to
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 i
 
 L^ 
 
 TWO ON A TOWER 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS HARDY 
 
 Atcthor of "Far from tJte i\Iadding Crowd^'' 
 ''A Pair of Blue Eyes,'' etc. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 HOVENDON COMPANY 
 
 17 AND 19 WAVERLEY PLACE
 
 
 rl 
 
 V 
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "•lOOi.— 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 (~\>^ an early winter afternoon, clear but not cold, when 
 ^-^ the vegetable world was a weird multitude of skele- 
 tons through whose ribs the sun shone freely, a gleaming 
 landau came to a pause on the crest of a hill in Wessex. 
 The spot was where the old Melchester road, which the 
 carriage had hitherto followed, was joined by a drive that 
 led round into a park at no great distance off. The foot- 
 man alighted, and went to the occupant of the carriage, 
 a lady of about six and twenty. She was looking through 
 the opening afforded by a field-gate at the undulating 
 stretch of country beyond. In pursuance of some remark 
 from her, the servant looked in the same direction. 
 
 The central feature of the middle distance, as they be- 
 held it, was a circular, isolated hill, of no great elevation, 
 which placed itself in strong chromatic contrast with a wide 
 acreage of surrounding arable, by being covered with fir- 
 trees. The trees were all of one size and age, so that their 
 tips assumed the precise curve of the hill they grew upon. 
 This pine-clad protuberance was yet further marked out
 
 2 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 from the general landscape by having on its summit a 
 tower in the form of a classical column, which, though 
 partly immersed in the plantation, rose above the tree- 
 tops to a considerable height. Upon this object the eyes 
 of lady and servant were bent. 
 
 "Then there is no road leading near it.?" she asked. 
 
 "Nothing nearer than where we are now, my lady." 
 
 "Oh! Then drive home." And the carriage rolled 
 on its way. 
 
 A few da}-s later, the same lady, in the same carriage, 
 passed that spot again. Her eyes, as before, turned to 
 the distant tower. 
 
 "Nobbs,"she said, "could you find your way home 
 through that field, so as to get near the outskirts of the 
 plantation .? " 
 
 The coachman regarded the field. "Well, my lady, " 
 he observed, "in dry weather we might drive in there, 
 and so get across by Five-and-Twenty Acres, all being 
 well. But the valler ground is so heavy after these rains 
 that — perhaps it would hardly be safe to try it now." 
 
 " Perhaos not, " she assented indifferentlv. " Remem- 
 ber it, will you, at a drier time.? " And again the carriage 
 sped along the road, the lady's eyes resting on the seg- 
 mental hill, the blue trees that muffled it, and the column 
 that formed its apex, till they were out of sight. 
 
 A long time elapsed before that lady drove over the hill 
 again. It was February; the soil was now unquestionabl) 
 dry, the weather and scene being in other respects much 
 a.s they had been before. The familiar shape of the col- 
 umn .seemed to remind her that at last an opportunity for 
 a close inspection had arrived. Giving her directions, sho
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 3 
 
 saw the gate opened, and after a little manoeuvring the car- 
 riage swayed slowly into the uneven fieltl. Although the 
 pillar stood upon the hereditary estate of her husband, the 
 ladv had never visited it, owing to its insulation by this 
 well-nigh impracticable ground. The drive to the base of 
 the hill \vas tedious and jerky, and on reaching it she 
 llighted, directing that the carriage should be driven back 
 empty over the clods, to wait for her on the nearest edge 
 of the field. She then ascended beneath the trees on foot. 
 
 The column now showed itself as a much more impor- 
 tant erection than it had appeared from the road, or the 
 park, or the windows of Wclland House, her residence 
 hard by, whence she had surveyed it hundreds of times 
 without ever feeling a sufficient mterest in its details to in- 
 vestigate them. The column had been erected in the last 
 century, as a substantial memorial of her husbands great- 
 grandfather, a respectable officer who had fallen in the 
 American war, and the reason of her lack of interest was 
 partly owing to her relations with this husband, of which 
 more anon. It was little more than the sheer desire for 
 something to do— the chronic desire of her curiously lonely 
 life — that had brought her here now. She was in a mood 
 to welcome anything that would in some measure disperse 
 an almost killing ennui. She would have welcomed even a 
 misfortune. She had heard that from the summit of the 
 ■)!llar three counties could be seen. Whatever pleasurable 
 eflect was to be derived from looking into three counties 
 at the same tim^ she would enjoy to-day. 
 
 The fir-shrouded hill-top turned out to be an old Ro- 
 man camp, — -if it were not an old British castle, or an on'' 
 Saxon field of Witenagernote, — witli remains of an out
 
 4 TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 and an inner vallum, a winding path leading up between 
 their overlapping ends by an easy ascent. The spikelets 
 from the trees formed a soft carpet over the route, and oc- 
 casionally a brake of brambles barred the interspaces of the 
 trunks. Soon she stood immediately at the foot of the 
 column. 
 
 I* had been built in the Tuscan order of architecture, 
 4nd was really a tower, being hollow, with steps inside. 
 The gloom and solitude which prevailed round the base 
 were remarkable. The sob of the environing trees was 
 here expressively manifest, and as, m the light breeze, their 
 thin, straight stems rocked in seconds, like inverted pen- 
 dulums, some boughs and twigs rubbed the pillar's sides, 
 or occasionally clicked in catching each other. Below 
 the level of their summits the masonry was lichen- 
 stained and mildewed, for the sun never pierced that 
 moaning clgud of blue-black vegetation; pads of moss 
 grew in the joints of the stone-work, and here and there 
 shade-loving insects had engraved on the mortar patterns 
 of no human st3'le or meaning, but curious and suggestive. 
 Above the trees the case was different: the pillar rose into 
 the sky a bright and cheerful thing, unimpeded, clean, and 
 flushed with the sunlight. 
 
 The spot was seldom visited by a pedestrian, e.xcept per- 
 haj)s in the shooting season. The rarity of human intru- 
 sion was evidenced by the mazes of rabbit-runs, the feathers 
 ^f :;hy birds, the exuvice of reptiles; as also by the fresli 
 an I uninterrupted paths of squirrels down the sides of 
 trunks, and thence horizontally away. The circumstance 
 of the plantiition being an Lsland in the midst of an arable 
 plain sufficiently accounted for this lack of visitors. Few
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 5 
 
 unaccustomed to such places can be aware of the insula- 
 ting effect of plowed ground, when no necessity compels 
 jieople to traverse it. This rotund hill of trees and bram- 
 bles, standing in the center of a plowed field of some 
 ninety or a hundred acres, was probably visited less fre- 
 quently than a rock would have been visited in a lake of 
 c<]iial extent. 
 
 She walked round the column to the other side, where 
 lih'j found the door through which the interior was reached. 
 'I'hc paint, if it had ever had any, was all washed from its 
 fixcc, and down the decaying surface of the boards liquid 
 rust from the nails and hinges had run in red stains. Over 
 the door was a stone tablet, bearing, apparently, letters or 
 words; but the inscription, whatever it was, had been 
 smoothed over with a plaster of lichen. 
 
 Here stood this aspiring piece of masonry, erected a? 
 the most conspicuous and ineffaceable reminder of a man 
 that could be thought of; and yet the whole aspect of the 
 memorial betokened forgetfulness. Probably not a dozen 
 people wilhin the district knew the name of the person 
 commemorated, while perhaps not a soul remembered 
 whether the column was hollow or solid, whether with or 
 without a tablet and a door. She herself had lived within 
 a mile of it for the last five years, and had never come 
 near it till now. 
 
 She had no intention of ascending, but finding that the 
 door was not fastened she pushed it open with her foot, 
 and entered. A scrap of writing-paper lay within, and ar- 
 rested her attention by its freshness. Some human being, 
 then, knew the spot, despite her surmises. But as the 
 paper had u^diing on it, no clew was afforded; yet, feel-
 
 6 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 ing herself the proprietor of the column and of all around 
 it, her self-assertiveness was sufficient to lead her on. The 
 staircase was lighted by slits in the wall, and there was no 
 difficulty in reaching the top, the steps being quite un- 
 ft^orn. The trap door giving on to the roof was open, and 
 on looking through it an interesting spectacle met her 
 eye. 
 
 A youth was sitting on a stool in the center of the lead 
 flat which formed the summit of the column, his eye being 
 applied to the end of a large telescope that stood before 
 him on a tripod. This sort of presence was unexpected, 
 and the lady started back into the shade of the opening. 
 The only effect produced upon him by her footfall was an 
 impatient wave of the hand, without removing his eye 
 from the instrument, as if to forbid her or anybody inter- 
 rupting him. 
 
 Pausing where she stood, the lady examined the aspect 
 of the individual who thus made himself so completely at 
 home on a building which she deemed her unquestioned 
 property. He was a youth who might properly have been 
 characterized by a word which the judicious chronicler would 
 not readily use in such a connection, preferring to reserve 
 it for raising images of the opposite sex. Whether because 
 no deep felicity is likely to arise from the circumstance, or 
 fiom any other reason, to say in these days that a youth is 
 beautiful is not to award him that amount of credit which 
 the expression would have carried with it if he had lived in 
 the times of the Classical Dictionary. So much, indeed, 
 is the reverse the case that the assertion creates an awk- 
 w.irdness in saying anything more about him. The beau- 
 t^fui y. luth usually verges so perilously on the incipient
 
 TIVO OiV A TOWER. J 
 
 coxcomb, who is about to become the Lothario or Juan 
 among the neighboring maidens, that, for the due under- 
 standing of our present joung man, his sublime innocence 
 of any thought concerning his own material aspect, or tha* 
 of others, is most fervently asserted, and must be as fer- 
 vently believed. 
 
 Such as he was, there the lad stood The sun shone 
 full in his face, and his hat was pushed aside for conven- 
 ience, disclosing a curly head of very light, shining hair, 
 which accorded well with the flush upon his cheek. He 
 had such a complexion as that with which Raphael en- 
 riches the countenance of the youthful son of Zacharias, 
 — a complexion which, though clear, is far enough re- 
 moved from virgin delicacy, and suggests plenty of sun 
 and wind as its accompaniment. His features were suf- 
 ficiently straight in the contours to correct the behold- 
 er's first impression that the head was the head of a girl. 
 Beside him stood a little oak table, and in front was the 
 tel -Scope. 
 
 His visitor had ample time to make these observations; 
 and she may have done so all the more keenly through 
 being herself of a totally opposite type. Her hair was 
 black as midnight, her eyes had no less deep a shade, and 
 her complexion showed the richness demanded as a sup 
 port to these decided features. As she continued to look 
 at the pretty fellow before her, apparently so far abstracted 
 into some speculative world as scarcely to need a real one, 
 a warmer wase of her warm temperament glowed visibly 
 through her, and a qualified observer might from this have 
 hazarded a guess that there was Southern blood, in her 
 veins.
 
 8 TIVO Oy A TOWER. 
 
 But even the interest attaching to the youth could not 
 arrest her attention forever, and as he made no further 
 signs of moving his eye from the instrument she broke 
 the silence with " What do you see ? — something happen 
 ing somewhere ? " 
 
 "Yes, quite a catastrophe," he automatically murmured, 
 without moving round. 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "A cyclone in the sun." 
 
 The lady paused as if to consider the doubtful weight 
 of that event in the scale of terrene life. "Will it make 
 anv difference to us, here.' " she asked. 
 
 The young man by this time seemed to be awakened to 
 the consciousness that somebody unusual was talking to 
 him, and he turned. 
 
 " 1 beg your pardon," he said. " I thought it was my 
 relative come to look after me. She often comes about 
 this time." 
 
 He continued to look at her and forget the sun, just 
 such a reciprocity of influence as might have been expected 
 between a dark lady and a flaxen-haired youth making 
 itself apparent in the faces of each. 
 
 "Don't let me interrupt your observations," said she. 
 
 "Ah, no," said he, again applying his eye; where jpon 
 ..is face lost the animation which her presence had lent ii, 
 and became immutable as that of a bust, though super- 
 adding to the serenity of repose, the sensitiveness of life. 
 The expression that settled on him was one of awe. Not 
 unaptly might it have been said that he was worshiping 
 the sun. Among the various intensities of that worship 
 which have prevailed since the first intelligent being saw
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. (^ 
 
 the luminary decline westward, as the young man now 
 beheld it doing, his was not the weakest. He was en- 
 gaged in what may be called a very chastened or schooled 
 ■or^a of that first and most natural of adorations. 
 
 ■■]5ut would }ou like to see it.^" he recommenced. 
 "It is an event that is v.itnessed only about once in two 
 .)r three years, though it may occur often enough." 
 
 She assented, and looked, and saw a whirling mass, in 
 the center of which the fiery globe seemed to be laid 
 bare to its core. It was a peep into a maelstrom of 
 lire, taking place where nobody had ever been or ever 
 would be. 
 
 "It is the strangest thing I ever beheld," she said. 
 Then he looked again; and, wondering who her compan- 
 ion could be, she asked, "Are you often here.' " 
 
 " ICvery night when it is not cloudy, and often in the 
 day. ■■ 
 
 "Ah, n'ght, of course. The heavens must be beauti- 
 ful f om this point." 
 
 " 1 hey are rather more than that." 
 
 "Indeed ! Have you entirely taken possession of this 
 column .' " 
 
 "Entirely." 
 
 ■' But it is my column," she said, with smiling asperity. 
 
 "Then are you Lady Constantine, wife of the absent 
 Sir Blount Constantine.-'" 
 
 " I am Lady Constantine." 
 
 " .Ml, then I agree that it is yours. But will you allow 
 ma to rent it of you for a time, Lady Constantine.' " 
 
 '• You have taken it, whether I allow it or not. IT)W- 
 ev.r, in the interests of science it is advisable that you con-
 
 lO TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 tinue your tenancy. Nobody knows you are here, I 
 
 suppose ? " 
 
 ' ' Hardly anybody. " 
 
 Me then took her down a few steps into the interior, 
 uid showed her some ingenious contrivances for stowing 
 iirticles away. " Nobody ever comes near the column, — 
 or, as it's called here, Rings-Hill Speer, " he continued; 
 "and when I first came up it nobody had been here for 
 thirty or forty years. The staircase was choked with daws' 
 nests and feathers, but I cleared them out." 
 
 " I understood the column was always kept locked .? " 
 
 "Yes, it has been so. When it was built, in 1782, the 
 key was given to m\- great-grandfather, to keep by him in 
 case visitors should happen to want it. He lived just 
 down there where I live now. " He denoted by a nod a 
 little dell lying immediately beyond the plowed land which 
 environed them. " He kept it in his bureau, and as the 
 bureau descended to my grandflither, my mother, and 
 m}'self, the key descended with it. After the first thirty 
 or forty years, nobody ever asked for it. One day I saw 
 it, lying rusty in its niche, ark J, finding that it belonged 
 to this column, I took it and came up. I stayed here till 
 it was dark, and the stars came out, and that night I re- 
 solved to be an astronomer. I came back here from 
 J .lioul three months ago, and I mean to be an astronomer 
 still.' He lowered his voice. "I aim at nothing less 
 thin the dignity and office of Astronomer-Royal, if I live. 
 Perhaps I shall not live." 
 
 " I don't see why you should suppose that. How long 
 are you going to make this your observatory ^ " 
 
 "About a year, — -till I have obt-tined a practical famil-
 
 Tiro ON A TOWER. II 
 
 iarity with the heavens. Ah, if I only had a good equa- 
 torial ! '' 
 
 "What is that?" 
 
 "A proper instrument for my pursuit. But time is 
 short, and science is infinite, — how infinite only those who 
 study astronomy fully realize, — and perhaps I shall be worn 
 out before I make my mark." 
 
 She seemed to be greatly struck with the odd mixture 
 in him of scientific earnestness and melancholy mistrust of 
 all things human. Perhaps it was owing to the nature of 
 his studies. "You are often on this tower alone at night.' " 
 she said. 
 
 "Yes; at this time of the year particularly, and while 
 there is no moon. I observe from seven or eight till about 
 two in the morning, with a view to my great work on va- 
 riable stars. But with such a telescope as this — well, I 
 must put up with it ! " 
 
 "Can you see Saturn's ring and Jupiter's moons.' " 
 
 He said dryly that he could manage to do that, not 
 without some contempt for the state of her knowledge. 
 
 "I have never seen any planet or star through a 
 telescope." 
 
 "If you will come the first clear night, Lady Con- 
 stantine, I will show you any number. I mean, at youi 
 express wish; not otherwise." 
 
 "I should like to come, and possibly may at some 
 time. These stars that vary so much — sometimes even- 
 ing stars, sometimes morning stars, sometimes in the 
 east, and sometimes in the west, — have always interested 
 me. 
 
 * ' Ah — now there is a reason for your not coming. Your
 
 12 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 ignorance of the realities of astronomy is so satisfactory that 
 I will not disturb it except at your serious request." 
 
 "But I wish to be enlightened." 
 
 " Let me caution you against it." 
 
 "Is enlightenment on iie subject, then, so terrible?' 
 
 "Yes, indeed." 
 
 She laughingly declared that nothing could have so 
 piqued her curiosity as his statement, and turned to de' 
 scend. He helped her down the stairs and through the 
 briers. He would have gone further, and crossed the open 
 corn-land with her, but she preferred to go alone. He 
 then retraced his way to the top of the column, but, in- 
 stead of looking longer at the sun, watched her diminish- 
 ing towards the distant fence, behind which waited the 
 carriage. When in the midst of the field, a dark spot on 
 an area of brown, there crossed her path a moving figure, 
 whom it was as difficult to distinguish from the earth he 
 trod as the caterpillar from its leaf, by reason of the excel- 
 lent match between his clothes and the clods. He was 
 one of a dying-out generation who retained the principle, 
 nearly unlearnt now, that a man's habiliments should be 
 in harmony with his environment. Lady Constantine and 
 this figure halted beside each other for some minutes; then 
 they went on their several ways. 
 
 The brown person wat a laboring man known to the 
 world of Welland as PLiymoss (the "worn" form of the 
 word Amos, to adopt the phrase of philologists). The 
 reason of the halt had been the following dialogue: — 
 
 Lady Constantine : "Who is that.' Amos Fry, I think." 
 
 Haymoss: "Yes, my lady; a homely barley driller, born 
 under the very eavesdroppings of your ladyship's smallest
 
 TWO ON A 7'OWRR. 1 3 
 
 outbuildings, in a manner of speaking,— though your 
 ladyship was neither born nor 'tempted at that time." 
 
 LadyC: "Who lives in the old house behind the 
 plantation ? " 
 
 H.: " Old Gammer Martin, my lady, and her grand- 
 son. 
 
 Lady C: " He has neither father nor mother, then?" 
 
 H. : " Not a single one, my lady." 
 
 Lady C. : "Where was he educated ? " 
 
 II. : "At Warborne, — a place where they draw up young 
 gam'sters' brains like rhubarb under a ninepenny pan, my 
 lady, excusing my common way. They hit so much lam- 
 ing into en that 'a could talk like the day of Pentecost; 
 which is a wonderful thing for a simple boy, and his moth- 
 er only the plainest ciphering woman in the world. War- 
 borne Grammar School — that's where 't was 'a went to. 
 His father, the reverent Pa'son St. Cleeve, made a terrible 
 bruckle hit in 's marrying, in the sight of the high. He 
 were the curate here, my lady, for a length o' time. " 
 
 Lad}' C. : " Oh, curate. It was before I knew the vil- 
 lage." 
 
 H. : "Ay, long and merry ago ! And he married Farm- 
 er- Martin's daughter, — Giles Martin, a limberish man, 
 who used to go rather bad upon his lags, if you can mind. 
 I knowed the man well enough: who should know en 
 better ! The maid was a poor windling thing, and, though 
 a playward piece o' flesh when he married her, 'a socked 
 and sighed, and went out like a snoff. Well, when 
 Pa'son St. Cleeve married this homespun woman the 
 toppermost folk wouldn't speak to his wife. Then he 
 dro])po(l a cuss or two, and said he'd no lontrer ge' his
 
 14 TfVO ON- A TOWER. 
 
 living by curing their twopenny souls o' such damn non- 
 sense as that (excusing my common way), and he took to 
 farming straightway, and then 'a dropped down dead in 
 a nor'west thunder-storm; it being said — hee-hee ! — that 
 Master God was in tantrums wi" en for leaving his service, 
 — hee-hee ! I give the story as I heard it, my lady, buf 
 be dazed if I believe in such trumpery behavior of the 
 fokes in the sky, nor anything else that's said about 'em. 
 Well, Swithin, the boy, was sent to the grammar school, 
 as I say for; but what with having two stations of life in 
 his blood, he's good for nothing, my lady. He mopes 
 about, — sometimes here, and sometimes there; nobody 
 troubles about en. " 
 
 Lady Constantine thanked her informant, and proceeded 
 onward. To her, as a woman, the most curious feature 
 in the afternoon's incident was that this lad, of striking 
 beauty, scientific attainments, and cultured bearing, should 
 be linked, on the maternal side, with a local agricultural 
 family, through his father's matrimonial eccentricity. A 
 more attractive feature in the case was that the same youth, 
 so capable of being ruined by flattery, blandishment, pleas- 
 ure, even gross prosperity, should be at present living on 
 in a primitive Eden of unconsciousness, with aims towards 
 whose accomplishment a Caliban shape would have been 
 as effective as his own.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OWITHIN ST. CLEEVE lingered on at his post, until 
 ^^ the more sanguine birds of the plantation, already 
 recovering from their midwinter consternation, piped a 
 short evening hymn to the vanishing sun. The landscape 
 was gently concave; with the exception of tower and hill, 
 there were no points on which late rays might linger; and 
 hence the dish-shaped ninety acres of tilled land assumed 
 a uniform hue of shade quite suddenly. The one or two 
 stars that appeared were quickly clouded over, and it was 
 soon obvious that there would be no sweeping the heaven? 
 that night. After tying a piece of tarpaulin, which hacJ 
 once seen service on his maternal grandfather's farm, over 
 all the apparatus around him, he went down the stairs in 
 the dark, and locked the door. With the key in his 
 pocket, he descended through the underwood on the side 
 of the slope opposite to that trodden by Lady Constantine, 
 ind crossed the field in a line mathematically straight, and 
 in a manner that left no traces, by keeping in the same 
 furrow all the way on tiptoe. In a few minutes he reached 
 a little dell, which occurred quite unexpectedly on the 
 other side of the field-fence, and descended to a venerable
 
 i6 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 thatched house, whose enormous roof, broken up by dor- 
 mers as big as haycocks, could be seen even in ihe twi- 
 light. Over the white walls, built of chalk in the lump, 
 outlines of creepers formed dark patterns, as if drawn in 
 charcoal. 
 
 Inside the house his maternal grandmother w?.s sitting 
 by a wood fire. Before it stood a pipkin, in which some- 
 ihing was evidently kept warm. An eight-legged oak 
 table in the middle of the room was laid for a meal. 
 This woman of eighty-three, in a large mob cap, under 
 which she wore a little cap to keep the other clean, re- 
 tained faculties but little blunted. She sat looking into 
 the fire, with her hands upon her knees, quietly re-enact- 
 ing in her brain certain of the long chain of episodes, pa- 
 thetic, tragical, and humorous, which had constituted the 
 parish history for the last sixty years. On Swithin's entry 
 she looked up at him in a sideway direction. 
 
 "You should not have waited for me, granny," he said. 
 
 " 'Tis of no account, my child. I've had a nap while 
 sitting here. Yes, I've had a nap, and was up in my old 
 country again, as usual. The place was as natural as when 
 I left it — e'en just threescore years ago. All the folks 
 and my old aunt were there, as when I was a child. — 
 'and when I awoke, behold it was a dream I' I suppose 
 if I were really to set out and go there, hardly a soul 
 would be left alive to say to me dog how art ! But tell 
 Hannah to stir her stumps and serve supper, — though I'd 
 fain do it myself, the poor old soul is getting so unhandy!" 
 
 Hannah revealed herself to be much nimbler and sev- 
 eral years younger than granny, though of this the latter 
 seemed to be oblivious. When the meal was nearly over
 
 Tft^O ON A TOWER. IJ 
 
 Mrs. Martin produced the contents of the mysterious ves- 
 sel by the lire, saying that she had caused it to be brought 
 in from the back kitchen, because Hannah was hardly 
 to be trusted witli such things, she was becoming so 
 childish. 
 
 "What is it, then.'" said Swithin. "Oh, one of your 
 special puddings. " At sight of it, however, he added re- 
 proachfully, " Now, granny ! " 
 
 Instead of being round it was in shape an irregular 
 bi ivlder that hail been exposed to the weather for centuries, 
 — a iittle scrap pared off here, and a little piece broken 
 away there; the general aim being, nevertheless, to avoid 
 destroying the symmetry of the pudding, while taking as 
 much as possible of its substance. 
 
 "The fact is," added Swithin, "the pudding is half 
 gone ! ' 
 
 "I've only sliced off the merest paring once or twice, to 
 taste if it was well done ! " pleaded granny INIartin, with 
 wounded feelings. "I said to Hannah, when she took it 
 up, ' Put it here to keep it warm, as there's a better fire 
 than in the back kitchen.'" 
 
 "Well, I am nut going to eat any of it ! " said Swithin 
 decisively, as he rose from the table, pushed away his chair, 
 and went upstairs; the other station of life that was in hi 
 blood, and had been brought out by the grammar school, 
 probably stimulating him. 
 
 "Ah, the world is an ungrateful city ! 'Twas a pity I 
 didn't go under ground and disappear from history sixty 
 years ago, instead of leaving my own country to come 
 here!" mourned old xAIrs. Martin. "But I told his 
 mother how 'twould be, — marrying so many notches
 
 i8 TIVO ON A TO WE a. 
 
 above her. The child was sure to chaw high, hke his 
 father. " 
 
 When Swithin had been upstairs a minute or two, how- 
 ever, he altered his mind, and, coming down again, ate 
 all the pudding, with the aspect of a person engaged in a 
 deed of great magnanimity. The relish with which he 
 did so restored the unison that knew no more serious in- 
 terruptions than such as this. 
 
 " ]\Ir. Torkingham has been here this afternoon,'" said 
 his grandmother; "and he wants me to let him meet some 
 of the choir here to-night fur practice. They who live at 
 this end of the parish won't go to his house to try over the 
 tunes, because 'tis so far, they say; and so 'tis, poor men. 
 So he's going to see what coming to them will do. He 
 asks if you would like to join." 
 
 " I w'ould if I had not so much to do." 
 
 "But it is cloudy to-night." 
 
 "Yes; but I have calculations without end, granny. 
 Now, don't you tell him I'm in the house, will you, and 
 then he'll not ask for me. " 
 
 "But if he should, must I then tell a lie, Lord forgive 
 me .' " 
 
 "No, you can say I'm upstairs; he must think what he 
 likes. Not a word about the astronomy to any of them, 
 whatever you do. I should be called a visionary, and all 
 sorts." 
 
 "So thou beest, child Why can't .ye do some'hing 
 that's of use " — 
 
 At the sound of footsteps Swithin beat a hasty retreat 
 upstairs, where he struck a light, and revealed a table cov- 
 ered with books and papers, while round the walls hung
 
 TWO ON A TOWER, 19 
 
 star-maps and other diagrams illustrative of celestial phe- 
 nomena. In a corner s ood a huge pasteboard tube, 
 which a close inspection would have shown to be in- 
 tended for a telescope. Suitl in hung a thick cloth over 
 the window in addition to the curtains, and sat dov\n to 
 his papers. On the ceil.ny was a black stain of smoke, 
 and under this he placed his lamp, evidencing that the 
 midr.ight oil was consumed on that precise spot pretty 
 often. 
 
 Meanwhile, there had entered to the room below a per- 
 sonage who, to judge from her voice and the quick pit-pat 
 of her feet, was a female, young and blithe. Mrs. Martin 
 welcomed her by the title of Miss Tabitha Lark, and in- 
 quired what wind had brought her that way; to which the 
 visitor replied that she had come for the singing. 
 
 "Oh, you are one of them .^ Sit ye down. And do 
 you still go to the House to read to my lady .' " 
 
 "Yes, I go and read; but as to getting my lady to 
 hearken, that's more than a team of six horses could force 
 her to do." The girl had a remarkably smart and fluent 
 utterance, which was probably a cause, or a consequence, 
 of her vocation. 
 
 "'Tis the same story, then.^" said grandmother Martin. 
 
 "Yes. Eaten out with listlessness. She's neither sick 
 nor sorry, but how dull and dreary she is, only herself can 
 tell. When [ get there in the morning, there she is sit- 
 ting up in bed, for my lady don't care to get up; and then 
 she makes me bring this book and that book, till the bed 
 is heaped up with immense volumes, that half bury her, 
 making her look, as she leans upon her elbow, like the 
 stoning of Stephen in the church-window. She yawnsj
 
 20 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 then she looks towards the tall glass; then she looks out 
 at the weather, mooning her great black eyes, and fixing 
 them on the sky as if they stuck there, while my tongue 
 s;oes flick-flack along, a hundred and fifty words a minute; 
 ;hen she looks at the clock; then she asks me what I've 
 been reading." 
 
 "Ah, poor soul!" said granny. "No doubt she says 
 in the morning, 'Would God it were evening,' and in the 
 evening, 'Would God it were morning,' like the disobedi- 
 ent woman in Deuteronomy." 
 
 Swithin, in the room overhead, had suspended his cal- 
 culations, for the dialogue interested him. There now 
 crunched heavier steps outside the door, and his grand- 
 mother could be heard greeting sundry representatives of 
 the bass and tenor voice, who lent a cheerful and well- 
 known personality to the names Sammy Blore, Nat Chap- 
 man, Hezekiah Biles, and Haymoss Fry (the latter being 
 one with whom the reader has already a distant acquaint- 
 ance); besides these came small producers of treble, who 
 had not yet developed into such distinctive units of society 
 as to require particularizing. 
 
 "Is the good man come.^ " asked Nat Chapman. "No, 
 —I see we are here afore him. And how is it with aged 
 »,'omen to-night, Mrs. ]\Iartin .•* " 
 
 ' ' Tedious traipsing enough with this one, Nat. Sit ye 
 down. Weil, little Freddy, you don't wish in the morn- 
 ing that 'twere evening, and at evening that 'twere morning 
 again, do you, Freddy, trust ye for it .'' " 
 
 "Now, who might wish such a thing as that, Mrs. 
 Martin i — nobody in this parish ! " asked Sammy Blore 
 curiously.
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 2i 
 
 "My lady is always wishing- it," spoke up Miss Tabilha 
 Lark. 
 
 "Oh, she! Nobody can be answerable for the wishes 
 of thai oniiatural class of mankind. Not but that the 
 woman's heart-strings is tied in many aggravating ways." 
 
 "Ah, poor woman!" said granny. "The state she 
 finds herself in — neither maid, wife, nor widow, as you 
 may say — is not the primest form of life for keeping in 
 good spirits. How long is it since she has heard from Sir 
 Blount, Tabitha?" 
 
 "Two years and mor'.,' said the \oung woman. " He 
 went into one side of Africa, as it might be, three St. Mar- 
 tin's days back. I can mind it, because 'twas my birth- 
 day. And he meant to come out the other side. But he 
 didn't. He has never com.e out at all." 
 
 "For all the world like losing a rat in a barley-mow," 
 said Hezekiah, glancing round for corroboration. " He's 
 lost, though you know where h.e is."' His comrades 
 nodded. "Ay, my lady is a v.-alking weariness, that's 
 plain. I seed her yawn ji;st at the very moment when 
 the fox was holloaed away by Harton Copse, and the 
 hounds ran him all but past her carriage wheels. If I 
 were she, I'd see a little life ; though there's no-fnir, club- 
 walking, nor feast, to speak of, till Easter week, — that's 
 true." 
 
 "She dares not. She's unfler solemn oath and testa- 
 ment to do no such thing." 
 
 " Be cust if I would keep any such oath and testament ! 
 But here's the pa'son, if my ears don't deceive me." 
 
 There w^as a noise of horse's hoofs without, a srumbling 
 against the door-scraper, a tethering to the window- shutter,
 
 2i 7'IVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 a creaking of the door on its hinges, and a voice whiCii 
 Swithin recognized as Mr. Torkingham's. He greeted 
 each of the previous arrivals by name, and stated that 1 e 
 was glad to see them all so punctually assembled. 
 
 "Ay, sir," said Haymoss Fry, " Tis only my jints tha 
 hive kept me from assembling myself long ago. I'd as 
 semble upon the top of Welland Steeple, if 'tweren't for 
 my jints. I assure ye, Pa'son Tarkengham, that in the 
 clitch o' my knees, where the rain used to come through, 
 when I was cutting clots for the new lawn, in old my 
 lady's time, 'tis as if rats were gnawing, every now and 
 then. When a fellow's young he's too small in the brain 
 to see how soon a constitution can be squandered, worse 
 luck ! " 
 
 ''True," said Biles, to fill the time while the parson 
 was engaged in finding the psalms. "A man's a fool till 
 he's forty. Often have I thought, when hay-pitching, and 
 the small of my back seeming no stouter than a harnet's. 
 ' The Lord send that I had but the making of laboring 
 men for a twelvemonth ! ' I'd gie every man jack tv.-o 
 good backbones, even if the alteration was as wrong as 
 forgery. " 
 
 "Four, — four backbones," said Haymoss, decisively. 
 
 "Yes, four," threw in Sammy Blore, with additional 
 weight of experience. "For you want one in front for 
 breastplowing and such like, one at the right side for 
 ground-dressing, and one at the left side for turning 
 mixens. " 
 
 "Well, four. Then next I'd move every man's wynd- 
 pipe a good span away from his glutch-pipe, so that al 
 harvest time he could fetch breathing in 's drinking, witii
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 23 
 
 out being choked and strangled as he is now. Thinks I, 
 when I feel the victuals going " — 
 
 "Now we'll begin," interrupted Mr. Turkingham, his 
 mind returning lo this world again on concludiig his 
 search for a hymn. 
 
 Thereupon the racket of chair-legs on the floor signifie'' 
 that they were settling into their seats, ---a disturbanc- 
 which Swithin took advantage of by going on tiptoe across 
 the lloor above, and putting sheets of paper over knot- 
 holes in the boarding at points where carpet was lacking, 
 that his lamp-light might not shine down. The absence 
 of a ceiling beneath rendered his position virtually that of 
 one suspended in the same apartment. 
 
 The parson announced the tune, and his voice burst 
 forth with "Onward, Christian soldiers!" in notes of rigid 
 cheerfulness. In this start, however, he was joined only 
 bv the girls and boys, the men furnishing but an accom- 
 paniment of ahas and hems. Mr. Torkingham stopped, 
 and Sammy Blore spoke: — 
 
 "Beg your pardon, sir, — if you'll deal mild with us a 
 moment. What with the wind and walking, my throat's 
 rough as a grater; and not knowing you were going to 
 hit up that minute, I hadn't hawked, and I don't think 
 Hezzy and Nat had, either, — had ye, souls .-' " 
 
 "I hadn't done it thoroughly, that's true," said Heze- 
 kiah. 
 
 "Quite right of you, then, to speak, " said Mr. Tork- 
 ingham. "Don't mind explaining; we are here for 
 practice. Now clear your throats, then, and at it 
 
 agam. 
 
 There was a noise, as of atmospheric hoes and scrapers,
 
 34 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 and the bass contingent at last got under way with a time 
 of its own. " Honwerd, Christen sojers ! " 
 
 "Ah, that's where wcare so defective, — the pronuncia- 
 tion," interrupted the parson. "Now repeat after me: 
 ' On-ward, Christ-ian, sol-diers.'" 
 
 The choir repeated hke an exaggerative echo: "On-wed, 
 Chris-ting, sol-jaws. " 
 
 " Better ! " said the parson, in the strenuously sanguine 
 tones of a man who got his living by discovering a bright 
 side in things where it was not very perceptible to other 
 people. "But it should not be given with quite so ex- 
 treme an accent; or we may be called affected by other 
 parishes. And Nathaniel Chapman, there's a jauntiness in 
 )f)ur manner of singing which is not quite becoming. 
 Why don't you sing more earnestly .'' " 
 
 "My conscience won't let me, sir," said Nat. "They 
 say every man for himself; but, thank God, I'm not so 
 mean as to lessen old folkes' chances by singing earnest in 
 the prime o' life." 
 
 "It's bad reasoning, Nat, I fear. Now, perhaps we had 
 better sol-fa the tune. Eyes on your books, please. Sol- 
 sol! /a-/a/ mi" — 
 
 "I can't sing like that, not I!" said Sammy Blore, 
 with coodemnatory astonishment. " I can sing genuine 
 music, like F and G; but not anything so much out of 
 the order of nature as that." 
 
 "Perhaps you've brought the wrong book, sir? "chimed 
 in liaymoss kindly. "I've knowed music early iii life. 
 and late, —in short, ever since Luke Sneap broke his new 
 fiddle bow in the wedding-psalm, when Pa'son Wilton 
 brought home his bride (you can mind the time, Samm} .•
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 25 
 
 — at ' His wife, like a fair fertile vine, her lovely fruit shall 
 bring,' when the young woman turned as red as a rose, 
 not knowing 'twas coming). I've knowed music ever 
 since then, I say, sir, and never heard the like o' that. 
 Every martel note had his name of A, B, C, at that time 
 ind since. ' 
 
 ' Ves, yes, — but this is a more recent system.'' 
 
 "Still, you can't alter a old established note that's A or 
 B by nater," rejoined Haymoss, with yet deeper conviction 
 that Mr. Torkingham was getting off his head. "Now 
 sound A, neighbor Sammy, and let's have a slap at Chris- 
 ten sojers again. " 
 
 Sammy produced a private tuning-fork, black and grimy, 
 which, being about seventy years of age, and wrought be- 
 fore pianoforte builders had sent up the pitch to make their 
 instruments brilliant, was nearly a note fkitlcr than the 
 parson's. While an argument as to the true pitch was in 
 progress, there came a knocking without. 
 
 " Somebody's at the door ! " said a little treble girl. 
 
 "Thought 1 heard a knock before ! " said the relieved 
 choir. 
 
 The latch was lifted, and a man asked from the dark' 
 ness, "Is Mr. Torkingham here.?" 
 
 "Yes, ]\Iills. What do you want .^ " It was the par- 
 son's man. 
 
 "Oh, if you please," says Mills, showing an advanced 
 margin of hmiself round the door. "Lady Constantine 
 wants to see you very particular, sir, and could you call 
 on her after dinner, if you ben't engaged with fokes.'' She's 
 just had a letter, — so they say, — and it's about that, I 
 believe. "
 
 26 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 YiviAiVi'^, im looking at his watch, that it was necessaiy 
 to start at once if he meant to see her that night, the par- 
 son cut short the practicing, and, naming another night 
 for meeting, he withdrew. All the singers assisted him on 
 to his cob, and watched him till he disappeared over the 
 edge of the glen.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A /TR. TORKINGHAM trotted briskly onward to his 
 ■^*-*- hous3, a distance of about a mile, each cottage, as 
 it revealed its half-buried position by its single light, ap- 
 pearing like a one-eyed night creature watching him from 
 an ambush. Leaving his horse at the parsonage, he per- 
 formed the remainder of the journey on foot, crossing the 
 park towards Welland House by a stile and path, till he 
 struck into the drive near the north door of the mansion. 
 This drive, it may be remarked, was also the common 
 highway to the lower village, and hence Lady Constantine's 
 residence and park, as is often the case with old-fashioned 
 manors, possessed none of the exclusiveness often found 
 in newer aristocratic settlements. The parishioners looked 
 upon the park avenue as their natural thoroughfare, par- 
 ticularly for christenings, weddings, and funerals, which 
 passed the squire's mansion with due considerations as to 
 the scenic effect of the same from the manor windows. 
 Hence the house of Constantine, when going out from its 
 breakfast, had been continually crossed on the doorstep, 
 for the last two hundred years, by the houses of Hodge 
 and Giles in full cry to, dinner. At present these collis-
 
 zS TIVO OM A TOWER. 
 
 ions were but too infrequent, for though the villagers 
 passed the north front door as regularly as ever, they sel- 
 dom met a Constantine. Only one was there to be met, 
 and she had no zest for outings before noon. 
 
 The long, low front of the Great House, as it was called 
 by the parishioners, stretching from end to end of the ter- 
 race, was in darkness as the vicar slackened his pace be 
 fore it, and only the distant fall of water disturbed the still- 
 ness of the manorial precincts. 
 
 On gaining admittance he found Lady Constantine wait- 
 ing tct receive him. She wore a heavy dress of veWet and 
 lace, and, being the only person in the spacious apart- 
 ment, she looked small and isolated. In her left hand 
 she held a letter and a couple of at-home cards. The soft 
 dark eyes which she raised to him as he entered — large, 
 and melancholy by circumstance far more than by quality 
 — were the natural indices of a warm and affectionate, 
 perhaps slightly voluptuous, temperament, languishing foi 
 want of something to do, cherish, or suffer for. 
 
 JMr. Torkingham seated himself His boots, which l;ad 
 seemed elegant in the farm-house, appeared rather clums)' 
 here, and his coat, that was a model of tailoring when he 
 stood amid the choir, now exhibited. decidedly strange rela- 
 tions with his limbs. Three years had passed since his 
 induction to the living of Welland, but he had never as 
 yet found means to establish that relationship with Lady 
 Constantine which usually grows up, in the ccurse of time, 
 between parsonage and manor-house, — unless, indeed, 
 either side should surprise the other by showing a weak- 
 ness for awkward modern ideas on land-ownership or church 
 formulas respectively, which had not been the case here.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 29 
 
 The present meeting, however, seemed likely to initiate 
 such a relationship. 
 
 There was an appearance of confidence on Lady Con- 
 Stantine's face; she said she was so very glad that he had 
 come; and, looking down at the letter in her hand, she 
 was on the point of pulling it from its envelope, but she 
 did not. After a moment she went on more quickly: "I 
 wanted your advice, or rather your opinion, on a serious 
 matter,— on a point of conscience." Saying which, she 
 laid down the letter and looked at the cards. 
 
 It might have been apparent to a more penetrating eye 
 than the vicar's, that Lady Constant! ne, either from timidity, 
 misgiving, or reconviction, had swerved from her intended 
 communication, or perhaps decided to begin at the other 
 
 end. 
 
 The parson, who had been expecting a question on 
 some local business or intelligence, at the tenor of her 
 words altered his face to the higher branch of his profession. 
 
 "I hope I may find myself of service, on that or any 
 other question," he said gendy. 
 
 ' ' I hope so. You may possibly be aware, Mr. Tork- 
 ingham, that my husband. Sir Blount Constantine, was, 
 not to mince matters, a mistaken — somewhat jealous man. 
 Yet you may hardly have discerned it in the short time 
 you knew him. " 
 
 ' I had soTne little knowledge of Sir Blount's character 
 in that respect. " 
 
 "Well, on this account my married life with him was 
 not of the most comfortable kind." (Lady Constantine's 
 voice dropped to a more pathetic note.) "I am sure I 
 gave him no cause for suspicion; though had I known
 
 50 TtVO OJV A TOWER. 
 
 his disposition sooner I should hardly have dared to 
 marry him. But his jealousy and doubt of me were not 
 so strong as to divert him from a purpose of his, — a mania 
 for African lion-hunting, which he dignified by calling it 
 a scheme of geographical discovery; for he was inordi- 
 nately anxious to make a name for himself in that field. 
 It was the one passion that was stronger than his mistrust 
 of me. Before going away he sat down with me in this 
 room, and read me a lecture, which resulted in a very 
 rash offer on my part. When I tell it to you, you will 
 find that it provides a key to all that is unusual in my life 
 here. He bade me consider what my position would be 
 when he was gone; hoped that I should remember what 
 was due to him, — that I would not so behave toward? 
 other men as to bring the name of Constantine into sus- 
 picion; and charged me to avoid levity of conduct ir 
 attending any ball, rout, or dinner to which I miglit bo 
 invited. I, in some indignation at his low opinion n\ 
 me, responded perhaps too spiritedly. I volunteered, 
 there and then, to live like a cloistered nun during his 
 absence; to go into no society whatever, — not even to a 
 neighbor's dinner-party; and demanded bitterly if ihat 
 would satisfy him. He said yes, instantly held me to my 
 word, and gave me no loop-hole for retracting it. The 
 inevitable fruits of precipitancy have resulted to me: my 
 life has become a burden. I get such invitations as these" 
 (holding up the cards), "but I so invariably refuse them 
 that they are getting very rare. ... I ask you, Can I 
 honestly break that promise to my husband .? " . 
 
 Mr. Torkingham seemed embarrassed. "If you prom- 
 ised Sir Blount Constantine to live in solitude till he comes
 
 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 31 
 
 back, you are, it seems to me, bound by that promise. 1 
 fear that the wish to be released from your engagement is 
 to some extent a reason why it should be kept. But your 
 own conscience would surely be the best guide, Lady 
 Constanline ! " 
 
 "My conscience is disordered with the sense of its re- 
 sponsibilities," she continued, with a sigh. " Yet it cer- 
 tainly does sometimes say to me that — that I ought to keep 
 my word. Very well; I must go on as I am going, I 
 suppose. " 
 
 "If you respect a vow, -I think }ou must respect your 
 own," said the parson, acquiring some further firmness. 
 " Had it been wrung from you by compulsion, moral or 
 physical, it would have been open to you to break it. But 
 as you proposed a vow when your husband only required 
 a good intention, I think you ought to adhere to it; or 
 what is the pride worth that led you to offer it } " 
 
 "Very well," she said, with resignation. "But it was 
 quite a work of supererogation on my part. " 
 
 "That you proposed it in a supererogatory spirit does 
 not lessen your obligation, having once put yourself under 
 that obligation. St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Hebrews, 
 says, 'An oath for confirmation is an end of all strife.' 
 A.nd you will readily recall the words of Ecclesiastes: 'Pay 
 that which thou hast vowed. Better is it that thou should- 
 est not vow than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.' 
 Why not write to Sir Blount, tell him the inconvenience 
 of such a bond, and ask him to release you } " 
 
 "No; never will I. The expression of such a desire 
 would, in his mind, be a sufficient reason for disallowing 
 it. I'll keep my word. "
 
 32 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Mr. Torkingham rose to leave. After she had held out 
 her hand to him, when he had crossed the room, and was 
 within two steps of the door, she said. "Mr. Torkingham." 
 He stopped. " What I have told you is not what I sent 
 .or you to tell you. " 
 
 Mr. Torkingham walked back to her side. " What is 
 it, tlien .' "" he asked, with grave surprise. 
 
 "It is a true revelation, as far as it goes; but there is 
 something more. I have received this letter, and I wanted 
 to sav — something." 
 
 "Then sav it now, mv dear ladv. '" 
 
 "No,"' .--he answered, with a look of distress. "I can- 
 not speak of it now ! Some other time. Don't stay. 
 Please consider Uiis conversation as private. Good-night."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TT was a bright starlight night, a week or ten days later. 
 
 "*■ There had been several such nights since the occasion 
 of Lady Constantine's promise to Swithin St. Cleeve to 
 come and study astronomical phenomena on the Rings- 
 Hill column; but she had not gone there. This evening 
 she sat at a window, the blind of which had not been 
 drawn down. Her elbow rested on a little table, and her 
 cheek on her hand. Her eyes were attracted by the 
 brightness of the planet Jupiter, as he rode in the ecliptic 
 opposite, beaming down upon her as if desirous of 
 notice. 
 
 Beneath the planet could be still discerned the dark 
 edges of the park landscape against the sky. As one of 
 its features, though nearly screened by the trees which 
 had been planted to shut out the fallow tracts of the estate, 
 rose the upper part of the column. It was hardly visible 
 now, even if visible at all; yet Lady Constantine knew 
 from day-time experience its exact bearing from the win- 
 dow at wliich she leaned. The knowledge that there it 
 still was, despite its rapid envelopment by the shades, led 
 her ion y !iii i 1 lo her late meeting on its summit with
 
 34 TIVO ON" A TOWER. 
 
 the young astronomer, and to her promise to honor him 
 with a visit for learning some secrets about the scintilla- 
 ting bodies overhead. The curious juxtaposition of youth- 
 ful ardor and old despair that she had found in the lad 
 would have made him interesting to a woman of percep- 
 tion, apart from his fair hair and early-Christian face. But 
 such is the heightening touch of memory that his beauty 
 was probably richer in her imagination than in the real. 
 It was a moot point to consider whether the temptations 
 that would be brought to bear upon him in his course 
 would exceed the static power of his nature to resist. Had 
 he been a rich youth, he would have seemed one to tremble 
 for. In spite of his attractive ambitions and gentlemanly 
 bearing, she thought it would possibly be better for him 
 if he never became known outside his lonely tower, — for- 
 getting that he had received such intellectual enlargement 
 as would make his continuance in Welland seem, in his 
 own eye, a slight upon his father's branch of his family, 
 the social standing of which had been, only a few years 
 earlier, but little removed from her own. 
 
 Suddenly she flung a cloak about her and went out on 
 the terrace. An altogether new idea plainly possessed her. 
 She went down the steps to the lower lawn, through the 
 door to the open park, and there stood still. The tower 
 was now discernible. As the words in which a thought is 
 expressed develop a further thought, so did the fact of her 
 having got so far influence her to go further. A perst»n 
 who had casually observed her gait would have thought it 
 irregular; the lessenings and increasings of speed with 
 which she proceeded in the direction of the pillar could be 
 accounted for only by a motive mu.li nioio disturbing
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 35 
 
 than an intention to look through an astronomical tele- 
 scope. Thus she went on, till, leaving the park, she 
 crossed the turnpike road, and entered the large field, in 
 the middle of which the fir-clad hill stood like Wont 
 St. Michel in its bay. 
 
 The stars were so bright as distinctly to show her the 
 [)laco, and now she could see a faint light at the top of 
 the column, which rose like a shadowy finger pointing 
 to the upper constellations. There was no wind, in a 
 human point of view; but a steady stertorous breathing 
 from the fir-trees showed that, now as always, there was 
 movement in apparent stagnation. Nothing but an ab- 
 solute vacuum could paralyze their utterance. 
 
 The door of the tower was shut. It was something 
 more than the freakishness that is engendered by a sick- 
 , ening monotony which had led Lady Constantine thus 
 far, and hence she made no ado about admitting herself. 
 Three years ago, when her every action was a thing of 
 propriety, she had known of no possible purpose which 
 could have led her abroad in a manner such as this. 
 
 She ascended the tower noiselessly. On raising her 
 head above the hatchway she beheld Swithin bending over 
 a scroll of paper which lay on the little table beside him. 
 The small lantern that illuminated it showed also that he 
 was warmly wrapped up in a coat and thick ca[), behind 
 him standing the telescope on its frame. What was he 
 doing.' She looked over his shoulder upon the paper, 
 and saw figures and signs. When he had jotted down 
 something, he went to the telescope again. 
 
 "What a,re you doing, to,-uight.'" she said in a lo\Sf 
 voice.
 
 36 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Swithin stalled, and turned. The faint lamp-light was 
 sufficient to reveal her face to him. 
 
 " " Tedious work, Lady Constantine," he answered, with- 
 out betraying much surprise. "Doing my best to watch 
 phenomenal stars, as I may call them. " 
 
 "You said you would show me the heavens, if I could 
 come on a starlight night. I have come." 
 
 Swithin, as a preliminary, swept round the telescope to 
 Jupiter, and exhibited to her the glory of that orb. Then 
 he directed the instrument to the less bright shape of Sat- 
 urn. " Here," he .said, warming up to the subject, "we 
 see a woild which is to my mind by far the most wonder- 
 ful in the solar system. Think of streams of satellites or 
 meteors racing round and round the planet like a fly- 
 wheel, so close together as to seem solid matter ! " He 
 entered further and further into the subject, his ideas gath- 
 ering momentum as he went on, like his pet heavenly 
 bodies. 
 
 When this yellow-haired laddie paused for breath, she 
 said, in tones very different from his own, "I ought now 
 to tell you that, though I am interested in the stars, they 
 were not what I came to see }ou about. They were only 
 an excuse fur coming. I first thought of disclosing the 
 matter to Mr. Torkingham; but I altered my mind, and 
 decided on you." 
 
