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The corridor along which we passed was lofty and richly carpeted, and I felt a strange incongruity between my thick, clumsy boots-which, however, were Martin's best make-and the soft, velvet-like substance on which they pressed. At the end of the corridor was a magnificent painted window, through which the noonday sun poured down his beams in broad slants of vivid green and purple, intense amber, and deep flushing rose. I had never seen anything so beautiful in my life, and I would fain have paused to contemplate it at leisure, but Sophie motioned me on, and we turned suddenly from the grand corridor into more retired passages. We seemed now to have entered upon an enchanted region; rich draperies, statues, stands of flowering and fragrant plants, and all sorts of lovely and curious things were lavishly dispersed around me. Wherever I looked, some fresh wonder met my eye, some fresh piece of splendour riveted my attention.

Presently we reached a curtained door, at which Sophie tapped; and then I heard a low, sweet voice say, "Come in!" We entered, and there, sitting on a low chair by the open window, which commanded a lovely prospect of flower-garden, plesaunce, wooded park, and wide, glittering sea, sat the beautiful lady I had seen in the chancel-pew on Sunday. Such a vision of beauty I had never pictured even in my wildest dreams of romance. I did not know that mortal woman could be so fair. Child as I was, I stood abashed and subdued, not at the splendour in the midst of which I found myself, not at the lady's sparkling gems and graceful flowing drapery, all of which I somehow took in at a glance, but at the perfect and marvellous beauty to which I was now brought face to face. Surely Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, and Fair Rosamund never boasted of such resplendent loveliness as did Helena, Marchioness of Dovercourt !

I am not clever at word-painting, but I will try to tell you how she looked-my beautiful, worshipped Marchioness-on that bright autumn day, when first I spoke with her. She was pale, pale as the purest marble, when we came in, but the next minute the loveliest carnation dyed her delicate cheeks and slender, almost transparent throat. A light, that made me think of the lustre of a large silvery planet I used to watch rising over the mountains at Eaglesmere, shone out from her sweet violet eyes, shadowed by full snowy lids and long brown, silky lashes. Her eyebrows, of the same hue, were exquisitely pencilled, and round the broad alabaster forehead lay masses of wavy, golden hair, gathered together by filmy lace, and strings of pearls, and falling behind in long, loose, natural ringlets. The sweet lips were rosy as a child's, and the whole face mingled strangely-but, oh! how bewitchingly-the

grace of the high-born, beautiful woman, with the unconscious innocence and purity of the child.

"Here are the children, Miladi!" said Sophie, respectfully. "Monsieur Wray is gone away. I told him that they would be taken back quite safely at the proper time."

"That is well!" said the low, flute-like voice. The Marchioness spoke very quietly, but I thought her tones a little tremulous. Sophie apparently thought so, too.

"Is it not that Miladi is too fatigued to talk to these enfants?" she said, anxiously. "Miladi has not been strong for some days; shall it not be that the enfants go now to the nursery for a little while, and come to visit Miladi herself another day?"

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"No, I thank you, Sophie," replied the Marchioness; not at all tired, and the children will amuse me. Give me that flason of eau-de-cologne, and then you need not stay any longer. But stop, perhaps these young people have not dined. Little one," turning to Phoebe, " have you had your dinner?"

"No, please, leddy," said poor Phoebe, overpowered with bashfulness.

Well, then, I please that you should have some. Send a tray up here, Sophie, with some chicken, and tarts, and plenty of fruits and creams, and such things as children love; and tell them to be quick about it."

Sophie disappeared, and we were left alone with the Marchioness. She motioned Phoebe to a little chair just opposite to her, but she pointed me to a footstool almost concealed by her long, ample skirts.

"Now tell me your name," she said to Phoebe, who would willingly have dispensed with conversation, and who told me afterwards that she felt so dashed she would have liked to keep utter silence, only she knew it was bad manners not to speak when spoken to, and granny would be rare and angry if she knew she had behaved improperly. So, blushing to the ears, and hanging her head like a pretty little rustic as she was, Phoebe replied"Phœbe Miller, an' it please your leddyship."

Margery had given us several lessons as to the etiquette to be observed in addressing the Marchioness. Her parting charge had been-"Touch naething ye see, bairns, and dinna speer aboot aught; ask nae questions, but answer plain oot wheniver ye are spoken to. An' be sure to say 'my leddy' and 'yer leddyship' each time ye spake to t' Marchioness. An', Hughy lad, mek yer verra best bow, and Phoebe, moind ye mek yer varra prattiest curtsey as often as ye see occasion; and be sure to say an' it please yer leddyship' an'' thank you, my leddy,' as often as ye spake to her."

"And how old are you?" pursued her leddyship. And again

Phoebe dropped her regulation curtsey, and wrung out the ends of her blue sash, and replied with as much confusion as if she had been confessing to a crime-" Past eight, an' it please yer ladyship."

Then the Marchioness turned to me, and asked me my name. Strange to say I felt no bashfulness, and I answered out boldly, "Hugh Travis-Vassall." Then she asked me other questionsabout my age, and what I knew, and about Eaglesmere, till the dainty little dinner she had ordered appeared, and we sat down to table, and regaled ourselves on chicken and partridge-pie, and lemon cream, and peaches, and pears, and plums, and grapes. At least all these things were there, though I do not remember whether we partook of them all. Seeing that Phoebe was too shy to eat, the Marchioness went away, leaving us to Sophie for awhile, and when she came back we had both made an excellent and most recherché repast.

