That Stick

arrangements of the executors made it desirable that they should not take possession till October, when they left behind them the gorgeous autumn beauty of the western coast and journeyed southwards.

The bells were rung, the gates thrown wide open, and lights flashed in the windows as Lord and Lady Northmoor drove up to their home, but it was in the dark, and there was no demonstrative welcome, the indoor servants were all new, the cook-housekeeper hired by Lady Kenton's assistance, and the rest of the maids chosen by her, the butler and his subordinate acquired in like manner.

It was a little dreary. The rooms looked large and empty. Miss Morton's belongings had been just what gave a homelike air to the place, and when these were gone, even the big fires could not greatly cheer the huge spaces. However, these two months had accustomed the new arrivals to their titles, and likewise to being waited upon, and they were less at a loss than they would have been previously, though to Mary especially it was hard to realise that it was her own house, and that she need ask no one's leave. Also that it was not a duty to sit with a fire. She could not well have done so, considering how many were doing their best to enliven the house, and finally she spent the evening in the library, not a very inviting room in itself, but which the late lord had inhabited, and where the present one had already held business interviews. It was, of course, lined with the standard books of the last generation, and Mary, who had heard of many, but never had access to them, flitted over them while her husband opened the letters he had found awaiting him. To her, what some one has called the 'tea, tobacco, and snuff' of an old library where the books are chiefly viewed as appropriate furniture, were all delightful discoveries. Even to 'Hume's History of England-nine volumes! I did not know it was so long! Our first class had the Student's Hume. Is there much difference?'

'Rather to the Student's advantage, I believe. Half these letters, at least, are mere solicitations for custom! And advertisements!'

'How the books stick together! I wonder when they were opened last!'

'Never, I suspect,' said he. 'I do not imagine the Mortons were much disposed to read.'

'Well, they have left us a delightful store! What's this? Smollett's Don Quixote. I always wanted to know about that. Is it not something about giants and windmills? Have you read it?'

'I once read an odd volume. He was half mad, and too good for this world, and thought he was living in a romance. I will read you some bits. You would not like it all.'

'Oh, I do hope you will have time to read to me! Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. All these volumes! They are quite damp. You have read it?'

'Yes, and I wish I could remember all those Emperors. I must put aside this letter for Hailes-it is a man applying for a house.'

'How strange it sounds! Look, here is such an immense Shakespeare! Oh! full of engravings,' as she fell upon Boydell's Shakespeare -another name reverenced, though she only knew a few selected plays, prepared for elocution exercises.

Her husband, having had access to the Institute Library, and spent many evenings over books, was better read than she, whose knowledge went no farther than that of the highest class, but who knew all very accurately that she did know, and was intelligent enough to find in those shelves a delightful promise of pasture. He was by this time sighing over requests for subscriptions.

'Such numbers! Such good purposes! But how can I give?'

'Cannot you give at least a guinea?' asked Mary, after hearing some.

'I do not know whether in this position a small sum in the list is not more disadvantageous than nothing at all. Besides, I know nothing of the real merits. I must ask Hailes. Ah! and here is Emma, I thought that she would be a little impatient. She says she shall let her house for the winter, and thinks of going to London or to Brighton, where she may have masters for the girls.'

'Oh, I thought you meant them to go to a good school?'

'So I do, if I can get Emma's consent; but I doubt her choosing to part with Ida. She wants to come here.'

'I suppose we ought to have her?'

'Yes, but not immediately. I do not mean to neglect her-at least, I do hope to do all that is right; but I think you ought to have a fair start here before she comes, so that we will invite her for Christmas, and then we can arrange about Ida and Constance.'

'Dear little Connie, I hope she is as nice a little girl as she used to be!'

'With good training, I think, she will be; and the tutor gives me good accounts of Herbert in this letter.'

'Shall we have him here on Sunday week?'

'Yes, I am very anxious to see him. I hope his master gives him more religious instruction than he has ever had, poor boy!'

Though not brilliant or playful, Lord and Lady Northmoor had, it may be perceived, no lack of good sense in their strange new surroundings. It was hard not to feel like guests on sufferance, and next morning, a Sunday, was wet. However, under their waterproofs and umbrellas trudging along, they felt once more, as Mary said, like themselves, as if they had escaped from their keepers. Nobody on the way had the least idea who the two cloaked figures were, and when they crept into the seat nearest the door they were summarily ejected by a fat, red-faced man, who growled audibly, 'You've no business in my pew!'

However, with the words, 'Beg your pardon,' they stepped out with a little amusement in their eyes, when a spruce young woman sprang up from the opposite pew, with a scandalised whisper-

'Mr. Ruddiman, it's his Lordship! Allow me, my Lord-your own seat-'

And she marshalled them up to the choir followed closely by Mr. Ruddiman, ruddier than ever, and butcher all over, in a perfect agony of apology, which Lord Northmoor in vain endeavoured to suppress or silence, till, when the guide had pointed to a handsome heavy carved seat with elaborate cushions, he gave a final gasp of, 'You'll not remember it in the custom, my Lord,' and departed, leaving his Lordship almost equally scarlet with annoyance at the place and time of the demonstration, though, happily, the clergyman had not yet appeared, in his long and much-tumbled surplice.

It was a case of a partial restoration of a church in the dawn of such doings, when the horsebox was removed, but the great family could not be routed out of the chancel, so there were the seats, where the choir ought to have sat, beneath a very ugly east window, bedecked with the Morton arms. In the other division of the seat was a pale lady in black, with a little girl, Lady Adela Morton, no doubt, and opposite were the servants, and the school children sat crowded on the steps. It was not such a service as had been the custom of the Hurminster churches; and the singing, such as it was, depended on the thin shrill voices of the children, assisted by Lady Adela and the mistress; the sermon was dull and long, and altogether there was something disheartening about the whole.

Lady Adela had a gentle, sweet countenance and a simple devout manner; but it was disappointing that she did not attempt to address the newcomers, though they passed her just outside the churchyard, talking to an old man. Lady Kenton would surely have welcomed them.

CHAPTER XII. THE BURTHEN OF HONOURS

A fearful affair to the new possessors of Northmoor was the matter of morning calls. The first that befell them, as in duty bound, was that from the Vicar. They were peaceably writing their letters in the library, and hoping soon to go out to explore the Park, when Mr. Woodman was announced, and was found a lonely black speck in the big dreary drawing-room, a very state room, indeed, which nobody had ever willingly inhabited. The Vicar was accustomed to be overridden; he was an elderly widower, left solitary in his old age, and of depressed spirits and manner. However, Frank had been used to intercourse with clergy, though his relations with them seemed reversed, and instead of being patronised, he had to take the initiative; or rather, they touched each other's cold, shy, limp hands, and sat upright in their chairs, and observed upon the appropriate topic of early frosts, which really seemed to be affecting themselves.

There was a little thaw when Lord Northmoor asked about the population, larger, alas, than the congregation might have seemed to show, and Mary asked if there were much poverty, and was answered that there was much suffering in the winter, there was not much done for the poor except by Lady Adela.

'You must tell us how we can assist in any way.'

The poor man began to brighten. 'It will be a great comfort to have some interest in the welfare of the parish taken here, my Lord. The influence hitherto has not been fortunate. Miss Morton, indeed-latterly-but, poor thing, if I may be allowed to say so, she is flighty-and uncertain-no wonder-'