 She spoke in so low a voice that he might not have 
 heard her. At all events, abstracted by his grand theme, 
 he-did not heed her. He continued, — 
 
 "We^l, we will get outside the solar system altogether, 
 leave the whole group of sun, primary, and secondary 
 planets quite behind us in our flight, as a bird might
 
 TtVO OJV A TOWER. 37 
 
 leave its bush and sweep into the whole forest. Now what 
 do you see, Lady Constantine ? " He leveled the achro- 
 matic at Sirius. 
 
 She said that she saw a bright star, though it only 
 seemed a point of light now as before. 
 
 "That's because it is so distant that no magnifying will 
 bring its size up to zero. Though called a fixed star, it 
 is, like all fixed stars, moving with inconceivable velocity; 
 but no magnifying will show that velocity as anything but 
 rest. " 
 
 And thus they talked on about Sirius, and then about 
 other stars 
 
 . . . in the scrowl 
 Of all those beasts, and fish, and fowl, 
 With which, like Indian plantations, 
 • The learned stock the constellations, 
 
 * 
 
 till he asked her how many stars she thought were visible 
 to them at that moment. 
 
 She looked around over the magnificent stretch of sky 
 that their high position unfolded. "Oh, thousands, — 
 hundreds of thousands," she said absently. 
 
 "No. There are only abuut three thousand. Now, 
 how many do you think are brought within sight by the 
 help of a powerful telescope t " 
 
 " I won't guess." 
 
 "Twenty millions. So that, whatever the stars were 
 made for, they wltc not made to please our eyes. It is 
 just the same in everything; nothing is made for man." 
 
 "Is it that notion which makes you so sad for your 
 age.?" she asked, w.ih almost maternal solicitude. "I
 
 38 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 think astronomy is a bad study for you. It makes you 
 feel human insignificance too plainly." 
 
 "Perhaps it does. However," he added more cheer- 
 fully, "though I feel the study to be one almost tragic in 
 its quality, I hope to be the new Copernicus. What he 
 was to the solar system I aim to be to the systems beyond." 
 Then, by means of the instrument at hand, they traveled 
 together from the earth to Uranus and the mysterious out- 
 skirts of the solar system; from the solar system to "61 
 Cv2-ni," the nearest fixed star in the northern sky; from 
 "61 Cygni" to remoter stars; thence to the remotest vis- 
 ible, till the ghastly chasm which they had bridged by a 
 fragile line of sight was realized by Lady Constantine. 
 
 "We are now traversing distances beside which the im- 
 mense Ime stretching from the earth to the sun is but an 
 invisible point," said the youth. "When, just now, «'e 
 had reached a planet whose remoteness is a hundred times 
 the remoteness of the sun from the earth, we were only 
 a two thousandth part of the journey to the spot at which 
 we have optically aimed now." 
 
 "Oh, pray don't; it overpowers me ! " she replied, not 
 without seriousness. "It makes me feel that it is not 
 * worth while to live; it quite annihilates me." 
 
 "If it annihilates your ladyship to roam over these 
 yawning spaces just once, think how it must annihilate 
 me to be, as it were, in constant suspension amid them 
 night after night.'' 
 
 "Yes. It was not really this subject that I came to 
 see you upon, INIr. St. Cleeve," she began a second time. 
 "It was a persona,l matter. " 
 
 ' I am listening, Lad}- Constantine,'"
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 39 
 
 "I will lellityuu. Vet no, — not this moment. Let 
 us finish this grand subject first; it dwarfs mine. " It would 
 have been difficult to judge from her accents whether she 
 were afraid to broach her own matter, or really interested 
 in his. Or a certain youthful pride that he evidenced at 
 being the elucidator of such a large theme, and at having 
 drawn her there to hear and observe it, may have inclined 
 her to indulge him for kindness' sake. 
 
 Thereupon he took exception to her use of the word, 
 "grand" as descriptive of the actual universe. "The 
 imaginary picture of the sky as the concavity of a dome 
 whose base extends from horizon to horizon of our earth 
 is grand, simply grand, and I wish I had never got beyond 
 looking at it in that way. But the actual sky is a horror." 
 
 "A new view of our old friends, the stars," she said, 
 smiling up at them. 
 
 "But such an obviously true one ! You would hardly 
 think, al first, that horrid monsters lie up there," said the 
 young man, " waiting to be discovered by any moderately 
 penetrating mind, — monsters to which those of the oceans 
 bear no sort of comparison. " 
 
 " What monsters may they be } '' 
 
 "The monsters called Immensities. Until a person has 
 thought out the stars and their interspaces, he has hardly 
 learnt that there are things much more terrible than mon- 
 sters of shape, namely, monsters of magnitude without 
 known shape. Such monsters are the voids and waste 
 places of the sky. Look, for instance, at those pieces of 
 darkness in the jNIilky Way," he went on, pointing with 
 his finger to where the galaxy stretched across over their 
 heads with the luinin.Qusness of a frosted web.^ " You se^
 
 40 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 that dark opening in it near the Swan ? There is a stul 
 more remarkable one south of the equator, called the Coal 
 Sack, as a sort of nickname that has a farcical force from 
 its very inadequacy. In these our sight plunges quite be- 
 yond any twinkler we have yet visited. Those are deep 
 wells for the human mind to let itself down into, leave 
 alone the human body! and think of the side caverns and 
 secondary abysses to nght and left as you pass on." 
 
 Lady Constantine was seriously impressed. 
 
 He tried to give her yet another idea of the size of the 
 universe; never was there a more ardent endeavor to bring 
 down the immeasurable to human comprehension ! By 
 figures of speech and apt comparisons he took her mind 
 into leading-strings, compelling her to follow him into wil- 
 dernesses of which she had never in her life even realized 
 the existence. "There is a size at which dignity begins," 
 he exclaimed: "further on there is a size at which gran- 
 deur begins; further on there is a size at which solemnity 
 begins; further on, a size at which awfulness begins; fur- 
 ther on, a size at which ghastiiness begins. That size 
 faintly approaches the size of the stellar universe. So am 
 I not right in saying that those minds who exert their im- 
 aginative powers to bury themselves in the depths of that 
 universe merely strain their faculties to gain a new horror? ' 
 
 Standing, as she stood, in the presence of the stellar uni- 
 verse, under the very eyes of the constellations, Lady Con- 
 stantine apprehended something of the argument. 
 
 "And to add a new weirdness to what the sky possesses 
 in its size and formlessness, there is added the quality of 
 aecay. For all the wonder of these everlasting stars, eter- 
 nal spheres, and what not, they are not everlasting, they
 
 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 41 
 
 are not eternal; they burn out like candles. You see that 
 dying one in the body of the Great Bear ? Two centuries 
 ago it was as bright as the others. The senses may be- 
 come terrified by plunging among them as they are, but 
 there is a pitifulness even in their glory. Imagine them 
 all extinguished, and your mind feeling its way through 
 a heaven of total darkness, occasionally striking against 
 the black, invisible cinders of those stars. ... If you 
 are cheerful, and wish to remain so, leave the study of 
 astronomy alone. Of all the sciences, it alone deserves 
 the character of the terrible. ' 
 
 " I am not altogether cheerful." 
 
 "Then, if, on the other hand, you are restless, worried 
 by your worldly affairs, and anxious about the future, 
 study astronomy at once. Your troubles will be reduced 
 amazingly. But \our study will reduce them in a singular 
 way. By reducing the importance of everything. So that 
 the science is still terrible even as a panacea. It is quite 
 impossible to think at all adequately of the sky, of what 
 the sky substantially is, without feeling it as a juxtaposed 
 nightmare, which it is better for men to forget than to 
 bear clearly in mind. But you say the stars were not 
 really what you came to see me about. What was it, 
 may I ask. Lady Constantine }" 
 
 She mused, and sighed, and turned to him with some- 
 thing of the pathetic in her mien. "The immensity of 
 the subject you have engaged me on has completely crushed 
 my subject out of me. Yours is celestial; mine, lament- 
 ably human ! And the less must give way to the greater." 
 
 "But is it, in a human sense, and apart from macro- 
 Cosrnic magnitudes, important.?" he inquired, at last at-
 
 42 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 traded by her manner; for he began to perceive, in spue 
 of his prepossession, that she had really something on her 
 mind. 
 
 " It is as important as personal troubles usually are." 
 
 Notwithstanding her preconceived notion of coming to 
 Swithin as employer to dependent, as chatelaine to page, 
 she was falling into confidential intercourse with him. 
 His vast and romantic endeavors lent him a personal 
 force and charm which she could not but apprehend. In 
 the presence of the immensides that his young mind had 
 as it were, brought down from above to hers, they becan e 
 uncon.sciously equal. There was, moreover, an inborn 
 liking in Lady Constantine to dwell less on her permanent 
 position as a county lady than on her passing emotions 
 as a woman. 
 
 "I will postpone the matter I came to charge you with," 
 she resumed, smiling. "I must reconsider it. Now I 
 will return." 
 
 ''Allow me to show you out through the trees and 
 across the field } " 
 
 She said neither a distinct yes nor no; and, descending 
 the tower, they threaded the firs and crossed the plowed 
 field. By an odd coincidence he remarked, when they 
 drew near the Great House, " You may possibly be inter- 
 esteil in knowing, Lady Constantine, that that medium- 
 sized star you see over there, low down in the south, is 
 precisely over Sir Blount Constantine's head in the middle 
 of Africa. " 
 
 " How very strange that you should have said so ! " she 
 answered. ' ' You have broached for me the very subject 
 1 had com.e to speak of. "
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 43 
 
 "On a domestic matter?" he said, with surprise. 
 
 "Yes. What a small matter it seems now, after our 
 astronomical stupendousness ! and yet on my \va}- to you 
 it so far transcended the ordinary matters of my life as the 
 subject you have led me up to transcends this. But," 
 with a little laugh, " I will endeavor to sink down to such 
 ephemeral trivialities as human tragedy, and explain, since 
 I have come. The point is, I want a helper: no woman 
 ever wanted one more. For days I have wanted a trusty 
 friend who couUl go on a secret errand for me. It is 
 necessary that my messenger should be educated, should 
 be intelligent, should be silent as the grave. Do you give 
 me your solemn promise as to the last point, if I confide 
 in you ? " 
 
 " Most emphatically, Lady Constantine." 
 
 "Your right hand upon the compact." 
 
 He gave his hand, and raised hers to his lips. In addi- 
 tion to his respect for her as the lady of the manor, there 
 was the admiration of eighteen years for twenty-six in such 
 relations. 
 
 "I trust you," she said. "Now, beyond the above 
 conditions, it was specially necessary that my agent should 
 have known my husband well by sight when he was at 
 home. For the errand is concerning my husband; I am 
 much disturbed at what I have heard about him." 
 
 " I am indeed sorry to know it." 
 
 "There are only two people in the parish who fulfill all 
 the conditions, — Mr. Torkingham, and yourself I sent 
 for Mr. Torkingham, and he came. I could not tell him. 
 I felt at the last moment that he wouldn't do. I have 
 come to you because I think you will do. This is it: my
 
 44 rtVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 husband has led me and all the world to believe that he is 
 in Africa, hunting lions. I have had a mysterious letter 
 informing me that he has been seen in London, in very 
 peculiar circumstances. The truth of this I want ascer- 
 tained. Will you go on the journey } " 
 
 "Personally, I would go to the end of the world for 
 you, Lady Constantine; but " — 
 
 "No buts!" 
 
 ' ' How can I leave ? " 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "I am preparing a work on variable stars. There is 
 one of these which I have exceptionally observed for sev- 
 eral months, and on this my great theory is mainly based. 
 It has been hitherto called irregular; but I have detected 
 a periodicity in its so-called irregularities which, if proved, 
 would add some very valuable facts to those known on 
 this subject, one of the most interesting, perplexing, and 
 suggestive in the whole field of astronomy. Now, to 
 clinch my theory, there should be a sudden variation this 
 week — or at latest next week, — and I have to watch ever}' 
 night not to let it pass. You see my reason for declin- 
 ing, Lady Constantine. " 
 
 " Young men are always so selfish ! '' she said. 
 
 "It might ruin the whole of my year's labor if I leave 
 now!" returned the youth, greatly hurt. "Could you 
 not wait a fortnight longer.'"' 
 
 "No, — no. Don't think that I have asked you, pray. 
 I have no wish to inconvenience you." 
 
 " I>ady Constantine, don't be angry with me! Will 
 you do this, — watch the star for me while I am gone? 
 If you are prepared to do it effectually, I will go. "
 
 TWO OAT A roWER. 45 
 
 "Will it be much trouble?" 
 
 "It will De some trouble. You would have to come 
 here every clear evening about nine. If the sky were not 
 clear, then you would have to come at four in the morn- 
 ing, should the clouds have dispersed." 
 
 "Could not the telescope be brought to my hou.se.?" 
 
 Swi'thin shook his head. "Perhaps you did not ob- 
 serve its real size,— that it was fixed to a frame-work.' 
 I could not afford to buy an equatorial, and I have been 
 obliged to rig up an apparatus of my own devising, so 
 as to make it in some measure answer the purpose of 
 an equatorial. It could be moved, but I would rather 
 not touch it." 
 
 "Well, I'll go to the telescope," she went on, with an 
 emphasis that was not wholly playful. "You are the 
 most ungallant youth I ever met with; but I suppose I 
 must set that down to science. Yes, I'll go to the tower 
 at nine every night. " 
 
 "And alone? I should prefer to keep my pursuits 
 there unknown." 
 
 "And alone," she answered, quite overborne by his 
 inflexibility. 
 
 "You will not miss the morning observation, if it 
 should be necessary ? " 
 
 ' ' I have given my word. " 
 
 "And I give mine. I suppose I ought not to have 
 been so exacting I " He spoke with that sudden emo- 
 tional consciousness of his own transitoriness which made 
 these alternations of mood possible. "I will go any- 
 where — do anything for you — this moment — to-mor- 
 row, or at anv time. 'But vou must return with me
 
 46 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 to the tower, and let me show you the observing 
 process. " 
 
 They retraced their steps, the tender hoar-frost taking 
 the imprint of their feet, and two stars in the Twins look- 
 ing down upon their two persons through the trees, as 
 if those two persons could bear some sort of comparison 
 with them. On the tower the instructions were given. 
 When all was over, and he was again conducting her to 
 the Great House, she said, "When can you start.?" 
 
 "Now," said Swithin. 
 
 "So much the better. You shall go up by the night 
 mail."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ON the third morning after the young man's departure, 
 Lady Constantine opened the post-bag anxiously. 
 Though she had risen before four o'clock, and crossed to 
 the tower through the gray half-light, when every blade 
 and twig was furred with rime, she felt no languor. Ex- 
 pectation could banish at cockcrow the eye-heaviness which 
 apathy had been unable to disperse all the day long. 
 
 There was, as she had hoped, a letter from Swithin St. 
 Cleeve. 
 
 Dear Lady Constantine, — I have quite succeeded in my mis- 
 sion, and shall return to-morrow at ten P. M. I hope you have not 
 failed in the observations. Watching the star through an opera-glass 
 Sunday night, I fancied some change had taken place, but I could 
 not make myself sure. Your memoranda for that night I await with 
 impatience. Please don't neglect to write down, at the moment, all 
 remarkable appearances both as to color and intensity; and be very 
 exact as to time, which correct in the way I showed you. 
 
 I am, dear Lady Constantine, 
 Yours most faithfully, 
 
 Swithin St. Cleeve. 
 
 Not another word in the letter about his errand; his 
 m'.nd ran on nothing but this astronomical subject. He
 
 48 TIVO OM A TOWER. 
 
 hai.i succeeded in his mission, and yet he did not even say 
 ves or no to the great question, — whether or not her hus- 
 band was masquerading in London at the address she had 
 given. " Was ever anything so provoking ! " she cried. 
 
 However, "the time was not long to wait. His way 
 homeward would lie within a stone's-throw of the manor- 
 house, and though for certain reasons she had forbidden 
 him to call at the late houi of his arrival, she could easily 
 intercept him in the avenue. At twenty minutes past ten 
 she went out into the drive, and stood in the dark. Seven 
 minutes later she heard his footstep, and saw his outline in 
 the slit of light between the avenue-trees. He had a valise 
 in one hand, a great-coat on his arm, and under his arm 
 a parcel which seemed to be very precious, from the man- 
 ner in which he held it. 
 
 " Lady Constantine? " he asked softly. 
 
 "Yes," she said, in her excitement holding out both 
 her hands, though he had plainly not expected her to offer 
 one. 
 
 ' ' Did you watch the star } " 
 
 "I'll tell you everything in detail; but, pray, your er- 
 rand first } " 
 
 "Yes, it's all right. Did you watch every night, — 
 not missing one.?" 
 
 "I forgot to go — twice," she murmured contritely. 
 
 "Oh, Lady Constantine 1 " he cried in dismay. "How 
 could you serve me so ! what shall I do ! " 
 
 " Please forgive me! Indeed, I could not help it. I 
 had watched and watched, and nothing happened, and 
 somehow my vigilance relaxed when I found nothing was 
 iikel)- to take place in the star."
 
 TtVO OJV A TOWER. 49 
 
 "But the very circumstance of it not having happened 
 made it all the more Hkely every day ! " 
 
 "Have you — seen " — she began, after a silence. 
 
 Swithin sighed, lowered his thought to sublunary things, 
 and told briefly the story of his journey. Sir Dlount Con- 
 stantine was not in London at the address which had been 
 anonymously sent her. It was a mistake of identity. The 
 person who had been seen there Swithin had sought out. 
 He resembled Sir Blount strongly; but he was a stranger. 
 
 "How can I reward you!" she exclaimed, when he 
 had done. 
 
 "In no way but by giving me your good wishes in 
 what I am going to tell you on my own account." He 
 spoke in tones of mysterious exultation. "This parcel 
 is going to make my fame ! " 
 
 "What is it.'" 
 
 "A huge object-glass for the great telescope I am so 
 busy about ! Such a magnificent aid to science has never 
 entered this county before, you may depend ! " 
 
 He produced from under his arm the carefully cuddled- 
 up package, which was in shape a round flat disk, like 
 a dinner-plate, tied in paper. 
 
 Proceeding to explain his plans to her more fully, he 
 walked with her towards the door by which she had 
 emerged. It was a little side wicket through a wall di- 
 viding the open park from the garden terraces. Here for 
 a moment he placed his valise and parcel on the coping 
 of the stone balustrade, till he had bidden her farewell. 
 Then he turned, and in laying hold of his bag by the 
 dim light pushed the parcel over the parapet. It fell 
 upon the paved walk ten or a dozen feet beneath.
 
 50 rtVO CA*" A TOIVEK. 
 
 "Oh, good heavens!" 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "My object-glass broken ! " 
 
 "Is it of much value?" 
 
 "It cost all I possess." 
 
 He ran round by the steps to the lower lawn, Lady 
 Constantine following, as he continued, "It is a mag- 
 nificent six-inch first quality object lens. I took advan- 
 tage of my journey to London to get it. I have been 
 six weeks making the- tube, of milled board; and as I 
 had not enough money by twelve pounds for the lens, 
 I borrowed it of my grandmother out of her last annuity 
 payment. What can be — can be done ! " 
 
 "Perhaps it is not broken." 
 
 He felt on the ground, found the parcel, and shook it. 
 A clicking noise issued from inside. Swithin smote his 
 forehead with his hand, and walked up and down like 
 a mad fellow. 
 
 "My telescope! I have waited nine months for this 
 lens. Now the possibility of setting up a really powerful 
 instrument is over ! It is too cruel— how could it hap- 
 pen ! . . . . Lady Constantine, I am ashamed of myself, 
 — before you. Oh, but, Lady Constantine, if you only 
 knew what it is to a person engaged in science to have 
 the means of clinching a theory snatched away at the last 
 moment ! It is I against the world; and when the world has 
 accidents on its side in addition to its natural strength, what 
 chance for me ! " The young astronomer leant against the 
 wall, and was silent. His misery was of an intensity and 
 kind with that of Palissy, in these struggles with an adverse 
 fate.
 
 TIFO ON A TOWER. 51 
 
 "Don't mind it, — pray don't!" said Lady Con^tantine, 
 with deep feeling. "It is dreadfully unfortunate ! You 
 have my whole sympathy. Can it be mended ! " 
 
 "Mended, — no, no!" 
 
 "Cannot you do with your present one a little longer.?" 
 
 "It is altogether inferior, cheap, and bad ! " 
 
 "I'll get you another, — yes, indeed, I will ! Allow me 
 to get you another as soon as possible. I'll do anything 
 to assist you out of your trouble; for I am most anxious 
 to see you famous. I know you will be a great astron- 
 omer, in spite of this rnishap ! Com.e, say I may get a 
 new one. " 
 
 Swithin took her hand. He could not trust himself 
 to speak. 
 
 Some days later a little box of peculiar kind came to 
 tlie Great House. It was addressed to Lady Constantine, 
 "with great care." She had it partly opened and taken 
 to her own little writing-room; and after lunch, when she 
 had dressed for walking, she took from the box a paper 
 parcel like the one which had met with the accident. 
 This she hid under her mantle, as if she had stolen it; 
 and, going out slowly across the lawn, passed through 
 the little door before spoken of, and was soon hastening 
 in the direction of the Rings-Hill column. 
 
 There was a bright sun overhead on that afternoon of 
 early spring, and its rays shed an unusual warmth, though 
 shady places still retained the look and feel of winter. 
 Rooks were already beginning to build new nests or to 
 mend up old ones, and clamorously called in neighbors 
 to give opinions on difficulties in their architecture. Lady 
 Constantine swerved once from her j)ath, as if she had
 
 52 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 decided to go to the homestead where Swithin lived but 
 on second thoughts she bent her steps to the column. 
 Drawing near it, she looked up; but on account of the 
 height of the parapet nobody could be seen thereon who 
 did not stand on tiptoe. She thought, however, that her 
 young friend might possibly see her, if he were there, and 
 come down; and that he was there she soon ascertained 
 by finding the door unlocked, and the key inside. No 
 movement, however, reached her ears from above, and 
 she began to ascend. 
 
 iMeanwhile affairs at the top of the column had pro- 
 gressed as follows. The afternoon being exceptionally 
 fine, Swithin had ascended about two o'clock, and, seating 
 himself at the little table which he had constructed on 
 the spot; he began reading over his notes and examining 
 some astronomical journals that had reached him in the 
 morning. The sun blazed into the hollow roof-space as 
 into a tube, and the sides kept out every breeze. Though 
 the month was February below, it was May in the abacus 
 of the column. This state of the atmosphere, and the 
 fact that on the previous night he had pursued his obser- 
 vations till past two o'clock, produced in him at the end 
 of half an hour an overpowering inclination to sleep. 
 Spreading on the lead-work a thick rug, which he kept 
 up there, he flung himself down against the parapet, and 
 was soon in a state of unconsciousness. 
 
 It was about ten minutes afterwards that a soft rustle 
 of silken clothes came up the spiral staircase, and, hesi- 
 tadng onwards, reached the orifice, where appeared the 
 fonn of Lady Constantine. She did not at first perceive 
 that he was present, and stood still to reconrioiter. Her
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 53 
 
 eye glanced over his telescope, now wiajjped up, his table 
 and papers, his observing-chair, and his contrivances for 
 makinor the best of a deficiency of instruments. All 
 was warm, sunny, and silent, excej^t that a solitary bee, 
 which had somehow got within the hollow of the abacus, 
 was singing round inquiringly, unable to discern thai 
 ascent was the only mode of escape. In another moment 
 she beheld the astronomer, lying in the sun like'^a sailor 
 in the main-top. 
 
 Lady Constantine coughed slightly: he did not awake. 
 She then entered, and, drawing the parcel from beneath 
 her cloak, placed it on the table; after this she waited, 
 looking for a long time at his sleeping face, whi'-h had 
 a very interesting appearance. She seemed reluctant tc 
 leave, yet wanted resolution to wake him; and penciling 
 his name on the parcel, she withdrew to the staircise, 
 where the brushing of her dress decreased to silence as 
 she receded round and round on her way to the base. 
 
 Swithin still slept on, and presently the rustle began 
 again in the far-down interior of the column. The door 
 could be heard closing, and the rustle came nearer, show- 
 ing that she had shut herself in, — no doubt to le.ssen the 
 risk of an accidental surprise by any roaming villager. 
 When Lady Constantine reappeared at the top, and saw 
 the parcel was untouched, and Swithin asleep as before, 
 she exhibited some disappointment; but she did not retreat. 
 
 Looking again at him, her e_yes became so sentimentally 
 fixed on his face that it seemed as if she could not with- 
 draw them. There lay, in the shape of an Antinous, no 
 amoroso, no gallant, but a guileless philosopher. His 
 parted lips were lips which spoke, not of love, but of mil-
 
 54 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 lions of miles; those were eyes which looked, not into tha 
 depths of other eyes, but into other worlds. Within his 
 temples dwelt thoughts, not of woman's looks, but of stellar 
 aspects and the configuration of constellations. 
 
 Thus, to his physical attractiveness was added the at- 
 tractiveness of mental inaccessibility. The ennobling in- 
 fluence of scientific pursuits was demonstrated by the spec- 
 ulative purity which expressed itself in his eyes whenever 
 he looked at her in speaking, and in the child-like faults 
 of manner which arose from his obtuseness to their differ- 
 ence of sex. He had never, since becoming a man, looked 
 even so low as to the level of a Lady Constantine. His 
 heaven at present was truly in the skies, and not in that 
 only other place where they say it can be found, in the 
 eyes of some daughter of Eve. Would any Circe or Ca- 
 lypso — and if so what one .'' — ever check this pale-haired 
 scientist's nocturnal sailings into the interminable spaces 
 overhead, and send all his mighty calculations on cosmic 
 force and stellar fire flying into Limbo.? Oh, the pity of 
 it, if such should be the case ! 
 
 She became much absorbed in these very womanly re- 
 flections; and at last Lady Constantine sighed, perhaps she 
 herself did not exactly know why. Then a very soft ex- 
 pression lighted on her lips and eyes, and she looked at 
 one jump seven years more youthful, — quite a girl in as- 
 pect, younger than he. On the table lay his implements; 
 among them a pair of scissors, which, to judge from the 
 shreds around, had been used in cutting curves in thick 
 paper, for some calculating process. 
 
 What whim, agitation, or attraction prompted the im- 
 pulse nobody knows; but she took the scissors, and, bend-
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 55 
 
 ing over the sleeping youth, cut ofT one of ttie curls, 01 
 rather crooks, — for they hardly reached a curl, — into which 
 each lock of his hair chose to twist itself in the last inch of 
 its length. The hair fell upon the rug. She picked it up 
 quickly, returned the scissors to the table, and, as if her 
 dignity had suddenly become ashamed of her fantasies, 
 hastened through the door, and descended the staircase.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 T^7HEX his nap had naturally exhausted itself, Swithin 
 * ^ awoke. He awoke without any surprise, for he 
 not unfrequently gave to sleep in the day-time what he 
 had stolen from it in the night watches. The first object 
 that met his eyes was the parcel on the table, and, seeing 
 his name inscribed thereon, he made no scruple to open 
 it. The sun flashed upon a lens of surprising magnitude, 
 polished to such a smoothness that the eye could scarcely 
 meet its reflections. Here was a crystal, in whose depths 
 were to be seen more wonders than had been revealed by 
 the crystals of all the Cagliostros. 
 
 Swithin, hot with joyousness, took this treasure to his 
 telescope manufactory at the homestead; then he started 
 off for the Great House. On gaining its precincts he felt 
 shy of calling, never having received any hint or permis- 
 sion to do so; while Lady Constantine's mysterious man- 
 ner of leaving the parcel seemed to demand a like myste- 
 riousness in his approaches to her. All the afternoon he 
 lingered about uncertainly, in the hope of intercepting her 
 on her return from a drive, occasionally walking with an 
 indifferent lunge across glades commanded by the win-
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 57 
 
 dows, that if she were in-doors she might linow he was 
 near. But she did not show herself during the daylight. 
 Still impressed by her playful secrecy, he carried on the 
 same idea after dark, by returning to the house, and pass- 
 ing through the garden door on to the lawn front, where 
 he sat on the parapet that breasted the terrace. She fre- 
 quently came out here for a melancholy saunter after din- 
 ner, and to-night w-as such an occasion. Swithin went 
 forward, and met her at nearly the spot where he had 
 dropped the lens some nights earlier. 
 
 "I have come to see you. Lady Constantine. How 
 did the glass get on my table .' '' 
 
 She laughed as lightly as a girl; that he had come to 
 her in this way was plainly no offense thus far. 
 
 " Perhaps it was dropped from the clouds by a bird,'" 
 she said. 
 
 "Why should you be so good to me.' Whatever dis- 
 coveries result from this shall be ascribed to you as much 
 as to me. Where should I have been without your gift.'" 
 
 "You would possibly have accomplished your purpose 
 just the same, and have been so much the nobler for your 
 struggle against ill-luck. I hope that now you will be 
 able to proceed with your large telescope as if nothing had 
 happened." 
 
 "Oh yes, I will, certainly. I am afraid I showed too 
 much feeling, the reverse of stoical, when the accident oc- 
 curred. That was not very noble of me." 
 
 "There is nothing unnatural in such feeling at your 
 age. When you are older you will smile at such moods, 
 and at the mishaps that gave rise to them." 
 
 "Ah, I perceive you think me weak in the extreme.
 
 58 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 But you will never realize that an incident which filled but 
 a degree in the circle of your thoughts covered the whole 
 circumference of mine. No person can see exactly what 
 and where another's horizon is." 
 
 They soon parted, and she re-entered the house, where 
 she sat reflecting for some time, till she seemed to fear 
 that she had wounded his feelings. She awoke in the 
 night, and thought the same thing more intensely. When 
 it was morning, she looked across at the tower, and, sit- 
 ting down, wrote the following note: — 
 
 Dear Mr. St. Cleeve, — I cannot allow you to remain under the 
 impression that I despised your scientific endeavors in speaking as I 
 did last night. I think you were too sensitive to my remark. But 
 perhaps you were agitated with the labors of the day, and I fear thai 
 watching so late at night must make you very weary. If I can help 
 you again, please let me know. I never realized the grandeur of 
 astronomy till you showed me how to do so. Also let me know 
 about the new telescope. Come and see me at any lime. After your 
 great kindness in being my messenger I can never do enough for you. 
 I wish you had a mother or sister, and pity your loneliness ! I am 
 lonely, too. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 ViVIETTE CONSTANTINE. 
 
 She was so anxious that he should get this letter the 
 same day that she ran across to the column with it during 
 the morning, preferring to be her own emissary in so cu- 
 rious a case. The door, as she had expected, was locked; 
 and, slipping the letter under it, she went home again. 
 During lunch her ardor in the cause of Swithin's hurt 
 feelings cooled down, till she exclaimed to herself, as 
 she sat at her lonely table, "What could have possessed 
 me to write in that way ! "
 
 TIVO ON' A TOWER. 59 
 
 After lunch she went faster to the tower than she had 
 gone in the early morning, and peeped eagerly into the 
 chink under the door. She could discern no letter, and 
 on trying the latch found that the door would open. The 
 letter was gone, Swithin having obviously arrived in the 
 interval. 
 
 She blushed a blush which seemed to say, "I am get- 
 ting foolishly interested in this young man." She had, 
 in short, in her own opinion, somewhat overstepped the 
 bounds of dignity. Her instincts did not square well 
 with the formalities of her existence, and she walked home 
 despondently. 
 
 Had a concert, bazaar, lecture, or Dorcas meeting 
 required the patronage and support of Lady Constantine 
 at this juncture, the circumstance would probably have 
 been sufficient to divert her mind from Swithin St. Cleeve 
 and astronomy for some little time. But as none of these 
 incidents were within the range of expectation, — Welland 
 House anil parish lying far from towns and watering- 
 places, — the void in her outer life continued, and with 
 it the voi;: 'w her inner life. The youth had not answered 
 her letter; leilher had he called upon her, in response 
 to the invitation she had regretted, with the rest of the 
 epi>t:e. as being somewhat too warmly informal for black 
 uuJ while. To speak tenderly to him was one thing, 
 to write another, — that was her feeling immediately after 
 the event; but his countermove of silence and avoidance, 
 though probably the result of pure unconsciousness on 
 his part, completely dispersed such self-considerations 
 now. Her eyes never fell upon the Rings-Hill column 
 without a solicitous wonder arising as to what he was
 
 6o TIVO ON A TOWER, 
 
 doing. A natural woman, she would assume the remo- 
 test possibility to be the most likely contingency, if the 
 possibility had the recommendation of being tragical; and 
 she now feared that something was wrong with Swithin 
 St. Cleeve. Yet there was not the least doubt that he 
 had become so immersed in the business of the new tel- 
 escope as to forget everything else. 
 
 On Sunday, between the services, she walked to Little 
 Welland, chiefly for the sake of giving a run to a house- 
 dog, a large black retriever, of whom she was fond. The 
 distance was but short; and she returned along a narrow 
 lane, divided from the river by a hedge, through whose 
 leafless twigs the ripples flashed silver lights into her eyes. 
 Here she discovered Swithin, leaning over a gate, his 
 eyes bent upon the stream. The dog first attracted his 
 attention; then he heard her, and turned round. She 
 had never seen him looking so despondent. 
 
 "You have never called, though I invited you," said 
 Lady Constantine. 
 
 ' ' My great telescope won't work. " 
 
 "T am sorry for that. So it has made you quite for- 
 get me } " 
 
 "Ah, yes; you wrote me a very kind letter, which I 
 ought to have answered. Well, I did forget. Lady Con- 
 stantine. My new telescope won't work; and I don't 
 know what to do about it at all ! " 
 
 "Can I assist you any further.?" 
 
 ' ' No, I fear not. Besides, you have assisted me already. " 
 
 "What would really help you out of all your difficulties.? 
 Something would, surely.?" 
 
 He shook his head.
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 6 1 
 
 "There must be some solution to them?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," he repHed, with a hypothetical gaze into 
 the stream; "some solution, of course, — an equatorial, 
 for instance. " 
 
 "What's that?" 
 
 "Briefly, an impossibility. It is a splendid instrument, 
 with an object lens of, say, six or nine inches aperture, 
 mounted with its axis parallel to the earth's axis, and fitted 
 up with graduated circles for denoting right ascensions 
 and declinations; besides having special eye-pieces, a finder, 
 and all sorts of appliances, clock-work to make the tel- 
 escope follow the motion in right ascension — I cannot 
 tell you half the conveniences. Ah, an equatorial is a 
 thing indeed ! " 
 
 "An equatorial is the one instrument required to make 
 you quite happy?" 
 
 "Well, yes." 
 
 "I'll see what I can do." 
 
 "But, Lady Constantine, an equatorial such as I de- 
 scribe costs as much as two grand pianos." 
 
 She was rather staggered at this news; but she rallied 
 gallantly, and said, "Never mind. I'll make inquiries." 
 
 "But it could not be put on the tower without people 
 seeing it. It would have to be fixed to the masonry. 
 And there must be a dome of some kind to keep off the 
 rain. A tarpaulin might do." 
 
 Lady Constantine reflected. "It would be a great 
 busmesfr, I see," she said. "Though as f\r as the fixing 
 and roofing go, I would of course consent to your doing 
 what you liked with the old column. ]\Iy workmen could 
 fix it, could the\- not?"
 
 62 TWO ON A TOWEk. 
 
 "Oh, yes. But what would Sir Blount say, if he came 
 home and saw the goings-on ? " 
 
 Lady Constantine turned aside to hide a sudden dis- 
 placement of blood from her cheek. "Ah, — my hus- 
 band ! " she whispered. ' ' I am just now going to church, " 
 she said. ' ' I will think of this matter. " 
 
 In church it was with Lady Constantine as with the 
 Lord Angelo of Vienna, in a similar situation, — Heaven 
 had her empty words only, and her invention heard not 
 her tongue. She soon recovered from the momentary 
 consternation into which she had fallen at Swithin's abrupt 
 query. The possibility of that young astronomer becoming 
 a renowned scientist by her aid was a thought which gave 
 her secret pleasure. The course of rendering him instant 
 material help began to have a great fascination for her; 
 it was a new and unexpected channel for her cribbed and 
 confined emotions. With experiences so much wider than 
 his, Lady Constantine saw that the chances were perhaps 
 a million to one against Swithin St. Cleeve ever being 
 Astronomer-Royal, or Astronomer-Extraordinary of any 
 sort; yet the remaining chance in his favor was one of 
 those possibilities which, to a woman of bounding intellect 
 and venturesome fancy, are pleasanter to dwell on than 
 likely issues that have no savor of high speculation in 
 them. The equatorial question was a great one; and she 
 had caught such a large spark from his enthusiasm that 
 she could think of nothing so piquant as how to obtain 
 the important instrument. 
 
 When Tabitha Lark arrived at the Great House, next 
 day, instead of finding Lady Constantine in bed, she 
 discovered her in the library, poring over what astro
 
 r^VO OAT A TOWER. 63 
 
 nomical works she had been able to unearth from the 
 shelves. As these publications were, for a science of such 
 rapid development, somewhat venerable, there was not 
 much help of a practical kind to be gained from them. 
 Nevertheless, the equatorial retained a hold upon her 
 fancy, till she became as eager to see one on the Rings- 
 Hill column as Switliin himself. 
 
 The upshot of it was that Lady Constantine sent a 
 messenger that evening to Rings-Hill Bottom, where the 
 homestead of Swithin's grandmother was situated, request- 
 ing the young man's presence at the house at twelve o'clock 
 next day. He {promptly returned an obedient reply, and 
 the circumstance was enough to lend great freshness to 
 her manner next morning, instead of the leaden air which 
 was too frequent with her before the sun reached the merid- 
 ian, and sometimes after. The mental room taken up by an 
 idea depends as largely on the available space for it as 
 on its nominal magnitude: in Lady Constantine's life of 
 infestivity, in her domestic voids, and in her .social dis- 
 couragements, there was nothing to oust the lightest 
 fancy. Switliin had, in fact, arisen as an attractive little 
 mterpolation between herself and despair.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 A FOG deformed all the trees of the park that morning; 
 *■ -^ the white atmosphere adhered to the ground hke a 
 fungoid growth from it, and made the turfed undulations 
 look slimy and raw; but Lady Constantine settled down 
 in her chair to await the coming of the late curate's son, 
 with a serenity which the vast blanks outside could neither 
 destroy nor baffle. At two mmutes to twelve the door- 
 bell rang, and a look overspread the lady's face that was 
 neither maternal, sisterly, nor amorous, but partook in an 
 indescribable manner of all three. The door was fluno; 
 open and tlic young man was ushered in, the fog still 
 cl nging to his hair, in which she could discern a little 
 ni tch where she had nipped off the curl. 
 
 A speechlessness that socially was a defect in him was 
 to her view a piquant attribute just now. He looked ra- 
 ther alarmed. "Lady Constantine, have I done any- 
 thing " — he began breadilessly, as he gazed in her face, 
 with parted lips. 
 
 "Oh, no, of course not. I have decided to do some- 
 thing, — nothing more," she said, holding out licr han 1,
 
 ttVO ON A TOWER. 65 
 
 wliich he rather gingerly touched. "Don't look so con- 
 cerned. Who makes eqiiatorials } " 
 
 This remark was like the drawing of a weir-hatch, and 
 she was speedily inundated with all she wished to know- 
 concerning astronomical opticians. When he had im- 
 parted the particulars he waited, manifestly burning to 
 know whither these inquiries tended. 
 
 "I am not going to buy you one," she said, gently. 
 
 He looked as if he would laint. 
 
 "Certainly not. I did not wish it. I — I could not 
 have accepted it," saitl the young man. 
 
 "But I am going to buy one for myself I lack a 
 hobby, and I shall choose astronomy. I shall fix my 
 equatorial on the column." 
 
 Swithin brightened up. 
 
 "And I shall let you have the use of it whenever you 
 choose. In brief, Swithin St. Cleeve shall be Lady Con- 
 stantine's Astronomer-Royal; and she"— 
 
 "Shall be his queen.'' The words came not much the 
 worse for being uttered only in the tone of one anxious to 
 complete a tardy sentence. 
 
 "Well, that's what I have decided to do," resumed Lady 
 Constantine. " I will write to these opticians at once." 
 
 There seemed to be no more for him to do than to 
 thank her for the privilege, whenever it should be avail- 
 able, which he promptly did, and then made as if to go. 
 But Lady Constantine detained him, with "Have you ever 
 seen my library .'' " 
 
 "No; never." 
 
 " \\)i\ don't say you would like to see it." 
 
 " Hill I .should."
 
 66 ftro ON- A TOWEk. 
 
 "It is the third door on the right. You can find /our 
 \vav in, and you can stay there as long as you Hke. " 
 
 Swithin then left the morning-room for the apartment 
 designated, and amused himself in that "soul of the 
 house,'' as Cicero defined it, till he heard the lunch-bell 
 sounding from the turret, when he came down from the 
 library steps, and thought it time to go home. But at 
 that moment a servant entered to inquire whether he would 
 prefer to have his lunch brought in to him there, and upon 
 his replying in the affirmative a large tray arrived on the 
 stomach of a footman, and Swithin was greatly surprised 
 to see a whole pheasant placed at his disposal. 
 
 Having breakfasted at eight that morning, and having 
 been much in the open air afterwards, the Adonis astron- 
 omer's appetite assumed grand proportions. How much 
 of that pheasant he might consistently eat without hurting 
 his dear patroness Lady Constantine's feelings, when he 
 could readily eat it all, was a problem in which the reason- 
 ableness of a larger and larger quantity argued itself in- 
 versely as a smaller and smaller quantity remained. When, 
 at length, he had finally decided on a terminal point in 
 the body of the bird, the door was gently opened. 
 
 "Oh, you have not finished.?" came to him over his 
 shoulder, in a considerate voice. 
 
 "Oh, yes, thank you, Lady Constantine," he said, jump- 
 ing up. 
 
 "Why did you prefer to lunch in this awkward, dusty 
 place .? "" 
 
 "I thought — it would be better," said Swithin simply. 
 
 "There is fruit in the other room, if you like '.« come 
 But perhaps you would rather not .' "
 
 TIVO av A TOWER. 67 
 
 "Oh, yes, I should much Hke to," said Swithin, walk- 
 ing over his napkin, and following her as she led the way 
 to the adjoining apartment. 
 
 Here, while she asked him what he had been reading, 
 he modestly ventured on an apple, in whose flavor he 
 recognized the familiar taste of old friends robbed from her 
 husband's orchards in his childhotKl. long before Lady 
 Constantine's advent on the scene. She supposed he had 
 confined his search to his own sublime subject, astronomy.' 
 
 Swithin suddenly became older to the eye, as his thoughts 
 reverted to the topic thus reintroduced. "Yes," he in- 
 formed her. "I seldom read any other subject. In these 
 days the secret of productive study is to avoid well." 
 
 *' Did you find any good treatises.-' " 
 
 "None. The theories in your books are almost as 
 obsolete as the Ptolemaic system. Only fancy, that niag- 
 nificent Cyclopsedia, leather bound, and stamped, and gilt, 
 and wide-margined, and bearing the blazon of your house 
 in magnificent colors, says that the twinkling of the stars 
 is probably caused by heavenly bodies passing in front of 
 them in their revolutions." 
 
 "And is it not so.' That was what I learned when I 
 was a girl." 
 
 The modern Eudo.xus now rose above the embarrassing 
 horizon of Lady Constantine's great house, magnificent 
 furniture, and awe-inspiring footmen. He became quite 
 natural, all his self consciousness fled, and his eye spoke 
 into hers no less than his lips to her cars, as he said, " How 
 such a theory can have lingered on to this day beats con- 
 jecture ! Francois Arago, as long as filty <.;f sixty years 
 ago, conclusively established the fact thai .■.<■.. ,'^iliatiou is
 
 68 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 the simplest thing in the world, — merely a matter of at- 
 mosphere. But I won't speak of this to you now. The 
 comparative absence of scintillation in warm countries was 
 noticed by Humboldt. Then, again, the scintillations 
 vary. No star flaps his wings like Sirius when he lies 
 low ! He flashes out emeralds and rubies, amethystine 
 flames and sapphirine colors, in a manner quite marvel- 
 ous to behold. And this is only one star ! So, too, do 
 Arcturus, and Capella, and lesser luminaries. . . . But 
 I tire you with this subject.-*" 
 
 "On the contrary, you speak so beautifully that I could 
 listen all day." 
 
 The astronomer threw a searching glance upon her for 
 a moment; but there was no satire in the warm, soft eyes 
 which met his own with a luxurious contemplative in- 
 terest. 
 
 "Say some more o{ it to me," she continued, in a 
 voice not (lir removed from coaxing. 
 
 After some hesitation the subject returned again to 
 his lips, and he said some more — indeed, much more: 
 Lady Constantine often throwing in an appreciative re- 
 mark or question, often^r meditatively regarding him, 
 in pursuance of ideas not exactly based on his words, 
 and letting him go on as he would. 
 
 Before he left the house the new astronomical project 
 was .set in train. The top o the column was to l)e 
 roofed in, to form a proper observatory; and on the 
 ground that he knew better than any one else how this 
 was to be carried out, she requested him to give precise 
 directions on the point, and to superintend the whole. 
 A woodei^ cabin was to be erected at the foot of the
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 69 
 
 tower, to provide better accommodation for casual vis- 
 itors to the observator}' than the spiral staircase and lead- 
 ilat afforded. As this cabin would be completely buried 
 in the dense pine foliage which enveloped the lower part 
 of the column and its pedestal, it would be no disfigure- 
 ment to the general appearance. Finally, a path was to 
 bj made across ihe surrounding fallow, by which she 
 might easily approach the scene of her new study. 
 
 When he was gone she wrote to the firm of opticians 
 concerning the equatorial for whose reception all this was 
 designed. 
 
 The undertaking was soon in full progress; and by 
 degrees it became the talk of the hamlets round that Lady 
 Constantine had given up melancholy for astronomy, to 
 the great advantage of all who came in contact with her. 
 One morning, when Tabitha Lark had come as usual to 
 read, Lady Constantine chanced to be in a quarter of the 
 house to which she seldom wandered; and while here she 
 heard her maid talking confidentially to labitha in the 
 adjoining room on the curious and sudden interest which 
 Lady Constantine had acquired in the moon and stars. 
 
 "They ilo say all sorts of trumpery," observed the 
 hand-maid. "They say — though "tis little better than 
 mischief, to be sure — that it isn't the moon, and it isn"t 
 the stars, and it isn't the plannards, that my lady cares 
 for, but for the pretty lad who draws 'em down I'rom the 
 sky to please her; and being a married example, and what 
 with sin and shame knocking at every poor maid's door 
 afore you can say, 'Hands off, my dear,' to the civilest 
 young man, she ought to set a better pattern." 
 
 Lady Constantine's face flamed up vividly.
 
 ;o TIFO ON A TOWER. 
 
 ' ' If Sir Blount were to come back all of a sudden— 
 oh, my ! " 
 
 Lady Constantino grew cold as ice. 
 'There's nothing in it," said Tabitha scornfully. "I 
 could prove it any day. " 
 
 "Well, I wish I had half her chance!" sighed the 
 lady's-maid. And no more was said on the subject then. 
 
 Tabitha's remark showed that the suspicion was quite 
 an embr}'0 as yet. Nevertheless, saying nothing to re- 
 veal what she had overheard, immediately after the read- 
 ing Lady Constantine flew like a bird to where she knew 
 that Swithin might be found. He was in the plantation, 
 sticking up little sticks to mark where the wooden cabin 
 was to stand. She called him to a remote place under 
 the funereal trees. " I have altered my mind," she said. 
 "1 can have nothing to do with this matter." 
 
 "Indeed.'" said Swithin, surprised. 
 
 "Astronomy is not my hobby any longer. And you 
 are not my Astronomer-Royal." 
 
 "Oh, Lady Constantine!" cried the youth, aghast. 
 "Why; the work is begun. I thought the equatorial 
 was ordered. " 
 
 She dropped her voice, though there was nobody to 
 hear even a Jericho shout. "Of course astronomy is my 
 hobby privately, and you are to be my Astronomer-Royal, 
 and I still furnish the observatory; but not to the outer 
 world. There is a reason against mv indulgence in such 
 scientific fancies openly; and the project must be arranged 
 in this wise. The whole enterprise is yours; you rent the 
 tower of me: you build the cabin: you get the equatorial. 
 I simply give pxirmission^ since you desire it. The path
 
 TIVO ON- A TOWER. 7 1 
 
 that was to be made from the hill to the park is not to 
 be thought of. There is to be no communication be- 
 tween the house and the column. The equatorial will 
 arrive addressed to you, and its cost I will j)ay through 
 you. ]My name must not appear, and I vanish entirely 
 
 from the undertaking This blind is necessary," 
 
 she added, sii^rhing. "Good-bve. " 
 
 "But you do take as much interest as before, and it 
 will be yours just the same } " he said, walking after her. 
 He scarcely comprehended the subterfuge, and was ab- 
 solutely blind as to its reason. 
 
 "Can you doubt it.' But I dare not do it openly.'' 
 
 With this she went awav; and in due time there circu- 
 lated through the parish an assertion that it was a mistake 
 to suppose Lady Constantine had anything to do with 
 Swithin St. Cleeve or his star-gazing schemes. She had 
 merely allowed him to rent the tower of her for use as 
 his observator)', and to put some temporary fixtures on 
 it for that purpose. 
 
 After this Lady Constantine lapsed into her former Hfe 
 of loneliness; and by these prompt measures the ghost of 
 a rumor which had barely started into existence was 
 speedily laid to rest. It had probably originated in her 
 own house, and had gone but little further. Yet, despite 
 her self-control, a certain north window of the Great 
 House, that commanded an uninterrupted view of the 
 upper ten feet of the column, revealed her as somewhat 
 frequently gazing from it at a rotundity which had begun 
 to appear on the summit. To those with whom she 
 came in contact she sometimes addressed such remarks 
 as, "Is young Mr.. St Cleeve getting on witl\ his ob-
 
 72 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 servatory? I hope he will fix his instruments without 
 damaging the column, which is so interesting to us as 
 being in memor}- of my dear husband's great-granrifather 
 — a truly brave man. " 
 
 On one occasion her building-steward ventured to sug- 
 gest to her that, Sir Blount having deputed to her the 
 power to grant short leases in his absence, she should 
 have a distinctive agreement with Swithin, as between 
 landlord and tenant, with a stringent clause against his 
 driving nails into the stone-work of such an historical me- 
 morial. She replied that she did not wish to be severe 
 on the last representative of such old and respected parish- 
 ioners as his mother's family had been, and of such a well- 
 descended family as his father's; so that it would only be 
 necessary for the steward to keep an _eye on Mr. St. 
 Cleeve's doings. 
 
 Further, when a letter arrived at the Great House from 
 Hilton and Pimm's, the opticians, with information that 
 the equatorial was ready and packed, and that a man 
 would be sent with it to fix it, she replied to that firm 
 to the effect that their letter should have been addressed 
 to Mr. St. Cleeve, the local astronomer, on whose behalf 
 she had made the inquiries; that she had nothing more 
 o do with the matter; that he would receive the instru- 
 ment and pay the bill, — her guarantee being given f('ir 
 the latter performance.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 T ADY CONSTANTINE then had tlie pleasure of 
 ■^-^ beholding a wagon, laden with packing-cases, in 
 llie act of crossing the field towards the pillar; and not 
 miny days later Swithin, who had never come to the 
 Great House since the luncheon, met her in a path 
 which he knew to be one of her promenades. 
 
 "The equatorial is fixed, and the man gone," he saitl, 
 half in doubt as to his speech, for her commands to him 
 not to recognize her agency or patronage still puzzled 
 him. "I respectfully wish — you could come and see 
 it. Lady Constantine. " 
 
 " I wouUi rather not; I cannot." 
 
 "Saturn is lovely; Jupiter is simply sublime; 1 can 
 see double stars in the Lion and in the Virgin where 
 I had seen only a single one before. It is all I re 
 quired to set me going ! " 
 
 "Is it so? ril come. But — you need say nothing 
 about my visit. I cannot come to-night, but I will 
 some time this week. Vet only this once, to try the 
 instrument. Afterwards you must be content to pursue 
 your studiqs alone."
 