As soon as our dinner or luncheon was over, the Marchioness said to Sophie-" I fancy this little girl will be happier in the nursery with Lord Felixstowe and Lady Maude. Take her up to nurse, Sophie, and tell Lady Maude to bring out all her toys. Will you not go, little one? You shall play with a beautiful doll dressed like a real baby; and Maude has a doll's house full of chairs and tables, and tea-things and dinner-things, and she has beautiful picture-books and puzzles, and there is a rocking-horse with a sidesaddle, and no end of pretty things. Will you go, Phœbe?"

Phoebe consented quite willingly; she was not afraid of servants or of children, and down here, in the Marchioness's boudoir, her shyness oppressed her so painfully that I knew once or twice she was on the brink of tears. It was a relief to go away to the nursery, and to its paradisiacal pleasures, which, even to my boyish and older notions, sounded most invitingly. I did not want to play with the toys, of course, but I thought I would like to see them. However, Phoebe would tell me all about them when we got home.

Hand in hand my little sister and Sophie went away, the latter casting at me an appealing glance, as if she did not quite like the separation, but accepted her lot with resignation, and as the lesser evil. Then we were left alone, the Marchioness and I.

I hardly know how to describe what followed; it came upon me so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that it took away my breath, and very nearly my senses. I hardly knew whether I was awake or asleep; whether I was really in the Marchioness's boudoir at Dovercourt Castle, or dreaming one of my wild, improbable, romantic dreams in my own bed in the Gate-chamber. For a minute or two we kept silence, and I heard only the soft rustle of

the trees outside, and the low coo of some foreign birds in a great gilt cage at the further end of the room. I was sitting very close to the Marchioness on the stool I before mentioned, and my brown, sturdy little hand rested on her soft, shimmering robe. Suddenly that hand was caught up in the lady's own white, jewelled fingers; it was not simply held, it was clasped as it never had been clasped before; then before I could look my wonder she had burst into a passion of tears and sobs, and she had gathered me up to her bosom as if I were a baby, and was showering kisses on my lips, and cheeks, and brow, on my hair and hands, even on my clothes-warm, ardent, passionate kisses, which thrilled through and through me like an electric current. And, instead of feeling abashed, I flung my arm round her white neck, and pressed my dark cheek against her face, and kissed her back again-not quite kiss for kiss, perhaps-but with an intensity of affection that seemed to myself, when I afterwards thought of it, a rush of sheer insanity.

How long we cried and kissed each other I cannot say, but presently the lady grew calmer; she put me gently from her, though one arm still lovingly encircled me; I could see that she was trying to compose herself, but I could feel her trembling in every nerve.

Hugh-Hugh Vassall," she said at length, "I am so glad you are come to me. Do you think me very strange, my dear boy? Well, I will tell you-you are like-you remind me of some one I once loved very dearly-some one who is dead, and whom I, Hugh, loved more than all the rest of the world beside! But you need not tell any one this; I do not wish any one-not any one, mindto know it. Can you keep a secret, Hugh?"

"Try me, lady," I replied; "Captain Vassall's son ought to be able to keep a secret, for they tell me he was a most honourable man."

Something seemed to thrill her all over as I said these words; for a moment she was silent, though I could feel her pulses bounding. Then she said steadily, and almost proudly, " Captain Vassall was a most honourable man, the very soul of truth, and honour, and goodness; his son cannot be too proud that he bears his name."

"Lady, did you know my father?" I asked.

Again there was a silence, and her arm tightened round me before she replied "Yes, Hugh, I knew your father; I knew Captain Vassall."

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Did you know him well? Martin only saw him once, and he says I am like him."

"Like him? You are his living picture. You have his eyes, his beautiful dark shining eyes, his smooth olive skin, which he

inherited from his mother, an Andalusian, his firm chin, and his mouth, with all its lines and curves of blended tenderness and strength. All your features are his; your hands are exact copies of his, for he had just such long, lithe fingers and filbert-shaped nails, and above all your hair is his. He had exactly these masses of raven, silken curls; and when you grow older, and have his thick, soft beard and moustache, Hugh, you will look just as he looked when-when I saw him for the first time. Yes, you are your father's own son, Hugh Vassall. Always remember that, my dear boy."

I cannot describe to you the lingering tenderness of her last words. They were a caress in themselves, and all the while her arm was tightly around me, and I was leaning on her lap, as if I were her child and she my own gentle, loving mother. At last I said, "Lady, will you not tell me all about my father? I know nothing of him save his name, and that he was good and noble, and that he died and was buried in the deep, deep sea." "Ah! the sea, the cruel, treacherous sea," and she looked shudderingly at the wide expanse of sunlit waters, which we could see from the window. "Sometimes I listen to it, Hugh, on quiet evenings, or when I am lying awake at night, and fancy it is telling of all the treasures which it keeps till the restitution of all things, when it shall give up its dead. Sometimes I think it is whispering of that time,-for it. has a strange, sad, mystic voice,-that everchanging and yet changeless sea, that ebbs and flows now as in the days of Eden, that murmurs on through golden summer noons and stormy wintry days, and makes its ceaseless moan alike on savage shores where all is solitude, and on busy-peopled strands, resounding with the hum of life. It is a great mystery-an awful, beautiful presence-the great, deep sea."

"Have you always lived near it, lady?"

"No, not always. When I was a child I lived in one of the Yorkshire dales, but I was little more than sixteen when I went to live on the coast. Since then I have never left it for long together; I could not be happy away from its billowy anthem' that has sounded in my ears through so many days of joy and sorrow, and hope and desolation. But you want to know about your father, Hugh-your dear, dear father, whom you must love and reverence henceforth and for evermore."

"I do love him," I replied; "I loved him ever since I began to think about him."

"And how long has that been?"

"I can hardly tell; it grew upon me so gradually that I was not Martin and Margery's grandson. Then I began to wonder who I was, and who my father was, and I asked those who knew, and they told so much and no more, and bade me ask no further ques

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