THE] IBRARY 
 
 "HE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CAL IFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 A ROSE OF A HUNDRED LEAVES

 
 A ROSE 
 
 OF A 
 
 a 
 
 BY 
 
 AMELIA E. BARR 
 
 AUTHOR OF "FRIEND OLIVIA," "THE BOW OF ORANGE 
 RIBBON," "JAN VEDDER'S WIFE," ETC. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 1891
 
 Copyright, 1891, 
 BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY. 
 
 Copyright, 1891, 
 By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY. 
 
 Ail rights reserved 
 
 JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. THE WILD ROSE is THE SWEETEST 9 
 
 II. FORGIVE ME, CHRIST ! 35 
 
 III. ONLY BROTHER WILL 77 
 
 IV. FOR MOTHER'S SAKE 113 
 
 V. BUT THEY WERE YOUNG . . . . 151 
 VI. "LOVE SHALL BE LORD OF SANDY- 
 
 SlDE " 1 80 
 
 VII. "A ROSE OF A HUNDRED LEAVES" 208 
 
 1OOCC76
 
 A ROSE OF A HUNDRED 
 LEAVES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE WILD ROSE IS THE SWEETEST. 
 
 I TELL again the oldest 
 and the newest story 
 of all the world, 
 the story of Invincible 
 Love ! 
 
 This tale divine an 
 cient as the beginning 
 of things, fresh and 
 young as the passing 
 hour has forms and 
 names various as hu 
 manity. The story of 
 Aspatria Anneys is but
 
 io A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 one of these, one leaf from all the roses 
 in the world, one note of all its myriad 
 of songs. 
 
 Aspatria was born at Seat-Ambar, an 
 old house in Allerdale. It had Skiddaw 
 to shelter it on the northwest ; and it 
 looked boldly out across the Solway, and 
 into that sequestered valley in Furness 
 known as " the Vale of the Deadly 
 Nightshade." The plant still grew there 
 abundantly, and the villagers still kept 
 the knowledge of its medical value taught 
 them by the old monks of Furness. For 
 these curious, patient herbalists had dis 
 covered the blessing hidden in the fair, 
 poisonous amaryllis, long before modern 
 physicians called it "belladonna." 
 
 The plant, with all its lovely relations, 
 had settled in the garden at Seat-Ambar 
 Aspatria's mother had loved them all : 
 the girl could still remember her thin 
 white hands clasping the golden jonquils 
 in her coffin. This memory was in her 
 heart, as she hastened through the lonely 
 place one evening in spring. It ought to
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 1 1 
 
 have been a pleasant spot, for it was full 
 of snowdrops and daffodils, and many 
 sweet old-fashioned shrubs and flowers; 
 but it was a stormy night, and the blos 
 soms were plashed and downcast, and all 
 the birds in hiding from the fierce wind 
 and driving rain. 
 
 She was glad to get out of the gray, 
 wet, shivery atmosphere, and to come into 
 the large hall, ruddy and glowing with fire 
 and candle-light. Her brothers William 
 and Brune sat at the table Will was 
 counting money ; it stood in small gold 
 and silver pillars before him. Brune was 
 making fishing-flies. Both looked up at 
 her entrance ; they did not think words 
 necessary for such a little maid. Yet 
 both loved her; she was their only sister, 
 and both gave her the respect to which 
 she was entitled as co-heir with them of 
 the Ambar estate. 
 
 She was just sixteen, and not yet beau 
 tiful. She was too young for beauty. Her 
 form was not developed ; she would prob 
 ably gain two or three inches in height ;
 
 12 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and her face, though exquisitely modelled, 
 wanted the refining which comes either 
 from a multitude of complex emotions or 
 is given at once by some great heart- 
 sorrow. Yet she had fascination for those 
 capable of feeling her charm. Her large 
 brown eyes had their childlike clearness ; 
 they looked every one in the face with its 
 security of good-will. Her mouth was a 
 tempting mouth ; the lips had not lost 
 their bow-shape ; they were red and pout 
 ing, but withal ever ready to part. She 
 might have been born with a smile. Her 
 hair, soft and dark, had that rarest quality 
 of soft hair, a tendency to make itself in 
 to little curls and tendrils and stray down 
 the white throat and over the white brow ; 
 yet it was carefully parted and confined 
 in two long braids, tied at the ends with 
 a black ribbon. 
 
 She wore a black dress. It was plainly 
 made, and its broad ruffle around the open 
 throat gave it an air of simplicity almost 
 childlike in effect. Her arms below the 
 elbows were uncovered, and her hands
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 13 
 
 were small and finely formed, as patrician 
 hands should be. There was no ring 
 upon them, and no bracelet above them. 
 She wore neither brooch nor locket, nor 
 ornament of any kind about her person , 
 only a daffodil laid against the snowy skin 
 of her bosom. Even this effect was not 
 the result of coquetry ; it was a holy and 
 loving sentiment materialized. 
 
 Altogether, she was a girl quite in keep 
 ing with the antique, homelike air of the 
 handsome room she entered ; her look, 
 her manner, and even her speech had the 
 local stamp ; she was evidently a daughter 
 of the land. Her brothers resembled her 
 after their masculine fashion. They were 
 big men, whom nature had built for the 
 spaces of the moors and mountains and 
 the wide entrances of these old Cumber 
 land homes. They would have been 
 pushed to pass through narrow city door 
 ways. A fine open-air colour was in their 
 faces ; they had that confident manner 
 which great physical strength imparts, and 
 that air of conscious pride which is born 
 in lords of the soil.
 
 14 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Indeed, William and Brune Anneys 
 made one understand how truthfully pop 
 ular nomenclature has called an English 
 man " John Bull." For whoever has seen a 
 bull in its native pastures proud, obsti 
 nate, conscious of his strength, and withal 
 a little surly must understand that there 
 is a taurine basis to the English char 
 acter, finely expressed by the national 
 appellation. 
 
 A great thing was to happen that hour, 
 and all three were as unconscious of the 
 approaching fate as if it was to be a part 
 of another existence. Squire William fin 
 ished his accounts, and played a game of 
 chess with his brother. Aspatria walked 
 up and down the hall, with her hands 
 clasped behind her, or sat still in the 
 Squire's hearth-chair, with her dress lifted 
 a little in front, to let the pleasant heat 
 fall upon her ankles. She did not think 
 of reading or of sewing, or of improving 
 the time in any way. Perhaps she was 
 not as dependent on books as the women 
 of this generation. Aspatria's mind was
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 15 
 
 sensitive and observing; it lived very well 
 on its own ideas. 
 
 The storm increased in violence ; the 
 rain beat against the windows, and the 
 wind howled at the nail-studded oak door, 
 as if it intended to blow it down. A big 
 ploughman entered the room, shyly pulled 
 his front hair, and looked with stolid in 
 quiry into his master's face. The Squire 
 pushed aside the chess-board, rose, and 
 went to the hearth-stone; for he was young 
 in his authority, and he felt himself on 
 the hearth-stone to hold an impregnable 
 position. 
 
 " Well, Steve Bell, what is it? " 
 " Be I to sow the high land next, sir? " 
 " If you can have a face or back wind, 
 it will be best; if you have an elbow-wind, 
 you must give the land an extra half- 
 bushel." 
 
 " Be I to sow mother-of-corn ] on the 
 east holme? " 
 
 kt It is matterless Is it going to be a 
 flashy spring? " 
 
 1 Clover.
 
 1 6 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 "A right season, sir, plenty 
 of manger-meat." 
 
 " How is the weather? " 
 " The rain is near past ; it will 
 take up at midnight." 
 
 As he spoke, As- 
 patria, who had 
 been sitting with 
 folded hands and 
 half-shut eyes, 
 straightened her- 
 s e 1 f suddenly, 
 and threw up her 
 head to listen. 
 There was cer 
 tainly the tramp 
 of a horse's feet, 
 and in a moment 
 the door was 
 loudly and im 
 patiently struck 
 with the metal 
 handle of a riding- 
 whip. 
 
 Steve Bell went to
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 17 
 
 answer the summons ; Brune trailed slowly 
 after him. Aspatria and the Squire heard 
 nothing on the hearth but a human voice 
 blown about and away by the wind. But 
 Steve's reply was distinct enough, 
 
 "You be wanting Redware Hall, sir? 
 Cush ! it 's unsensible to try for it. The 
 hills are slape as ice ; the becks are full ; 
 the moss will make a mouthful of you 
 horse and man to-night." 
 
 The Squire went forward, and Aspatria 
 also. Aspatria lifted a candle, and carried 
 it high in her hand. That was the first 
 glimpse of her that Sir Ulfar Fenwick 
 had. 
 
 " You must stay at Seat-Ambar to 
 night," said William Anneys. " You can 
 not go farther and be sure of your life. 
 You are welcome here heartily, sir." 
 
 The traveller dismounted, gave his horse 
 to Steve, and with words of gratitude 
 came out of the rain and darkness into the 
 light and comfort of the home opened to 
 him. " I am Ulfar Fenwick," he said, 
 " Fenwick of Fenwick and Outerby ; and
 
 1 8 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 I think you must be William Anneys of 
 Ambar-Side." 
 
 " The same, sir. This is my brother 
 Brune, and my sister Aspatria. You arc 
 dreeping wet, sir. Come to my room and 
 change your clothing." 
 
 Sir Ulfar bowed and smiled assent; and 
 the bow and the smile were Aspatria's. 
 Her cheeks burned ; a strange new life 
 was in all her veins. She hurried the 
 housekeeper and the servants, and she 
 brought out the silver and the damask, 
 and the famous crystal cup in its stand of 
 gold, which was the lucky bowl of Ambar 
 Side. When Fenwick came back to the 
 hall, there was a feast spread for him ; and 
 he ate and drank, and charmed every 
 one with his fine manner and his witty 
 conversation 
 
 They sat until midnight, an hour 
 strange to Seat-Ambar. No one native in 
 that house had ever seen it before, no one 
 ever felt its mysterious influence Sir 
 Ulfar had been charming them with tales 
 of the strange lands he had visited, and the
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 19 
 
 strange peoples who dwelt in them. He 
 had not spoken much to Aspatria, but it 
 was in her face he had found inspiration 
 and sympathy. For her young eyes 
 looked out with such eager interest, with 
 glances so seeking, so without guile and 
 misgiving, that their bright rays found a 
 corner in his heart into which no woman 
 had ever before penetrated. And she was 
 equally subjugated by his more modern 
 orbs, orbs with that steely point of bril 
 liant light, generated by large experience 
 and varied emotion, electric orbs, such 
 as never shone in the elder world. 
 
 When the clock struck twelve, Squire 
 Anneys rose with amazement. " Why, it 
 is strike of midnight ! " he said " It is 
 past all, how the hours have flown ! But 
 we must n't put off sleeping-time any 
 Jonger. Good-night heartily to you, sir. 
 It will be many a long day till I forget this 
 night What doings you have seen, sir!" 
 
 He was talking thus to his guest, as he 
 led him to the guest-room. Aspatria still 
 stood by the dying fire. Brune rose
 
 2O A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 silently, stretched his big arms, and said : 
 " I '11 be going likewise. You had best 
 remember the time of 
 night, Aspatria." 
 
 " What do you think 
 of him, Brune? " 
 
 " Fenwick ! I would n't 
 think too high of him. 
 One might have to come 
 down a peg or two. He 
 sets a good deal of store by 
 himself, I should say." 
 
 " You and I are of two ways 
 of judging, Brune." 
 
 " Never mind ; time will let 
 light into all our ways of 
 judging." 
 
 He went yawning upstairs and 
 Aspatria slowly followed. She was not 
 a bit sleepy. She was wider awake 
 than she had ever been before Her 
 hands quivered like a swallow's wings ; 
 her face was rosy and luminous. She 
 removed her clothing, and unbraided her 
 hair and shook it loose over her slim
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 21 
 
 shoulders. There was a smile on her lips 
 through all these preparations for sleep, 
 a smile innocent and glad. Suddenly 
 she lifted the candle and carried it to the 
 mirror. She desired to look at herself, 
 and she blushed deeply as she gratified 
 the wish. Was she fair enough to please 
 this wonderful stranger? 
 
 It was the first time such a query had 
 ever come to her heart. She was inclined 
 to answer it honestly. Holding the light 
 slightly above her head, she examined her 
 claims to his regard. Her expressive face, 
 her starry eyes, her crimson, pouting lips, 
 her long dark hair, her slight, virginal 
 figure in its gown of white muslin scantily 
 trimmed with English thread-lace, her 
 small, bare feet, her air of childlike, curi 
 ous happiness, all these things, taken 
 together, pleased and satisfied her desires, 
 though she knew not how or why. 
 
 Then she composed herself with inten 
 tional earnestness. She must " say her 
 prayers." As yet it was only saying pray 
 ers with Aspatria, only a holy habit. A
 
 22 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves, 
 
 large Book of Common Prayer stood open 
 against an oaken rest on a table ; a cushion 
 of black velvet was beneath it. Ere she 
 knelt, she reflected that it was very late, 
 and that her Collect and Lord's Prayer 
 would be sufficient. Youth has such con 
 fidence in the sympathy of God. She 
 dropped softly on her knees and said her 
 portion. God would understand the rest. 
 The little ceremony soothed her, as a 
 mother's kiss might have done ; and with 
 a happy sigh she put out the light. The 
 old house was dark and still, but her 
 guardian angel saw her small hands loose 
 lying on the snowy linen, and heard her 
 whisper, " Dear God ! how happy I am ! " 
 And this joyous orison was the acceptable 
 prayer that left the smile of peace upon 
 her sleeping face. 
 
 In the guest-chamber Ulfar Fenwick 
 was also holding a session with himself. 
 He had come to his room very wide 
 awake ; midnight was an early hour to 
 him. And the incidents he had been tell 
 ing filled his mind with images of the past.
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 23 
 
 He could not at once put them aside. 
 Women he had loved and left visited his 
 memory, light loves of a season, in which 
 both had declared themselves broken 
 hearted at parting, and both had known 
 that they would very soon forget. Neither 
 was much to blame : the maid had long 
 ceased to remember his vows and kisses ; 
 he ; in some cases, had forgotten her name. 
 Yet, sitting there by the glowing oak logs, 
 he had visions of fair faces in all kinds of 
 surroundings, in lighted halls, in moon 
 lit groves under the great stars of the 
 tropics, on the Shetland seas when the 
 aurora made for lovers an enchanted at 
 mosphere and a light in which beauty was 
 glorified. Well, they had passed as April 
 passes, and now, 
 
 As a glimpse of a burnt-out ember 
 
 Recalls a regret of the sun, 
 He remembered, forgot, and remembered 
 
 What love saw clone and undone. 
 
 Aspatria was different from all. He 
 whispered her strange name on his lips, 
 and he thought it must have wandered
 
 24 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 from some sunny southern clime into these 
 northern solitudes. His eyes shone; his 
 heart beat. He said to it: "Make room 
 for this innocent little one ! What a dar 
 ling she is ! How clear, how candid, how 
 beautiful ! Oh, to be loved by such a 
 woman ! Oh, to kiss her ! to feel her 
 kiss me! " He set his mouth tightly; the 
 soft dreamy look in his face changed to 
 one of purpose and pleasure. 
 
 " I shall win her, or die for it," he said. 
 " By Saint George ! I would rather die than 
 know that any other man had married her." 
 
 Yet the thought of marriage somewhat 
 sobered him. " I should have to give up 
 my voyage to the Spanish Colonies, and 
 I am very much interested in their struggle. 
 I could not take her to Mexico, I suppose, 
 - there is nothing but fighting there ; 
 and I could not no, I could not leave 
 her. If she were mine, I should hate to 
 have any one else breathe the same air with 
 her. I could not endure that others should 
 speak to her. I should want to strike any 
 man who touched her hand. Perhaps I
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 25 
 
 had better go away in the morning, and 
 ride this road no more. I have made my 
 plans." 
 
 And fate had made other plans. Who 
 can fight against his destiny? When he 
 saw Aspatria in the morning, every plan 
 that did not include her seemed unworthy 
 of his consideration. She was ten times 
 lovelier in the daylight. She had that 
 fresh invincible charm which women of 
 culture and intellect seldom have: she 
 was inspired by her heart. It taught her 
 a thousand delightful subjugating ways. 
 She served his breakfast with her own fair 
 hands ; she offered him the first sweet 
 flowers in the garden; she fluttered around 
 his necessities, his desires, his intentions, 
 with a grace and a kindness nothing but 
 love could have taught her. 
 
 He thanked her with marvellous glances, 
 with smiles, with single words dropped 
 only for her ears, with all the potent elo 
 quence which passion and experience 
 teach. And he had to pay the price, as 
 all men must do. The lesson he taught
 
 26 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 he also learned. " Aspatria ! " he 
 said, in soft, penetrating accents; 
 and when she answered his 
 
 call and 
 
 came to his side, 
 her dress trailing 
 across his feet be 
 witched him. They 
 were in the garden, 
 and he clasped her 
 hand, and went down 
 the budding alleys 
 with her, speechless, but gazing 
 into her face until she dropped 
 her tremulous, transparent lids be 
 fore her eyes; they were too full of 
 light and love to show to any mortal. 
 The sky was white and blue, the air
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 27 
 
 fresh and sweet; the swallows had just 
 come, and were chattering with the star 
 lings ; hundreds of daffodils " danced in 
 the wind " and lighted the ground at their 
 feet; troops of celandines starred the 
 brook that babbled by the bee-skips ; the 
 southernwood, the wall-flower, the budding 
 thyme and sweet-brier, a thousand ex 
 halations filled the air and intensified that 
 intoxication of heart and senses which 
 makes the first stage of love's fever 
 delirious. 
 
 Fenwick went away in the afternoon, 
 and his adieus were mostly made to the 
 Squire. He had done his best to win his 
 favour, and he had been successful. He 
 left Seat-Ambar under an engagement to 
 return soon and try his skill in wrestling 
 and pole-leaping with Brune. Aspatria 
 knew he would return : a voice which 
 Fenwick's voice only echoed told her so. 
 She watched him from her own window 
 across the meadows, and up the mountain, 
 until he was lost to her vision. 
 
 She was doubtless very much in love,
 
 28 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 though as yet she had not admitted the 
 fact to herself. The experience had come 
 with a really shocking swiftness. Her 
 heart was half angry and half abashed by 
 its instantaneous surrender. Two circum 
 stances had promoted this condition. 
 First, the singular charm of the man. 
 Ulfar Fenwick was unlike any one she had 
 ever seen. The squires and gentlemen 
 who came to Seat-Ambar were physically 
 the finest fellows in England, but noble 
 women look for something more than 
 mere bulk in a man. Sir Ulfar Fenwick 
 had this something more. Culture, travel, 
 great experience with women, had added to 
 his heroic form a charm flesh and sinew 
 alone could never compass. And if he had 
 lacked all other physical advantages, he 
 possessed eyes which had been filled to 
 the brim with experiences of every kind, 
 gray eyes with pure, full lids thickly 
 fringed, eyes always lustrous, sometimes 
 piercingly bright. Secondly, Aspatria had 
 no knowledge which helped her to ward 
 off attack or protract surrender. In a
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 29 
 
 multitude of lovers 
 there is safety ; but 
 Fenwick was Aspa- 
 tria's first lover. 
 
 He rode hard, as 
 if he would ride from 
 fate. Perhaps he 
 hoped at this early 
 
 stage of feeling to do as he had often 
 
 done before, 
 
 To love and then ride away. 
 
 He had also a fresh, pressing anxiety to 
 see his sister, who was Lady of Redware 
 Manor. Seven years and much besides
 
 3O A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 years had passed since they met. She 
 was his only sister, and ten years his 
 senior. She loved him as mothers love, 
 unquestioningly, with miraculous excuses 
 for all his shortcomings. She had been 
 watching for his arrival many hours before 
 he appeared. 
 
 " Ulfar ! how welcome you are!" she 
 cried, with tears in her eyes and her voice. 
 " Oh, my dear ! how happy I am to see 
 you once more ! " 
 
 She might have been his only love, he 
 kissed and embraced and kissed her again 
 so fondly. Oh, wondrous tie of blood 
 and kinship ! At that moment there really 
 seemed to Ulfar Fenwick no one in the 
 whole world half so dear as his sister 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 He told her he had lost his way in the 
 storm and been detained by Squire An- 
 neys ; and she praised the Squire, and 
 said that she would evermore love him 
 for his kindness. " I met him once, at 
 the Election Ball in Kendal. He danced 
 with me ; ' we neighbour each other,' you
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 3 I 
 
 see ; and they are a grand old family, I 
 can tell you." 
 
 " There is a younger brother, called 
 Brune." 
 
 " I never saw him." 
 
 "A sister also, a child yet, but very 
 handsome. You ought to see her." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " You would like her. I do." 
 
 " Ulfar, there is a ' thus far ' in every 
 thing. In your wooing and pursuing, 
 the line lies south of Seat-Ambar. To 
 wrong a woman of that house would be 
 wicked and dangerous." 
 
 " Why should T wrong her? I have no 
 intention to do so. I say she is a lovely 
 lady, a great beauty, worthy of honest 
 love and supreme devotion." 
 
 " Such a rant about love and beauty ! 
 Nine tenths of the men who talk in this 
 way do but blaspheme Love by taking his 
 name in vain." 
 
 " However, Elizabeth, it is marriage or 
 the Spanish colonies for me. It is Miss 
 Anneys, or Cuba, New Orleans, and
 
 32 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Mexico. Santa Anna is a supreme villain ; 
 I have a fancy to see such a specimen." 
 
 " You are then between the devil and 
 the deep sea; and I should say that the 
 one-legged Spaniard was preferable to the 
 deep sea of matrimony." 
 
 " She is so fair! She has a virgin timid 
 ity that enchants me." 
 
 " It will become matronly indecision, or 
 mental weakness of will. In the future it 
 will drive you frantic." 
 
 " Her sweet sensibility 
 
 " Will crystallize into passionate irrita 
 tion or callous opposition. These child 
 like, tender, clinging maidens are often 
 capable of sudden and dangerous action. 
 Better go to Cuba, or even to Mexico, 
 Ulfar." 
 
 " I suppose she has wealth. You will 
 admit that excellence?" 
 
 " She is co-heir with her brothers. She 
 may have two thousand pounds a year. 
 You cannot afford to marry a girl so 
 poor." 
 
 " I have not yet come to regard a large
 
 The Wild Rose is the Sweetest. 33 
 
 sum of money as a kind of virtue, or the 
 want of it as a crime." 
 
 " Your wife ought to represent you. 
 How can this country-girl help you in the 
 society to which you belong? " 
 
 "Society! What is society? In its 
 elemental verity it means toil, weariness, 
 loss of rest and health, useless expense, 
 envy, disappointment, heart-burnings, - 
 all for the sake of exchanging entertain 
 ments with A and B, C and D. It means 
 chaff instead of wheat." 
 
 " If you want to be happy, Ulfar, put 
 this girl out of your mind. I am sure her 
 brothers will oppose your suit. They will 
 not let their sister leave Allerdale. No 
 Anneys has ever done so." 
 
 "You have strengthened my fancy, 
 Elizabeth. There is a deal of happiness 
 in the idea of prevailing, of getting the 
 mastery, of putting hindrances out of 
 the way." 
 
 " Well, I have given you good advice." 
 
 " There are many ' counsels of perfec 
 tion ' nobody dreams of following. To 
 3
 
 34 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 advise a man in love not to love, is one 
 of them." 
 
 " Love ! " she cried scornfully. " Be 
 fore you make such a fuss about the 
 Spanish Colonies and their new-found 
 freedom, free yourself, Ulfar ! You have 
 been a slave to some woman all your life. 
 You are one of those men who are natur 
 ally not their own property. A child can 
 turn you hither and thither ; a simple 
 country girl can lead you." 
 
 He laughed softly, and murmured, 
 
 "There is a rose of a hundred leaves, 
 But the wild rose is the sweetest."
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 FORGIVE ME, CHRIST! 
 
 THE ultimatum reached by Fenwick in 
 the consideration of any subject was, to 
 please himself. In the case of Aspatria 
 Anneys he was particularly determined to 
 do so. It was in vain Lady Redware en 
 treated him to be rational. How could he 
 be rational? It was the preponderance of 
 the emotional over the rational in his 
 nature which imparted so strong a person 
 ality to him. He grasped all circum 
 stances by feeling rather than by reason. 
 
 In a few days he was again at Seat- 
 Ambar. Aspatria drew him, as the candle 
 draws the moth which has once burned 
 its wings at it. And among the simple 
 Anneys folk he found a hearty welcome. 
 With Squire William he travelled the hills, 
 and counted the flocks, and speculated on 
 the value of the iron-ore cropping out of
 
 36 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 the ground. With Brune he went line- 
 fishing, and in the wide barns tried his 
 skill in wrestling or pole-leaping or sin 
 gle-stick. He tolerated the rusticity of 
 the life, for the charming moments he 
 found with Aspatria. 
 
 No one like Ulfar Fenwick had ever 
 visited Ambar-Side. To the young men, 
 who read nothing but the Gentleman's 
 Magazine and the Whitehaven Herald, 
 and to Aspatria, who had but a volume 
 of the Ladies' Garden Manual, Notable 
 Things, her Bible and Common Prayer, 
 Fenwick was a book of travel, song, and 
 story, of strange adventures, of odd bits 
 of knowledge, and funny experiences. 
 Things old and new fell from his hand 
 some lips. Squire William and Brune 
 heard them with grave attention, with de 
 light and laughter ; Aspatria with eyes full 
 of wonder and admiration. 
 
