It reminded me of my own dear mother. Do you know, I often go and have a talk to the old lady, that I may just look at that cap of hers ; its the most loveable thing in Oakham.'' (No wonder, 1 thought, that she considers him faultless.) '■ You have been adding to the place since I was here,'' I said. '' Eeally, Grant, I never expected to see new graperies.'' " That was your sister's affair ; trust a woman for getting what I she has a mind for." " And, then, the chapel .' '' •' Ah, yes, I couldn't always be going over to Bradford, as on that eventful Sunday. You've seen it, of course ? "' •• Yes, and Bt. Alexis."' i He smiled. " That was poor Werner's painting ; such a fellow, i Jack ; a true painter ; a man with a soul at the end of his paintbrush ; it was wonderful." '• So you burnt poor Adonis? '' '•Who's been talking about all that nonsense? Mary, I'll i)» ! bound. Yes, I burnt him, and I'd burn him again if I had the'offe ? I " What a Goth you arc, Grant .' " | " About as bad as Ht. Gregory, for he would certainly have done i the same. Look here. .lack ; you send a fellow to prison for a month, i with hard labour, for selling prints in a shop window that shock the I eye of the respectable public : and then the respectable public votes thousands of the public money to hang the walls of the national col- , lections with abominations, much more dangerous." •' WelL but what about Werner ? is he au ancient or a modern 1 " •• Werner 1 Oh, I forgot you didn't know him ; well, I think I j never loved a fellow better : but, you see, my Mends have all got a trick of leaving me."' I '■ I» he dead, then," I asked, gently, '• Dead to this world, Jack : he has left it ; passed, as the Laureate [ would say, ' into the silent life? He carried his heart and his pencil j to Gleuleven. 1 ' Jle was hi lent. '• l'eoplc say " I began, then paused, furl , thought, it might seem an impertinence. "I know what you mean." he said, quickly. "Yes. I dreamt about it once, but they would not hear of it. They told me truly that I had received my call, and that my sacrifice must be to remain in the world, and not to leave it." '• Wliy, of course," T said. " Could you doubt it ? It is not every one who has .such means at his command." He sighed deeply. " Means enough, but so little comes of it." Come now. Grant, what do you mean by that' Just look at Bradford." '• Bradford ! " he said : '• yes, indeed, look at it — such an utter failure. No, of course. I don't regret it, nor the time, nor the plague of it. nor the money : and I don"t mean there's been nothing done ; but, oh, the depths of iniquity hidden away iv places like that, and all England seething with them." He bent his head for a minute or two. and an expression of great pain was on his brow when he once moic raised it. But it passed in a moment, and again the sweet, calm louk returned "All right. Jack : one must do one's best, and a sad mess the best is : but one must do it, and then leave it with God."' 11 And how about Glenleven .' Is it true. Grant, that you are tr\ - in» to create a Garden of Kden there, with all due precautions for shutting out the serpent .' " •' If you mean the ale-house, yes,"' he answered. '• I suspect that is our English edition of the monster." ' What.' beer actually prohibited? My dear Grant, that will never pay : the Anglo-Saxon animal cannot live without it." '• I believe he can't ; but I don't go that length." •• What then ? "' •' Well, I try it tliis way : I engage the fellows to drink what they want at home at their own houses."' " But how can they get it to drink ? " I asked. Isn"t there something about ' licensed to be drunk on the premises ? '" He looked a little timid, as though aware that he was confessing to a hobby. "Ido it this way, Jack: they all have their ration*. Every man at work on the place has his proper allowance, and it is ; sent him from the little tavern. But the tavern is in my own handy, and the fellow who keeps it has no licence to sell beer or spirits on 1 the premises." '■ Don't they evade your code of laws .' " " Well, on the whole, no : but time alone can test it." We walked up and down for a while in silence. " I koo^Jv. my dear Aubrey," at last he said, " that there's much to be said against i it, as unreal, unpractical. Most men think me an ass, and I daresay I they are in the right of it. But to secure even a year, a month, a i week of innocence is worth living for — at least that is how I see it." 1 I felt touched at the humble, apologetic tone of the man who was 1 speaking of what the world styled his crotchet. "My dear Grant," I • said, " who can doubt it ? All I was thinking was, how far any private efforts can ever take the place of law and public opinion." " Your old stronghold !" he said, smiling. You were always the , man for law and order. Just sec here. Did you ever hear of , Count ' Kumi'ord ? '" ■