Chapter I: Part 1

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL

OF

POPULAR

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART

Fifth Series

ESTABLISHED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, 1832

CONDUCTED BY R. CHAMBERS (SECUNDUS)

NO. 155.—VOL. III. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1886. PRICE 1½_d._]

JUST BEFORE WINTER.

BY RICHARD JEFFERIES, AUTHOR OF THE ‘GAMEKEEPER AT HOME,’ ETC.

A rich tint of russet deepened on the Forest top and seemed to sink day by day deeper into the foliage like a stain; riper and riper it grew, as an apple colours. Broad acres these of the last crop, the crop of leaves; a thousand, thousand quarters, the broad earth will be their barn. A warm red lies on the hillside above the woods, as if the red dawn stayed there through the day; it is the heath and heather seeds; and higher still, a pale yellow fills the larches. The whole of the great hill glows with colour under the short hours of the October sun; and overhead, where the pine-cones hang, the sky is of the deepest azure. The conflagration of the woods burning luminously crowds into those short hours a brilliance the slow summer does not know.

The frosts and mists and battering rains that follow in quick succession after the equinox, the chill winds that creep about the fields, have ceased a little while, and there is a pleasant sound in the fir-trees. Everything is not gone yet. In the lanes that lead down to the ‘shaws’ in the dells, the ‘gills,’ as these wooded depths are called, buckler ferns, green, fresh, and elegantly fashioned, remain under the shelter of the hazel-lined banks. From the tops of the ash-wands, where the linnets so lately sang, coming up from the stubble, the darkened leaves have been blown, and their much-divided branches stand bare like outstretched fingers. Black-spotted sycamore leaves are down, but the moss grows thick and deeply green; and the trumpets of the lichen seem to be larger now they are moist, than when they were dry under the summer heat. Here is herb-Robert in flower—its leaves are scarlet; a leaf of St John’s wort, too, has become scarlet; the bramble leaves are many shades of crimson; one plant of tormentil has turned yellow. Furze bushes, grown taller since the spring, bear a second bloom, but not perhaps so golden as the first. It is the true furze, and not the lesser gorse; it is covered with half-opened buds; and it is clear, if the short hours of sun would but lengthen, the whole gorse hedge would become aglow again. Our trees, too, that roll up their buds so tightly, like a dragoon’s cloak, would open them again at Christmas; and the sticky horse-chestnut would send forth its long ears of leaves for New-year’s Day. They would all come out in leaf again if we had but a little more sun; _they_ are quite ready for a second summer.

Brown lie the acorns, yellow where they were fixed in their cups; two of these cups seem almost as large as the great acorns from abroad. A red dead nettle, a mauve thistle, white and pink bramble-flowers, a white strawberry, a little yellow tormentil, a broad yellow dandelion, narrow hawkweeds, and blue scabious, are all in flower in the lane. Others are scattered on the mounds and in the meads adjoining, where may be collected some heath still in bloom, prunella, hypernicum, white yarrow, some heads of red clover, some beautiful buttercups, three bits of blue veronica, wild chamomile, tall yellow weed, pink centaury, succory dock cress, daisies, fleabane, knapweed, and delicate blue harebells. Two York roses flower on the hedge: altogether, twenty-six flowers, a large bouquet for the 19th of October, gathered, too, in a hilly country.

Besides these, note the broad hedge-parsley leaves, tunnelled by leaf-miners; bright masses of haws gleaming in the sun; scarlet hips; great brown cones fallen from the spruce-firs; black heart-shaped bindweed leaves here, and buff bryony leaves yonder; green and scarlet berries of white bryony hanging thickly on bines from which the leaves have withered; and bunches of grass, half yellow and half green, along the mound. Now that the leaves have been brushed from the beech saplings, you may see how the leading stem rises in a curious wavy line; some of the leaves lie at the foot, washed in white dew, that stays in the shade all day; the wetness of the dew makes the brownish red of the leaf show clear and bright. One leaf falls in the stillness of the air slowly, as if let down by a cord of gossamer gently, and not as a stone falls—fate delayed to the last. A moth adheres to a bough, his wings half open, like a short brown cloak flung over his shoulders. Pointed leaves, some drooping, some horizontal, some fluttering slightly, still stay on the tall willow-wands, like bannerets on the knights’ lances, much torn in the late battle of the winds. There is a shower from a clear sky under the trees in the forest; brown acorns rattling as they fall, and rich coloured Spanish chestnuts thumping the sward, and sometimes striking you as you pass under; they lie on the ground in pocketfuls. Specks of brilliant scarlet dot the grass like some bright berries blown from the bushes; but on stooping to pick them, they are found to be the heads of a fungus. Near by lies a black magpie’s feather, spotted with round dots of white.

At the edge of the trees stands an old timbered farmstead, whose gables and dark lines of wood have not been painted in the memory of man, dull and weather-beaten, but very homely; and by it rises the delicate cone of a new oasthouse, the tiles on which are of the brightest red. Lines of bluish smoke ascend from among the bracken of the wild open ground, where a tribe of gypsies have pitched their camp. Three of the vans are time-stained and travel-worn, with dull red roofs; the fourth is brightly picked out with fresh yellow paint, and stands a marked object at the side. Orange-red beeches rise beyond them on the slope; two hoop-tents, or kibitkas, just large enough to creep into, are near the fires, where the women are cooking the gypsy’s _bouillon_, that savoury stew of all things good: vegetables, meat, and scraps, and savouries, collected as it were in the stockpot from twenty miles round. Hodge, the stay-at-home, sturdy carter, eats bread and cheese and poor bacon sometimes; he looks with true British scorn on all scraps and soups, and stockpots and _bouillons_—not for him, not he; he would rather munch dry bread and cheese for every meal all the year round, though he could get bits as easy as the other and without begging. The gypsy is a cook. The man with a gold ring in his ear; the woman with a silver ring on her finger, coarse black snaky hair like a horse’s mane; the boy with naked olive feet; dark eyes all of them, and an Oriental, sidelong look, and a strange inflection of tone that turns our common English words into a foreign language—there they camp in the fern, in the sun, their Eastern donkeys of Syria scattered round them, their children rolling about like foals in the grass, a bit out of the distant Orient under our Western oaks.