 As the season advanced and they grew 
 more familiar, Aspatria was thrown natur 
 ally into his society. The Squire was in 
 the hay-field ; Brune had his task there
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 37 
 
 also. Or they were down at the Long 
 Pool, washing the sheep, or on the fells, 
 shearing them. In the haymaking, Aspa- 
 
 tria and 
 Fenwick made 
 some pretence of 
 assistance ; but they both 
 very soon wearied of the real 
 labour. Aspatria would toss a few 
 furrows of the warm, sweet grass ; 
 but it was much sweeter to sit down 
 under the oak-tree with Fenwick at her 
 side, and watch the moving picture, and 
 listen to the women singing in their 
 high shrill voices, as they turned the
 
 38 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 swaths, the Song of the Mower, and the 
 men mournfully shouting out the chorus 
 to it,- 
 
 " We be all like grass ! We be all like grass ! " 
 
 As for the oak, it liked them to sit under 
 it; all its leaves talked to each other about 
 them. The starlings, though they are 
 always in a hurry, stopped to look at the 
 lovers, and went off with a Q-q-q of satis 
 faction. The crows, who are a bad lot, 
 croaked innuendoes, and said it was to be 
 hoped that evil would not come of such 
 folly. But Aspatria and Fenwick listened 
 only to each other ; they saw the whole 
 round world in each other's eyes. 
 
 Fenwick spoke very low ; Aspatria had 
 to droop her ear to his mouth to under 
 stand his words. And they were such 
 delightful words, she could not bear to 
 lose one of them. Then, as the sun grew 
 warm, and the scent of the grass filled the 
 soft air, and the haymakers were more and 
 more subdued and quiet, heavenly lan 
 guors stole over them. They sat hand in
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 39 
 
 hand, Aspatria sometimes with shut eyes 
 humming to herself, sometimes dreamily 
 pulling the long grass at her side; Fen- 
 wick mostly silent, yet often whispering 
 those words which are single because they 
 are too sweet to be double, " Darling ! 
 Dearest ! Angel ! " and the words drew 
 her eyes to his eyes, drew her lips to his 
 lips; ere she was aware, her heart had 
 passed from her in long, loving, stolen 
 kisses. On the fells, in the garden, in 
 the empty, silent rooms of the old house, 
 it was a repetition of the same divine 
 song, with wondrously celestial variations. 
 Goethe puts in Faust an Interlude in 
 Heaven : Fenwick and Aspatria were in 
 their Interlude. 
 
 One evening they stood among the 
 wheat-sheaves. The round, yellow har 
 vest-moon was just rising above the fells, 
 and the stars trembling into vision. The 
 reapers had gone away ; their voices made 
 faint, fitful echoes down the misty lane. 
 The Squire was driving home one load of 
 ripe wheat, and Brune another. Aspatria
 
 4O A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 said softly, " The day is over. We must 
 go home. Come ! " 
 
 She stood in the warm mystical light, 
 with one hand upon the bound sheaf, the 
 other stretched out to him. Her slim 
 form in its white dress, her upturned face, 
 her star-like eyes, he saw all at a glance. 
 He was subjugated to the innermost room 
 of his heart. He answered, with inexpres 
 sible emotion, 
 
 " Come ! Come to me, my Dear One ! 
 My Love! My Joy! My Wife!" He 
 held her close to his heart ; he claimed 
 her by no formal special yes, but by all 
 the sweet reluctances and sweeter yield- 
 ings, the thousand nameless consents won 
 day by day. 
 
 Oh, the glory of that homeward walk ! 
 The moon beamed^upon them. The trees 
 bent down to touch them. The heath 
 and the honeysuckle made a posy for 
 them. The nightingale sang them a can 
 ticle. They did not seem to walk ; they 
 trod on ether; they moved as people 
 move in happy dreams of other stars,
 
 42 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 where thought and wish are motion. It 
 would have been heaven upon earth if 
 those minutes could have lasted ; but it 
 was only an interlude. 
 
 That night Fenwick spoke to Squire 
 William and asked him for his sister. The 
 Squire was honestly confounded by the 
 question. Aspatria was such a little lass ! 
 It was beyond everything to talk of mar 
 rying her. Still, in his heart he was proud 
 and pleased at such high fortune for the 
 little lass ; and he said, as soon as Fen- 
 wick's father and family came forward as 
 they should do, he would never be the one 
 to say nay. 
 
 Fenwick's father lived at Fenwick Cas 
 tle, on the shore of bleak Northumber 
 land. He was an old man, but his natural 
 feelings and wisdom were not abated. He 
 consulted the History of Cumberland, and 
 found that the family of Ambar-Anneys 
 was as ancient and honourable as his own. 
 But the girl was country-bred, and her 
 fortune was small, and in a measure de 
 pendent upon her brother's management
 
 Forgive me, CJirist ! 
 
 43 
 
 of the estate. A careless 
 master of Ambar-Side 
 would make Aspa- 
 tria poor. While 
 he was consid 
 ering these 
 things, Lady 
 Redware ar 
 rived at the 
 castle, and they talked 
 over the matter together. 
 
 " I expected Ulfar to marry very 
 differently, and I must say I am disap 
 pointed. But I suppose it will be useless 
 to make any opposition, Elizabeth," the 
 old man said to his daughter. 
 
 " Quite useless, father. But absence 
 works miracles. Try to secure 
 twelve months. You ought 
 to go to a warm climate 
 this winter; ask Ulfar 
 to take you to Italy. 
 In a year time may 
 re-shuffle the cards. 
 And you must write to the
 
 44 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 girl, and to her eldest brother, who is a 
 fine fellow and as proud as Lucifer. I 
 called upon them before I left Cumber 
 land. She is very handsome." 
 
 " Handsome ! Old men know, Eliza 
 beth, that six months after a man is mar 
 ried, it makes little difference to him 
 whether his wife is handsome or not." 
 
 " That may be, or it may not be, father. 
 The thing to consider is, that young men 
 unfortunately persist in marrying for that 
 first six months." 
 
 " Well, then, fortune pilots many a ship 
 not steered. Suppose we leave things to 
 circumstances? " 
 
 " No, no ! Human affairs are for the 
 most part arranged in such a way that 
 those turn out best to which most care 
 is devoted." 
 
 So the letters were thoughtfully written ; 
 the one to Aspatria being of a paternal 
 character, that to her brother polite and 
 complimentary. To his son Ulfar the old 
 baronet made a very clever appeal. He 
 reminded him of his great age, and of the
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 45 
 
 few opportunities left for showing his af 
 fection and obedience. He regretted the 
 necessity for a residence in Italy during 
 the winter, but trusted to his son's love to 
 see him through the experience. He con 
 gratulated Ulfar on winning the love of a 
 young girl so fresh and unspoiled by the 
 world, but kindly insisted upon the wisdom 
 of a little delay, and the great benefit this 
 delay would be to himself. 
 
 It was altogether a very temperate, wise 
 letter, appealing to the best side of Ulfar's 
 nature. Squire William read it also, and 
 gave it his most emphatic approval. He 
 was in no hurry to lose his little sister. 
 She was but a child yet, and knew nothing 
 of the world she was going into ; and 
 " surely to goodness," he said, looking at 
 the child, " she will have a lot of things 
 to look after, before she can think of 
 wedding." 
 
 This last conjecture touched Aspatria 
 on a very womanly point. Of course there 
 were all her " things " to get ready. She 
 had never possessed more than a few
 
 46 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 frocks at a time, and those of the simplest 
 character; but she was quite alive to the 
 necessity of an elaborate wardrobe, and 
 she had also an instinctive sense of what 
 would be proper for her position. 
 
 So the suggestions of Ulfar's father were 
 accepted in their entirety, and the old 
 gentleman was put into a very good tem 
 per by the fact. And what was a year? 
 " It will pass like a dream," said Ulfar. 
 " And I shall write constantly to you, and 
 you will write to me; and when we meet 
 again it will be to part no more." Oh, 
 the poverty of words in such straits as 
 these! Men say the same things in the 
 same extremities now that have been said 
 millions of times before them. And As- 
 patria felt as if there ought to have been 
 entirely new words, to express the joy of 
 their betrothal and the sorrow of their 
 parting. 
 
 The short delay of a last week together 
 was perhaps a mistake. A very young 
 girl, to whom great joy and great sorrow 
 are alike fresh experiences, may afford a
 
 Forgive me, Christ I 47 
 
 prolonged luxury of the emotions of part 
 ing. Love, more worldly-wise, deprecates 
 its demonstrativeness, and would avert it 
 altogether. The farewell walks, the senti 
 mental souvenirs, the pretty and petty de 
 vices of love's first dream, are tiresome to 
 more practised lovers ; and Ulfar had often 
 proved what very cobwebs they were to 
 bind a straying fancy. 
 
 "Absence makes the heart grow fonder." 
 Perhaps so, if the last memory be an alto 
 gether charming one. It was, unfortu 
 nately, not so in Aspatria's case. It should 
 have been a closely personal farewell with 
 Ulfar alone; but Squire Anneys, in his 
 hospitable ignorance, gave it a public char 
 acter. Several neighbouring squires and 
 dames came to breakfast. There was cup- 
 drinking, and toasting, and speech-making; 
 and Ulfar's last glimpse of his betrothed 
 was of her standing in the wide porch, sur 
 rounded by a waving, jubilant crowd of 
 strangers, whose intermeddling in his joy 
 he deeply resented. Anneys had invited 
 them in accord with the traditions of his
 
 48 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 house and order. Fenwick thought it was 
 a device to make stronger his engagement 
 to Aspatria. 
 
 " As if it needed such contrivances ! " 
 he muttered angrily. "When it does, it is 
 a broken thread, and no Anneys can knot 
 it again." 
 
 The weeks that followed were full of 
 new interests to Aspatria. Mistress Frost- 
 ham, the wife of a near shepherd-lord, had 
 been the friend of Aspatria's mother; she 
 was fairly conversant with the world out 
 side the fells and dales, and she took the 
 girl under her care, accompanied her to 
 Whitehaven, and directed her in the pur 
 chase of all considered necessary for the 
 wife of Ulfar Fenwick. 
 
 Then the deep snows shut in Seat- 
 Ambar, and the great white hills stood 
 round about it like fortifications. But as 
 often as it was possible the Dalton post 
 man fought his way up there, with his 
 packet of accumulated mail ; for he knew 
 that a warm welcome and a large reward 
 awaited him. In the main, the long same
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 
 
 49 
 
 days went happily by. William and Brune 
 had a score of resources for the sea 
 son ; the farm-servants worked in the 
 barn ; they were making and mending 
 sacks for the wheat, and caps 
 for the sheeps' heads 
 in fly-time, ^^_ 
 sharpening 
 scythes and / 
 tools, doing the in 
 door work of a 
 great farm, and 
 
 mostly singing as they 
 did it. 
 
 As Aspatria sat in her room, 
 surrounded by fine cambric and 
 linen and that exquisite English 
 thread-lace now gone out of fashion, she 
 
 4
 
 50 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 could hear their laughter and their song, 
 and she unconsciously set her stitches to 
 its march and melody. The days were 
 not long to her. So many dozens of gar 
 ments to make with her own slight fin 
 gers ! She had not a moment to waste, 
 but the necessity was one of the sweetest 
 delight. The solitude and secrecy of her 
 labour added to its charm. She never 
 took her sewing into the parlour. And yet 
 she might have done so : William and 
 Brune had a delicacy of affection for her 
 which would have made them blind to her 
 occupation and densely stupid as to its 
 design. 
 
 So, although the days were mostly alike, 
 they were not unhappily so ; and at inter 
 vals destiny sent her the surprises she 
 loved. One morning in the beginning of 
 February, Aspatria felt that the postman 
 ought to come ; her heart presaged him. 
 The day was clear and warm, so much 
 so, that the men working in the barn had 
 all the windows open. They were singing 
 in rousing tones the famous North Country
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 5 1 
 
 song to the barley-mow, and drinking it 
 through all its verses, out of the jolly 
 brown bowl, the nipperkin, the quarter- 
 pint, the quart and the pottle, the gallon 
 and the anker, the hogshead and the 
 pipe, the well, and the river, and the 
 ocean, and then rolling back the chorus, 
 from ocean to the jolly brown bowl. Sud 
 denly, while a dozen men were shouting in 
 unison, 
 
 " Here 's a health to the barley mow ! " 
 
 the verse was broken by the cry of " Here 
 comes Ringham the postman ! " Then 
 Aspatria ran to the window and saw him 
 climbing the fell. She did not like to go 
 downstairs until Will called her; but she 
 could not sew another stitch. And when 
 at last the aching silence in her ears was 
 filled by Will's joyful " Come here, As 
 patria ! Here is such a parcel as never 
 was, from foreign parts too ! " she hardly 
 knew how her feet twinkled down the long 
 corridor and stairs. 
 
 The parcel was from Rome. Ulfar had
 
 52 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 sent it to his London banker, and the 
 banker had sent a special messenger to 
 Dalton with it. Over the fells at that sea 
 son no one but Ringham could have found 
 a safe way; and Ringham was made so 
 welcome that he was quite imperious. He 
 ordered himself a rasher of bacon, and a 
 bowl of the famous barley broth, and 
 spread himself comfortably before the 
 great hearth-place. At the table stood 
 Aspatria, William, and Brune. Aspatria 
 was nervously trying to undo the seals and 
 cords that bound love's message to her. 
 Will finally took his pocket-knife and cut 
 them. There was a long letter, and a box 
 containing exquisite ornaments of Roman 
 cameos, precious onyx, made more 
 precious by work of rare artistic beauty, a 
 comb for her dark hair, a necklace for her 
 white throat, bracelets for her slender 
 wrists, a girdle of stones linked with gold 
 for her waist. Oh, how full of simple de 
 light she was ! She was too happy to 
 speak. Then Will discovered a smaller 
 package. It was for himself and Brune.
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 53 
 
 Will's present was a cameo ring, on which 
 were engraved the Anneys and Fenwick 
 arms. Brune had a scarf-pin, representing 
 a lovely Hebe. It was a great day at 
 Seat-Ambar. Aspatria could work no 
 more; Will and Brune felt it impossible 
 to finish the game they had begun. 
 
 There is a tide in everything: this was 
 the spring-tide of Aspatria's love. In its 
 overflowing she was happy for many a 
 day after her brothers had begun to spec 
 ulate and wonder why Ringham did not 
 come. Suddenly it struck her that the 
 snow was gone, and the road open, and 
 that there was no letter. She began to 
 worry, and Will quietly rode over to Dai- 
 ton, to ask if any letter was lying there. 
 He came back empty-handed, silent, and 
 a little surly. The anniversary of their 
 meeting was at hand : surely Ulfar would 
 remember it, so Aspatria thought, and she 
 watched from dawn to dark, but no token 
 of remembrance came. The flowers began 
 to bloom, the birds to sing, the May sun 
 shine flooded the earth with glory, but
 
 54 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 fear and doubt and dismay and daily dis 
 appointment made deepest, darkest winter 
 in the low, long room where Aspatria 
 watched and waited. Her sewing had 
 been thrown aside. The half-finished gar 
 ments, neatly folded, lay under a cover 
 she had no strength to remove. 
 
 In June she wrote a pitiful little note to 
 her lover. She said that he ought to tell 
 her, if he was tired of their engagement. 
 She told Will what she had said, and asked 
 him to post the letter. He answered 
 angrily, " Don't you write a word to him, 
 good or bad ! " And he tore the letter 
 into twenty pieces before her eyes. 
 
 " Oh, Will, I cannot bear it!" 
 
 " Thou art a woman : bear what other 
 women have tholed before thee." Then 
 he went angrily from her presence. Brune 
 was thrumming on the window-pane. She 
 thought he looked sorry for her; she 
 touched his arm and said, " Brune, will 
 you take a letter to Dalton post for 
 me?" 
 
 " For sure I will. Go thy ways and
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 55 
 
 write it, and I '11 be gone before Will is 
 back." 
 
 It was an unfortunate letter, as letters 
 written in a hurry always are. Absolute 
 silence would have piqued and worried 
 Ulfar. He would have fancied her ill, 
 dying perhaps; and the uncertainty, vague 
 and portentous, would have prompted him 
 to action, if only to satisfy his own mind. 
 Sometimes he feared that a girl so sensi 
 tive would fade away in neglect; and he 
 expected a letter from William Anneys 
 saying so. But a hurried, halting, not 
 very correct epistle, whose whole tenour 
 was, " What is the matter? What have I 
 done? Do you remember last year at 
 this time?" irritated him beyond reply. 
 
 He was still in Italy when it reached 
 him. Sir Thomas Fenwick was not likely 
 ever to return to England. He was slowly 
 dying, and he had been removed to a villa 
 in the Italian hills. And Elizabeth Red- 
 ware had a friend with her, a young widow 
 just come from Athens, who affected at 
 times its splendid picturesque national
 
 56 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 costume. She was a very bright, hand 
 some woman, whose fine education had 
 been supplemented by travel, society, and 
 a rather unhappy matrimonial experience. 
 She knew how to pique and provoke, how 
 to flirt to the very edge of danger and 
 then sheer off", how to manipulate men 
 before the fire of passion, as witches used 
 to manipulate their waxen images before 
 the blazing coals. 
 
 She had easily won Ulfar's confidence ; 
 she had even assisted in the selection of 
 the cameos ; and she declared to Elizabeth 
 that she would not for a whole world 
 interfere between Ulfar and his pretty 
 innocent ! A natural woman was such a 
 phenomenon ! She was glad Ulfar was 
 going to marry a phenomenon. 
 
 Elizabeth knew her better. She gave 
 the couple opportunity, and they needed 
 nothing more. There were already be 
 tween them a good understanding, trans 
 parent secrets, little jokes, a confessed con 
 fidence. They quickly became affectionate. 
 The lovely Sarah, relict of Herbert Sandys,
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 
 
 57 
 
 Esq., not only reminded Ulfar of his vows 
 to Aspatria, but in the very reminder she 
 tempted him to break them. When As- 
 patria's letter was put into his hand, she 
 
 was with him, marvellously arrayed in 
 tissue of silver and brilliant colours. A 
 head-dress of gold coins glittered in her 
 fair braided hair; her long white arms 
 were shining with bracelets ; she was at
 
 58 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 once languid and impulsive, provoking 
 Elizabeth and Ulfar to conversation, and 
 then amazing them by the audacity and 
 contradiction of her opinions. 
 
 " It is so fortunate," she said, " that Ulfar 
 has found a little out-of-the-way girl to ap 
 preciate his great beauty. The world at 
 present does not think much of masculine 
 beauty. A handsome fellow who starts for 
 any of its prizes is judged to be frivolous 
 and poetical, perhaps immoral : you see 
 Byron's beauty made him unfit for a legis 
 lator, he could do nothing but write poetry. 
 I should say it was Ulfar's best card to 
 marry this innocent with the queer name : 
 with his face and figure, he will never get 
 into Parliament. No one would trust him 
 with taxes. He is born to make love, and 
 he and his country Phyllis can go simper 
 ing and kissing through life together. If 
 I were interested in Ulfar " 
 
 " You are interested in Ulfar, Sarah," 
 interrupted Elizabeth. " You said so to 
 me last night." 
 
 "Did I? Nevertheless, life does not
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 59 
 
 give us time really to question ourselves, 
 and it is the infirmity of my nature to mis 
 take feeling for evidence." 
 
 " You must not change your opinions 
 so quickly, Sarah." 
 
 " It is often an element of success to 
 change your opinions. It is hesitating 
 among a variety of views that is fatal. 
 The man who does not know what he 
 wants is the man who is held cheap." 
 
 " I am sure I know what I want, Sarah." 
 And as he spoke, Ulfar looked with intelli 
 gence at the fair widow, and in answer she 
 shot from her bright blue eyes a bolt of 
 summer lightning that set aflame at once ' 
 the emotional side of Ulfar's nature. 
 
 " You say strange things, Sarah. I wish 
 it was possible to understand you." 
 
 " ' Who shall read the interpretation 
 thereof? ' is written on everything we see, 
 especially on women." 
 
 " I believe," said Elizabeth, " that Ulfar 
 has quarrelled with his country maid. Is 
 there a quarrel, Ulfar, really? " 
 
 " No," he answered, with some temper.
 
 60 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Sarah nodded at Ulfar, and said softly : 
 " The absent must be satisfied with the 
 second place. However, if you have quar 
 relled with her, Ulfar, turn over a new 
 leaf. I found that out when poor Sandys 
 was alive. People who have to live to 
 gether must blot a leaf now and then with 
 their little tempers. The only thing is to 
 turn over a new one." 
 
 " If anything unpleasant happens to 
 me," said Ulfar, " I try to bury it." 
 
 " You cannot do it. The past is a ghost 
 not to be laid ; and a past which is buried 
 alive, it is terrible." It was Sarah who 
 spoke, and with a sombre earnestness not 
 in keeping with her usual character. There 
 was a minute's pregnant silence, and it was 
 broken by the entrance of a servant with 
 a letter. He gave it to Ulfar. 
 
 It was Aspatria's sorrowful, questioning 
 note. Written while Brune waited, it was 
 badly written, incorrectly constructed and 
 spelled, and generally untidy. It had the 
 same effect upon Ulfar that a badly 
 dressed, untidy woman would have had.
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 6 1 
 
 He was ashamed of the irregular, childish 
 scrawl. He did not take the trouble to 
 put himself in the atmosphere in which 
 the anxious, sorrowful words had been 
 written. He crushed the paper in his 
 hand with much the same contemptuous 
 temper with which Elizabeth had seen him 
 treat a dunning letter. She knew, how 
 ever, that this letter was from Aspatria, 
 and, saying something about her father, 
 she went into an adjoining room, and left 
 Ulfar and Sarah together. She thought 
 Sarah would be the proper alterative. 
 
 The first words Sir Thomas Fenwick 
 uttered regarded Aspatria. Turning his 
 head feebly, he asked : " Has Ulfar quar 
 relled with Miss Anneys ? I hear nothing 
 of her lately." 
 
 " I think he is tired of his fancy for her. 
 There is no quarrel." 
 
 " She was a good girl, eh ? Kind- 
 hearted, beautiful, eh, Elizabeth?" 
 
 " She certainly was." 
 
 He said no more then ; but at midnight, 
 when Ulfar was sitting beside him, he
 
 62 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves, 
 
 called his son, and spoke to him on the 
 subject. "I am going almost gone 
 the way of all flesh, Ulfar. Take heed of 
 my last words. You promised to make 
 Miss Anneys your wife, eh? " 
 
 " I did, father." 
 
 " Do not break your promise. If she 
 gives it back to you, that might be well; 
 but you cannot escape from your own 
 word and deed. Honour keeps the door of 
 the house of life. To break your word is 
 to set the door wide open, open for 
 sorrow and evil of all kinds. Take care, 
 Ulfar." 
 
 The next day he died, and one of Ulfar's 
 first thoughts was that the death set him 
 free from his promise for one year at the 
 least. A year contained a multitude of 
 chances. He could afford to write to 
 Aspatria under such circumstances. So 
 he answered her letter at once, and it 
 seemed proper to be affectionate, prepara 
 tory to reminding her that their marriage 
 was impossible until the mourning for Sir 
 Thomas was over. Also death had soft-
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 63 
 
 ened his heart, and his father's last words 
 had made him indeterminate and a little 
 superstitious. A clever woman of the 
 world would not have believed in this 
 letter ; its aura subtle but persistent, as 
 the perfume of the paper would have 
 made her doubt its fondest, lines. But 
 Aspatria had no idea other than that cer 
 tain words represented absolutely certain 
 feelings. 
 
 The letter made her joyful. It brought 
 back the roses to her cheeks, the spring 
 of motion to her steps. She began to 
 work in her room once more. Now and 
 then her brothers heard her singing the 
 old song she had sung so constantly with 
 Ulfar, - 
 
 " A shepherd in a shade his plaining made, 
 
 Of love, and lovers' wrong, 
 Unto the fairest lass that trod on grass, 
 
 And thus began his song : 
 ' Restore, restore my heart again, 
 Which thy sweet looks have slain, 
 Lest that, enforced by your disdain, I sing, 
 Fye ! fye on love ! It is a foolish thing ! 
 
 " ' Since love and fortune will, I honour still 
 Your dark and shining eye ;
 
 64 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 What conquest will it be, sweet nymph, to thee, 
 
 If I for sorrow die ? 
 Restore, restore my heart again, 
 Which thy sweet looks have slain, 
 Lest that, enforced by your disdain, I sing, 
 Fye ! fye on love ! It is a foolish thing ! ' ' 
 
 But the lifting of the sorrow was only 
 that it might press more heavily. No 
 more letters came ; no message of any 
 kind ; none of the pretty love-gages he 
 delighted in giving during the first months 
 of their acquaintance. A gloom more 
 wretched than that of death or sickness 
 settled in the old rooms of Seat-Ambar. 
 William and Brune carried its shadow on 
 their broad, rosy faces into the hay-fields 
 and the wheat-fields. It darkened all the 
 summer days, and dulled all the usual 
 mirth-making of the ingathering feasts. 
 William was cross and taciturn. He loved 
 his sister with all his heart, but he did not 
 know how to sympathize with her. Even 
 mother-love, when in great anxiety, some 
 times wraps itself in this unreasonable 
 irritability. Brune understood better. He 
 had suffered from a love-change himself;
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 
 
 he knew its ache and longing, its black 
 despairs and still more cruel hopes. He 
 was always on the lookout for Aspatria; 
 and one day he heard news which he 
 
 thought would 
 interest her. Lady Red- 
 ware was at the Hall. William 
 had heard it a week before, but 
 he had not considered it prudent to 
 name the fact. Brune had a kinder 
 intelligence. 
 
 " Aspatria," he said, " Redware Hall is 
 open again. I saw Lady Redware in the 
 village." 
 
 " Brune ! Oh, Brune, is he there too?" 
 5
 
 66 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " No, he is n't. I made sure of that." 
 
 "Brune, I want to go to Redware. 
 Perhaps his sister may tell me the truth. 
 Go with me. Oh, Brune, go with me ! I 
 am dying of suspense and uncertainty." 
 
 " Ay, they 're fit to kill anybody, let 
 alone a little lass like you. It will put 
 William about, and it may make bad 
 bread between us ; but I '11 go with you, 
 even if we do have a falling out. I 'm not 
 flayed for William's rages." 
 