 74 
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Swithin seemed but little affected at this announce- 
 ment. "Hilton and Pimm's man handed me the bill,'' 
 he continued. 
 
 " How much is it.' " 
 
 He told her. "And the man who has built the hut 
 and dome, and done the other fixing, has sent in his." 
 He named this amount also. 
 
 "Very well. They shall be settled with. My debts 
 must be paid with my money, which you shall have at 
 once, — in cash, since a check would hardly do. Come 
 to the house for it this evening. But no, no ! — you 
 must not com.e openly; such is the world. Come to 
 the window — the window that is e.xactly in a line with 
 the long snow-drop bed, in the south front — at eight 
 to-night, and 1 will give you what is necessary." 
 
 "Certainly, Lady Constantine, " said the young man 
 respectfully. 
 
 At eight that evening, accordingly, Swithin entered like 
 a ghost upon the terrace to seek out the spot she had 
 designated. The equatorial had so entirely absorbed his 
 thoughts that he did not trouble himself seriously to 
 conjecture the why and wherefore of her secrecy. If 
 he casually thought of it, he set it down in a general 
 way to an intensely generous wish on her part not to 
 lessen his influence among the sparse inhabitants by 
 making him appear the object of patronage. 
 
 While he stood by the long snow-drop bed, which 
 looked up at him like a nether ISIilky Way, the French 
 casement of the window opposite softly opened, and a 
 hand bordered by a glimmer of lace was stretched forth, 
 from which he received a crisp little parcel, — bank-notes,
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 1% 
 
 apparently. He knew the hand, and held it long enough 
 to press it to his lips, the only form which had ever oc- 
 curred to him of expressing his gratitude to her without 
 the incumbrance of clumsy words, — a vehicle at the best 
 of times but rudely suited for such delicate merchandise. 
 The hand was hastily withdrawn, as if the treatment had 
 been unexpected. Then seemingly moved by second 
 thoughts, she bent forward and said, "Is the night good 
 for observations } " 
 
 "Perfect." 
 
 "Then I'll come to-night; it makes no difference to 
 me, after all. Wait just one moment." 
 
 He wailed, and she presently emerged, muffled up 
 like a nun; whereupon they left the terrace and struck 
 across the park together. Very little was said by either 
 till they were crossing the fallow, when he asked if his 
 arm would help her. She did not take the offered sup- 
 port just then; but when they were ascending under 
 the heavy gloom of the fir-trees she seized it, as if rather 
 influenced by the oppressive solitude than by fatigue. 
 
 Thus they reached the foot of the column, ten thou- 
 sand spirits in prison seeming to gasp their griefs from 
 the funereal boughs overhead, and a few twigs scratch- 
 ing the pillar with the drag of impish claws as tenacious 
 as those figuring in St. Anthony's temptation. 
 
 " How intensely dark it is just here ! " she whispered. 
 "I wonder you can keep in the path. Many ancient 
 Britons lie buried here, doubtless." 
 
 He led her round to the other side, where, feeling his 
 way with his hands, he suddenly left her, appearing a 
 moment after with a light.
 
 76 TIVO ON A TOWEk. 
 
 "What place is this?" she exclaimed. 
 
 "This is the cabin," said he; and she could jusl 
 discern the outline of a little house, not unlike a bath- 
 ing-machine without wheels. "I have kept lights ready 
 here, as I thought you might come any evening, and 
 possibly bring company." 
 
 "Don't quarrel with me for coming alone!" she ex- 
 claimed, with sensitive promptness. "There are rea- 
 sons for what I do of which you know nothing," 
 
 "Perhaps it is much to my discredit that I don't 
 know. " 
 
 " Not at all. Vou are all the better for it. God for- 
 bid that I should enlighten you. Well, I see this is the 
 hut. But I am more curious to go to the top, and 
 make discoveries." 
 
 He brought a little lantern from the cabin, and lighted 
 her up the winding staircase to the temple of that sub- 
 lime mvstery on whose threshold he stood as priest. 
 The top of the column was quite changed. The tub- 
 shaped space within the parapet, formerly open to the 
 air and sun, was now arched over by a light dome of 
 lath-work covered with felt. But this dome was not 
 fixed. At the line where its base descended to the par- 
 apet there were half a dozen iron balls, precisely like 
 cannon-shot, standing loosely in a groove, and on these 
 the dome rested its whole weight. In the side of the 
 dome was a slit, through which the wind blew and the 
 North Star beamed, and towards it the end of the great 
 telescope was directed. This latter magnificent object, 
 with its circles, axes, and handles complete, was securely 
 fixed in the middle of the floor.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 77 
 
 "But yuu can only see one pan of llie sky througli 
 that slit," sa;tl she. 
 
 The astronomer stretched out his arm, and the whole 
 dome tminl horizontally round, running on the balls 
 with a rumble like that of near thunder. Instead of 
 the star Polaris, which had been peeping in upon them 
 through the slit, there now appeared the faces of Castor 
 and Pollux. Swithin then manipulated the equatorial, 
 and put it through its capabilities in like manner. 
 
 She was enchanted; being rather excitable, she even 
 clapped her hands just once. She turned to him: "Now 
 are you happy ^ " 
 
 "But it is ^W yours, Lady Constantine." 
 
 "At this moment. But that's a defect which can 
 soon be remedied. When is }our birthday ? " 
 
 "Next month, — the seventh." 
 
 "Then it shall all be yours, — a birthday present." 
 
 The young man protested; it was too much. 
 
 "No, you must accept it all, — equatorial, dome, stand, 
 hut, and everything that has been put here for this as- 
 tronomical purpose. The possession of these apparatus 
 would only compromise me. Already they are reputed 
 to be yours, and they must be made yours. There is 
 no help for it. If ever " (here her voice lost some 
 firmness), — "if ever you go away from me, — from this 
 place, I mean, — and marry, and settle in a new home 
 elsewhere for good, you must take these things, equa- 
 torial and all, and never tell how they came to be yours." 
 
 "I wish 1 could do something more for you!" ex- 
 claimed the much-moved astronomer. "If you could 
 but share my fame, — supposing I get any, which I may
 
 fg TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 die before doing, — it would be a litde compensation. 
 As to m\- going away and marrying, I certainly shall 
 not. I may go away, but I shall never marry." 
 
 "Why not.?" 
 . "A beloved science is enough wife for me, — combined, 
 perhaps, with a litde warm friendship with one of kin- 
 dred pursuits." 
 
 " Who is the friend .? " 
 
 "Yourself I should like it to be." 
 
 ' ' You would have to become a woman before I could 
 be that, publicly; or I a man," she replied, with dry mel- 
 ancholy. 
 
 ' ' Why a woman, dear Lady Constantine } " 
 
 "I cannot explain. No; you must keep your fame and 
 your science all to yourself, and I must keep my — troubles." 
 
 Swithin, to divert her from melancholy, — not knowing 
 that in the expression of her melancholy thus and now she 
 found much pleasure, — changed the subject by asking if 
 they should take some observations. 
 
 "Yes; the scenery is well hung to-night," she said, 
 looking out upon the heavens. 
 
 Then they proceeded to scan the sky, roving from planet 
 to star, from single stars to double stars, from double to 
 colored stars, in the cursory manner of the merely curious. 
 They plunged down to that at other times invisible stel- 
 lar multitude in the back rows of the celestial theater; re- 
 mote layers of constellations whose shapes were new and 
 singular; pretty twinklers which for infinite ages had spent 
 their beams without calling forth from a single poet a 
 single line, or being able to bestow a ray of comfort on a 
 single benighted traveler.
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 79 
 
 "And to think," said Lady. Constantine, "that the 
 whole race of shepherds, since the beginning of the world, 
 — even those immortal shepherds who watched near Beth- 
 lehem, —should have gone into their graves without know- 
 ing that for one star that lighted them in their labors there 
 were ten as good behind trying to do so ! . . . I have a 
 feeling for this instrument not unlike the awe I should 
 feel in the presence of a great magician in whom I really 
 believed. Its powers are so enormous, and weird, and 
 fantastical, that I should have a personal fear in being 
 with it alone. INIusic drew an angel down, said the poet; 
 but what is that to drawing down worlds ! " 
 
 ' ' I often experience a kind of fear of the sky after sit- 
 ting in the observing-chair a long time. And when I walk 
 home afterwards I fear it, for what I know is there, but 
 cannot see, as one naturally fears the presence of a vast 
 something that only reveals a very little of itself That's 
 partly what I meant -by saying that magnitude, which up 
 to a certain point has grandeur, has beyond it ghasdiness." 
 
 Thus the interest of their sidereal observations led them 
 on, till the knowledge that scarce any other human vision 
 was traveling within a hundred million miles of their own 
 • gave them such a sense of the isolation of that faculty as 
 almost to be a sense of isolation as regarded their whole 
 personality, causing a shudder at its absoluteness. At 
 nisfht, when human discords and harmonies are hushed, in 
 a general sense, for the greater part of twelve hours, there 
 is nothing to moderate the blow with which the infinitely 
 great, the stellar universe, strikes down upon the infinitely 
 little, the mind of the beholder; and this was the case 
 now. Having got closer to immensity than their fellow-
 
 So TWO OJV A TOWER. 
 
 creatures, they saw at once its beauty and its frightfulness. 
 They more and more felt the contrast between their own 
 tiny magnitudes and those among which they had reck- 
 lessly plunged, till they were oppressed with the presence 
 of a vastness they could not cope with even as an idea, 
 which hung about them like a nightmare. 
 
 He stood bv her while she observed; she bv him when 
 they changed places. Once that Swithin's emancipation 
 from a trammeling body had been effected by the tele- 
 scope, and he was well away in space, she felt her influ- 
 ence over him diminishing to nothing. He was quite 
 unconscious of his terrestrial neighborings, and of herself 
 as one of them. It still further reduced her towards 
 simplicity. 
 
 The silence was broken only by the ticking of the clock- 
 work which gave diurnal motion to the instrument. To 
 expect that he was ever voluntarily going to end the pause 
 by speech was apparently futile. She laid her hand upon 
 his arm. He started, withdrew his eye from the telescope, 
 and brought himself back to the earth by a visible effort. 
 
 "Do come out of it ! " she coaxed, with a softness in 
 her voice which anv man but Swithin would have felt to 
 be exquisite. "I feel that I have been so foolish as to 
 put in your hands an instrument to effect my own anni- 
 hilation. Not a word have you spoken for the last ten 
 minutes." 
 
 "I have been mentally getting on with my great the- 
 ory. I hope soon to be able to publish it to the world. 
 What, are you going.? I will walk with you, Lady Con- 
 stantine. When will you come again 't '' 
 
 "When your great theory is published to the world,"
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 T ADY CONSTANTINE, if narrowly observed at this 
 ^~-^ time, would have seemed to be deeply troubled in 
 conscience, and particularly after the interview above de- 
 scribed. Ash-Wednesday occurred in the calendar a few 
 days later, and she went to morning service with a look 
 of genuine contrition on her emotional and yearning coun- 
 tenance. Besides herself the congregation consisted only 
 of the parson, clerk, school-children, and three old people 
 living on alms, who sat under the reading-desk; and thus, 
 when Mr. To;kingham blazed forth the denunciatory sen- 
 tences of the Commination, the whole force of them seemed 
 to descend upon her own shoulders. Looking across the 
 empty pews, she saw through the one or two clear panes 
 of the window opposite a figure in the churchyard, and 
 the very feeling against which she had tried to pray came 
 back again. When she came out and had crossed into 
 the private walk, Swithin came forward to speak to her. 
 This was a most unusual circumstance, and argued a mat- 
 ter of importance. 
 
 " 1 have made an amazing discovery in connection with 
 the variab'e stars!" he exclaimed. "It will excite the
 
 82 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 whole astronomical world, and the world outside but little 
 less. I had long suspected the true secret of their varia- 
 bility; but it was by the merest chance on earth that 1 hit 
 upon a proof of my guess. Your equatorial has done it, 
 my good, kind Lady Constantine, and our fame is estab- 
 lished forever ! " He sprang into the air, and waved his 
 hat in his triumph. 
 
 "Oh, I am so glad — so rejoiced ! " she cried. "What 
 is it.^ But don't stop to tell me. Publish it at once in 
 some paper; nail your name to it, or somebody will seize 
 the idea and appropriate it, — forestall you in some way. 
 It will be Adams and Leverrier over again." 
 
 "If I may walk with you I will explain the nature of 
 the discovery. It accounts for the occasional green tint 
 of Castor and every difficulty. I said I would be the Co- 
 pernicus of the stellar system, and I have begun to be. 
 Yet who knows } " 
 
 ' ' Now don't be so up and down ! I shall not understand 
 your explanation, and I would rather not know it. I shall 
 reveal it if it is very grand. Women, you know, are not 
 safe depositaries of such valuable secrets. You may walk 
 with me a little way, with great pleasure. Then go and 
 write your account, so as to insure your ownership of the 
 discovery. . . . But how you have watched ! ' she cried, 
 in a sudden accession of anxiety, as she turned to look 
 more closely at him. "The orbits of your eyes are lead- 
 en, and your eyelids are red and heavy. Don't do it, — 
 pray don't ! You will be ill, and break down." 
 
 "I have, it is true, been up a little late this last week," 
 he said cheerfully. " In fact, I couldn't tear myself away 
 from the equatorial; it is such a wonderful possession that
 
 TIVO O.Y A TOWER. 83 
 
 it keeps me there till da\light. But what does that mat- 
 ter, now I have made the discovery ? " 
 
 "Ah, it does matter! Now, promise me — I insist — 
 that vou will not commit such imprudences again; for 
 what shouUl I do if my Astronomer-Royal were to die ? '' 
 She laughed, but far too apprehensively to be effective as a 
 display of levity. 
 
 They parted, and he went home to write out his paper. 
 He promised to call as soon as his discovery was in print. 
 Then they waited for the result. 
 
 It is impossible to describe the tremulous state of Lady 
 Constantine during the interval. The warm interest she 
 took in Swithin St. Cleeve — many would have said dan- 
 gerously warm interest — made his hopes her hopes; and 
 though she sometimes admitted to herself that great allow- 
 ance WAS requisite for the ovei weening confidence of youth 
 in the future, she permitted herself to be blinded to prob- 
 abilit es f )r the pleasure of sharing his dreams. It seemed 
 not unreasonable to suppose the present hour to be the 
 beginning of realization to her darling wish that this young 
 mm sliould become famous. He had worked hard, and 
 why should he not be famous early.? His very simplicity 
 in mundane affairs afforded a strong presumption that in 
 things celestial he might be wise. To obtain support for 
 this hypothesis she had only to think over the lives of many 
 eminent astronomers. 
 
 She waited feverishly for the flourish of trumpets from 
 afar, by which she expected the announcement of his dis- 
 covery to be greeted. Knowing that immediate intelli- 
 gence of the outburst would be brought to her by himself, 
 she watched from the windows of the Great House each
 
 84 Tiro ON A TOWER. 
 
 morning for a sight of his figure hastening down the glade. 
 But he did not come. 
 
 A long arra}- of wet days passed their dreary shapes be- 
 fore her, and made the waiting still more tedious. On one 
 of these occasions she ran across to the tower, at the risk 
 of a severe cold. The door was locked. Two days after 
 she went again. The door was locked still. But this 
 was only to be expected in such weather. Yet she would 
 have gone on to his house, had there not been one reason 
 too many against such precipitancy. As astronomer and 
 astronomer there was no harm in their meetings; but as 
 woman and man she feared them, — for herself, at any 
 rate. 
 
 Ten days passed without a sight of him; ten blurred 
 and dreary days, during which the whole landscape dripped 
 like a mop and the park trees swabbed the gravel from the 
 drive, while the sky was lined with a thick vault of immov- 
 able cloud. It seemed as if the whole science of astron- 
 omy had never been real, and that the heavenly bodies, 
 with their motions, were as theoretical as the moves and 
 pieces at a bygone game of chess. 
 
 She could content herself no longer with fruitless visits 
 to the column, and when the rain had a litde abated she 
 walked to the nearest hamlet, and in a conversation with 
 the first old woman she met contrived to lead up to the 
 subject of Swithin St. Cleeve, by talking about his grand- 
 mother. 
 
 "Ah, poor old heart; 'tis a bad time for her, my lady.''' 
 exclaimed the dame. 
 
 "Why.?" 
 
 " Her grandson is dying; and such a gentleman born ! "'
 
 TIVO OX .1 rOWER. 85 
 
 "Oh, it has sometliinq; tu do with that dreadfal dis- 
 CO very ! " 
 
 "Wliat, my lady?" 
 
 She left the old woman with an evasive answer, and 
 uith a breaking lieart crept along the road. Tears 
 l)rimmed into her e\-es as she walked, and b}' the time 
 that she was out of sight sobs burst forth tumultuously. 
 '*I am too fond of him, but 1 can't help it, and I don't 
 care, — I don't care ! " 
 
 Without further considerations as to who beheld her do- 
 ings, she instinctively went straight towards Mrs. Martin's. 
 Seeing a man coming, she calmed herself sufficiently to 
 ask him through her dropped veil how poor Mr. St. Cleeve 
 was that day. But she only got the same reply: "They 
 say he is d}-ing, my lady. " 
 
 When Swithin had parted from Lady Constantine, on 
 the previous Ash-Wednesday, he had gone straight to the 
 homestead and prepared his account of A New Astronom- 
 ical Discovery. It was written in perhaps too glowing a 
 rhetoric for the true scientific tone of mind; but there was 
 no doubt that his assertion met with a most startling apt- 
 ness all the difficulties which had accompanied the received 
 theories on the phenomena attending those marvelous suns 
 of maiTclous systems so far away. It accounted for the 
 nebulous mist that surrounds some of them at their weak- 
 est time; in short, took up a position of probability which 
 has never yet been assailed. 
 
 The papers were written in triplicate, and carefully 
 sealed up with blue wax. One copy was directed to 
 Greenwich, another to the Royal Society, another to a
 
 86 • TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 prominent astronomer. A brief statement of the essence 
 of the discovery was also prepared for the leading daily 
 paper. 
 
 He considered these documents, embodying as they did 
 two years of his constant thought, reading, and observa- 
 tion, too important to be intrusted for posting to the hands 
 of a messenger; too important to be sent to the sub-post- 
 office at hand. Though the day was wet, dripping wet, 
 he went on foot with them to a chief office, five miles off, 
 and registered them. Quite exhausted by the walk, after 
 his long night-work, wet through, yet sustained by the 
 sense of a great achievement, he called at a bookseller's for 
 the astronomical periodicals to which he subscribed; then, 
 resting for a short time at an inn, he plodded his way 
 homewards, reading his papers as he went, and planning 
 how to enjoy a repose, on his laurels, of a week or more. 
 
 On he strolled through the rain, holding the umbrella 
 vertically over the exposed page to keep it dry while he 
 read. Suddenly his eye was struck by an article. It was 
 the review of a pamphlet by an American astronomer, in 
 which the author announced a conclusive discovery with 
 regard to variable stars. - 
 
 The discovery was precisely the discovery of Swithin St. 
 Cleeve. Another man had forestalled his fame by a period 
 of about six weeks. 
 
 Then the youth found that the goddess Philosophy, to 
 whom he had vowed to dedicate his whole life, would not 
 in return support him through a single hour of despair. 
 In truth, the impishness of circumstance was newer to 
 him than it would have been to a philosopher of threescore 
 and ten. In a wild wish for annihilation he flung himselt
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 87 
 
 down on a patch of heather that lay a Hltle removed from 
 the road, and in this watery bed remained motionless, 
 while time passed by unheeded. At last, from sheer mis- 
 ery and weariness, he fell asleep. The March rain pelted 
 him mercilessly, the beaded moisture from the heavily 
 charged locks of heath penetrated him through back and 
 sides, and clotted his hair to unsightly tags and tufts. 
 When he awoke it was dark. He thought of his grand- 
 mother, and of her possible alarm at missing him. On at- 
 tempting to rise, he found that he could hardly bend his 
 joints, and that his clothes were as heavy as lead from sat- 
 uration. His teeth chattering and his knees trembling, 
 he pursued his way home, where his appearance excited 
 great concern. He was obliged at once to retire to bed, 
 and the next day he was delirious from the chill. 
 
 It w-as about ten days after this unhappy occurrence 
 that Lady Constantine learnt the news, as above described, 
 and hastened along to the homestead in that state of an- 
 guish in which the heart is no longer under the control 
 of the judgment, and self-abandonment, even to error, 
 verges on heroism. On reaching the house in Rings- 
 Hill Bottom, the door was opened to her by old Han- 
 nah, who wore an assiduously sorrowful look; and Lady 
 Constantine was shown into the large room, — so wnde 
 that the beams bent in the middle, — where she took 
 her seat in one of a methodic range of chairs, beneath 
 a portrait of the Reverend ?iL-. St. Cleeve, her astrono- 
 mer's erratic father. 
 
 The eight unwatered plants, in the row of eight flower- 
 pots, denoted that there was something wrong in the 
 house. JMrs. Martin came down-stairs, fretting, her won-
 
 88 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 der at beholding Lady Constantine not altogether diS' 
 placing the previous mood. "Here's a pretty kettle of 
 fish, my lady ! "' she exclaimed. 
 
 Lady Constantine said, " Hush ! " and pointed inquir- 
 ingly upward. 
 
 " He is not overhead, my lady," replied Swithin's grand- 
 mother. " His bedroom is at the back of the house." 
 
 " How is he now } " 
 
 " He is better, just at this moment; and we are more 
 hopeful. But he changes so." 
 
 "May I go up.' I know he would like to see me." 
 
 Her presence having been made known to the sufferer, 
 she was conducted upstairs to Swithin's room. The way 
 thither was through the large chamber he had used as 
 a study and for the manufacture of optical instruments. 
 There lay the large pasteboard telescope, that had been 
 just such a failure as Crusoe's large boat; there were his 
 diagrams, maps, globes, and celestial apparatus of va- 
 rious sorts. The ab.sence of the worker through illness 
 or death is sufficient to touch the prosiest workshop with 
 the hues of pathetic romance, and it was with a swell- 
 ing bosom that Lady Constantine passed through this 
 arena of his youthful activities to the little chamber where 
 he lay. 
 
 Old Mrs. Martin sat down by the window, and Lady 
 Constantine bent over Swithin. 
 
 "Don't speak to me!" she whispered. "It will 
 weaken you; it will excite you. If you do sj)eak it must 
 be very softly." She took his hand, nn 1 one irrepressi- 
 ble tear fell upon it. 
 
 " Nothing will excite me now, Lady Constantine, ' he
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 89 
 
 said; "not even your goodness in coming. My last ex- 
 citement was when I lost the battle. ... Do you know 
 that my discovery has been forestalled.' It is that that's 
 killing me." 
 
 " But you are going to recover; you are better, they say. 
 Is it so 'i " 
 
 " I think I am, to-day. But who can be sure? " 
 
 "The poor boy was so upset at finding that his labor 
 had been thrown away," said his grandmother, " that he 
 lay down in the rain, and chilled his life out." 
 
 " How could you do it.-* " Lady Constantine whispered. 
 " How coukl you think so much of renown, and so lit- 
 tle of me ? ^^'h}■, for every discovery made there are ten 
 behind that await making. To commit suicide like this, 
 as if there were nobody in the world to care for }-ou ! " 
 
 "It was done in my haste, and I am very, very sorry for 
 it ! I beg both you and all my few friends never, never to 
 forgive me ! It would kill me with self-reproach if you 
 were to pardon my rashness ! " 
 
 At this moment the doctor was announced, and Mrs. 
 Martin went downstairs to receive him. Lady Constan- 
 tine thought she would remain to hear his report, and for 
 this purpose came out, and sat down in a nook of the 
 adjoining work-room of Swithin, the doctor meeting her 
 as he passed through it into the sick-chamber. 
 
 He was there during what seemed a torturingly long 
 time; but at length he came out to the room she waited 
 in, and crossed it on his way downstairs. She rose and 
 followed him to the stair-head. 
 
 "How is he.'" she anxiously asked. "Will he get 
 over it ? "
 
 90 TM^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 The doctor, not knowing the depth of her interest in 
 the patient, spoke with the l^lunt candor natural towards 
 a comparatively indifferent inquirer. "No, Lady Con- 
 stantine," he replied; "there's a change for the worse." 
 And he retired down the stairs. 
 
 Scarcely knowing what she did. Lady Constantine ran 
 back to Swithin's side, flung herself upon the bed, and in 
 a throb of sorrow kissed him.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 npHE placid inhabitants of the parish of Welland, in- 
 ■"■ eluding warbling wagoners, lone shepherds, plow- 
 men, the blacksmith, the carpenter, the gardener at the 
 Great House, the steward and agent, the parson, clerk, 
 and so on, were hourly expecting the announcement of 
 St. Cleeve's death. The sexton had been going to see 
 his brother-in-law, nine miles distant, but promptly post- 
 poned the visit for a few days, that there might be the 
 regular professional hand present to toll the bell in a note 
 of due fullness and solemnity; an attempt by a deputy, 
 on a previous occasion of his absence, having degenerated 
 into a miserable stammering clang that was a disgrace to 
 the parish. But Swithin St. Cleeve did not decease, a 
 fact of which, indeed, the habituated reader will have 
 been well aware ever since the rain came down upon the 
 young man in the twenty-sixth paragraph of the ninth 
 chapter, and led to his alarming illness. Too many 
 maimed histories (such as his would have read, in those 
 circumstances) are hourly enacting themselves in this dun- 
 colored world to justify the gratuitous infliction of yet 
 other mournful details concerning those
 
 92 TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 " Who lay great bases for eternity 
 Which prove more short than waste or ruining." 
 
 How it arose that he did not die was in this wise; and 
 his example affords another instance of that reflex rule 
 of the vassal mind over the sovereign body, which, oper- 
 ating so wonderfully in elastic natures, and more or less 
 in all, originally gave rise to the legend that the suprem- 
 acy lay on the other side. 
 
 The evening of the day after the tender, despairing 
 farewell kiss of Lady Constantine, when he was a litde 
 less weak than during her visit, he lay with his face to 
 the window. He lay alone, quiet and resigned. He 
 had been thinking, sometimes of her and other friends, 
 but chiefly of his lost discovery. Although nearly un- 
 conscious at the time, he had yet been aware of that kiss, 
 as the delicate flush which followed it upon his cheek 
 would have told; but he had attached little importance 
 to it as between woman and man. Had he been dying 
 of love instead of wet weather, perhaps the impulsive act 
 of that handsome lady would have been seized on as 
 proof that his love was returned; as it was, her kiss 
 seemed but the evidence of a naturally demonstrative 
 kindliness, felt towards him chiefly because he was be- 
 lieved to be leaving her forever. 
 
 The reds of sunset passed, as dusk drew on. Old 
 Hannah came upstairs to pull down the blinds, and as 
 she advanced to the window he said to her, in a faint 
 voice, "Well, Hannah, what news to-day .? " 
 
 "Oh, nothing, sir," Hannah replied, looking out of 
 the window with sad apathy, "only that ihere's a comet, 
 they say. "
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 93 
 
 "A what?" said the dying astronomer, starting up on 
 his elbow. 
 
 "A comet, — that's all, Master Swithin," repeated Han- 
 nah, in a lower voice, fearing she had done harm in some 
 way. 
 
 "Well, tell me, tell me!" cried Swithin. "Is it 
 Gambart's.' Is it Charles the Fifth's, or Halley's, or 
 Faye's, or whose } " 
 
 "Hush!" said she, thinking St. Cleeve slightly deliri- 
 ous again. " 'Tis God A'mighty's, of course. I haven't 
 seed en m}self; but they say he's getting bigger every 
 night, and that he'll be the biggest one known for fifty 
 years when he's full growed. There, you must not talk 
 any more now, or I'll go away." 
 
 Here was an amazing event, litde noise as it had made 
 in the happening. Of all phenomena that he had longed 
 to witness during his short astronomical career, those ap- 
 Dertainins: to comets had excited him most. That the 
 magnificent comet of 1811 would not return again for 
 thirty centuries had been quite a permanent regret with 
 him. And now, when the bottomless abyss of death 
 seemed yawning beneath his feet, one of these much- 
 desired apparitions, as large, apparendy, as any of its 
 tribe, had chosen to show itself 
 
 "Oh, if I could but live to see that comet through my 
 equatorial ! " he cried. 
 
 Compared with comets, variable stars, which he had 
 hitherto made his study, were, from their remoteness, un- 
 interesting. They were to the former as the people of 
 Ujiji or Unyamwesi to the people of his own country. 
 Attached to the solar system, these dazzling and perplex-
 
 94 TWO ON' A TOWER. 
 
 ing rangers, the Byrons of firmamental celebrities, the 
 fascination of all astronomers, rendered themselves still 
 more fascinating by the sinister suspicion attaching to 
 them of being possibly the ultimate destroyers of the 
 human race. In his physical prostration St. Cleeve wept 
 bitterly at not being hale and strong enough to welcome 
 with proper honor the new-come specimen of these de- 
 sirable visitors. 
 
 The strenuous wish to live and behold the new phe- 
 nomenon, supplanting the utter weariness of existence that 
 he had heretofore experienced, lent him a new vitality. 
 The crisis passed; there was a turn for the better; and 
 after that he rapidly mended. The comet had in all 
 probability saved his life. The limitless and complex 
 wonders of the sky resumed their old power over his im- 
 agination; the possibilities of that unfathomable blue ocean 
 were endless; finer feats than ever he would perform were 
 to be achieved in its investigation. What Lady Constan- 
 tine had said, that for one discovery made ten awaited 
 making, was strikingly verified by the sudden appearance 
 of this splendid marvel. 
 
 The windows of St. Cleeve's bedroom faced the west, 
 and nothing would satisfy him but that his bed should 
 be so pulled round as to give him a view of the low sky, 
 in which the as yet minute tadpole of fire was recogniz- 
 able. The mere sight of it seemed to lend him sufficient 
 resolution to complete his own cure forthwith. His only 
 fear now was lest, from some unexpected cause or other, 
 the comet would vanish before he could get to the obser- 
 vatory on Rings-Hill Speer. 
 
 In his fervor to begin observing, he directed that an
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 95 
 
 old telescope, which he had used in his first celestial 
 attempts, should be tied atone end to the bedpost, and 
 at the' other fixed near his eye, as he reclined. Equipped' 
 only with this rough improvisation, he began to take 
 notes. Lady Constantine was forgotten, till one day, 
 suddenly, wondering if she knew of the important phe- 
 nomenon, he revolved in his mind whether, as a'ffellow-" 
 student and sincere friend of his, she ought not to be 
 sent for, and instructed in the use of the equatorial. 
 
 But though the image of Lady Constantine, in spite of 
 her kindness and unmistakably warm heart, had been ob- 
 scured in his mind by the heavenly body, she had not so 
 readily forgotten him. Too shy to repeat her visit after so 
 nearly betraying herself, she yet, every day. by the most 
 ingenious and subtle means that could be devised by a 
 woman who feared for herself, but could not refrain from 
 tampering with danger, ascertained the state of her young 
 friend's health. On hearing of the turn in his condition 
 she rejoiced on his account, and became yet more despond- 
 ent on her own. If he had died, she might have mused 
 on him as her dear departed saint without much sin; but 
 his return to life was a delight that bewildered and dismayed. 
 
 One evening, a little later on, he was sitting at his bed- 
 room window, as usual, waiting for a sufficient decline of 
 light to reveal the comet's form, when he beheld, crossing 
 the field contiguous to the house, a figure which he knew 
 to be hers. He thought she must be coming to see him 
 on the great comet question, to discuss which with so de- 
 lightful and kind a comrade was an expectation full of 
 pleasure. Hence he keenly observed her approach, till 
 something happened that surprised him. When, at the
 
 96 TWO 01^ A TOWER. 
 
 descent of the hill, she reached the stile that admitted to 
 Mrs. Martin's garden, Lady Constantine stood quite still 
 for a minute or more, her gaze bent on the ground. In- 
 stead of coming on to the house she went heavily and 
 slowly back, almost as if in pain; and then at length, 
 quickening her pace, she was soon out of sight. She ap- 
 peared in the path no more that day.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 "Y X THY had Lady Constantine stopped and turned? 
 
 * * A misgiving had taken sudden possession of her. 
 Her true sentiment towards St. Cleeve was too recognizable 
 to herself to be tolerated. 
 
 That she had a legitimate interest in him as a young as- 
 tronomer was true; that her sympathy on account of his 
 severe illness had been natural and commendable was also 
 true. But the superfluous feeling was what filled her with 
 trepidation. Superfluities have been defined as things yuu 
 cannot do without, and this particular emotion, that came 
 not within her rightful measure, was just such a superfluity 
 with her. In short, she felt there and then that to see St. 
 Cleeve again would be dangerous; and by a violent effort 
 she retreated from his precincts as he had observed. 
 
 She resolved to ennoble her conduct from that moment 
 of her life onwards. She would exercise kind patronage 
 towards Swithin without once indulging herself with his 
 company. Inexpressibly dear to her deserted heart he was 
 becoming, but for the future he should at least be hidden 
 from her eyes. To speak plainly, it was growing a serious 
 question whether, if he were not hidden from her eyes, she
 
 98 Tjvo on a tower. 
 
 would not Sdori be across the ragged boundar}' which di- 
 vides the permissible from the forbidden. 
 
 By the time she drew near home the sun was going 
 down. The heavy and handsome church, now subdued 
 by violet shadow, except where its upper courses caught 
 the western stroke of flame-color, stood close to her 
 grounds, though the village of which it formerly was the 
 nucleus had become quite depopulated, its cottages having 
 been demolished to enlarge the park, leaving the old build- 
 ing to stand there alone, like a standard without an army. 
 It was Friday night, and she heard the organist practicing 
 voluntaries within. The hour, the notes, the even-song 
 of the birds, and her own previous emotions combined to 
 influence her devotionaliy: she entered, turning to the 
 right and passing under the chancel arch, where she sat 
 down and viewed the whole empty length, east and west. 
 The semi-Norman arches of the nave, with their multi- 
 tudinous notchings, were still visible by the light from the 
 tower window, but the lower portion of the building was 
 in obscurity, except where the feeble glimmer from the 
 candle of the organist spread a glow-worm radiance around. 
 The player, who was Miss Tabitha Lark, continued with- 
 out intermission to produce her wandering sounds, uncon- 
 scious of any one's presence except that of the youthful 
 blower at her side. 
 
 The rays from the organist's candle illuminated but one 
 small fragment of the chancel outside the precincts of the 
 instrument, and that was the portion of the eastern wall 
 whereon the ten commandments were inscribed. The 
 gilt letters shone sternly into Lady Constantine's eyes; and 
 she, being as impressionable as a turtle-dove, watched one
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. .99 
 
 of those commandments on the second table, till its thun- 
 der broke her spirit witli blank contrition. 
 
 She knelt down, and did her utmost to eradicate those 
 impulses towards St. Cleeve which were inconsistent with 
 her position as the wife of an absent man, though not un- 
 natural in her as his victim. 
 
 She knelt till she seemed scarcely to belong to the time 
 she lived in, which lost the magnitude that the nearness of 
 its perspective lent it on ordinary occasions, and took its 
 natural rank with the other centuries. Having once got 
 out of herself, she was calniL-r, and went on to register a 
 magnanimous vow. She would look about for some maid- 
 en fit and likely to make St. Cleeve happy; and this girl 
 she would endow with what money she could afford, that 
 the natural result of their apposition should do him no 
 worldly harm. The interest of her, Lady Constantine's, 
 life should be in watching the development of love between 
 Swithin and the ideal maiden. 
 
 The very painfulness of the scheme to her susceptible 
 heart made it pleasing to her conscience; and she won- 
 dered that she had not before this time thought of a strat 
 agem which united the possibility of benefiting the astron- 
 omer with the advantage of guarding against peril to both 
 Swithin and herself By providing for him a suitable 
 helpmate she would preclude the dangerous awakening in 
 l^m of sentiments reciprocating her own. Arrived at a 
 point of exquisite misery through this heroic intention, 
 Lady Constantine's tears moistened the books upon which 
 her forehead was bowed. And as she heard her feverish 
 heart throb against the desk, she firmly believed the wear- 
 ing; impulses of that heart would put an end to her sad
 
 lOO TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 life, and momentarily recalled the banished image of St. 
 Cleeve to apostrophize him in a paraphrase of the poet's 
 quaint lines: — 
 
 " Dear love, press tliy hand to my breast, and tell 
 If thou tracest the knocks in tliat narrow cell: 
 A carpenter dwells there; cunning is he, 
 And slyly he's shaping a coffin for me. 
 
 " He hammers and knocks by night and by day; 
 My repose he has utterly banished away. 
 O carpenter, carpenter, prithee work fast. 
 That I in still silence may slumber at last." 
 
 Lady Constantine was disturbed by a break in the or- 
 ganist's meandering practice, and raising her head she saw 
 a person standing by the player. It was Mr. Torkingham, 
 and what he said was distinctly audible. He was inquir- 
 ing for herself 
 
 " I thought I saw Lady Constantine walk this way," he 
 rejo'ned to Tabitha's negative. "I am very anxious in- 
 deed to meet with her." 
 
 She went forward. "I am here," she said. "Don't 
 stop playing, IMiss Lark. What is it, Mr. Torkingham.-*" 
 
 Tabitha thereupon resumed her playing, and Mr. Tor- 
 kingham joined Lady Constantine. 
 
 " I have some very serious intelligence to break to your 
 ladyship," he said. '' But — I will not interrupt you here. " 
 (He had seen her rise from her knees to come to him.) 
 " I will call at the house the first moment you can receive 
 me, after reaching home." 
 
 "No, tell me here," she said, reseating herself 
 
 He came close, and placed his hand on the popp}-hcad
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. lOI 
 
 of the seat. "I have received a telegram," he resumed, 
 haltingly, "in which I am requested to prepare you for 
 the contents of a letter that you will receive to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 " I am quite ready." 
 
 "The subject is briefly this. Lady Constantine: that you 
 have been a widow for more than eighteen months." 
 
 "Dead!" 
 
 " Yes. Sir Blount was attacked by dy.sentery and ma- 
 larious fever, on the banks of the Zonga in South Africa, 
 so long ago as last October twelvemonths, and it carried 
 him off. Of the three men who were with him, two suc- 
 cumbed to the same illness, a hundred miles further on; 
 while the third, retracing his steps into a healthier district, 
 remained there with a native tribe, and took no pains to 
 make the circumstances known. It seems to be only by 
 the mere accident of his having told some third party that 
 we know of the matter now. This is all I can tell you 
 nt jjrescnt. " 
 
 She was greatly agitated for a few moments; and the Ta- 
 ble of the Lxw opposite glistened indistinctly upon a vision 
 stiil obscured by the old tears, which now seemed to ap- 
 peitain to another dispensation. 
 
 " Shall I conduct you home.? " asked the parson. 
 
 'No, thank you," said Lady Constantine. "I wouUi 
 rather go alone. "
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 /^N the afternoon of the next day Mr. Torkingham, whc 
 ^^ occasionally dropped in to see St. Cleeve, called 
 again as usual, and after duly remarking on the state of 
 the weather, congratulating him on his sure though slow 
 improvement, and answering his inquiries about the comet, 
 said, "You have heard, I suppose, of what has happened 
 to Lady Constant] ne .' " 
 
 "No. Good heavens ! Nothing serious. '' 
 
 "Yes, it is serious." The parson informed him of the 
 death of Sir Blount, and of the accidents which had hin- 
 dered all knowledge of the same, — accidents favored by 
 the estrangement of the pair, and the lack of correspond- 
 ence between them for some time. 
 
 His listener received the news with the concern of a 
 fiiend, Lady Constantine's aspect in his eyes depending 
 but little on her condition matrimonially. 
 
 "T5>ei|€ was no attempt to bring him home when he 
 
 * 0;h, n,o. The climate necessitates instant burial. We 
 shall h^y'i? more particulars in a day or two,, doubtless." 
 " I-QOr Lady. Constantine, — so good and so emotionajl
 
 riFO OJV A TOWER. I03 
 
 as she is ! I suppose she is quite prostrated by the bad 
 
 news. " 
 
 "Well, she is rather serious, — not prostrated. The 
 household is going into mourning." 
 
 "Ah no, she would not be quite prostrated," mur- 
 mured Swilliin, recollecting himself. "He was unkind 
 to her in many ways. Do you think she will go away 
 from Wei land ? " 
 
 That the vicar could not tell. But he feared that Sir 
 Blount's affairs had been in a seriously involved condition, 
 which might necessitate many and unexpected changes. 
 
 Time showed that Mr. Torkingham's surmises were cor- 
 rect. During the long weeks of early summer, through 
 which the young man still lay imprisoned, if not within; 
 his own chamber; within the limits of the house and gar- 
 den, news reached him that Sir Blounts mismanagement; 
 and eccentric behavior were resulting in serious conse- 
 quences to Lady Constantine; nothing less, indeed, than 
 her almost complete impoverishment. His personality was 
 swallowed up in paying his debts, and the Welland estate 
 was so heavily charged with annuities to his distant rela- 
 tives that onl\' a mere pittance was left for her. She was 
 reducing the establishment to the narrowest compass com- 
 patible with decent gentility. The horses were sold one 
 by one; the greater part of the house was shut up, and she 
 resided in the smallest rooms. All that was allowed to re- 
 ro.ain of her former contingent of male servants were an 
 odd man and a boy. Instead of using a carriage, she 
 now drove about in a donkey-chair, the said boy walking 
 in front to clear the way and keep the animal in motion; 
 while she wore, so his infor\nants reported,, not an ord.i->
 
 104 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 nary widow's cap or bonnet, but something even plainer, 
 the black material being drawn tightly round her face, giv- 
 ing her features a small, demure, devout cast, very pleas- 
 ing to the eye. 
 
 " Now what's the most curious thing in this, Mr. San 
 Cleeve, " said Sammy Blore, who, in calling to inquire 
 after Swithin's health, had imparted some of the above 
 particulars, '"is that my lady seems not to mind being a 
 pore woman half so much as we do at seeing her so. 'Tis 
 a wonderful gift, Mr. San Cleeve, to be able to guide yer- 
 .self, and not let loose yer soul at such a misfortune. I 
 should go and drink neat if it had happened to me; but 
 my lady's plan is best, though I only know such practices 
 by hearsay, to be sui-e, for I never had nothing to lose." 
 
 Meanwhile, the observatory was not forgotten; nor that 
 visitant of singular shape and habits, which had appeared 
 in the sky from no one knew whither, trailing its lumi- 
 nous streamer, and proceeding on its way in the face of a 
 wondering world, till it should choose to vanish as sud- 
 denly as it had come. When, about a month after the 
 above dialogue took place, Swithin was allowed to go about 
 as usual, his first pilgrimage was to the Rings- Hill Speer. 
 Here he studied at leisure what he had come to see. 
 
 On his return to the homestead, just after sunset, he 
 found his grandmother and Hannah in a state of great 
 concern. The former was looking out for him against the 
 evening light, her face showing itself worn and rutted like 
 an old highway by the passing of many days. Her infor- 
 mation was that in his absence Lady Constantine had called 
 in her driving-chair, to inquire for him. Her ladyship had 
 wished to observe the comet through the gieat telescope^
 
 Tivo OjV a tower. 105 
 
 but had found the door locked when she apphed at the 
 tower. Would he kindly leave the door unfastened to- 
 morrow, she had asked, that she might be able to go to 
 ihe column on the following evening, for the same pur- 
 pose ? She did not require him to attend. 
 
 During the next day he sent Hannah with the key to 
 Welland House, not caring to leave the tower open. As 
 evening advanced and the comet grew distinct, he doubted 
 if Lady Constantine could handle the telescope alone with 
 any pleasure or profit to herself. Unable, as a devotee to 
 science, to rest under this misgiving, he crossed the field 
 in the furrow that he had used ever since the corn was 
 sown, and entered the plantation. His unpracticed mind 
 never once guessed that her stipulations against his com- 
 ing might have arisen from a sense that such meetings had 
 already been too frequent to bear repetition with propriel}-, 
 innocent as they had been in fact and intent. 
 
 On ascending he found her already there. She sat in 
 the observing-chair: the warm light from the west, which 
 flowed in through the opening of the dome, brightened 
 her face, and her face only, her robes of sable lawn ren- 
 dering the remainder of her figure almost invisible. 
 
 " Vou have come ! " she said, with some dismay. " I 
 d:d not require you. But never mind." She extended 
 her hand cordially to him. 
 
 Before speaking he looked at her with a great new in- 
 terest in his eye. It was the first time that he had seen 
 her thus, and she was altered in more than dress. 
 
 " Have you nothing to say.? " she continued. '' Your 
 footsteps were audible to me from the very bottom, and I 
 knew they wtre yours. You look almost restored."
 
 lo6 TfVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 " I am almost restored," he replied, respectfuliy pressing 
 her hand. "A reason for living arose, and I lived." 
 
 "What reason .? " she quickly inquired. 
 
 He pointed to the rocket-like object in the western sky. 
 His eyes tlien returned to her face, whose soberly-sweet ex- 
 pression was of a rare and peculiar kind, — something that 
 he had never seen before in woman. 
 
 "You mean the comet? Well, you will never make a 
 courtier ! You know, of course, what has happened to 
 me. Have you also heard that I am now quite a poor 
 woman } Tell me what you think of it." 
 
 " I have thought very little of it, since I heard that you 
 seemed to mind it but little. There is even this good in 
 it, that I may now be able to show you some little kind- 
 ness for all those you have done me, my dear lady. " 
 
 "Unless, for economy's sake, I go and live abroad, — 
 at Dinan, Versailles, or Boulogne." 
 
 Swithin, who had never thought of such a contingency, 
 was earnest in his regrets; without, however, showing more 
 than a sincere friend's disappointment. 
 
 " I did not say it was absolutely necessary," she contin- 
 ued. "I have, in fact, grown so homely and home-lov- 
 ing, I am so interested in the place and the people here, 
 that, in spite of advice, I have almost determined not to 
 let the house; but to continue the less business-like but 
 pleasanter alternative of living humbly in a part of it, and 
 shutting up the rest." 
 
 "Your love of astronomy is getting as strong as mine !" 
 he said ardently. ' ' You could not tear yourself away from 
 the observatory 'i " 
 
 *'' Yon might have supposed me capa,l)le of a litUe hu-
 
 Tli^O OAT A TOWER, I07 
 
 man feeling as well as scientific, in connection with the 
 obsei"vatory. " 
 
 "Dear Lady Constantine, by admitting that your as- 
 tronomer has also a part of your interest" — 
 
 "Ah, you did not find it out without my telling ! " she 
 said, with a playfulness which was scarcely playful, a slight 
 accession of pinkness being visible in her face. "I di- 
 minish myself in your esteem by reminding you." 
 
 " You might do anything in this world without dimin- 
 ishing yourself in my esteem, after the goodness you have 
 shown. And more than that, no misrepresentation, no 
 rumor, no damning appearance whatever, would ever 
 shake my loyalty to you." 
 
 "But you put a very matter-of-fact construction on my 
 motives, sometimes. You see me in such a hard light 
 that I have to drop hints in quite a manoeuvring manner 
 to let you know I am as sympathetic as other people. I 
 sometimes think you would rather have me die than have 
 your equatorial stolen. Confess that your admiration for 
 me was based on my house and position in the county ! 
 Now I am shorn of all that glory, such as it was, and am 
 a widow, and am poorer than my tenants, and can no 
 longer buy telescopes, and am unable, from the narrow- 
 ness of my circumstances, to mix in circles that people 
 formerly said I adorned, I fear I have lost the little hold 
 I once had over you." 
 
 "You are as unjust now as you have been generous 
 hitherto, " said St. Clceve, with tears in his eyes at the gen- 
 tle banter of the lady, which he, poor innocent, read as 
 her real opinions. Seizing her hand, he continued, in 
 tones between reproach and anger, "I swear to you that
 
 lo8 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 I have but two devotions, two thoughts, two hopes, and 
 two blessings in this world, and that one of them is 
 yourself! " 
 
 "And the other?" 
 
 "The pursuit of astronomy." 
 
 "And astronomy stands first." 
 
 " I have never ordinated two such di.ssimilar ideas. And 
 why should you deplore your altered circumstances, my 
 dear lady .'' Your widowhood, if I may take the liberty to 
 speak on such a subject, is, though I suppose a sadness, 
 not perhaps an unmixed evil. For though your pecuniary 
 troubles have been discovered to the world and yourself 
 thereby, your happiness in marriage was, as you have gen- 
 erously confided to me, not great; and you are now left 
 free as a bird to follow your own hobbies. " 
 
 "I wonder you recognize that." 
 
 "But perhaps," he added, with a sigh of regret, "you 
 will again fall a prey to some man, some uninteresting 
 country squire or other, and be lost to the scientific world, 
 after all." 
 
 " If I fall a prey to any man, it will not b • to a ( ::Ury 
 squire. But don't go on with this, for Heav n'-; :.i';el 
 You may think what you like in silence." 
 
 "We are forgetting the comet, "said St. Clecvc. He 
 turned, and set the instrument in order for observation, 
 and wheeled round the dome. While they were looking 
 at the nucleus of the fiery plume, that now filled so large 
 a space of the sky as completely to dominate it, Swithin 
 dropped his gaze upon the field, and beheld in the dying 
 light a number of laborers crossing it directly towards the 
 column.
 
 TPVO OX A TOWER. I09 
 
 "What do you see? " Lady Constantine asked, without 
 ceasing to observe the comet. 
 
 "Some of the work-folk are coming this way. I know 
 what they are coming for, — I promised to let them look 
 at the comet through the glass. " 
 
 "They must not come up here," she said decisively. 
 
 " They shall await your time." 
 
 ' ' I have a special reason for wishing them not to see 
 me here. If you ask why, I can tell you. They mis- 
 takenly suspect my interest to be less in astronomy than 
 in the astronomer, and they must have no showing for such 
 a wild notion. What can you do to keep them out .? " 
 
 "I"ll lock the door," said Swithin. "They will then 
 think I am away." 
 
 He ran down the staircase, and she could hear him has- 
 tily turning the key. Lady Constantine sighed. 
 
 "What weakness, what weakness ! " she said to herself. 
 "That envied power of self-control, — where is \\.} That 
 power of concealment which a woman should have, — where .' 
 To run such risks, to come here alone, — oh, if it were 
 known ! But I was always so, — always ! " 
 
 She jumped up, and followed him downstairs.
 
 CHAPTER Xlli. 
 
 HE was sUudir.g i•.n.n^;diately inside the door at the 
 bottom, t'ii'o-Ji'j. icwas so dark she could hardly see 
 him. The vuJagerj were audibly talking just without. 
 
 " He's su'-e co come, sooner or later," resounded up the 
 spiral in ihe voice of Hezzy Biles. ' ' He wouldn't let 
 such a fine show as the comet makes to-night go by with- 
 out peeping at it, — not Master Cleeve ! Did ye bring 
 along the flagon, Haymoss ? Then we'll sit down inside 
 the hut here and wait. He'll come afore bed-time. Why, 
 his sf>y-glass will stretch out that there comet as long as 
 Wei land Lane." 
 
 "I'd as soon miss the great peep-show that comes 
 every year to Greenhill Fair as a sight of such a immortal 
 spectacle as this ! " 
 
 " 'Immortal spectacle,' — where did ye get that choice 
 morsel, Haymoss.?" inquired Sammy Blore. "Well, 
 well, the Lord save the simple. But, as 'tis so dark in 
 the hut, suppose we draw out the bench into the fijnt 
 here, souls ? " 
 
 The bench was accordingly brought forth, and in o der 
 to have a back to lean against they placed it exactly across 
 the door into the spiral staircase. "Now, have ye got
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. Ill 
 
 any backer? If ye haven't, I have," continued Sammy 
 Blore. A striking of matches followed, and'the speaker 
 concluded comfortably, "Now we shall do very well." 
 
 "And what do this comet mean?" asked Haymoss. 
 "That some great tumult is going to happen, or that 
 we shall die of a famine ? " 
 
 "Famine? — no," said Nat Chapman. "That only 
 touches such as we, and God only concerns himself wi' 
 his upper creatures. It isn't to be supposed that a strange 
 fiery lantern like that would be lighted up for folks with 
 ten or a dozen shillings a week and their gristing, and 
 a load o' thorn fagots when we can get 'em. If 'tis a 
 signal to mend the ways of anybody in this parish, 'tis 
 to my Lady Constantine, since she is the only one with 
 feelings worth such a hint." 
 