It is the nature of the oak to be still, it is the nature of the hawk to roam with the wind. The Anglo-Saxon labourer remains in his cottage generation after generation, ploughing the same fields; the express train may rush by, but he feels no wish to rush with it; he scarcely turns to look at it; all the note he takes is that it marks the time to ‘knock off’ and ride the horses home. And if hard want at last forces him away, and he emigrates, he would as soon jog to the port in a wagon, a week on the road, as go by steam; as soon voyage in a sailing-ship as by the swift Cunarder. The swart gypsy, like the hawk, for ever travels on, but, like the hawk, that seems to have no road, and yet returns to the same trees, so he, winding in circles of which we civilised people do not understand the map, comes, in his own times and seasons, home to the same waste spot, and cooks his savoury _bouillon_ by the same beech. They have camped here for so many years, that it is impossible to trace when they did not; it is wild still, like themselves. Nor has their nature changed any more than the nature of the trees.

The gypsy loves the crescent moon, the evening star, the clatter of the fern-owl, the beetle’s hum. He was born on the earth in the tent, and he has lived like a species of human wild animal ever since. Of his own free-will he will have nothing to do with rites or litanies; he may perhaps be married in a place of worship, to make it legal, that is all. At the end, were it not for the law, he would for choice be buried beneath the ‘fireplace’ of their children’s children. He will not dance to the pipe ecclesiastic, sound it who may—churchman, dissenter, priest, or laic. Like the trees, he is simply indifferent. All the great wave of teaching and text and tracts and missions and the produce of the printing-press has made no impression upon his race any more than upon the red-deer that roam in the forest behind his camp. The negroes have their fetich, every nation its idols; the gypsy alone has none—not even a superstitious observance; they have no idolatry of the Past, neither have they the exalted thought of the Present. It is very strange that it should be so at this the height of our civilisation, and you might go many thousand miles and search from Africa to Australia before you would find another people without a Deity. That can only be seen under an English sky, under English oaks and beeches.

Are they the oldest race on earth? and have they worn out all the gods? Have they worn out all the hopes and fears of the human heart in tens of thousands of years, and do they merely live, acquiescent to fate? For some have thought to trace in the older races an apathy as with the Chinese, a religion of moral maxims and some few josshouse superstitions, which they themselves full well know to be naught, worshipping their ancestors, but with no vital living force, like that which drove Mohammed’s bands to zealous fury, like that which sent our own Puritans over the sea in the _Mayflower_. No living faith. So old, so very, very old, older than the Chinese, older than the Copts of Egypt, older than the Aztecs; back to those dim Sanskrit times that seem like the clouds on the far horizon of human experience, where space and chaos begin to take shape, though but of vapour. So old, they went through civilisation ten thousand years since; they have worn it all out, even hope in the future; they merely live acquiescent to fate, like the red-deer. The crescent moon, the evening star, the clatter of the fern-owl, the red embers of the wood-fire, the pungent smoke blown round about by the occasional puffs of wind, the shadowy trees, the sound of the horses cropping the grass, the night that steals on till the stubbles alone are light among the fields—the gypsy sleeps in his tent on mother-earth; it is, you see, primeval man with primeval nature. One thing he gains at least—an iron health, an untiring foot, women whose haunches bear any burden, children whose naked feet are not afraid of the dew.

By sharp contrast, the Anglo-Saxon labourer who lives in the cottage close by and works at the old timbered farmstead, is profoundly religious.

The gypsies return from their rambling soon after the end of hop-picking, and hold a kind of informal fair on the village green with cock-shies, swings, and all the clumsy games that extract money from clumsy hands. It is almost the only time of the year when the labouring people have any cash; their weekly wages are mortgaged beforehand; the hop-picking money comes in a lump, and they have something to spend. Hundreds of pounds are paid to meet the tally or account kept by the pickers, the old word tally still surviving, and this has to be charmed out of their pockets. Besides the gypsies’ fair, the little shopkeepers in the villages send out circulars to the most outlying cottage announcing the annual sale at an immense sacrifice; anything to get the hop-pickers’ cash; and the packmen come round, too, with jewelry and lace and finery. The village by the Forest has been haunted by the gypsies for a century; its population in the last thirty years has much increased, and it is very curious to observe how the gypsy element has impregnated the place. Not only are the names gypsy; the faces are gypsy; the black coarse hair, high cheek-bones, and peculiar forehead, linger; even many of the shopkeepers have a distinct trace, and others that do not show it so much, are known to be nevertheless related.