 The next market-day Brune kept his 
 word. As soon as Squire Anneys had 
 climbed the fell breast and passed over 
 the brow of the hill, Brune was at the door 
 with horses for Aspatria and himself. She 
 was a good rider, and they made the dis 
 tance, in spite of hills and hollows, in two 
 hours. Lady Redware was troubled at the 
 visit, but she came to the door to welcome 
 Aspatria, and she asked Brune with partic 
 ular warmth to come into the house with 
 his sister. Brune knew better; he was 
 sure in such a case that it would prove a 
 mere formal call, and that Aspatria would
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 67 
 
 never have the courage to ask the ques 
 tions she wished to. 
 
 But Aspatria had come to that point of 
 mental suffering when she wanted to know 
 the truth, even though the truth was the 
 worst. Lady Redware saw the determina 
 tion on her face, and resolved to gratify it. 
 She was shocked at the change in Aspa- 
 tria's appearance. Her beauty was, in a 
 measure, gone. Her eyes were hollow, 
 and the lids dark and swollen with weep 
 ing. Her figure was more angular. The 
 dew of youth, the joy of youth, was over. 
 She drooped like a fading flower. If Ulfar 
 saw her in such condition he might pity, 
 but assuredly he would not admire her. 
 
 Lady Redware kissed the poor girl. 
 " Come in, my dear," she said kindly. 
 " How ill you look ! Here is wine : take 
 a drink." 
 
 " I am ill. I even hope I am dying. 
 Life is so hard to bear. Ulfar has forgot 
 ten me. I have vexed him, and cannot 
 find out in what way. If you would only 
 tell me !"
 
 68 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " You have not vexed him at all." 
 
 "What then?" 
 
 " He is tired, or he has seen a fresher 
 face. That is Ulfar's great fault. He 
 loves too well, because he does not love 
 very long. Can you not forget him? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 "You must have other lovers? " 
 
 " No. I never had a lover until Ulfar 
 wooed me. I will have none after him. 
 I shall love him until I die." 
 
 " What folly ! " 
 
 " Perhaps. I am only a foolish child. 
 If I had been wise and clever, he would 
 not have left me. It is my fault. Do you 
 believe he will ever come to Seat-Ambar 
 again? " 
 
 " I do not think he will. It is best to 
 tell you the truth. My dear, I am truly 
 sorry for you ! Indeed I am, Aspatria! " 
 
 The girl had covered her face with her 
 thin white hands, tier attitude was so 
 hopeless that it brought the tears to Lady 
 Redware's eyes. Hoping to divert her 
 attention, she said,
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 69 
 
 " Who called you Aspatria?" 
 
 " It was my mother's name. She was 
 born in Aspatria, and she loved the place 
 very much." 
 
 "Where is it, child? I never heard of 
 
 it." 
 
 " Not far away, on the sea-coast, a 
 little town that brother Will says has been 
 asleep for centuries. Such a pretty place, 
 straggling up the hillside, and looking 
 over the sea. Mother was born there, and 
 she is buried there, in the churchyard. 
 It is such an old church, one thousand 
 years old ! Mother said it was built by 
 Saint Kentigern. I went there to pray 
 last week, by mother's grave. I thought 
 she might hear me, and help me to bear 
 the suffering." 
 
 " You poor child ! It is shameful of 
 
 Ulfar ! " 
 
 " He is not to blame. Will told me that 
 it was a poor woman who could n't keep 
 what she had won." 
 
 " It was very brutal in Will to say such 
 a thing."
 
 7O A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " He did not mean it unkindly. We are 
 plain-spoken people, Lady Redvvare. Tell 
 me, as plainly as Will would tell me, if 
 there is any hope for me. Does Ulfar love 
 me at all now?" 
 
 " I fear not." 
 
 "Are you sure? " 
 
 " I am sure." 
 
 " Thank you. Now I will go." She 
 put out her hands before her, as if she was 
 blind and had to feel her way; and in 
 answer to all Lady Redware's entreaties to 
 remain, to rest, to eat something, she only 
 shook her head, and stumbled forward. 
 Brune saw her coming. He was standing 
 by the horses, but he left them, and went 
 to meet his sister. Her misery was so visi 
 ble that he put her in the saddle with fear. 
 But she gathered the reins silently, and 
 motioned him to proceed; and Aspatria's 
 last sad smile haunted Lady Redware for 
 many a day. Long afterward she recalled 
 it with a sharp gasp of pity and annoyance. 
 It was such a proud, sorrowful farewell. 
 She reached home, but it took the last
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 71 
 
 remnant of her strength. She was carried 
 to her bed, and she remained there many 
 weeks. The hills were white with snow, 
 and the winter winds were sounding among 
 them like the chant of a high mass, when 
 she came down once more to the parlor. 
 Even then Will carried her like a baby in 
 his arms. He had carried her mother in 
 the same way, when she began to die ; and 
 his heart trembled and smote him. He 
 was very tender with his little sister, but 
 tempests of rage tossed him to and fro 
 when he thought of Ulfar Fenwick. 
 
 And he was compelled lately to think of 
 him very often. All over the fell-side, all 
 through Allerdale, it had begun to be 
 whispered, " Aspatria Anneys has been 
 deserted by her lover." How the fact had 
 become known it was difficult to discover : 
 it was as if it had flown from roof to roof 
 with the sparrows. Will could see it in the 
 faces of his neighbours, could hear it in 
 the tones of their speech, could feel it in 
 the clasp of their hands. And he thought 
 of these things, until he could not eat a
 
 72 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 meal or sleep an hour in peace. His 
 heart was on fire with suppressed rage. 
 He told Brune that all he wanted was to 
 lay Fenwick across his knees and break 
 his neck. And then he spread out his 
 mighty hands, and clasped and unclasped 
 them with a silent force that had terrible 
 anticipation in it. And he noticed that 
 after her illness his sister no longer wore 
 the circlet of diamonds which had been 
 her betrothal-ring. She had evidently 
 lost all hope. Then it was time for him 
 to interfere. 
 
 Aspatria feared it when he came to her 
 room one morning and kissed her and 
 bade her good-by. He said he was going 
 a bit off, and might be a week away, 
 happen more. But she did not dare to 
 question him. Will at times had masterful 
 ways, which no one dared to question. 
 
 Brune knew where his brother was go 
 ing. The night before he had taken 
 Brune to the little room which was called 
 the Squire's room. In it there was a 
 large oak chest, black with age and heavy
 
 Forgive me, Christ ! 
 
 73 
 
 with iron bars. It contained the 
 title-deeds, and many other 
 valuable papers. Will ex 
 plained these 
 and the oth 
 er business 
 of the farm 
 to Brune ; 
 and Brune 
 did not need 
 to ask him 
 why. He was 
 well aware 
 what business 
 William Anneys 
 was bent on, be 
 fore Will said, 
 " I am going to Fen- 
 wick Castle, Brune. I am 
 going to make that measure 
 less villain marry Aspatria." 
 " Is it worth while, Will? " 
 "It is worth while. He shall keep his 
 promise. If he does not, I will kill him, 
 or he must kill me."
 
 74 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " If he kills you, Will, he must then 
 fight me." And Brune's face grew red and 
 hot, and his eyes flashed angry fire. 
 
 " That is as it should be ; only keep your 
 anger at interest until you have lads to 
 take your place. We must n't leave Am- 
 bar-Side without an Anneys to heir it. I 
 fancy your wrath won't get cold while it is 
 waiting." 
 
 " It will get hotter and hotter." 
 " And whatever happens, don't you be 
 saving of kind words to Aspatria. The 
 little lass has suffered more than a bit; 
 and she is that like mother ! I could n't 
 bide, even if I was in my grave, to think 
 of her wanting kindness." 
 
 The next morning Will went away. 
 Brune would not talk to Aspatria about 
 the journey. This course was a mistake; 
 it would have done her good to talk con 
 tinually of it. As it was, she was left to 
 chew over and over the cud of her mourn 
 ful anticipations. She had no womanly 
 friend near her. Mrs. Frostham had drawn 
 back a little when people began to talk of
 
 Forgive me, Christ! 75 
 
 "poor Miss Anneys." She had daughters, 
 and she did not feel that her friendship for 
 the dead included the living, when the liv 
 ing were unfortunate and had questionable 
 things said about them. 
 
 And the last bitter drop in Aspatria's 
 cup full of sorrow was the hardness of her 
 heart toward Heaven. She could not 
 care about God ; she thought God did not 
 care for her. She had tried to make her 
 self pray, even by going to her mother's 
 grave, but she felt no spark of that hidden 
 fire which is the only acceptable prayer. 
 There was a Christ cut out of ivory, nailed 
 to a large ebony cross, in her room. It 
 had been taken from the grave of an old 
 abbot in Aspatria Church, and had been 
 in her mother's family three hundred years. 
 It was a Christ that had been in the grave 
 and had come back to earth. Her mother's 
 eyes had closed forever while fixed upon 
 it, and to Aspatria it had always been an 
 object of supreme reverence and love. 
 She was shocked to find herself unmoved 
 by its white pathos. Even at her best
 
 76 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 hours she could only stand with clasped 
 hands and streaming eyes before it, and 
 with sad imploration cry, - 
 
 " I cannot pray ! I cannot pray ! For 
 give me, Christ ! "
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ONLY BROTHER WILL. 
 
 IT was a dull raw day 
 in late autumn, especial 
 ly dull and raw near the 
 sea, where there was an 
 evil-looking sky to the 
 eastward. Ulfar 
 Fenvvick stood at a 
 window in Castle Fen- ! 
 wick which commanded 
 the black, white-frilled 
 surges. He was watch 
 ing anxiously the point 
 at which the pale gray wall 
 of fog was thickest, a 
 wall of inconceivable height, 
 resting on the sea, reaching to 
 the clouds, when suddenly there emerged 
 from it a beautifully built schooner-yacht.
 
 78 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 She cut her way through the mysterious 
 barrier as if she had been a knife, and came 
 forward with short, stubborn plunges. 
 
 All over the North Sea there are deso 
 late places full of the cries of parting souls, 
 but nowhere more desolate spaces than 
 around Fenwick Castle ; and as the winter 
 was approaching, Ulfar was anxious to 
 escape its loneliness. His yacht had been 
 taking in supplies; she was making for 
 the pier at the foot of Fenwick Cliff, and 
 he was dressed for the voyage and about 
 to start upon it. He was going to the 
 Mediterranean, to Civita Vecchia, and his 
 purpose was the filial one of bringing 
 home the remains of the late baronet. He 
 had promised faithfully to see them laid 
 with those of his fore-elders on the windy 
 Northumberland coast; and he felt that 
 this duty must be done, ere he could com 
 fortably travel the westward route he had 
 so long desired. 
 
 He was slowly buttoning his pilot-coat, 
 when he heard a heavy step upon the 
 flagged passage. Many such steps had
 
 Only Brother Will. 79 
 
 been up and down it that hour, but none 
 with the same fateful sound. He turned 
 his face anxiously to the door, and as he 
 did so, it was flung open, as if by an angry 
 man, and William Anneys walked in, 
 frowning and handling his big walking- 
 stick with a subdued passion that filled 
 the room as if it had been suddenly 
 charged with electricity. The two men 
 looked steadily at each other, neither of 
 them flinching, neither of them betraying 
 by the movement of an eyelash the emotion 
 that sent the blood to their faces and the 
 wrath to their eyes. 
 
 " William Anneys ! What do you 
 want? " 
 
 " I want you to set your wedding-day. 
 It must not be later than the fifteenth of 
 this month." 
 
 "Suppose I refuse to do so? I am go 
 ing to Italy for my father's body." 
 
 "You shall not leave England until you 
 marry my sister." 
 
 " Suppose I refuse to do so? " 
 
 " Then you will have to take your
 
 8o A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 chances of life or death. You will give 
 me satisfaction first; and if you escape the 
 fate you well deserve, Brune may have 
 better fortune." 
 
 " Duelling is now murder, sir, unless we 
 pass over to France." 
 
 " I will not go to France. Wrestling is 
 not murder, and we both know there is a 
 ' throw ' to kill ; and I will ' throw ' until I 
 do kill, or am killed. There 's Brune 
 after me." 
 
 " I have ceased to love your sister. I 
 dare say she has forgotten me. Why do 
 you insist on our marriage? Is it that she 
 may be Lady Fenwick? " 
 
 " Look you, sir ! I care nothing for 
 lordships or ladyships ; such things are 
 matterless to me. But your desertion has 
 set wicked suspicions loose about Miss 
 Anneys ; and the woman they dare to 
 think her, you shall make your wife. By 
 God in heaven, I swear it ! " 
 
 " They have said wrong of Miss Anneys ! 
 Impossible ! " 
 
 "No, sir! they have not said wrong.
 
 Only Brother Will. 81 
 
 If any man in Allerdale had dared to say 
 wrong, I had torn his tongue from his 
 mouth before I came here ; and as for the 
 women, they know well I would hold their 
 husbands or brothers or sons responsible 
 for every ill word they spoke. But they 
 think wrong, and they make me feel it 
 everywhere. They look it, they shy off 
 from Aspatria, -oh, you know well enough 
 the kind of thing going on." 
 
 " A wrong thought of Miss Anneys is 
 atrocious. The angels are not more pure." 
 He said the words softly, as if to himself; 
 and William Anneys stood watching him 
 with an impatience that in a moment or 
 two found vent in an emphatic stamp with 
 his foot. 
 
 " I have no time to waste, sir. Are 
 you afraid to sup the ill broth you have 
 brewed? " 
 
 " Afraid ! " 
 
 " I see you have no mind to marry. 
 Well, then, we will fight! I like that 
 better." 
 
 " I will fight both you and your brother, 
 6
 
 82 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 make any engagement you wish ; but if the 
 fair name of Miss Anneys is in danger, I 
 have a prior engagement to marry her. I 
 will keep it first. Afterward I am at your 
 service, Squire, yours and your brother's; 
 for I tell you plainly that I shall leave my 
 wife at the church door and never see her 
 again." 
 
 " I care not how soon you leave her ; the 
 sooner the better. Will the eleventh of 
 this month suit you? " 
 
 " Make it the fifteenth. To what church 
 will you bring my fair bride? " 
 
 "Keep your scoffing for a fitter time. 
 If you look in that way again, I will strike 
 the smile off your lips with a hand that 
 will leave you little smiling in the future." 
 And he passed his walking-stick to his left, 
 and doubled his large right hand with an 
 ominous readiness. 
 
 " We may even quarrel like gentlemen, 
 Mr. Anneys." 
 
 "Then don't you laugh like a black 
 guard, that's all." 
 
 "Answer me civilly. At what church
 
 Only Brother Will. 83 
 
 shall I meet Miss Anneys, and at what 
 hour on the fifteenth?" 
 
 " At Aspatria Church, at eleven o'clock." 
 
 " Aspatria?" 
 
 " Ay, to be sure ! There will be wit 
 nesses there, I can tell you, generations 
 of them, centuries of generations. They 
 will see that you do the right thing, or 
 they will dog your steps till you have paid 
 the uttermost farthing of the wrong. Mind 
 what you do, then ! " 
 
 " The dead frighten me no more than 
 the living do." 
 
 " You will find out, maybe, what the 
 vengeance of the dead is. I would be 
 willing to leave you to it, if you shab off, 
 and I am not sure but you will." 
 
 "William Anneys, you are sure I will 
 not. You are saying such things to pro 
 voke me to a fight." 
 
 "What reason have I to be sure? All 
 the vows you made to Aspatria you have 
 counted as a fool's babble." 
 
 " I give you my word of honour. Be 
 tween gentlemen that is enough."
 
 84 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " To be sure, to be sure ! Gentlemen 
 can make it enough. But a poor little lass, 
 what can she do but pine herself into a 
 grave ? " 
 
 " I will listen to you no longer, Squire 
 Anneys. If your sister's good name is at 
 stake, it is my first duty to shield it with 
 my own name. If that does not satisfy 
 your sense of honour, I will give you and 
 your brother whatever satisfaction you 
 desire. On the fifteenth of this month, at 
 eleven o'clock, I will meet you at Aspatria 
 Church. Where shall I find the place? " 
 
 " It is not far from Gosforth and Dalton, 
 on the coast. You cannot miss it, unless 
 you never look for it." 
 
 "Sir!" 
 
 " Unless you never look for it. I do not 
 feel to trust you. But this is a promise 
 made to a man, made to William Anneys ; 
 and he will see that you keep it, or else 
 that you pay for the breaking of it." 
 
 " Good-morning, Squire. There is no 
 necessity to prolong such an unpleasant 
 visit."
 
 Only Brother Will. 
 
 " Nay, I will not ' good-morning ' with 
 you. I have not a good wish of any kind 
 for you." 
 
 With these defiant words he left the 
 castle, and Fenwick threw off his pilot- 
 coat and sat 
 down to con 
 sider. First 
 thoughts gen 
 erally come 
 from the sel 
 fish, and there 
 fore the worst, side 
 of any nature ; and 
 Fenwick's first thoughts 
 were that his yacht was ready to sail, 
 and that he could go away, and stay away 
 until Aspatria married, or some other 
 favourable change took place. He cared 
 little for England. With good manage 
 ment he could bring home and bury his 
 father's dust without the knowledge of 
 William Anneys. Then there was the 
 west ! America was before him, north and 
 south. He had always promised himself
 
 86 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 to see the whole western continent ere he 
 settled for life in England. 
 
 Such thoughts were naturally foremost, 
 but he did not encourage them. He felt 
 no lingering sentiment of pity or love for 
 Aspatria, but he realized very clearly what 
 suspicion, what the slant eye, the whis 
 pered word, the scornful glance, the doubt 
 ful shrug, meant in those primitive valleys. 
 And he had loved the girl dearly ; he had 
 promised to marry her. If she wished him 
 to keep his promise, if it was a necessity to 
 her honour, then he would redeem with his 
 own honour his foolish words. He told 
 himself constantly that he had not a particle 
 of fear, that he despised Will and Brune 
 Anneys and their brutal vows of ven 
 geance; but but perhaps they did un 
 consciously influence him. Life was sweet 
 to Ulfar Fenwick, full of new dreams and 
 hopes set in all kinds of new surroundings. 
 For Aspatria Anneys why should he die? 
 It was better to marry her. The girl had 
 been sweet to him, very sweet! After all, 
 he was not sure but he preferred that she
 
 Only Brother Will. 87 
 
 should be so bound to him as to prevent 
 her marrying any other man. He still 
 liked her well enough to feel pleasure in 
 the thought that he had put her out of the 
 reach of any future lover she might have. 
 
 Squire Anneys rode home in what 
 Brune called " a pretty temper for any 
 man." His horse was at the last point of 
 endurance when he reached Seat-Ambar, 
 he himself wet and muddy, " cross and 
 unreasonable beyond everything." Aspa- 
 tria feared the very sound of his voice. 
 She fled to her room and bolted the door. 
 At that hour she felt as if death would be 
 the best thing for her; she had brought 
 only sorrow and trouble and apprehended 
 disgrace to all who loved her. 
 
 " I think God has forgotten me too ! " 
 she cried, glancing with eyes full of an 
 guish to the pale Crucified One hanging 
 alone and forsaken in the darkest corner 
 of the room. Only the white figure was 
 visible ; the cross had become a part of 
 the shadows. She remembered the joy 
 ous, innocent prayers that had been wont
 
 88 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 to make peace in her heart and music on 
 her lips; and she looked with a sorrow 
 that was almost reproach at her Book of 
 Common Prayer, lying dusty and ne 
 glected on its velvet cushion. In her rebel 
 lious, hopeless grief, she had missed all its 
 wells of comfort Oh, if an angel would 
 only open her eyes ! One had come to 
 Hagar in the desert : Aspatria was almost 
 in equal despair. 
 
 Yet when she heard her brother Will's 
 voice she knew not of any other sanctuary 
 than the little table which held her Bible 
 and Prayer Book, and upon which the wan, 
 sad ivory Christ looked down. In speech 
 less misery, with clasped hands and low- 
 bowed head, she knelt there. Will's voice, 
 strenuous and stern, reached her at inter 
 vals. She knew from the silence in the 
 kitchen and farm-offices, and the hasty 
 movements of the servants, that Will was 
 cross; and she greatly feared her eldest 
 brother when he was in what Brune called 
 one of his rages. 
 
 A long lull was followed by a sharp call.
 
 Only Brother Will. 
 
 89 
 
 It was Will calling her name. She felt it 
 impossible to answer, impossible to move; 
 and as he ascended the stairs and came
 
 go A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 grumbling along the corridor, she crouched 
 lower and lower. He was at her door, 
 his hand on the latch ; then a few piteous 
 words broke from her lips : " Help, Christ, 
 Saviour of the world ! " 
 
 Instantly, like a flash of lightning, came 
 the answer, " It is I. Be not afraid." She 
 said the words herself, gave to her heart 
 the promise and the comfort of it, and, so 
 saying them, she drew back the bolt and 
 stood facing her brother. He had a can 
 dle in his hand, and it showed her his red, 
 angry face, and showed him the pale, reso 
 lute countenance of a woman who had 
 prayed and been comforted. 
 
 He walked into the room and put the 
 candle down on a small table in its centre. 
 They both stood a moment by it; then 
 Aspatria lifted her face to her brother and 
 kissed him. He was taken aback and 
 softened, and troubled at his heart. Her 
 suffering was so evident; she was such a 
 gray shadow of her former self. 
 
 "Aspatria! Aspatria! my little lass!" 
 Then he stopped and looked at her again.
 
 Only Brother Will. 91 
 
 "What is it, Will? Dear Will, what is 
 it?" 
 
 " You must be married on the fifteenth. 
 Get something ready. I will see Mrs. 
 Frostham and ask her to help you a bit." 
 
 " Whom am I to marry, Will? On the 
 fifteenth? It is impossible! See how ill 
 I am!" 
 
 " You are to marry Ulfar Fenwick. 111? 
 Of course you are ill ; but you must go to 
 Aspatria Church on the fifteenth. Ulfar 
 Fenwick will meet you there. He will 
 make you his wife." 
 
 " You have forced him to marry me. I 
 will not go, I will not go. I will not 
 marry Ulfar Fenwick." 
 
 " You shall go, if I carry you in my 
 arms ! You shall marry him, or I will 
 -kill you!" 
 
 " Then kill me ! Death does not terrify 
 me. Nothing can be more cruel hard than 
 the life I have lived for a long time." 
 
 He looked at her steadily, and she 
 returned the gaze. His face was like a 
 flame ; hers was white as snow.
 
 92 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " There are things in life worse than 
 death, Aspatria. There is dishonour, dis 
 grace, shame." 
 
 " Is sorrow dishonour? Is it a disgrace 
 to love? Is it a shame to weep when love 
 is dead? " 
 
 " Ay, my little lass, it may be a great 
 wrong to love and to weep. There is a 
 shadow around you, Aspatria; if people 
 speak of you they drop their voices and 
 shake their heads ; they wonder, and they 
 think evil. Your good name is being 
 smiled and shaken away, and I cannot 
 find any one, man or woman, to thrash 
 for it." 
 
 She stood listening to him with wide- 
 open eyes, and lips dropping a little apart, 
 every particle of colour fled from them. 
 
 "It is for this reason Femvick is to 
 marry you." 
 
 " You forced him ; I know you forced 
 him." She seemed to drag the words 
 from her mouth; they almost shivered; 
 they broke in two as they fell halting on 
 the ear.
 
 Only Brother Will. 93 
 
 " Well, I must say he did not need forc 
 ing, when he heard your good name was 
 in danger. He said, manly enough, that 
 he would make it good with his own name. 
 I do not much think I could have either 
 frightened or flogged him into marrying 
 you." 
 
 " Oh, Will ! I cannot marry him in this 
 way ! Let people say wicked things of 
 me, if they will." 
 
 "Nay, I will not! I cannot help them 
 thinking evil ; but they shall not look it, 
 and they shall not say it." 
 
 " Perhaps they do not even think it, 
 Will. How can you tell?" 
 
 " Well enough, Aspatria. How many 
 women come to Ambar-Side now? If 
 you gave a dance next week, you could 
 not get a girl in Allerdale to accept your 
 invitation." 
 
 "Will!" 
 
 " It is the truth. You must stop all this 
 by marrying Ulfar Fenwick. He saw it 
 was only just and right: I will say that 
 much for him."
 
 94 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " Let me alone until morning. I will 
 do what you say. Oh, mother ! mother ! 
 I want mother now ! " 
 
 " My poor little lass ! I am only brother 
 Will ; but I am sorry for thee, I am that ! " 
 
 She tottered to the 
 bedside, and he lifted her 
 gently, and laid her on it; and then, as 
 softly as if he was afraid of waking her, he 
 went out of the room. Outside the door 
 he found Brune. He had taken off his 
 shoes, and was in his stocking-feet. Will 
 grasped him by the shoulder and led him 
 to his own chamber.
 
 Only Brother Will. 95 
 
 "What were you watching me for? 
 What were you listening to me for? I 
 have a mind to hit you, Brune." 
 
 " You had better not hit me, Will. I 
 was not bothering myself about you. 
 I was watching Aspatria. I was listening, 
 because I knew the madman in you had 
 got loose, and I was feared for my sister. 
 I was not going to let you say or do 
 things you would be sorry to death for 
 when you came to yourself. And so you 
 are going to let that villain marry Aspa 
 tria? You are not of my mind, Will. I 
 would not let him put a foot into our 
 decent family, or have a claim of any kind 
 on our sister." 
 
 " I have done what I thought best." 
 
 " I don't say it is best." 
 
 " And I don't ask for your opinion. Go 
 to your own room, Brune, and mind your 
 own affairs." 
 
 And Brune, brought up in the religious 
 belief of the natural supremacy of the 
 elder brother, went off without another 
 word, but with a heart full to overflowing 
 of turbulent, angry thoughts.
 