 "As for her income, — that she's now lost' 
 
 "Ah, well; I don't take in all I hear." 
 
 Lady Constantine drew close to St. Cleeve's side, and 
 whispered, trembling, "Do you think they will wait 
 long ? Or can we get out ? " 
 
 Swithin felt the awkwardness of the situation. The 
 men had stupidly placed the bench close to the door, 
 which, owing to the stairs within, opened outwards; so 
 that, at the first push by the pair inside to release them- 
 selves, the bench must have gone over, and sent the 
 smokers sprawling on their faces. He whispered to her 
 to ascend the column and wait till he came. 
 
 "And have the dead man left her nothing? And have 
 he carried his inheritance into 's grave? And will his 
 skeleton lie warm on account o't ? Hee-hee ! " said 
 Haymoss.
 
 112 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Tis all swallered up," observed Hezzy Biles. "His 
 goings-on made her miserable till 'a died, and if I were 
 the woman I'd have my antics now. He ought to have 
 bequeathed to her this young gendeman, Mr. St. Cleeve, 
 as some sort of amends. I'd up and marry him if I were 
 she; since her downfall has brought 'em quite near to- 
 gether, and made him as good as she in rank, as he was 
 afore in bone and breeding." 
 
 "D'ye think she' will .? " asked Sammy Blore. "Or 
 is she intending virginity for the rest of her days .'' " 
 
 "I don't want to be unreverent to her ladyship; but 
 I really don't think she is intending any such desperate 
 martyring of herself I say she's rather intending to com- 
 mit lawful matrimony with somebody or other, and one 
 young gentleman in particular." 
 
 " But the young man himself? " 
 
 "Planned, cut out, and finished for the delight of 
 
 woman 
 
 " Yet he must be willing." 
 
 "That would soon come. If they get up this tower 
 ruling plannards together much longer, their plannards 
 will soon rule them together, in my way of thinking. If 
 she've a disposition towards the knot, she can soon teach 
 him." 
 
 "True, true, and lawfully. What before might ha' 
 been a wrong desire is now a holy wish. " 
 
 The scales fell from Swithin St. Cleeve's eyes as he 
 neard the words of his neighbors. How suddenly the 
 truth dawned upon him; how it bewildered him, till he 
 scarcely knew where he was; how he recalled the full force 
 of what he had only half apprehended at earlier times, —
 
 TJVO ON A TOWEk. 1 13 
 
 these vivid things are difficult to tell in slow verbiage. 
 He could remain there no longer, and with an electrified 
 heart he retreated up the spiral. He found Lady Con- 
 stantine half-way to the top, standing by a loop-hole, and 
 when she spoke he discovered that she was almost in 
 tears. "Are they gone .' " she asked. 
 
 "I fear they will not go yet," he replied, with a ner- 
 vous fluctuation of manner that had never before ap- 
 peared in his bearing towards her. 
 
 " What shall I do.' " she asked. " I ought not to be 
 here; nobody knows that I am out of the house. Oh, 
 this is a mistake ! I must 'go home somehow." 
 
 " Did you hear what they were saying .' " 
 
 "No," said she. "What is the matter? Surely you 
 are trembling } What did they say .' " 
 
 "It would be the exaggeration of frankness in me to 
 tell you." 
 
 "Is it what a woman ought not to be made acquainted 
 with .? " 
 
 " It is, in this case. It is so new and so indescribable 
 an idea to me — that" — He leant against the concave 
 wall, quite tremulous with strange incipient sentiments. 
 
 " What sort of an idea.? " she asked gently. 
 
 "It is — an awakening. In thinking of the heaven 
 above, I did not perceive — the " — 
 
 " Earth beneath.-* " 
 
 "The other heaven beneath. Pray, dear Lady Con- 
 stantine, give me vour hand for a moment ! " 
 
 She seemed startled, and the hand was not given. "I 
 am so anxious to get home," she repeated. "I did not 
 mean to stay here more than five minutes ! "
 
 It4 TlVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 " I fear I am much to blame for this accident," he said 
 "I ought not to have intruded here. But don't grievel 
 I will arrange for your escape, somehow. Be good 
 enough to follow me down." 
 
 They redescended, and, whispering to Lady Constan- 
 tine to remain a few stairs behind, he began to rattle and 
 unlock the door. The men precipitately removed their 
 bench, and Swithin stepped out, the light of the summer 
 night being still enough to enable them to distinguish 
 him. 
 
 "Well, Hezekiah, and Samuel, and Nat, how are 
 you .'' " he said boldly. 
 
 "Well, sir, 'tis much as before with me," replied Nat. 
 " One hour a week with God and the rest with the devil, 
 as a man may say. And really, now yer poor father's 
 gone, I'd as lief that Sunday hour should go like the 
 rest; for Pa'son Tarkenham do tease a feller's conscience 
 that much that church is no hollerday at all to the limbs, 
 as it was in yer reverent father's time. But we've been 
 waiting here, Mr. San Cleeve, supposing ye had not 
 come." 
 
 " I have been sitting at the top, and fastened the door 
 not to be disturbed. Now I am sorry to disappoint you, 
 but I have another engagement this evening, so that it 
 would be inconvenient to admit you. To-morrow even- 
 ing, or any evening but this, I will show you the comet 
 and any stars you like." 
 
 They readily agreed to come the next night, and pre- 
 pared to depart. But what with the flagon and the pipes 
 and the final observations, getting away was a matter of 
 time. ^Meanwhile, a cloud, which nobody had noticed,
 
 Tiro ON A TOWER. II5 
 
 had arisen from the north overhead, and large drops of 
 rain began to fall so rapidl)- that the conclave entered 
 the hut till it should be over. St. Cleeve strolled off 
 under the firs. The next moment there was a rustling 
 through the trees at another point, and a man and woman 
 appeared. The woman took shelter under a tree, and 
 the man, bearing wraps and umbrellas, came forward. 
 
 "My lady's man and maid," said Sammy. 
 
 " Is her ladyship here .' " asked the man. 
 
 "Her ladyship keeps more kissable company," replied 
 Nat Chapman. 
 
 "Hush !" said Blore. 
 
 "Not here .? Well, to be sure.' We can't find her any- 
 where in the wide house ! I've been sent to look for her 
 w^th these overclothes and umbrella. I've suffered horse- 
 flesh traipsing up and down, and can't find her nowhere. 
 Lord, Lord, where can she be, and two months' wages 
 owing to me ! " 
 
 "Why so anxious, Anthony Green, as I think your 
 name is shaped .? You be not a married man .? " said 
 Hezzy. 
 
 "'Tis what they call me, neighbors, whether or no." 
 
 " But surely you was a bachelor chap by late, afore her 
 ladyship got rid of the regular servants and took ye } " 
 
 "I were; but that's past." 
 
 "And how came ye to bow yer head to 't, Anthony.' 
 Tis what you never was inclined to. You was by no 
 means a doting man in my time." 
 
 ' ' Well, had I been left to my own free choice, 'tis as 
 like as not I should ha' shunned forming such kindred, 
 being at that time a poor day man, or weekly, at my high-
 
 Il6 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 est luck in hiring. But 'tis wearing work to hold out 
 against common usage, and the woman wantmg ye to 
 stand by her and save her trom unborn shame; so, since 
 custom would have it, I let myself be carried away by 
 Dpinion and took her. Though she's never once thanked 
 me for covering her confusion, that's true. Well, well, 
 'tis the way of God's creatures, as a man may say, and I 
 don't complain. Here she is, just behind, under the tree, 
 if you'd like to see her. Well, well, where can my lady 
 be.'' And I the trusty jineral man, — 'tis more than my 
 place is worth to lose her ! Come forward, Christiana, 
 and talk to the gentlemen." 
 
 While the woman was talking, the rain increased so 
 much that they all retreated further into the hut. St. 
 Cleeve, who had impatiently stood a little way off, now 
 saw his opportunity, and, putting in his head, said, "The 
 rain beats in; you had better shut the door. I must as- 
 cend and close up the dome." Slamming the door upon 
 them without ceremony, he quickly went to poor Lady 
 Constantine in the column, and telling her she could pass 
 them unseen gave her his arm; thus he conducted her 
 across the front of the hut into the shadows of the firs. 
 
 "1 will run to the house and harness your little car- 
 riage myself," he said tenderly. "I will then take you 
 home in it." 
 
 "No; please don't leave me alone under these dismal 
 trees." Neither would she hear of his getting her any 
 U'raps; and, opening her little sunshade to keep the rain 
 out of her face, she walked with him across the insulating 
 field, after which the trees of the park afforded her a suffi- 
 cient shelter to reach home without much "damage. Swith-
 
 71 FO O.V A rOlVER. W] 
 
 in was too greatly afifectcd b\' what he had overheard to 
 speak much to her on tlie way, and protected her as if she 
 had been a shorn lamb. After a farewell which had more 
 meaning than sound in it, he hastened back to Rings-Hill 
 Speer. The workfolk were still in the hut, and by dint 
 of friendly converse and a sip at the flagon had-so cheered 
 Mr. and Mrs. Anthony Green that they neither thought 
 nor cared what had become of Lady Constantine. 
 
 St. Cleeve's sudden sense of new relations with that sweet 
 patroness had taken away in one half hour his natural in- 
 genuousness. Henceforth he could act a part. 
 
 ''I have made all secure at the top," he said, putting 
 his head into the hut. "I am now going home. When 
 the rain ceases, lock this door and bring the key to my 
 house."
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 "D URAL solitude, which provides ample themes for the 
 -^^ intellect and sweet occupations innumerable for 
 the minor sentiments, affords no normal channel for those 
 stronger passions that enter no less than the others into the 
 complicated stream of human consciousness. The sus- 
 pended pathos finds its remedy in crystallizing on the first 
 intrusive object that happens to be reasonably well organ- 
 ized for the purpose, regardless of reasonable accessories. 
 Where the solitude is shadowed by the secret melancholies 
 of the solitary, this process is still surer in operation. 
 
 The labored resistance which Lady Constantine's judg- 
 ment had offered to her rebellious affection ere she learnt 
 that she was a widow, and which had taken the form of 
 sharp remorse, became now an inward bashfulness, that 
 rendered her even more unstable of mood tha,n she was 
 before. However, having discovered herself to love this 
 handsome youth of intellectual promise, she was one of 
 that mettle, fervid, cordial, and spontaneous, who would 
 rather see all her affairs going to rack and ruin than abjure 
 a tender faith in anybody to repair them. But they had 
 already gone to rack and ruin by no fault of hers, and had
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. II9 
 
 left her such a painfully narrowed existence as even lent 
 something of rationality to her attachment. Thus it was 
 that her restful and unambitious soul found comfort in her 
 reverses. 
 
 As for St. Cleeve, the tardiness of his awakening was the 
 natural result of his inexperience combined with devotion 
 to his hobby. But, like a spring bud hard in bursting, 
 the delay was compensated by after-speed. At once breath- 
 lessly recognizing in his fellow-watcher of the skies a hand- 
 some woman attached to him in addition to the patroness 
 and friend, he truly translated the nearly forgotten kiss she 
 had given him in her moment of despair. The first word 
 of self-communing about her in this aspect begot a sec- 
 ond, and the second a third, and so on to the end of the 
 chapter of development which makes up the growth of a 
 love. 
 
 Lady Constantine, in being seven years his senior, was 
 an object even better calculated to nourish a youth's first 
 passion than any girl his own age, superiority of experi- 
 ence and ripeness of emotion exercising a peculiar fascina- 
 tion over young men in their first ventures in this kind. 
 
 The alchemy which. thus transmuted an abstracted as- 
 tronomer into an eager lover — alas, must it be said, spoilt 
 a promising young physicist to produce a commonplace 
 inamorato .■" — may be almost described as working its change 
 in one short night. Next morning he was so fascinated 
 with the new sensation that he wanted to rush off at once 
 to Lady Constantine, and say, "I love you true!" in the 
 intensest tones of that mental condition, so as to register 
 his assertion in her heart before any of those accidents which 
 "creep in 'twixt vows, and change decrees of kings," should
 
 I20 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 occur to hinder him. But his embarrassment at standing 
 in a new position towards her would not allow him to pre- 
 sent himself at her door in any such hurry. He waited 
 on, as helplessly as a girl, for a chance of encountering 
 her. 
 
 But though she had tacitly agreed to see him on any 
 reasonable occasion, Lady Constantine did not put herself 
 in his way. She even kept herself out of his way. Now 
 that for the first time he had learnt to feel a strong impa- 
 tience for their meeting, her shyness for the first time led 
 her to delay it. But given two people living in one parish, 
 who long from the depths of their hearts to be in each oth- 
 er's company, what resolves of modesty, policy, pride, or 
 apprehension will keep them for any length of time apart .f* 
 One afternoon he was watching the sun from his tower, 
 and half echoing the Greek astronomer's wish that he might 
 be set close to that luminary for the wonder of beholding 
 it in all its glory, at the slight penalty of being utterly con- 
 sumed the next instant. Glancing over the high-road be- 
 tween the field and the park (which sublunary features now 
 too often distracted his attention from his telescope), he 
 saw her passing along that way. She was seated in the 
 donkey-carriage, that had now taken the place of her lan- 
 dau, the white animal looking no larger than a cat at that 
 distance. The buttoned boy, who represented both coach- 
 man and footman, walked alongside the animal's head at 
 a solemn pace; the dog stalked at the distance of a yard 
 behind the vehicle, without indulging in a single gambol; 
 and the whole turn-out resembled in dignity a dwarfed 
 state procession. 
 
 Here was an excellent opportunity but for two obstruc-
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. IZ\ 
 
 tions: the boy, who might be curious; and the dog, who 
 might bark and attract the attention of any laborers or ser- 
 vants near. Yet tlie risk was to be run, and, knowing 
 that she would soon turn up a certain shady lane at right 
 angles to the road she had followed, he ran hastily down 
 the staircase, crossed the barley (which now covered the 
 field) by the path not more than a foot wide, which he had 
 trodden for himself, and got into the lane at the other end. 
 By slowly walking along it in the direction of the turnpike 
 road he soon had the satisfaction of seeing her coming. 
 To his surprise, he also had the additional satisfaction of 
 perceiving that neither boy nor dog was in her company. 
 They both blushed as they approached, she from sex, 
 he from juvenility. One thing she seemed to see in a mo- 
 ment, that in the interval of her absence St. Cleeve had 
 become a man; and as he greeted her widi this new and 
 maturer light in his eyes, she could not hide her embar- 
 rassment or meet their fire. 
 
 " I have just sent my page across to the column with 
 your book on Cometary Nuclei, that you might not have 
 to come to the House for it. I did not know I should 
 meet you here. " 
 
 '' Didn't you wish me to come to the House for it.?" 
 •' I did not, frankly. You know why, do you not.?" 
 •Yes, I know. Well, my longing is at rest. I have 
 met you again. But are you unwell, that you drive out 
 in this chair.'"' 
 
 " No; I walked out this morning, and am a little tired." 
 
 "I have been looking for you night and day. Why 
 
 do you turn your face aside.? You used not to be so." 
 
 Her hand rested on th'^ side of the chair, and he took it.
 
 122 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Do you know that since we last met, I have been think- 
 ing of you — daring to think of you — as I never thought of 
 vou before? " 
 
 "Yes, I know it." 
 
 " How did you know? " 
 
 " I saw it in your face when you came up." 
 
 "Well, I suppose I ought not to think of you so. And 
 yet, had I not learnt to, I should never fully have felt how 
 gentle and sweet you are. Only think of my loss if I had 
 lived and died without seeing more in you than in astron- 
 omy ! But I shall never cease to do so now. When you 
 talk I shall love your understanding; when you are silent 
 I shall love your face. But how shall I know that you 
 care to be so much to me?" 
 
 Her manner was disturbed as she recognized the im- 
 pending self-surrender, which she knew not how to resist, 
 and was not altogether at ease in welcoming. 
 
 "Oh, Lady Constantine, " he continued, bending over 
 her, "give me some proof more than mere seeming and 
 inference, which are all I have at present, that you don't 
 think this I tell you of presumption in me ! I have been 
 unable to do anything since I last saw you for pondering 
 uncertainly on this. Some proof, or little sign, that we 
 are one in heart ! " 
 
 A blush settled on her face; and half in effort, half in 
 spontaneity, she put her finger on her cheek. He respect- 
 fully, almost devotional ly, kissed the spot. 
 
 "Does that suffice?" she asked, scarcely giving her 
 words voice. 
 
 "Yes; I am convinced. " 
 
 "Then that must be the end. Let me drive on; the
 
 TM^O ON A TOWER. 123 
 
 boy will be back again soon." She spoke hastily, and 
 looked askance, to hide the heat of her cheek. 
 
 "No, the tower door is open, and he will go to the top, 
 and waste his time in looking through the telescope. " 
 
 "Then you should rush back, for he will do some 
 damage. " 
 
 "No; he may do what he likes, tinker and spoil the 
 instrument, destroy my papers, — anything, so that he will 
 stay there and leave us alone." 
 
 She flushed with a species of pained pleasure. "You 
 never used to feel like that ! " she said, and there was keen 
 self-reproach in her voice. " You were once so devoted 
 to your science that the thought of an intruder into your 
 temple would have driven you wild. Now you don't care; 
 and who is to blame } Ah, not you, not you ! " 
 
 The animal ambled on with her, and he, leaning on the 
 side of the little vehicle, kept her company. "Well, don't 
 let us think of that," he said. " I offer myself and all my 
 energies, frankly and entirely, to you, my dear, dear lady, 
 whose I shall be always. But my words in telling you this 
 will only injure my meaning, instead of emphasize it. In 
 expressing, even to myself, my thoughts of you, I find 
 that I fall into phrases which, as a critic, I should hitherto 
 have heartily despised for their commonness. What's the 
 use of saying, for instance, as I have just said, that I give 
 myself entirely to you, and shall be yours always, — that 
 you have my devotion, my highest homage .•* Those words 
 have been used so frequently in a flippant manner that 
 honest use of them is not distinguishable from the unreal." 
 He turned to her, and added, smiling, " Your eyes are to 
 be mv stars for the future."
 
 124 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Yes, I know it, — I know it, and all you would say ! 
 I dreaded even while I hoped for this, my dear young 
 friend," she replied, her eyes being full of tears. "I am 
 injuring you; who knows that I am not ruining your fu- 
 ture, — I who ought to know better? Nothing can come 
 of this, — nothing must, — and I am only wasting your 
 time. Why have I drawn you off from a grand celestial 
 study to study poor lonely me .? Say you will never de- 
 spise me, when you get older, for this episode in our lives. 
 But you will, — I know you will. All men do, when they 
 have been attracted in their unsuspecting youth as I have 
 attracted you. I ought to have kept my resolve. " 
 
 ' ' What was that .? " 
 
 "To bear anything rather than draw you from your 
 high purpose; to be like the noble citizen of old times, 
 who, attending a sacrifice, let himself be burnt to the-bone 
 by a coal that jumped into his sleeve rather than disturb 
 the sacred ceremony. " 
 
 " But can I not study and love both? " 
 
 " I hope so, — I earnestly hope so. But you'll be the 
 first if you do, and I am the responsible one if you 
 do not." 
 
 "You speak as if I were quite a child, and you im- 
 mensely older. Why, how old do you think I am ? I 
 am twenty." 
 
 "You seem younger. Well, that's so much the better. 
 Twenty sounds strong and fiim. How old do you think 
 I am ? " 
 
 "I have never thought of considering." He innocently 
 turned to scrutinize her face. She winced a little. But 
 the instinct was premature. Time had taken no liber-
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 1 25 
 
 ties with her features as yet; nor had trouble very roughly 
 handled her, to outward view. 
 
 "I will tell you," she replied, speaking almost with 
 physical pain, yet as if determination should carry her 
 through. "I am six and twenty — nearly — I mean a 
 little more, a few months more. Am I not a fearful 
 deal older than you } " 
 
 "At first it seems a great deal," he answered mus- 
 ing. "But it doesn't seem much when one gets used 
 to it." 
 
 "Nonsense!" she exclaimed. "It is a good deal." 
 
 "Very well, then, sweetest Lady Constantine, let it 
 be," he said gently. 
 
 "You should not let it be! A polite man would 
 
 have flatly contradicted me Oh, I am ashamed 
 
 of this ! " she added, a moment after, with a subdued, 
 sad look upon the ground. "I am speaking by the 
 card of the outer world, which I have left behind utterly: 
 no such lip-service is known in your sphere. I care 
 nothing for those things, really; but that which is called 
 the Eve in us will out sometimes. Well, we will forget 
 that now, as we must, at no very distant date, forget all 
 the rest of this." 
 
 He walked beside her thoughtfully a while, with his 
 eyes also bent on the road. "Why must we forget it 
 all .''" he inquired. 
 
 "It is only an interlude." 
 
 "An interlude I It is no interlude to me. Oh, how 
 can you talk so lightly of this. Lady Constantine.'' And 
 yet, if I were to go away from here, 1 might, perhaps 
 soon reduce it to an interlude I Yes," he resumed im-
 
 126 TIFO OM A TOWER. 
 
 pulsively, "I will go away. Love dies, and it is just 
 as well to strangle it in its birth; it can only die once ! 
 
 rii go." 
 
 "No, no!" she said, looking up apprehensively. 
 "I misled you. It is no interlude to me, — it is tragical. 
 I only meant that from a worldly point of view it is 
 an interlude, which we should try to forget. But the 
 world is not all. You will not go away } " 
 
 But he continued, drearily, "Yes, yes, I see it all: you 
 have enlightened me. It will be hurting your prospects 
 even more than mine, if I stay. Now Sir Blount is dead, 
 you are free again, — may marry where you will, but for 
 this fancy of ours. I'll leave Welland, before harm comes 
 of my staying." 
 
 "Don't decide to do a thing so rash!" she begged, 
 seizing his hand, and looking miserable at the effect of 
 her words. "I shall have nobody left in the world to 
 care for ! And now I have given you the great tele- 
 scope, and lent you the column, it would be ungrateful 
 to go away ! I was wrong; believe me that I did not 
 mean that it was a mere interlude to 7ne. Oh, if you 
 only knew how very, verj' far it is from that ! It is my 
 doubt of the result to you that makes me speak so 
 slightingly." 
 
 They were now approaching cross-roads, and, casually 
 looking up, they beheld thirty or forty yards beyond 
 the crossing, Mr. Torkingham, who was leaning over a 
 gate, his back being towards them. As yet he had not 
 recognized their approach. 
 
 The master passion had already supplanted St. Cleeve's 
 natural ingenuousness by subtlety.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 27 
 
 "Would it be well for us to meet Mr. Torkingham 
 just now ? " he began. 
 
 "Certainly not," she said hastily, and pulling the 
 rein she instantly drove down the right-hand road. "I 
 cannot meet anybody," she murmured. "Would it not 
 be better that you leave me now .? — not for my pleasure, 
 but that there may arise no distressing tales about us 
 before we know — how to act in this — this " — (she smiled 
 faintly) " heart-aching extremity." 
 
 They were passing under a huge oak-tree, whose limbs, 
 irregular with shoulders, knuckles, and elbows, stretched 
 horizontally over the lane in a manner recalling Absalom's 
 death. A slight rustling was perceptible amid the leafage 
 as they drew out from beneath it, and, turning up his 
 eyes, Swithin saw that very buttoned page, whose advent 
 they had dreaded, looking down with interest at them 
 from a perch not much higher than a yard above their 
 heads. He had a bunch of oak apples in his hand, 
 plainly the object of his climb, and was furtively watching 
 Lady Constantine with the hope that she might not see 
 him. But that she had already done, though she did 
 not reveal it, and, feaiing that the latter words of their 
 conversation had been overheard, they spoke not until 
 they had passed the next turning. 
 
 She stretched out her hand to his. "This must not 
 go on," she said imploringly. " My anxiety as to what 
 may be said of such methods of meeting makes me too 
 unhappy. See what has happened ! " She could not 
 help smiling. "Out of the frying-pan into the fire! 
 After meanly turning to avoid the parson, we have rushed 
 into a worse publicity. It is too humiliating to have to
 
 128 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 avoid people, and lowers both you and ine. The only 
 remedy is not to meet." 
 
 "Very well," said Swithin, with a sigh, '"So shall it 
 be." 
 
 And with smiles that might as well have been tears 
 they parted there and then.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 npHE summer passed away, and autumn, witli its infi- 
 -*- nite succession of tints, came creeping on. Darker 
 grew the evenings, teariuller the moonlights, and heavier 
 the dews. Meanwhile the comet had waxed to its largest 
 dimensions, — so large that not only the nucleus but a 
 portion of the tail had been visible in broad day. It was 
 now on the wane, though every night the equatorial still 
 afforded an opportunity of observing the singular object, 
 which would soon disappear altogether from the heavens 
 for perhaps thousands of years. 
 
 But the astronomer of the Rings-Hill Speer was no 
 longer a match for his celestial materials. Scientifically 
 he had become but a dim vapor of himself; the lover 
 had come into him like an armed man, and cast out the 
 student, and his intellectual situation was growing a life- 
 and-death matter. 
 
 The resolve of the pair had been so far kept: they had 
 not seen each other in private for three months. But 
 on one day in October he ventured to write a note 
 to her: —
 
 130 TWO ON A TOV/ER. 
 
 I can do nothing. I have ceased to study, ceased to ODserve. 
 The equatorial is useless to me. This affection I have for you ab- 
 sorbs my life, and outweighs my intentions. The power to labor in 
 this grandest of fields has left me. I struggle against the weakness 
 till I think of the cause, and then I bless her. But the very desper- 
 ation of my circumstances has suggested a remedy; and this I would 
 inform you of at once. 
 
 Can you come to me, since I must not come to you ? 1 will 
 wait to-morrow night at the edge of the plantation by which you 
 would enter to the column. I will not detain you; my plan can be 
 told in ten words. 
 
 I'he night after posting this missive to her he waited 
 at the spot mentioned. It was a melancholy evening 
 for coming abroad. A blusterous wind had risen dur- 
 ing the day, and still continued to increase. Yet he 
 stood watchful in the darkness, and was ultimately re- 
 warded by discerning a shady muffled shape that embod- 
 ied itself from the field, accompanied by the scratching of 
 silk over stubble. There was no longer any disguise as 
 to the nature of their meeting. It was a lovers' assigna- 
 tion, pure and simple; and boldly realizing it as such he 
 clasped her in his arms. 
 
 ■ ' I cannot bear this any longer ! " he exclaimed. 
 " Three months since I saw you alone ! Only a glimpse 
 of you in church, or a bow from the distance, in all that 
 time ! What a fearful struggle this keeping apart has 
 been ! " 
 
 "Yet I would have had strength to persist, since it 
 seemed best," she murmured, when she could speak, 
 ''had not your words on your condition so alarmed and 
 saddened me. This inability of yours to work, or study, 
 or observe, — it is terrible! So terrible a sting is it to my
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 131 
 
 conscience that your words about a remedy have brought 
 me instantly.'' 
 
 "Yet I don't altogether mind it, since it is you, my 
 dear lady, who have displaceil the work; and yet the loss 
 o'" time nearly distracts me, when I have neither the pow- 
 er to work nor the delight of }()ur company." 
 
 "But your remedy! Oh, I cannot help guessing it! 
 Yes, you are going away ! " 
 
 "Let us ascend the column; we can speak more at 
 ease there. Then I will explain all. I would not ask 
 you to climb so high, but the hut is not yet furnished.'" 
 
 He entered the cabin at the foot, and, having lighted a 
 small lantern, conducted her up the hollow stair-case to 
 the top, where he closed the slides of the dome to keep 
 out the wind, and placed the observing chair for her. 
 
 "I can stay only five minutes,"' she said, without sit- 
 ting down. "You said it was important that you should 
 see me, and I have come. I assure you it is at a great 
 risk. If I am seen here at this time I am ruined forever. 
 But what would 1 not do for you 1 Oh, Swithin, your 
 remedy — is it to go away .'' There is no other; and yet 
 I dread that like death ! " 
 
 " I can tell vou in a moment, but I must begin at the 
 beginning. All this rumous idleness and distraction is 
 caused by the misery of our not being able to meet with 
 freedom. The fear that something may snatch you from 
 me keeps mc in a state of perpetual apprehension." 
 
 "It is too true also of me. I dread that some acci- 
 dent may happen, and waste my days in meeting the 
 trouble half-way." 
 
 "So our lives go on, and our labors stand still. Now
 
 132 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 for the remedy. Dear Lady Coiistantine, allow nie to 
 marry you. " 
 
 She started, and the wind without shoolc the building, 
 sending: up a yet intenser moan from the firs. 
 
 "1 mean, marry you (juite privately. Let it make no 
 difference whatever to our outward lives for years, for I 
 know that in m\- present position you could not possibly 
 acknowledge me as husband publicly. But by marry- 
 ing at once we secure the certainty that we cannot be di- 
 vided by accident, coaxing, or artifice; and, at ease on 
 that point, I shall embrace my studies with the old vigor, 
 and you yours." 
 
 Lady Constantine was so agitated at the unexpected 
 boldness of such a proposal from one hitherto so boyish 
 and deferential that she sank into the observing-chair, her 
 intention to remain for only a lew minutes being quite 
 forgotten. 
 
 She covered her face with her hands. "No, no,— 1 
 dare not ! " she whispered. 
 
 "But is there a single thing else left to do.''" he 
 pleaded, kneeling down beside her, less in supplication 
 than in abandonment. " What else can we do .'' " 
 
 " Wait till you are famous." 
 
 "But I cannot be famous unless I strive, and this dis- 
 tracting condition prevents all striving ! " 
 
 "Could you not strive on if I — give you a promise, a 
 solemn promise, to be yours when your name is fairly 
 well known } " 
 
 St. Cleeve breathed heavily. "It will be a long, weary 
 time," he said. "And even with your promise I shall 
 work but halfh( artedly. Every hour of study will be in-
 
 riro ox A TOWER. 133 
 
 terrupted with 'Suppose this or this happens; ' 'Suppose 
 somebody persuades her to break hei promise; ' worse 
 still, 'Suppose some rival maligns me, and so seduces 
 her away.' No, Lady Constantine, dearest, best, as you 
 are, that element of distraction would still remain, and 
 where that is, no sustained energy is possible. Many 
 erroneous things have been written and said by the sages, 
 but never did llicy tloat a greater fallacy than that an ar- 
 dent love serves as a stimulus to win the loved one by 
 patient toil." 
 
 " I cannot argue with you," she said weakly. 
 
 "My only possible other chance would lie in going 
 away," he resumed, after a moments reflection, with his 
 eves on the lantern flame, which waved and smoked in 
 the currents of air that leaked into the dome from the 
 fierce wind-stream without. " If I might — take away the 
 equatorial, supposing it possible that I could find some 
 suitable i)lace for observing in the southern hemisphere, 
 — say, at the Cape, — I might be able to apply myself to 
 serious work again, after the lapse of a little time. The 
 southern constellations offer a less exhausted field for in- 
 vestigation. I wonder if I might ! " 
 
 " You mean," she answered, uneasily, "that you might 
 apjilv vourself to work when your recollection of me be- 
 ■Mu to faiie, and rav life to become a matter of indilTerence 
 to you. . . . Yes, go! No, — I cannot bear it! The rem- 
 edy is worse than the disease. I cannot let }ou go away ! " 
 
 "Then how can you refuse the only condition on which 
 1 can stav, without ruin to my purpose and scandal to 
 your name.^ Dearest, agree to my proposal, as you love 
 both me anvi wmrself!"
 
 134 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 He waited, while the fir-trees rubbed and prodded the 
 base of the tower, and the wind roared around and shook 
 it; but she could not find words to reply. 
 
 "Would to God," he burst out, "that I might perish 
 here, like Winstanley in his lighthouse 1 Then the diffi- 
 culty would be solved for you." 
 
 "You are so wrong, so very wrong, in saying so ! " she 
 exclaimed passionatelv. "You may doubt my wisdom, 
 pity my short-sightedness; but there is one thing you do 
 know, — that I love you dearly ! " 
 
 "You do, — I know it!" he said, softened in a mo- 
 ment. " But it seems such a simple remedy for the diffi- 
 culty that I cannot see how you can mind adopting it, if 
 you care so much for me as I do for you." 
 
 "Should we live . . . just as we are, exactly, . . . 
 supposing I agreed .'' " she faintly inquired. 
 
 ' ' Yes, that is m.y idea. " 
 
 "Quite privately, you say. How could — the marriage 
 be quite private .? " 
 
 " I would go away to London and get a license. Then 
 you could come to me, and return again immediately 
 after the ceremony. I could return at leisure, and not a 
 soul in the world would know what had taken place. 
 Think, dearest, with what a free conscience you could 
 then assist me in my efforts to plumb these deeps above 
 us ! Any feeling that you may now have against clandes- 
 tine meetings as such would then be removed, and our 
 hearts would be at rest." 
 
 There was a certain scientific practicability even in his 
 love-making, and it here came out excellently. But she 
 sat on with ijuspended breath, her heart wildly beating,
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 135 
 
 while he waited in upcn-muuthed expcclation. Each was 
 swayed by the emotion within them, much as the candle 
 flame was swayed by the tempest without. It was the 
 most critical evening of their lives. The pale ra}S of the 
 Httle lantern fell upon her emotional face, snugly and 
 neatly bound in by her black bonnet, but not a beam 
 leaked out to suggest to any watchful eye that human 
 life at its highest excitement might be beating within that 
 dark and isolated tower; for the dome had no windows, 
 and every shutter that afforded an opening for the teles- 
 cope was hermetically closed. Predilections and misgiv- 
 ings so equally strove within her still youthful breast that 
 she could not utter a word; her intention wheeled this 
 way and that like the balance of a watch. His unex- 
 pected proposition had brought about the smartest en- 
 counter of inclination with prudence, of impulse with re- 
 serve, that she had ever known. 
 
 Of all the reasons that she had expected him to give for 
 his urgent request to see her this evening, an offer of mar- 
 riage was probably the last. Whether or not she had ever 
 amused herself with hypothetical fancies on such a subject, 
 — and it was only natural that she should vaguely have 
 done so, — the courage in her protege coolly to advance 
 it, without a hint from herself that such a proposal would 
 be tolerated, showed her that there was more in his char- 
 acter than she had reckoned on; and the discovery al- 
 most frightened her. The humor, attitude, and tenor 
 of her attachment had been of quite an unpremeditated 
 quality, unsuggestive of any such audacious solution to 
 their distresses as this. 
 
 " 1 repeat my question, dearest," he said after her long
 
 136 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 pause. "Shall it be done? Or shall I exile myself, anl 
 study as best I can, in some distant country, out of sight 
 and sound ? " 
 
 "Are those the only alternatives? Yes, yes, I suppose 
 they are ? ' She waited yet another moment, bent over 
 his kneeling figu'e, and kissed his forehead. "Yes; it 
 siiall be done," she whispered. " I will marry you." 
 
 " Mv anp^el, I am content ! " 
 
 "I am weaker than you,— far the weaker," she went 
 on, her tears falling. "Rather that lose you out of my 
 sight I will marry without stipulation or condition. But 
 — I put it to your kindness — grant me one little request." 
 
 He instantly assented. 
 
 "It is that, in consideration of my peculiar position 
 in this county, — oh, you can't understand it! — you will 
 not jjut an end to the absolute secrecy of our relationship 
 without my full assent. Also, that you will never come 
 to Welland House without first discussing with me the 
 advisability of the visit, accepting my opinion on the 
 point. There, see how a timid woman tries to fence 
 herself in ! " 
 
 "My dear lad)-love, neither of those two high-handed 
 f'ourses should I have taken, even had you not stipulated 
 a,ain.st them. The very essence of our marriage plan is 
 tiiat those two conditions are kept. I see as well as you 
 do, even more than you, how important it is that for the 
 present — more, for a long time hence — I should still be 
 but the curate's lonely son, unattached to anybody or any- 
 thing, with no object of interest but his science; and you 
 the recluse lady of the manor, to whom he is only an 
 acquaintance."
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 37 
 
 *'See what deceits love sows in honest minds ! " 
 
 " It would be a humiliation to you at present that I 
 could not bear if a marriage between us were made public; 
 an inconvenience wiilinui any compensating advantage."' 
 
 "I am so glad you assume it without my setting it 
 before you ! Now I know vou are not onl\- good and 
 true, but politic and trustworthy." 
 
 "Well, then, here is our covenant. My lady swears 
 to marry me; I, in return for such great courtesy, swear 
 never to compromise her by intruding at Welland House, 
 and to keep the marriage concealed till I have won a po- 
 sition worthy of her." 
 
 "Or till I request it to be made known," she added, 
 possibly foreseeing a contingency which had not occurred 
 to him. 
 
 " Or till you request it," he repeated. 
 
 "It is agreed," mtirmured Lady Constantino.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 A FTER this there only remained to be settled between 
 '^^*- them the practical details of the project. These were 
 that he should leave home in a couple of days, and take 
 lodgings either in the city of Melchester or in a convenient 
 suburb c)f London, till a sufficient time should have elapsed 
 to satisfy legal requirements; that on a fine morning at the 
 end of this time she should hie away to the same place, 
 and be met at the station by St. Cleeve, armed with the 
 marriage license; whence they should at once proceed to 
 the church fixed upon for the ceremony, returning home 
 independently in the course of the next two or three days. 
 While these tactics were under discussion, the two and 
 thirty winds of heaven continued, as before, to beat about 
 the tower, though their onsets appeared to be somewhat 
 lessening in force. Himself now calmed and .satisfied, 
 Swithin, as is the wont of humanity, took serener views 
 of Nature's crushing mechanics without, and said, "The 
 wind seems indispo.sed to put the tragic period to our 
 hopes and fears that I spoke of in my momentary despair." 
 " Tlie disposition of the wind is as vicious as ever," she 
 answered, looking into his fage m{h paiising thoughts or,
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 1 39 
 
 perhaps, other subjects than that discussed. " It is your 
 mood of viewing it that has changed. ' There is nothing 
 either good or bad but thinking makes it so.'" 
 
 And, as if flatly to stultify Swithin's a.ssumption, a cir- 
 cular hurricane, exceeding in violence any that had pre- 
 ceded it, seized hold upon Rings-Hill Speer at that mo- 
 ment with the determination of a conscious agent. The 
 first sensation of a resulting catastrophe was conveyed to 
 their intelligence by the flapping of the candle-flame against 
 the lantern-glass; then the wind, which hitherto they had 
 heard rather than felt, rubbed by them like a passing fugi- 
 tive. Swithin beheld around and above him, in place of 
 the concavity of the dome, the open heaven, with its racing 
 clouds, remote horizon, and intermittent gleam of stars. 
 The dome that had covered the tower had been whirled 
 off bodily, and they heard it descend, crashing, upon the 
 trees. 
 
 Finding himself untouched, Swithin stretched out his 
 arms towards Lady Constantine, whose apparel had been 
 seized by the spinning air, nearly lifting her off her legs. 
 She, too, was as yet unharmed. Each held the other for 
 a moment, when, finding that nothing further happened, 
 they took shelter in the staircase. 
 
 " Dearest, what an escape ! " he said, still holding her. 
 
 " What is the accident } " she asked. " Has the whole 
 top really gone .' " 
 
 "The dome has been blown oft" the roof." 
 
 As soon as it was practicable he relit the lantern, which 
 had been extinguished, and they emerged again u})ou the 
 leads, where the extent of the disaster became at once ap- 
 parent. Saving tlij absence of the inclosing hemisphere,
 
 140 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 all remained the same. The dome, being constructed of 
 wood, was light by comparison with the rest of the struct- 
 ure, and the wheels which allowed it horizontal, or, as 
 Swithin expressed it, azimuth motion deprived it of a firm 
 hold upon the walls; so that it had been lifted off them like 
 a cover from a pot. The equatorial stood in the midst, as 
 it had stood before. 
 
 Having executed its grotesque purpose, the wind sank 
 to comparative mildness. Swithin took advantage of this 
 lull by covering up the instruments with cloths, after which 
 the betrothed ones prepared to go downstairs. But the 
 events of the night had not yet fully disclosed themselves. 
 At this moment there was a sound of footsteps, and a knock- 
 ing at the door below. 
 
 " It can't be for me ! " said Lady Constantine. "I re- 
 tired to my room before leaving the house, and told them 
 on no account to disturb me." 
 
 She remained at the top, while Swithin went down the 
 spiral. In the gloom he beheld Hannah. 
 
 " Oh, ^Master Swithin, can yc come home ! The wind 
 have blowed down the chimley that don't smoke, and the 
 gable with it; and the old ancient house,- that have been 
 in your family so long as the memory of man, is bare to 
 the wide world. It is a mercy that your grammer were 
 not killed, sitting by the hearth, poor old soul, and not 
 long to be with us, — for 'a 's getting feeble on her pins, 
 Mr. Swithin, as folks do. As I say, a was all but mur- 
 dered by the open elements, and doing no more harm than 
 the babe in the wood, nor speaking one harmful word; 
 and the fire and smoke were blowed all across the room 
 like a chapter in Revelation; and your poor reverend fa-
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 141 
 
 ther's features bescorched to flakes, looking like the vilest 
 ruffian, and the gilt frame spoiled. Every flitch, every eye- 
 piece, and every chop is buried under the walling; and 1 
 fed them pigs with my own hands. Master Swithin, little 
 thinking they would come to this unnatural end. Do ye 
 collect yourself, Mr. Swithin, and come at once !" 
 
 "I will, — I will. I'll follow you in a moment. Do you 
 hasten back again and assist." 
 
 When Hannah had departed, the young man ran up to 
 Lady Constantine, to whom he explained the accident. 
 After sympathizing with old Mrs. Martin, Lady Constan- 
 tine said, " I thought something would occur to mar our 
 scheme ! " 
 
 " I am not quite sure of that yet." 
 
 On a short consideration with him, she agreed to wait 
 at the top of the tower till he could come back and inform 
 her if the accident were really so serious as to interfere with 
 his plan for departure. He then left her, and there she 
 sat in the dark, alone, looking over the parapet, and strain- 
 ing her eyes in the direction of the homestead. 
 
 At first all was obscurity; but when he had been gone 
 about ten minutes lights began to move to and fro in the 
 hollow where the house stood, and shouts occasionally 
 mingled with the wind, which retained some violence yet, 
 playing over the trees beneath her as on the pipes of an 
 organ. Bj not a bough of them was visible, a cloak of 
 blackness covering everything netherward; while overhead 
 the broad windy sky looked down with a strange, disguised 
 face, the three or four stars that alone were visible being 
 so dissociated by clouds that she knew not which they were. 
 
 Under any other circumstances Lady Constantine might
 
 142 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 have felt a nameless fear in thus sitting aloft on a lonelj 
 column, with a forest groaning under her feet, and pa- 
 laeolithic dead men feeding its roots; but the recent pas- 
 sionate decision stirred her pulses to an intensity beside 
 which the ordinary tremors of feminine existence asserted 
 themselves in vain. The apocalyptic eftect of the scene 
 surrounding her was, indeed, not inharmonious, and 
 aftbrded an appropriate background to her intentions. 
 
 After what seemed to her an interminable space of time, 
 quick steps in the staircase became audible above the roar 
 of the firs, and in a few instants St. Cleeve again stood 
 beside her. The case of the homestead was serious. 
 Hannah's account had not been exaggerated in substance: 
 the gable end of the house was open to the garden; the 
 joists, left without support, had dropped, and with them 
 the upper floor. By the help of some laborers, who 
 lived near, and Lady Constantine's man Anthony, who 
 was passing at the time, the homestead had been propped 
 up, and protected for the night by some rick cloths; but 
 Swithin felt that it would be selfish in the highest degree 
 to leave two lonely old women to themselves at this 
 juncture. "In short," he concluded despondently, "I 
 cannot go to stay in Melchester or London just now; 
 perhaps not for another fortnight ! " 
 
 ' ' Never mind, " she said cheeringly. ' ' A fortnight hence 
 will do as well." 
 
 "And I have these for you," he continued. "Youi 
 man Green was passing my grandmother's, on his way 
 back from Warborne, where he had been, he says, for 
 any letters that had come for you by the evening post. 
 As he staid to assist the other men, I told him I would
 
 riVO OJV A TOWER. 143 
 
 go on to your house with the letters he had brought. 
 Of course I did not tell him I should see you here." 
 
 "Thank you. Of course not. Now I'll return at 
 once. " 
 
 In descending the column her eye fell upon the super- 
 scription of one of the letters, and she opened and glanced 
 over it by the lantern light. She seemed starded, and, 
 musing, said, "The postponement of our — intention must 
 be, I fear, for- a long time. I find that after the end of 
 this month I cannot leave home safely, even for a day." 
 Perceiving that he was about to ask why, she added, "I 
 will not trouble you with the reason now; it would only 
 harass you. It is only a family business, and cannot be 
 helped." 
 
 "Then we cannot be married till — God knows when ! " 
 said Swithin blankly. "I cannot leave home till after the 
 next week or two; you cannot leave home unless within 
 that time. So what are we to do.'" 
 
 "I do not know." 
 
 "My dear, dear one, don't let us be beaten like this! 
 Don't let a well-considered plan be overthrown by a mere 
 accident ! Here's a remedy. Do you go and stay the 
 requisite time in the parish we are to be married in, in- 
 stead of me. When my grandmother is again well housed, 
 I can come to you, instead of you to me, as we first said. 
 Then it can be done within the time." 
 
 Reluctantly, shyly, and yet with a certain gladness of 
 heart, she gave way to his proposal that they should 
 change places in the programme. There was much that 
 she did not like in it, she said. It seemed to her as if 
 she were taking the initiative by going and attending to
 
 144 T'f^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 the preliminaries. It was the man's part to do that, in 
 her opinion, and was usually undertaken by him. 
 
 "But, "argued Swithin, "there are cases in which the 
 woman does give the notices, and so on; that is to say, 
 when the man is absolutely hindered from doing so; and 
 ours is such a case. The seeming is nothing; I know 
 the truth, and what does it matter } You do not refuse 
 — retract your word to be my wife, because, to avoid a 
 sickening delay, the formalties require you to attend to 
 them in place of me.-'" 
 
 She did not refuse, she said. In short she agreed to 
 his entreaty. They had, in truth, gone so far in their 
 dream of union that there was no drawing back now. 
 Whichever of them was forced by circumstances to be 
 the protagonist in the enterprise, the thing must be done. 
 Their intention to become hasband and wife, at first 
 halting and timorous, had accumulated momentum with 
 the lapse of hours, till it now bore down every obstacle 
 in its course. 
 
 "Since you beg me to, — since there is no alternative 
 between my going and a long postponement," she said, 
 as they stood in the dark porch of Welland House be- 
 fore parting, — "since I am to go first, and seem to be 
 the pioneer in this adventure, promise me, Swithin, 
 promise your Viviette, that in years to come, when per- 
 haps you may not love me so warmly as you do now" — 
 
 "That will never be." 
 
 "Well, hoping it will not, but supposing it should, 
 promise me that you will never reproach me as the one 
 who took the initiative when it should have been yourself, 
 forgetting that it was at your request; ])r(iniise that you
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 145 
 
 will never say I showed immodest readiness to do so, or 
 anything which may imply your obliviousness to the fact 
 that I act in obedience to necessity and your earnest 
 prayer. " 
 
 Need it be said that he promised never to reproach 
 her with that or any other thing as long as they should 
 live? I'he few details of the reversed arrangement were 
 soon settled, IMelchester being the place finally decided 
 on. Then, with a warm audacity which events had en- 
 couraged, he pressed her to his breast, and she silently 
 entered the house. He returned to the homestead, there 
 to attend to the unexpected duties of repairing the havoc 
 wrought b}' the gale. 
 
 That night, in the solitude of her chamber, Lady 
 Constantine reopened and read the subjoined letter, — 
 one of those handed to her by St. Cleeve: — 
 
 Street Piccadilly 
 October 15, 18 
 
 ,LY, 1 
 
 Dear Vivieite, — You will be surprised to learn that I am in 
 lingland, and that I am again out of harness, — unless you should 
 have seen the latter in the papers. Rio Janeiro may do for mon- 
 keys, but it won't do for me. Having resigned the appointment, 
 I liave returned iiere, as a preliminary step to finding another vent 
 for my energies; in other words, another milch cow for my suste- 
 nance. I knew nothmg whatever of your husband's death till two 
 days ago; so that any letter from you on the subject, at the time 
 it became known, must have miscarried. Hypocrisy at such a mo- 
 ment is worse than useless, and I therefore do not condole with you, 
 particularly as the event, though new to a banished man like me. 
 occurred so long since. You are better without him, Viviette, and 
 are now just the limb for doing something for yourself, notwithstand- 
 ing the threadbare state*in which you seem to have been cast upon 
 the world. You are still young, and, as I imagine (unless you have
 
 14'S TJVO OJV A TOWER. 
 
 vastly altered since I beheld you), good-looking: therefore make up 
 your mind to retrieve your position by a match with one of the local 
 celebrities, and you would do well to begin drawing ncighhoring 
 covers at once. A genial squire, with more weight than wit, more 
 realty than weight, and more personalty than realty (considering the 
 circumstances), would be best for you. You might make a position 
 for us both by some such alliance; for, to tell the truth, I have had 
 but in-and-out luck so far. I shall be with you in little more than 
 a fortnight, when we will talk over the matter seriously, if you don't 
 object. Your affectionate brother, 
 
 Louis. 
 
 It was this allusion to her brother's coming visit which 
 had caught her eye in the tower staircase, and led to a 
 modification in the wedding arrangement. 
 
 Having read the letter through once, Lady Constantine 
 flung it aside with a vigor that shook the decaying old flooi 
 and casement. Its contents produced perturbation, mis- 
 giving, but not retreat. The circumambient glow of en- 
 chantment shed by the idea of a private union with hei 
 beautiful young lover killed the pale light of cold reason- 
 ing from an indifferently good relative. "Oh, no, " she 
 murmured, as she sat, covering her face with her hand. 
 "Not for wealth untold could I give him up now ! " 
 
 No argument, short of Apollo himself from the clouds, 
 would have influenced her. She made her preparations 
 for departure as if nothing had intervened.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 IN her days of prosperity Lady Constantine had often 
 staid at Melchester, eidier frivolously, for shopping 
 purposes, or musico-religiously, to attend choir festivals in 
 the cathedral; so there was nothing surprising in her re- 
 verting to an okl practice. That the journey might ap- 
 pear to be of a somewhat similar nature she took with her 
 the servant who had been accustomed to accompany her 
 on former occasions, though the woman, having now left 
 her service, and settled in the village as the wife of An- 
 thony Green, with a young child on her hands, could with 
 some difficulty leave home. Lady Constantine overcame 
 the an.xious mother's scruples by providing that young 
 Green should be well cared for; and knowing that she 
 could count upon this woman's fidelity, if upon anybody's, 
 in case of an accident (for it was chiefly Lady Constantine's 
 exertions that had made an honest wife of Mrs. Green), 
 she departed for a fortnight's absence. 
 
 The next day found mistress and maid settled in lodg- 
 ings in an old plum-colored brick street, which a hundred 
 years ago could boast of rank and fashion among its resi- 
 dents, though now the broad fan-light over each broad door
 
 148 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 admitted the sun only to the halls of a caretaker. The lamp- 
 posts were still those that had done duty with oil lights; 
 and rheumatic old coachmen and postilions, that once had 
 driven and ridden gloriously from London to Land's End, 
 ornamented with their bent persons and bow legs the pave- 
 ment in front of the chief inn, in the sorry hope of earn- 
 ing sixpence to keep body and soul together. 
 
 "We are kept well informed on the time o' day, my 
 lady," said jNIrs. Green, as she pulled down the blinds in 
 Lady Constantine's room, on the evening of their arrival. 
 "There's a church exactly at the back of us, and I hear 
 every hour strike." 
 
 Lady Constantine said she had noticed that there was a 
 church quite near. 
 
 "Well, it is better to have that at the back than other 
 folks' winders. And if your ladyship wants to go there it 
 won"t be far to walk." 
 