Until land became so valuable—it is now again declining—these Forest grounds of heath and bracken were free to all comers, and great numbers of squatters built huts and inclosed pieces of land. They cleared away the gorse and heath and grubbed the fir-tree stumps, and found, after a while, that the apparently barren sand could grow a good sward. No one would think anything could flourish on such an arid sand, exposed at a great height on the open hill to the cutting winds. Contrary, however, to appearances, fair crops, and sometimes two crops of hay are yielded, and there is always a good bite for cattle. These squatters consequently came to keep cows, sometimes one and sometimes two—anticipating the three acres and a cow—and it is very odd to hear the women at the hop-picking telling each other they are going to churn to-night. They have, in fact, little dairies. Such are the better class of squatters. But others there are who have shown no industry, half gypsies, who do anything but work—tramp, beg, or poach; sturdy fellows, stalking round with toy-brooms for sale, with all the blackguardism of both races. They keep just within the law; they do not steal or commit burglary; but decency, order, and society they set utterly at defiance. For instance, a gentleman pleased with the splendid view, built a large mansion in one spot, never noticing that the entrance was opposite a row of cottages, or rather thinking no evil of it. The result was that neither his wife nor visitors could go in or out without being grossly insulted, without rhyme or reason, merely for the sake of blackguardism. Now, the pure gypsy in his tent or the Anglo-Saxon labourer would not do this; it was the half-breed. The original owner was driven from his premises; and they are said to have changed hands several times since from the same cause. All over the parish this half-breed element shows its presence by the extraordinary and unusual coarseness of manner. The true English rustic is always civil, however rough, and will not offend you with anything unspeakable, so that at first it is quite bewildering to meet with such behaviour in the midst of green lanes. This is the explanation—the gypsy taint. Instead of the growing population obliterating the gypsy, the gypsy has saturated the English folk.

When people saw the red man driven from the prairies and backwoods of America, and whole States as large as Germany without a single Indian left, much was written on the extermination of the aborigines by the stronger Saxon. As the generations lengthen, the facts appear to wear another aspect. From the intermarriage of the lower orders with the Indian squaws, the Indian blood has got into the Saxon veins, and now the cry is that the red man is exterminating the Saxon, so greatly has he leavened the population. The typical Yankee face, as drawn in _Punch_, is indeed the red Indian profile with a white skin and a chimney-pot hat. Upon a small scale, the same thing has happened in this village by the Forest; the gypsy half-breed has stained the native blood. Perhaps races like the Jew and gypsy, so often quoted as instances of the permanency of type, really owe that apparent fixidity to their power of mingling with other nations. They are kept alive as races by mixing; otherwise, one of two things would happen—the Jew and the gypsy must have died out, or else have supplanted all the races of the globe. Had the Jews been so fixed a type, by this time their offspring would have been more numerous than the Chinese. The reverse, however, is the case; and therefore, we may suppose they must have become extinct, had it not been for fresh supplies of Saxon, Teuton, Spanish, and Italian blood. It is in fact the intermarriages that have kept the falsely so-called pure races of these human parasites alive. The mixing is continually going on. The gypsies who still stay in their tents, however, look askance upon those who desert them for the roof. Two gypsy women, thoroughbred, came into a village shop and bought a variety of groceries, ending with a pound of biscuits and a Guy Fawkes’ mask for a boy. They were clad in dirty jackets and hats, draggle-tails, unkempt and unwashed, with orange and red kerchiefs round their necks (the gypsy colours). Happening to look out of window, they saw a young servant-girl with a perambulator on the opposite side of the ‘street;’ she was tidy and decently dressed, looking after her mistress’ children in civilised fashion; but they recognised her as a deserter from the tribe, and blazed with contempt. ‘Don’t _she_ look a figure!’ exclaimed these dirty creatures.

The short hours shorten, and the leaf-crop is gathered to the great barn of the earth; the oaks alone, more tenacious, retain their leaves, that have now become a colour like new leather. It is too brown for buff—it is more like fresh harness. The berries are red on the holly bushes and holly trees that grow, whole copses of them, on the forest slopes—‘the Great Rough’—the half-wild sheep have polished the stems of these holly trees till they shine, by rubbing their fleeces against them. The farmers have been drying their damp wheat in the oasthouses over charcoal fires, and wages are lowered, and men discharged. Vast loads of brambles and thorns, dead firs, useless hop-poles and hopbines and gorse are drawn together for the great bonfire on the green. The 5th of November bonfires are still vital institutions, and from the top of the hill you may see them burning in all directions, as if an enemy had set fire to the hamlets.

BY ORDER OF THE LEAGUE.

CHAPTER XIX.

Near one window stood a high Japanese screen, with plate-glass panels. Isodore had barely time to conceal herself behind this, when Le Gautier entered. He seemed somewhat hurried, but otherwise calm enough, as he walked into the room and towards Enid. ‘Before I leave’—— Then he stopped suddenly.

Sir Geoffrey was standing a little way back from the group, one hand behind his back, the other pointing with unsteady forefinger to Linda Despard, while he never moved his eyes from Le Gautier’s face. A little flick of the nostrils, a quiver of the lip, and the Frenchman was himself again. But Sir Geoffrey never moved; he merely opened his lips, and snapped out one word, ‘Well?’

‘Is this a theatrical rehearsal?’ Le Gautier asked at length.

‘I am waiting,’ the baronet returned, ‘for some explanation. To a man of your astuteness, I need not be explicit. This lady, monsieur, and you, I hear, are old acquaintances.’

‘You talk in riddles, Sir Geoffrey.’

‘You are anxious to gain time. I, on the other hand, do not wish to be too hard upon you. Let me explain. Miss Linda Despard—who has been in my house for some time, the result of an accident, the details of which you have probably heard—turns out to be an old friend of yours. She is dressed this moment, you perceive, in a character which had been rehearsed under your personal superintendence—the character of my late brother.’

‘But what can this possibly have to do with me?’