 96 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 In the morning Will went to see Mrs. 
 Frostham. He told her of his interview 
 with Ulfar Fenwick, and begged her to 
 help Aspatria with such preparations as 
 could be made. But neither to her nor 
 yet to Aspatria did he speak of Fenwick's 
 avowed intention to leave his wife after the 
 ceremony. In the first place, he did not 
 believe that Fenwick would dare to give 
 him such a cowardly insult; and then, 
 also, he thought that the sight of Aspa- 
 tria's suffering would make him tender 
 toward her. William Anneys's simple, 
 kindly soul did not understand that of all 
 things the painful results of our sins are 
 the most irritating. The hatred we ought 
 to give to the sin or to the sinner, we give 
 to the results. 
 
 Surely it was the saddest preparation 
 for a wedding that could be. Will and 
 Brune were " out." They did not speak to 
 each other, except about the farm business. 
 Aspatria spent most of her time in her 
 own room with a sempstress, who was 
 making the long-delayed wedding-dress.
 
 Only Brother Will. 97 
 
 The silk for it had been bought more than 
 a year, and it had lost some of its lustrous 
 colour. Mrs. Frostham paid a short visit 
 every day, and occasionally Alice Frost- 
 ham came with her. She was a very 
 pretty girl, gentle and affectionate to As- 
 patria; and just because of her kindness 
 Will determined at some time to make her 
 Mistress of Seat-Ambar. 
 
 But in the house there was a great de 
 pression, a depression that no one could 
 avoid feeling. Will gave no orders for 
 wedding-festivities ; a great dinner and 
 ball would have been a necessity under the 
 usual circumstances, but there were no 
 arrangements even for a breakfast. Aspa- 
 tria wondered at the omission, but she did 
 not dare to question Will; indeed. Will 
 appeared to avoid her as much as he 
 could. 
 
 Really, William Anneys was very anx 
 ious and miserable. He had no depen 
 dence upon Fenwick's promise, and he 
 felt that if Fenwick deceived him there 
 was nothing possible but the last ven- 
 7
 
 98 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 geance. He had this thought constantly 
 in his mind ; and he was 
 quietly ordering 
 things on the 
 farm for a long 
 absence, and 
 f o r Brune's 
 management 
 or succession. 
 He paid several 
 visits to White- 
 haven, where was 
 his banker, and to 
 Gosport, where his law 
 yer lived. He felt, during 
 that terrible interval of sus 
 pense, very much as a man 
 under sentence of death 
 might feel. 
 
 The morning of the 
 fifteenth broke chill and dark, 
 
 with a promise of rain. Great 
 
 Gable was carrying on a con 
 
 flict with an army of gray clouds 
 
 assailing h i s summit and bod-
 
 Only Brother Will. 99 
 
 ing no good for the weather. The fog 
 rolled and eddied from side to side of the 
 mountains, which projected their black 
 forms against a ghastly, neutral tint behind 
 them , and the air was full of that melan 
 choly stillness which so often pervades the 
 last days of autumn. 
 
 Squire Anneys had slept little for two 
 weeks, and he had been awake all the 
 night before. While yet very early, he 
 had every one in the house called. Still 
 there were no preparations for company 
 or feasting. Brune came down grumbling 
 at a breakfast by candle-light, and he and 
 William drank their coffee and made a 
 show of eating almost in silence. But 
 there was an unspeakable tenderness in 
 William's heart, if he had known how to 
 express it. He looked at Brune with a 
 new speculation in his eyes. Brune might 
 soon be master of Ambar-Side: what 
 kind of a master would he make? Would 
 he be loving to Aspatria? When Brune 
 had sons to inherit the land, would he 
 remember his promise, and avenge the
 
 IOO A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 insult to the Anneys, if he, William, should 
 give his life in vain? Out of these ques 
 tions many others arose ; but he was natu 
 rally a man of few words, and not able to 
 talk himself into a conviction that he 
 was doing right ; nor yet was he able to 
 give utterance to the vague objections 
 which, if defined by words, might per 
 haps have changed his feelings and his 
 plans. 
 
 He had sent Aspatria word that she 
 must be ready by ten o'clock. At eight 
 she began to dress. Her sleep had been 
 broken and miserable. She looked anx 
 iously in the glass at her face. It was as 
 white as the silk robe she was to wear. A 
 feeling of dislike of the unhappy garment 
 rose in her heart. She had bought the 
 silk in the very noon of her love and 
 hopes, a shining piece of that pearl-like 
 tint which only the most brilliant freshness 
 and youth can becomingly wear. Many 
 little accessories were wanting. She tried 
 the Roman cameos with it, and they 
 looked heavy; she knew in her womanly
 
 Only Brother Will. 101 
 
 heart that it needed the lustre of gems, the 
 sparkle of diamonds or rubies. 
 
 Mrs. Frostham came a little later, and 
 assisted her in her toilet; but a passing 
 thought of the four bridemaids she had 
 once chosen for this office made her eyes 
 dim, while the stillness of the house, the 
 utter neglect of all symbols of rejoicing, 
 gave an ominous and sorrowful atmosphere 
 to the bride-robing. Still, Aspatria looked 
 very handsome ; for as the melancholy 
 toilet offices proceeded with so little in 
 terest and so little sympathy, a sense of 
 resentment had gradually gathered in the 
 poor girl's heart. It made her carry her 
 self proudly, it brought a flush to her 
 cheeks, and a flashing, trembling light to 
 her eyes which Mrs. Frostham could not 
 comfortably meet. 
 
 A few minutes before ten, she threw over 
 all her fateful finery a large white cloak, 
 which added a decided grace and dignity 
 to her appearance. It was a garment 
 Ulfar had sent her from London, a long, 
 mantle-like wrap, made of white cashmere,
 
 IO2 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and lined with quilted white satin. Long 
 cords and tassels of chenille fastened it at 
 the throat, and the hood was trimmed with 
 soft white fur. She drew the hood over 
 her head, she felt glad to hide the wreath 
 of orange-buds and roses which Mrs. Frost- 
 ham had insisted upon her wearing, the 
 sign and symbol of her maidenhood. 
 
 Will looked at her with stern lips, but 
 as he wrapped up her satin-sandalled feet 
 in the carriage, he said softly to her, " God 
 bless you, Aspatria!" His voice trem 
 bled, but not more than Aspatria's as she 
 answered, 
 
 " Thank you, Will. You and Brune are 
 father and mother to me to-day. There 
 is no one else." 
 
 " Never mind, my little lass. We are 
 enough." 
 
 She was alone in the carriage. Will 
 and Brune rode on either side of her. The 
 Frosthams, the Dawsons, the Bellendens, 
 the Atkinsons, and the Lutons followed. 
 Will had invited every one to the church, 
 and curiosity brought those who were not
 
 Only Brother Will. 
 
 103 
 
 moved by sympathy or regard. 
 
 Fortunately the rain held off, 
 
 though the air was damp and 
 
 exceedingly depressing. 
 When they arrived 
 
 at Aspatria Church, 
 
 they found the yard full , 
 every gravestone was occu 
 pied by a little party of 
 gossips. At the 
 gate there was 
 
 o 
 
 a handsome 
 travelling- 
 chariot 
 with 
 
 ; 4 
 
 four 
 horses. 
 It lifted 
 a great 
 weight of 
 apprehen- 
 William 
 told him 
 kept his word. 
 
 sion from 
 Anneys, for it 
 that Fenwick had 
 He helped Aspatria 
 
 to alight, and his heart ached for her. How
 
 IO4 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 would she be able to walk between that 
 crowd of gazing, curious men and women ? 
 He held her arm tight against his big 
 heart, and Brune, carefully watching her, 
 followed close behind. 
 
 But Aspatria's inner self had taken pos 
 session of the outer woman. She walked 
 firmly and proudly, with an erect grace, 
 without hesitation and without hurry, toward 
 her fate. Something within her kept say 
 ing words of love and encouragement; she 
 knew not what they were, only they 
 strengthened her like wine. She passed 
 the church door whispering the promise 
 given her, "It is I. Be not afraid." 
 And then her eyes fell upon the ancient 
 stone font, at which her father and mother 
 had named her. She put out her hand and 
 just touched its holy chalice. 
 
 The church was crowded with a curious 
 and not unsympathetic congregation. As- 
 patria Anneys was their own, a dales- 
 woman by a thousand years of birthright. 
 Fenwick was a stranger. If he were going 
 to do her any wrong, and Will Anneys was
 
 Only Brother Will. 105 
 
 ready to punish him for it, every man and 
 woman present would have stood shoulder 
 to shoulder with Will. There was an unde 
 fined expectation of something unusual, of 
 something more than a wedding. This 
 feeling, though unexpressed, made itself 
 felt in a very pronounced way. Will and 
 Brune looked confidingly around ; Aspa- 
 tria gathered courage with every step. 
 She felt that she was among her own 
 people, living and dead. 
 
 As soon as they really entered the 
 church, they saw Fenwick. He was with 
 an officer wearing the uniform of the 
 Household Troops ; and he was evidently 
 pointing out to him the ancient tombs of 
 the Ambar-Anneys family, the Crusaders 
 in stone, with sheathed swords and hands 
 folded in prayer, and those of the fam 
 ily abbots, adorned with richly floriated 
 crosses. 
 
 When he saw Aspatria he bowed, and 
 advanced rapidly to the altar. She had 
 loosened her cloak and flung back her 
 hood, and she watched his approach with
 
 io6 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 eyes that seemed two separate souls of 
 love and sorrow. One glance from them 
 troubled him to the seat of life. He 
 motioned to the waiting clergyman, and 
 took his place beside his bride. There 
 was a dead stillness in the church, and a 
 dead stillness outside; the neighing of a 
 horse sounded sharp, imperative, fateful. 
 A ripple of a smile followed ; it was a lucky 
 omen to hear a horse neigh. Brune 
 glanced at his sister, but she had not 
 heeded it. Her whole being was swal 
 lowed up in the fact that she was standing 
 at Ulfar's side, that she was going to be 
 his wife. 
 
 The aged clergyman was fumbling with 
 the Prayer Book: "The Form of Solemni 
 zation of Matrimony " seemed hard to find. 
 And so vagrant is thought, that while he 
 turned the leaves Aspatria remembered the 
 travelling-chariot, and wondered whether 
 Ulfar meant to carry her away in it, and 
 what she would do for proper clothing. 
 Will ought to have told her something of 
 the future. How cruel every one had
 
 Only Brother Will. 107 
 
 been ! It took but a moment for these 
 and many other thoughts to invade Aspa- 
 tria's heart, and spread dismay and anx 
 iety and again the sense of resentment. 
 
 Then she heard the clergyman begin. 
 His voice was like that of some one speak 
 ing in a dream, till she sharply called her 
 self together, hearing also Ulfar's voice, 
 and knowing that she too would be called 
 upon for her assent. She glanced up at 
 Ulfar, who was dressed with great care and 
 splendour and looking very handsome, and 
 said her " I will " with the glance. Ulfar 
 could not receive it unmoved ; he looked 
 steadily at her, and then he saw the ruin 
 of youth that his faithlessness had made. 
 Remorse bit him like a serpent, but re 
 morse is not repentance. Then William 
 Anneys gave his sister to his enemy ; and 
 the gift was like death to him, and the 
 look accompanying the gift filled Ulfar's 
 heart with a contemptuous anger fatal to 
 all juster or kinder feelings. 
 
 When the service was ended, Fenwick 
 turned to Aspatria and offered her his
 
 io8 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 hand. She put hers into his, and so he led 
 her down the aisle, and through the church 
 yard, to her own carriage. William had 
 followed close. He wondered if Fenwick 
 meant to take his wife with him, and he 
 resolved to give him the opportunity to do 
 so. But as soon as he perceived that the 
 bridegroom would carry out his threat, and 
 desert his bride at the church gates, he 
 stepped forward and said, 
 
 " That is enough, Sir Ulfar Fenwick. 
 I have made you keep your word. I will 
 care for your wife. She shall neither bear 
 your name nor yet take anything from 
 your bounty." 
 
 Fenwick paid no heed to his brother-in- 
 law. He looked at Aspatria. She was 
 whiter than snow; she had the pallor of 
 death. He lifted his hat and said, 
 
 " Farewell, Lady Fenwick. We shall 
 meet no more." 
 
 " Sir Ulfar," she answered calmly, " it 
 is not my will that we met here to-day." 
 
 " And as for meeting no more," said 
 Brune, with passionate contempt, " I will
 
 Only Brother Will. 109 
 
 warrant that is not in your say-so, Ulfar 
 Fenwick." 
 
 As he spoke, Fenwick's friend handed 
 Will Anneys a card ; then they drove rap 
 idly away. Will was carefully wrapping 
 his sister for her solitary ride back to Seat- 
 Ambar ; and he did this with forced delib 
 eration, trying to appear undisturbed by 
 what had occurred ; for, since it had hap 
 pened, he wished his neighbours to think 
 he had fully expected it. And while so 
 engaged he found opportunity to whisper 
 to Aspatria : " Now, my little lass, bear up 
 as bravely as may be. It is only one hour. 
 Only one hour, dearie ! Don't you try to 
 speak. Only keep your head high till you 
 get home, darling! " 
 
 So the sad procession turned homeward, 
 Aspatria sitting alone in her carriage, 
 William and Brune riding on either side 
 of her, the squires and dames bidden to 
 the ceremony following slowly behind. 
 Some talked softly of the affair ; some pas 
 sionately assailed William Anneys for not 
 felling the villain where he stood. Gradu-
 
 I io A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 ally they said good-by, and so went to their 
 own homes. Aspatria had to speak to 
 each, she had to sit erect, she had to bear 
 the wondering, curious gaze not only of 
 
 her friends, but of the hinds and peasant- 
 women in the small hamlets between the 
 church and Seat-Ambar; she had to en 
 dure her own longing and disappointment, 
 and make a poor attempt to smile when 
 the children flung their little posies of late 
 flowers into the passing carriage. 
 
 To the last moment she bore it. "A
 
 Only Brother Will. in 
 
 good, brave girl ! " said Will, as he left her 
 at her own room door. " My word ! it is 
 better to have good blood than good 
 fortune: good blood never was beat! 
 Aspatria is only a little lass, but she is 
 more than a match for yon villain ! A big 
 villain he is, a villain with a latchet ! " 
 
 The miserable are sacred. All through 
 that wretched afternoon no one troubled 
 Aspatria. Will and Brune sat by the 
 parlour fire, for the most part silent. The 
 rain, which had barely held off until their 
 return from the church, now beat against 
 the window-panes, and drenched and scat 
 tered even the hardy Michaelmas daisies. 
 The house was as still as if there had been 
 death instead of marriage in it. Now and 
 then Brune spoke, and sometimes William 
 answered him, and sometimes he did not. 
 
 At last, after a long pause, Brune asked : 
 " What was it Fenwick's friend gave you ? 
 A message? " 
 
 " A message." 
 
 " You might as well say what, Will." 
 
 " Ay, I might. It said Fenwick would
 
 H2 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 wait for me a week at the Sceptre Inn, 
 Carlisle." 
 
 " Will you go to Carlisle?" 
 
 " To be sure I will go. I would not 
 miss the chance of 'throwing' him, no, 
 'not for ten years' life!" 
 
 "Dear me! what a lot of trouble has 
 come with just taking a stranger in out 
 of the storm ! " 
 
 "Ay, it is a venturesome thing to do. 
 How can any one tell what a stranger may 
 bring in with him ? "
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 FOR MOTHER'S SAKE. 
 
 IN the upper chamber where Will had 
 left his sister, a great mystery of sorrow 
 was being endured. Aspatria felt as if all 
 had been. Life had no more joy to give, 
 and no greater grief to inflict. She un 
 dressed with rapid, trembling fingers; her 
 wedding finery was hateful in her sight. 
 On the night before she had folded all her 
 store of clothing, and laid it ready to put 
 in a trunk. She had been quite in the 
 dark as to her destiny ; the only thing that 
 appeared certain to her was that she would 
 have to leave home. Perhaps she would 
 go with Ulfar from the church door. In 
 that case Will would have to send her 
 clothing, and she had laid it in the neatest 
 order for the emergency. 
 
 On the top of one pile lay a crimson 
 Canton crape shawl. Her mother had 
 8
 
 114 -A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 worn it constantly during the last year of 
 her life; and Aspatria had put it away, as 
 something too sacred for ordinary use. 
 She now folded it around her shoulders, 
 and sat down. Usually, when things trou 
 bled her, she was restless and kept in 
 motion, but this trouble was too bitter and 
 too great to resist; she was quiet, she took 
 its blows passively, and they smote her on 
 every side. 
 
 Could she ever forget that cruel ride 
 home, ever cease to burn and shiver when 
 she remembered the eyes that had scanned 
 her during its progress? The air seemed 
 full of them. She covered her face to 
 avoid the pitying, wondering, scornful 
 glances. But this ride through the valley 
 of humiliation was not the bitterest drop 
 in her bitter cup ; she could have smiled 
 as she rode and drank it, if Ulfar had been 
 at her side. It was his desertion that was 
 so distracting to her. She had thought 
 of many sorrows in connection with this 
 forced marriage, but this sorrow had never 
 suggested itself as possible.
 
 For Mother's Sake. 115 
 
 Therefore, when Ulfar bade her farewell 
 she had felt as if standing on the void of 
 the universe. It was the superhuman 
 woman within her that had answered him, 
 and that had held up her head and had 
 strengthened her for her part all through 
 that merciless ride. And the sight of her 
 handsome, faithless lover, the tones of his 
 voice, the touch of his hand, his half- 
 respectful, half-pitying kindness, had awak 
 ened in her heart a tenfold love for him. 
 
 For she understood then, for the first 
 time, her social and educational inferiority. 
 She felt even that she had done herself 
 less than justice in her fine raiment: her 
 country breeding and simple beauty would 
 have appeared to greater advantage in the 
 white merino she had desired to wear. 
 She had been forced into a dress that 
 accentuated her deficiencies. At that 
 hour she thought she could never see 
 Mrs. Frostham again. 
 
 To these tempestuous, humiliating, heart 
 breaking reflections the storm outside 
 made an angry accompaniment. The
 
 u6 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 wind howled down the chimney and wailed 
 around the house, and the rain beat 
 against the window and pattered on the 
 
 e d walks. 
 
 The darkness 
 came on early, 
 and the cold grew 
 every hour more 
 searching. She 
 was not insen 
 sible to these 
 physical dis 
 comforts, but 
 they seemed 
 so small a 
 part of her 
 misery that 
 she made no 
 resistance t o 
 their attack. 
 Will and Brune, 
 sitting almost speechless 
 
 downstairs, were both thinking of her. 
 When it was quite dark they grew un 
 happy. First one and then the other
 
 For Mother s Sake. 1 1 7 
 
 crept softly to her room door. All was as 
 still as death. No movement, no sound of 
 any kind, betrayed in what way the poor 
 soul within suffered. No thread of light 
 came from beneath the door : she was in 
 the dark, and she had eaten nothing all day. 
 
 About six o'clock Will could bear it no 
 longer. He knocked softly at her door, 
 and said : " My little lass, speak to Will ! 
 Have a cup of tea ! Do have a cup of 
 tea, dearie ! " 
 
 The voice was so unlike Will's voice that 
 it startled Aspatria. It told her of a suf 
 fering almost equalling her own. She 
 rose from the chair in which she had been 
 sitting for hours, and went to him. The 
 room was dark, the passage was dark ; he 
 saw nothing but the denser dark of her 
 figure, and her white face above it. She 
 saw nothing but his great bulk and his 
 shining eyes. But she felt the love flow 
 ing out from his heart to her, she felt his 
 sorrow and his sympathy, and it comforted 
 her. She said : " Will, do not fret about 
 me. I am over-getting the shame and sor-
 
 1 1 8 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 row. Yes, I will have a cup of tea, and 
 tell Tabitha to make a fire here. Dear 
 Will, I have been a great care and shame 
 to you." 
 
 " Ay, you have, Aspatria; but I would 
 rather die than miss you, my little lass." 
 
 This interview gave a new bent to Aspa- 
 tria's thoughts. As she drank the tea, and 
 warmed her chilled feet before the blaze, 
 she took into consideration what misery 
 her love for Ulfar Femvick had brought to 
 her brothers' once happy home, the anxi 
 ety, the annoyance, the shame, the ill-will 
 and quarrelling, the humiliations that Will 
 and Brune had been compelled to endure. 
 Then suddenly there flashed across her 
 mind the card given to Will by Ulfar's 
 friend. She was not too simple to con 
 ceive of its meaning. It was a defiance of 
 some kind, and she knew how W 7 ill would 
 answer it. Her heart stood still with 
 terror. 
 
 She had seen Will and Ulfar wrestling ; 
 she had heard Will say to Brune, when 
 Ulfar was absent, " He knows little about
 
 For Mother s Sake. "119 
 
 it; when I had that last grip, I could have 
 flung him into eternity." It was common 
 enough for dalesmen quarrelling to have 
 a "fling" with one another and stand by 
 its results. If Will and Ulfar met thus, 
 one or both would be irremediably injured. 
 In their relation to her, both were equally 
 dear. She would have given her poor 
 little life cheerfully for the love of either. 
 Her cup shook in her hand. She had a 
 sense of hurry in the matter, that drove 
 her like a leaf before a strong wind. If 
 Will got to bed before she saw him, he 
 might be away in the morning ere she was 
 aware. She put down her cup, and while 
 she stood a moment to collect her strength 
 and thoughts, the subject on all its sides 
 flashed clearly before her. 
 
 A minute afterward she opened the par 
 lour door. Brune sat bent forward, with a 
 poker in his hands. He was tracing a 
 woman's name in the ashes, though he 
 was hardly conscious of the act. Will's 
 head was thrown back against his chair; 
 he seemed to be asleep. But when Aspa-
 
 I2O* A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 tria opened the door, he sat upright and 
 looked at her. A pallor like death spread 
 over his face ; it was the crimson shawl, his 
 mother's shawl, which caused it. Wearing 
 it, Aspatria closely resembled her. Will 
 had idolized his mother in life, and he wor 
 shipped her memory. If Aspatria had 
 considered every earthly way of touching 
 Will's heart, she could have selected none 
 so certain as the shawl, almost accidentally 
 assumed. 
 
 She went direct to Will. He drew a 
 low stool to his side, and Aspatria sat 
 down upon it, and then stretched out her 
 left hand to Brune. The two men looked 
 at their sister, and then they looked at 
 each other. The look was a vow. Both 
 so understood it. 
 
 " Will and Brune," the girl spoke softly, 
 but with a great steadiness, " Will and 
 Brune, I am sorry to have given you so 
 much shame and trouble." 
 
 " It is not your fault, Aspatria," said 
 Brune. 
 
 " But I will do so no more. I will never
 
 For Motlier's Sake. 121 
 
 name Ulfar again. I will try to be cheer 
 ful and to make home cheerful, try to 
 carry on life as it used to be before he 
 came. We will not let people talk of him, 
 we will not mind it if they do. Eh, Will? " 
 
 "Just now, dear, in a little while." 
 
 "Will, dear W 7 ill ! what did that card 
 mean, the one Ulfar's friend gave? You 
 will not go near Ulfar, Will? Please do 
 not!" 
 
 " I have a bit of business to settle with 
 him, Aspatria, and then I never want to 
 see his face again." 
 
 "Will, you must not go." 
 
 " Ay, but I must. I have been thought 
 of with a lot of bad names, but no one 
 shall think ' coward ' of me." 
 
 " Will, remember all I have suffered 
 to-day." 
 
 " I am not likely to forget it." 
 
 " That ride home, Will, was as if I was 
 going up Calvary. My wedding-dress 
 was heav^y as a cross, and that foolish 
 wreath of flowers was a wreath of cruel 
 thorns. I was pitied and scorned, till I
 
 122 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 felt as if my heart my real heart was 
 all bruised and torn. I have suffered 
 so much, Will, spare me more suffering. 
 Will ! Will ! for your little sister's sake, 
 put that card in the fire, and stay here, 
 right here with me." 
 
 " My lass ! my dear lass, you cannot tell 
 what you are asking." 
 
 " I am asking you to give up your re 
 venge. I know that is a great thing for 
 a man to do. But, Will, dear, you stand 
 in father's place, you are sitting in father's 
 chair; what would he say to you? " 
 
 " He would say, ' Give the rascal a good 
 thrashing, Will. When a man wrongs a 
 woman, there is no other punishment for 
 him. Thrash him to within an inch of hir> 
 cruel, selfish, contemptible life ! ' That is 
 what father would say, Aspatria. I know 
 it, I feel it" 
 
 " If you will not give up your revenge 
 for me, nor yet for father, then I ask you 
 for mother's sake ! What would mother 
 say to-night if she were here? very like 
 she is here. Listen to her, Will. She is
 
 For Mother's Sake. 123 
 
 saying, ' Spare my little girl any more 
 sorrow and shame, Will, my boy Will ! ' 
 that is what mother would say. And if 
 you hurt Ulfar you hurt me also, and if 
 Ulfar hurts you my heart will break. The. 
 fell-side is ringing now with my troubles. 
 If I have any more, I will go away where 
 no one can find me. For mother's sake, 
 Will ! For mother's sake ! " 
 
 The strong man was sobbing behind his 
 hands, the struggle was a terrific one. 
 Brune watched it with tears streaming un 
 consciously down his cheeks. Aspatria 
 sunk at Will's feet, and buried her face on 
 his knees. 
 
 " For mother's sake, Will ! Let Ulfar 
 go free." 
 
 " My dear little lass, I cannot ! " 
 
 " For mother's sake, Will ! I am speak 
 ing for mother ! For mother's sake ! " 
 
 " I I - Oh, what shall I do, Brune ? " 
 
 " For mother's sake, Will ! " 
 
 He trembled until the chair shook. He 
 dared not look at the weeping girl. She 
 rose up. She gently moved away his
 
 124 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 hands. She kissed his eyelids. She said, 
 with an irresistible entreaty: " Look at me, 
 Will. I am speaking for mother. Let 
 Ulfar alone. I do not say forgive him." 
 
 " Nay, I will never forgive him." 
 