 "That's what occurred to me," said Lady Constantine, 
 — ''i/Y should want to go." 
 
 During the ensuing days she felt to the utmost the te- 
 diDusness of waiting merely that time might pass. She 
 went to and from shops, with Green as her companion. 
 Though there were purchases to be made, they were by 
 no means of a pressing nature, and but poorly filled up 
 the vacancies of those strange, speculative days,— days sur- 
 rounded by a penumbra of fear, yet poetized by sweet 
 expectation. 
 
 On the fourteenth day she told Green that she was go- 
 ing to the cathedral close, and leaving the house she passed 
 in under the nearest archway to that spot, where, wander- 
 ing about beneath the rooks' nest till her courage wa^
 
 Tl^VO ON A TOWER. 149 
 
 screwed to its highest, she went round to the other side, 
 and searched about for a certain door, which she reached 
 just at the moment when her heart began to sink to its 
 very lowest, rendering all the screwing up in vain. 
 
 Whether it was because the month was October, or from 
 any other reast)n, the deserted aspect of the close in gen- 
 eral sat specially on this building. Moreover, the pave- 
 ment was up, and heaps of stone and gravel obstructed the 
 footway. Nobody was coming, nobody was going, in that 
 thoroughfare: she appeared to be the single one of the hu- 
 man race bent upon marriage business, which seemed to 
 have been unanimously abandoned by all the rest of the 
 world as proven foil}-. P>ul she thought of Swithin, his 
 blonde hair and ardent eyes and eloquent lips, and was 
 carried onward by the very reflection. 
 
 Entering the surrogate's room. Lady Constantine man- 
 aged at the last juncture to state her errand in tones so 
 collected as to startle even herself; to which her listener re- 
 plied also as if the wlidle thing wt-re the most natural in 
 the world. When it came to the affirmation that she had 
 lived iiitcen days in the parish, she said with dismay, "Oh, 
 no ! I thought the filleen days meant the interval of resi- 
 lience before the marriage takes place. I have lived here 
 only fourteen days and a half Now I must come again ! '' 
 
 " Oh — well — heh-hch — I think you need not be so par- 
 ticular," said the surrogate. " As a matter of fact, though 
 the letter of the law requires fifteen da}s' residence, many 
 people make five sufficient. The provision is inserted, as 
 you doubtless are aware, to hinder runaway marriages as 
 much as possible, and secret unions, and other such ob- 
 jectionable practices. You need not come again."
 
 150 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 That evening Lady Constantine wrote to Swithiii St. 
 Cleeve the last letter of the fortnight: — 
 
 My Dearest, — Do come to me as soon as you can. By a sort ot 
 favoring blunder I have been able to shorten the time of waiting by a 
 day. Come at once, for I am almost broken down with apprehen- 
 sion. It seems rather rash at moments, all this, and I wish you were 
 here to reassure me. I did not know I should feel so alarmed. I am 
 frightened at every footstep, and dread lest anybody who knows me 
 should accost me, and find out why I am here. I sometimes wonder 
 how I could have agreed to come and enact your part, but I did not 
 realize how trying it would be. You ought not to have asked me, 
 SwiLhin; upon my word, it was too cruel of you, and I will punish 
 you for it when you come. But I won't upbraid. I hope the home- 
 stead is repaired that has cost me all this sacrifice of modesty. If it 
 were anybody in the world but yon in question, I would rush home, 
 without waiting here for the end of it, — I really think I would ! But, 
 dearest, no. I must show my strength now, or let it be forever hid. 
 The barriers of ceremony are broken down between us, and it is for 
 the best that I am here. 
 
 And yet at no point of this trying prelude need Lady 
 Constantine have feared for her strength. Deeds in this 
 connection demand the particular kind of courage that such 
 perfervid women are endowed with, the courage of their 
 emotions, in which young men are often lamentably de- 
 ficient. Her fear was, in truth, the fear of being discov- 
 ered in an unwonted position; not of the act itself And 
 though her letter was in its way a true exposition of her 
 feeling, had it been necessary to go through the whole 
 Melchester process over again, she would have been found 
 equal to the emergency. 
 
 It had been for some days a point of anxiety with her 
 what to do with Green during the morning of the wedding.
 
 TlVO ON A TOWER. 1 51 
 
 Chance unexpectedly helped her in this difficulty. T he- 
 day before the purchase of the license, Green came to Lady 
 Constantine with a letter in her hand from her husband, 
 Anthony, her face as long as a fiddle. 
 
 "I hope there's nothing the matter.'" said Lady 
 Constantine. 
 
 "The child's took bad, my lady!" said Mrs. Green, 
 with floods of water in her eyes. "I love the child better 
 than I shall love all them that's coming put together; for 
 he's been a good boy to his mother ever since twelve 
 weeks afore he was born. ' I'was he, a tender deary, thai 
 made Anthony marry me, and thereby turned hisself 
 from a little calamity to a little blessing ! For the man 
 were a backward man in the church part o' matrimony, 
 my lady; though he'll do anything when he's forced a 
 bit by his manly feelings. And now to lose the child — 
 hoo-hoo 00-00 — What shall I do ! '' 
 
 "Well, you want to go home at once, I suppose.? " 
 
 Mrs. Green explained, between her sobs, that such was 
 her desire; and though this was a day or two sooner than 
 her mistress had wished to be left alone, she consented 
 to Green's departure. So, during the afternoon, her 
 woman went off, with directions to prepare for Lady 
 Constantine's return in two or three days. But as the 
 exact day^f her return was uncertain, no carriage was 
 to be sent to the staUon to meet her, her intention being 
 to hire one from the hotel. 
 
 Lady Constantine was now left in utter solitude to 
 await her lover's arrival.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 A MORE beautiful October morning than that of the 
 "^^- next day never beamed into the Welland valleys. 
 The yearly dissolution of leafage was setting in apace. 
 The foliage of the park trees, as it had rapidly resolved 
 itself into this complexion and that through the subtle 
 grades of decay, reflected wet lights of such innumerable 
 hues that it was a wonder to think their beauties only a 
 repetition of what had been exhibited on scores of pre- 
 vious Octobers b\' predecessors, which yet had been al- 
 lowed to pass away without a single dirge from the im- 
 perturbable beings who walked among them. Far in the 
 shadows semi-opaque .screens of blue haze made mysteries 
 of the commonest gravel-pit, dingle, or recess. 
 
 The wooden cabin at the foot of Rings-Hill Speer had 
 been furnished by Swithin as a sitting and sleeping apart- 
 ment, some little while before this time; for he had found 
 it highly convenient, during night observations at the top 
 of the column, to remain on the spot all night, not to 
 disturb his grandmother by passing in and out of the 
 house, and to save himself the labor of incessantly cross- 
 ing the field.
 
 TIVO av A TOWER. 1 53 
 
 He would much have hkcd to tell her the secret, and 
 had it been his own to tell would probably have done 
 so; but sharing- it with an objector who knew not his 
 grandmother's affection so well as he did himself, there 
 was no alternative to holding his tongue. The more 
 effectually to guard it he decided to sleep at the cabin 
 during the two or three nights previous to his departure, 
 leaving word at the homestead that in a day or two he 
 was going on an excursion. 
 
 It was very necessary to start early. Long before the 
 great eye of the sun was lifted high enough to dip into 
 the Welland valley, St. Cleeve arose from his bed in the 
 cabin and prepared to depart, cooking his breakfast upon 
 a little stove in the corner. The young rabbits littered 
 during the foregoing summer watched his preparations 
 through the open door from the gray dawn without, as 
 he busded, half-dressed in and out under the boughs, 
 and among the blackberries and brambles that grew 
 around. It was a strange place for a bridegroom to 
 perform his toilet in, but, considering the unconventional 
 nature of the marriage, a not inappropriate one. What 
 events had been enacted in that earthen camp since it 
 was first thrown up, nobody could say; but the primitive 
 simplicity of the young man's preparations accorded well 
 with the prehistoric spot on which they were made. Em- 
 bedded under his feet were possibly even now many rude 
 trinkets that had been worn at bridal ceremonies of the 
 early inhabitants. Litde signified those ceremonies to- 
 day, or the happiness or otherwise of the contracting 
 parties. That his own rite, nevertheless, signifies much 
 is the inconsequent reasoning of many another bride-
 
 154 TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 groom than Swithin; and he, hke the rest, went on with 
 his preparations, in that mood which sees in his stale 
 repetition the possibiHties of an original move. 
 
 Then through the wet cobwebs, that hung like mov- 
 able diaphragms on each blade and bough, he pushed 
 his way down to the furrow which led from the fir-tree 
 island to the wide world beyond the field. 
 
 He was not a stranger to enterprise, and still less to 
 the contemplation of enterprise; but an enterprise such 
 as this, dictated by the grand passion, he had never even 
 outlined. That his dear lady was troubled at the situ- 
 ation he had placed her in by not going himself on that 
 errand he could see from her letter; but believing an 
 immediate marriage with her to be the true way of 
 restoring to both that equanimity necessary to serene 
 philosophy, he held it of little account how the marriage 
 was brought about, and happily began his journey to- 
 wards her place of sojourn. Passing through a little 
 copse before leaving the parish, the smoke from the 
 newly lit fires of which rose like the stems of trees out 
 of the few cottage chimneys, he heard a quick, familiar 
 footstep in the path ahead of him, and, turning the 
 corner of the bushes, confronted the foot-post on his 
 way to Welland. In answer to St. Cleeves inquiry if 
 there was anything for himself, the postman handed out 
 one letter, and proceeded on his route. 
 
 Swithin opened and read the letter as he walked, till it 
 brought him to a standstill by the sheer weight of its contents. 
 They were enough to agitate a more phlegmatic youth than 
 he. He leant over the wicket which came in his path, and 
 endeavored to comprehend the sense of the whole.
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 155 
 
 The large long envelope contained, first, a letter from 
 a solicitor in a northern town, informing him that his 
 paternal great-uncle, who had recently returned from the 
 Cape (whither he had gone in an attempt to repair a 
 broken constitution), was now dead and buried. This 
 great-uncle's name was like a new creation to Swithin. 
 He had held no communication with the young man's 
 branch of the family for innumerable years, — never, in 
 fact, since the marriage of Swithin's father with the simple 
 daughter of Welland Farm. He had been a bachelor 
 to the end of his life, and amassed a fairly good profes- 
 sional fortune by a long and extensive medical practice 
 in the smoky, dreary manufacturing town in which he 
 had lived and died. Swithin had always been taught to 
 think of him as the embodiment of all that was unpleasant 
 in man. He was narrow, sarcastic, and shrewd to un- 
 seemliness. That very shrewdness had enabled him, 
 without much professional profundity, to establish his 
 large and lucrative connection, which lay almost entirely 
 among a class who neither looked nor cared for drawing- 
 room courtesies. 
 
 However, what Dr. St. Cleeve had been as a practitioner 
 matters little. He was now dead, and the bulk of his 
 property had been left to persons with whom this story 
 has nothing to do. But Swithin was informed that out 
 of it there was a bequest of ^^400 a year to himself, — 
 payment of which was to begin with his twenty-first year, 
 and continue for his life, unless he should marry before 
 reaching the age of twenty-five, in which precocious and 
 objectionable event his annuity would be forfeited. The 
 accompanying letter, said the solicitor, would explain all.
 
 156 rWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 This, the second letter, was from his uncle to himself, 
 written about a month before the former's death, and de- 
 posited with his will, to be forwarded to his nephew when 
 that event should have taken place. Swithin read, with 
 the solemnity that such posthumous episdes inspire, the 
 following words from one who, during life, had never 
 once addressed him: — 
 
 Dear Nephew, — You will doubtless experience some aston- 
 ishment at receiving a communication from one whom you have 
 never personally known, and who, when this comes into your 
 hands, will be beyond the reach of your knowledge. Perhaps I 
 am the loser by this life-long mutual ignorance. Perhaps I am 
 much to blame for it; perhaps not. But such reflections are prof- 
 itless at this date: I have written with quite other views than to 
 work up a sentimental regret on such an amazingly remote hy- 
 pothesis as that the fact of a particular pair of people not meet- 
 ing, among the millions of other pairs of people who have never 
 met, is a great calamity either to the world in general or to 
 themselves. 
 
 The occasion of my addressing you is briefly this: Nine months 
 ago a report casually reached me that your scientific studies were 
 pursued by you with great ability, and that you were a young 
 man of some promise as an astronomer. My own scientific pro- 
 clivities rendered the report more interesting than it might other- 
 wise have been to me; and it came upon me quite as a surprise 
 that any issue of your father's marriage should have so much in 
 him, or you might have seen more of me in former years than 
 you are ever likely to do now. My health had then begun to 
 fail, and I was starting for the Cape, or I should have crme my- 
 self to inquire into your condition and prospects. I did ntt re- 
 turn till six months later, and, as my health had not improved, 
 I sent a trusty friend to examine into your life, pursuits, and 
 circumstances, without your own knowledge, and to report his 
 observations to me. This he did. Tlnough liim I learnt, of fa 
 vorable news: —
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 57 
 
 (I.) Tliat you worked assiduously at the science ot astronomy. 
 
 (2.) That everything was auspicious in the career you have 
 chosen. 
 
 Of unfavoralilc news: — ■ 
 
 (I.) That the small income at your command, even when 
 eked out by the sum to which you would be entitled on your 
 grandmother's death and the free-hold of the homestead, would 
 be inadequate becomins^ly to support you as a scientific man, 
 whose lines of work were of a naUue not calculated to produce 
 an income for many years, if ever. 
 
 (2.) That there was something in your path worse than nar- 
 row means, and that that something was a woman. 
 
 To save you, if possible, from niin on these heads, I take 
 the preventive measures detailed below. 
 
 The chief step is, as ray solicitor will have informed you, 
 that the sum of ;^400 a year Ije settled on you for life, provided 
 you do not marry before reaching the age of twenty-five, — the 
 annuity to begin at the end of the first six months after you reach 
 the age of twenty-one; and, vice versa, that if you do maixy be- 
 fore reaching that age you will receive nothing thenceforward. 
 
 One object of my bequest is that you may have resources 
 sufficient to enable you to travel and study the Southern constel- 
 lations. When at the Cape, after hearing of your pursuits, I was 
 much struck with the importance of those constellations to an 
 astronomer just pushing into notice. There is more to be made 
 of the Southern hemisphere than ever has been made of it yet; 
 the mine is not so thoroughly worked as the Northern, and 
 thither your studies should tend. 
 
 The only other preventive step in my power is that of ex- 
 hortation, at which I am not an adept. Nevertheless, I say to 
 you, Swithin St. Cleeve, don't make a fool of yourself, as your 
 father did. If your studies are to be worth anything, believe me, 
 they must be carried on without the help of a woman. Avoid 
 her, and every one of the sex, if ytai mean to achieve any worthy 
 thing. Eschew all of that sort for many a year yet. Moreover, 
 I say, the lady of your acquaintance avoid in particular. I have 
 heard nothing aga n.^t her moral character hitherto; I have no
 
 "158 TIVO ON A TOJVE/?. 
 
 doubt it has been excellent. She may have many good qualities, 
 both of heart and of mind. But she has, in addition to her origi- 
 nal disqualification as a companion for you (that is, that of sex) 
 these two serious drawbacks: she is much older than yourself — 
 
 "Much older!" said Swithin, resentfully. 
 
 — and she is so impoverished that the title she derives from 
 her late husband is a positive objection. Beyond this, frankly, 
 I don't think well of her. I don't think well of any woman who 
 dotes upon a man younger than herself She's half, or quarter, 
 a foreigner, is she not? — or is it only her name? To care to be 
 the first fancy of a young fellow like you shows no great com- 
 mon .sense m her. If she were worth her salt, she would have 
 too much pride to be intimate with a youth in your unassured 
 position, to say no worse. She is old enough to know that a 
 liaison with her may, and almost certainly would, l>e your min; 
 and, on the other hand, that a marriage would be prepo.sterous, 
 — unless she is a complete fool, and in that case there is even 
 more reason for avoiding her than if she were in her few senses. 
 
 A woman of honorable feeling, nephew, would be careful to 
 do nothmg to hinder you in your career, as this putting of her- 
 self in your way most certainly will. Yet I hear that she pro- 
 fesses a great anxiety on this same future of yours as a physicist. 
 The best way in which she can show the reality of her anxiety 
 is by leaving you to yourself. Perhaps she persuades herself that 
 she is doing you no harm. Well, let her have the benefit of the 
 possible belief; but depend upon it that in truth she gives the 
 lie to her conscience by maintaining such a transparent fallacy. 
 Women's brains are not formed for assisting at any profound 
 science: they lack the power to see things except in the concrete. 
 She'll blab your most secret plans and theories to eveiy one of 
 her acquaintance — 
 
 " She's got none ! " said Swithin, beginning to get warm. 
 
 — and make them appear ridiculous by announcing them before 
 they are matured. If you attempt to study with a wom.an, you'll 
 !« ruled by her to entertain fancies instead of theories, a'r-castles
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 159 
 
 instead of intentions, qualms instead of opinions, sickly prepos- 
 sessions instead of reasoned conclusions. Your wide heaven of 
 study, young man, will soon reduce itself to the miserable narrow 
 expanse of her face, and your myriad of stars to her two trump- 
 ery eyes. 
 
 A woman waking your passions just at a moment when you 
 are endeavoring to shine mtellectually is like stirring up the mud 
 at the bottom of a clear brook. All your -brightness and sparkle 
 are taken away; you become moping and thick-headed; obstruc- 
 tions that before only brought out your brilliancies now distort 
 and disfigure your each dull attempt to surmount them. 
 
 Like a certain philosopher, I would, upon my soul, have all 
 young men from eighteen to five-and-twenty kept under barrels: 
 seeing how often, in the lack of some such sequestering process, 
 the woman sits down before each as his destiny, and too frequently 
 enei-vates his puipose, till he abandons the most promising course 
 ever conceived. 
 
 But no more. I now leave your fate in your own hands. 
 Your well-wishing relative, 
 
 JocELYN St. Cleeve, 
 
 Doctor in Medicine. 
 
 As coming from a bachelor and hardened misogynist of 
 seventy-two, the opinions herein contained were nothing 
 remarkable; but their practical result in restricting the sud- 
 den endowment of Swithin's researches by conditions which 
 turned the favor into a harassment was, at this unique mo- 
 ment, discomfiting and distracting in the highest degree. 
 
 Sensational, however, as the letter was, the passionate 
 intention of the day was not hazarded for more than a few 
 minutes thereby. The truth was, the caution and bribe 
 came too late, too unexpectedly, to be of influence. They 
 were the sort of thing which required fermentation to ren- 
 der them effective. Had St. Cleeve received the exhorta- 
 tion a month earlier; had he been able to run over in his
 
 l6o TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 mind, at everv wakeful hour of thirty consecutive nights, 
 a private catechism on the possibihties opened up by this 
 annuity, there is no tellin^t;; what might have been the stress 
 of such a web of perplexity upon him, — a }oung man 
 whose love for celestial physics was second to none. But 
 to have held befoi-e him, at the last moment, the picture 
 of a future advantage that he had never once thought of, 
 or discounted for present staying power, it affected him 
 about as much as the view of horizons shown by sheet- 
 lightning. He saw an immense prospect; it went, and the 
 world was as before. 
 
 He caught the train at Warborne, and moved rapidly 
 towards Melchester; not precisely in the same key as when 
 he had dressed in the hut at dawn, but, as regarded the 
 mechanical furtherances of the journey, as unhesitating as 
 before. And with the change of scene even his gloom left 
 him; his bosom's lord sat lightl)- in his throne. St. Cleeve 
 was not sufficiently in mind of poetical literature to re- 
 member that wise poets are accustomed to read that light- 
 ness inversely. Swilhin thought it an omen of good for- 
 tune, and as thinking is causing in woi a few such cases, 
 he was perhaps, in spite of poets, right.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 A T the station Lady Constantine appeared, standing ex- 
 pectant;'he saw her face from the window of the car- 
 riage long before she saw him. He no sooner saw her 
 than he was satisfied to his heart's content with his prize. 
 If his great-uncle had offered him, from the grave, a king- 
 dom instead of her, he would not have accepted it. Swith- 
 in jumped out, and nature never painted in a woman's face 
 more devotion than appeared in my lady's at that moment. 
 To both the situation seemed like a beautiful allegory, not 
 to be examined too closely, lest its defects of correspond- 
 ence with real life should be apparent. 
 
 They almost feared to shake hands in public, so much 
 depended upon their passing that morning without moles- 
 tation. A fly was called, and they drove away. 
 
 "Take this," she said, handing him a folded paper. 
 "It belongs to you rather than to me." 
 
 At crossings, and other occasional pauses, pedestrians 
 turned their faces and looked at the pair (for no reason but 
 that, among so man_\-, there were necessarily a few of the 
 sort who have eyes to ncjte what incidents chance holds be- 
 fore them as iliey plod on); but the two in the vehicle could
 
 t6i TIVO OiV A TOWER. 
 
 hot but fear that these innocent beholders had special de- 
 tective designs on them. 
 
 While driving round the close a fine-looking man, of 
 middle age, came from the palace gates, and struck across 
 the grass by a footpath. He wore a corded shovel hat of 
 glossy beaver, and black breeches. 
 
 "Who is he .^ The bishop, I suppose," said Swithin 
 
 "Yes," Lady Constan tine replied. "Dr Helmsdale. I 
 have seen him two or three times since my arrival. He is 
 but lately consecrated, as you know. " Nothing further hap- 
 pened, and they were set down opposite a shop, about fifty 
 yards from the church door, at five minutes to eleven. 
 
 "We will dismiss the fly," she said. " It will only at- 
 tract idlers. " 
 
 On turning the corner and reaching the church, they 
 found the door ajar; but the building contained only two 
 persons, a man and a woman, — the clerk and his wife, as 
 thev learnt. Swithin asked when the clergvman would arrive. 
 
 The clerk looked at his watch, and said, ' ' At just on 
 eleven o'clock." 
 
 " He ought to be here," said Swithin. 
 
 "Yes," replied the clerk, as the hour struck. "The 
 fact is, sir, he is a deputy, and apt to be rather wandering 
 in his understanding as regards time and such like, which 
 hev stood in the way of the man's getting a benefit. But 
 no doubt he'll come." 
 
 "The regular incumbent is away, then .' " 
 
 "He's gone for his bare pa'son's fortnight, — that's all; 
 and was forced to put up with a weak-talented man or 
 none. I'll tell ye what, sir: 1 think I'd better run round 
 to the gentleman's lodgings, and try to find him.''
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 1 63 
 
 " Pray do," said Lady Constantine. 
 
 The clerk left the church; his wiTe busied herself with 
 dusting at the further end, and Swithin and Viviette were 
 left to themselves. The imagination travels so rapidly, and 
 a w^oman's forethought is so assumptive, that the clerk's 
 departure had no sooner doomed them to inaction than it 
 was borne in upon Lady Constantine's mind that she would 
 not become the wife of Swithin St. Cleeve. either to-day 
 or on any other day. Her divinations were continually 
 misleading her, she knew; but a hitch at the moment of 
 marriage surely had a meaning in it. 
 
 "Ah, — the marriage is not to be ! " she said to herself. 
 "This is a fatality." 
 
 It was twenty minutes past, and no parson had arrived. 
 Swithin took her hand. "If it cannot be to-day, it can 
 be to-morrow," he whispered. 
 
 "I cannot eay,'' she answered. "Something tells me 
 no. 
 
 It was almost impossible that she could know anything 
 of the deterrent force exercised on Swithin by his dead 
 uncle that morning. Yet her manner tallied so curiously 
 well with such knowledge that he was struck by it, and 
 remained silent. 
 
 " You have a black tie," she continued, looking at him. 
 
 " Yes," replied Swithin. "I bought it on my way here." 
 
 "Why could it not have been less somber in color .^ " 
 
 "My great-uncle is dead." 
 
 "You had a great-uncle.? You never told me." 
 
 " I nevej saw him ir. my life. I have only heard about 
 him since his death.'' He spoke in as quiet and measured 
 a way as he could, but his heart was sinking. She would
 
 1 64 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 go on questioning; he could not tell her an untruth. She 
 would discover particulars of that great-uncle's provision 
 for him, which he, Swithin, was throwing away for her 
 sake, and she would refuse to be his for his own sake. 
 His conclusion at this moment was precisely what hers 
 had been five minutes sooner: they were never to be hus- 
 band and wife. 
 
 But she did not continue her questions, for the simplest 
 of all reasons: hasty footsteps were audible in the entrance, 
 and the parson was seen coming up the aisle, the clerk 
 behind him wiping the beads of perspiration from his face 
 The somewhat sorry clerical specimen shook hands with 
 them, and entered the vestry; and the clerk came up and 
 opened the book. 
 
 " The poor gentleman's memory is a bit top.-^y-turvy, " 
 whispered the latter. " He had got it in his mind that 't 
 were a funeral, and I found him wandering about the 
 cemetery a looking for us. However, all's well as ends 
 well." And the clerk wiped his forehead again. 
 
 "How ill-omened!" murmured Viviette. But the 
 parson came out robed at this moment, and the clerk 
 put on his ecclesiastical countenance and looked in his 
 book. Lady Constantine's momentary languor passed; 
 her blood resumed its courses with a new spring. The 
 subdued thunder of tlie church then rolled out upon 
 the palpitating pair, and no couple ever joined theii 
 whispers thereto with more fervency than they. 
 
 Lady Constantine (as she for some time continued to 
 be called by the outside world, and may therefore be 
 still called here) had told Green that she might be ex- 
 pected at Welland in a day, or two, or three, as circum-
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 165 
 
 Stance; should dictate. Though the time of return was 
 thus left open, it was deemed advisable, by both Swithin 
 and herself, that her journey back should not be deferred 
 after the next day, in case any suspicions might be 
 aroused. As for St. Cleeve, his comings and goings 
 were of no consequence. It was seldom known whether 
 he was at home or abroad, by reason of his frequent se- 
 clusion at the column. 
 
 Lite in the afternoon of the next day he accompanied 
 her to the Melchester station, intending himself to remain 
 in that city till llie following morning. But when a man 
 or youtii has such a tender article on his hands as a 
 thirty-hour bride, it is hardly in the power of his strongest 
 reason to set her down at a railway, and send her off like 
 a superfluous portmanteau; wherefore, the experiment 
 of parting so soon after their union jn-oved excrutiatingly 
 severe to these. The evening was dull; the breeze of 
 autumn cre{)L fitfuil}- through every slit and aperture in 
 the town; not a soul in the world seemed to notice or 
 care about anything they did. Lady Constantine sighed 
 and there was no resisting it, — he could not leave her 
 thus. He decided to get into the train with her, and 
 keep her company for at least a few stations on her way. 
 
 It drew (in to be a dark night, and, seeing that there 
 was no serious risk, after all, he prolonged his journey 
 witli her so far as to the junction at which the branch 
 line to Warboire forked off. Here it was necessary to 
 wa't a few minutes, before either he could go back or 
 she could go on. They wandered outside the station 
 doorway into the gloom of the road, and there agreed to 
 part.
 
 1 66 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 While she yet stood holding his arm a phaeton sped 
 up to the station entrance, where, in wheeling round, the 
 horse suddenly jibbed. The gentleman who was driving, 
 being either impatient, or possessed of a theory that all 
 jibbers may be started by severe whipping, because that 
 plan had answered with one in fifty, applied the lash; as 
 a result of it, the horse thrust round the carriage to 
 where they stood, and the end of the driver's sweeping 
 whip cut across Lady Constantine's face with such sever- 
 ity as to cause her an involuntary cry. Swithin turned 
 her round to the lamplight, and discerned a streak of 
 blood on her cheek. 
 
 By this time the gentleman who had done the mischief, 
 with many words of regret, had given the reins to his 
 man and dismounted. 
 
 "I will go to the waiting-room for a moment," whis- 
 pered Viviette, hurriedly; and, loosing her hand from 
 his arm, she pulled down her veil and vanished inside 
 the building. 
 
 The stranger came forward and raised his hat. He was 
 a slightly built and apparently town-bred man, of twenty- 
 eight or thirty; his manner of address was at once careless 
 and conciliatory. " I am greatly concerned at what I 
 have done, " he said. "I sincerely trust that your wife " 
 — but observing the youthfulness of Swithin, he withdrew 
 the words suggested by the manner of Swithin towards 
 Lady Constantine — "I trust the young lady was not se- 
 riously cut .? " 
 
 ^'I trust not," said Swithin, with sorne vexation. 
 
 ^' Where did the lash touch her.?" 
 
 "Straiirht down her cheek."
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 1 67 
 
 "Let me go to her and humbly apologize." 
 
 " I'll inquire.'' He went to the ladies' room, in which 
 Viviettc had taken refuge. She met him at the door, 
 her handkerchief to her check, and Swithin explained 
 thai the eirivcr of the phaeton had sent to make inquiries. 
 
 "I cannot see him!" she whispered. "He is my 
 brother Louis ! He is, no doubt, going on by the train 
 to my house. We must wait till he is gone." 
 
 Swithin, thereupon, went out again, and telling the 
 young man that the cut on her face was not serious, 
 but that she could not see him, alter a few words they 
 parted. St. Cleeve then heard him ask for a ticket for 
 Warborne, which confirmed Lady Constantine's view that 
 he was going on to her house. When the branch train 
 had moved off, Swithin returned to his bride, who waited 
 in a trembling state within. 
 
 " Is he gone .^ " she asked; and on being informed that 
 he had departed showed herself much relieved. 
 
 "Where does your brother come from .■' " said Swithin. 
 
 "From London, immediately. Rio before that. He 
 has a friend or two in this neighborhood, and visits here 
 occasionally. I have seldom or never spoken to you of 
 him, because of his long absence." 
 
 " Is he going to settle near you .' " 
 
 "No, nor anywhere, I fear. He is, or rather was, 
 in the diplomatic service. He was first a clerk in the 
 foreign office, and was afterwards appointed attache at 
 Rio Janeiro. But he has resigned the appointment. I 
 wish he had not." 
 
 "Why did he resign.'" 
 
 ♦' He complained of the banishment, and the cliniate,
 
 1 68 nVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 and everything that people complain of who are deter- 
 mined to be dissatisfied, — though, poor fellow, there is 
 some ground for his complaints. Perhaps some people 
 would say that he is idle. But he is scarcely that; he is 
 rather restless than idle, so that he never persists in any- 
 thing. Yet if a subject takes his fancy he will follow it up 
 with exemplary patience till somethmg diverts him." 
 
 " He is not kind to you, is he, dearest.'' " 
 
 "Why do you think that.?" 
 
 " Your manner seems to say so." 
 
 "Well, he may not always be kind. But look at my 
 face, does the mark show } " 
 
 A streak straight as a meridian, was visible down her 
 cheek. The blood had been brought almost to the sur- 
 face, but was not quite through, that which had originally 
 appeared thereon having possibly come from the horse. It 
 signified lluit to-morrow the red line would be a black one. 
 
 Swilhin informed her that her brother had taken a 
 ticket for Warborne, and she at once perceived that he 
 was going on to visit her at Welland, though from his, 
 letter she had not expected him so soon by a few days. 
 " JNIeanwhile, " continued Swilhin, "you can now get 
 home only by the late train, having missed that one." 
 
 " But. .Swilhin, don't you see my new trouble.'' If 1 
 g ) to Welland House to-night, and find my brother just 
 arrived there, and he sees this cut on my face, — which I 
 suppose you described to him " — 
 
 "I did." 
 
 — "he will know I was the lady with you !" 
 
 "Whom he called my wife. I wonder why we look 
 husband and wife already ! "
 
 riVO ON A TOWER. 169 
 
 "Then what am I to do? F<;>r the ensuing three or 
 four days I bear in my face a clew to his discovery c,f 
 our secret." 
 
 "Then you must not be seen. We must stay jI 
 an inn here." 
 
 "Oh, no!" she said timidly. "It is too near homo 
 to be quite safe. We might not be known; but if we 
 were ! 
 
 "We can't go back to Melchester now. I'll tell 
 you, dear Viviette, what we must do. We'll go on to 
 Warborne in separate carriages; we'll meet outside the 
 station; thence we'll walk to the column in the dark, 
 and I'll keep you a captive in the cabin, till the scar 
 has disappeared. " 
 
 As there was nothing which better recommended it- 
 self, this course was decided on; and after taking from 
 her trunks the articles that might be required for an 
 incarceration of two or three days, they left the said 
 trunks at the cloak-room and went on by the Isst train, 
 which reached Warborne about ten o'clock. It was 
 only necessary for Lady Constantine to cover her free 
 with the thick veil that she had provided for this es- 
 capade, to walk out of the station without fear of rec- 
 ognition. St. Cleevc came forth from another com- 
 pirlmcnt, and they did not rejoin each other till they 
 had reached a shadowy bend in the old turnpike rorul, 
 bjyond the irradiation of the Warborne lamplight. 
 
 The walk to Welland was long. It was the walk 
 wliich Switliin had taken in the rain when he had 
 learnt the fatal furestallment of his stellar discovery; but 
 now he wa,s moved by a less desperate mood, and
 
 170 7W0 ON A TOWER. 
 
 blamed neither God nor man. They were not bound 
 for time, and passed along the silent, lonely way wui. 
 that sense rather of predestination than of choice m 
 their proceedings which the presence of night some- 
 limes imparts. Reaching the park gate, they found u 
 open, and from this they inferred that her brother 
 Louis had arrived. 
 
 Leaving the house and park on their right, they 
 traced the highway yet a little further, and, plunging 
 through -the stubble of the opposite field, drew near 
 the isolated earthwork bearing the plantation and tower, 
 which, together, rose like a flattened dome and lantern 
 from the lighter-hued plain of stubble. It was far too 
 dark to distinguish firs from other trees by the eye alone, 
 but the peculiar dialect of sylvan language which the 
 piny conclave used would have been enough to pro- 
 claim their quality at any time. In the lovers' stealthy 
 progress up the slopes a dry stick here and there snap- 
 ped beneath their feet, seeming like a shot of alarm. 
 
 On being unlocked, the hut was found precisely as 
 Swithin had left it two days before. Lady Constantine 
 was thoroughly wearied, and sat down, while he gathered 
 a handful of twigs and spikelets from the masses 
 strewn without, and lit a small fire, first taking the pre- 
 caution to blind the little window and relock the door. 
 I-aciy Constantine looked curiously around by the light 
 of the b'aze. The hut was small as the prophet's 
 chamber provided by the Shunamite: its size was 
 ab(. ut seven feet by eleven; in one corner stood the 
 stove, with a little t.ible and chair, a small cupboard 
 hard bv, a })!tclicr uf water, a ra,ck overhead, with v^rj^
 
 TPt^O ON A TOWER. 17I 
 
 ous articles, including a kettle and gridiron; while the 
 other end of the room was fitted out as a dormitory, 
 for Swithin's use during late observations in the tower 
 overhead. 
 
 "It is not much of a palace to offer you," he re- 
 marked, smiling. "But at any rate, it is a refuge." 
 
 The cheerful firelight dispersed in some measure 
 Lady Constantine's anxieties. "If we only had some- 
 thing to eat ! " she said. 
 
 "Dear me," cried St. Cleeve, blankly, "That's a 
 thing I never thought of" 
 
 "Nor I, till now," she replied. 
 
 He reflected with misgiving. "Beyond a small loaf 
 of bread in the cupboard, I have nothing. However, 
 just outside the door there are lots of those little rab- 
 bits, about the size of rats, that the keepers call run- 
 ners. And they are as tame as possible. But I fear I 
 could not catch one now. Yet, dear Viviette, wait a 
 minute; I'll try. You must not be starved." 
 
 He softly let himself out, and was gone some time. 
 When he reappeared, he produced, not a rabbit, but 
 four sparrows and a thrush. "I could do nothing 
 in the way of a rabbit without setting a wire," he said. 
 "But I have managed to get these by knowing where 
 they roost." 
 
 He showed her how to prepare the birds, and, hav- 
 ing 5K;t her to roast them by the fire, departed with 
 the pitcher, to replenish it at the brook which flowed 
 near the homestead in the neighboring Bottom. 
 
 "They are all asleep at my grandmothers," he in- 
 formed her, when he re-entered, panting, with the- diip-
 
 172 TWO OU A TOWER. 
 
 ping pitcher. "They imagine me to be sixty miles 
 off." 
 
 The birds were now ready, and the table was spread. 
 With this fare, eked out by dry toast from the loaf, 
 and moistened with cups of water from the pitcher, to 
 which Swithin added a little wine from the flask he 
 had carried on his journey, they were forced to be con- 
 tent for their supper.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 WHEN Lady Constantine awoke, the next morning, 
 Swithin was nowhere to be seen. Before she was 
 quite ready for breakfast she heard the key turn in the 
 door, and felt startled, till she remembered that the 
 comer could hardly be anybody but he. He brought 
 a basket with provisions, an extra cup and saucer, 
 and so on. In a short space of time the kettle began 
 singing on the stove, and the morning meal was begun. 
 The sweet resinous air from the firs blew in upon them, 
 as they sat at breakfast; the birds hopped round the 
 door (which, somewhat riskily, they ventured to keep 
 open); and at their elbow rose the tall, lank column 
 into a realm of sunlight, which only reached them in 
 fitful darts and flashes. 
 
 "I could be happy here forever," said she, clasping 
 his hand. "I wish I could never see my great gloomy 
 house again, since I am not rich enough to throw it 
 open, and live there as I ought to do. Poverty of this 
 sort is not unpleasant, at any rate. What are you 
 thinking of.'" 
 
 "1 am thinking about my outing this morning. On
 
 174 TIVO OM A TOWER. 
 
 reaching m\' grandmother's she was only a Httle sur- 
 prised to see me. I was obliged to breakfast there, or 
 appear to do so, to divert suspicion; and this food is 
 supposed to be wanted for my dinner and supper. 
 There will of course be no difficulty in my obtaining 
 an ample supply for any length of time, as I can take 
 what I like from the buttery without observation. But 
 as I looked in my grandmother's face this morning, 
 and saw her looking affectionately in mine, and thought 
 how she had never concealed anything from me, and had 
 always had my welfare at heart, I felt — that I should 
 like to tell her what we have done." 
 
 "Oh, no, — please not, Swithin ! " she exclaimed 
 piteously. 
 
 "Very well," he answered. "On no consideration 
 will I do so without your assent." And no more was 
 said on the matter. 
 
 The morning was passed in applying wet rag and 
 other remedies to the purple line on Viviette's cheek; 
 and in the afternoon they set up the equatorial under 
 the replaced dome, to have it in order for nighf 
 observations. 
 
 The evening was clear, dry, and remarkably cold by 
 comparison with the day-time weather. After a frugal sup- 
 per, they replenished the stove with charcoal from the 
 homestead, which they also burnt during the day, — an idea 
 of Viviette's, that the smoke from a wood fire might not 
 be seen more frequently than was consistent with the oc- 
 casional occupation of the cabin by Swithin, as heretofore. 
 
 At eight o'clock she insisted upon his ascending the 
 tower for observations, in strict pursuance of the idea on
 
 TIVO OAT A TOWER. ITS 
 
 which their marriage had been based, namely, that of re- 
 storing regularity to his studies. 
 
 The sky had a new and startling beauty that night. A 
 broad, fluctuating, semicircular arch of vivid white light 
 spanned the northern quarter of the heavens, reaching 
 from the horizon to the star Eta in the Great Bear. It 
 was the Aurora Borealis, just risen up for the winter sea- 
 son out of the freezing seas of the north, where every au- 
 tumn vapor was now undergoing rapid congelation. 
 
 "Oh, let us sit and look at it!" she said; and they 
 .turned their backs upon the equatorial and the southern 
 glories of the heavens to this new beauty in a quarter which 
 they seldom contemplated. The luster of the fixed stars 
 was diminished to a sort of blueness. Little by little the 
 arch grew higher against the dark void, like the form of 
 the spirit-maiden m the shades of Glenfinlas, till its crown 
 drew near the zenith, and threw a tissue over the whole 
 wagon and horses of the great northern constellation. 
 Brilliant shafts radiated from the convexity of the arch, 
 coming and going silently. The temperature fell, and 
 Lady Constantine drew her wrap more closely around her. 
 
 "We'll go down," said Swithin. "The cabin is beau- 
 tifullv warm. Why should we try to observe to-night.? 
 Indeed, we cannot; the Aurora light overpowers every- 
 thing." 
 
 "Very well. To-morrow night there will be no inter- 
 ruption. I shall be gone." 
 
 "You leave me to-morrow, Viviette.?" 
 
 "Yes; to-morrow morning." 
 
 Indeed, with the progress of the hours and days, the 
 conviction was borne in upon Viviette more and more
 
 I 'J 6 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 forcibly tliat not for kingdoms and principalities could she 
 afford to risk the discovery of her presence here by any 
 living soul. 
 
 " But let me see your face, dearest," he said. "I don't 
 think it will be safe for yoU to meet your brother yet." 
 
 As it was too dark to see her face on the summit where 
 they sat,' they descended the winding staircase; and in the 
 cabin Swithin examined the damaged cheek. The line, 
 though broken up into dashes, and so far attenuated as 
 not to be observable by any one but an intimate, had not 
 quite disappeared. But in consequence of her reiterated 
 and almost tearful anxiety to go, and as there was a strong 
 probability that her brother had left the House, Swithin 
 decided to call at Welland next morning, and reconnoiter 
 with a view to her return. 
 
 Locking her in, he crossed the dewy stubble into the 
 park. The house was silent and deserted; and only one 
 tall stalk of smoke ascended from the chimneys. N(jt- 
 withstanding that the hour was hardly nine, he knocked 
 at the door. 
 
 "Is Lady Constantine at home.?" asked Swithin, with a 
 disingenuousness now habitual, yet unknown to him six 
 months before. 
 
 "No, Mr. St. Cleeve; my lady has not returned from 
 Melchester. We expect her every day." 
 
 " Nobody staying in the house .•* " 
 
 "My lady's brother has been here; but he is gone on 
 to Budmouth. He will come again in two or three weeks 
 I understand." 
 
 This was enough. Swithin said he would call again, 
 and returned to the cabin, where, waking Viviette, who
 
 riVO ON- A TOWEk. 177 
 
 was not by nature an early riser, he waited on the column 
 till she was ready to breakfast. When this had been shared 
 they prepared to start. 
 
 A long walk was before them. Warborne station lay 
 five miles distant, and the next station above that nine 
 miles. They were bound k)x the latter; their plan being 
 that she should there take the train to Filton Junction 
 (where the whip accident had occurred), claim her lug- 
 gage, and return with it to Warborne, as if from Melches- 
 ter. The morning was cool, and the walk not wearisome. 
 When once they had left the stubble field of their environ- 
 ment and the parish of Welland behind, they sauntered on 
 comfortably. Lady Constantine's spirits rising as she with- 
 drew further from danger. 
 
 They parted by a little brook, about half a mile from the 
 station; Swithin to return to Welland by the way he had 
 come. 
 
 Lady Constantine telegraphed from Filton to Warborne 
 for a carriage to be in readiness to meet her on her arrival; 
 and then, waiting for the down train, she traveled smoothly 
 home, reaching Welland House about five minutes sooner 
 than Swithin reached the column hard by, after foodng it 
 all the way from where they had parted.
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 
 "P^ROIM that day forward their hfe resumed its old chan- 
 ■*- nel in general outward aspect. Perhaps the most 
 remarkable feature in their romantic exploit was its com- 
 parative effectiveness as an expedient for the end designed, 
 — that of restoring calm assiduity to the studies of these 
 astronomers. Swithin took up his old position as the 
 lonely philosopher at the column, and Lady Constantine 
 lapsed back to immured existence at the house, with ap- 
 parently not a friend in the parish. The enforced narrow- 
 ness of life which her limited resources necessitated was 
 now an additional safeguard against the discovery of her re- 
 lationship with St. Cleeve. Her neighbors seldom troubled 
 her; as much, it must be owned, from a tacit understand- 
 ing that she was not in a position to return invitations as 
 from any selfish coldness engendered by her want of 
 wealth. 
 
 At the first meeting of the secretly united pair after their 
 short honeymoon, they were compelled to behave as stran- 
 gers to each other. It occurred in the only part of Wel- 
 land which deserved the name of a village street, and all 
 the laborers were returning to their midday meal, with
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 79 
 
 those of their wives who assisted at out-door work. Be- 
 fore the eyes of this innocent though quite untrustworthy 
 group, Swithin and his Viviette could only shake hands 
 in passing, though she continued to say to him in an un- 
 ilerlone, " My brother does not return yet for some time. 
 He has gone to Paris. I will be on the lawn this evening, 
 if you can come." It was a fluttered smile that she be- 
 stowed on him, and there was no doubt that every fiber 
 of her heart vibrated afre.^h at meeting, with such reserve, 
 one who stood in his intimate relation to her. 
 
 The shades of night fell early now, and Swithin was at 
 the spot (if ni)pointment about the time that he knew her 
 dinner wtnild be over. It was just where they had met 
 at the beginning of the year, but many changes had re- 
 sulted since then. The flower beds that had used to be so 
 neatly edged were now jagged and leaf)'; black stars ap- 
 peared on the pale surface of the gravel walks, denoting 
 tufts of grass that grew unmolested there. Lady Con- 
 stantine's external affairs wore just that aspect which sug- 
 gests that new blood may be advantageously introduced 
 into the line; and new blood had been introduced, in 
 good sooth, — with what result remained to be seen. 
 
 She silently entered on the scene from the same window 
 which had given her passage in months gone by. They 
 met with a concerted embrace, and St. Cleeve spoke his 
 greeting in whispers. 
 
 "We are quite safe, dearest," said she. 
 
 " But the servants.' " 
 
 " My meager staff consists of only two and the boy; and 
 they are away in the other wing. I thought you would 
 like to see the inside of my house, after showing me the
 
 l8o TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 inside of yours. So we will walk through it instead of 
 staying out here." 
 
 She let him in through the casement, and they strolled . 
 forward softly, Swithin never before having gone beyond- 
 the library. The whole western side of the house was at 
 this time shut up, her life being confined to two or three 
 small rooms in the southeast corner. The great apartment-s 
 through which they now whisperingly walked wore already 
 that funereal aspect that comes from disuse and inattention. 
 Triangular cobwebs already formed little hammocks for 
 the dust in corners of the wainscot, and a close smell of 
 wood and leather, seasoned with mouse-droppings, per-, 
 vaded the atmosphere. So seldom was the solitude of 
 these chambers intruded on by human feet that more than 
 once a mouse stood and looked the twain in the face from 
 the arm of a sofa, or the top of a cabinet, without any 
 great fear. 
 
 Swithin had no residential ambition whatever, but he 
 was interested in the place. "Will the house ever be 
 thrown open to gayety, as it was in old times ^ " said he. 
 "Not unless you make a fortune," she replied laugh- 
 ingly. " It is mine for my life, as you know; but the es- 
 tate is so terribly saddled with annuities to Sir Blount's 
 distant relatives, one of whom will succeed me here, that 
 I have practically no more than my own little private in- 
 come to exist on. " 
 
 ' ' And are you bound to occupy the house ? " 
 "Yes; that was one of the capricious conditions." 
 "And was there any stipulation in the event of your 
 remarriage ? " 
 
 "It was not naentioned."
 
 TIVO OA' A TOWER. l8l 
 
 " It is satisfactory to find that you lose nothing by marry- 
 ing me, at all events, dear Vivictte." 
 
 "I hope you lose nothing, cither, — at least, of conse- 
 quence." 
 
 ' ' What have I to lose ? " 
 
 " I meant your liberty. Suppose you become a popu- 
 lar physicist (popularity seems cooling towards art and co- 
 queting with science nowadays), and a better chance offers, 
 and one who would make you a newer and brighter wife 
 than I am comes in your way: will you never regret this.' 
 Will you never despise me.^ " 
 
 Swithin answered by a kiss, anil they again went on; 
 proceeding like a couple of burglars, lest they should at- 
 tract the attention of the cook or Green. 
 
 in one of the upper rooms his eyes were attracted by an 
 old chamber organ, which had once been lent for use in 
 the church. He mentioned "his recollection of the same, 
 which led her to say, "That reminds me of something ! 
 There is to be a confirmation in our parish in the spring, 
 and you once told me that you had never been confirmed. 
 What shocking neglect ! Why was it .' " 
 
 " I hardly know. The confusion resulting from my fa- 
 ther's death caused it to be forgotten, I suppose." 
 
 "Now, dear Swithin, you will do this to please me, — 
 be confirmed on the present occasion."' 
 
 "Since I have done without the virtue of it so long, 
 might I not do without it altogether.? " 
 
 "No, no ! " she said earnestly. " I do wish it, indeed. 
 I am made unhappy when I think you don't care about 
 such serious matters. Without the church to cling to, 
 what have we } ''
 
 1 82 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Each other. But, seriously, I should be inverting 
 the established order of spiritual things; people ought to 
 be confirmed before they are married. " 
 
 ' ' That's really of minor consequence. Now, don't think 
 slightingly of what so many good men have laid down as 
 necessary to be done. And, dear Swithin, I somehow feel 
 that a certain levity which has perhaps shown itself in our 
 treatment of the sacrament of marriage — by making a clan- 
 destine adventure of what is, after all, a solemn rite — would 
 be well atoned for by a due seriousness in other points of 
 religious observance. This opportunity should therefore 
 not be passed over. I thought of it all last night; and 
 you are a parson's son, remember. In short, Swithin, do 
 be a good boy, and observe the church's ordinances. " 
 
 Lady Constantine, by virtue of her temperament, was 
 necessarily either lover or devote, and she vibrated so grace- 
 fully between these two conditions that nobody who had 
 known the circumstances could have condemned her in- 
 consistencies. To be led into difficulties by those master- 
 ing emotions of hers, to aim at escape by turning round 
 and seizing the apparatus of religion (which, however, 
 could only rightly be worked by those emotions already 
 bestowed elsewhere), — it was, after all, but Nature's well- 
 meaning attempt to preserve the honor of her daughter's 
 conscience in the trying quandary to which the conditions 
 of se.x had given birth. As Viviette could not be confirmed 
 herself, and as the first Sunday in the month was a long 
 way off, she urged Swithin thus. 
 
 "And the new bishop is such a good man," she con- 
 tinued. " Do you remember seeing him in the cathedrs^l 
 close.' I liked the look of hini much,"
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 83 
 
 "Very well, dearest. To please you I'll be confirmed. 
 I\Iy grandmother, too, will be delighted, no doubt." 
 
 The}' continued their ramble; Lady Constantine first ad- 
 vancing into rooms with the candle, to assure herself that 
 all was empty, and then calling him forward in a whisper. 
 The stillness was broken only by these whispers, or the 
 occasional crack of a floor-board beneath their tread. At 
 last they sat down, and, shading the candle with a screen, 
 she showed him the faded contents of this and that drawer 
 or cabinet, or the wardrobe of some member of the family 
 who had died young early in the century, when muslin 
 reigned supreme, when waists were close to arm-pits, and 
 muffs as large as smugglers' tubs. 
 
 These researches among habilimental hulls and husks, 
 whose human kernels had long ago perished, had gone 
 on about half an hour, when the companions were startled 
 by a loud ringing at the front door bell.
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 T ADY CONSTANTINE flung down the old-fkshioned 
 ^^ lace-work, whose beauties she had been pointing 
 out to Swithin, and exxlaimed, "Who can it be? Not 
 Louis, surely ? " 
 
 They Hstened. An arrival was such a phenomenon at 
 this unfrequented mansion, and particularly a late arrival, 
 that no servant was on the alert to respond to the call; and 
 the visitor ranci again more loudlv than before. Sounds of 
 the tardy opening and shutting of a passage-door from the 
 kitchen quarter then reached their ears, and Viviette went 
 into the corridor to hearken more attentively. In a few 
 minutes she returned to the wardrobe-room in which she 
 had left Swithin. 
 
 "Yes; it is my brother," she said, with difficult com- 
 posure. "I just caught his voice. He has no doubt 
 come back from Paris to stay. This is a rather vexatious, 
 indolent way he has, never to write to prepare me ! " 
 
 "I can easily go away," said Swithin. 
 