‘A truce to this folly!’ Sir Geoffrey cried warmly. ‘I have heard everything about the jugglery at Paddington—the mirrors, and Pepper’s Ghosts, and the whole miserable machinery by which I was deluded.’

‘Then you no longer believe?’ Le Gautier asked, fixing his glittering eyes upon the baronet’s face.

But the magnetic power was gone now; the glance was returned as sternly. Sir Geoffrey seemed a new man. ‘I do not believe,’ he replied.

‘Then take the consequences—be a haunted, miserable man for the rest of your days! You will not be warned. I have done all I can for you. If you like to believe the tale you have heard, I will not prevent you. I say again, take the consequences.’

‘On the contrary, my good sir, it is you who will be the principal sufferer. I wish to make this interview as pleasant as possible, and cannot do better than by making it brief. There was a little contract between us, which you will consider at an end from this moment.’

‘And why?’ Le Gautier asked hotly. ‘You have proved nothing against me at present. This Linda Despard, whose tale you have been listening to, is no friend of mine.’

‘Can you look her in the face and say that she is wrong?’ Sir Geoffrey interrupted. ‘Of course, you cannot deny the truth of her words. Then why am I bound to fulfil my contract with you?’

‘Because I have your word it shall be so. On your word, and by the power I hold over you, I claim my wife still.’

‘And in good time, you shall have her, Hector le Gautier.’

The group assembled there looked suddenly at Lucrece, as she spoke. She came forward now, facing the Frenchman, who eyed her with an undisguised sneer.

‘And what has the maid of Miss Charteris to do with me?’

‘Much,’ she answered quietly.—‘Do you know who I am?’

‘A servant who has got into the drawing-room by mistake. If I am wrong, please enlighten me.’

Lucrece stepped forward, throwing her head back, and placing one hand upon a table at her side. ‘I will enlighten you. Five years is a long time in a lifetime like mine, but your memory will carry you back to the Villa Mattio. Hector le Gautier, I am Lucrece Visci, sister of your _friend_ Carlo Visci.’

‘And I am no wiser now.’

‘But I am,’ Enid exclaimed.—‘Father, you remember Signor Visci, the artist who used to meet us at Rome?’

‘Yes, my dear’—with a glance at Le Gautier—‘a fine specimen of an Italian gentleman. The only unpleasant recollection I have of him is, that he first introduced me to Monsieur le Gautier.’

The Frenchman’s eyes flashed, and he moved as if to speak; but Lucrece continued rapidly: ‘You may not remember me; but you have not forgotten my sister, Genevieve.—Ah! I have moved you now!—Miss Charteris, you were in Rome when she disappeared. Her false lover stands before you now!’

‘It is false!’ Le Gautier exclaimed. ‘Prove that I’——

‘It is true.—Prove it? Look at your own face there!’ Lucrece cried, pointing to a mirror opposite him. ‘Look there, and deny it if you can!’

‘True or false, I cannot waste words with you.—Sir Geoffrey, I hold you to your promise.—Enid, you shall keep your word.’

‘We are not in the habit of bestowing the daughters of our house upon adventurers,’ Sir Geoffrey replied. ‘I am sure your natural good sense and a little calm reflection will show you the folly of your demand.’

‘My father has spoken for me,’ Enid said. ‘I have nothing to add.’

Le Gautier stepped across the room to her. She rose to her feet in alarm. Lucrece stood between the two, and grasping Enid by the wrist, and laying her hand upon the Frenchman’s shoulder, held him back. ‘Are you mad that you ask this thing?’ she asked.

‘And wherefore? How does it concern you?’

She looked him steadily in the face as she replied: ‘Then I must refresh your memory;’ and raising her voice, till it rang through the lofty room, ‘because you have a wife already!’

Le Gautier staggered back; but he was not beaten yet. ‘Another of your little fabrications,’ he said mockingly.

‘Look at him!’ Lucrece exclaimed, turning to the others, and pointing at the detected man with infinite scorn. ‘Look into his face—mark his dejected air, though he braves it out well, and tell me if I am wrong.’

‘Your word is doubtless a good one; but there is something better than words, and that is proof. Do you not think I can see through this paltry conspiracy which has been got up against me? But you have the wrong man to deal with in me for that. I will have the compact fulfilled; my power is not over yet; and, Sir Geoffrey, I give you one more chance. Refuse at your peril.’

‘I do refuse,’ Sir Geoffrey answered icily. ‘Do your worst.’

‘That is your decision?—And now, as to these groundless accusations you have brought against me. You have made them; prove them.’ He turned to Lucrece with a gesture which was almost noble, all the actor’s instinct aroused in him now. There was one desperate chance for him yet.

‘You had best take, care, if I accept you at your word.’

‘I wish to be taken at my word. I demand your proofs!’

‘And you shall have them!’ Saying these words, Lucrece glided swiftly from the room.

An awkward silence fell upon the group. Le Gautier was the first to speak. There was a kind of moisture in his eye, and an air of resigned melancholy on his face. ‘You have misjudged me,’ he said sorrowfully. ‘Some day, you will be ashamed of this.—Sir Geoffrey, you are the victim of a designing woman, who seeks, for some reason, to traduce my fair fame. If I have a wife, let them bring me face to face with her here.’

‘You have your wish, Hector, for I am here!’

Le Gautier bounded forward like a man who has received a mortal hurt, and gazed at the speaker with glaring eyes. Valerie was standing before him, not without agitation herself. A low cry burst from his lips, and he drew his shaking hand down his white damp face. ‘What brings you here?’ he asked, his voice sounding strangely to his own ears, as if it came from far away. ‘Woman! why do you come here now, to destroy me utterly?’