 "But let him alone. Will! Will! let 
 him alone, for mother's sake ! " 
 
 Then he stood up. He looked into 
 Aspatria's eyes ; he let his gaze wander to 
 the crimson shawl. He began to sob like 
 a child. 
 
 "You may go, Aspatria," he said, in 
 broken words. " If you ask me anything 
 in mother's name, I have no power to 
 say no." 
 
 He walked to the window and looked 
 out into the dark stormy night, and Brune 
 motioned to Aspatria to go away. He 
 knew Will would regain himself better in 
 her absence. She was glad to go. As 
 soon as Will had granted her request, she 
 fell to the lowest ebb of life. She could 
 hardly drag herself up the long, dark stairs. 
 She dropped asleep as soon as she reached 
 her room.
 
 For Mother's Sake, 
 
 125 
 
 It was a bitter 
 awakening. The 
 soul feels sorrow 
 keenest at the first 
 moments of con 
 sciousness. It has 
 been away, perhaps, 
 in happy scenes, or 
 it has been lulling 
 itself in deep repose, 
 and then suddenly it 
 is called to lift again 
 the heavy burden of 
 its daily life. Aspa- 
 tria stood in her cold, 
 dim room ; and even 
 while shivering in her thin 
 nisht-dress, with bare feet 
 
 o 
 
 treading the polished oak floor, 
 
 she hastily put out of her sight 
 
 the miserable wedding-garments. A large 
 
 dower-chest stood conveniently near. She 
 
 opened it wide, and flung dress and wreath 
 
 and slippers and cloak into it. The lid 
 
 fell from her hands with a great clang, and
 
 1 26 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 she said to herself, " I will never open it 
 
 again." 
 
 The storm still continued. She dressed 
 
 in simple household fashion, and went 
 
 downstairs. Brune sat by the fire. He 
 
 said: "I was waiting for you, Aspatria. 
 
 Will is in the barn. He had his coffee 
 
 and bacon long ago." 
 
 " Brune, will you be my friend through 
 
 all this trouble? " 
 
 " I will stand by you through thick 
 
 and thin, Aspatria. There is my hand 
 
 on it." 
 
 About great griefs we do not chatter; 
 
 and there was no further discussion of 
 those events which had been barely turned 
 away from tragedy and death. Murder 
 and despairing love and sorrow might 
 have a secret dwelling-place in Seat- 
 Ambar, but it was in the background. 
 The front of life went on as smoothly as 
 ever; the cows were milked, the sheep 
 tended, the men and maids had their tasks, 
 the beds were made, and the tables set, 
 with the usual order and regularity.
 
 For Mother's Sake. 127 
 
 And Aspatria found this " habit of liv 
 ing" to be a good staff to lean upon. She 
 assumed certain duties, and performed 
 them ; and the house was pleasanter for 
 her oversight. Will and Brune came far 
 oftener to sit at the parlour fireside, when 
 they found Aspatria there to welcome 
 them. And so the days and weeks fol 
 lowed one another, bringing with them 
 those commonplace duties and interests 
 which give to existence a sense of stability 
 and order. No one spoke of Fenwick ; but 
 all the more Aspatria nursed his image in 
 her heart and her imagination. He had 
 dressed himself for his marriage with great 
 care and splendour. Never had he looked 
 so handsome and so noble in her eyes, 
 and never until that hour had she realized 
 her social inferiority to him, her lack of 
 polish and breeding, her ignorance of all 
 things which a woman of birth and wealth 
 ought to know and to possess. 
 
 This was a humiliating acknowledg 
 ment; but it was Aspatria's first upward 
 step, for with it came an invincible deter-
 
 128 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 initiation to make herself worthy of her 
 husband's love and companionship. The 
 hope and the object gave a new colour to 
 her life. As she went about her simple 
 duties, as she sat alone in her room, as 
 she listened to her brothers talking, it 
 occupied, strengthened, and inspired her. 
 Dark as the present was, it held the hope 
 of a future which made her blush and 
 tingle to its far-off joy. To learn every 
 thing, to go everywhere, to become a 
 brilliant woman, a woman of the world, to 
 make her husband admire and adore her, 
 these were the dreams that brightened the 
 long, sombre winter, and turned the low 
 dim rooms into a palace of enchantment. 
 
 She was aware of the difficulties in her 
 way. She thought first of asking Will to 
 permit her to go to a school in London. 
 But she knew he would never consent. 
 She had no friends to whom she could 
 confide her innocent plans, she had as yet 
 no money in her own control. But in less 
 than two years she would be of age. Her 
 fortune would then be at her disposal, and
 
 For Mother s Sake. 
 
 129 
 
 the law would permit her to order her own 
 life. In the mean time she could read and 
 study at home : when the spring came 
 she would see the vicar, and he would 
 lend her books from his library. 
 There was an Encyclopaedia in 
 the house ; she got to 
 gether its scattered 
 volumes, and began 
 to make herself 
 familiar with its 
 melange of in 
 formation. 
 
 In such efforts 
 her heart was 
 purified from 
 a 1 1 bitterness, 
 wounded vanity, 
 and impatience. Life 
 was neither lonely nor 
 monotonous, she had a noble 
 object to work for. So the winter 
 passed, and the spring came again. All 
 over the fells the ewes and their lambs 
 made constant work for the shepherds; 
 9
 
 130 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and Aspatria greatly pleased Will by go 
 ing out frequently to pick up the perish 
 ing, weakly lambs and succour them. 
 
 One day in April she took a bottle of 
 warm milk and a bit of sponge and went up 
 Calder Fell. On the first reach of the 
 fell she found a dying lamb, and carried it 
 down to the shelter of some whin-bushes. 
 Then she fed it with the warm milk, and 
 the little creature went to sleep in her 
 arms. 
 
 The grass was green and fresh, the sun 
 warm ; the whins sheltered her from the 
 wind, and a little thrush in them, busy 
 building her nest, was making sweet music 
 out of air as sweet. All was so glad and 
 quiet : she, too, was happy in her own 
 thoughts. A wagon passed, and then a 
 tax-cart, and afterward two old men going 
 ditching. She hardly lifted her head ; 
 every one knew Aspatria Anneys. When 
 the shadows told her that it was near noon, 
 she rose to go home, holding the lamb in 
 her arms. At that moment a carriage 
 came slowly from behind the hedge. She
 
 For Mother's Sake. 
 
 saw the fine horses with their glittering 
 harness, and knew it was a strange vehicle 
 
 in Ambar-Side, so she sat down 
 
 again until it should pass. The lamb was 
 
 in her left arm. She threw back her head,
 
 132 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and gazed fixedly into the whin-bush where 
 the thrush had its nest. Whoever it was, 
 she did not wish to be recognized. 
 
 Lady Redware, Sarah Sandys, and Ulfar 
 Fenwick were in the carriage. At the 
 moment she stood with the lamb in her 
 arms, Ulfar had known his wife. Lady 
 Redware saw her almost as quickly, and in 
 some occult way she transferred, by a 
 glance, the knowledge to Sarah. The car 
 riage was going very slowly ; the beauty 
 of the thrown-back head, the simplicity of 
 her dress, the pastoral charm of her posi 
 tion, all were distinct. Ulfar looked at her 
 with a fire of passion in his eyes, Lady 
 Redware with annoyance. Sarah asked, 
 with a mocking laugh, " Is that really 
 Little Bo Peep?" The joke fell flat. 
 Ulfar did not immediately answer it ; and 
 Sarah was piqued. 
 
 " I shall go to Italy again," she said. 
 " Englishmen may be admirable en masse, 
 but individually they are stupid or cross." 
 
 " In Italy there are the Capuchins," an 
 swered Ulfar. He remembered that Sarah
 
 For Mother s Sake. 133 
 
 had expressed herself strongly about the 
 order. 
 
 " I have just passed a week at Oxford 
 among the Reverends ; all things consid 
 ered, I prefer the Capuchins. When you 
 have dined with a lord bishop, you want 
 to become a socialist." 
 
 " Your Oxford friends are very nice 
 people, Sarah." 
 
 " Excellent people, Elizabeth, quite su 
 perior people, and they are all sure not only 
 of going to heaven, but also of joining 
 the very best society the place affords." 
 
 " Best society ! " said Ulfar, pettishly. 
 " I am going to America. There, I hope, 
 I shall hear nothing about it." 
 
 " America is so truly admirable. Why 
 was it put in such an out-of-the-way place? 
 You have to sail three thousand miles to 
 get to it," pouted Sarah. 
 
 " All things worth having are put out of 
 the way," replied Ulfar. 
 
 " Yes," sighed Sarah. " What an ad 
 mirable story is that of the serpent and 
 the apple ! "
 
 134 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " Come, Ulfar ! " said Lady Redware, 
 " do try to be agreeable. You used to 
 be so delightful ! Was he not, Sarah? " 
 
 " Was he? I have forgotten, Elizabeth. 
 Since that time a great deal of water has 
 run into the sea." 
 
 " If you want an ill-natured opinion 
 about yourself, by all means go to a 
 woman for it." And Ulfar enunciated 
 this dictum with a very scornful shrug 
 of his shoulders. 
 
 " Ulfar ! " 
 
 " It is so, Elizabeth." 
 
 " Never mind him, dear ! " said Sarah. 
 " I do not. And I have noticed that the 
 men who give bad characters to women 
 have usually much worse ones themselves. 
 I think Ulfar is quite ready for American 
 society and its liberal ideas." And Sarah 
 drew her shawl into her throat, and looked 
 defiantly at Ulfar. 
 
 "The Americans are all socialists. I 
 have read that, Ulfar. You know what 
 these liberal ideas come to, always 
 socialism."
 
 For Mother s Sake. 135 
 
 " Do not be foolish, Elizabeth. Social 
 ism never comes from liberality of thought : 
 it is always a bequest of tyranny." 
 
 " Ulfar, when are you going to be really 
 nice and good again? " 
 
 " I do not know, Elizabeth." 
 
 " Ulfar is a standing exception to the 
 rule that when things are at their worst 
 they must mend. Ulfar, lately, is always 
 at his worst, and he never mends." 
 
 There was really some excuse for Ulfar ; 
 he was suffering keenly, and neither of the 
 two women cared to recognize the fact. 
 He had just returned from Italy with his 
 father's remains, and after their burial he 
 had permitted Elizabeth to carry him off 
 with her to Redware. In reality the neigh 
 bourhood of Aspatria drew him like a mag 
 net. He had been haunted by her last, 
 resentful, amazed, miserable look. He 
 understood from it that Will had never 
 told her of his intention to bid her farewell 
 as soon as she was his wife, and he was 
 not devoid of imagination. His mind had 
 constantly pictured scenes of humiliation
 
 136 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 which he had condemned the woman he 
 had once so tenderly loved to endure. 
 
 And that passing glimpse of her under 
 the whin-bushes had revived something of 
 his old passion. He answered his sister's 
 and Sarah's remarks pettishly, because he 
 wanted to be left alone with the new hope 
 that had come to him. Why not take 
 Aspatria to America? She was his wife. 
 He had been compelled, by his sense of 
 justice and honour, to make her Lady Fen- 
 wick; why should he deny himself her 
 company, merely to keep a passionate, 
 impulsive threat? 
 
 To the heart the past is eternal, and 
 love survives the pang of separation. He 
 thought of Aspatria for the next twenty- 
 four hours. To see her ! to speak to her ! 
 to hear her voice ! to clasp her to his 
 heart ! Why should he deny himself these 
 delights? What pleasure could pride and 
 temper give him in exchange? Fenwick 
 had always loved to overcome an obsta 
 cle, and such people cannot do without 
 obstacles ; they are a necessary aliment.
 
 For Mother s Sake. 
 
 137 
 
 To see and to speak with Aspatria was 
 now the one thing in life worthy of his 
 attention. 
 
 It was not an easy thing to accom 
 plish. Every day for nearly a 
 week he rode furiously to 
 Calder Wood, tied his horse 
 there, and then hung about ^ 
 the brow of Calder Cliff, for 
 it commanded Seat-Ambar, 
 which lay below it as the 
 street lies below a high 
 tower. With his 
 glass he could see .. 
 
 and Brune passing 
 house to the barns 
 and once he saw 
 meet her brother 
 lift her face to 
 
 jl 
 iv 
 
 It y 
 
 Will 
 
 from the 
 or the fields, 
 Aspatria go to 
 Will ; he saw her 
 Will's face, he saw 
 
 A 
 fr 
 
 Will put her F* arm through his arm 
 and so go with her to the house. 
 
 How he / hated Will Anneys! 
 What a ' triumph it would be to 
 carry off his sister unknown to him and 
 without his say-so !
 
 138 A Rose of a Htmdred Leaves. 
 
 One morning he determined if he found 
 no opportunity to see Aspatria that day 
 alone he would risk all, and go boldly to 
 the house. Why should he not do so? 
 He had scarcely made the decision when 
 he saw Will and Brune drive away to 
 gether. He remembered it was Dalton 
 market-day; and he knew that they had 
 gone there. Almost immediately Aspatria 
 left the house also. Then he was jealous. 
 Where was she going as soon as her 
 brothers left her? She was going to the 
 vicar's to return a book and carry him a 
 cream cheese of her own making. 
 
 He knew then how to meet her. She 
 would pass through a meadow on her way 
 home, and this meadow was skirted by a 
 young plantation. Half-way down there 
 was a broad stile between the two. He 
 hurried his steps, and arrived there just 
 as Aspatria entered the meadow. There 
 was a high frolicking wind blowing right 
 in her face. It had blown her braids loose, 
 and her tippet and dress backward; her 
 slim form was sharply defined by it, and
 
 For Mother's Sake. 139 
 
 it compelled her to hold up both her 
 hands in order to keep her hat on her 
 
 head. 
 
 She came on so, treading lightly, almost 
 dancing with the merry gusts to and fro. 
 Once Ulfar heard a little cry that was half 
 laughter, as the wind made her pirouette 
 and then stand still to catch her breath. 
 Ulfar thought the picture bewitching. He 
 waited until she was within a yard or two 
 of the stile, ere he crossed it. She was 
 holding her hat down: she did not see 
 him until he could have put his hand upon 
 her. Then she let her hands fall, and her 
 hat blew backward, and she stood quite 
 still and quite speechless, her colour com 
 ing and going, all a woman's softest 
 witchery beaming in her eyes. 
 
 " Aspatria ! dear Aspatria ! I am come 
 to take you with me. I am going to 
 America." He spoke a little sadly, as if 
 he had some reason for feeling grieved. 
 
 She shook her head positively, but she 
 did not, or she could not, speak. 
 
 " Aspatria, have you no kiss, no word of
 
 T40 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 welcome, no love to give me?" And he 
 put out his hand, as if to draw her to his 
 embrace. 
 
 She stepped quickly backward: "No, 
 no, no ! Do not touch me, Ulfar. Go 
 away. Please go away ! " 
 
 "But you must go with me. You are 
 my wife, Aspatria." And he said the last 
 words very like a command. 
 
 " I am not your wife. Oh, no ! " 
 " I say you are. I married you in 
 Aspatria Church." 
 
 " You also left me there, left me to such 
 shame and sorrow as no man gives to the 
 woman he loves." 
 
 "Perhaps I did act cruelly in two or 
 three ways, Aspatria; but people who love 
 forgive two or three offences. Let us be 
 lovers as we used to be." 
 
 " No, I will not be lovers as we used to 
 be. People who love do not commit two 
 or three such offences as you committed 
 against me." 
 
 " I will atone for them. I will indeed ! 
 Aspatria, I miss you very much. I will
 
 *
 
 142 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 not go to America without you. How 
 soon can you be ready? In a week?" 
 
 "You will atone to me? How? There 
 is but one way. You shall, in your own 
 name, call every one in Allerdale, gentle 
 and simple, to Aspatria Church. You 
 shall marry me again in their presence, 
 and go with me to my own home. The 
 wedding-feast shall be held there. You 
 shall count Will and Brune Anneys as 
 your brothers. You shall take me away, 
 in the sight of all, to your home. Of all 
 the honour a wife ought to have you must 
 give me here, among my own people, a 
 double portion. Will you do this in 
 atonement? " 
 
 " You are talking folly, Aspatria. I 
 have married you once." 
 
 " You have not married me once. You 
 met me at Aspatria Church to shame me, 
 to break my heart with love and sorrow, 
 to humble my good brothers. No, I am 
 not your wife ! I will not go with you ! " 
 
 " I can make you go, Aspatria. You 
 seem to forget the law
 
 For Mother's Sake. 143 
 
 " Will says the law will protect me. 
 But if it did not, if you took me by force 
 to your house or yacht, you would not 
 have me. You could not touch me. As- 
 patria Anneys is beyond your reach." 
 
 " You are Aspatria Fenwick." 
 
 " I have never taken your name. Will 
 told me not to do so. Anneys is a good 
 name. No Anneys ever wronged me." 
 
 " You refused my home, you refused 
 my money, and now you refuse my name. 
 You are treating me as badly as possible. 
 The day before our marriage I sent to 
 your brother a signed settlement for your 
 support, the use of Fenwick Castle as a 
 residence, and two thousand pounds a 
 year. Your brother Will, the day after 
 our marriage, took it to my agent and tore 
 it to pieces in his presence." 
 
 " Will did right. He knew his sister 
 would not have your home and money 
 without your love." 
 
 She spoke calmly, with a dignity that 
 became well her youth and beauty. Ulfar 
 thought her exceedingly lovely. He at-
 
 144 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 tempted to woo her again with the tender 
 glances and soft tones and caressing touch 
 of their early acquaintance. Aspatria 
 sorrowfully withdrew herself; she held only 
 repelling palms toward his bending face. 
 She was not coy, he could have overcome 
 coyness; she was cold, and calm, and 
 watchful of him and of herself. Her face 
 and throat paled and blushed, and blushed 
 and paled ; her eyes were dilated with feel 
 ing; her pretty bow-shaped mouth trem 
 bled ; she radiated a personality sweet, 
 strong, womanly, a piquant, woodland, 
 pastoral delicacy, all her own. 
 
 But after many useless efforts to in 
 fluence her, he began to despair. He per 
 ceived that she still loved him, perhaps 
 better than she had ever done, but that 
 her determination to consider their mar 
 riage void had its source in a oneness of 
 mind having no second thoughts and no 
 doubt behind it. The only hope she gave 
 him was in another marriage ceremony 
 which in its splendour and publicity should 
 atone in some measure for the first. He
 
 For Mother's Sake. 145 
 
 could not contemplate such a confession 
 of his own fault. He could not give Will 
 and Brune Anneys such a triumph. If 
 Aspatria loved him, how could she ask 
 such a humiliating atonement? Aspatria 
 saw the shadow of these reflections on his 
 face. Though he said nothing, she under 
 stood it was this struggle that gave the 
 momentary indecision to his pleading. 
 
 For herself, she did not desire a present 
 reconciliation. She had nursed too long 
 the idea of the Aspatria that was to be, the 
 wise, clever, brilliant woman who was to 
 win over again her husband. She did not 
 like to relinquish this hope for a present 
 gratification, a gratification so much lower 
 in its aim that she now understood that it 
 never could long satisfy a nature so com 
 plex and so changeable as Ulfar's. She 
 therefore refused him his present hope, 
 believing that fate had a far better meeting 
 in store for them. 
 
 While these thoughts flashed through 
 her mind, she kept her eyes upon the 
 horizon. In that wide-open fixed gaze her
 
 146 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 loving, troubled soul revealed itself. Ulfar 
 was wondering whether it was worth while 
 to begin his argument all over again, when 
 she said softly: "We must now say fare 
 well. I see the vicar's maid coming. In 
 a few hours the fell-side will know of our 
 meeting. I must tell Will, myself. I 
 entreat you to leave the dales as soon as 
 possible." 
 
 " I will not leave them without you." 
 
 " Go to-night. I shall not change what 
 I have said. There is nothing to be done 
 but to part. We are no longer alone. 
 Good-by, Ulfar ! dear Ulfar ! " 
 
 " I care not who is present. You are 
 my wife." And he clasped her in his 
 arms and kissed her. 
 
 Perhaps she was not sorry. Perhaps 
 her own glance of love and longing had 
 commanded the embrace ; for when she 
 released herself she was weeping, and 
 Ulfar's tears were on her cheeks. But 
 she called the vicar's maid imperatively, 
 and so put an end to the interview. 
 
 " That was my husband, Lottie," she
 
 For Mother's Sake, 147 
 
 said. It was the only explanation offered. 
 Aspatria knew it was useless to expect any 
 reticence on the subject. In that isolated 
 valley such a piece of news could not be 
 kept; the very birds would talk about 
 it in their nests. She must herself tell 
 Will, and although she had done nothing 
 wrong, she was afraid to tell him. 
 
 When she reached home she was glad 
 to hear that Will had been sent for to 
 Squire Frostham's. " It was something 
 about a fox," said Brune. " They wanted 
 me too, but Alice Frostham is a girl I can 
 not abide. I would not go near her." 
 
 " Brune, will you take a long ride for 
 my sake? " 
 
 " I will do anything for you I can." 
 " I met Ulfar Fenwick this morning." 
 " Then you did a bad thing. I would 
 not have believed it of you. Good Lord ! 
 there is as much two-facedness in a woman 
 as there is meat in an egg." 
 
 " Brune, you are thinking wrong. I 
 did not know he was in the country till 
 he stood before me ; and he did not move
 
 148 A- Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 me a hair's-breadth any way. But Lottie 
 from the vicarage saw us together ; and 
 she was going to Dalton. You know what 
 she will say ; and by and by the Frosthams 
 will hear ; and then they will feel it to be 
 ' only kind ' to talk to Will about me and 
 my affairs ; and the end of it will be some 
 foolish deed or other. If you love me, 
 Brune, go to Redware to-night, and see 
 Lady Redware, and tell her there is dan 
 ger for her brother if he stays around 
 here." 
 
 " I can say that truly. There is danger 
 for the scoundrel, a good deal of it." 
 
 " Brune, it would be such a sorrow to 
 me if every one were talking of me again. 
 Do what I ask you, Brune. You promised 
 to stand by me through thick and thin." 
 
 " I did ; and I will go to Redware as 
 soon as I have eaten my dinner. If Lottie 
 saw him, it will be known all over. And 
 if no one came up here on purpose to tell 
 Will, he would hear it at Dalton next week, 
 when that lot of bothering old squires sit 
 down to their market dinner. It would
 
 For Mother's Sake. 
 
 149 
 
 be a grand bit for them to chew with their 
 
 victuals." 
 
 " I thought they talked about politics." 
 " They are like other men. If you get 
 
 more than one man in a 
 
 place, they are talking bad 
 
 about some woman. They 
 
 call it politics, but it is mostly 
 
 slander." 
 
 " I am going to tell Will myself." 
 
 " That is a deal the best plan." 
 
 "Be sure to frighten Lady Redware; 
 
 make her think Ulfar's life is in danger, 
 
 anything to get him out of the dales." 
 " She will feel as if the heavens were 
 
 going to fall, when I get done with her. 
 
 My word ! who would have thought of him 
 
 coming back? Life is full of surprises."
 
 150 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " But only think, if there was never any 
 thing accidental happened ! Surprises are 
 just what make life worth having, eh, 
 Brune?" 
 
 " Maybe so, and maybe not. When 
 Will comes home, tell him everything at 
 once. I can manage Lady Redware, I '11 
 be bound." 
 
 With the promise he went away to per 
 form it, and Aspatria carried her trembling 
 heart into solitude. But the lonely place 
 was full of Ulfar. A thousand hopes were 
 budding in her heart, growing slowly, 
 strongly, sweetly, in that earth which 
 she had made for them out of her love, 
 her desires, her hopes, and her faithful 
 aspirations.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 BUT THEY WERE YOUNG. 
 
 BRUNE arrived at Redware Hall while 
 it was still afternoon, and he found no diffi 
 culty in obtaining an interview with its 
 mistress. She was sitting at a table in a 
 large bay-window, painting the view from 
 it. For in those days ladies were not 
 familiar with high art and all its nomencla 
 ture and accessories; Lady Redware had 
 never thought of an easel, or a blouse, or 
 indeed of any of the trappings now con 
 sidered necessary to the making of pic 
 tures. She was prettily dressed in silk; 
 and a square of bristol-board, a box of 
 Newman's water-colours, and a few camel's- 
 hair pencils were neatly arranged before 
 her. 
 
 She rose when Brune entered, and met 
 him with a suave courtesy; and the unso-
 
 152 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 phisticated young man took it for a gen 
 uine pleasure. He felt sorry to trouble 
 such a nice-looking gentlewoman, and he 
 said so with a sincerity that made her sud 
 denly serious. " Have you brought me 
 bad news, Mr. Anneys?" she asked. 
 
 " I am afraid you will be put about a 
 bit. Sir Ulfar Femvick met my sister this 
 morning; and they were seen by ill-natured 
 eyes, and I came, quiet-like, to let you know 
 that he must leave the dales to-night." 
 
 " Cannot Sir Ulfar meet his own wife? " 
 
 " Lady Redware, that is not the ques 
 tion. Put it, ' Cannot Sir Ulfar meet your 
 sister?' and I will answer you quick 
 enough, ' Not while there are two honest 
 men in Allerdale to prevent him.' " 
 
 " You cannot frighten Sir Ulfar from 
 Allerdale. To threaten him is to make 
 him stay." 
 
 " Dalesmen are not ones to threaten. I 
 tell you that the vicar's maid saw Sir Ulfar 
 and my sister together; and when William 
 Anneys hears of it, Sir Ulfar will get such 
 a notice to leave these parts as will give
 
 154 -^ Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 him no choice. I came to warn him away 
 before he could not help himself. I say 
 freely, I did so to please Aspatria, and out 
 of no good-will going his way." 
 " But if he will not leave Allerdale? " 
 " But if William Anneys, and the sixty 
 gentlemen who will ride with William 
 Anneys, say he must go? What then? " 
 
 " Of course Sir Ulfar cannot fight a 
 mob." 
 