 By this time, however, her brother had been shown 
 into the house, and the footsteps of the page were audi- 
 ble, coming in search of Lady Constantine. 
 
 "If you will wait there a moment," she said, directing
 
 TPFO OAT A TOWER. 1 83 
 
 St. Cleeve into her dressing-room, which adjoined. "You 
 will be quite safe from interruption, and I will quickly 
 come back." Taking the light, she left him. 
 
 Swithin waited in darkness. Not more tlian ten minutes 
 had passed when a whisper in her voice came through 
 tlie keyhole. He opened the door. 
 
 " Yes; he is come to stay ! " she said. " He is at sup- 
 per now. " 
 
 "Very well; don't be flurried, dearest. Shall I sta}', 
 too.'" 
 
 "Oh, Swithin, I fear not!" she replied anxiously. 
 "You sec how it is. To-night we have broken the ar- 
 rangement that you should never come here; and this is 
 the result. Will it offend you if — I ask you to leave.?" 
 
 "Not in the least. Upon the whole, I prefer the com- 
 fort of my little cabin and homestead to the guantness and 
 alarms of this place." 
 
 "There, now, I fear you are offended!" she said, a 
 tear collecting in her eye. "Would that I were going 
 back with }'0U to the cabin ! How happy we were, those 
 three days of our stay there ! But it is better, perhaps, 
 just now, that you should leave me. Yes, these rooms 
 are oppressive. They require a large household to make 
 them cheerful. . . . Yet, Swithin," she added, after re- 
 flection, "I will not request you to go. Do as you 
 think best. I will light a night-light and leave you here 
 to consider. For myself, I must go down-stairs to my 
 brother at once, or he'll wonder what I am doing." 
 
 She kindled the little light, and again retreated, closing 
 the door upon him. 
 
 Swithin stood and waited some time; till he considered
 
 1 86 TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 that upon the whole it would be preferable to leave 
 With this intention he emerged, and went softly alono: the 
 dark passage towards the extreme end, where there was 
 a little crooked staircase that would conduct him down 
 to a disused side door. Descending this stair he diilv 
 arrived at the other side of the house, facing the quar- 
 ter whence the wind blew; and here he was surprised 
 to catch the noise of rain beating against the windows. 
 It was a state of weather which fully accounted for the 
 visitor's impatient ringing. 
 
 St. Cleeve was in a minor kind of dilemma. The rain 
 reminded him that his hat and great-coat had been left 
 down-stairs, in the front part of the house; and though 
 he might have gone home without either in ordinary 
 weather, it was not a pleasant feat in the pelting winter 
 rain. Retracing his steps to Viviette's room, he took the 
 light, and opened a closet door that he had seen ajar on 
 his w^ay down. It was a closet in which hung various 
 articles of apparel, upholstery lumber of all kinds filling 
 the back part. Swithin thought he might find here a 
 ":loak of hers to throw round him, but finally took down 
 rom a peg a more suitable garment, the only one of the 
 3ort that was there. It was an old moth-eaten great-coat, 
 heavily trimmed with fur; and in removing it a compan- 
 ion cap of seal-skin was disclosed. 
 
 "Whose can they be."*" he thought, and a gloomy 
 answer suggested itself "Pooh," he then said (sum- 
 moning the .scientific side of his nature), "matter is mat- 
 ter, and mental association only a delusion." Putting on 
 the garments, he returned the light to Lady Constantine's 
 dressing-room, .and again prepared to depart, as before.
 
 TH^O ON A TOWER. 1 87 
 
 Scarcely, however, had he regained the corridor a sec- 
 ond time, when he heard a Hght footstep — seemingly 
 Viviette's — again on the front landing. Wondering what 
 she wanted with him further, he waited, taking the pre- 
 caution to step into a closet till sure it was she. 
 
 The figure came onward, bent to the keyhole of the 
 dressing-room door, and whispered (supposing him still 
 inside), "Swithin, on second thoughts, I think you may 
 stay with safety." 
 
 Having no further doubt of her personality, he came 
 out with thoughtless abruptness from the closet behind 
 her, and looking round suddenly she beheld his shadowy 
 fur-clad oudine. At once she raised her hands in horror 
 as if to protect herself from him; she uttered a shriek and 
 turned shudderingly to the wall, covering her face. 
 
 Swithin would have picked her up in a moment but 
 by this time he could hear footsteps rushing upstairs, in 
 response to her cry. In consternation, and entirely with 
 the view of not compromising her, he effected his retreat 
 as fast as possible, reaching the bend of the corridor just 
 as her brother Louis appeared with a light at the other 
 extremitv. 
 
 "What's the matter, for Heaven's sake, Viviette.?" said 
 Louis. 
 
 " My husband ! " she involuntarily exclaimed. 
 
 " What nonsense ! " 
 
 "Oh, yes, it is nonsense," she added with an effort 
 " It was nothing." 
 
 " But what was the cause of your cry ? " 
 
 She had evidently by this time recovered her reason 
 and judgment. "Oh, it was a trick of the imagination,"
 
 1 88 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 she said, with a faint laugh. ''I live so much alone that 
 I get superstitious — and — I thought for the moment I 
 saw an apparition ! " 
 
 " Of your late husband ? " 
 
 "Yes. But it w-as nothing; it was the outline of the 
 tall clock and the chair behind. Would you m.ind go- 
 ing down, and leaving me to go into my room for a 
 moment.? " 
 
 She entered the bedroom, and her brother went down- 
 stairs. Swithin thought it best to leave well alone, and. 
 going noiselessly out of the house, plodded through the 
 rain homeward. It was plain that agitations of one sort 
 and another had so w^eakened Viviette's ner^-es as to lay 
 her open to every impression. That the clothes he had 
 borrowed were some cast-off garments of the late Sir Blount 
 had occurred to St. Cleeve in taking them; but in the 
 moment of returning to her side he had forgotten this, and 
 the shape they lent his figure had obviously been a re- 
 minder of too sudden a sort for her. ]M using thus, he 
 walked along as if he were still, as before, the lonely student 
 dissociated from all mankind, and with no shadow of right 
 or interest in Welland House or its mistress. 
 
 The great-coat and cap were unpleasant companions; 
 but Swithin having been reared, or having reared himself, 
 in the scientific school of thought, would not, as has been 
 said, give way to his sense of their weird ness. To do so 
 would have been like treason to his own beliefs and aims. 
 
 When nearly home, at a point where his track converged 
 on another path, there approached him from the latter a 
 group of indistinct forms. The tones of their speech re- 
 vealed them to be Hezzy Biles, Nat Chapman, Fry, and
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 189 
 
 other laborers. Swithin was about to say a word to them; 
 till, recollecting his disguise, he deemed it advisable to 
 hold his tongue, lest his attire should tell a too dangerous 
 tale as to where he had come from. By degrees they drew 
 closer, their walk being in the same direction. 
 
 "Good-night, stranger," said Nat. 
 
 The stranger did not reply. 
 
 All of them paced on abreast of him, and he could 
 perceive in the gloom that their faces were turned inquir- 
 ingly upon his form. Then a whisper passed from one 
 to another of them; then Chapman, who was the boldest, 
 dropped immediately behind his heels, and followed there 
 for some distance, taking close observations of his outline, 
 after which the men grouped again and whispered. Think- 
 ing it best to let them pass on, Swithin slackened his 
 pace, and they went ahead of him, apparently without 
 much reluctance. 
 
 There ^vas no doubt that they had been impressed by 
 the clothes he wore; and having no wish to provoke similar 
 comments from his grandmother and Hannah, Swithin 
 took the precaution, on arriving at Welland Bottom, to 
 enter the homestead by the outhouse. Here he deposited 
 the cap and coat in secure hiding, afterwards going round 
 to the front, and opening the door in the usual way. 
 
 In the entry he met Hannah, who said, ' ' Only to hear 
 what have been seed to-night, Mr. Swithin ! The work- 
 folk have dropped in to tell us ! " 
 
 In the kitchen were the men who had outstripped him 
 on the road. Their countenances, instead of wearing: 
 the usual knotty irregularities, had a smoothed-out ex- 
 pression of blank concern. Swiihin's entrance having been
 
 1 90 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 unobtrusive and quiet, as if he had merely come down 
 from his study upstairs, they only noticed him by enlarging 
 their gaze, so as to include him in the audience. 
 
 "We was in a deep talk at the moment," continued 
 Blore, "and Nat had just brought up that story about 
 old Jeremiah Paddock's crossing the park one night at 
 one o'clock in the morning, and seeing Sir Blount a-shutting 
 my lady out-o'-doors; and we was saying that it seemed 
 a true return that he should perish in a foreign land; when 
 we happened to look up, and there was Sir Blount a-walking 
 along. ■' 
 
 " Did it overtake you, or did you overtake it } " inquired 
 Hannah. 
 
 "I don't say 'twas il," returned Sammy. "God forbid 
 that I should drag in a resurrection word about what 
 perhaps was still solid manhood, and has to die. But 
 he, or it, closed in upon us, as 'twere. " 
 
 "Yes, closed in upon us," said Haymoss. 
 
 "And I said 'Good-night, stranger,'" added Chapman. 
 
 "Yes, 'Good-night, stranger,' — that wez yer words, 
 Natty. I support ye in it. " 
 
 "And then he closed in upon us still more." 
 
 "We closed in upon he, rather," said Chapman. 
 
 "Well, well; 'tis the same thing in these onnateral 
 matters ! — And the form was Sir Blount's. My nostrils 
 told me, for — there, 'a smelled. Yes, I could smell 'n, 
 being to leeward. " 
 
 "Lord, lord, what an unwholesome scandal about the 
 ghost of a respectable gentleman ! " said Mrs. Martin, who 
 had entered from the sitting-room. 
 
 "Now, wait, ma'am. I don't say 'twere a low smell,
 
 TPVO ON' A TOWER. I91 
 
 mind ye. 'Twere a high smell, a sort of gamey flavlor, 
 calling to mind venison and hare, just as you'd expect 
 of a great squire, — not like a poor man's 'natomy, at all; 
 and that was what strengthened my faith that 'twas Sir 
 Blount." 
 
 ("It was the skins that old coat was made of," thought 
 Swithin. ) 
 
 "Well, well; I've not defied the figure of starvation 
 these five and twenty year, on nine shillings a week, to 
 be afeard of a walking vapor, sweet or savory," said Hezzy. 
 "So here's home-along." 
 
 "Bide a bit longer, and I'm going, too," continued 
 Fry. "Well, when I found 'twas Sir Blount my spet 
 dried up within me; for neither hedge nor bush were 
 there for refuge against any foul spring 'a might have 
 made at us. " 
 
 "'Twas very curious; but we had likewise mentioned 
 his name just afore, in talking of the confirmation that's 
 shortly coming on," said Hezzy. 
 
 "Is there soon to be a confirmation .'' " 
 
 " Yes. In this parish, — the first time in Welland church 
 for twenty years. As I say, I had told 'em that he was 
 confirmed the same year that I went up to have it done, 
 as I have very good c^use to mind. When we went to 
 be examined, the pa'son said to me, ' Rehearse the articles 
 of thy belief Mr. Blount (as he w-as then) was nighest 
 me, and he whispered, ' Women and wine.' ' Women and 
 wine,' says I to the pa'son: and for that I was sent back 
 till next confirmation. Sir Blount never owning that he 
 was the rascal. " 
 
 "Confirmation was a sight different at that time," said
 
 T92 TPVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 Biles. "The Bishops didn't lay it on so strong then as 
 they do now. Nowadays, yer Bishop gies both hands to 
 every Jack-rag and Tom -straw that drops the knee afore 
 him; but 'twas six chaps to one blessing when we was 
 boys. The Bishop a' that time would stretch out his 
 palms and run his fingers over our row of crowns as off- 
 hand as a bank gentleman telling money. The great 
 prophets of the church in them days wasn't particular to a 
 soul or two more or less; and, for my part, I think living 
 was easier for "t. " 
 
 "The new Bishop, I hear, is a bachelor-man; or a 
 widow gentleman is it .? " asked Mrs. Martin. 
 
 "Bachelor, I believe, ma'am. Mr. San Cleeve, making 
 so bold, vou've never faced him vet, I think .? " 
 
 Mrs. Martin shook her head. "No; it was a piece of 
 neglect. 1 hardly know how it happened," she said. 
 
 "I am going to, this time,'' said Swithin, and turned 
 thechat to other matters
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 S WITH IN could not sleep that night for thinking of 
 his Viviette. Nothing told so significantly of the 
 conduct of her first husband towards the poor lady as the 
 abiding dread of him which was revealed in her by any 
 sudden revival of his image or memory. But for that 
 consideration, her almost child-like terror at Swithin's 
 inadvertent disguise would have been ludicrous. 
 
 He waited anxiously through several following days for 
 an opportunity of seeing her, but none was afforded. Her 
 brother's presence in the house sufficiently accounted for 
 this. At length he ventured to write a note, requesting 
 her to signal to him in a way she had done once or twice 
 before, — by pulling down a blind in a particular window 
 of the house, one of the few visible from the top of the 
 Rings-Hill column; this to be done on any evening before 
 dark, when she could see him after dinner on the terrace. 
 
 When he had leveled the glass at the window for five 
 successive nights he beheld the blind in the posidon sug- 
 gested. Three hours later, quite in the dusk, he lepaired 
 to the place of appointment. 
 
 " My brother is away this evening," she explained, "and 
 that's why I can come out. He is not gone for more than
 
 194 ^f^O OAT A TOWER. 
 
 a few hours, nor is he likely to do so just yet. He keeps 
 himself a good deal in my company, which has made it 
 unsafe for me to venture near you." 
 
 " Has he any suspicion .'' " 
 
 " None apparently. But he rather depresses me." 
 
 "How, Viviette.'' I fear, from your manner, that this 
 is something serious. " 
 
 "I would rather not tell." 
 
 "But— Well, never mind ! " 
 
 "Yes, Swithin, I will tell you. There should be no 
 secrets between us. He urges upon me the necessity of 
 marning, day after day. " 
 
 " For money and position, of course. " 
 
 "Yes. But I take no notice. I let him go on." 
 
 "Really, this is sad ! '* said the young man. "I must 
 work harder than ever, or you will never be able to own me. " 
 
 "Oh, yes, in good time ! " she cheeringly replied. 
 
 "I shall be very glad to have you always near me. I 
 felt the gloom of our position keenly when I was obliged 
 to disappear, that night, without assuring you it was only 
 I who stood there. Why were you so frightened at those 
 old clothes I borrowed 'i " 
 
 "Don't ask, — don't ask !" she said, burying her face 
 on his shoulder. " I don't want to speak of that. There 
 was something so ghastly and so uncanny in your putting 
 on such garments that I wish you had been more thought- 
 ful, and had left them alone. " 
 
 "I did not stop to consider whose they were. By the 
 way, they must be sent back." 
 
 "No; I never wish to see them again ! I cannot help 
 feeling that your putting them on was ominous."
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 1 95 
 
 "Nothing is ominous in serene philosophy," he said, 
 kissing her. "Things are either causes, or they are not 
 causes. When can you see me again } " 
 
 In such wise the hour passed away. The evening was 
 tvpical of others which followed it at irregular intervals 
 through the winter. And during the intenser months of 
 the season, frequent falls of snow lengthened even more 
 than other difficulties had done the periods of isolation 
 between the pair. Swithin adhered with all the more 
 strictness to the letter of his promise not to intrude into 
 the house, from his sense of her powerlessness to compel 
 him to keep out should he choose to rebel. A student of 
 the greatest forces in nature, he had, like many others 
 of his sort, no personal force to speak of, in a social point 
 of view, mainly because he took no interest in human 
 ranks and intricacies; and hence he was docile as a child 
 in her hands wherever matters of that kind were concerned. 
 
 Her brother wintered at Welland; but whether because 
 his experience of tropic climes had unfitted him for the 
 brumal rigors of Britain, or for any other reason, he sel- 
 dom showed himself out-of-doors, and Swithin caught but 
 passing glimpses of him. Now and then, Viviette's im- 
 pulsive kindness would overcome her sense of risk, and 
 she would press Swithin to call on her, at all cost. This 
 he would by no means do. It was obvious to his more 
 logical mind that the secrecy to which they had bound 
 themselves must be kept in its fullness, or might as well 
 be abandoned altogether. 
 
 He was now sadly exercised on the subject of his uncle's 
 m\\. There had as yet been no pressing reasons for a full 
 and candid reply to the solicitor who had communicated
 
 196 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 with him, owing to the fact that the annuity was not to 
 begin til! Swithin was one and twenty; but time was going 
 on, and something definite would have to be done soon. 
 To own to his marriage and consequent disqualification 
 for the bequest was easy in itself; but it involved telling 
 at least one man what both Viviette and himself had great 
 reluctance in telling anybody. Moreover, he wished Vivi- 
 ette to know nothing of his loss in making her his wife. 
 All he could think of doing for the present was to write 
 a postponing letter to his uncle's lawyer, and wait events. 
 The one comfort of this dreary winter-time was his per- 
 ception of a returning ability to work with the regularity 
 antl much of the spirit of earlier days. 
 
 One bright night in April there was an eclipse of the 
 moon, and ]Mr. Torkingham, by arrangement, brought 
 to the observatory several laboring men and boys, to whom 
 he had promised a sight of the phenomenon through the 
 telescope. The coming confirmation, fixed for May, was 
 again talked of; and St. Cleeve learned from the parson 
 that the Bishop had arranged to stay the night at the 
 vicarage, and was to be invited to a grand luncheon at 
 Welland House immediately after the ordinance. 
 
 This seemed like a going back into life again as re- 
 garded the mistre.ss of that house; and St. Cleeve was a 
 little surprised that, in his communications with Viviette, 
 she had mentioned no such probability. The next day 
 he walked round the mansion, wondering how in its 
 present state any entertainment could be given therein. 
 
 He found that the shutters had been opened, which 
 had restored ar^ unexpected liveliness to the aspect of
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 1 97 
 
 the windows. Two men were putting a chimney-pot on 
 one of the chimney-stacks, and two more were scraping 
 green mold from the front wall. He made no inquiries 
 on that occasion. Three days later he strolled thitherward 
 again. Now a great cleaning of window-panes was going 
 on, Hezzy Biles and Sammy Blore being the operators, 
 for which purpose their services must have been borrowed 
 from the neighboring farmer. Hezzy dashed water at the 
 glass with a force that threatened to break it in, the broad 
 face of Sammy being discernible inside, wrinkling at the 
 onset. In addition to them, Anthony Green and another 
 were weeding the gravel walks, and putting fresh plants 
 into the flower beds. Neither of these reasonable opera- 
 tions was a great undertaking, singly looked at; but the 
 life Viviettc had latterly led and the mood in which she had 
 hitherto regarded the premises rendered it somewhat sig- 
 nificant. Swithin, however, was rather curious than con- 
 cerned at the proceedings, and returned to his tower with 
 feelings of interest not entirely confined to the worlds 
 overhead. 
 
 Lady Constantine may or may not have seen him from 
 the house; but the same evening, which was fine and dry, 
 while he was occupying himself in the observatory with 
 cleaning the eye-pieces of the equatorial, skull-cap on 
 head, observing-jacket on, and in other ways primed for 
 sweeping, the customary stealthy step on the winding 
 staircase brought her form in due course into the rays of 
 the bull's-eye lantern. The meeting was all the more 
 pleasant to him horn being unexpected, and he at once 
 lit up a larger candle in honor of the occasion. 
 
 "It is but a hasty visit," she said, when, after putting
 
 198 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 up her mouth to be kissed, she had seated herself in the 
 low chair used for observations, panting a little with the 
 labor of ascent. "But I hope to be able to come more 
 freely soon. My brother is still living on with me. Yes, 
 he is going to stay until the confirmation is over. After 
 the confirmation he will certainly leave. So good it is 
 of you, dear, to please me by agreeing to the ceremony. 
 The Bishop, you know, is going to lunch with us. It 
 is a wonder he has agreed to come, for he is a man averse 
 to society, and mostly keeps entirely with the clergy on 
 these confirmation tours, or circuits, or whatever they call 
 them. But Mr. Torkingham's house is so very small, 
 and mine is so close at hand, that this arrangement to 
 relieve him of the fuss of one meal, at least, naturally 
 suggested itself; and the Bishop has fallen in with it very 
 readily. How are you getting on with your observations .? 
 Have you not wanted me dreadfully, to write down notes .^ " 
 
 "Well, I have been obliged to do without you, whether 
 or no. See here, — how much I have done." And he 
 showed her a book ruled in columns, headed "Object," 
 "Right Ascension," "Declination," "Features," "Re- 
 marks," and so on. 
 
 She looked over this and other things, but her mind 
 speedily winged its way back to the confirmation. "It 
 is so new to me," she said, "to have persons coming to 
 the house that I feel rather anxious. I hope the lunch- 
 eon will be a success. " 
 
 "You know the Bishop } " said Swithin. 
 
 "I have not seen him for many years. I knew him 
 when I was quite a girl, and he held the litde living of 
 Puddle-sub-lNIixenj near us; but after that time, and ever
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 1 99 
 
 svice I have lived here, I have seen nothing of him. 
 There has been no confirmation in this village, they say, 
 for twenty years. The other bishop used to make the 
 young men and women go to Warborne; he wouldn't take 
 t^je trouble to come to such an out-of-the-way parish as 
 ours. " 
 
 "This cleaning and preparation that I obser\'e going 
 on must be rather a tax upon you .' " 
 
 "My brother Louis sees to it, and, what is more, bears 
 the expense. " 
 
 "Your brother.' " said Swithin, with surprise. 
 
 "Well, he insisted on doing so," she replied, in a 
 hesitating, despondent tone. "He has been active in 
 the whole matter, and was the first to suggest the invita- 
 tion. I should not have thought of it." 
 
 "Well, I will hold aloof till it is all over." 
 
 "Thanks, dearest, for your considerateness. I w^ish 
 it was not still advisable ' But I shall see you on the 
 day, and watch my own philosopher all through the ser- 
 vice from the corner of my pew ! . . . I hope you are 
 well prepared for the rite, Swithin .' " she added, turning 
 tenderly to him. "It would perhaps be advisable for 
 you to give up this astronomy till the confirmation is 
 over, in order to devote your attention exclusively to that 
 more serious matter." 
 
 "More serious! Well, I will do the best I can. I 
 am sorry to see that you are less interested in astronomy 
 than you used to be, Viviette. " 
 
 "No; it is only that these preparations for the Bishop 
 unsettle my mind from study. Now put on your othec 
 todt and hat, and come with me a. little way."
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 npHE morning of the confirmation was come. It was 
 -*■ mid-iNIay time, bringing with it weather not, per- 
 haps, quite so blooming as that assumed to be natural 
 to the month by the joyous poets of three hundred years 
 ago; but a very tolerable, well-wearing May, that the 
 average rustic would willingly compound for in lieu of 
 Mays occasionally fairer, but usually more foul. 
 
 Among the larger shrubs and flowers which composed 
 the outworks of the Welland gardens, the lilac, the labur- 
 num, and the guelder-rc>se hung out their respective 
 colors of purple, yellow, and white; whilst within these, 
 belted round from every disturbing gale, rose the colum- 
 bine, the peony, the larkspur, and the Solomon's seal. 
 The animate things that moved amid this scene of color 
 were plodding bees, gadding butterflies, and numerous 
 sauntering young feminine candidates for the impending 
 confirmation, who, having gayly bedecked themselves for 
 the ceremony, were enjoying their own appearance by 
 walking about in twos and threes till it was time to start. 
 
 Swithin St. Cleeve, whose preparations were somewhat 
 simpler than those of the village belles, waited till his
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 201 
 
 grandmother and Hannah had set out, and then, locking 
 the door, followed towards the distant church. On reach- 
 ing the churchyard gate he met Mr. Torkingham, who 
 shook hands with him in the manner of a man with 
 several irons in the fire, and telling Swithin where to sit, 
 disappeared to hunt up some candidates who had not yet 
 made themselves visible. 
 
 Casting his eyes round for Viviette, and seeing nothing 
 of her, Swithin went on to the church porch, and looked 
 in. From the north side of the nave smiled a host of 
 girls, gayly uniform in dress, age, and a temporary re- 
 pression of their natural tendency to "skip like a hare 
 over the meshes of good counsel."' Their white muslin 
 dresses, their round white caps, from beneath whose bor- 
 ders hair-knots and curls, of various shades of brown, 
 escaped upon their low shoulders, as if against their will, 
 lighted up the black pews and gray stonework to an 
 unwonted w^armth and life. On the south side were the 
 young men and boys, — heavy, angular, and massive, as 
 indeed was rather necessary, considering what they would 
 have to bear at the hands of wind and weather before they 
 returned to that moldy nave for the last time. 
 
 Over the heads of all these he could see into the 
 chancel, to the square pew on the north side, which was 
 attached to Welland House. There he discerned Ladv 
 Constantine already arrived, her brother Louis sitting by 
 her side. 
 
 Swithin entered, and seated himself at the end of a 
 bench, and she, who had been on the watch, at once 
 showed, by subtle signs, her consciousness of the pres- 
 ence of the young man who had reversed the ordained
 
 202 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 sequence of the church services on her account. She 
 appeared in black attire, though not strictly in mourning, 
 a touch of red in her bonnet setting off the richness of 
 her complexion without making her gay. Handsomest 
 woman in the church she decidedly was; and yet a dis- 
 interested spectator who had known all the circumstances 
 would probably have felt that, the future considered, 
 Swithin's more natural mate would have been one of the 
 muslin-clad maidens who were to be presented to the 
 Bishop with him that day. 
 
 When the Bishop had come, and gone into the chan- 
 cel, and blown his nose, the congregation were suffi- 
 ciently impressed by his presence to leave off looking lU 
 one another. 
 
 Twenty years, people said, had elapsed since a bishop 
 had sat in that humble and remote house of prayer. 
 The Right Reverend Cuthbert Helmsdale, D. D. , ninety- 
 fourth occupant of the episcopal throne of the diocese, 
 revealed himself to be a dark man in skin as well as hair, 
 whose darkness was thrown still further into prominence 
 by the lawn protuberances that now rose upon his shoul- 
 ders, like the Eastern and Western hemispheres. In 
 stature he seemed to be tall and imposing, but some- 
 thing of this aspect may have been derived from his robes. 
 
 The service was, as usual, of a length which severely 
 tried the tariying powers of the young people assembled; 
 and it was not till the youth of all the other parishes had 
 gone up that the turn came for the Welland bevy. Swith- 
 in and some older ones were nearlv the last. When, at 
 the heels of Mr. Torkingham, he passed Lady Constan- 
 tine's pew, 1\q liftced hj^ eyes from, the red lining of tha.t
 
 o 
 
 ttVO ON A TOWER. iOj 
 
 gentleman's hood sufficiently high to catch hers. She was 
 abstracted, tearful, — regarding liim with all the rapt ming- 
 ling of religion, love, fervor, and hope which such women 
 can feel at such times, and which men know nothing of. 
 How fervently she watched the Bishop place his hand on 
 her beloved youth's head; how she saw the great episcopal 
 ring glistening in the sun among Swithin's brown curls; 
 how she waited to hear if Dr. Helmsdale uttered the form 
 "this thy child" (which he used for the younger ones), 
 or "this thy servant'" (which he used for those older); and 
 how, when he said "this thy child" she felt a prick of'con- 
 science, like a person who had entrapped an innocent 
 youth into marriage, for her own gratification, till she re- 
 membered that she had raised his social position thereby, 
 —all this could only have been told in its entirety by herself. 
 
 As for Swithin, he felt ashamed of his own utter lack of 
 the high enthusiasm which beamed so eloquently from her 
 eves. When he passed her again, on the return journey 
 from the Bishop to his seat, her face was warm with a blush, 
 which her brother might have observed had he regarded her. 
 
 Whether he had observed it or not, as soon as St. Cleeve 
 had sat himself down again, Louis Glanville turned, and 
 looked hard at the young astronomer. This was the first 
 time that St. Clteve and Viviette's brother had been face 
 to face in a distinct light, their first meeting having oc- 
 curred in the dusk of a railway-station. Swithin was not 
 in the habit of noticing people's features; he scarcely ever 
 observed any detail of physiognomy in his friends, a gen- 
 eralization from their whole aspect forming his idea of 
 them; and he mnv only noted a young man of perhaps 
 thirtv, who lolled a good deal, and in whose small dark
 
 204 TM^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 • eyes seemed to be concentrated the activity that the rest of 
 his frame decidedly lacked. This gentleman's eyes were 
 henceforward, to the end of the service, continually fixed 
 upon Swithin; but as this was their natural direction, from 
 the position of his seat, there was no great strangeness in 
 the circumstance. 
 
 Swithin wanted to say to Viviette, "Now I hope you 
 are pleased; I have conformed to your ideas of my duty, 
 leaving my fitness out of consideration; " but as he could 
 only see her bonnet and forehead, it was not possible even 
 to look the intelligence. He turned to his left hand, where 
 the organ stood, with Miss Tabitha Lark seated behind it. 
 
 It being now sermon-time, the youthful blower had fallen 
 asleep over the handle of his bellows, and Tabitha pulled 
 out her handkerchief, apparently with the intention of 
 flapping him awake with it. With the handkerchief tum- 
 bled out a whole family of unexpected articles: a silver 
 thimble; item, a photograph; item, a little purse; item, a 
 scent-bottle; item, some loose halfpence; item, nine green 
 gooseberries; item, a key. They rolled to Swithin's feet, 
 and, passively obeying the first instinct which came, he 
 picked up as many of the articles as he could find, and 
 handed them to her amid the smiles of the neighbors. 
 
 Tabitha was so overpowered at such a humiliating event 
 happening to her under the very eyes of the Bishop, on 
 this her glorious day, that she turned pale as a sheet, and 
 could hardly keep her seat. Fearing she might faint, 
 Swithin, who had genuinely sympathized, bent over and 
 whispered, encouragingly: "Don't mind it, Tabitha. 
 Shall I take you out into the air.^" She declined his 
 offer, and presently the sermon Ciime to an end.
 
 TPf^O ON A TOWER. iO% 
 
 Swithin lingered behind the rest of tlie congregation 
 sufficiently long to see Lady Constantine, accompanied by 
 her brother, the Bishop, the Bishop's chaplain, Mr. Tork- 
 ingham, and several other clergy and ladies, enter to the 
 grand luncheon by the door which admitted from the 
 churchyard to the lawn of Welland House; the whole 
 group talking with a vivacity all the more intense, as it 
 seemed, from the recent two hours' enforced repression of 
 their social qualities within the adjoining building. 
 
 The young man stood till he was left quite alone in the 
 churchyard, and then went slowly homeward over the hill, 
 perhaps a trifle depressed at the impossibility of being near 
 Viviette in this her one day of gayety, and joining in the 
 conversation of those who surrounded her. 
 
 Not that he felt any jealousy of her situation, as his wife, 
 in comparison with his own. He had so clearly under- 
 stood from the beginning that, in the event of marriage, 
 their outward lives were to run on as before, that to rebel 
 now would have been unmanly in himself and cruel to her, 
 by adding to embarrassments that were great enough al- 
 ready. His momentary doubt was of his own strength to 
 achieve sufficiently high things to render himself, in rela- 
 tion to her, other than a patronized young favorite, whom 
 she had married at an immense sacrifice of position. Now, 
 at twenty, he was doomed to isolation even from a wife; 
 could it be that at, say, thirty he would be welcomed ev- 
 erywhere ' 
 
 But with motion through the sun and air his mood as- 
 sumed a lighter complexion, and on reaching home he re- 
 membered with interest that Venus was in a favorable aspect 
 for observation that afternoon.
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 TV /TEANWHILE, the interior of Welland House was 
 -^*-^ in a rattle with the progress of the ecclesiastical 
 luncheon. 
 
 The Bishop, who sat on Lady Constantine's right hand, 
 seemed enchanted with her company, and from the begin- 
 ning she engrossed his attention almost entirely. The 
 truth was that the circumstance of her not having her whole 
 soul centered on the success of the repast and the pleasure 
 of Bishop Helmsdale imparted to her, in a great measure, 
 the mood to insure both. Her brother Louis it was who 
 had laid out the plan of entertaining the Bishop, to which 
 she had assented but indifferently. She was secretly bound 
 to another, on whose career she had staked all her happi- 
 ness. Having thus other interests, she evinced to-day all 
 the ease of one who hazards nothing, and there was no sign 
 of that preoccupation with housewifely contingencies which 
 often so disfigures the not over-rich hostess that she is 
 hardly recognizable as the same charming woman who 
 graced a friend's home the day before. In marrying Swith- 
 in, Lady Constantine had played her card, — recklessly, im- 
 pulsively, ruinously, perhaps; but she had played it; it
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 207 
 
 could not be withdrawn; and she took this morning's 
 luncheon as an episode that could result in nothing to her 
 beyond the day's entertainment. 
 
 Hence, by that power of indirectness to accomplish in 
 an hour what strenuous aiming will not effect in a life- 
 time, she fascinated the Bishop to an unprecedented de- 
 gree. A bachelor, he rejoiced in the hard-headed period 
 of life that fills the tract of years between the time of wan- 
 ing impulse and the time of incipient dotage, when a wo- 
 man can reach the male heart neither by awakening a 
 young man's passion nor an old man's infatuation. He 
 must be made to admire, or he can be made to do nothing. 
 Unintentionally that is how Viviette operated on her guest. 
 
 Lady Constantine, to external view, was in a position to 
 desire many things, and of a sort to desire them. She 
 was obviously, by nature, warm and impulsive to indis- 
 cretion. But instead of exhibiting activities to correspond, 
 recently gratified aft'ection lent to her manner just now a 
 sweet serenity, a truly Christian contentment, which it 
 puzzled the learned Bishop exceedingly to find in a warm 
 young widow, and increased his interest in her every mo- 
 ment Thus matters stood, when the conversation veered 
 round to the morning's confirmation. 
 
 "That was a singularly engaging young man who came 
 up among Mr. Torkingham's candidates," said the Bishop 
 to her, somewhat abruptly. 
 
 But abruptness does not catch a woman without her wit. 
 "Which one.?" she said innocently. 
 
 "That youth with the 'corn-colored' hair, as a poet of 
 the new school would call it, who sat just at the side of 
 the organ. Do you know who he is ? "
 
 2o8 TPFO ON A TOWER. 
 
 In answering Viviette showed a little nervousness, for 
 the first time that day. 
 
 " Oh, yes. He is the son of an unfortunate gentleman 
 who was formerly curate here, — a Mr. St. Cleeve. " 
 
 "I never saw a handsomer young man in my life." 
 (Lady Constantine blushed.) "There was a lack of self- 
 consciousness, too, in his manner of presenting himself, 
 which very much won me. A Mr. St. Cleeve, do you 
 say.? A curate's son? His father must have been St. 
 Cleeve ol All Angels, whom I knew. How comes he to 
 be staying on here } What is he doing .'' " 
 
 Mr. Torkingham, who kept one ear on the Bishop all 
 the lunch-time, finding that Lady Constantine was not ready 
 with an answer, hastened to reply: "His father was an All 
 Angels man, my lord. The youth is rather to be pitied." 
 
 " He was a man of talent," affirmed the Bishop. " But 
 I quite lost sight of him." 
 
 " He was curate to the late vicar," resumed the parson, 
 "and was much liked by the parish: but, being erratic in 
 his tastes and tendencies, he rashly contracted a marriage 
 with the daughter of a farmer, and then quarreled with the 
 local gentry for not taking up his wife. This lad was an 
 only child. There was enough money to educate him, 
 and he is sufficiently well provided for to be independent of 
 the world, so long as he is content to live here with great 
 eccmomy. But of course this gives him few opportunides 
 of bettering himself" 
 
 "Yes, naturally," replied Bishop Helmsdale. "Better 
 nave been left entirely dependent on himself These half 
 incomes do men little good, unless they happen to be 
 either weaklings or geniuses."
 
 nVO ON- A TOWER. 209 
 
 Lady Constantine would have given the world to say, 
 " He is a genius, and the hope of my life; " but it would 
 have been decidedly risky, and in another moment was 
 unnecessary, for Mr. Torkingham said, "There is a cer- 
 tain genius in this young man, I sometimes think." 
 
 "Well, he really looks quite out of the common," said 
 the Bishop. 
 
 ' ' Youthful genius is sometimes disappointing, " observed 
 Viviette, not believing it in the least. 
 
 "Yes," said the Bishop. "Though it depends. Lady 
 Constantine, on what you understand by disappointing. 
 It may produce nothing visible to the world's eye, and yet 
 may complete its development within inavery perfect degree. 
 Objective achievements, though the only ones which are 
 counted, are not the only ones that exist and have value; 
 and I for one should be sorry to assert that, because a man 
 of genius dies as unknown to the world as when he was 
 born, he therefore was an instance of wasted material." 
 
 Objective achievements were, however, those that Lady 
 Constantine had a weakness for in the present case, and 
 she asked her more experienced guest if he thought early 
 development of a special talent a good sign in youth. 
 
 The Bishop thought it well that a particular bent should 
 not show itself too early, lest disgust should result. 
 
 " Still," argued Lady Constantine rather firmly (for she 
 felt this opinion of the Bishop's to be one throwing doubt 
 on Swithin), "sustained fruition is compatible with early 
 bias. Tycho Brahe showed quite a passion for the solar 
 system when he was but a youth, and so did Kepler and 
 James Ferguson had a surprising knowledge of the stars "by 
 the time he was eleven or twelve."
 
 2IO TWO ON" A TOWER. 
 
 "Yes, sustained fruition," conceded the Bishop (rathei 
 liking the words), "is certainly compatible with early bias, 
 Fenelon preached at fourteen." 
 
 " He — Mr. St. Cleeve — is not in the church," said Lad) 
 Constantine. 
 
 "He is a scientific young man, my lord," explained 
 Mr. Torkingham. 
 
 "An astronomer," she added, with suppressed pride. 
 
 " An astronomer .' Really, that makes him still more 
 interesting than being handsome and the son of a man I 
 knew. How and where does he study astronomy } " 
 
 "He has a beautiful observatory. He has made use 
 of an old column that was erected on this manor to the 
 memory of one of the Constantines. It has been very in- 
 geniously adapted for his purpose, and he does very good 
 work there. I believe he occasionally sends up a paper 
 to the Royal Society, or Greenwich, or somewhere, and to 
 astronomical periodicals. " 
 
 " I should have had no idea, from his boyish look, that 
 he had advanced so far," the Bishop answered. "And yet 
 I saw on his face that within there was a book worth study- 
 ing. His is a career I should very much like to watch." 
 
 A thrill of pleasure passed through Lady Constantines 
 heart at this praise of her chosen one. It was an unwitting 
 compliment to her taste and discernment in singling him 
 out for her own, despite its temporary inexpediency. 
 
 Her brother Louis now spoke. " I fancy he is as inter- 
 ested in one of his fellow-creatures as in the science of as- 
 tronomy," observed that cynic dryly. 
 
 "In whom .? " said Lady Constantine quickly. 
 
 "In the fair maiden who sat at the organ, — a prettv
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 211 
 
 girl, rather. I noticed a sort of by-play going on between 
 them occasionally, during the sermon, which meant mat- 
 ing, if I am not mistaken." 
 
 " She ! " said Lady Constantine. * ' She is only a village 
 girl, a dairy-man's daughter, — Tabitha Lark, who used 
 to come to read to me." 
 
 "She may be a savage, for all I know: but there is some- 
 thing between those two young people, nevertheless." 
 
 The Bishop looked as if he had allowed his interest in 
 a stranger to carry him too far, and Mr. Torkingham was 
 horrified at the irreverent and easy familiarity of Louis 
 Glanville's talk in the presence of a consecrated bishop. 
 As for Viviette, her tongue lost all its volubility. She felt 
 quite faint at heart, and hardly knew how to control herself 
 
 "I have never noticed anything of the sort," said Mr. 
 Torkingham. 
 
 " It would be a matter for regret," said the Bishop, "if 
 he should follow his father in forming an attachment that 
 would be a hindrance to him in any honorable career; 
 though perhaps an early marriage, abstractedly considered, 
 would not be bad for him. A youth who looks as if he 
 had come straight from old Greece may be exposed to 
 many temptations, should he go out into the world with- 
 out a friend or counselor to guide him." 
 
 Despite her sudden jealousy, Viviette's eyes grew moist 
 at the picture of her innocent Swithin going into the world 
 without a friend or counselor. But she was sick in soul 
 and disquieted still by Louis's dreadful remarks, who, un- 
 believer as he was in human virtue, could have no reason 
 whatever for representing Swithin as engaged in a private 
 love affair, if such were not his honest impression.
 
 212 TM^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 She was so absorbed during the remainder of the lunch- 
 eon that she did not even observe the kindly Hght that her 
 presence was shedding on the right reverend gentleman by 
 her side. He reflected it back in tones duly mellowed by 
 his position; the minor clergy caught up the rays thereof, 
 and so the gentle influence played down the table. The 
 company so;)n departed, when luncheon was over; and the 
 remainder of the day passed in quietness, the Bishop being 
 occupied in his room at the vicarage with writing letters 
 or a sermon. Having a long journey before him the 
 next day, he had expressed a wish to be housed for the 
 night without ceremony, and would have dined alone with 
 Mr. Torkingham, but that, by a happy thought, Lady 
 Constantine and her brother were asked to join them. 
 
 However, when Louis crossed the churchyard and 
 entered the vicarage drawing-room at seven o'clock, his 
 sister was not in his cofnpany. She was, he said, suffer- 
 ing from a slight headache, and much regretted that she 
 was on that account unable to come. At this intelligence 
 ^he social sparkle disappeared from the Bishop's eye, and 
 Te sat down to table, endeavoring to mold into the form 
 Df episco])al serenity an expression which was really one 
 of common human disappointment. 
 
 In his simple statement Louis Glanville had by no means 
 expressed all the circumstances which accompanied his sis- 
 ter's refusal, at the last moment, to dine at her neighbor's 
 house. Louis had strongly urged her to bear up against 
 her slight indisposition, — if it were that, and not disincli- 
 nation, — and come along with him on just this one occa- 
 sion, perhaps a more important episode in her life than 
 she was aware of Viviette thereupon knew quite well
 
 Tiro ON A TOWER. 213 
 
 that he alluded to the favoiable impression she was pro- 
 ducing on the Bishop, notwithstanding that neither of 
 them mentioned the Bishop's name. But she did not 
 give way, though the argument waxed strong between 
 them; and Louis left her in no very amiable mood, say- 
 ing, " I don't believe you have any more headache than 
 I have, Viviette. It is some provoking whim of yours, — 
 nothing more." 
 
 Now in this there was a substratum of truth. When 
 her brother had left her, and she had seen him from the 
 window entering the vicarage gate, Viviette seemed to be 
 much relieved, and sat down in her dressing-room til! 
 the evening grew dark, and only the lights shining through 
 the trees from the i)arsonage dining-room revealed to the 
 eve where thai il welling stood. Then she arose, and put- 
 dng on the cloak she had used so many times before for 
 the same purpose, she locked her bedroom door (to be 
 supposed within, in case of the accidental approach of a 
 servant), and let herself privately out of the house. 
 
 Lady Constantine paused for a moment under the vicar- 
 age windows, till she could sufficiently well hear the voices 
 of the diners to be sure that they were actually within, and 
 then went on her way, which was towards the Rings-Hill 
 column. She appeared a mere spot, hardly distinguisha- 
 ble from the grass, as she crossed the open ground, and 
 soon became absorbed in the black mass of the fir 
 plantation. 
 
 Meanwhile, the conversation at Mr. Torkingham's din- 
 ner-table was not of a highly exhilarating quality. The 
 parson, in long self-communing during the afternoon, had 
 decided that the D^^cesan Synod, whose annual session at
 
 214 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Melchester had occurred in the month previous, would af- 
 ford a solid and unimpeachable subject to launch dur- 
 ing the meal whenever conversation flagged; and that it 
 would be one likely to win the respect of his spiritual 
 chieftain for himself, as the introducer. Accordingly, in 
 the further belief that you could not have too much of a 
 good thing, Mr. Torkingham not only acted upon his 
 idea, but at every pause rallied to the synod point with un- 
 broken firmness. Everything which had been discussed 
 at that last session — such as the introduction of the lay 
 element into the councils of the church, the reconstitution 
 of the ecclesiastical courts, church patronage, the tithe 
 question — was revived by Mr. Torkingham, and the ex- 
 cellent remarks which the Bishop had made in his ad- 
 dresses on those subjects were quoted back to him. 
 
 As for Bishop Helmsdale himself, his instincts seemed to 
 be to allude in a debonair spirit to the incidents of the past 
 day, — to the flowers in Lady Constantine's beds, the date 
 of her house, — perhaps with a view of hearing a little more 
 about their owner from Louis, who would very readily have 
 followed the Bishop's lead, had the parson allowed him 
 room. But this Mr. Torkingham seldom did, and about 
 half past nine they prepared to separate. 
 
 Louis Glanville had risen from the table, and was stand- 
 ing by the window, looking out upon the sky, and pri- 
 \'ately yawning, the topics discussed having been hardly in 
 his line. "A fine night," he said at last. 
 
 "I suppose our young astronomer is hard at work 
 now," said the Bishop, following the direction of Louis's 
 glance towards the clear sky. 
 
 "Yes," said the parson; "he is very assiduous when-
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 21 5 
 
 ever the nights are good for observation. I have occasion- 
 ally joined him in his tower, and looked through his tele- 
 scope with great benefit to my ideas of celestial phenom- 
 ena. I have not seen what he has been doing lately." 
 
 ''Suppose we go. -^ " said Louis. " Would you be in- 
 terested in seeing the observatory, Bishop .-* " 
 
 "I am quite willing to go," said the Bishop, " if the 
 distance is not too great. I should not be at all averse to 
 making the acquaintance of so exceptional a young man 
 as this Mr. St. Cleeve seems to be; and I have never seen 
 the inside of an observatory in my life. " 
 
 The intention was no sooner formed than it was carried 
 out, Mr, Torkingham leading the way.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 T TALF an hour before this time Swithin St. Cleeve had 
 ■*- -*■ been sitting in his cabin, at the base of the column, 
 workins: out some calculations from observations taken 
 on preceding nights, with a view to a theory that he had 
 in his head on the motions of certain so-called fixed stars. 
 
 The evening being a little chilly, a small fire was burn- 
 ing in the stove, and this and the shaded lamp before him 
 lent a remarkably cosy air to the chamber. He was awak- 
 ened from his reveries by a scratching at the window-pane 
 like that of the point of an ivy leaf, which he knew to be 
 really caused by the tip of his sweetheart-wife's fore-finger. 
 He rose and opened the door to admit her, not without 
 astonishment as to how she had been able to get away 
 from her friends. 
 
 ' ' Dearest Viv, why, what's the matter '■! " he said, per- 
 ceivmg that her face, as the lamplight fell on it, was sad, 
 and even stormy. 
 
 "I thought I would run across to see you. I have 
 heard something so — so — to your discredit and I know it 
 can't be true ! I know you are constancy itself; but your 
 constancy produces strange effects in people's eyes I "
 
 TIVO ON A rOWER. 217 
 
 " Good heavens ! Nobody has found us out. " 
 
 "No, no, — it is not that. You know, Swithin, that I 
 am always sincere, and willing to own if I am to blame in 
 anything. Now will yjou prove to me that you are the 
 same by owning some feult to me } " 
 
 "Yes, dear, indeed; directly I can think of one worth 
 owning." 
 
 "I wonder one does not rush upon your tongue in a 
 moment ! " 
 
 " I confess that I am sufficiently a Pharisee not to ex- 
 perience that spontaneity." 
 
 "Swithin, don't speak so affectedly, w^hen you know so 
 well what I mean ! Is it nothing to you that, after all 
 our vows for life, you have thought it right to — flirt with 
 a village girl ? " 
 
 "Oh, Viviette ! " interrupted Swithin, taking her hand, 
 which was hot and trembling. " You who are full of no- 
 ble and generous feelings, and regard me with devoted 
 tenderness that has never been surpassed by woman, — 
 how can you be so greatly at fault.'* /flirt, Viviette.'' By 
 thinking that you injure yourself in my eyes. Why, I am 
 so far from doing so that 1 continually pull myself up for 
 watching you too jealously, as to-day, when I have been 
 dreading the effect upon you of other company in my ab- 
 sence, and thinking that you rather shut the gates against 
 me when you have big-wigs to entertain. ' 
 
 "Do you, Swithin.'" she cried. It was evident that the 
 honest tone of his words was having a great effect in clear- 
 ing away the clouds. She added, with an uncertain smile, 
 "But how can 1 believe that, after what was seen to-day? 
 Mv brother, not knowing in the least that I had an iota of
 
 ?lS Tl^^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 interest in y 3U, told me that he witnessed the signs jf an 
 attachment between you and Tabitha Lark in church, this 
 morning." 
 
 "Ah I " cried Swithin, with a burst of laughter. "Now 
 I know what you mean, and what has caused this misun- 
 derstanding ! How good of you, Viviette, to come at once 
 and have it out with me, instead of brooding over it with 
 dark imaginings, and thinking bitter things of me, as many 
 women would have done ! " He succinctly told the whole 
 story of his little adventure with Tabitha that morning; and 
 the sky was clear on both sides. " When shall I be able 
 to claim you," he added, "and put an end to all such pain- 
 ful accidents as these ! " 
 
 She partially sighed. Her perception of what the out- 
 side world was made of, latterly somewhat obscured by sol- 
 itude and her lover's company, had been revived to-day by 
 her entertainment of the Bishop, clerg)'men, and, more 
 particularly, clergymen's wives; and it did not diminish 
 her sense of the difficulties in Swithin's path to see anew 
 how little was thought of the greatest gifts, mental and 
 spiritual, if they were not backed up by substantial tem- 
 poralities. However, the pair made the best of their future 
 that circumstances permitted, and the interview was at length 
 drawing to a close, when there came, without the slightest 
 forewarning, a smart rat-tat-tat upon the little door. 
 
 ' ' Oh, I am lost ! " said Viviette, seizing his arm. ' ' Why 
 was I so incautious ! " 
 
 "It is nobody of consequence," whispered Swithin as- 
 suringly, " Somebody from my grandmother, probably, 
 to know when I am coming home. " 
 
 They were unperceived so far, for the only window
 
 TH^O ON A TOWER. 219 
 
 which gave Hght to the hut was screened by a curtain. 
 At that moment they heard the sound of their visitors' 
 voices, and, with a consternation as great as her own, 
 Swithin discerned the tones of Mr. Torkingham and the 
 Bishop of Melchester. 
 
 " Where shall I get .? What shall I do ? " said the poor 
 lady, clasping her hands. 
 
 Swithin looked around the cabin, and a very little look 
 was required to take in all its resources. At one end, as 
 previously explained, were a table, stove, chair, cupboard, 
 and so on; while the other was completely occupied by an 
 Arabian bedstead, hung with curtains of pink-and-white 
 chintz. On the inside of the bed there was a narrow chan- 
 nel, about a foot wide, between it and the wall of the hut. 
 Into this cramped retreat Viviette slid herself, and stood 
 trembling behind the curtains. 
 
 By this time the knock had been repeated more loudly, 
 the light through the window-blind unhappily revealing 
 the presence of some inmate. Swithin threw open the 
 door, and Mr. Torkingham introduced his visitors. 
 
 The Bishop shook hands with the young man, told him 
 he had known his father, and at Swithin's invitation, weak 
 as it was, entered the cabin, the vicar and Louis Glanville 
 remaining on the threshold, not to inconveniently crowd 
 the limited space within. Bishop Helmsdale looked be- 
 nignantly around the apartment, and said, "Quite a set- 
 tlement in the backwoods, — quite: far enough from the 
 world to afford the votary of science the seclusion he needs, 
 and not so far as to limit his resources. A hermit might 
 apparently live here in as much solitude as in a primeval 
 forest. "
 
 220 TWO ON- A TOWER. 
 
 "His lordship has been good enough to express an 
 interest in your studies," said Mr. Torkingham to St. 
 Cleeve. "And we have come to ask you to let us see 
 the observatory." 
 
 "With great pleasure," stammered Swithin. 
 
 "Where is the observatory.?" inquired the Bishop, peer- 
 ing round again. 
 