She shrank back—an eloquent gesture to the onlookers—a gesture seven years’ freedom from thraldom had not obliterated. ‘You wished to see me. Lo! I am here! Turn round to your friends now, and deny that I am your lawful wife—deny again that you have ever seen me before, and put me to the proof.—Why do you not speak? Why do you not show a little of that manhood you used to have? Strike me, as you have done often in the times gone by—anything better than standing there, a poor, pitiful, detected swindler—a miserable hound indeed!’

There was a dead silence now, only broken by Le Gautier’s heavy breathing, and the rustle of his sleeve as he wiped the perspiration from his face.

‘There is the proof you demanded,’ Lucrece said at length. ‘We are waiting for you to deny the witness of your eyes.’

But still Le Gautier did not speak, standing there like some stone figure, his limbs almost powerless. He raised his head a moment, then lowered it again swiftly. He tried to articulate a few words, but his tongue refused its office.

Sir Geoffrey laid his hand upon the bell. ‘Have you nothing to say?’ he asked.

‘I—I—— Let me go out—the place is choking me!’

Sir Geoffrey rang the bell sharply. ‘Then this interview had better close. It has already been too long, and degrading.—James, show Monsieur le Gautier out, if you please.—I have the honour to wish you good-morning; and if we do meet again,’ he added in a stern undertone, ‘remember, it is as strangers.’

Le Gautier, without another word or look, left the room, Lucrece following a moment later, and leading Valerie away. Isodore stepped out from her hiding-place, her face alternately scornful and tender.

‘We owe you a heavy debt of gratitude indeed!’ Sir Geoffrey exclaimed warmly. ‘It is extremely good of you to take all this trouble for mere strangers. Accept my most sincere thanks!’

‘We are not quite strangers,’ Isodore replied, turning to Enid. ‘Lucrece told you who she was; let me tell you who I am. I have never met you, though once I hoped to do so. I am Genevieve Visci!’

‘What! Signor Visci’s sister—the girl who—who’——

‘Do not hesitate to say it. Yes, Isodore and Genevieve are one. Out of recollection of old times, when you were so kind to my dear brother, I have not forgotten you, knowing Le Gautier so well.’

‘But Lucrece, your sister, to come here as my maid. And Le Gautier—how did you know? I am all at sea yet.’

‘It is a long sad story, and some day, when I know you better, I will tell you all, but not now. But one thing, please, remember, that come what will, Le Gautier cannot harm you now. He may threaten, but he is powerless. I have only to hold up my hand’——

‘And Frederick—Mr Maxwell?’

‘Do not be impatient. You will see him to-morrow; for this evening I have need of him. You have not the slightest grounds for anxiety. Le Gautier will never harm any one more.’

‘How strangely, sternly, you speak,’ Enid replied.

Isodore smiled. ‘Do I? Well, you heard what Lucrece said, and I may have planned a little retaliation of my own. The eastern eagle flies slowly, but his flight is sure. Trust me, and fear not.’

Enid was bewildered. But the time was near when she was to understand.

* * * * *

With baffled fury and revenge raging in his heart, Le Gautier turned away in the direction of his lodgings, anywhere to get away from himself for a time, nothing left to him now but to wreak his vengeance upon Sir Geoffrey in the most diabolical way his fiendish ingenuity could contrive—and Isodore. By this time, Maxwell was no more; there was some grain of satisfaction in that; and he had Marie St Jean to fall back upon.

He sat brooding in his rooms till nearly nine—time to attend the meeting of the League, the last one he determined that should ever see his face. Had he known how fatally true this was, he would have faced a thousand dangers rather than gone to Gray’s Inn Road that night. It was nearly ten when he lowered his gas, and struck off across the side streets in the direction of Holborn. When he reached his destination, he walked up-stairs, the only arrival as yet. Had he been less preoccupied, he would not have failed to notice the glance bestowed upon him by the custodian. He lingered about the room till one by one the company came in.

They were not long in commencing business. Le Gautier did not occupy the chair on this occasion; the proceedings of the evening were important, and a Supreme Councillor was present. He greeted each man coldly. To Le Gautier his manner was stern to the last degree. The routine commenced, and was conducted quietly for some time in the briefest, dryest fashion. Then the president for the evening rose, and taking from his pocket the gold moidore, commanded every one there to throw his upon the table. Presently, nine golden coins glittered on the green baize. ‘One short,’ the president said sternly. ‘Whose?’

They looked round, each waiting for the other to speak.

‘It is mine,’ Le Gautier exclaimed. ‘I did not think it necessary.’

‘You have no right to think; it is not in your province. If you have in any way parted with it’—— He stopped significantly, and Le Gautier hastily intervened.

‘I humbly beg your pardon. I will fetch it immediately. I have not far to go; I can return at once. In justice to myself, I am sure you will permit me to fetch it.’

‘No!’ thundered the Chief Councillor with a glance in Le Gautier’s face that made his heart beat thick and fast. ‘And as to justice, you shall have it presently, to the uttermost scruple.—Gentlemen, there is a traitor present!’

With one accord they sprang to their feet, suspicion and alarm in every eye.

‘Who is it?’ they cried. ‘Death to the traitor!’

‘Look round among yourselves, and see if you can discover him.—No? Then he wears a good mask who has a hard conscience.—Stand up, traitor!—ay, the most despicable; stand up, and look us in the face! Who is the man who has enjoyed our deepest confidences—the man we have to thank Isodore for discovering?—Stand up, I say! Rise, Hector le Gautier!’