 " Not one of that mob of gentlemen 
 would fight him ; but they all carry stout 
 riding-whips." And Brune looked at the 
 lady with a sombre intentness which made 
 further speech unnecessary. She had been 
 alarmed from the first; she now made no 
 further attempt to disguise her terror. 
 
 "What must I do, Mr. Anneys?" she 
 asked. "What must I do?" 
 
 " Send your brother away from Cum 
 berland to-night. I say he must leave 
 to-night. To-morrow morning may be too 
 late to prevent a great humiliation. Aspa 
 tria begged me to come to you. I do not 
 say I wanted to come."
 
 But they were Young. 
 
 155 
 
 At this moment the door opened, and 
 Sarah Sandys entered. Brune turned, and 
 saw her; and his heart stood still. She 
 came slowly forward, her gar 
 ment of pale-green and 
 white just touching 
 her sandalled feet. 
 She had a rush bas 
 ket full of violets in 
 her hands ; there 
 were primroses in 
 her breast and belt, 
 and her face was 
 like a pink rose. 
 High on her head her 
 fair hair was lifted, and, 
 being fastened with a 
 large turquoise comb, it 
 gave the idea of sunshine and 
 blue sky. 
 
 Brune stood looking at her, as a mortal 
 might look at the divine Cytherea made 
 manifest. His handsome, open face, full 
 of candid admiration, had almost an august 
 character. He bowed to her, as men bow
 
 156 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 when they bend their heart and give its 
 homage and delight. Sarah was much 
 impressed by the young man's beauty, and 
 she felt his swift adoration of her own 
 charms. She made Lady Redware intro 
 duce her to Brune, and she completed her 
 conquest of the youth as she stood a 
 moment holding his hand and smiling with 
 captivating grace into his eyes. 
 
 Then Lady Redware explained Brune's 
 mission, and Sarah grasped the situation 
 without any disguises. " It simply means 
 flight, Elizabeth," she said. "What could 
 Ulfar do with fifty or sixty angry Cumber 
 land squires? He would have to go. In 
 fact, I know they have a method of per 
 suasion no mortal man can resist." 
 
 Brune saw that his errand was accom 
 plished. Lady Redware thanked him for 
 his consideration, and Sarah rang for the 
 tea-service, and made him a cup, and gave 
 it to him with her own lovely hands. 
 Brune saw their exquisite form, their trans 
 lucent glow, the sparkling of diamonds 
 and emeralds upon them. The tea was
 
 But they were Young. 157 
 
 as if brewed in Paradise; it tasted of all 
 things delightful; it was a veritable cup 
 of enchantments. 
 
 Then Brune rode away, and the two 
 women watched him over the hill. He 
 sat his great black hunter like a cavalry 
 officer; and the creature devoured the 
 distance with strides that made their hearts 
 leap to the sense of its power and life. 
 
 " He is the very handsomest man I ever 
 saw ! " said Sarah. 
 
 "What is to be done about Ulfar? 
 Sarah, you must manage this business. 
 He will not listen to me." 
 
 " Ulfar has five senses. Ulfar is very 
 fond of himself. He will leave Redware, 
 of course. How handsome Brune Anneys 
 is! " 
 
 "Will you coax him to leave to-night? " 
 
 " Ulfar? Yes, I will; for it is the proper 
 thing for him to do. It would be a shame 
 to bring his quarrels to your house. What 
 a splendid rider! Look, Elizabeth, he is 
 just topping the hill ! I do believe he 
 turned his head! Is he not handsome?
 
 158 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Apollo! Antinous! Pshaw! Brune An- 
 neys is a great deal more human, and a 
 great deal more godlike, than either." 
 
 " Do not be silly, Sarah. And do oc 
 cupy yourself a little with Ulfar now." 
 
 "When the hour comes, I will. Ulfar 
 is evidently occupying himself at present 
 in watching his wife. There is a decorous 
 naughtiness and a stimulating sense of 
 danger about seeing Aspatria, that must 
 be a thorough enjoyment to Ulfar." 
 
 " Men are always in fusses. Ulfar has 
 kept my heart palpitating ever since he 
 could walk alone." 
 
 Sarah sighed. "It is very difficult," 
 she said, " to decide whether very old men 
 or very young men can be the greater 
 trial. The suffering both can cause is im 
 mense ! Poor Sandys was sixty-six, and 
 Ulfar is thirty-six, and " She shook 
 her head, and sighed again. 
 
 " How hateful country-people are ! " ex 
 claimed Elizabeth. " They must talk, no 
 matter what tragedy they cause with their 
 scandalous words."
 
 But they were Young. 159 
 
 " Are they worse than our own set, 
 either in town or country? You know 
 what the Countess of Denbigh considered 
 pleasant conversation? telling things 
 that ought not to be told." 
 
 " The Countess is a wretch ! she would 
 tell the most sacred of secrets." 
 
 " I tell secrets also. I do not consider 
 it wrong. What business has any one to 
 throw the onus of keeping their secret on 
 my shoulders? Why should they expect 
 from me more prudence than they them 
 selves have shown?" 
 
 " That is true. But in these valleys they 
 speak so uncomfortably direct; nothing 
 but the strongest, straightest, most definite 
 words will be used." 
 
 " That is a pity. People ought to send 
 scandal through society in a respectable 
 hunt-the-slipper form of circulation. But 
 that is a kind of decency to be cultivated. 
 However, I shall tell Ulfar, in the plainest 
 words I can find, that there will be about 
 sixty Cumberland squires here to-morrow, 
 to ride with him out of the county, and
 
 160 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 that they are looking forward to the fun 
 of it just as much as if it was a fox-hunt. 
 Ulfar has imagination. He will be able 
 to conceive such a ride, the flying man, 
 and the roaring, laughing, whip-cracking 
 squires after him ! He will remember 
 how Tom Appleton the wrestler, who did 
 something foul, was escorted across the 
 county line last summer. And Ulfar hates 
 a scene. Can you fancy him making him 
 self the centre of such an affair? " 
 
 So they talked while Brune galloped 
 homeward in a very happy mood. He 
 felt as those ancients may have felt when 
 they met the Immortals and saluted them. 
 The thought of the beautiful Mrs. Sandys 
 filled his imagination ; but he talked com 
 fortably to Aspatria, and assured her that 
 there was now no fear of a meeting be 
 tween her husband and Will. " Only," he 
 said, " tell Will yourself to-night, and he 
 will never doubt you." 
 
 Unfortunately, Will did not return that 
 night from the Frosthams' ; for in the morn 
 ing the two men were to go together to Dal-
 
 But they were Young. 161 
 
 ton very early. Will heard nothing there, 
 but Mrs. Frostham was waiting at her gar 
 den gate to tell him when he returned. He 
 had left Squire Frostham with his son-in- 
 law, and was alone. Mrs. Frostham made 
 a great deal of the information, and broke 
 it to Will with much consideration. Will 
 heard her sullenly. He was getting a few 
 words ready for Aspatria, as Mrs. Frost- 
 ham told her tale, but they were for her 
 alone. To Mrs. Frostham he adopted a 
 tone she thought very ungrateful. 
 
 For when the whole affair, real and con 
 sequential, had been told, he answered : 
 " What is there to make a wonder of? 
 Cannot a woman talk and walk a bit with 
 her own husband? Maybe he had some 
 thing very particular to say to her. I think 
 it is a shame to bother a little lass about a 
 thing like that." 
 
 And he folded himself so close that Mrs. 
 Frostham could neither question nor sym 
 pathize with him longer. " Good-evening 
 to you," he said coldly; and then, while 
 visible, he took care to ride as if quite at 
 ii
 
 1 62 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 his ease. But the moment the road turned 
 from Frostham he whipped his horse to 
 its full speed, and entered the farmyard 
 with it in a foam of hurry, and himself 
 in a foam of passion. 
 
 Aspatria met him with the confession on 
 her lips. He gave her no time. He as 
 sailed her with affronting and injurious 
 epithets. He pushed her hands and face 
 from him. He vowed her tears were a 
 mockery, and her intention of confessing a 
 lie. He met all her efforts at explanation, 
 and all her attempts to pacify him, at 
 sword-point. 
 
 She bore it patiently for a while ; and 
 then Will Anneys saw an Aspatria he had 
 never dreamed of. She seemed to grow 
 taller; she did really grow taller; her face 
 flamed, her eyes flashed, and, in a voice 
 authoritative and irresistible, she com 
 manded him to desist. 
 
 " You are my worst enemy," she said. 
 " You are as deaf as the village gossips. 
 You will not listen to the truth. Your 
 abuse, heard by every servant in the house,
 
 But they were Young. 163 
 
 certifies all that malice dares to think. 
 And in wounding my honour you are 
 a parricide to our mother's good name ! 
 I am ashamed of you, Will! " 
 
 From head to foot she reflected the in 
 dignation in her heart, as she stood erect 
 with her hands clasped and the palms 
 dropped downward, no sign of tears, no 
 quiver of fear or doubt, no retreat, and no 
 submission, in her face or attitude. 
 
 " Why, whatever is the matter with you, 
 Aspatria? " 
 
 At this moment Brune entered, and she 
 went to him, and put her hand through 
 his arm, and said : " Brune, speak for me ! 
 Will has insulted mother and father, 
 through me, in such a way that I can 
 never forgive him ! " 
 
 " You ought to be ashamed of yourself, 
 Will Anneys ! " And Brune put his sister 
 gently behind him, and then marched 
 squarely up to his brother's face. " You 
 are as passionate as a brute beast, Will, 
 and that, too, with a poor little lass that 
 has her own troubles, and has borne
 
 164 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 them like like a good woman always 
 does." 
 
 " I do not want to hear you speak, 
 Brune." 
 
 " Ay, but I will speak, and you shall 
 hear me. I tell you, Aspatria is in no kind 
 to blame. The man came on her sudden, 
 out of the plantation. She did not take 
 his hand, she did not listen to him. She 
 sent him about his business as quick as 
 might be." 
 
 " Lottie Patterson saw her," said Will, 
 dourly. 
 
 " Because Aspatria called Lottie Patter 
 son to her; and if Lottie Patterson says 
 she saw anything more or worse than 
 ought to be, I will pretty soon call upon 
 Seth Patterson to make his sister's words 
 good. Cush ! I will that ! And what is 
 more, Will 'Anneys, if you do not know 
 how to take care of your sister's good 
 name, I will teach you, you mouse of a 
 man ! You go and side with that Frostham 
 set against Aspatria ! Chaff on the Frost- 
 hams ! It is a bad neighbourhood where
 
 But they were Young. 165 
 
 a girl like Aspatria cannot say a word or 
 two on the king's highway at broad noon 
 day, without having a sisserara about it." 
 
 " I did not side with the Frosthams 
 against Aspatria." 
 
 "I'll be bound you did!" 
 
 " Let me alone, Brune ! Go your ways 
 out of here, both of you ! " 
 
 " To be sure, we will both go. Come, 
 Aspatria. When you are tired of balloon 
 ing, William Anneys, and can come down 
 to common justice, maybe then I will talk 
 to you, not till." 
 
 Now, good honest anger is one of the 
 sinews of the soul; and he that wants it 
 when there is occasion has but a maimed 
 mind. The hot words, the passionate at 
 mosphere, the rebellion of Aspatria, the 
 decision of Brune, had the same effect 
 upon Will's senseless anger as a thunder 
 storm has upon the hot, heavy, summer 
 air. Will raged his bad temper away, and 
 was cool and clear-minded after it. 
 
 At the same hour the same kind of 
 mental thunder-storm was prevailing over
 
 1 66 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 all common-sense at Redware Hall. Ulfar, 
 after a long and vain watch for another 
 opportunity to speak to Aspatria, returned 
 there in a temper compounded of anger, 
 jealousy, disappointment, and unsatisfied 
 affection. He heard Lady Redware's 
 story of his own danger 
 and of Brune's considera 
 tion with scornful indiffer 
 ence. Brune's consid 
 eration he laughed at. 
 He knew very well, he 
 answered, that Brune 
 Anneys hated him, and 
 would take the greatest 
 delight in such a hubbub 
 as he pretended was in 
 project. 
 
 " But he came to please 
 Aspatria," continued Lady 
 Redware. " He said he came only to 
 please Aspatria." 
 
 " So Aspatria wishes me to leave Aller- 
 dale? I will not go." 
 
 " Sarah, he will not go," cried Lady
 
 But they were Young. 167 
 
 Redware, as her friend entered the room. 
 " He says he will not go." 
 
 " That is because you have appealed to 
 Ulfar's feelings instead of to his judgment. 
 When Ulfar considers how savagely primi 
 tive these dalesmen are in their passions, 
 he will understand that discretion is the 
 nobler part of valour. In Russia he 
 thought it a very prudent thing to get out 
 of the way when a pack of wolves were in 
 the neighbourhood." 
 
 "The law will protect me in this house. 
 Human beings have to mind the law." 
 
 " There are times when human beings 
 are a law unto themselves. How would 
 you like to see a crowd of angry men 
 shouting around this house for you? 
 Think of your sister, and of me, if I am 
 worth so much consideration." 
 
 " I am not to be frightened, Sarah." 
 
 " Will you consider, then, that as far as 
 Keswick and Kendal on one side, and as 
 far as Dalton and Whitehaven on the other 
 side, every local newspaper will have, or 
 will make, its own version of the affair?
 
 1 68 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 The Earl of Lonsdale, with a large party, 
 is now at Whitehaven Castle. What a 
 sauce piquante it will be to his dinners ! 
 How the men will howl over it, and how 
 the women will snicker and smile ! " 
 
 " Sarah ! you can think of the hateful- 
 lest things." 
 
 " And Lonsdale will go up to London 
 purposely to have the delight of telling it 
 at the clubs." 
 
 " Sarah ! " 
 
 "And the 'Daily Whisper' will get 
 Lonsdale's most delectable version, and 
 blow it with the four winds of heaven to 
 the four corners of the civilized world." 
 
 "Sarah Sandys, I " 
 
 " Worse still ! that poor girl whom you 
 treated so abominably, must suffer the 
 whole thing over again. Her name will be 
 put as the head and front of your offend 
 ing. All her sorrows and heartbreak will 
 be made a penny mouthful for country 
 bumpkins and scandalous gammers to 
 ' Oh ! ' and ' Ah ! ' over. Ulfar, if you are 
 a man, you will not give her a moment's
 
 But tJiey were Young. 169 
 
 terror of such consequences. You may 
 see that she fears them, by her sending her 
 brother to entreat your absence." 
 
 " And I must be called coward and 
 runaway ! " 
 
 " Let them call you anything they like, 
 so that you spare her further shame and 
 sorrow." 
 
 " Your talking in this fashion to me 
 Sarah, is very like Satan correcting sin. 
 I loved Aspatria when I met you in 
 Rome." 
 
 " Of course ! Adam always has his Eve 
 ready. ' Not my fault, good people ! 
 Look at this woman ! With her bright 
 smiles and her soft tongue she beguiled 
 me ; and so I fell ! ' We can settle that 
 question, you and I, again. Now you 
 must ring the bell, and order your horse 
 say, at four o'clock to-morrow morning. 
 You can have nearly six hours' sleep, 
 quite enough for you." 
 
 " You have not convinced me, Sarah." 
 
 " Then you must ride now, and be con 
 vinced afterward. For your sister's sake
 
 1 70 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and for Aspatria's sake, you will surely go 
 away." 
 
 Lady Redware was crying, and she cried 
 a little harder to emphasize Sarah's plead 
 ing. Ulfar was in a hard strait He 
 looked angrily at the handsome little 
 woman urging him to do the thing he 
 hated to do, and then taking the kerchief 
 from his sister's face, he kissed her, and 
 promised to leave Redware at dawn of 
 day. 
 
 " But," said he, " if you send me away 
 now, I tell you, our parting is likely to be 
 for many years, perhaps for life. I am 
 going beyond civilization, and so beyond 
 scandal." 
 
 " Do not flatter yourself so extrava 
 gantly, Ulfar. There is scandal every 
 where, and always has been, even from 
 the beginning. I have no doubt those 
 nameless little sisters of Cain and Abel 
 were talked about unpleasantly by their 
 sisters and brothers-in-law. In fact, wher 
 ever there are women there are men glad 
 to pull them down to their own level."
 
 But they were Young. 
 
 171 
 
 " Is it not very hard, 
 then, that I am not to 
 be permitted to stay 
 here and defend the 
 women I love? " 
 
 Sarah shook her 
 head. " It is beyond 
 your power, Ulfar. If 
 Porthos were on earth 
 again, or Amadis of 
 Gaul, they might have 
 happy and useful ca 
 reers in handling as they 
 deserve the maligners 
 of good, quiet women. 
 But the men of this 
 era! which of them 
 durst lift the stone that 
 the hand without sin is 
 permitted to cast? " 
 
 So they talked the 
 night away, drifting 
 gradually from the un 
 pleasant initial subject to 
 Ulfar's plan of travel and
 
 172 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 the far-off prospect of his return. And in 
 the gray, cold dawn he bade them farewell, 
 and they watched him until he vanished in 
 the mists rolling down the mountain. Then 
 they kissed each other, a little, sad kiss 
 of congratulation, wet with tears ; they had 
 won their desire, but their victory had left 
 them weeping. Alas ! it is the very condi 
 tion of success that every triumph must be 
 baptized with somebody's tears. 
 
 This event, beginning in such a trifle as 
 an almost accidental visit of Aspatria to 
 the vicar, was the line sharply dividing 
 very different lives. Nothing in Seat- 
 Ambar was ever quite the same after it. 
 William Anneys, indeed, quickly perceived 
 and acknowledged his fault, and the recon 
 ciliation was kind and complete; but As 
 patria had taken a step forward, and crossed 
 clearly that bound which divides girlhood 
 from womanhood. Unconsciously she as 
 sumed a carriage that Will felt compelled 
 to respect, and a tone was in her voice he 
 did not care to bluff and contradict. He 
 never again ordered her to remain silent or
 
 But they were Young. 173 
 
 to leave his presence. A portion of his 
 household authority had passed from him, 
 both as regarded Aspatria and Brune ; and 
 he felt himself to be less master than he 
 had formerly been. 
 
 Perhaps this was one reason of the grow 
 ing frequency of his visits to Frostham. 
 There he was made much of, deferred to, 
 and all his little fancies flattered and 
 obeyed. Will knew he was the most im 
 portant person in the world to Alice 
 Frostham ; and he knew, also, that he 
 only shared Aspatria's heart with Ulfar 
 Fenwick. Men like the whole heart, and 
 nothing less than the whole heart; hence 
 Alice's influence grew steadily all through 
 the summer days, full to the brim of happy 
 labour and reasonable love. As early as 
 the haymaking Will told Aspatria that 
 Alice was coming to Seat-Ambar as its 
 mistress ; and when the harvest was gath 
 ered in, the wedding took place. It was 
 as noisily jocund an affair as Aspatria's 
 had been silent and sorrowful ; and Alice 
 Frostham, encircled by Will's protecting
 
 1 74 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 arm, was led across the threshold of her 
 own new home, to the sound of music and 
 rejoicing. 
 
 The home was quickly divided, though 
 without unkind intent. Will and Alice had 
 their own talk, their own hopes and plans, 
 and Aspatria and Brune generally felt that 
 their entrance interfered with some dis 
 cussion. So Aspatria and Brune began to 
 sit a great deal in Aspatria's room, and by 
 and by to discuss, in a confidential way, 
 what they were to do with their future. 
 Brune had no definite idea. Aspatria's 
 intents were clear and certain. But she 
 knew that she must wait until the spring 
 brought her majority and her freedom. 
 
 One frosty day, near Christmas, as Brune 
 was returning from Dalton, he heard him 
 self called in a loud, cheerful voice. He 
 was passing Seat-Ketel, and he soon saw 
 Harry Ketel coming quickly toward him. 
 Harry wore a splendid scarlet uniform; and 
 the white snow beneath his feet, and the 
 dark green pines between which he walked, 
 made it all the more splendid by their
 
 But they were Young. 175 
 
 contrast. Brune had not seen Harry for 
 five years ; but they had been companions 
 through their boyhood, and their memo 
 ries were stored with the pleasant hours 
 they had spent together. 
 
 Brune passed that night, and many sub 
 sequent ones, with his old friend ; and when 
 Harry went back to his regiment he took 
 with him a certainty that Brune would 
 soon follow. In fact, Harry had found his 
 old companion in that mood which is 
 ready to accept the first opening as the 
 gift of fate. Brune found there was a 
 commission to be bought in the House 
 hold Foot-Guards, and he was well able to 
 pay for it. Indeed, Brune was by no 
 means a poor man ; his father had left 
 him seven thousand pounds, and his share 
 of the farm's proceeds had been constantly 
 added to it. 
 
 Aspatria was delighted. She might now 
 go to London in Brune's care. They dis 
 cussed the matter constantly, and began 
 to make the preparations necessary for the 
 change. But affairs were not then ar-
 
 \j6 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 ranged by steam and electricity, and the 
 letters relating to the purchase and trans 
 fer of Brune's commission occupied some 
 months in their transit to and fro ; although 
 Brune did not rely upon the postman's 
 idea of the practicability of the roads. 
 
 Aspatria's correspondence was also un 
 certain and unsatisfactory for some time. 
 She had at first no guide to a school but 
 the advertisements in the London papers 
 which Harry sent to his friend. But one 
 night Brune, without any special intention, 
 named the matter to Mrs. Ketel ; and that 
 lady was able to direct Aspatria to an 
 excellent school in Richmond, near Lon 
 don. And as she was much more favour 
 ably situated for a quick settlement of 
 the affair, she undertook the necessary 
 correspondence. 
 
 Will was not ignorant of these move 
 ments, but Alice induced him to be passive 
 in them. " No one can then blame us, 
 Will, whatever happens." And as Will 
 and Alice were extremely sensitive to 
 public opinion, this was a good consid-
 
 But tJiey were Young. 177 
 
 eration. Besides Alice, not unnaturally, 
 wished to have the Seat to herself; so 
 that Aspatria's and Brune's wishes fitted 
 admirably into her own desires, and it 
 gave her a kind of selfish pleasure to 
 forward them. 
 
 The ninth of March was Aspatria's 
 twenty-first birthday ; and it was to her a 
 very important anniversary, for she re 
 ceived as its gift her freedom and her for 
 tune. There was no hitch or trouble in 
 its transfer from Will to herself. Honour 
 and integrity were in the life-blood of 
 William Anneys, honesty and justice the 
 very breath of his nostrils. Aspatria's 
 fortune had been guarded with a super- 
 sensitive care ; and when years gave her its 
 management, Will surrendered it cheer 
 fully to her control. 
 
 Fortunately, the school selected by 
 Mrs. Ketel satisfied Will thoroughly; and 
 Brune's commission in the Foot-Guards 
 was in honourable accord with the highest 
 traditions and spirit of the dales. For the 
 gigantic and physically handsome men of
 
 1 78 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 these mountain valleys have been for cen 
 turies considered the finest material for 
 those regiments whose duty it is to guard 
 
 the 
 
 persons 
 and the 
 homes of 
 royalty. Brune 
 had only followed 
 steps of a great num- 
 ancestors. 
 
 In the beginning of 
 patria left Seat-Ambar for London, left 
 forever all the pettiness of her house life, 
 chairs and tables, sewing and meals, and 
 the useless daily labour that has to be con 
 tinually done over again. And at the last 
 Will was very tender with her, and even 
 Alice did her best to make the parting 
 
 in the 
 ber of his 
 
 April, As-
 
 But tliey were Young, 179 
 
 days full of hope and kindness. As for 
 the journey, there was no anxiety; Brune 
 was to travel with his sister, and see her 
 safely within her new home. 
 
 Yet neither of them left the old home 
 without some tears. Would they ever see 
 again those great, steadfast hills, that 
 purify those who walk upon them ; ever 
 dwell again within the dear old house, that 
 had not been builded, but had grown with 
 the family it had sheltered, through a 
 thousand years? They hardly spoke to 
 each other, as they drove through the 
 sweet valleys, where the sunshine laid a 
 gold on the green, and the warm south- 
 wind gently rocked the daisies, and the 
 lark's song was like a silvery water-fall up 
 in the sky. 
 
 But they were young; and, oh, the rich 
 significance of the word " young " when the 
 heart is young as well as the body, when 
 the thoughts are not doubts, and when the 
 eyes look not backward, but only forward, 
 into a bright future !
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 " LOVE SHALL BE LORD OF SANDY-SIDE." 
 
 DURING thirty years of the first half of 
 this century Mrs. St. Alban's finishing 
 school for young gentlewomen was a 
 famous institution of its kind. For she 
 had been born to the manner of courts 
 and of people of high degree ; and when 
 evil fortune met her, she very wisely 
 turned her inherited social advantages into 
 a means of honest livelihood. Aspatria 
 was much impressed by her noble bearing 
 and fine manners, and by the elaborate 
 state in which the twelve pupils, of whom 
 she was one, lived. 
 
 Each had her own suite of apartments ; 
 each was expected to keep a maid, and to 
 dress with the utmost care and propriety. 
 There were fine horses in the stables for 
 their equestrian exercise, there were grooms
 
 ' ' Love shall be L ord of Sandy- Side. " 1 8 1 
 
 to attend them during it, and there were 
 regular reception-days, which afforded 
 tyros in social accomplishments practical 
 opportunities for cultivating the graceful 
 and gracious urbanity which evidences 
 really fine breeding. 
 
 Many of Aspatria's companions were of 
 high rank, Lady Julias and Lady Augus 
 tas, who were destined to wear ducal 
 coronets and to stand around the throne 
 of their young queen. But they were 
 always charmingly pleasant and polite, 
 and Aspatria soon acquired their outward 
 form of calm deliberation and their mode 
 of low, soft speech. For the rest, she 
 decided, with singular prudence, to culti 
 vate only those talents which nature had 
 obviously granted her. 
 