 " The staircase is just outside this door," Swithin an- 
 swered. "I am at your lordship's service, and will show 
 you up at once. " 
 
 "And here are your books," said the Bishop, turning 
 to the table and the shaded lamp. ' ' You take an obser- 
 vation at the top, I presume, and come down here to re- 
 cord your observations." 
 
 The young man explained his precise processes as well 
 as his state of mind would let him, and while he was doing 
 so Mr. Torkingham and Louis waited patiently without, 
 looking sometimes into the night, and sometimes through 
 the door at the interlocutors, and listening to their scien- 
 tific converse. When all had been exhibited here below, 
 Swithin lit his lantern, and, inviting his visitors to follow, 
 led the way up the column, experiencing no small sense 
 of relief as soon as he heard the footsteps of all three tramp- 
 ing on the stairs behind him. He knew very well that, 
 once they were inside the spiral, Viviette was out of danger, 
 her knowledge of the locality enabling her to find her way 
 with perfect safety through the plantation, and into the 
 park, home. 
 
 At the top he uncovered his equatorial, and, fo the 
 first time at ease, explained to them its beauties and 
 revealed by its help the glories of those stars thai svere
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 22 1 
 
 eligible for inspection. The Bishop spolce as intelHgcntly 
 as could be expected on a topic not peculiarly his own; 
 but. .somehow, he seemed rather more abstracted in manner 
 now than when he had arrived. Swithin thought that 
 perhaps the long clamber up the stairs, coming after a 
 hard day's work, had taken his spontaneity out of him, 
 and Mr. Torkingham was afraid that his lordship was 
 getting bored. But this did not appear to be tiie case; 
 for, though he said little, he staid on some time longer, 
 examining the construction of the dome after relinquishing 
 the telescope; while occasionally Swithin caught the eyes 
 of the Bishop fixed hard on him. 
 
 "Perhaps he sees some likeness of my father in me," 
 the young man thought; and the party making ready to 
 leave at this time, he conducted them to the bottom of 
 the tower. 
 
 Swithin was not prepared for what followed their descent. 
 All were standing at the foot of the staircase. The astron- 
 omer, lantern in hand, offered to show them the way 
 o?it of the plantation, to which Mr. Torkingham replied 
 that he knew the way very well, and would not trouble 
 his young friend. He strode forward with the words, and 
 Louis followed him, after waiting a moment, and finding 
 .hat the Bishop would not take the precedence. The 
 latter and Swithin were thus left together for one moment, 
 whereupon the Bishop turned. 
 
 "Mr. St. Cleeve," he said in a low voice, "I should 
 like to speak to you privately, before I leave, to-morrow 
 morning. Can you meet me — let me see — in the church- 
 yard, at half past ten o'clock .-' " 
 
 " Oh yes, certainly," murmured Swithin. And before
 
 2 22 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 he had recovered from his surprise the Bishop had joined 
 the others in the shades of the plantation. 
 
 Swithin immediately opened the door of the hut, and 
 scanned the nook behind the bed. As he had expected, 
 his bird had flown.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII.. 
 
 A LL night the astronomer's mind was on the stretch 
 -^ with curiosity as to what the Bishop could wish to 
 siy to him. A dozen conjectures entered his brain, to 
 be abandoned in turn as unUkcly. That which finally 
 seemed the most plausible was that the Bishop, having be- 
 come interested in his pursuits, and entertaining friendly 
 recollections of his father, was going to ask if he could 
 do anything to help him on- in the profession he had 
 chosen. Should this be the case, thought the suddenly 
 sanguine youth, it would seem like an encouragement to 
 that spirit of firmness which had led him to reject his late 
 uncle's offer, because it involved the renunciation of Lady 
 Constantine. 
 
 At last he fell asleep; and when he awoke it was so late 
 that the hour was ready to solve what conjecture could 
 not. After a huiried breakfast he paced across the fields, 
 entering the churchyard by the south gate precisely at the 
 appointed minute. 
 
 The inclosure was well adapted for a private interview, 
 being bounded by bushes of laurel and alder neariy on 
 all sid?s. He looked round; the Bishop was not there,
 
 2 24 TWO Oy A TOWER. 
 
 nor any living creature save liimself. Switliin sat down 
 upon a tombstone to await Bishop Helmsdale's arrival. 
 
 While he sat he (fancied he could hear voices in conver- 
 sation, not [ax oil", and further attention convinced him 
 that diey came from Lady Constantine's lawn, which was 
 on!v divided from the churchvard bv a hi2:h wall and 
 shrubbery. As tlie Bishop still delayed his coming, 
 though the time was nearly eleven, and as the lady who.se 
 sweet voice mingled with those heard from the lawn was 
 his personal property, Swithin became exceedingly cu- 
 rious to learn what was going on within that screened 
 promenade. A way of doing so occurred to him. The 
 key was in the church door; he opened it, entered, and 
 ascended to the ringer's loft in the west tower. At the 
 back of this was a window commanding a full view of 
 Viviette's garden front. 
 
 The flowers were all in gayest bloom, and the creepers 
 on the walls of the house were bursting into *ufts of young 
 green. A broad gravel-walk ran from end to end of tlie 
 fa9ade, terminating in a large conservatory. In the walk 
 were three people, pacing up and down. Lady Constan- 
 tine's was the central figure, her brother being on one side 
 of her, and a stately form, in a corded shovel-hat of glossy 
 beaver and black breeches, on the other. This was the Bish- 
 op. Viviette carried over her shoulder a sunshade lined 
 with red, which she twirled idly. They were laughing and 
 chatting gayly, and when the group approached the 
 churchyard many of their remarks entered the silence of 
 the church tower through the ventilator of the window. 
 
 The conversation was general, yet interesting enough 
 to Swithin. At length Louis stepped upon the grass,
 
 TlVO ON A TOWER. 225 
 
 Jlhd picked up something, which turned out to be a 
 bowl that had lain there: throwing it forward, he took 
 a second, and bowled it towards the fust, or jack. 
 The Bishop, who seemed to be in a sprightly mood, fol- 
 lowed suit, and bowled one in a curve towards the jack 
 turning and speaking to Lady Constantine as he con- 
 cluded the feat. As she had not left the graveled ter- 
 race, he raised his voice, so that the words reached Swithin 
 distinctly. " Do you follow us ? " he asked gayly. 
 
 " I am not skillful, " she said. ' ' I always bowl narrow. " 
 The Bishop meditatively paused. " This moment re- 
 minds one of the scene in Richard the Second," he said. 
 "I mean the Duke of York's garden, where the queen 
 and her two ladies play, and the queen says, — 
 
 " ' What sport shall we devise here in this garden, 
 To drive away the heavy thought of care ? ' 
 
 ' • To which her lady answers, ' Madam, we'll play at 
 bowls. 
 
 "That's an unfortunate quotation for you," said Lady 
 Constantine; "for if I don't forget, the queen declines, 
 saying, ' 'T will make me think the world is full of rubs, 
 and that my fortune runs against the bias.' " 
 
 "Then I cit» mal a propos. But it is an interesting 
 old game, and might have been played at that very date, 
 on this very green. " 
 
 The Bishop lazily bowled another, and while he was do- 
 ing it Vivieiti's glance rose by accident to the church-tower 
 window, where she recognized Swithin's face. Her sur- 
 prise was uu!y momentary; a;id waiting till both her
 
 2 26 TlVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 companions' backs were turned, she smiled and blew 
 him a kiss. In another minute she had another oppor- 
 tunity and blew him another: afterwards blowing him 
 one a third time. 
 
 Her blowings were put a stop to by the Bishop and 
 Louis throwing down the bowls and rejoining her in the 
 path, the house-clock at the moment striking half past eleven. 
 
 "This is a fine way of keeping an engagement," said 
 Swithin to himself. " I have waited an hour while you 
 indulge in those trifles." 
 
 He fumed, turned, and behold somebody was at his 
 elbow: Tabitha Lark. Swithin started, and said, "How 
 did you come here, Tabitha } " 
 
 "In the course of my calling, Mr. St. Cleeve," said the 
 smiling girl. ' ' I come to practice on the organ. When 
 I entered I saw you up here through the tower arch, 
 and I crept up to see what you were looking at. The 
 Bishop is a striking man, is he not .'' " 
 
 "Yes, rather," said Swithin. 
 
 " I think he is much devoted to Lady Constantine, and 
 I am glad of it. Aren't you .? " 
 
 "Oh, yes — very," said Swithin, wondering if Tabitha 
 had seen the tender little salutes between Lady Constantine 
 and himself 
 
 " I don't think she cares much for him," added Tabitha 
 judicially. " Or, even if she does, she could be got away 
 from him in no time by a younger man." 
 
 "Pooh, that's nothing," said Swithin impatiendy. 
 
 Tabitha then remarked that her blower had not come 
 to time, and that she must go to look for him; upon which 
 she descended tlie stairs, and left Swithin again alone.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 227 
 
 A few minutes later the Bishop suddenly looked at his 
 watch, Lady Constantine having withdrawn towards the 
 house. Apparently apologizing to Lfuiis, the Bishop 
 came down the terrace, and through the door into the 
 churchyard. Swithin hastened downstairs, and joined 
 him in the path under the sunny wall of the aisle. 
 
 Their glances met, and it was with some consternation 
 lliat Swithin beheld the change that a few short minutes 
 had wrought in that episcopal countenance. On the lawn 
 with Lady Constantine, the rays of an almost perpetual 
 smile had brightened his dark aspect like flowers in a 
 shady place: now the smile was gone as completely as yes- 
 terday; the lines of his face were firm; his dark e^es and 
 whiskers were overspread with gravity; and as he gazed 
 upon Swithin from the repose of his stable figure, it was 
 like an evangeii^icd King of Spades come to have it out 
 with the Knave of Hearts. 
 
 To return for a moment to Louis Glanville. He had 
 been somewhat struck with the abruptness of the Bishop's 
 de{)arture, and more particularly by the circumstance that 
 he had gone away by the private door into the church\ard, 
 instead of by the regular exit on the other side. True, 
 great men were known to suffer from absence of mind, 
 and Bishop Helmsdale, having a dim sense that he had 
 enlereti by that door yesterday, might have unconsciously 
 lurncii thitherward now. Louis, upon the whole, thought 
 little of the matter, and being now left quite alone on the 
 lawn, he seated himself in an arbor, and began smoking. 
 
 The arbor was situated against the churchyard wall. 
 r^he almospherq was as still as the air of a hot-house;
 
 2 28 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 fourteen inches of brickwork only divided Louis from 
 the scene of the Bishop's interview with St. Cleeve, and, 
 as voices on the lawn had been audible to Swithin in the 
 churchyard, voices in the churchyard could be heard 
 without difficulty from that close corner of the lawn. No 
 sooner had Louis lit a cigar than the dialogue began. 
 
 "Ah, you are here, St. Cleeve," said the Bishop, 
 hardly replying to Swithin's good morning. "I fear I 
 am a little late. Well, my request to you to meet me 
 may have seemed somewhat unusual, seeing that we were 
 strangers till a few hours ago." 
 
 " I don't mind that, if your lordship wishes to see me." 
 
 " I thought it best to see you regarding your confirma- 
 tion yesterday; and my reason for taking a more active 
 step with you than I should otherwise have done is that 
 1 have some interest in you through having known your 
 father when we were undergraduates. His room was on 
 the same staircase with mine at All Angels, and we were 
 friendly till time and affairs separated us even more com- 
 pletely than usually happens. However, about your pre- 
 senting yourself for confirmation." (The Bishop's voice 
 grew stern. ) "If I had known yesterday morning what 
 I knew twelve hours later, I wouldn't have confirmed you 
 at all." 
 
 " Indeed, Bishop Helmsdale ! " 
 
 "Yes, I say it, and I mean it. I visited your obser- 
 vatory last night. " 
 
 "You did." 
 
 "In inspecting it I noticed something which I may 
 truly describe as extraordinary. I have had young men 
 present theraselyes to me who turned out to be note-
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 229 
 
 riously unfit, either from giddiness, from being profane or 
 intemperate, or from some bad quality or other. But I 
 never remember a case which equaled the cool culpability 
 of this. While infringing the first principles of social de- 
 corum, you might at least liave respected the ordinance 
 sufficiently to have staid away from it altogether. Now 
 I have sent for vou here to see if a last entreaty and a di- 
 rect appeal to your sense of manly uprightness will have 
 any effect in inducing you to change your course of life." 
 
 The voice of Swithin in his next remark showed how 
 tremendously this attack of the Bishop had told upon his 
 feelings. Louis, of course, did not know the reason why 
 the words should have affected him precisely as they did; 
 to any one in the secret, the double embarrassment aris- 
 ing from misapprehended ethics and inability to set mat- 
 ters right, because his word of secrecy to another was in- 
 violable, would have accounted for the young man's 
 emotion sufficiently well. 
 
 " I am very sorry your lordship should have seen any- 
 thing objectionable," said Swithin. " May I ask what it 
 was .' " 
 
 " You know what it was. Something in your chamber, 
 which forced me to the above conclusions. I disguised 
 mv feelings of sorrow at the time for obvious reasons, but 
 I never in my whole life was so shocked. " 
 
 " At what, my lord .^ " 
 
 ' ' At what I saw. '" 
 
 " Pardon me, Bishop Helmsdale, but you said just now 
 thai we are strangers; so what you saw in m}' cabin con- 
 cerns me only. '" 
 
 "There I contra 1 ci you. Twenty-four hours ago that
 
 230 
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 remark would have been plausible enough; but by pre- 
 senting yourself for confirmation at my hands, you have 
 invited my investigation into your principles." 
 
 Swithin sighed. " I admit it," he said. 
 
 ' ' And what do you find them .? " 
 
 "You say reprehensible. But you might at least let 
 me hear the proof. 
 
 "I can do more. I can let you see it." 
 
 There was a pause. Louis Glanville was so highly in- 
 terested that he stood upon the seat of the arbor, and 
 looked through the leafage over the wall. The Bishop 
 had produced an article from his pocket. 
 
 " Wliat is it.'" said Swithin, laboriously scrutinizing 
 the object, as if he did not understand its nature or use. 
 
 "Why, don't you see } " said the Bishop, holding it out 
 between his finger and thumb in Swithin's face. "A 
 bracelet, — a coral bracelet. I found it on the coverlet in 
 your chamber. And of the sex of the owner there can be 
 no doubt. More than that, she was concealed behind the 
 curtains, for I saw them move. " In the decision of his 
 opinion the Bishop threw the coral bracelet down on a 
 tombotone. 
 
 "Nobody was in my room, my lord, who had not a per- 
 r.ct right to be there," said the younger man, firmly. 
 
 "Well, well, that's a matter of assertion. Now don't 
 get in a passion, and say to me in your haste what you'll 
 rcDcnt of saving afterwards." 
 
 "I am not in a passion, I assure your lordship. I am 
 too .sad for passion." 
 
 "Very well; that's a hopeful sign. Now 1 would ask 
 yoUj as one man of another, do you tliink that to come
 
 rff^O ON A TOWER. 23 1 
 
 to me, the Bishop of ibis large and important diocese, as 
 you came yesterday, and jirctend to be something that 
 you are not, is (]uilc upright conduct, leave alone relig- 
 ious ? 'I'hink it over. We may never meet again. But 
 bear in mind what your Bishop and si)irilual head says 
 to yiiu, and see if you cannot mend before it is too late.'" 
 
 Swilhin was meek as Moses, and he brushed away a 
 tear. " Mv lord l^ishop, I am in a difficult position," he 
 said mournfully. "How difficult, nobody but myself 
 can tell. I cannot e.xplain; there are insuperable reasons 
 against it. But will you lake my word of assurance that 
 I am not so bad as I seem } Some day I will prove it. 
 Till then I only ask you to suspend your judgm.ent on 
 me. 
 
 The Bishop shook his head, and went towards the 
 vicarage as if he had suddenly lost his hearing, Swithin 
 followed him with his eyes, and Louis's followed the 
 direction of Swithin's. Belbre the Bishop had reached 
 the vicarage entrance. Lady Constantine crossed in front 
 of him. She had a basket on her arm, and was, in fact, 
 going to visit some of the poorer cottages. Who could 
 believe the Bishop now to be the same man that he was 
 a moment before.'* The darkness left his face as if he 
 had come out of a cave; his look was all sweetness and 
 shine and ga}ety, as he again greeted Viviette.
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 "T^FiE conversation which arose between the Bishop 
 -•- and Lady Constantine was of that lively and repro- 
 ductive kind which cannot be ended during any reason- 
 able halt of two people going in opposite directions. He 
 turned, and walked with her along the laurel-screened 
 lane that bordered the churchvard, till their voices died 
 away in the distance. Swithin then aroused himself from 
 his thoughtful regard of them, and went out of the church- 
 yard by another gate. 
 
 Seeing himself now to be left alone on the scene, Louis 
 Glanville descended from his post of observation in the 
 arbor. He came through the private doorway, and on 
 to that spot among the graves where the Bishop and St. 
 Cleeve had conversed. On the tombstone still lay the 
 coral bracelet which Dr. Helmsdale had flung down there 
 in his indignation; for the agitated, introspective mood 
 into which Swithin had been thrown had banished from 
 his mind all thought of securing the trinket, and putting 
 it in his pocket. 
 
 Louis picked up the little red scandal-breeding thing, 
 and while walking on with it in his hand he observed Tabitha
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 233 
 
 Lark approaching Uie church, in company with the young 
 blower whom she had gone in search of, to inspire her 
 organ-practicing within. Louis immediately put together, 
 with that rare diplomatic keenness of which he was proud, 
 the little scene he had witnessed between Tabitha auvl 
 Swithin during the confirmation, and the Bishop's stern 
 statement as to where he had found the bracelet. He 
 had no longer any doubt that it belonged to her. 
 
 " Poor girl ! " he said to himself, and sang in an under- 
 tone, — 
 
 " Tra deri, dera, 
 L'histoire n'est pas nouvelle ! " 
 
 When she drew nearer, Louis called her by name. 
 She sent the boy into the church, and came forward, 
 blushing at having been called by so fin« a gentleman. 
 Louis held out the bracelet. 
 
 "Here is something I have found, or somebody else 
 has found," he said to her. "I won't state where. Put 
 it away, and say no more about it. 1 will not mention 
 it either. Now go on into the church, v.-here you were 
 going, and may God have mercy on your soul, my dear.'' 
 
 "Thank you, sir," said Tabitha, with some perplexity, 
 yet inclined to be pleased, and only recognizing in the 
 situation the fact that Lady Constantine's humorous broth- 
 er was making her a present. 
 
 " You are much obliged to me.? " 
 
 "Oh, yes!" 
 
 "Well, Miss Lark, I've discovered a secret, you see." 
 
 "What may that be, I\Ir. Glanville?" 
 
 "That you are in love."
 
 234 TWO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 " I don't admit it, sir. Who told you so? " 
 "Nobody. Only I put two and two together. Now 
 take my advice. Beware of lovers ! They are a bad lot, 
 ai\(l bring young women to tears." 
 
 ' • Some do, I dare say. But some don't. " 
 "And you think that in your particular case the latter 
 alternative will hold good.' We generally think we shall 
 be lucky ourselves, though all the world before us, in the 
 same situation, have been otherwise." 
 
 "Oh, yes, or we should die outright of despair." 
 "Well, I don't think j^ou will be lucky in your case." 
 "Please how do you know so much, since my case has 
 not yet arrived .'' " asked Tabitha, tossing her head a little 
 disdainfully, but less than she might have done if he had 
 not obtained a charter for his discourse by giving her the 
 bracelet. 
 
 "Fie, Tabitha!" 
 
 "I tell you it has not arrived!" she said, with some 
 anger. " I have not got a lover, and everybody knows I 
 haven't, and it's an insinuating thing for you to say so ! " 
 Louis laughed, thinking" how natural it was that a girl 
 should so emphatically deny circumstances that would 
 not bear curious inquiry. "Why, of course I meant my- 
 self," he said soothingly. "So, then, you will not accept 
 me.' "' 
 
 "I didn't know you meant yourself," she replied. 
 " Bu: I won't accept you. And I think you ought not 
 to jest on such, subjects. " 
 
 "Well, perhaps not. However, don't let the Bishop 
 see your bracelet, and all will be xyeU. But mind, lovers 
 aiJ:e d.ecQivQrs.,"
 
 TlVO OM A TOWER. ij5 
 
 Tabitha laughed, and they parted, the girl entering the 
 church. She had been feeling almost certain that, having 
 accidentally found the bracelet somewhere, he had pre- 
 sented it in a whim to her as the first girl he met. Yet 
 now she began to have momentary doubts whether he 
 had not been laboring under a mistake, and had imag- 
 ined her to be the owner. The bracelet was not valuable; 
 it was, in fact, a mere toy, — the pair of which this was 
 one being a little present made to Lady Constantine by 
 Swithin on the day of their marriage; and she had not 
 worn them with sufficient frequency out of doors for Tabi- 
 tha to recognize either as positively her ladyship's. But 
 when, out of sight of the blower, the girl momentarily 
 tried it on, in a corner by the organ, it seemed to her 
 that the ornament was possibly Lady Constantine's. Now 
 that the pink beads shone before her eyes on her own 
 arm, she remembered having seen a bracelet with just 
 such an effect gracing the wrist of Lady Constantine, upon 
 one occasion. A temporary self-surrender to the sophism 
 that if jNIr. Louis Glanville chose to give away anything 
 belonging to his sister she, Tabitha, had a right to take it 
 without question, was soon checked by a resolve to carry 
 the tempting strings of coral to her ladyship that evening 
 and incpiirc the truth about them. This decided on, she 
 slipped the bracelet into her pocket, and played her vol- 
 untaries with a light heart. 
 
 Bishop Helmsdale did not tear himself away from Wel- 
 land till about two o'clock that afternoon, which was three 
 hours later than he had intended to leave. It was with a 
 feeling of relief tliat Swlihin, looking from the top of the
 
 2^6 TlVO ON' A TOlVEk. 
 
 tower, saw the carriage drive out from the vicarage into 
 the turnpike road, and ivhirl the right reverend gentleman 
 again towards Warborne. The coast being now clear of 
 him, Swithin meditated how to see Viviette, and explain 
 what had happened. With this in view he waited where 
 he was till evening came on. 
 
 Meanwhile, Lady Constantine and her brother dined 
 by themselves at Welland House. They had not met 
 since the morning, and as soon as they were left alone 
 Louis said, "You have done very well so far; but you 
 miorht have been a little warmer." 
 
 " Done well .-' '' she asked, with surprise. 
 
 " Yes, with the Bishop. The difficult question is how 
 to follow up our advantage. How are you to keep your- 
 self in sight of him 1 "' 
 
 " Heavens, Louis ! You don't seriously mean that the 
 Bishop of Melchester has any feelings for me other than 
 friendly } " 
 
 "Viviette, this is affectation. You know he has as 
 well as I do." 
 
 She sighed. "Yes," she said. "I own I had a sus- 
 picion of the same thing. What a misfortune ! " 
 
 "A misfortune.'' Surely the world is turned upside 
 down ! You will drive me to despair about our future, if 
 you see things so awry. Exert yourself to do something, 
 so as to make of this accident a stepping-stone to higher 
 things. The gentleman will give us the slip, if we don't 
 pursue the friendship at once." 
 
 "I cannot have you talk like this!" she cried impa- 
 tiently. " I have no more thought of the Bishop than I 
 have of the Pope. I would much rather not have had
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 23^ 
 
 him here to lunch at all. You said it would be necessary 
 to do it, and an opportunit\', and I thought it my duty 
 to show some hospitality when he was coming so near, 
 Mr. Torkingham's house being so small. But ol course 
 I understood that the opportunity would be one for \chi 
 in getting to know him, your prospects being so indefinite 
 at present; not one for me." 
 
 " If you don't follow up this chance of being spiritual 
 queen of Melchester, you will never have another of be- 
 ing anything. Mind this, Vivietle; you are not so young 
 as you were. You are getting on to be a middle-aged 
 woman, ami your black hair is precisely of the sort which 
 time quickly turns gray. You must make up your mind 
 to grizzled bachelors or widowers. Young marriageable 
 men won't look at you; or if they do just now, in a year 
 or two more they'll despise you as an antiquated party." 
 
 Lady Constantine perceptibly paled. "Young men 
 what .'' " she asked. " Say that again." 
 
 "I .said it was no use to think of young men: they 
 won't look at you much longer; or if they do, it will be 
 to look away again very quickly." 
 
 •'You imply that if 1 were to marry a man younger 
 than myself he would speedily acquire a contempt for me.' 
 How much younger must a man be than his wife — to get 
 that feeling for her.? ' She was resting her elbow on the 
 chair as she faintly spoke the words, and covered her eyes 
 with her hand. 
 
 "An exceedingly small number of years," said Louis, 
 dryly. "Now the Bishop is at least fifteen years older 
 than you, and on that account, no less than on others, is 
 an excellent match. You would be head of the church in
 
 238 TIVO ON- A TOWER. 
 
 this diocese; what more can you require, after these }ears 
 of miserable obscurity? In addition, you would escape 
 that thorn in the flesh of bishops' wives, of being only Mrs. 
 while their husbands are peers." 
 
 She was not listening; his previous observation still de- 
 tained her thoughts. 
 
 "Louis," she said, "in the case of a woman marrying a 
 man much younger than herself, does he get to dislike 
 her, even if there has been a social advantage to him in 
 the union .'' '' 
 
 "Yes, — not a whit less. Ask any person of experi- 
 ence. But what of that .? Let's talk of our own affairs. 
 You say you have no thought of the Bishop. And yet if 
 he had staid here another day or two he would have pro- 
 posed to you straight off. " 
 
 "Seriously, Louis, I could not accept him." 
 
 "Why not.'" 
 
 "I don't love him." 
 
 "Oh, oh, I like those words !" cried Louis, throwing 
 himself back in his chair, and looking at the ceiling in sa- 
 tirical enjoyment. "A woman who at two-and-twenty 
 married for convenience, at nearly thirty talks of not mar- 
 rying without love; the rule of inverse, that is, in which 
 more requires less, and less requires more. As your only 
 brother, older than yourself, and more experienced, I in- 
 sist that you encourage the Bishop." 
 
 "Don't quarrel with me, Louis," she said piteously. 
 "We don't know that he thinks anything of me, — we only 
 guess. " 
 
 "I know it, — and j-ou shall hear how I know. I am 
 of a curious and conjectural nature, as you are aware.
 
 Tl'FO ON A TOWER. 239 
 
 Last night, when everybody had gone to bed, I stepped 
 out for a five minutes' smoke on the lawn, and walked 
 down to where you get near the vicarage windows. While 
 I was there in the dark, one of them opened, and Bishop 
 Helmsdale leant out. The illuminated oblong of your 
 window shone him full in the face between the trees, and 
 presently your shadow crossed it. He waved his hand, 
 and murmured some tender words, though what they were, 
 exactly, I could not hear." 
 
 " What a vague, imaginary story, — as if he could know 
 my shadow ! Besides, a man of the Bishop's dignity 
 wouldn't have done such a thing. When I knew him as 
 a younger man he was not at all romantic, and he's not 
 likely to have grown so now. " 
 
 " Tliat's just what he is likely to have done. No lover 
 is so extreme a specimen of the species as an old lover. 
 Come, Viviette, no more of this fencing. I have entered 
 into the project heart and soul, — so much that I have 
 postponed my departure till the matter is well under way." 
 
 " Louis — my dear Louis — yoM. will bring me into some 
 disagreeable position ! " said she, clasping her hands. "I 
 do entreat you not to interfere, or do anything rash about 
 me. The step is impossible. I have something to tell 
 you some day. I must live on, and endure" — 
 
 "Eveiything except this penur}-," replied Louis, un- 
 moved. "Come, I have begun the campaign by inviting 
 Bishop Helmsdale, and I'll take the responsibility of car- 
 rying it on. All I ask of you is not to make a ninny of 
 yourself. Come, give me your promise 1 " 
 
 "No, I cannot, — I don't know how to. I only know 
 one th'ng, — that I am in no hurrv" —
 
 240 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "No hurry be hanged ! Agree, Hke a good sister, to 
 charm the Bishop." 
 
 "I must consider !" she rephed, with perturbed evasive- 
 ness. 
 
 It being a fine evening, Louis went out of the house to 
 enjoy his Havana in the shrubbery. On reaching his 
 favorite seat he found he had left his cigar-case behind 
 him; he immediately returned for it. " When he ap- 
 proached the window by which he had emerged, he saw 
 Swithin St. Cleeve standing there in the dusk, talking to 
 Viviette inside. 
 
 St. Cleeve's back was towards Louis, but, whether at a 
 signal from her or by accident, he quickly turned and rec- 
 ognized Glanville; whereupon, raising his hat to Lady 
 Constantine, the young man passed along the terrace walk 
 and by the churchyard door. 
 
 Louis rejoined his sister. "I didn't know you allowed 
 your lawn to be a public thoroughfare for the parish," he 
 said suspiciously. 
 
 " I am not exclusive, especially since I have been so 
 poor," replied she. 
 
 "Then, do you let everybody pass this way, or only 
 that illustrious youth, because he is so good-looking.? " 
 
 " 1 have no strict rule in the case. Mr. St. Cleeve is 
 an acquaintance of mine, and he can certainly come here 
 if he chooses." Her color rose somewhat, and she spoke 
 warmly. 
 
 Louis was too cautious a bird to reveal to her what had 
 suddenly dawned upon his mind, — that his sister, in com- 
 mon with the (to his thinking) unhappy Tabitha Lark, 
 had been foolish enougli to j;et interested in this phenom-
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 24 1 
 
 enon of the parisli, this scientific Adonis. But he resolved 
 to cure at once her tenc!er feehng, if it existed, by letting 
 out a secret which would inflame her dignity against the 
 weakness. 
 
 "A good-looking young man," he said, with his eyes 
 where Swithin had vanished. "But not so good as he 
 looks. In fiict, a regular young sinner." 
 
 " What do you mean .? " 
 
 "Oh, only a little feature I discovered in St. Cleeve's 
 history. But I suppose he has a right to sow his wild 
 oats as well as other young men. "' 
 
 "Tell me what vou allude to, — do, Louis." 
 
 "It is hardly fit that I should. However, the case is 
 amusing enough. I was sitting in the arbor to-day, and 
 was an unwilling listener to the oddest interview I ever 
 heard of. Our friend the Bishop discovered, when we 
 visited the observatory last night, that our astronomer was 
 not alone in his seclusion. A lady shared his romantic 
 cabin with him; and finding this, the Bishop naturally 
 enou2:h felt that the ordinance of confirmation had been 
 profaned. So his lordship sent for Master Swithin this 
 morning, and, meeting him in the churchyard, read him 
 such an excommunicating lecture as I warrant he won't for- 
 get in his life-time. Ha-ha-ha! 'T was very good, — very." 
 
 He watched her face narrowly, while he spoke with such 
 seeming carelessness. Instead of the agitation of jealousy 
 that he had expected to be aroused by this hint of another 
 woman in the case, there was a curious expression, more 
 like embarrassment than anything else, which might have 
 been fairly attributed to the subject. Can it be that I am 
 mistaken .-" he asked himself.
 
 242 TIVO ON" A TOWER. 
 
 The possibility that he might be mistaken restored Louis 
 to good humor, and, the hghts having been brought, he 
 sat with his sister for some time, talking with purpose of 
 Swithin's low rank on one side, and the sordid struggles 
 that might be in store for him. St. Cleeve being in the 
 unhappy case, of deriving his existence from two channels 
 of society, it resulted that he seemed to belong to either 
 this or that, according to the attitude of the beholder. 
 Louis threw the light entirely on Swithin's agricultural 
 side, bringing out old Mrs. Martin and her connections 
 and her ways of life with luminous distinctness, till Lady 
 Constantine became greatly depressed. She, in her hope- 
 fulness, had almost forgotten, latterly, that the bucolic ele- 
 ment, so incisively represented by Messrs. Hezzy Biles, 
 Haymoss Fry, Sammy Blore, and the rest, entered into 
 his condition at all; to her he had been the son of his aca- 
 demic father alone. 
 
 But she would not reveal the depression to which she 
 had been subjected by this resuscitation of the homely half 
 of poor Swithin; presently putting an end to the subject, 
 by walking hither and thither about the room. 
 
 "What have you lost.'" said Louis, observing her 
 movements. 
 
 "Nothing of consequence, — a bracelet." 
 
 "Coral } " he inquired calmly. 
 
 "Yes. How did you know it was coral.? You have 
 never seen it, have you } '' 
 
 He was about to make answer; but the amazed en- 
 lightenment which her announcement had produced in 
 him, through knowing where the Bishop had found such 
 an article, led him to reconsider himself Then, like an
 
 TIVO OJV A rOlVER. 243 
 
 astute man, by no means sure of the dimensions of the 
 intrigue he might be uneaitliing, he said carelessly, "I 
 found such a one in the churchyard to-day. But I thought 
 it appeared to be of no great rarity, and I gave it to (;>ne 
 of the village girls who was passing by." 
 
 "Did she take it? Who was she.? " said the unsuspect- 
 ing Viviette. 
 
 "Really, I don't remember. I suppose it is of no 
 consequence .•* " 
 
 "Oh, no; its value is nothing, comparatively. It was 
 only one of a pair such as young girls wear." Lady Con- 
 stantine could not add that, in spite of this, she herself 
 valued it as being Swithin's present, and the best he could 
 afford. 
 
 Panic-struck by his ruminations, although revealing 
 nothing by his manner, Louis soon after went up to his 
 room, professedly to write letters. He gave vent to a low 
 whistle when he was out of hearing. He of course re- 
 membered perfectly well to whom he had given the corals, 
 and resolved to seek out Tabitha the next morning to as- 
 certain whether she could possibly have owned such a 
 trinket, as well as his sister, — which at present he very 
 greatly doubted, though fervently hoping that she might.
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 nPHE effect upon Swithin of the interview with the 
 -*- Bishop had been a very marked one. He felt 
 that he had good ground for resenting that dignitary's 
 tone in haughtilv assuming that all must be sinful which 
 at the first blush appeared to be so, and in narrowly re- 
 fusing a young man the benefit of a single doubt. Swithin's 
 assurance that he would be able to explain all some day 
 had been taken in contemptuous incredulity. 
 
 " He may be as virtuous as his prototype Timothy; but 
 he's an opinionated old fogy, all the same," said St. Cleeve 
 petulantly. 
 
 Yet, on the other hand, Swithin's nature was so fresh 
 and ingenuous, notwithstanding that recent affairs had 
 somewhat denaturalized him, that for a man in the Bish- 
 op's position to think him immoral was almost as over- 
 whelming as if he had actually been so, and at moments 
 he could scarcely bear existence under so gross a suspicion. 
 What was his union with Lady Constantine worth to him 
 when, by reason of it, he was thought a reprobate by al- 
 most the only living man who had professed to take an 
 interest in him ':" 
 
 Certainly, by contrast with his air-built image of hirn-
 
 TIVO ON A TO TVER. 245 
 
 self as a worthy astronomer, received by all the world, 
 and the envied husband of Viviette, the present imputation 
 was humiliating. The glorious light of this tender and 
 refined passion seemed to have become debased to bur- 
 lesque hues by pure accident, and his aesthetic no less than 
 his ethic taste was offended by such an anticlimax. He 
 who had soared amid the remotest grandeurs of nature 
 had been taken to task on a rudimentary question of 
 morals, which had never been a question with him at 
 all. This was what the exigencies of an awkward at- 
 tachment had brought him to; but he blamed the cir- 
 cumstances, and not for one moment Lady Constantine. 
 
 Having now set his heart against a longer concealment, 
 he was disposed to think that an excellent way of begin- 
 ning a revelation of their marriage would be by writing 
 a confidential letter to the Bishop, detailing the whole 
 case. But it was impossible to do this on his own re- 
 spon'^ibilitv. He still recognized the understanding en- 
 tered into with Viviette before the marriage to be as 
 binding as ever, — namely, that the initiative in disclos- 
 ing: their union should come from her. Yet he hardiv 
 doubted that she would take that initiative when he told 
 her of his extraordinary reprimand in the churchyard. 
 
 I'his was what he had come to do when Louis saw him 
 standing at the window. But before he had said half a 
 dozen words to Viviette she motioned to him to go on, 
 which he mechanically did, ere he could sufficiently col- 
 lect his thoughts on its advisability or otherwise. He did 
 not, however, go far. While Louis and his sister were 
 discussing him in the drawing-room he lingered, musing,- 
 in the church}ard, hoping that she might be able to es-
 
 246 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 cape, and join him in the consultation he so earnestly 
 desired. 
 
 She at last found opportunity to do this. As soon as 
 Louis had left the room, and shut himself in upstairs, 
 she ran out by the window in the direction Swithin had 
 taken. When her footsteps began crunching on the 
 gravel he came forward from the churchyard door. 
 
 They embraced each other in haste, and then, in a 
 few short, panting words she explained to him that her 
 brother had heard and witnessed the interview on that 
 spot between himself and the Bishop, and had told her 
 the substance of the Bishop's accusation, not knowing 
 she was the woman in the cabin. 
 
 "And what I cannot understand is this," she added: 
 "how did the Bishop discover that the person behind 
 the bed-curtains was a woman, and not a man } " 
 
 Swithin explained that in addition to seeing the cur- 
 tains move the Bishop had unluckily found on the bed 
 a bracelet she had dropped there, and had brought it 
 to him in the churchyard. 
 
 "Oh, Swithin, what do you say.? Found the coral 
 bracelet .-* What did you do with it.-* " 
 
 Swithin clapped his hand to his pocket. "Dear me! 
 I recollect — I left it where it lay on Reuben Heath's 
 tombstone." 
 
 ' ' Oh, my dear, dear Swithin ! " she cried miserably. 
 "You have compromised me by your forgetfulness ! I 
 have claimed the article as mine. My brother did not 
 tell me that the Bishop brought it from the cabin. What 
 can I, can I do, that neither the Bishop nor my brother 
 rnay conclude / was the woman there 1"
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 247 
 
 " Bui if we announce our marriage " — 
 
 " Even as your wife, the position was too undignified — 
 too 1 don't l<now what — for nic ever to admit that.I was 
 iherej Right or wrong, I must declare the bracelet was 
 not mine. Such an escapade — why, it would make me 
 ridiculous in the county; and anything rather than that." 
 
 " I was in hope that you would agree to let our mar- 
 riage be known," said Swithin, with some disappoint- 
 ment. " I thought that these circumstances would make 
 the reason for doing so doubly strong." 
 
 "Yes. But there are, alas, reasons against it still 
 stronger ! Let me have my way. " 
 
 "Certainly, dearest. I promised that before you 
 agreed to be mine. My reputation, — what is it! Per- 
 haps I shall be dead and forgotten before the next transit 
 of Venus ! " 
 
 She soothed him tenderly, but could not tell him why 
 she felt the reasons against any announcement as yet to 
 be stronger than those in favor of it. How could she, 
 when her feeling had been cautiously fed and developed 
 by her brother Louis's unvarnished exhibition of Swithin s 
 material position in the eyes of the world.? — that of a 
 young man, the scion of a family of farmers recently her 
 tenants, living at the homestead with his grandmother, 
 Mrs. Martin. 
 
 That this objection, at present so strong in her, was 
 only temporary she quite believed, and was as convinced 
 of his coming success as ever; praying and hoping for 
 it on his own account not less than on her own. She 
 hoped all the more earnestly from an occasional twinge 
 of coriscience on the question whether his marriage with
 
 24^ TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 her had been so greatly for his good as they convention- 
 ally assumed it to be. She could not be blind to the 
 fact that she had agreed to the step as much for her own 
 pleasure as from a disinterested wish to release his mind 
 from a distraction which was fatal to his studies; that had 
 Swithin never seen her it would probably have been far 
 better for him and his prospects, since (excepting the 
 equatorial) she had brought him no solid help as yet, 
 either in wealth or friends. 
 
 To soften her refusal, she said in declaring it, "One 
 concession, Swithin, I certainly will make. I will see you 
 oftener. I will come to the cabin and tower frequently; 
 and will contrive, too, that _you come to the house occa- 
 sionally. During the last winter we passed whole weeks 
 without meeting: don't let us allow that to happen again." 
 
 "Very well, dearest," said Swithin good humoredly. 
 " I don't care so terribly much for the old man's opinion 
 of me, after all. For the present, then, let things be as 
 :hey are. " 
 
 Nevertheless, the youth felt her refusal more than he 
 owned; but the unequal temperament of Swithin's age, so 
 soon depressed on his own account, was also soon to re- 
 cover on hers, and it was with almost a child's forgetful- 
 ness of the past that he took her view of the case. 
 
 When he was gone she hastily re-entered the house. 
 Her brother had not reappeared from upstairs; but she was 
 informed that Tabitha Lark was waiting to see her, if her 
 ladyship would pardon the said Tabitha for coming so late. 
 Lady Constant! ne made no objection, and saw the young 
 girl at (juce. 
 
 When Lady Constantine entered the waiting-room, be-
 
 TIVO OiV A rOWER. 249 
 
 hokl in Tabitha's outstretched hand lay the coral orna- 
 ment which had been causing Viviette so much anxiety. 
 
 " I guessed, on second thoughts, that it was yours, my 
 lady," said Tabitha, with rather a frightened face. "And 
 so I have brought it back." 
 
 " But ln)W did )ou come by it, Tabitha.? " 
 
 "Mr. Glanville gave it to me; he must have thought it 
 was mine. I took it, fancying at the moment that he 
 handed it to me because I happened to come by first after 
 he had found it." 
 
 Lady Constantine saw how the situation might be im- 
 proved so as to effect her deliverance from this trouble- 
 some little web of evidence. 
 
 "Oh, you can keep it," she said brightly. "It was 
 very good of you to bring it back. But keep it for your 
 very own. Take Mr. Glanville at his word, and don't ex- 
 plain. And, Tabitha, divide the strands into two brace- 
 lets; there are enough of them to make a pair." 
 
 The next morning, in pursuance of his resolution, Louis 
 wandered round the grounds till he saw the girl for whom 
 he was wailing enter the church. He accosted her over 
 the wall. 15at, puzzling to view, a coral bracelet blushed 
 on each of her young arms, for she had promptly carried 
 out the suggestion of Lady Constantine. 
 
 "You are wearing it, I see, Tabitha, with the other," 
 he murmured. " Then you mean to keep it .•* " 
 
 ' ' Yes, I mean to keep it. " 
 
 "You are sure it is not Lady Constantine's. I find she 
 has one like it." 
 
 "()uiie sure. But you had better take it to her, sir, 
 and ask her," said the saucy girl.
 
 250 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Oh, no; that's not necessary," replied Louis, consider- 
 ably shaken in his convictions. 
 
 When Louis met his sister, a short time after, he did 
 not catch her, as he had intended to do, by saying sud- 
 denly, " I have found your bracelet. I know who has got 
 it. '• 
 
 "You cannot have found it," she replied quietly, "for 
 I have discovered that it was never lost," and stretching 
 out both her hands she revealed one on each, Viviette hav- 
 ing performed the same operation with her remaining 
 bracelet that she had advised Tabitha to do with the other. 
 
 Louis was mystified, but by no means convinced. In 
 spite of this attempt to hoodwink him, his mind returned 
 to the subject every hour of the day. There was no doubt 
 that either Tabitha or Viviette had been with Swithin in 
 the cabin. He recapitulated every case that had occurred 
 during his visit to Welland in which his sister's manner 
 had been of a color to justify the suspicion that it was 
 she. There was that strange incident in the corridor, 
 when she had screamed at what she described to be a 
 shadowy resemblance to her late husband: how veiy im- 
 probable that this fancy should have been the only cause 
 of her agitation ! Then he had noticed, during Swithin's 
 confirmation, a blush upon her cheek when he passed her, 
 on his wav to the Bishop, and the fen'or in her glance 
 (ir,ring the few moments of the imposition of hands. Then 
 he suddenly recalled the night at the railway station, when 
 the accident with the whip took place, and how, when he 
 reached Welland House, an hour later, he had found no 
 Viviette there. Running thus from incident to incident, 
 he increased his suspicions without being able to cuU
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 251 
 
 from the circumstances anything amounting to evidence; 
 but evidence he now determined to acquire without saying 
 a word to any one. 
 
 His plan was of a cruel kind: to set a trap into which 
 the pair would blindly walk, if any secret understanding 
 existed between them of the nature he suspected.
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 T OUIS began his stratagem by calling at the tower one 
 -*-^ afternoon, as if on the spur of the moment. 
 
 After a friendly chat with Swithin, whom he found there 
 (having watched him enter), Louis invited the young man 
 to dine the same evening at the house, that he might 
 have an opportunity of showing him some interesting old 
 scientific works in folio, which, according to Louis's ac- 
 count, he had stumbled on in overhauling the library. 
 Louis set no great bait for St. Cleeve in this statement, 
 for old science was not old art, which, having perfected 
 itself, has died and left its secret hidden in its remains. 
 But Swithin was a responsive fellow, and readily agreed 
 to come, being, moreover, always glad of a chance of 
 meeting Viviette en familh. Besides, he hoped to tell 
 her of a scheme that had lately suggested itself to him as 
 likely to benefit them both: that he should go away foi 
 a while, and endeavor to raise suffic'ent funds to visit the 
 great observatories of Europe, possibly with a view to 
 obtaining a post in one of them. Hilhciti) llif or.'y lur 
 to the plan had been the exceeding narrowness of his 
 income, which, though sufficient for his present life, was
 
 TPVO ON A TOWER. 253 
 
 absolutely inadequate to the requirements of a traveling 
 astronomer. 
 
 Meanwhile, Louis Glanville had returned to the house, 
 and told his sister in the most innocent manner that he 
 had been in the company of St. Cleeve that afternoon, 
 getting a few wrinkles on astronomy: that they had grown 
 so friendly over the fascinating subject as to leave him 
 no alternative but to invite St. Cleeve to dine at Welland 
 the same evening, with a view to certain researches in 
 the library afterwards. 
 
 " I could quite make allowances for any youthful errors 
 into which the young man may have been betrayed," he 
 continued sententiously, "since, for a scientist, he is 
 really admirable. No doubt the Bishop's caution will 
 not be lost upon him; and as for his birth and connections, 
 — those he can't help." 
 
 Lady Constantine showed such alacrity in adopting the 
 idea of having Swithin to dinner, and she ignored his 
 "youthful errors" so completely, as almost to betray 
 herself In fulfillment of her promise to see him oftener, 
 she had been intending to run across to Swithin on that 
 identical evening. Now the trouble would be saved in 
 a very delightful way, by the exercise of a little hospitality, 
 which Viviette herself would not have dared to susrsrest. 
 
 Dinner-time came, and with it Swithin, exhibiting rather 
 a blushing and nervous manner that was, unfortunately, 
 more likely to betray their cause than was Viviette's own 
 more practiced bearing. Throughout the meal Louis sat 
 like a spider in the corner of his web, observing them nar- 
 rowly, and at moments flinging out an artful thread, here 
 and there, with a view to their entanglement.
 
 254 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 But they underwent the ordeal marvelously well. V:x- 
 haps the actual tie between them, through being so mucli 
 closer and of so much more practical a nature than even 
 their critic supposed it, was in itself a protection against 
 their exhibiting that ultra-reciprocity of manner which, had 
 they been merel}' lovers, might have betrayed them. 
 
 After dinner the trio duly adjourned to the library, as 
 had been planned, and the volumes were brought forth by 
 Louis with the zest of a bibliophilist. Swithin had seen 
 most of them before, and thought but litde of them; but 
 the pleasure of staying in the house made him welcome 
 any reason for doing so, and he willingly looked at what- 
 ever was put before him, from Bertius's Ptolemy to Rees's 
 Cyclopasdia. 
 
 The evening thus passed away, and it began to grow 
 late. Swithin, who, among other things, had planned to 
 go to Greenwich next day, to view the Royal Observatory, 
 would start up and prepare to leave for home, every now 
 and then, when Glanville would unearth some other vol- 
 ume, and so detain him yet another half-hour. 
 
 "By George!" he said, looking at the clock, when 
 Swithin was at last really about to depart. "I didn't know 
 it was so late. Why not stay here to-night, St. Cleeve .'' 
 It is very dark, and the way to your place is an awkward 
 cross-cut over the fields." 
 
 "It would not inconvenience us at all, Mr. St. Cleeve, 
 if you would care to stay," said Lady Constantine. 
 
 "I am afraid — The fact is, I wanted to take an ob- 
 servation at twenty minutes past two" — began Swithin. 
 
 "Oh, now, nevermind your cbservation,'" said Louis. 
 "That's only an .excuse. Do that to-morrow night.
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 255 
 
 iMow you will stay. It is settled. Viviette, say he must 
 stay, and we'll have another hour of these charming intel- 
 lectual researches." 
 
 Viviette obeyed with delightful ease. " Do stay, Mr. St. 
 Cleeve ! " she said sweetly. 
 
 "Well, in truth I can do without the observation," re- 
 plied the young man, as he gave way. "It is not of the 
 greatest consequence. " 
 
 Thus it was arranged; but the researches among the 
 tomes were not prolonged to the extent that Louis had sug- 
 gested. In three quarters of an hour from that time they 
 had all retired to their respective rooms; Lady Constantine's 
 being on one side of the west corridor, Swithin's opposite, 
 and Louis's at the further end. 
 
 Had a person followed Louis when he withdrew, that 
 watcher would have discovered, on peeping through the 
 keyhole of his door, that he was engaged in one of the 
 oddest of occupations for such a man, — sweeping down 
 from the ceiling, by means of a walking-cane, a long cob- 
 web which lingered on high in the corner. Keeping it 
 stretched upon the cane, he gently opened the door, and 
 set the candle in such a position on the mat that the light 
 shone down the corridor. Thus guided by its rays, he 
 passed outslipperless, till he reached the door of St. Cleeve 's 
 room, where he applied the dangling spider's thread in such a 
 manner that it stretched across, like a tight rope, from 
 jamb to jamb, barring, in its fragile way, entrance and 
 egress 'J"he operation completed, he retired again, and, 
 extinguishing his light, went through his bedroom window 
 out upon the flat roof of the portico, to which it gave access. 
 
 Here Louis m.ide himself comfnrtablc in his chair and
 
 256 TWO aV A TOWER. 
 
 smoking-cap, enjoying the fragrance of a cigar for some- 
 tliing like half an hour. His position commanded a view 
 of the two windows of Lady Constantine's room, and from 
 these a dim light shone continuously. Having the win- 
 dow partly open at his back, and the door of his room 
 also scarcelv closed, his ear retained a fair command of 
 any sounds that might be caused by meeting and whisper- 
 ing lovers, either in the corridor, or out upon the lawn. 
 
 In due time certain sounds became audible; whereupon, 
 returning to his room, he re-entered the corridor, and lis- 
 tened intently. All was silent again, and darkness reigned 
 from end to end. Glanville, however, groped his way 
 along the passage till he again reached Swithin's door, 
 where he examined, by the light of a wax-match he had 
 brought, the condition of the spider's thread. It was 
 gone; somebody had carried it off bodily, as Samson car- 
 ried off the pin and the web. In other words, a person 
 had passed through the door. 
 
 Still holding the faint wax-light in his hand, Louis 
 turned to the door of Lady Constantine's chamber, where 
 he observed first that, though it was pushed together so as 
 to appear fiistened to cursory view, the door was not really 
 closed by about quarter of an inch. He dropped his light, 
 and extinguished it with his foot. Listening, he heard a 
 voice within, — Viviette's voice, in a subdued murmur, 
 though speaking earnestly. 
 
 Without any hesitation, Louis then returned to Swith- 
 in's door, opened it, and walked in. The starlight from 
 without was sufficient, now that his eyes had become ac- 
 customed to the darkness, to reveal that the room was un- 
 occupied, and that nothing therein had been disturbed.
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 257 
 
 With a heavy tread Louis came forth, walked loudly 
 across the corridor, knocked at Lady Constantine's door, 
 and called " Viviette ! " 
 
 She heard him instantly, replying "Yes" in startled 
 tones. Immediately afterwards she opened her door, and 
 confronted him in her dressing-gown, with a light in her 
 hand. " What is the matter, Louis?" she said. 
 
 " I am greatly alarmed. Our visitor is missing." 
 