The Frenchman knew his last hour had come; he knew that such a bold accusation as this could not be made without the most convincing proof. But despite his failings, he was not the man to cower before such a great danger. He braced his nerves till they were like steel; there was no particle of fear in his face as he turned at bay.

‘I had expected something like this,’ he said. ‘It is not likely that my promotion should pass by without incurring some jealousy. I will say nothing about my long services, the years I have spent in the service of the League. My accuser, and your proof!’

A murmur of applause ran round the table at this sentiment. There was no appearance of guilt here.

‘Isodore is your accuser—the proofs she holds. You are charged with conspiracy to overthrow the League, in conjunction with another person. Your companion is one Marie St Jean.’

Even with his iron nerves under control as they were, Le Gautier could not repress a start, which was not lost upon the Councillor.

‘Marie St Jean,’ he continued, ‘received from you certain papers for the purpose of handing them over to the police. The information contained therein is complete. Do you deny your handwriting?’

He threw a bundle of papers across the table to Le Gautier. As he read them, his white face became corpse-like in its livid hue. But he was fighting for his life now, and summoned all his self-command to his aid, knowing full well that if he was condemned, he would never leave that room alive. His calm air came back to him.

‘I admit the handwriting—private memoranda stolen from my apartments. I am still waiting for your proof. Besides, Marie St Jean is a member of the League; she restored to me’——

‘Your insignia, which you had the temerity to stake upon the colour at Homburg.—Salvarini, I call upon you to say if this is not so?’

‘I would rather say nothing about this,’ Salvarini said. Le Gautier noticed how distressed and agitated he was. ‘I fear—I much fear you have too much proof, without calling upon me.’

‘You stand by a friend, Luigi!’ Le Gautier said bitterly. ‘Do not think of me now. Every man must look to himself!’

‘Sufficient of this,’ the president interrupted. ‘My proofs are overpowering. You are charged with packing the cards, to force the Brother Maxwell upon a dangerous mission.’

‘Enough!’ the prisoner exclaimed; ‘confront me with my accuser!’

‘You shall see her.—Isodore!’

As he raised his voice, a breathless hush fell upon the assembly. Presently, a woman entered; for a moment she looked at the group, and then raising her veil, showed her beautiful face.

‘Marie!’ A deep, bitter cry, following this word, burst from Le Gautier’s lips, and he fell forward upon the table, his head upon his hands. There was no escape now, he knew full well. And the woman he thought had loved him—the woman who knew all his plans to the letter, was the Princess of the League, the most dangerous member, Isodore herself! Salvarini looked into her face for a moment, and then whispered one word—Genevieve; but she heard it, and smiled at him, pleased that one man should remember—heard the little word which struck a womanly chord in her heart, and was thankful. Then she made him a sign to be silent.

Stunned by the crushing force and suddenness of the blow, Le Gautier half lay there, with his head resting upon the table, no sound breaking the solemn silence. The president addressed the wretched man, asking him if he had anything to say.

He raised his head and looked dazedly around, then down again. ‘I? No! I have nothing to say. My doom is sealed!’

‘Bind him!’

Rough hands were laid upon the doomed wretch, and fastened him in his chair securely, taking care to make his bonds too tight for escape. Le Gautier did not resist; he knew now that there was no escape in all the wide world for him. They left him thus, trooping in to an adjoining room to go through the mockery of the trial which the orders of the League demanded.

When Le Gautier looked up, he was alone, save for Isodore. ‘You are satisfied with your work now?’

‘Yes, I am satisfied now,’ Isodore echoed. ‘So you thought to play me off against Enid Charteris, poor fool! Hector le Gautier, I am going to tax your memory. Do you remember one evening in the Mattio woods when you abandoned a lonely trusting girl, the sister of your friend? Do you remember laughing at a vow of vengeance five years ago? Justice is slow, but it is sure. Do you remember?’

‘Yes. Is it possible that you can be?’——

‘Yes, it is possible, for I am Genevieve Visci! It is my turn now.’ And without another word she left him.

Presently, a desire to live took the place of his dull despair. In an agony he tugged and turned, cutting his wrists with the keen rope till the blood ran down his hands. He could hear the low monotonous voices from the adjoining room, the hurrying footsteps in the road below; and only that thin wall between himself and safety. Even the window leading from the iron staircase was open, and the evening breeze fanned his white despairing face. He struggled again till his heart nearly burst, and then, worn out, broke into tears.

‘Hector!’

He turned round, hardly certain whether it was a voice or a fancy. Gradually out of the mists a figure emerged, and creeping stealthily across the bare floor, came to his side. It was Valerie.

‘So you have come to gloat over my misery too,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘Go, or, manacled as I am, I shall do you a mischief.’

For answer, she drew a knife from her pocket, and commenced, with trembling fingers, to sever his bonds. One by one the sharp knife cut through them, till at length he stood a free man. One grudging, grateful glance at the woman, and he disappeared.

CHRISTMAS IN A DÂK BUNGALOW.