 A few efforts proved that she had no 
 taste for art. Indeed, the attempt to por 
 tray the majesty of the mountains or the 
 immensity of the ocean seemed to her 
 childishly petty and futile. She had dwelt 
 among the high places and been familiar 
 with the great sea, and to make images of
 
 1 82 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 them appeared a kind of sacrilege. But 
 she liked the study of languages, and she 
 had a rich contralto voice capable of ex 
 pressing all the emotions of the heart. At 
 the piano she hesitated ; its music, under 
 her unskilled fingers, sounded mechanical ; 
 she doubted her ability to put a soul into 
 that instrument. But the harp was differ 
 ent; its strings held sympathetic tones she 
 felt competent to master. To these studies 
 she added a course of English literature 
 and dancing. She was already a fine 
 rider, and her information obtained from 
 the vicar's library and the Encyclopaedia 
 covered an enormous variety of subjects, 
 though it was desultory, and in many 
 respects imperfect. 
 
 Her new life was delightful to her. She 
 had an innate love for study, for quiet, and 
 for elegant surroundings. These tastes 
 were fully gratified. The large house stood 
 in a fair garden, surrounded by very high 
 walls, with entrance-gates of handsomely 
 wrought iron. Perfect quiet reigned within 
 this flowery enclosure. She could study
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side'' 1 83 
 
 without the constant interruptions which 
 had annoyed her at home ; and she was 
 wisely aided in her studies by masters 
 
 whose low 
 voices and glid 
 ing steps seemed 
 only to accentuate the 
 peace of the wide school 
 room, with its perfect appoint 
 ments and its placid group of 
 beautiful students. 
 
 On Saturdays Brune gen 
 erally spent several hours 
 with her ; and if the weather 
 were fine, they rode or walked in the Park. 
 Brune was a constant wonder to Aspatria. 
 Certainly his handsome uniform had done 
 much for him, but there was a greater
 
 184 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 change than could be effected by mere 
 clothes. Without losing that freshness and 
 singleness of mind he owed to his country 
 training, he had become a man of fashion, 
 a little of a dandy, a very innocent sort of 
 a lady-killer. His arrival caused always a 
 faint flutter in Mrs. St. Alban's dove-cot, 
 and the noble damosels found many little 
 womanly devices to excuse their passing 
 through the parlour while Brune was pres 
 ent. They liked to see him bend his 
 beautiful head to them ; and Lady Mary 
 Boleyn, who was Aspatria's friend and 
 companion, was mildly envied the privi 
 leges this relation gave her. 
 
 During the vacations Aspatria was al 
 ways the guest of one or other of her 
 mates, though generally she spent them 
 at the splendid seat of the Boleyns in 
 Hampshire, and the unconscious education 
 thus received was of the greatest value to 
 her. It gave the ease of nature to ac 
 quired accomplishments, and, above all, 
 that air which we call distinction, which is 
 rarely natural, and is attained only by
 
 " Love sJiall be Lord of Sandy- Side" 1 85 
 
 frequent association with those who dwell 
 on the highest social peaks. 
 
 Much might be said of this phase of 
 Aspatria's life which may be left to the 
 reader's imagination. For three years it 
 saw only such changes as advancing intel 
 ligence and growing friendships made. 
 The real change was in Aspatria person 
 ally. No one could have traced without 
 constant doubt the slim, virginal, unfin 
 ished-looking girl that left Seat-Ambar, 
 in the womanly perfection of Aspatria 
 aged twenty-four years. She had grown 
 several inches taller ; her angles had all dis 
 appeared ; every joint was softly rounded. 
 Her hands and arms were exquisite; her 
 throat and the poise of her head like those 
 of a Greek goddess. Her hair was darker 
 and more abundant, and her eyes retained 
 all their old charm, with some rarer and 
 nobler addition. 
 
 To be sure, she had not the perfect reg 
 ularity of feature that distinguished some 
 of her associates, that exact beauty which 
 Titian's Venus possesses, and which makes
 
 1 86 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 no man's heart beat a throb the faster. 
 Her face had rather the mobile irregularity 
 of Leonardo's Mona Lisa, the charming 
 face that men love passionately, the face 
 that men can die for. 
 
 At the close of the third year she re 
 fused all invitations for the summer holi 
 days, and went back to Seat-Ambar. 
 There had not been much communication 
 between Will and herself. He was occu 
 pied with his land and his sheep, his wife 
 and his two babies. People then took 
 each other's affection as a matter of course, 
 without the daily assurance of it. About 
 twice a year Will had sent her a few 
 strong words of love, and a bare descrip 
 tion of any change about the home, or 
 else Alice had covered a sheet with pretty 
 nothings, written in the small, pointed, 
 flowing characters then fashionable. 
 
 But the love of Aspatria for her home 
 depended on no such trivial, accidental 
 tokens. It was in her blood ; her person 
 ality was knotted to Seat-Ambar by cen 
 turies of inherited affection ; she could test
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side." 187 
 
 it by the fact that it would have killed her 
 to see it pass into a stranger's hands. When 
 once she had turned her face northward, 
 it seemed impossible to travel quickly 
 enough. Hundreds of miles away she 
 
 felt the cool wind blowing through the 
 garden, and the scent of the damask rose 
 was on it. She heard the gurgling of 
 the becks and the wayside streams, and the 
 whistling of the boys in the barn, and the 
 tinkling of the sheep-bells on the highest 
 fells. The raspberries were ripe in their 
 sunny corner; she tasted them afar off.
 
 1 88 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 The dark oak rooms, their perfume of 
 ancient things, their air of homelike com 
 fort, it was all so vivid, so present to her 
 memory, that her heart beat and thrilled, 
 as the breast of a nursing mother thrills 
 and beats for her longing babe. 
 
 She had told no one she was coming ; 
 for, the determination made, she knew 
 that she would reach home before the 
 Dalton postman got the letter to Seat- 
 Ambar. The gig she had hired she left 
 at the lower garden gate; and then she 
 walked quickly through the rose-alley up 
 to the front door. It stood open, and 
 she heard a baby crying. How strange 
 the wailing notes sounded ! She went 
 forward, and opened the parlour door ; 
 Alice was washing the child, and she 
 turned with an annoyed look to see the 
 intruder. 
 
 Of course the expression changed, but 
 not quickly enough to prevent Aspatria 
 seeing that her visit was inopportune. 
 Alice said afterward that she did not recog 
 nize her sister-in-law, and, as Will met her
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy- Side." 189 
 
 precisely as he would have met an entire 
 stranger, Alice's excuse was doubtless a 
 valid one. There were abundant exclama 
 tions and rejoicings when her identity was 
 established, but Will could do nothing all 
 the evening but wonder over the changes 
 that had taken place in his sister. 
 
 However, when the first joy of reunion 
 is over, it is a prudent thing not to try too 
 far the welcome that is given to the home- 
 comer who has once left home. Will and 
 Alice had grown to the idea that Aspa- 
 tria would never return to claim the room 
 in Seat-Ambar which was hers legally so 
 long as she lived. It had been refurnished 
 and was used as a guest-room. Aspatria 
 looked with dismay on the changes made. 
 Her very sampler had been sent away, 
 the bit of canvas made sacred by her 
 mother's fingers holding her own over it. 
 She could remember the instances con 
 nected with the formation of almost every 
 letter of its simple prayer, 
 
 Jesus, permit thy gracious name to stand 
 As the first effort of my infant hand ;
 
 190 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 And, as my fingers on the sampler move, 
 Engage my tender heart to seek thy love. 
 With thy dear children may I have a part, 
 And write thy Name, thyself, upon my heart. 
 
 And it was gone ! She went into the 
 lumber-room, and picked it out from under 
 a pile of old prints and shabbily framed 
 certificates for prize cattle. 
 
 With a sad heart Aspatria regarded the 
 other changes. Her little tent-bed, with 
 its white dimity curtains, had been given 
 to baby's nurse. The vase her father had 
 bought her at Kendal fair was broken. 
 Her small mirror and dressing-table had 
 been removed for a fine Psyche in a 
 gilded frame. Nothing, nothing was un 
 touched, but the big dower-chest into 
 which she had flung her wretched wedding- 
 clothes. She stood silently before it, 
 reflecting, with excusable ill-nature, that 
 neither Will nor Alice knew the secret of 
 its spring. Her mother had taught it to 
 her, and that bit of knowledge she deter 
 mined to keep to herself. 
 
 After some hesitation she tried the
 
 1 Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side^ 191 
 
 spring: it answered her pressure at once; 
 the lid flew back, and there lay the un 
 happy white satin dress, the wreath, and 
 
 veil, and slippers, just as she had tumbled 
 them in. The bitter hour came sharply 
 back to her; she thought and gazed, and 
 thought and gazed, until she felt herself 
 to be weeping. Then she softly closed
 
 192 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 the lid, and, as she did so, a smile parted 
 her lips, a smile that denied all that her 
 tears said ; a smile of hope, of good pres 
 age, of coming happiness. 
 
 She stayed only a week at Seat-Ambar, 
 though she had originally intended to 
 remain until the harvest was over. The 
 time was spent in public festivity; every 
 one in Allerdale was invited to give her a 
 fitting welcome. But the very formality 
 of all this entertainment pained her. It 
 was, after all, only a cruel evidence that 
 Will and Alice did not care to take her into 
 their real home-life. She would rather 
 have sat alone with them, and talked of 
 their hopes and plans, and been permitted 
 to make friends of the babies. 
 
 So far away, so far away as she had 
 drifted in three years from the absent liv 
 ing! Would the dead be kinder? She 
 went to Aspatria Church and sat down in 
 her mother's seat, and let the strange spir 
 itual atmosphere which hovers in old 
 churches fill her heart with its supernatural 
 influence. All around her were the graves
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side." 193 
 
 of her 
 fore-elders, 
 strong elemen 
 tal men, simple 
 God-loving women. 
 Did they know her? 
 Did they care for her? 
 Her soul looked with 
 piteous entreaty into the void behind it, 
 but there was no answer ; only that dread 
 ful silence of the dead, which presses upon 
 the drum of the ear like thunder. 
 
 She went into the quiet yard around the 
 13
 
 194 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 church. The ancient, ancient sun shone 
 on the young grass. Over her mother's 
 grave the sweet thyme had grown luxuri 
 antly. She rubbed her hands in it, and 
 spread them toward heaven with a prayer. 
 Then peace came into her heart, and she 
 felt as if eyes, unseen heavenly eyes, 
 rained happy influence upon o her. Thus 
 it is that death imparts to life its most 
 intense interest; for, kneeling in his very 
 presence, Aspatria forgot the mortality of 
 her parents, and did reverence to that 
 within them which was eternal. 
 
 She returned to London, and was a little 
 disappointed there also. Mrs. St. Alban 
 had promised herself an absolute release 
 from any outside element. She felt As 
 patria a trifle in the way, and, though far 
 too polite to show her annoyance, Aspa 
 tria by some similar instinct divined it. 
 That is the way always. When we plan 
 for ourselves, all our plans fail. Happy 
 are they who learn early to let fate alone, 
 and never interfere with the Powers who 
 hold the thread of their destiny !
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side'' 195 
 
 It was not until she had reached this 
 mood, a kind of content indifference, that 
 her good genius could work for her. She 
 then sent Brune as her messenger, and 
 Brune took his sister to meet her on Rich 
 mond Hill. On their way thither they 
 talked about Seat-Ambar, and Will and 
 Alice, until Aspatria suddenly noticed that 
 Brune was not listening to her. His eyes 
 were fixed upon a lovely woman approach 
 ing them. It was Sarah Sandys. Brune 
 stood bareheaded to receive her salutation. 
 " I never should have known you, Lieu 
 tenant Anneys," she said, extending her 
 hand, and beaming like sunshine on the 
 handsome officer, " had not your colonel 
 Jardine been in Richmond to-day. He is 
 very proud of you, sir, and said so many 
 fine things of you that I am ambitious to 
 show him that we are old acquaintances. 
 May I know, through you, Mrs. Anneys 
 also? " 
 
 " This is my sister, Mrs. Sandys, my 
 sister ' Brune hesitated a moment, and 
 then said firmly, " Miss Anneys."
 
 196 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Then Sarah insisted on taking them to 
 her house to lunch ; and there she soon 
 had them under her influence. She waited 
 on them with ravishing smiles and all sorts 
 of pretty offices. She took them in her 
 handsome carriage to drive, she insisted 
 on their remaining to dinner. And before 
 the drive was over, she had induced Aspa- 
 tria to extend her visit until the opening 
 of Mrs. St. Alban's school. 
 
 " We three are from the north country," 
 she said, with an air of relationship ; " and 
 how absurd for Miss Anneys to be alone at 
 Mrs. St. Alban's, where she is not wanted, 
 and for me to be alone here, when I desire 
 her society so much ! " 
 
 Aspatria was much pleased to receive 
 such a delightful invitation, and a messen 
 ger was sent at once for her maid. Mrs. 
 St. Alban was quite ready to resign Aspa 
 tria, and the maid was as glad as her mis 
 tress to leave the lonely mansion. In an 
 hour or two she had removed Aspatria's 
 wardrobe, and was arranging the pleasant 
 rooms Mrs. Sandys had placed at her 
 guest's disposal.
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side." 197 
 
 Sarah was evidently bent on conquest. 
 Her toilet was a marvellous combination 
 of some shining blue and white texture, 
 mingled with pink roses and gold orna 
 ments. Her soft fair 
 hair was loosened 
 and curled, and she 
 had a childlike man 
 ner of being care 
 lessly happy. Brune 
 sat at her right hand ; 
 she talked to him in 
 smiles and glances, 
 and gave her words 
 to Aspatria. She 
 was determined to 
 please both sister 
 and brother, and she 
 succeeded. Aspatria 
 thought she had 
 
 never in all her life seen a woman so lova 
 ble, so amusing, so individual. 
 
 Brune was naturally shy and silent 
 among women. Sarah made him elo 
 quent, because she had the tact to dis-
 
 198 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 cover the subject on which he could talk, 
 his regiment, and its sayings and doings. 
 So Brune was delighted with himself; he 
 had never before suspected how clever he 
 was. Stimulated by Sarah's and Aspa- 
 tria's laughter and curiosity, he found it 
 easy to retail funny little bits of palace and 
 mess gossip, and to describe the queer 
 men and the vain men and the fine fel 
 lows that were his familiars. 
 
 " And pray how do you amuse yourself, 
 Lieutenant? Do you drink wine, and 
 gamble, and go to the races, and bet your 
 purse empty? " 
 
 " I was never brought up in such ways," 
 Brune answered, " and, I can tell you, I 
 would n't make believe to like them. 
 There are a good many dalesmen in my 
 company, and none of us enjoy anything 
 more than a fair throw or an in-lock." 
 
 " A throw or an in-lock ! What do you 
 mean, Lieutenant ? You must explain 
 yourself to Miss Anneys and myself." 
 
 " Aspatria knows well enough. Did 
 you ever see north-country lads wrestling,
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side'' 199 
 
 madam? No? Then you have as fine a 
 thing in keeping for your eyes as human 
 creatures can show you. I '11 warrant that ! 
 VVhy-a ! wrestling brings all men to their 
 level. When Colonel Jardine is ugly-tem 
 pered, and top-heavy with his authority, a 
 few sound throws over Timothy Sutcliffe's 
 head does bring him to level very well. I 
 had a little in-play with him yesterday; 
 for in the wrestling-ring we be all equals, 
 though out of it he is my colonel." 
 
 " Now for the in-play. Tell me about 
 it, for I see Miss Anneys is not at all 
 interested." 
 
 "Colonel Jardine is a fine wrestler; a 
 fair match he would be even for brother 
 Will. Yesterday he said he could throw 
 me ; and I took the challenge willingly. 
 So we shook hands, and went squarely for 
 the throw. I was in good luck, and soon 
 got my head under his right arm, and his 
 head close down to my left side. Then it 
 was only to get my right arm up to his 
 shoulder, and lift him as high as my head, 
 and, when so, lean backward and throw
 
 2OO A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 him over my head : we call it the Flying 
 Horse." 
 
 " Oh, I can see it very well. No wonder 
 Rosalind fell in love with Orlando when 
 he threw the wrestler Charles." 
 
 " Were they north-country or Cornish 
 men? " 
 
 She was far too kindly and polite to 
 smile ; indeed, she gave Aspatria a pretty, 
 imperative glance, and answered, in the 
 most natural manner, " I think they were 
 Italians." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Brune, with some contempt. 
 " Chaff on their ways ! The Devonshire 
 wrestlers are brutal ; the Cornish are too 
 slow; but the Cumberland men wrestle 
 like gentlemen. They meet square and 
 level in the ring, and the one who could 
 carry ill-will for a fair throw would very 
 soon find himself out of all rings and all 
 good fellowship." 
 
 " You said ' even brother Will.' Is your 
 brother a better wrestler than you ? " 
 
 "My song! he is that! Will has his 
 
 match, though. We had a ploughman 
 
 *
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side." 201 
 
 once, Aspatria remembers him, Robert 
 Steadman, an upright, muscular young 
 fellow, civil and respectful as could be in 
 everything about his work and place ; but 
 on wet days when we were all, masters and 
 servants, in the barn together, it was a 
 sight to see Robert wrestling with Will for 
 the mastery, and Will never so ready to 
 say, ' Well done ! ' nor the rest of us so 
 happy, as when we saw Will's two brawny 
 legs going handsomely over Robert's 
 head." 
 
 " If I were a man, I should try to be a 
 fine wrestler." 
 
 " It is a great comfort," said Brune. 
 " If you have a quarrel of any kind, it is a 
 deal more satisfactory to meet your man, 
 and throw him a few times over your head, 
 than to go to law with him. It puts a 
 stop to unpleasantness very quickly and 
 very good-naturedly." 
 
 Then Sarah rose and opened the piano, 
 and from its keys dashed out a lilting, 
 hurrying melody, like the galloping of 
 horses and shaking of bridles; and in a
 
 202 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 few moments she began to sing, and Brune 
 went to her side, and, because she looked 
 so steadily into his eyes, he could remem 
 ber nothing at all of the song but its 
 dashing refrain, 
 
 " For he whom I wed 
 
 Must be north country bred, 
 And must carry me back to the North Countrie." 
 
 Then Aspatria played some wonderful 
 music on her harp, and Sarah and Brune 
 sat still and listened to their own hearts, 
 and sent out shy glances, and caught 
 each other in the act, and Brune was 
 made nervous, and Sarah gay, by the 
 circumstance. 
 
 By and by they began to talk of schools, 
 and of how much Aspatria had learned ; 
 and so Brune regretted his own ignorance, 
 and wished he had been more attentive to 
 his schoolmaster. 
 
 Sarah laughed at the wish. " A knowl 
 edge of Shakspeare and the musical 
 glasses and the Delia Cruscans," she said, 
 " is for foolish, sentimental women. You 
 can wrestle, and you can fight, and I
 
 Love shall be Lord of Sandy -Side." 203 
 
 suppose you can make money, and per 
 haps even make love. Is there anything 
 else a soldier needs? " 
 
 "Colonel Jardine is very clever," con 
 tinued Brune, regretfully ; " and I had a 
 good schoolmaster 
 
 " Nonsense, Lieutenant ! " said Sarah. 
 " None of them are good. They all spoil 
 your eyes, and seek to lay a curse on you ; 
 that is the confusion of languages." 
 
 " Still, I might have learned Latin." 
 
 " It was the speech of pagans and 
 infidels." 
 
 "Or logic." 
 
 "Logic hath nothing to say in a good 
 
 cause." 
 
 " Or philosophy." 
 
 " Philosophy is curiosity. Socrates was 
 very properly put to death for it." 
 
 They were all laughing together, when 
 Sarah condemned Socrates, and the even 
 ing passed like a happy dream away. 
 
 It was succeeded by weeks of the same 
 delight. Aspatria soon learned to love 
 Sarah. She had never before had a
 
 204 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 woman friend on whom she could rely 
 and to whom she could open her heart. 
 Sarah induced her to speak of Ulfar, to 
 tell her all her suffering and her plans and 
 hopes, and she gave her in return a true 
 affection and a most sincere sympathy. 
 Nothing of the past that referred to Ulfar 
 was left untold ; and as the two women sat 
 together during the long summer days, 
 they grew very near to each other, and 
 there was but one mind and one desire 
 between them. 
 
 So that when the time came for Aspatria 
 to go back to Mrs. St. Alban's, Sarah 
 would not hear of their separation. " You 
 have had enough of book-learning," she 
 said. " Remain with me. We will go to 
 Paris, to Rome, to Vienna. We will study 
 through travel and society. It is by rub 
 bing yourself against all kinds of men and 
 women that you acquire the finest polish 
 of life ; and then when Ulfar comes back 
 you will be able to meet him upon all 
 civilized grounds. And as for the South 
 Americans, we will buy all the books
 
 " Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side'' 205 
 
 about them we can find. Are they red 
 or white or black, I wonder? Are they 
 pagans or Christians? I seem to re 
 member that when I was at school I 
 learned that the Peruvians worshipped 
 the sun." 
 
 " I think, Sarah, that they are all descen 
 dants of Spaniards; so they must be 
 Roman Catholics. And I have read that 
 their women are beautiful and witty." 
 
 " My dear Aspatria, nothing goes with 
 Spaniards but gravity and green olives." 
 
 Aspatria was easily persuaded to accept 
 Sarah's offer; she was indeed very happy 
 in the prospect before her. But Brune was 
 miserable. He had spent a rapturous 
 summer, and it was to end without har 
 vest, or the promise thereof. He could 
 not endure the prospect, and one night he 
 made a movement so decided that Sarah 
 was compelled to set him back a little. 
 
 "Were you ever in love, Mrs. Sandys?" 
 poor Brune asked, with his heart filling his 
 mouth. 
 
 She looked thoughtfully at him a mo-
 
 206 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 merit, and then slowly answered : " I once 
 felt myself in danger, and I fled to France. 
 I consider it the finest action of my life." 
 
 Aspatria felt sorry for her brother, and 
 she said warmly: " I think no one falls in 
 love now. Love is out of date." 
 
 Sarah enjoyed her temper. " You are 
 right, dear," she answered. " Culture 
 makes love a conscious operation. When 
 women are all feeling, they fall in love ; 
 when they have intellect and will, they 
 attach themselves only after a critical 
 examination of the object." 
 
 Later, when they were alone, Aspatria 
 took her friend to task for her cruelty: 
 " You know Brune loves you, Sarah ; and 
 you do love him. Why make him miser 
 able? Has he presumed too far? " 
 
 "No, indeed! He is as adoring and 
 humble as one could wish a future lord 
 and master to be." 
 
 "W 7 ell, then?" 
 
 " I will give our love time to grow. 
 When we come back, if Brune has been 
 true to me in every way, he may fall to
 
 " Love sJiall be Lord of Sandy-Side." 207 
 
 blessing himself with both hands ; " and 
 then she began to sing, 
 
 " Betide, betide, whatever betide, 
 Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side ! " 
 
 " Love is a burden two hearts carry very 
 easily together, but, oh, Sarah ! I know 
 how hard it is to bear it alone. Therefore 
 I say, be kind to Brune while you can." 
 
 " My dear, your idea is a very pretty 
 one. I read the other day a Hindu 
 version of it that smelled charmingly of 
 the soil, 
 
 ' A clapping is not made with one hand alone : 
 Your love, my beloved, must answer my own.'" 
 
 But in spite of such reflections, Sarah's 
 will and intellect were predominant, and 
 she left poor Brune with only such hope 
 as he could glean from the lingering pres 
 sure of her hand and the tears in her 
 eyes. Aspatria's pleading had done no 
 good. Perhaps it had done harm ; for the 
 very nature of love is that it should be 
 spontaneous.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 "A ROSE OF A HUNDRED LEAVES." 
 
 ONE morning in spring Aspatria stood 
 in a balcony overlooking the principal 
 thoroughfare of Rome, the Rome of papal 
 government, mythical, mystical, mediaeval 
 in its character. A procession of friars 
 had just passed ; a handsome boy was cry 
 ing violets ; some musical puppets were 
 performing in the shadow of the opposite 
 palace ; a party of brigands were going to 
 the Angelo prison ; the spirit of Caesar was 
 still abroad in the black-browed men and 
 women, lounging and laughing in their 
 gaudy, picturesque costumes ; and the spirit 
 of ecclesiasticism lifted itself above every 
 earthly object, and touched proudly the 
 bells of a thousand churches. Aspatria 
 was weary of all. 
 
 She had that morning an imperative 
 nostalgia. She could see nothing but the
 
 " A Rose of a Hundred Leaves^ 209 
 
 mountains of Cumberland, and the white 
 sheep wandering about their green sides. 
 Through the church- 
 bells she heard the 
 sheep-bells. 
 Above the boy 
 crying violets 
 she heard the 
 boy whistling 
 in the fresh- 
 ploughed furrow. 
 As for the vio 
 lets, she knew 
 how the wild 
 ones were blow 
 ing in Ambar 
 wood, and how 
 in the garden the 
 daffodil-beds were aglow, 
 and the sweet thyme hum 
 bling itself at their feet, be 
 cause each bore a chalice. Oh for a 
 breath from the mountains and the sea! 
 The hot Roman streets, with their ever- 
 changing human elements of sorrow and
 
 2io A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 mirth, sin and prayer, riches and poverty, 
 made her sad and weary. 
 
 Sarah came toward her with a letter in 
 her hand. " Ria," she said, " this is from 
 Lady Redware. Your husband will be in 
 England very shortly." 
 
 It was the first time Sarah had ever 
 called Ulfar Aspatria's husband. In con 
 versation the two women had always 
 spoken of him as " Ulfar." The change 
 was significant. It implied that Sarah 
 thought the time had come for Aspatria 
 to act decisively. 
 
 " I shall be delighted to go back to 
 England. We have been twenty months 
 away, Sarah. I was just feeling as if it 
 were twenty years." 
 
