CHAPTER IX.

IN PERPLEXITIES.

Look, a horse at the door,

And little King Charles is snarling;
Go back, my lord, across the moor,
You are not her darling.

ELEANOR set out early to go home. She would not wait to

be sent for. The walk might set her pulses in motion again, perhaps. The fog was breaking away under the sun's rays, but it had left everything wet; the morning was excessively chill. There was no grass in her way, however, and Eleanor's thick shoes did not fear the road, nor her feet the three miles of way. The walk was good. It could not be said to be pleasant; yet action of any kind was grateful and helpful. She saw not a creature till she got home.

Home struck her with new sorrow, in the sense of the disappointment she was going to bring to so many there. She made her own room without having to speak to anybody; bathed and dressed for breakfast. How grave her face was this morning. She could not help that. And she felt that it grew graver when, entering the breakfast-room, she found Mr. Carlisle there.

"What have you done to yourself?" said he, after they were seated at the breakfast-table.

"Taken a walk this morning."

"Judicious, in this air, which is like a suspended shower-bath. Where did you go?"

"On the Wiglands road."

"If I had come in time, I should have taken you up before me and cut short such a proceeding. Mrs. Powle, you do not make use of your authority.'

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"Seems hardly worth while, when it is on the point of expiring," said Mrs. Powle blandly, with a smiling face.

"Why, Eleanor had to come home," said Julia; "she spent the night in the village. She could not help walking, unless mamma had sent the carriage or something for her."

"Spent the night in the village," said Mr. Carlisle.

Eleanor took it into her head that she must go to take care of a sick girl there, the daughter of her nurse. It is great foolishness, I think, but Eleanor will do it."

"It don't agree with her very well," said Julia. "How you do look, Eleanor, this morning."

"She looks very well," said the Squire, "for all I see. Walking won't hurt her."

What Mr. Carlisle thought he did not say. When breakfast was over he drew Eleanor off into the library.

"How do you do this morning?" said he, stopping to look at her.

"Not very well."

"I came early, to give you a great gallop to the other end of the moor, where you wished to go the other day. You are not fit for it now?"

Hardly."

"Did you sit up with that girl last night?"

"I sat up. She did not want much done for her. there was a great comfort to her."

My being

"Far too great a comfort. You are a naughty child. Do you fancy, Eleanor, your husband will allow you to do such things? "I must try to do what is right, Macintosh."

"Do you not think it will be right that you should pleasure me in what I ask of you?" he said very gently, and with a caressing action which took away the edge of the words.

"Yes, in things that are right," said Eleanor, who felt that she owed him all gentleness because of the wrong she had done.

Now do

"I shall not ask you anything that is not right; but if I should, the responsibility of your doing wrong will rest on me. you feel inclined to practise obedience a little to-day?"

"No, not at all," said Eleanor honestly, her blood rousing.

"It will be all the better practice. You must go and lie down and rest carefully, and get ready to ride with me this afternoon, if the weather will do. Eh, Eleanor?"

"I do not think I shall want to ride to-day." "Kiss me, and say you will do as I bid you.'

Eleanor obeyed and went to her room, feeling wretched. She must find some way quickly to alter this state of things, if she could alter them. In the meantime she had promised to rest. It was a comfort to lock the door and feel that for hours at any rate she was alone from all the world. But Eleanor's heart fainted. She lay down, and for a long time remained in motionless, passive dismay; then Nature asserted her rights and she slept.

If sleep did not quite "knit up the ravelled sleeve of care" for her, Eleanor yet felt much less ragged when she came out of her slumber. There was some physical force now to meet the mental demand. The first thing demanded was a letter to Mr. Carlisle. It was in vain to think to tell him in spoken words what she wanted him to know; he would cut them short or turn them aside as soon as he perceived their drift, before she could at all possess him with the facts of the case. Eleanor sat down before dressing to write her letter, so that no call might break her off until it was done.

It was a weary, anxious, sorrowful writing; done with some tears and some mute prayers for help; with images constantly starting into her mind that she had to put aside together, with the hot drops they called forth. The letter was finished, when Eleanor was informed that Mr. Carlisle waited for her.

She put

"To ride, I suppose," she thought. "I will not go.' on a house dress and went down to the library, where her mother

and Mr. Carlisle were together; looking both of them so well pleased.

"You are not dressed for riding," he said, taking her in his arms. "As you see— returned Eleanor.

"I have brought a new horse for you. Will you change your dress?"

"I think not. I am not equal to anything new."

"Have you slept?"

"Yes, but I have not eaten; and it takes both to make muscle. I cannot even talk to you till after tea."

"Have you had no luncheon?"

"I was asleep."

"Mrs. Powle," said the gentleman, "you do not take care of my interests here. May I request you to have this want supplied; I am going to take Eleanor a great gallop presently; she must have something first." He put Eleanor in an easy-chair as he spoke, and stood looking at her. Probably he saw some unusual lines of thought or care about the face, but it was by no means less fine for that. Mr. Carlisle liked what he saw. Refreshments came; and he poured out chocolate for her and served her with an affectionate supervision that watched every item. But when, after a very moderate meal, Eleanor's hand was stretched out for another piece of bread, he stopped her. no more now. Now go and put on your

"No," he said;

habit."

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"But I am very hungry," said Eleanor.

"No matter, you will forget it in five minutes. Go and put on your habit."

Eleanor hesitated; thought that, perhaps, after all the ride would be the easiest way of passing the afternoon, and went.

"Well, you do understand the art of command," said Mrs. Powle admiringly. "" "She would never have done that for me.