I have spent Christmas Day in England and abroad, in my own family, in mess, and with three commanding officers; but till the year 1883, I had never spent one absolutely alone. I had on this occasion another opportunity of spending the day in mess, for I was in India at the time; but I came to the conclusion that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush; and three days’ leave for certain is better than a fortnight’s in prospect; and having had rather a trying share of work for some time before Christmas, I decided to forego the usual ‘going round the men’s dinners,’ with its concomitant drinking of curious and, I hope, rare liquors, eating pieces of Christmas pudding, and subsequently getting through the day in a manner more Sunday-like than actually amusing. So, on the 23d December I found myself about seven P.M. in the dâk bungalow of a river-side station in the Punjab, to which I had been recommended by a messmate as a good spot for a few days’ duck-shooting. My servant, a Madrassi, rejoicing in the name of Zacharias—the ‘Madras-man every time liking Christian name, sah’—had preceded me, and had got the principal agent for my three days’ shooting in the shape of a shikaree, who bore the very unchristian name of Rukkum (Rook’em) Deen, in attendance to make arrangements for the morrow.

Now, I am not going to enter into a discussion on the subject of duck-shooting, for many reasons, of which I will mention, first, that I might have conducted such operations on any other three days of the year, if I could have got leave; second, that I am not very proud of my own prowess with a gun; third, that I didn’t get much, though I saw a great deal; and fourth, that the subject of wildfowl shooting is not one to enter into in a light and frivolous spirit, but must be approached with awe, and with a due appreciation of nice distinctions of weights and measures, and a ready desire to hear all manner of extraordinary asseverations, however fond of truth the listener may be. Mine is a true story, and is only a collection of jottings and thoughts. After this explanation, I can safely skip over my doings on the 24th, which were confined solely to the region of the river and the somewhat distant society of the wildfowl.

Christmas Day opened fine and clear. That is a matter not of much note in India, where the weather is remarkable for its succession of fine clear days; but in England, Christmas Day—if my recollection serves me true—does not always open fine and clear. I was called at half-past six A.M.; and by eight had put my cartridges together, dispensed with a tub, had breakfast, and started for the river again. Outside the dâk bungalow, as luck would have it, I met an Englishman—a terrible thing on the continent, I know; but somehow in India we are not so painfully exclusive. I wished him good-morning and the compliments of the season; he returned the sentiments; and that was all the conversation I had with a fellow-countryman on that day. I was on the river from half-past eight till four; but skip that period for the third of my reasons for making this no wildfowler’s story. Soon after getting in, cleaning my gun, having my tub, and generally assuming a more civilised appearance, I heard the church bells ringing; and hurried off to find a children’s service being conducted by a very nice, benevolent-looking clergyman, who had for his congregation about twenty children and a round dozen of adults, parents and so on. The reverend gentleman was giving the children a simple address as I entered, and I felt at home and happy. The little voices joined in singing hymns and saying prayers; and when the lines, ‘Guard the sailors tossing on the deep blue sea,’ were sung, I let my thoughts wander over a good many leagues of land and sea to where others were, as I felt sure, thinking of me in the midst of their Christmas doings.

On my return to the bungalow, I found that there was an Englishman living under the same roof, and felt that I should very much like to have a companion at my dinner. I accordingly sent Zacharias to find out who the Englishman was and what he was doing here; for I did not want to bore him with an invitation if he had come here for the express purpose of being alone with his thoughts. I imagine my faithful valet found the inquiry difficult of prosecution, or, what is more likely, that he gave it up in favour of seeing ‘master’s Christmas dinner’ being properly cooked. Anyway, it was not till Zacharias brought me my soup that he brought the intelligence that ‘the English gentleman having joint;’ so my intentions were frustrated, and the only attention I could pay the mysterious stranger was to send him the following note:

DÂK BUNGALOW, _Christmas Day_.

DEAR SIR—I should be very proud if you would accept a glass of
wine from my bottle, which I send by bearer, and drink with me to
Absent Friends. I am very sorry I did not find out till too late
that there was an Englishman in the bungalow, or I would have
done myself the pleasure of asking if you would care to dine with
a fellow-countryman on this occasion. Hoping you will excuse my
intrusion, I am, sir, with all the compliments of the season, yours
truly,

H. S.

I sent him at the same time an open bottle of ‘Sparkling Wine,’ and soon after received my bottle back, with but very little gone, and at the same time the following answer:

DEAR SIR—Thanks very many. A merry Christmas to you. I drink your
health.—Yours sincerely,

——.

I am very sorry I cannot put in the name of an eminent politician or other dignitary, by way of completing the story; but as I couldn’t read it, my curiosity must remain for ever unsatisfied, and the mysterious stranger of Christmas Day, 1883, will remain wrapped up in his mystery, unless he chances to peruse these lines, and, remembering the incident, discloses himself.

As for my Christmas dinner, I must say it was as good as any government establishment, and much better than most dâk bungalows could produce. The hand of Zacharias was betrayed in potato chips and cunning sauces. I can here fairly bring in that I had a duck of my own shooting, and the only thing wanting was bread. The forgetful _khansamah_ or housekeeper had not warned the native baker, and I had to make the best I could of _chupatties_, a poor substitute; and I am convinced that its permanent institution on the English diet table would soon reduce us to a very low ebb indeed. But being in a properly Christmas frame of mind, good-will to all men, &c., I determined to make the best of a bad business, and toasted them before a wood-fire, thus giving myself an opportunity of introducing to Zacharias’ notice, à la Mr Barlow, of _Sandford and Merton_ fame, ‘The Story of King Alfred and the Chupattie, or the Indigent Monarch and the Haughty Swineherd’s Wife.’ Wishing to be understood, I endeavoured to put the simple narrative in a somewhat Indianised language, and the following was the result:

‘One time in Englishman’s place, one King Alfred living.—Do you understand “king?” _Mr_ Queen _subse burra rajah_’ (the biggest swell of all).

_Zacharias._ Yes, sah.