 Sarah looked critically at the woman 
 who was going to cast her last die for love. 
 She was so entirely different from the girl 
 who had first won that love, how was it 
 possible for her to recapture the same 
 sweet, faithless emotion? She had a swift 
 memory of the slim girl in the plain black 
 frock whom she had seen sitting under the
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 211 
 
 whin-bushes. And then she glanced at 
 Aspatria standing under the blue-and-red 
 awning of the Roman palace. She was 
 now twenty-six years old, and in the very 
 glory of her womanhood, tall, superbly 
 formed, graceful, calm, and benignant. 
 Her face was luminous with intellect and 
 feeling, her manner that of a woman high 
 bred and familiar with the world. Culture 
 had done all for her that the lapidary does 
 for the diamond ; travel and social advan 
 tages had added to the gem a golden set 
 ting. She was so little like the sorrowful 
 child whom Ulfar had last seen in the 
 vicar's meadow that Sarah felt instantane 
 ous recognition to be almost impossible. 
 
 After some hesitation, Aspatria agreed 
 to accept Sarah's plan and wait in Rich 
 mond the development of events. At first 
 she had been strongly in favour of a 
 return to Seat-Ambar. " If Ulfar really 
 wants to see me," she said, " he will be 
 most likely to seek me there." 
 
 " But then, Ria, he may think he does 
 not want to see you. Men never know
 
 212 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 what they really do want. You have to 
 give them ' leadings.' If Ulfar can look on 
 you now and have no curiosity about your 
 identity, I should say the man was not 
 worth a speculation from any point. See 
 if you have hold sufficient on his memory 
 to pique his curiosity. If you have, lead 
 him wherever you wish." 
 
 "But how? And where?" 
 
 "Do I carry a divining-cup, Ria? Can 
 I foresee the probabilities of a man so im 
 possible as Ulfar Fenwick? I only know 
 that Richmond is a good place to watch 
 events from." 
 
 And of course the Richmond house 
 suited Brune. His love had grown to the 
 utmost of Sarah's expectations, and he was 
 no longer to be put off with smiles and 
 pleasant words. Sarah had promised him 
 an answer when she returned, and he 
 claimed it with a passionate persistence 
 that had finally something imperative in it. 
 To this mood Sarah succumbed; though 
 she declared that Brune had chosen the 
 morning of all others most inconvenient
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves'' 213 
 
 for her. She was just leaving the house. 
 She was going to London about her 
 jewels. Brune had arrested the coachman 
 by a peremptory movement, and he looked 
 as if he were quite prepared to lift Sarah 
 out of the carriage. 
 
 So Aspatria went alone. She was glad 
 of the swift movement in the fresh air, she 
 was glad that she could be quiet and let 
 it blow passively upon her. The restless 
 ness of watching had made her feverish. 
 She had the "strait" of a strong mind 
 which longs to meet her destiny. For her 
 love for her husband had grown steadily 
 with her efforts to be worthy of that love, 
 and she longed to meet him face to face 
 and try the power of her personality over 
 him. The trial did not frighten her; she 
 felt within her the ability to accomplish 
 it ; her feet were on a level with her task ; 
 she was the height of a woman above 
 it 
 
 Musing on this subject, letting her mind 
 shoot to and fro like a shuttle between the 
 past and the present, she reached Picca-
 
 214 -^ Rose of a Hundred Leaves, 
 
 dilly, and entered a large jeweller's shop. 
 The proprietor was talking to a gentleman 
 who was exhibiting a number of uncut 
 gems. Aspatria knew him instantly. It 
 was Ulfar Fenwick, the same Ulfar, older, 
 and yet distinctly handsomer. For the 
 dark hair slightly whitened, and the thin, 
 worn cheeks, had an intensely human 
 aspect. She saw that he had suffered; 
 that the sum of life was on his face, toil, 
 difficulty, endurance, mind, and also that 
 pathetic sadness which tells of endurance 
 without avail. 
 
 She went to the extreme end of the 
 counter, and began to examine the jewels 
 which Sarah had sent to be reset. Some 
 were finished ; others were waiting for the 
 selection of a particular style, and Aspatria 
 looked critically at the models shown her. 
 The occupation gave her an opportunity 
 to calm and consider herself ; she could 
 look at the jewels a few moments without 
 expressing an opinion. 
 
 Then she gave, in a clear, distinct voice, 
 some order regarding a pearl necklace ;
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves"' 215 
 
 and Ulfar turned like a flash, and looked 
 at the woman who had spoken. She had 
 the pearls in one hand ; the other touched 
 a satin cushion on which lay many orna 
 ments of diamonds, sapphires, and rubies. 
 The moonlight iridescence of the pearls, 
 the sparkling glory of the gems, seemed 
 to be a part of her noble beauty. He 
 forgot his own treasures, and stood look 
 ing at the woman whose voice had called 
 to him out of the past, had penetrated his 
 heart like a bell struck sharply in its inner 
 most room. Who was it? Where had 
 they met before? He knew the face. He 
 knew, and yet he did not know, the whole 
 charming personality. As she turned, 
 his eyes met her eyes, and the pure pallor 
 of her cheeks was flooded with crimson. 
 
 She passed him within touch ; the rustle 
 of her garments, their faint perfume, the 
 simple sense of her nearness, thrilled his 
 being wondrously. And, above all, that 
 sense of familiarity ! What could it mean? 
 He gave the stones into the jeweller's care, 
 and hurriedly followed her steps.
 
 216 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " That is Sarah Sandys's carriage, my 
 barony for it ! " he exclaimed ; " and the 
 men are in the Sandys livery. Sarah, 
 then, is in Richmond ; and the woman 
 who rides in her carriage is very likely in 
 her house; but who can it be?" 
 
 The face haunted him, the voice tor 
 mented him like a melody that we contin 
 ually try to catch. He endeavoured to 
 place both as he rode out to Richmond. 
 More than once the thought of Aspatria 
 came to him, but he could not make any 
 memory of her fit that splendid vision of 
 the woman with uplifted hand and the 
 string of pearls dropping from it. Her 
 exquisite face, between the beauty of their 
 reflection and the flashing of the gems 
 beneath, retained in his memory a kind 
 of glory. " Such loveliness is the proper 
 setting for pearls and diamonds," he said. 
 " Many a beauty I have seen, but none 
 that can touch the heel of her shoe." 
 
 For he really thought that it was her 
 personal charms which had so moved him. 
 It was the sense of familiarity ; it was in a
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 217 
 
 far deeper and dimmer way a presentiment 
 of right, of possession, a feeling of personal 
 touch in the emotion, which per 
 
 plexed and stimulated him 
 
 as the mere JJL. mystery and 
 
 beauty of the 
 flesh could 
 never have 
 done. 
 
 As soon as he 
 reached the top of 
 Richmond Hill he 
 saw Sarah. She was 
 sauntering along 
 that loveliest of 
 cliffs, with Brune. An 
 orderly was leading 
 Brune's horse; he him 
 self was in the first ecstasy of 
 Sarah's acknowledged love. Ulfar went 
 into the Star and Garter Inn and watched 
 Sarah. He had no claim upon her, and 
 yet he felt as if she had been false to him. 
 "And for a mere soldier!" Then he 
 looked critically at the soldier, and said,
 
 218 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 with some contempt : " I am sorry for him ! 
 Sarah Sandys will have her pastime, and 
 then say, ' Farewell, good sir ! '" As for 
 the mere soldier being Brune Anneys, 
 that was a thought out of Ulfar's horizon. 
 
 In a couple of hours he went to 
 Sarah's. She met him with real delieht 
 
 o 
 
 ' You are just five years lovelier, Sarah," 
 he said. 
 
 " Admiration from Sir Ulfar Fenwick is 
 admiration indeed ! " 
 
 " Yes ; I say you are beautiful, though 
 I have just seen the most bewitching wo 
 man that ever blessed my eyes, in your 
 carriage too." And then, swift as light 
 or thought, there flashed across his mind 
 a conviction that the Beauty and Aspatria 
 were identical. It was a momentary intel 
 ligence ; he grasped it merely as a clew 
 that might lead him somewhere. 
 
 "In my carriage? I dare say it was 
 Ria. She went to Piccadilly this morning 
 about some jewels." 
 
 " She reminded me of Aspatria." 
 
 " Have you brought back with you that
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves." 219 
 
 old trouble? I have no mind to hear 
 more of it." 
 
 " Who is the lady I saw this morning? " 
 
 " She is the sister of the man I am go 
 ing to marry. In four months she will be 
 my sister." 
 
 " What is her name? " 
 
 " That is to tell you my secret, sir." 
 
 " I saw you throwing your enchantments 
 over some soldier. I knew just how the 
 poor fellow felt." 
 
 " Then you also have been in Arcadia. 
 Be thankful for your past blessings. I do 
 not expect you to rejoice with me ; none 
 of the apostolic precepts are so hard as 
 that which bids us rejoice with those who 
 do rejoice." 
 
 " Neither Elizabeth nor you have ever 
 named Aspatria in your letters." 
 
 " Did you expect us to change guard 
 over Ambar-Side? I dare say Aspatria 
 has grown into a buxom, rosy-cheeked 
 woman and quite forgotten you." 
 
 " I must go and see her." 
 
 " I think you ought. Also, you should
 
 220 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 give her her freedom. I consider your 
 behaviour a dog-in-the-manger atrocity." 
 
 " Can you not pick nicer words, Sarah ? " 
 
 " I would not if I could." 
 
 " Sarah, tell me truly, have I lost my 
 good looks? " 
 
 She regarded him attentively a moment, 
 and answered: "Not quite. You have 
 some good points yet You have grown 
 thin and gray, and lost something, and 
 perhaps gained something; but you are 
 not very old, and then, you know, you 
 have your title, and your castle, and your 
 very old, old family, and I suppose a good 
 deal of money." In reality, she was sure 
 that he had never before been so attrac 
 tive; for he had now the magic of a 
 countenance informed by intellect and 
 experience, eyes brimming with light, lips 
 neither loose nor coarse, yet full of passion 
 and the faculty of enjoyment. 
 
 He smiled grimly at Sarah's list of his 
 charms, and said, " When will you intro 
 duce me to your future sister?" 
 
 " This evening. Come about nine. I
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 221 
 
 have a few sober people who will be 
 delighted to hear your South American 
 adventures. Ria goes to Lady Chester's 
 ball soon after nine. Do not miss your 
 chance." 
 
 " Could I see her now? " 
 
 " You could not." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 " Do you suppose she would leave a 
 modiste for you ? " 
 
 " I wonder where Aspatria is ! " 
 
 " Go and find out." 
 
 " Sarah, who is the young lady I saw in 
 your carriage? " 
 
 " She is the sister of the officer you saw 
 me with, the man I am going to marry." 
 
 " Where did you meet him? " 
 
 " At a friend's house." 
 
 " Where did you meet her? " 
 
 " Her brother brought her to my house. 
 I asked her to stay with me, and finally we 
 went to Italy together." 
 
 " She has a very aristocratic manner." 
 
 " She ought to have. She was educated 
 at Mrs. St. Alban's, and she visits at the
 
 222 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Earl of Arundel's, the Duke of Norfolk's, 
 and the very exclusive Boleyns', Lady- 
 Mary Boleyn is her friend, and she has 
 also had the great advantage of my society 
 for nearly two years." 
 
 ' Then of course she is not Aspatria, 
 and my heart is a liar, and my memory is 
 a traitor, and my eyes do not see correctly. 
 I will call about nine. I am at the Star 
 and Garter. If she should name me at 
 all " 
 
 "Do you imagine she noticed you? and 
 in such a public place as Howell's? " 
 
 "I really do imagine she noticed me. 
 Ask her." 
 
 " I see you are in love again. After all 
 that experience has done for you ! It is a 
 Nemesis, Ulfar. I have often noticed that, 
 however faithless a man may be, there 
 comes at last one woman who avenges 
 all the rest. Enter Nemesis at nine 
 to-night ! " 
 
 "Sarah, you are an angel." 
 "Thank you, Ulfar. I thought you 
 classed me with the other side."
 
 " A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 223 
 
 " As for Aspatria 
 
 " Life is too short to discuss Aspatria. 
 I remember one day at Redware being 
 sharply requested to keep silence on that 
 subject. The wheel of retribution has 
 made a perfect circle as regards Aspatria ! 
 I shall certainly tell Ria that you have 
 made her the heroine of your disagreeable 
 matrimonial romance." 
 
 " No, no, Sarah ! Do not say a word 
 to her. I must wait until nine, I sup 
 pose? And I am so anxious and so fear 
 ful, Sarah." 
 
 " You must wait until nine. And as for 
 the rest, I know very well that in the pre 
 sent age a lover's cares and fears have 
 
 Dwindled to the smallest span. 
 
 Do go to your hotel, and get clothed and 
 in your right mind. You are most unbe 
 comingly dressed. Good-by, old friend, 
 good-by!" And she left him with an 
 elaborate courtesy. 
 
 Ulfar was now in a vortex. Things 
 went around and around in his conscious-
 
 224 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 ness; and whenever he endeavoured to 
 examine events with his reason, then feel 
 ing advanced some unsupported conviction, 
 and threw him back into the same sense 
 less whirl of emotion. 
 
 He had failed to catch 
 the point which would 
 have given him the clew 
 to the whole mystery, 
 - the identity of Brune 
 with the splendidly ac 
 coutred officer Sarah 
 avowed to be her in 
 tended husband. 
 Without taking special 
 note of him, Ulfar had 
 seen certain signs of birth, 
 breeding, and assured 
 position. In his mind 
 there was a great gulf 
 between the haughty- 
 looking soldier and 
 
 the simple, handsome, but rather boorish- 
 looking young Squire of Ambar-Side. 
 The two individualities were as far apart
 
 11 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 22$ 
 
 in social claims as the north and south 
 poles are apart physically. 
 
 And if this beautiful woman were indeed 
 Aspatria, how could he reconcile the fact 
 with her education at St. Alban's, her 
 friendship with such exalted families, her 
 relationship to an officer of evident birth 
 and position? When he thought thus, he 
 acknowledged the impossibility; but then 
 no sooner had he acknowledged it than his 
 heart passionately denied the deduction, 
 with the simple iteration, " It is Aspatria! 
 It is Aspatria ! " 
 
 Aspatria or not, he told himself that he 
 was at last genuinely in love. Every affair 
 before was tame, pale, uninteresting. If 
 it was not Aspatria, then the first Aspatria 
 was the shadow of the second and real one ; 
 the preface to love's glorious tale ; the pre 
 lude to his song ; the gray, sweet dawn to 
 his perfect day. He could not eat, nor sit 
 still, nor think reasonably, nor yet stop 
 thinking. The sun stood still; the minutes 
 were hours ; at four o'clock he wished to 
 fling the timepiece out of the window. 
 15
 
 226 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 Aspatria had the immense strength of 
 certainty. She knew. Also, she had 
 Sarah to advise with. Still better, she 
 had the conviction that Ulfar loved her. 
 Perhaps Sarah had exaggerated Ulfar's 
 desperate condition ; if so, she had done 
 it consciously, for she knew that as soon 
 as a woman is sure of her power she puts 
 on an authority which commands it. 
 She was now only afraid that Ulfar would 
 not be kept in suspense long enough, 
 that Aspatria would forgive him too 
 easily. 
 
 " Do make yourself as puzzling as you 
 can, for this one night, Aspatria," she 
 urged. " Try to outvie and outdo and 
 even affront that dove-like simplicity he 
 used to adore in you, and into which you 
 are still apt to relapse. He told me once 
 that you looked like a Quakeress when he 
 first saw you.'' 
 
 " I was just home from Miss Gilpin's 
 school in Kendal. It was a Quaker school. 
 I have always kept a black gown ready, 
 like the one he saw me first in."
 
 " A Rose of a Hundred Leaves." 227 
 
 "No black gown to-night. I have a 
 mind to stay here and see that you turn 
 the Quakeress into a princess." 
 
 " I will do all you wish. To-night you 
 shall have your way ; but poor Ulfar must 
 have suffered, and " 
 
 "Poor Ulfar, indeed! Be merry; that 
 is the best armour against love. What 
 ruins women? Revery and sentimentality. 
 A woman who does not laugh ought to 
 be watched." 
 
 But though she lectured and advised 
 Aspatria as to the ways of men and the 
 ways of love, Sarah had not much faith in 
 her own counsels. " No one can draw 
 out a programme for a woman's happi 
 ness," she mused ; " she will not keep to 
 its lines. Now, I do wonder whether she 
 will dress gorgeously or not? What did 
 Solomon in all his glory wear? If Aspa 
 tria only knew how dress catches a man's 
 eye, and then touches his vanity, and then 
 sets fire to his imagination, and finally, 
 somehow, someway, gets to his heart ! If 
 she only knew,
 
 228 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 'All thoughts, all passions, all delights, 
 Whatever stirs this mortal frame, 
 
 Are but the ministers of Love, 
 And feed his sacred flame ! ' " 
 
 A little before nine, Ulfar entered Sarah's 
 drawing-room. It was lighted with wax 
 candles. It was sweet with fresh violets, 
 and at the farther end Aspatria stood by 
 her harp. She was dressed for Lady 
 Chester's ball, and was waiting her chap 
 eron ; but there had been a little rebellion 
 against her leaving without giving her 
 admirers one song. Every person was 
 suggesting his or her favourite ; and she 
 stood smiling, uncertain, listening, watch 
 ing, for one voice and face. 
 
 Her dazzling bodice was clasped with 
 emeralds ; her draperies were of damasked 
 gauze, shot with gold and silver, and 
 abloom with flowers. Her fair neck spark 
 led with diamonds; and the long white 
 fingers which touched the strings so firmly 
 glinted with flashing gems. The moment 
 Ulfar entered, she saw him. His eyes, full 
 of fiery prescience, forced her to meet their 
 inquiry ; and then it was that she sat down
 
 230 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 and filled the room with tinkling notes, 
 that made every one remember the moun 
 tains, and the merry racing of the spring 
 winds, and the trickling of half-hidden 
 fountains. 
 
 Sarah advanced with him. She touched 
 Aspatria slightly, and said: "Hush! a 
 moment. This is my friend Sir Ulfar 
 Fenwick, Ria." 
 
 Ria lifted her eyes sweetly to his eyes ; 
 she bowed with the grace and benignity of 
 a queen, and adroitly avoided speech by 
 turning the melody into song: 
 
 " I never shall forget 
 The mountain maid that once I met 
 By the cold river's side. 
 I met her on the mountain-side ; 
 She watched her herds unnoticed there : 
 ' Trim-bodiced maiden, hail ! ' I cried. 
 She answered, ' Whither, Wanderer ? 
 For thou hast lost thy way.'" 
 
 Every word went to Ulfar's heart, and 
 amid all the soft cries of delight he alone 
 was silent. She was beaming with smiles ; 
 she was radiant as a goddess; the light 
 seemed to vanish from the room when she
 
 "A Rose of a Hundred Leaves," 231 
 
 went away. Her adieu was a general one, 
 excepting to Ulfar. On him she turned 
 her bright eyes, and courtesied low with 
 one upward glance. It set his heart on 
 fire. He knew that glance. They might 
 say this or that, they might lie to him 
 neck-deep, he knew it was Aspatria ! He 
 was cross with Sarah. He accused her of 
 downright deception. He told her frankly 
 that he believed nothing about the soldier 
 and his sister. 
 
 She bade him come in the morning and 
 talk to Ria; and he asked impetuously: 
 " How soon? Twelve, I suppose? How 
 am I to pass the time until twelve 
 to-morrow? " 
 
 "Why this haste?" 
 
 " Why this deception? " 
 
 " After seven years' indifference, are you 
 suddenly gone mad? " 
 
 " I feel as if I was being very badly 
 used." 
 
 " How does the real Aspatria feel? Go 
 at once to Ambar-Side."
 
 232 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 " The real Aspatria is here. I know it ! 
 I feel it!" 
 
 " In a court of law, what evidence would 
 feeling be?" 
 
 " In a court of love " 
 " Try it." 
 
 " I will, to-morrow, at ten o'clock." 
 His impetuosity pleased her. She was 
 disposed to leave him to Aspatria now. 
 And Aspatria was disposed on the follow 
 ing morning to make his confession very 
 easy to him. She dressed herself in the 
 simple black gown she had kept ready for 
 this event. It had the short elbow sleeves, 
 and the ruffle round the open throat, and 
 the daffodil against her snowy breast, that 
 distinguished the first costume he had ever 
 seen her in. She loosened her hair and 
 let it fall in two long braids behind her 
 ears. She was, as far as dress could make 
 her so, the Aspatria who had held the 
 light to welcome him to Ambar-Side that 
 stormy night ten years ago. 
 
 He was standing in the middle of the
 
 " A Rose of a Hundred Leaves." 233 
 
 room, restless and expectant, when she 
 opened the door. He called her by name, 
 and went to meet her. She trembled and 
 was silent. 
 
 " Aspatria, it is you ! My Life ! My 
 Soul ! It is you ! " 
 
 He took her hands ; they were as cold 
 as ice. He drew her close to his side ; he 
 stooped to see her eyes ; he whispered word 
 upon word of affection, sweet-meaning 
 nouns and adjectives that caught a real 
 physical heat from the impatient heart and 
 tongue that forged and uttered them. 
 
 " Forgive me, my dearest ! Forgive me 
 fully ! Forgive me at once and altogether ! 
 Aspatria, I love you ! I love none but 
 you ! I will adore you all my life ! Speak 
 one word to me, one word, my love, one 
 word : say only ' Ulfar ! ' 
 
 She forgot in a moment all that she had 
 suffered. She forgot all she had promised 
 Sarah, all her intents of coldness, all re 
 proaches ; she forgot even to forgive him. 
 She just put her arms around his neck and
 
 234 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 kissed him. She blotted out the past for 
 ever in that one whispered word, " Ulfar." 
 And then he took her to his heart ; he 
 kissed her for very wonder; he kissed her 
 for very joy; but most of all he kissed her 
 for fervent love. Then once more life was 
 an " Interlude in Heaven." Every hour 
 held some sweet surprise, some accidental 
 joy. It was Brune, it was Sarah, it was 
 some eulogium of Ulfar in the great Lon 
 don weeklies. He had fought in the good 
 fight for freedom; he had done great 
 deeds of mercy as well as of valour ; he had 
 crossed primeval forests, and brought back 
 wonderful medicines, and dyes, and many 
 new specimens for the botanist and the nat 
 uralist. The papers were never weary in 
 praising his pluck, his bravery, his gener 
 osity, and his endurance; the Geograph 
 ical Society sent him its coveted blue 
 ribbon. In his own way Ulfar had made 
 himself a fit mate for the new Aspatria. 
 
 And she was a constant wonder to him. 
 Nothing in all his strange experience
 
 11 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves." 235 
 
 touched his heart like the thought of his 
 simple, patient wife, studying to please 
 him, to be worthy of his love. Every day 
 revealed her in some new and charming 
 light. She was one hundred Aspatrias in 
 a single, lovable, lovely woman. On what, 
 ever subject Ulfar spoke, she understood, 
 supplemented, sympathized with, or as 
 sisted him. She could talk in French and 
 Italian ; she was not ignorant of botany 
 and natural science, and she was delighted 
 to be his pupil. 
 
 In a single month they became all the 
 world to each other ; and then they began 
 to long for the lonely old castle fronting 
 the wild North Sea, to plan for its restora 
 tion, and for a sweet home-life, which 
 alone could satisfy the thirst of their 
 hearts for each other's presence. At the 
 end of June they went northward. 
 
 It was the month of the rose, and the 
 hedges were pink, and the garden was a 
 garden of roses. There were banks of 
 roses, mazes of roses, walks and standards
 
 236 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 of roses, masses of glorious colour, and 
 breezes scented with roses. Butterflies were 
 chasing one another among the flowers ; 
 nightingales, languid with love, weresinging 
 softly above them. And in the midst was 
 a gray old castle, flying its old border 
 flags, and looking as happy as if it were 
 at a festival. 
 
 Aspatria was enraptured, spellbound 
 with delight With Ulfar she wandered 
 from one beauty to another, until they 
 finally reached a great standard of pale- 
 pink roses. Their loveliness was beyond 
 compare; their scent went to the brain 
 like some divine essence. It was a glory, 
 a prayer, a song of joy ! Aspatria 
 stood beside it, and seemed to Ulfar but 
 its mortal manifestation. She was clothed 
 in a gown of pale-pink brocade, with a 
 little mantle of the same, trimmed with 
 white lace, and a bonnet of white lace and 
 pink roses. She was a perfect rose of 
 womanhood. She was the glory of his 
 life, his prayer, his song of joy !
 
 " A Rose of a Hundred Leaves" 237 
 
 " It is the loveliest place in the world ! " 
 he said, " and you ! you are the loveliest 
 woman ! My sweet Aspatria ! " 
 
 She smiled divinely. " And yet," she 
 answered, " I remember, Ulfar, a song of 
 yours that said something very different. 
 Listen : 
 
 ' There is a rose of a hundred leaves, 
 But the wild rose is the sweetest ! ' " 
 
 And as she sang the words, Ulfar had a 
 vision of a young girl, fresh and pure as a 
 mountain bluebell, in her scrimp black 
 frock. He saw the wind blowing it tight 
 over her virgin form ; he saw her fair, 
 childish, troubled face as she kissed him 
 farewell in the vicar's meadows ; and then 
 he saw the glorious woman, nobly planned, 
 perfect on every side, that the child wife 
 had grown to. 
 
 So, when she ceased, he pulled the fair 
 est rose on the tree ; he took from it every 
 thorn, he put it in her breast, he kissed 
 the rose, and he kissed her rose-like face. 
 Then he took up the song where she
 
 238 A Rose of a Hundred Leaves. 
 
 dropped it ; and hand in hand, keeping 
 time to its melody, they crossed the thresh 
 old of their blessed home. 
 
 " The robin sang beneath the eaves : 
 ' There is a rose of a hundred leaves, 
 But the wild rose is the sweetest ! ' 
 
 " The nightingale made answer clear : 
 ' O darling rose ! more fair, more dear ! 
 O rose of a hundred leaves ! ' " 
 
 , 
 
 T
 
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