Mr. Carlisle did not look surprised, nor gratified. nor in fact show anything whatever in his looks. Unless it were that the difference of effects produced by himself and his future mother-in-law was very much a matter of course. He stood before the fire, with no change at all in his clear hazel eyes, until Eleanor appeared. Then they sparkled. Eleanor was for some reason or other particularly lovely in his eyes to-day.

The horse he had brought for her was a superb Arabian, showing nerve and fire in every line of his form and starting muscle, from the tips of the ears down to the long fetlock and beautiful hoof. Showing fire in the bright eye, too. A brown creature, with luxuriant flowing mane and tail.

"He is not quite so quiet as Black Maggie," Mr. Carlisle said as he put Eleanor upon his back; "and you must not curb him, Eleanor, or he will run."

They went to the moor, and by degrees getting wonted to her fiery charger and letting him display his fine paces and increase his speed, Eleanor found the sensation very inspiriting. Even Black

Maggie was not an animal like this; every motion was instinct with life and power, and not a little indication of headstrongness and irritability gave a great additional interest and excitement to the pleasure of managing him. Mr. Carlisie watched her carefully, Eleanor knew; he praised her handling. He himself was mounted on a quiet, powerful creature that did not make much show. "If this fellow-what is his name?"

"Tippoo Sultan."

"If he were by any chance to run, would that horse you are riding keep up with him?”

I hope you will not try."

"I don't mean it—but I am curious. There, Mr. Carlisle, there is the place where I was thrown."

"A villanous-looking place. I wish it was mine. How do you like Tippoo?"

"Oh, he is delightful!"

Mr. Carlisle looked satisfied, as he might; for Eleanor's colour had become brilliant, and her face had changed greatly since setting out. Strength, and courage, and hope seemed to come to her on Tippoo's back, facing the wind on the moor and gallopping over the wild, free way. They took in part the route Eleanor had followed that day alone, coming back through the village by a still wider circuit. As they rode more moderately along the little street-if it could be called so; the houses were all one side-Eleanor saw Mr. Rhys standing at Mrs. Lewis's door; he saw her. Involuntary her bow in return to his salutation was very low. At the same instant Tippoo started on a run to which all his former galloping had been a gentle amble. This was not ungentle; the motion had nothing rough; only Eleanor was going in a straight line over the ground at a rate that took away her breath. She had presence of mind not to draw the curb rein, but she felt that she could hardly endure long the sort of progress she was making through the air. It did not seem to be on the ground. Her curiosity was gratified on one point; for after the first instant she found Mr. Carlisle's powerful grey straining close beside her. Nevertheless Tippoo was so entirely in earnest that it was some little time-it seemed a very long one-before the grey could get so close to the brown and so far up with him that Mr. Carlisle could lay his hand upon the thick brown mane of Tippoo and stoop forward to speak to him. As soon as that was done once or twice. Tippoo's speed gradually relaxed; and a perseverance in his master's appeals to nis reason and sense of duty brought the wild creature back to the moderate pace and air of a civilised horse. Mr. Carlisle transferred his grasp from the mane to

Eleanor's hand.

"Eleanor, what did you do that for?"

"Do what? I did nothing."

"You curbed him. You drew the rein, and he considered himself insulted. I told you he would not bear it.”

"He has had nothing to bear from me. I have not drawn the curb at all, Robert."

"I must conuadict you. I saw you do it. him."

That started

Eleanor remained silent and a little pale. Was Mr. Carlisle right? The ride had until then done her a great deal of good; roused up her energies and restored in some degree her spirit; the involuntary race, together with the sudden sight of Mr. Rhys, had the effect to bring back all the soberness which for the moment the delight and stir of the exercise had dissipated. She went on pondering various things. Eleanor's letter to Mr. Carlisle was in the pocket of her habit, ready for use; she determined to give it him when he left her that evening; that was one of her subjects of thought. Accordingly he found her very abstracted and cold the rest of the way; grave and uninterested. He fancied she might have been startled by her run on Tippoo's back, though it was not very like her; but he did not know what to fancy. And true it is, that a remembrance of fear had come up to Eleanor after that gallop. Afraid she was not, at the time; but she felt she had been in a condition of some peril from which her own forces could not have extricated her; that brought up other considerations, and sadly in Eleanor's mind some words of the hymn they had sung last night in the barn floated over among her thoughts:

When I can read my title clear

To mansions in the skies,
I'll bid farewell to every fear,

And wipe my weeping eyes.

Very simple words; words that to some ears have become trite with repetition; but thoughts that went down into the depths of Eleanor's heart and garrisoned themselves there, beyond the power of any attacks to dislodge. Her gravity and indifference piqued Mr. Carlisle, curiosity and affection both. He spent the evening in trying to overcome them, with very partial success. When he was leaving her, Eleanor drew the letter from her pocket. "What is this?" said he, taking it.

"Only a letter for you."

"From you!

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The consideration of that must not be postponed." He broke the seal. Come, sit down again. I will read it here." Take it home, Macintosh, and read it there.

"Not now.

it wait so long."

"Why?"

"Never mind why. Do; because I ask you."

Let

"I don't believe I can understand it without you beside me," said he smiling, and drawing the letter from its envelope while he looked at her.

"But there is everybody here," said Eleanor, glancing at another part of the room where the rest of the family were congregated. "I would rather you took it home with you."

"It is something that requires serious treatment?"

"Yes.

"You are a wise little thing," said he, “and I will take your advice." He put the letter in his pocket, then took Eleanor's hand