‘One time Alfred Sahib young man, and wanting to study how the newly franchised ones would vote.—No; I mean liking to see how his people’s getting on _mallum_.—Do you understand?’

_Zach._ Yes, sah.

‘Very well; he went to house of one man looking after pigs (_Suir ke kubberdarwallah_). That right?’

_Zach._ Yes, sah.

‘Pigman’s wife not knowing Alfred Sahib have much _Burra Bahadur_ (Great Panjandrum), giving him some chupatties to toast before fire, same like Master doing now. Then pigman’s wife going out to see pigs. Alfred Sahib besides being king of England, was a bit of a _Bajawallah_ (music-man). When pigman’s wife going out, Alfred Sahib playing on his baja same like Master on banjo. Chupatties getting burned; pigman’s wife coming back, getting plenty angry, then stick-striking (_Lackri-marta_) Alfred Sahib.—Now, Zacharias, you understand all that?’

_Zach._ Yes, sah.

‘What do you understand?’

_Zach._ Master not liking raw chupatties.

‘Yes; and I would take this opportunity of impressing on you the many advantages to be gained by entirely giving up chupatties in favour of bread. Look at that piece of garbage I have got to eat! I warn you that so long as you and your fellow-men in India continue to eat chupatties and such-like nastiness, so long will you remain in that state of degradation and darkness that England was in, in the days of Alfred Sahib.—Do you understand?’

_Zach._ Yes, sah.

After this expression of sentiment, I went to dinner, and really enjoyed my toasted chupattie, as I had converted it into a sort of ship’s biscuit, than which there is nothing better. When I felt the influence, benign and benevolent, of doing myself well, creeping over me, I was at the stage of my first glass of wine, and this was a bumper to Absent Friends. What a host of faces passed before my eyes as I shut them and quaffed the time-honoured toast! How I could have moralised, and become sentimental and maudlin! But as that was not my intention at all, I wished all the dear good souls the ‘Best of luck—lots of it, and may I soon be there to see!’ and resumed my lessons in civilisation to Zacharias. I never before appreciated so thoroughly what a capital thing it is to have an English-speaking servant in India. Did I say English-_speaking_? I am afraid I did; but English-understanding would be a better expression, for I never gave Zacharias a chance of speaking till after dinner, when he came in capitally. I told him how shameful it was that his fellows would use the poisonous _dekskai_ (cooking-pot), with its bi-monthly demand for tinning or for a substitute ‘leading,’ when kind English people tried to introduce the more familiar saucepan of iron and enamel. I told him how much better a slow-burning moderate fire was for cooking purposes than the pot-destroying furnaces of charcoal over which everything is cooked in India; how nothing was cooked through, but everything sodden inside and burned outside. I ingratiated myself again by drinking his health. I then attacked him on another point, and told him confidentially that if it was not for his fellows’ silly ideas on the subject of caste, that we should never have taken the country; and was rather glad that he put a stop to this unwise disclosure and counsel by saying: ‘God is good, sah. Gentlemens never knowing why caste, and not liking.’

At last I finished dinner; and then gave a few directions for the morning—to be called at half-past six, to have breakfast ready at seven A.M., and to shut up rooms and come with me. But the demon of speechifying was on me, the _cacoëthes loquendi_, and nothing under an eighteen-hundred horse-power steam fire-engine could quench the raging fire that had mastered the movements of my tongue. The only consolation was that I gave Zacharias more chances. I asked him questions. ‘When Master going to the war’ (there was none in prospect), ‘what will Zacharias do?’

‘I will always come with Master. Master good to me, sah.’

‘Has Zacharias ever heard of Russian peoples?’

‘Yes, sah. I was always hearing when I was little child in _i-school_, Russian peoples coming—never come. God is good, and Russian peoples bad peoples. If Russian peoples coming, then Queen’s peoples putting them back to their own land; but never coming, sah.’

‘But the Baboos say they are not well treated sometimes; and they make a lot of bobbery, and do plenty bad talking, and not liking English peoples. I tell you, Zacharias, if the Russian people came, the Baboos won’t have a chance of holding their silly meetings; they’ll be put to clean the Russian gentlemen’s backyards, and do all the dirty work that can be found for them.’

‘Yes, sah. These Baboos are fools. If English gentlemens not coming, where is got Baboo? Only Bengal people talking that way. Madras peoples always right.’

‘Bravo, Zacharias! Here’s a toast to Madras, the benighted presidency, and may she always have as staunch countrymen as you!’

‘Thank you, sah.’

‘But about these Russians—tell me some more.’

‘Russian peoples got no money; Queen got plenty money. English soldiers plenty strong, so Russian peoples not coming.’

‘That’s right. You stick to that; and when you hear the silly Baboos saying they are downtrodden, you tell them, with my compliments, that they are a pack of fools, and that they had better not wait for anybody else to tread on them, when they hear the _Sahiblogues_ [Englishmen] are going.’

‘Yes, sah; that is right. If English peoples not coming here, I would never be wearing such clothes as these.’ (Zacharias is very well pleased with himself when he has got on his clean dinner clothes, as he had, to celebrate Christmas Day of 1883.)

‘Now, you understand what I say, eh?’

‘Yes, sah.’ (Here came the crushing blow, the long-deserved snub to my loquacity.) ‘Master wants calling at half-past six, and breakfast at seven.—Good-night, sah.’

I couldn’t help but take a hint so gently given; and so, bidding my faithful Zacharias—I sincerely believe he is faithful—‘good-night,’ I knocked the ashes out of my pipe, and brought to a conclusion my Christmas Day.

A NOVEL ADVENTURE.