 "Missing.? What, I\Ir. St. Cleeve.?" 
 
 "Yes. I was sitting up to finish a cigar, when I 
 thought I heard a noise in this direction. On coming to 
 his room, I find he is not there." 
 
 ' ' Good Heaven ! I wonder what has happened ! " she 
 exclaimed, in apparently intense alarm. 
 
 " I wonder," said Glanville grimly. 
 
 "Suppose he is a somnambulist ! If so, he may have 
 gone out and broken his neck. I have never heard that 
 he is one, but they say that sleeping in strange places dis- 
 turbs the mind of people who are given to that sort of 
 thing, and provokes them to it." 
 
 " Unfortunately for your theory, his bed has not been 
 touched. " 
 
 "Oh, what then can it be.' " 
 
 Her brother looked her full in the face. "Viviette ! " 
 he said sternly. 
 
 She seemed puzzled. " Well .'" she replied, in simple 
 tones. 
 
 " I heard voices in your room," he continued. 
 
 "Voices.?" 
 
 ' ' A voice, — yours. " 
 
 "Yes, you w\\\ have done so. It was mine."
 
 258 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "A listener is required for a speaker." 
 
 "True, Louis." 
 
 " Well, to whom were you speaking? " 
 
 "God." 
 
 " Viviette ! I am ashamed of you." 
 
 ' ' I was saying my prayers. " 
 
 "Prayers — to God ! To St. Swithin, rather!" 
 
 "What do you mean, Louis.?" she asked, flushing up 
 warm, and drawing back from him. "It was a form of 
 prayer I use, particularly when I am in trouble. It was 
 recommended to me by the Bishop, and Mr. Torkingham 
 commends it very highly." 
 
 "On your honor, if you have any," he said bitterly, 
 "whom have you there in your room ! " 
 
 "No human being.'' 
 
 "Flatly, I don't believe you." 
 
 She gave a dignified little bow, and, waving her hand 
 into the apartment, said, "Very well; then search and see." 
 
 Louis entered, and glanced round the room, behind 
 the curtains, under the bed, out of the window, — a view 
 from which showed that escape thence would have been 
 impossible, — everywhere, in short, capable or incapable 
 of affording a retreat to humanity; but discovered nobody. 
 All he observed was that a light stood on the low table by 
 her bedside; that on the bed lay an open Prayer Book, the 
 counterpane being unpressed, except into a little pit be- 
 side the Prayer Book, apparently where her head had 
 rested in kneeling. 
 
 "But where is St. Cleeve.?" he said, turning in be- 
 wilderment from these evidences of innocent devotion. 
 
 "Where can he be.?" she chimed in, with real distress
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 259 
 
 "I should so much Hke to know. Look about for him. 
 I am quite uneasy ! " 
 
 " I will, on one condition: that you own that you love 
 him. " 
 
 "Why should you force me to that? " she murmured. 
 *' It would be no such wonder if I did." 
 
 ' ' Come, you do .'' " 
 
 "Well, I do." 
 
 "Now I'll look for him." 
 
 Louis look a light, and t»rned away, his ignorance 
 of her legal relation to Swithiu leaving him astonished that 
 his sister had not indignantly resented his intrusion and 
 the nature of his questioning. 
 
 At this moment a slight noise was heard on tlie stair- 
 case, and they could see a figure rising step by step, and 
 coming forward against the long lights of the staircase 
 window. It was Swithin, in his ordinary dress, and 
 carrying his boots in his hand. 
 
 When he beheld them standing there so motionless, he 
 looked rather disconcerted, but came on towards his room. 
 
 Lady ConsLantine was too much agitated to speak, but 
 Louis said, " I am glad to see you again. Hearing a noise, 
 a few minutes ago, I came out to leain what it could be. 
 I found you absent, and we have been very much alarmed." 
 
 " I am very sorry," said Swithin, with contrition. "I 
 owe you a hundred apologies: but the truth is that on 
 entering my bedroom I found the sky remarkably clear, 
 and though I told you that the observation I was to make 
 was of no great consequence, on thinking it over alone 
 I felt it ought not to be allowed to pass; so I was tempted 
 to run across to the observatory, and make it, a,s I hacj
 
 26o TWO O.V A TOWER. 
 
 hoped, without disturbing anybody. If I had kno\*n that 
 I should alarm you I would not have done it for the world. " 
 
 Swithin spoke very earnestly to Louis, and did not ob- 
 serve the tender reproach in Viviette's eyes, when he showed 
 by his tale his decided notion that the prime use of star- 
 light nights was their furtherance of practical astronomy. 
 
 Everything being now satisfactorily explained, the three 
 retired to their several chambers, and Louis heard no more 
 noises that night, or rather morning; his attempts to solve 
 the myster}' of Viviette's Hie here and her relations with 
 St. Cleeve having thus far resulted chiefly in perplexity. 
 True, an admission had been wrung from her; and even 
 without such an admission, it was clear that she had a 
 tender feeling for Swithin. How to extinguish that ro- 
 mantic folly it now became his object to consider.
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 SWITHIN'S midnight excursion to the tower in the 
 cause of science led him to oversleep himself, and 
 when the brother and sister met at breakfast in the morn- 
 ing he did not appear. 
 
 "Don't disturb him, — don't disturb him," said Louis 
 laconically. "Hullo, Viviette, what are you reading there 
 that makes you flame up so ? " 
 
 She was glancing over a letter that she had just opened, 
 and at his words looked up with misgiving. 
 
 The incident of the previous night left her in great 
 doubt as to what her bearing towards him ought to be. 
 She had made no show of resenting his conduct at the 
 time, from a momentary supposition that he must know 
 all her secret; and afterwards, finding that he did not 
 know it, it seemed too late to affect indignation at his 
 suspicions. So she pres3rved a quiet neutrality. Even 
 had she resolved on an artificial part, she might have for- 
 gotten to play it at this instant, the letter being of a kind 
 to banish previous considerations. 
 
 "It is a letter from Bishop Helmsdale," she faltered. 
 
 "Well done ! I hope for your sake it is an offer."
 
 262 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "That's just what it is." 
 
 "No, — surely?" said Louis, beginning a laugh of 
 surprise. 
 
 "Yes," she returned indifferently. "You can read it, 
 if yoii like." 
 
 "I don't wish to pry into a communication of that 
 sort. " 
 
 "Oh, you can read it," she said, tossing the letter across 
 to him. 
 
 Louis thereupon read as under: — 
 
 The Palace, Melchester, 
 June 28, 
 
 tiELCHESTER, 1 
 ?, 18-. \ 
 
 Mv DEAR Lady Constantine, — During the two or three weeks 
 thai have elapsed since I experienced the great pleasure of renewing 
 my acquaintance with you, the varied agitation of my feelings has 
 clearly proved that my only course is to address you by letter, and at 
 once. Whether tlie subject of my communication be acceptable to 
 you or not, I can at least assure you that to suppress it would be far 
 less natural, and upon the whole less advisable, than to speak out 
 frankly, even if afterwards I hold my peace forever. 
 
 The great change in my experience during the past year or two — 
 the change, that is, which has resulted from my advancement to a 
 bishopric — has frequently suggested to me, of late, that a discontinu- 
 ance in my domestic life of the solitude of past years was a question 
 which ought to be seriously contemplated. But whether I should 
 ever have contemplated it without the great good fortune of my meet- 
 ing with you is doubtful. However, the thing has been considered 
 at last, and without more ado I candidly ask if you would be willing 
 to give up your life at Welland, and relieve my household lonelmess 
 here by becoming my wife. 
 
 I am far frqna desiring to force a hurried decision on your part, and 
 will wait your good pleasure patiently, should you feel any uncer- 
 tainty at the moment as to the step. I am quite disqualified, by habits 
 and experience, for the delightful procedure of urging my suit |n tlie
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 263 
 
 arderii terms which would he. so appropriate towards such a lady, and 
 so expressive of my inmost fcelin;^. In tiuth, a prosy cleric of five- 
 and-finiy wants cncoura.,'ement to make him eloijuent. Of this, how- 
 ever, I can assure you: that if admiration, esteem, and devotion can 
 compensate in any way for ihe lacl< of those qualities which might 
 be found to burn with more outward brightness in a younger man, 
 those it is in my power to l)Cstow f )r the term of my earthly life. 
 Your steady adherence to church principles and your interest in ec- 
 clesiastical polity (as was shown by your bright questioning on those 
 subjects during our morning walk round your grounds) have indicated 
 strongly to me the grace and appro])riateness with which you would 
 fill the position of a bishop's wife, and how greatly you would add 
 to his reputation, should you be disposed to honor him with your 
 hand. Formerly there have been times when I was of opinion — and 
 you will rightly appreciate my candor in owning it— that a wife was 
 an impediment to a bishop's due activities: but constant observation 
 has convinced me that, far from this being the truth, a nieet consort 
 infuses life into episcopal influence and teaching. 
 
 Should you reply in the affirmative I will at once come to see you, 
 and with your permission will, among other things, show you a few 
 plain, practical rules which I have interested myself in drawing up 
 for our future guidance. Should you refuse to change your condition 
 on my account, your decision will, as 1 need hardly say, be a great 
 blow to me. In any event, I could not do less than I have done, 
 after giving the subject my full consideration. Even if there be a 
 slight deficiency of warmth on your part, my earnest hope is that a 
 mind comprehensive as yours will perceive the immense power foi 
 good that you might exercise in the position in which a union with 
 me would place you, and allow that perception to weigh in deter- 
 mining your answer. 
 
 I remain, my dear Lady Constantine, with the highest respect and 
 affection. Yours always, 
 
 C. Melchester. 
 
 "Well, vou will not have the foolhardiness to decline, 
 now that the question has actually been popped, I shotilc^ 
 hope," said Louis, when he had done reading.
 
 264 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Certainly I shall," she replied. 
 
 "You will reallv be such a flat, Viviette ? " 
 
 "You speak without much compliment. I have not 
 the least idea of accepting him." 
 
 "Surely you will not let your infatuation for that young 
 follow carry you so far, after my acquainting you with the 
 shady side of his character.' You call yourself a religious 
 woman, say your prayers out loud, follow up the revived 
 methods in church practice, and what not; and yet you can 
 think with partiality of a person who, far from having any 
 religion in him, breaks the most elementary command- 
 ments in the decalogue. " 
 
 "I cannot agree with you," she said, turning her face 
 askance, for she knew not how much of her brother's lan- 
 guage was sincere, and how much assumed, the extent of 
 his discoveries with regard to her secret ties being a mys- 
 tery. At moments she was disposed to declare the whole 
 truth, and have done with it. But she hesitated, and left 
 the words unsaid; and Louis continued his breakfast in 
 silence. 
 
 When he had finished, and she had eaten little or noth- 
 ing, he asked once more, " How do you intend to answer 
 that letter } Here you are, the poorest woman in the coun- 
 tv, abandoned by people who used to be glad to know 
 you, and leading a life as dismal and dreary as a nun's, 
 when an opportunity is offered you of leaping at once into 
 a leading position in this part of England. Bishops are 
 given to hospitality; you would be welcomed ever}'wbere. 
 In short, your answer must be yes." 
 
 "And yet it will be no," she said in a low voice. She 
 had at length learnt, from the tone of her brother's latter
 
 T^VO ON A TOWER. 265 
 
 remarks, that at any rate he had no knowledge of her act- 
 ual marriage, whatever indirect ties he might suspect her 
 guilty of. 
 
 Louis could restrain himself no longer at her answer. 
 ■■Then conduct your affliirs your own way. I know you 
 to be leading a life that won't bear investigation, and I'm 
 DAMNED if I'll stay here any longer." 
 
 Saying which, Glanville jerked back his chair, and 
 strode out of the room. In less than a quarter of an hour, 
 and before she had moved a step Iron the table, she heard 
 him leaving the house.
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 T X THAT to do she could not tell. The step to which 
 * ^ Swithin had entreated her, objectionable and pre- 
 mature as it had seemed, in a county aspect, would at 
 all events have saved her from this dilemma. Had she 
 allowed him to tell the Bishop his simple story in its 
 fullness, who could say but that that divine might have 
 generously bridled his own impulses, entered into the 
 case with sympathy, and forwarded with zest their designs 
 for the future, owing to his interest of old in Swithin's 
 father, and in the naturally attractive features of the young 
 man's career ? 
 
 A puff of wind from the open window, wafting the 
 Bishop's letter to the floor, aroused her from her reverie. 
 With a sigh she stooped and picked it up, glanced at it 
 again; then aro!-e, and with the deliberateness of inevitable 
 action wrote her reply: — 
 
 Wrlland House, yiote 29, 18-^. 
 My dear Bishop of Melchester, — I confess to you that youv 
 letter, so gracious and flattering as it is, has taken your friend some- 
 what unawares. Tlie least I can do in return for its contents is to 
 reply as quickly as possible,
 
 TH^O OAT A TOWER. iGj 
 
 There is no one in the world who esteems your hi;;^h qualities more 
 than myself, or who has greater faith in your ability to adorn the 
 episcopal seat that you have been called on to fill. But to your 
 question I can give only one reply, and that is an unqualified nega- 
 tive. To state this unavoidable decision distresses me, without af- 
 fectation; and I trust you will believe that, though I decline the 
 distinction of becoming your wife, I shall never cease to interest 
 myself in all that pertains to you and your office; and shall feel the 
 keenest regret if this refusal should interfere to prevent a lifelong 
 friendship between us. 
 
 I am, my dear Bishop of Melchester, 
 
 Ever sincerely yours, 
 
 VlVIETTE . 
 
 " Viviette what .' " she exclaimed to herself hopelessly, 
 as she flung down the pen. 
 
 A sudden revulsion from the subterfuge of signing her- 
 self " Viviette Constantine, " in a letter of this serious sort, 
 and the impracticability of using another signature for the 
 present, wrought in her mind a feeling of dissatisfaction 
 with the whole epistle, and pushing it aside she allowed 
 it to remain unsubscribed. 
 
 In a few minutes she heard Swithin approaching; w-hen 
 she put the letter out of the way, and turned to receive 
 him. 
 
 Swithin entered quietly, and looked round the room. 
 Seeing, with unexpected pleasure, that she was there 
 alone, he came over and kissed her. Her discomposure 
 at some foregone event was soon obvious. 
 
 " Has my staying caused you any trouble? '' he asked, 
 in a whisper. "Where is a our brother, this morning.? " 
 
 She smiled through her perplexity as she took his 
 hand.
 
 268 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "The oddest things happen to me, dear Swithin," she 
 said. "Do you wish particularly to know what has hap- 
 pened now ? " 
 
 "Yes, if you don't mind telling me." 
 
 "I do mind telling you. But I must. Among other 
 things, I am resolving to give way to your representa- 
 tions, — in part, at least. It will be best to tell the Bishop 
 everything, and my brother, if not other people. "' 
 
 "I am truly glad to hear it, Viviette," said he cheer- 
 fully. "I have felt for a long time that honesty is the 
 best policy. " 
 
 " I at any rate feel it now. But it is a policy that re- 
 quires a great deal of courage ! '' 
 
 "It certainly requires some courage, — I should not 
 say a great deal; and indeed as far as I am concerned, it 
 demands less courage to speak out than to hold my 
 tongue." 
 
 "But, you silly boy, you don't know what has hap- 
 pened. The Bishop has made me an offer of marriage."' 
 
 "Good gracious, what an impertinent old man ! What 
 have you done about it, dearest .-* " 
 
 "Well, I have hardly accepted him," she replied, laugh- 
 ing. "It is this event which has suggested to me thai I 
 make my refusal a reason for confiding our situation to 
 him." 
 
 "What would vou have done if vou had not been al- 
 ready appropriated } " 
 
 "That's an inscrutable mystery. He is a worthy 
 man; but he has very pronounced views about his own 
 position, and some other undesirable qualities. Still, 
 who knows ? You must bless your stars that you have
 
 TH^O OAT A TOWER. 269 
 
 secured me. Now let us consider liow to draw up our 
 confession to him. I wish I had hstened to you at the 
 first, and allowed you to take him into our confidence 
 before hi.-' declaration arrived. He may possibly resent 
 the concealment now. However, this cannot be helped." 
 
 "I tell you what, Viviette," said Swithin, after a 
 thoughtful pause. "If the Bishop is such a sort of man 
 as this, a man who goes falling in love, and wanting to 
 marry vou, and so on, I am not disposed to confess any- 
 thing to him at all. I fancied him altogether different 
 from that." 
 
 "But he's none the worse for it, dear.? " 
 
 "I think he is, — to lecture me and love you, all in 
 one breath. " 
 
 "Still, that's only a passing phase, and you first pro- 
 posed making a confidant of him." 
 
 "I did. . . . Very well. Then we are to tell no- 
 body but the Bishop .' " 
 
 "And my brother Louis. I must tell him; it is un- 
 avoidable. He suspects me in a way I could never have 
 credited of him." 
 
 Swithin, as was before stated, had arranged to start 
 for Greenwich that morning, permission having been ac- 
 corded him by the Astronomer-Royal to view the Obser- 
 vatory; and their final decision was that, as he could not 
 afford time to sit down with her, and write to the Bishop 
 in collaboration, each should, during the day, compose a 
 well considered letter, disclosing their position from his 
 and her own point of view; Lady Constantine leading up 
 to her confession by her refusal of the Bishop's hand. It 
 was necessary that she should know what Swithin contem-
 
 270 TH^O ON A TOWER. 
 
 plated saying, that her statements might precisely har- 
 monize. He ultimately agreed to send her his letter by 
 the next morning's post, when having read it, she would 
 in due course dispatch it with her own. 
 
 As soon as he had breakfasted Swithin went his way, 
 promising to return from Greenwich by the end of the 
 week. 
 
 Viviette passed the remainder of that long summer day, 
 during which her young husband was receding towards the 
 capital, in an almost motionless state. At some instants 
 she felt exultant at the idea of announcing her marriage, 
 and defying general opinion. At another her heart mis- 
 gave her, and she was tormented by a fear lest Swithin 
 should some day accuse her of having hampered his delib- 
 erately shaped plan of life by her intrusive romanticism. 
 That was often the trick of men who had sealed by mar- 
 riage, in their inexperienced youth, a love for those whom 
 their maturer judgment would have rejected as too 
 obviously disproportionate in years. 
 
 However, it was now too late for these lugubrious 
 thoughts; and, bracing herself, she began to frame the 
 new reply to Eishop Helmsdale, — the plain, unvarnished 
 tale that was to supplant the undivulgmg answer first writ- 
 ten. She was engaged on this difficult production till 
 daylight faded in the west, and the broad-faced moon 
 edged upward like a plate of old gold, over the elms tow- 
 ards the village. B}- that time Swithin had reached Green- 
 wich; hor brother had gone she knevi not where; and she 
 and loneliness dwell solely, as before, within the walls of 
 Welland House. 
 
 At this hour of sunset and moonrise, the new parlor-
 
 TIFO OAT A TOWER. 271 
 
 maid entered, to inform her that Mr. Cecil's head clerk, 
 from Warborne, particularly wished to see her. 
 
 Mr. Cecil was her solicitor, and she knew of nothing 
 whatever that required his intervention just at present. 
 But he would not have sent at this time of day without 
 excellent reasons, and she directed that the young man 
 might be shown in where she was. On his entry, the 
 first thing she noticed was that in his hand he carried a 
 newspaper. 
 
 " In case you should not have seen this evening's paper, 
 Lady Constantine, Mr. Cecil has directed me to bring it 
 to you at once, on account of what appears there in re- 
 lation to your ladyship. He has only just seen it himself" 
 
 "What is it .? How does it concern me ? " 
 
 " I will point it out." 
 
 "Read it yourself to me. Though I am afraid there's 
 not enough light." 
 
 " I can see very well here," said the lawyer's clerk, step- 
 ping to the window. Folding back the paper he read: — 
 
 NEWS FROM SOUTH AFRICA. 
 
 " 'Cape Town, May 17, via Plymouth. — A correspon- 
 dent of the Cape Chronicle states that he has interviewed 
 an Englishman just arrived from the interior, and learns 
 from him that a considerable misapprehension exists in 
 England concerning the death of the traveler and hunter, 
 Sir Blount Constantine ' " — 
 
 "Oh, he's living! My husband is alive!" she cried, 
 sinking down in nearly a fainting condition. 
 
 "No, my lady. Sir Blount is dead enough, I am sor- 
 ry to say. "
 
 272 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 " Dead, did you say ? " 
 
 " Certainly, Lady Constantine; there is no doubt of ic. " 
 
 She sat up, and her intense relief almost made itself 
 perceptible like a fresh atmosphere in the room. "Yes. 
 Then what did you come for ? " she asked calmly. 
 
 "That Sir Blount died is unquestionable," replied the 
 lawyer's clerk gently. " But there has been some mistake 
 about the date of his death." 
 
 " He died of malarious fever on the banks of the Zonga, 
 October 24, 18 — ." 
 
 "No; he only lay ill there a long time it seems. It was 
 a companion who died at that date. But I'll read the ac- 
 count to vour ladyship, with your permission: — 
 
 ' ' ' The decease of this somewhat eccentric wanderer 
 did not occur at the time hitherto supposed, but only in 
 last December. The following is the account of the 
 Englishman alluded to, given as nearly as possible in his 
 own words: During the illness of Sir Blount and his 
 friend by the Zonga, three of the servants went away, 
 taking with them a portion of his clothing and effects; 
 and it must be they who spread the report of his death at 
 this time. After his companion's death he mended, and 
 when he was strong enough he and I traveled on to a 
 healthier district. I urged him not to delay his return 
 to England; but he was much against going back there 
 again, and became so rough in his manner towards me 
 that we parted company at the first opportunity I could 
 find. I joined a party of white traders returning to the 
 west coast. I staid here among the Portuguese for many 
 months. I then found that an English traveling part}' 
 were going to e.Kplore a district adjoining that which I
 
 TIFO ON A TOWER. 273 
 
 had formerly traversed with Sir Blount. They said they 
 would be glail of my services, and I joined them. When 
 we had crossed the territory to the south of Ulunda, and 
 drew near to Marzambo, I heard tidings of a man living 
 there whom I suspected to be Sir Blount, although he 
 was not known by that name. Being so near, I was in- 
 duced to seek him out, and found that he was indeed the 
 same. He had dropped his old name altogether, and 
 had married a native princess ' " — 
 
 " Married a native princess.' "' said Lady Constantino. 
 
 "That's what it says, my lady, — 'married a native prin- 
 cess according to the rites of the tribe, and was living very 
 happily with her. He told me he should never return 
 to England again. He also told me that, having seen 
 this princess just after I had left him, he had been at- 
 tracted by her, and had thereupon decided to reside with 
 her in that country, as being a land which afforded him 
 greater happiness than he could hope to attain elsewhere. 
 He asked me to stay with him, instead of going on with 
 my party, and not reveal his real title to any of them. 
 After some hesitation I did stay, and was not uncomfort- 
 able at first. But I soon found that Sir Blount drank 
 much harder now than when I had known him, and that 
 he was at times very greatly depressed in mind at his po- 
 sition. One morning, in the middle of December last, 
 I heard a shot from his dwelling. His wife rushed franti- 
 cally past me, as I hastened to the spot, and when I had 
 entered I found that he had put an end to himself with 
 his revolver. His princess was broken-hearted all that day. 
 When we had burietl him, I tliscovered in his house a 
 little bo.\ directed to his solicitors at Warborne, in Eng-
 
 2 74 TWO ON" A TOWER. 
 
 land, and a note for myself, saying that I had better gel 
 the first chance of returning that oifered, and requesting 
 me to take the box with me. It is supposed to contain 
 papers and articles for friends in England who have 
 deemed him dead for some time.'" 
 
 The clerk stopped his reading, and there was a silence. 
 "The middle of last December," she at length said, in a 
 whisper. ' ' Has the box arrived yet } " 
 
 ''No' yet, my lady. We have no further proof of any- 
 thing. As soon as the package comes to hand you shall 
 know of it immediately." 
 
 Such was the clerk's mission; and leaving the paper 
 with her, he withdrew. The intelligence amounted to 
 thus much: that. Sir Blount having been alive till at least 
 six weeks after her marriage with Swithin St. Cleeve. 
 Svvithin St. Cleeve was not her husband in the eye of the 
 law: that she would have to consider how her marriage 
 with the latter might be instantly repeated to establish 
 herself legally as that young man's wife.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 NEXT morning, Viviette received a visit from Mr. 
 Cecil himself. He informed her that the box spo- 
 ken of by the servant had arrived quite unexpectedly, just 
 after the departure of his clerk on the previous evening. 
 There had not been sufficient time for him thoroughly 
 to examine it as yet, but he had seen enough to enable 
 him to state that it contained letters, dated memoranda 
 in Sir Blount's handwriting, notes referring to events 
 which had happened later than his supposed death, and 
 other irrefragable proofs that the account in the newspapers 
 was correct as to the main fact, — the comparatively recent 
 date of Sir Blount's decease. 
 
 She looked up, and spoke with the irresponsible help- 
 lessness of a child. "On reviewing the circumstances, 
 I cannot think how I could have allowed myself to believe 
 the first tidings ! " she said. 
 
 "Everybody else believed them, and why should not 
 vou have done so .' " said the lawyer. 
 
 " How came the will to be permitted to be proved, as 
 there could, after all, have been no complete evidence.''" 
 she asked. " If I had been the executrix, I would not
 
 276 TIFO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 have attempted it. As I was not, I know very little about 
 how the business was pushed through. In a very unseemly 
 way, I think." 
 
 "Well, no, "said Mr. Cecil, feeling himself called upon 
 to defend law practice from such imputations, whatever 
 might be its defects in the present instance. "It was done 
 in the way customary in all cases where the proof of death 
 is only presumptive. The evidence, such as it was, was 
 laid before the court by the applicants, your husband's 
 cousins, and the servants who had been with him deposed 
 to his death with a particularity that was deemed sufficient. 
 Their error was, not that somebody died, — for somebody 
 did die at the time affirmed, — but that they mistook one 
 person for another; the person who died not being Sir 
 Blount Constantine. The court was of opinion that the 
 evidence led up to a reasonable inference that the deceased 
 was actually Sir Blount, and probate was granted on the 
 strength of it. As there was a doubt about the exact day 
 of the month, the applicants were allowed to swear that 
 he died on or after the date last given of his existence, — 
 which, in spite of their error then, has really come true 
 now, of course. " 
 
 "They little think what they have done to me by being 
 so ready to swear ! " she murmured. 
 
 Mr. Cecil, supposing her to allude only to the pecuni- 
 ary straits in which she had been prematurely placed by 
 the will taking effect a year before its due time, said, "True. 
 It has been to your ladyship's loss, and to their gain. 
 But they will make ample restitution, no doubt; and all 
 will be wound up satisfactorily." 
 
 Lady Constantine was far from explaining that this was
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 277 
 
 not her meaning, and after some further consultation of a 
 purely technical nature .Air. Cecil left her presence. 
 
 When she was again unencumbered with the necessity 
 of exhibiting a proper bearing, the sense that she had 
 gready suffered in pocket by the undue haste of the exec- 
 utors weighed upon her mind with a pressure quite inap- 
 preciable beside the greater gravity of her personal posi- 
 tion. What was her situation as a legatee to her situadon 
 as a woman ! Her face crimsoned with a Hush which she 
 was almost ashamed to show to the daylight, as she hastily 
 penned the following note to Swithin at Greenwich, — cer- 
 tainly one of the most informal documents she had ever 
 written: — 
 
 Welland, Thursday. 
 
 (J Swiihln, my tlear Swiiliin, what 1 have to tell you is so sad and 
 su humiliating that 1 can hardly write it, and yet I must! Though 
 we are dearer to each other than all the world besides, and as firmly 
 united as il we were one, I am not legally your wife. Sir Blount did 
 ni>t die till some time after we in England supposed. The service 
 must be repeated instantly. I have not been able to sleep all night. 
 I feel so wrong and unseemly that I can scarcely collect my thoughts. 
 Tiie newspaper sent with this will explain, if you have not seen par- 
 ticulars. Do come to me as soon as you can, that we may consult on 
 what to do. Burn this at once. Your 
 
 ViVIETTE. 
 
 When the note had been dispatched, she remembered 
 that there was another hardly less important question to be 
 answered, — the proposal of the Bishop for her hand. His 
 communication had sunk into nothingness beside the mo- 
 mentous news that had so greatly distressed her. 
 
 The two replies lay before her: the one she had first 
 written, simply declining to become Dr. Helmsdale's wife,
 
 278 Tlf^O ON' A TOWER. 
 
 without giving reasons; the second, which she had elabo- 
 rated with so much care on the previous day, relating in 
 confidential detail the history of her love for Swithin, their 
 secret marriage, and their hopes for the future, — asking 
 his advice on what their procedure should be to escape 
 the strictures of a censorious world. It was the letter she 
 T.zA barely finished writing when Mr. Cecil's clerk an- 
 nounced news tantamount to a declaration that she was 
 no wife at all. This episde she now destroyed, and with 
 the less reluctance in knowing that Swithin had been 
 somewhat averse to the confession as soon as he found 
 that Bishop Helmsdale was also a victim to tender sentiment 
 concerning her. The first, which she had been unable 
 honestly to sign "Viviette Constantine," and could not 
 openly sign " Viviette St. Cleeve," she sadly filled in with 
 the former surname, and sent the missive on its way. 
 Strange it was to her, and yet in keeping with the tenor 
 of human affairs, that the difficulty of signing that letter 
 should have resolved itself by the only means which at 
 the time of writing she would have deemed non-existent. 
 There had been a thousand reasons why she should sign 
 "Viviette Constantine," even when believing herself no 
 longer owner of that name; that she should ultimately 
 sign it because it had never ceased to be hers was a result 
 that distanced all conjecture. 
 
 The sense of her undefinable position kept her without 
 much repose on the second night also; but the following 
 morning brought an unexpected letter from Swithin, written 
 about the same hour as hers to him, and it comforted hei 
 much. 
 
 He had seen the account in the papers almost as soon
 
 TIVO OX A TOWER. 279 
 
 as it had come to her knowledge, and now sent th-s hne 
 to reassure her, in the perturbation she must naturally 
 feel. She was not to be alarmed at all. They two were 
 husband and wife in moral intent and antecedent belief, 
 and the legal flaw which accident had so curiously uncov- 
 ered could be mended in half an hour. He would return 
 on Saturday night at the latest; but as the hour would be 
 fiir advanced, he would ask her to meet him by slipping 
 out of the house to the tower any time during service on 
 Sunday morning, when there would be few persons about 
 likely to observe them. ]Meanwhile, he might provision- 
 ally state that their best course in the emergency would 
 be, instead of confessing to anybody that there had already 
 been a solemnization of marriage between them, to arrange 
 their remarriage in as open a manner as possible, as if it 
 were the just- reached climax of a sudden affection; pref- 
 acing it by a public announcement in the usual way. 
 
 This plan of approaching their second union with all the 
 show and circumstance of a new thing recommended it- 
 self to her strongly, but for one objection, — that by such 
 a course the wedding could not, without appearing like 
 an act of unseemly haste, take place so quickly as she de- 
 sired for her own peace of mind. It might occur some- 
 what early, say in the course of a month or two, without 
 bringing down upon her the charge of levity; for Sir 
 Blount, a notoriously unkind husband to her, had been 
 out of her sight four or five years, and in his grave nearl_\ 
 one. But what she naturally desired was that there should 
 be no more delay than was positively necessary for obtain- 
 ing a new license, — two or three days at longest: and in 
 view of this celerity it was next to impossible to make due
 
 2 So TIFO ON A TOWER. 
 
 preparation for a wedding of ordinary publicity, performed 
 in her own church, from her own house, with a feast and 
 amusements for the villagers, a tea for the school-children, 
 a bonfire, and other of those proclamatory accessories 
 which, by meeting wonder half-way, deprives it of much 
 of its intensity. It must be admitted, too, that she even 
 now shrank from the shock of surprise that would inevi- 
 tably be caused by her openly taking for her husband such 
 a mere youth as Swithin still appeared, notwithstanding 
 that in years he was by this time within a trifle of one and 
 twenty. 
 
 The straightforward course had, nevertheless, so much to 
 recommend it, and so well avoided the disadvantage of fu- 
 ture revelation which a private repetition of the ceremony 
 would entail, that, assuming she could depend upon 
 Swithin, as she knew she could do, good sense coun- 
 seled its serious consideration. She became more com- 
 posed at her queer situation: hour after hour passed, and 
 the first spasmodic impulse of womanly decorum not to 
 let the sun go down upon her present state was quite con- 
 trollable. She could regard the strange contingency that 
 had arisen with .something like philosophy. The day 
 slipped by: she thought of the awkwardness of the accident 
 rather than of its humiliation; and, loving Swithin now in 
 a far calmer spirit than at that past date, when they had 
 for the first time rushed into each other's arms and vowed 
 to be one, she ever and anon caught herself reflecting, 
 "Were it not that, for my honor's sake, I must remarry 
 him, I should perhaps be a nobler woman in not allowing 
 him to hamj)er his bright future by a union with me at 
 all."
 
 TIP'O ON A TOWER. 281 
 
 This thought, at first artificially entertained as little more 
 than a mental exercise, became by stages a genuine con- 
 viction; and while her heart enforced, her reason regretted, 
 tlie necessity of abstaining from self-sacrifice, — the being 
 obliged, despite his curious escape from the first attempt, 
 to lime Swithin's young wings again, solely for her credit's 
 sake. 
 
 However, the deed had to be done: Swiihin was to be 
 made legally hers. Selfishness in a conjecture of this sort 
 was excusable, and even obligatorv. Taking brighter 
 views, she allowed herself to hope that upon the whole this 
 yoking of the young fellow with her, a portionless woman 
 and his senior, would not greatly endanger his career. In 
 such a mood night overtook her, and she went to bed re- 
 flecting that Swithin had by this time arrived in the parish, 
 — was perhaps even at that moment passing homeward 
 beneath her walls, — and that in less than twelve hours she 
 would have met him, have ventilated the secret which op- 
 pressed her, and have satisfactorily arranged with him the 
 details of their reunion.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 O UN DAY morning came and complicated her previous 
 ^-' emotions by bringing with it a new and unexpected 
 shock to mingle with them. The postman had delivered, 
 among other things, an illustrated newspaper, sent by a 
 hand which she did not recognize; and on opening the 
 cover the sheet that met her eyes filled her with a horror 
 which she could not express. The print was one which 
 drew largeh' on its imagination for its engravings, and 
 it already contained an illustration of the death of Sir Blount 
 Constantine. In this work of art he was represented as 
 standing with his pistol to his mouth, his brains being in 
 the act of flying up to the roof of hiS chamber, and his 
 native princess rushing terror-stricken away to a remote 
 position in the thicket of palms which neighbored the 
 dwelling. 
 
 The crude realism of the picture, possibly harmless 
 CTiough in its effect upon others, naturally overpowered 
 and sickened her. By a curious fascination she would 
 look at it again and again, till every line of the engraver's 
 performance seemed really a transcript from what had hap- 
 pened. For the first time, on these grounds, she felt it to'
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 283 
 
 be a trying position that, with such details so fresh in her 
 thoughts, she was obHged to go out and make arrange- 
 ments for confirming, by repetition, her marriage with 
 another. No interval was available for serious reflection, 
 or for allowing the softening effects of time to operate in 
 her mind. It was as though her first husband had died 
 that moment, and she were keeping an appointment with 
 another in the presence of his corpse. 
 
 So revived was the actuality of Sir Blount's recent life 
 and death by this incident, that the distress of her per- 
 sonal relations with Swithin was the single force in the 
 world which could have coerced her into abandoning to 
 him the interval she would have first set apart for getting 
 over these new and painful impressions of her former hus- 
 band. Self-pity for ill-usage afforded her good reasons 
 for ceasing to love him, but he was yet too closely inter- 
 twined with her past life to be destructible on the instant 
 as a memory. 
 
 But there was no choice of occasions for her now, and 
 she listlessly waited for the church bells to cease chiming. 
 When all was still, and the surrounding cottagers had gath- 
 ered themselves within the walls of the adjacent building, 
 and Tabitha Lark's first voluntary had pealed from the 
 tower window, Lady Constantine left the garden in which 
 she had been loitering, and went towards Rings-Hill 
 Speer. 
 
 The sense of her situation obscured the morning pros- 
 pect. The country was unusually silent under the inten- 
 sifying sun, the songless season of birds having arrived. 
 Choosing her path amid the efts that were basking upon 
 the outer slopes of the plantation, she wound her way up
 
 284 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 the tree-shrouded camp to the wooden cabin in the cen- 
 ter. The door was ajar, but on entering she found the 
 place empty. The tower door was also partly open, and, 
 listening at the foot of the stairs, she heard Swithin above, 
 shifting the telescope and wheeling round the rumbling 
 dome, apparently in preparation for the next nocturnal 
 reconnoiter. There was no doubt that he would descend 
 in a minute or two to look for her, and, not wishing to 
 interrupt him till he was ready, she re-entered the cabin, 
 and patiently seated herself among the books and papers 
 that lay scattered about. 
 
 She did as she had often done before when waiting there 
 for him; that is, she occupied herself in turning over the 
 papers, and examining the progress of his labors. The 
 notes were mostly astronomical, of course, and she had 
 managed to keep, sufficiently abreast of him to catch the 
 meaning of a good many of these. The litter on the ta- 
 ble, however, was somewhat more profuse and miscellane- 
 ous in character this morning, as if the paper had been 
 hurriedly overhauled. Among the rest of the sheets lay 
 an open note, which, in the entire confidence that existed 
 between them, she glanced over and read as a matter of 
 course. 
 
 It was a most business-like communication, and bevond 
 the address and date contained only the following words: — 
 
 Dear Sir, — We beg leave t® draw your attention to a letter we 
 addressed ta you on tke 26th ult., to which wa have not yet been fa- 
 vored with a reply. As the time for the payment of the first moiety 
 of the four hundred pounds per annum, settled on you by your late 
 uncle, is now at hand, we shoukl be obliged by your giving directions 
 as to wliere and in what manner the money is to be handed over to
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 285 
 
 you, and shall also he. glad to receive any other definite instructions 
 from you with regard to the future. 
 
 • We are, dear sir, yours faithfully, 
 
 IIannkr & Rawles. 
 SwiTHih i:~. Cleeve, Esq. 
 
 An income of four hundred a year for Swithin, whom 
 she had hitherto understood to be possessed of an annuity 
 of eighty pounds at the outside, with no prospect of in- 
 creasing the sum but by hard work.! What could this 
 communication mean ! He, whose custom and deHght it 
 was to tell her all his heart, had not breathed a syllable of 
 this matter to her, though it met the very difficulty to- 
 wards which their discussions invariably tended, — how to 
 secure for him a competency which should enable him to 
 establish his pursuits on a wider basis, and throw himself 
 into more direct communication with the scientific world. 
 Quite bewildered by the lack of any explanation, she rose 
 from her seat, and, with the note in her hand, ascended 
 the winding tower steps. 
 
 Reaching the upper aperture, she perceived him under 
 the dome, moving musingly about, as if he had never been 
 absent an hour, his light hair frilling out from under the 
 edge of his velvet skull-cap as it had always been wont to 
 do. No question either of marriage or not marriage seemed 
 to be disturbing the mind of this juvenile husband of hers. 
 The be-all and end-all of his existence was apparently be- 
 fore him, namely, the equatorial telescope, which he was 
 carefully adjusting by means of screws and clamps, till, 
 hearing her movements, he turned his head. 
 
 "Oh, here you are, my dear Viviette ! I was just be- 
 ginning to expect you ! ' he exclaimed coming forward.
 
 286 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "I ought to have been looking out for you; but I have 
 found a little defect here in the instrument, and I wanted 
 to set it right before evening came on. It is not a good 
 thing to tinker your glasses, but I have found that the dif- 
 fraction rings are not perfect circles. I have learnt at 
 Greenwich how to correct them, — so kind they have been 
 to me there I — and so I have been loosening the screws of 
 the cell, and gently shifting the glass, till I think that I have 
 at last made, the illumination equal all round. I have so 
 much to tell you about my visit. One thing is that the 
 astronomical world is getting quite excited about the com- 
 ing transit of Venus. There is to be a regular expedition 
 fitted out. How I should like to join it ! " 
 
 He spoke enthusiastically, and his eyes sparkled at the 
 mental image of the said expedition. As it was rather 
 dark in the dome, he rolled it round on its axis till the 
 shuttered slit for the telescope directly faced the morning 
 sun, which thereupon flooded the concave, touching the 
 bright metal work of the equatorial, and lighting up Lady 
 Constantine's pale, troubled face. 
 
 "But, Swithin," she faltered, "my letter to you — our 
 marriage. " 
 
 "Oh yes, — this marriage question," he hastily added, 
 "I had not forgotten it, or at least only for a few minutes." 
 
 "Can you forget it, Swithin, for a moment.? Oh, how 
 can you ! " she said reproachfully. "It is such a distress- 
 ing thing. It drives away all my rest." 
 
 "Forgotten is not the word I should have used," he 
 apologized. "Temporarily dismissed it from my mind is 
 all I meant. The simple fact is that the vastness of the 
 field qS astronomy reduces every terrestrial thing to atomic
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 287 
 
 dimensions. Do not trouble, dearest. The remedy is quite 
 easy, as I stated in my letter. We can now be married in 
 a prosy, public way. Yes, early or late, next week, next 
 month, six months hence, just as you choose. Say the 
 word when, and I will obey." His face, with its absence 
 of all anxiety or consternation, contrasted strangely with 
 hers, which at last he saw, and, looking at the writing she 
 held, inquired, "But what paper have you in your hand.''" 
 
 "A letter which to me is actually inexplicable," said 
 she, her curiosity returning to the letter, and overriding 
 for the instant her immediate concern. "What does this 
 income of four hundred a year mean .' \\^hy have you 
 never told me about it, dear Swithin } Or does it not re- 
 fer to you } " 
 
 He looked at the note, flushed slightly, and was abso- 
 lutely unable to begin his reply at once. " I did not mean 
 you to see that, Viviette," he murmured. 
 
 "Why not.?" 
 
 "'I thought you had better not, as it docs not concern 
 me further, now. The solicitors are laboring under a 
 mistake in supposing that it does. I have to write at 
 once and inform them that the annuity is not mine to 
 receive. " 
 
 "What a strange mystery in your life!" she said, for- 
 cing a perplexed smile. "Something to balance the trag- 
 edy in mine. I am absolutely in the dark as to your past 
 history, it seems. And yet I had thought you told me 
 everything. " 
 
 " I could not tell you that, Viviette, because it would 
 have endangered our relations, — though not in the way 
 vou may suppose. You would have reproved me, — you,
 
 288 TtVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 who are so generous and noble, would have forbidden me 
 to do what I did; and I was determined not to be for- 
 bidden." 
 
 "To do what ! " 
 
 " To marry you." 
 
 "Why should I have forbidden } " 
 
 "Must I tell — what I would not.?" he said, placing 
 his hands upon her shoulders, and looking somewhat 
 sadly at her. "Well, perhaps, since it has come to this, 
 you ought to know all, since it can make no possible dif- 
 ference to my intentions now. We are one for e\-er, legal 
 blunders notwithstanding, — for happily they are quickly 
 reparable; — and this question of a devise from my uncle 
 Jocelyn concerned me only when I was a single man." 
 
 Thereupon, with obviously no con.sideration of the pos- 
 sibilities that were reopened by the nullity of their mar- 
 riage contract, he related in detail, and not without mis- 
 giving for havino: concealed them so long, the events that 
 had occurred on the morning of their wedding day; how 
 he had met the postman on his way to Warborne, after 
 dressing in the cabin, and how he had received from him 
 the letter from his dead uncle through his family lawyers, 
 informing him of the bequest and of the important condi- 
 tion attached, — that he should remain unmarried until his 
 iive-and-twentieth )ear; how, in comparison with the pos- 
 session of her tlcar self, he had reckoned the income as 
 naught, abandoned all idea of it there and then, and had 
 come on to the wedding as if nothing had happened to 
 interrupt for a moment the working out of their plan; how 
 he had scarcely thought with any closeness of the circum- 
 stances of the case since, until reminded of them by this
 
 TPVO OAT A TOURER. 2^9 
 
 note she had seen, and a previous one of the soit received 
 trom the same sohcitors. 
 
 "Oh, Swithin, Swithin ! " she cried, bursting into tears 
 as she realized it all, and sinking on the observing-chair 
 "I have ruined you, — yes, 1 have ruined you ! " 
 
 The }oung man was dismayed by her unexpected grief, 
 and endeavored to soothe her; but she seemed shaken by 
 a poignant remorse, which would not be comforted. 
 
 "And now," she continued, as soon as she could speak, 
 "when you are once more free, and in a position — act- 
 ually in a position to claim the annuity that would be the 
 making of you, I am compelled to come to you, and be- 
 seech you to undo yourself again, merely to save me ! " 
 
 "Not to save you, Viviette, but to bless me. Yot 
 do not ask me to remarry; it is not a question of alterna- 
 tives at all, — it is my straight course. I do not dream of 
 doing otherwise. I should be wretched if you thought 
 for one moment I could entertain the idea of doing 
 otherwise. "' 
 
 But the more he said, the worse he made the matter. 
 It was a state of affairs that would not bear discussion at 
 all, and the unsophisticated view he took of his course 
 seemed to increase her responsibility. 
 
 ".Why did your uncle attach such a cruel condition to 
 his bounty!" she cried bitterly. "Oh, he little thinks 
 how hard he hits me from the grave, — me, who have never 
 done him wrong; and you too. Swithin, are you sure 
 that he makes that condition indispensable.'* Perhaps he 
 meant that you should not marry beneath you; perhaps 
 he did not mean in such a case as your marrying (forgive 
 me for saying it) a little above you."
 
 igo TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "There is no doubt that he did not contemplate a case 
 which has led to such happiness as this has done," the 
 youth murmured with hesitation; for though he scarcely 
 remembered a word of his uncle's letter of advice, he had 
 a dim apprehension that it was couched in terms alluding 
 specifically to Lady Constantine. 
 
 "Are you sure that you cannot retain the money, and 
 be my lawful husband too?" she asked piteously. "Oh, 
 what a wrong I am doing you ! I did not dream that it 
 could be as bad as this. I knew I was wasting your time 
 by letting you love me, and hampering your projects; but 
 I thought there were compensating advantages. This 
 wreck of your future by me I did not contemplate. You 
 are sure there is no escape .-* Have you his letter with the 
 conditions, or the will .' Let me see the letter in which 
 he expresses his wishes. " 
 
 "I assure you it is all as I say," he pensively returned. 
 
 "But how does he put it."" How does he justify him- 
 self in making such a harsh restriction .? Do let me see 
 the letter, Swithin. I shall think it a want of confidence 
 if you do not. I may discover some way out of the diffi- 
 culty, if you let me look at the papers. Eccentric wills 
 can be evaded in all sorts of ways. " 
 
 Still he hesitated. ' " I would rather you did not see these 
 papers," he said. 
 
 But she persisted, as only a fond woman can. Hei 
 knowledge that she, who as a woman many years his sen- 
 ior should have shown her love for him by guiding him 
 straight into the paths he aimed at, had (though in some 
 respects unwittingly) blocked his attempted career for her 
 own li3pi)'.nc.ss, made her more intent than ever to find
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 2^1 
 
 out a device by which she might retain him, while he also 
 retained the life-interest under his uncle's will. Her en- 
 treaties were at length too potent for his resistance; and, 
 accompanying her downstairs to the cabin, he opened the 
 desk from which the other papers had been taken, and, 
 ugainst his belter judgment, handed her the ominous com- 
 nuinication of Jocelyn St. Cleeve, which lay in the envel- 
 ope just as it had been received, three quarters of a year 
 earlier. 
 
 " Don't read it now," he said. " Don't spoil our meet- 
 ing by entering into a subject which is virtually past and 
 done with. Take it with you, and look it over at your 
 leisure, — but merely as an old curiosity, remember, and 
 not as a still possibly operative document. I have almost 
 forgotten what the contents are, beyond the general ad- 
 vice and stipulation that I was to remain a bachelor." 
 
 "At any rate," she rejoined, "do not reply to the note 
 I have seen from the solicitors till I have read this also." 
 
 He promised. " But now about our public wedding," 
 he said. "Like certain royal personages, we have had 
 the religious rite; and now comes the civil contract. Will 
 you fix the day .' When is it to be ^ And shall it take 
 place at a registrar's office, since there is no necessity for 
 having the .sacred part over again .' " 
 
 "Til think," replied she. " I'll think it over." 
 
 "And let me know as soon as you can how you decide 
 to proceed." 
 
 "I will write to-morrow, or come. I do not know 
 what to say now. I cannot forget how I am wronging 
 you. This is almost more than I can bear." 
 
 To divert her mind he began talking about Greenwich
 
 292 ri-VO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Observatoiy, and the great instruments therein, and how he 
 had been received by the astronomers, and the details of 
 the expedition to observe the transit of Venus, together 
 with many other subjects of the sort, to which she had 
 not power to lend her attention. 
 
 "I mus*. reach home before the people are out of church," 
 she at length said wearily. "I wish nobody to know I 
 have been out thib morning. ' And forbidding Swithin 
 to cross into the open in her company, she left him on 
 the edge of the isoiatt»i plantation, which had latterly 
 known her tread to .ve^;.
 
 L 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 ADY CONSTANTINE crossed the field and the park 
 beyond, and found on passing the church that the 
 congregation was still within. There was no hurry for 
 getting indoors, the open windows enabling her to hear 
 lliat Mr. Torkingham had only just given out his text. 
 So instead of entering the house, she went through the 
 garden door to the old bowling-green, and sat down in 
 the. arbor that Louis had occupied when he overheard 
 the interview between Swithin and the Bishop. Not until 
 then did she find courage to draw out the letter and papers 
 relating to the bequest, which Swithin in a critical mo- 
 ment had handed to her. 
 
 Had he been ever so little older he would not have 
 placed that unconsidered confidence in her which had 
 led him to give w-ay to her curiosity. But the immense 
 influence over him which seven or eight outnumbering 
 vears lent her was again increased by her wider experi- 
 ences, and he had yielded the point, as he yielded all 
 social points; while tne same juniority freed him from 
 ' much consciousness that it was his duty to protect her 
 even from herself.
 
 294 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 The preamble of Dr. St. Cleeve's letter — in which he 
 referred to his pleasure at hearing of the v'oung man's 
 promise as an astronomer — disturbed her not at all; in- 
 deed, somewhat prepossessed her in favor of the old gen- 
 tleman who had written it. The first item of what he 
 called "unfavorable news," namely, the allusion to the 
 inadequacy of Swithin's income to the wants of a scientific 
 man, whose lines of work were not calculated to produce 
 pecuniary emoluments for many years, deepened the cast 
 of her face to concern. She reached the second item 
 of the so-called unfavorable news; and her face flushed 
 as she read how the doctor had learnt "that there was 
 something in }-our path worse than narrow means, and 
 that that something was a woman. " 
 
 "To save you, if possible, from ruin on these heads," 
 she read on, "I take the preventive measures detailed 
 below." And then followed the announcement of the 
 four hundred a year .settled on the youth for life, on the 
 single condition that he remained unmarried till the age 
 of twenty-five, just as Swithin had explained to her. She 
 next learnt that the bequest was for a definite object- that 
 he might have resources sufficient to enable him to travel 
 in an inexpensive way, and begin a study of the Southern 
 constellations, which, according to the shrewd old man's 
 judgment, were a mine not so thoroughly worked as the 
 Northern, and therefore to be recornmended. This was 
 followed by some sentences which hit her in the face like 
 a switch: — 
 
 "The only other preventive step in my power is that of 
 exhortation. . . . Swithin St. Cleeve, don't rnake a fool 
 of yourself, as your father did. If your studies are tq
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 295 
 
 DC woiih anything, believe me, they must be earned on 
 without the help of a woman. Avoid her, and every one 
 of the sex, if \ou mean to achieve any worthy thing. 
 Eschew all of that sort for many a year yet. Moreover, 
 I say, the lady of your accjuaintance avoid in particular. 
 .... She has, in addition to her original disqualifica- 
 tion as a companion for you (that is, that of sex), these 
 two serious drawbacks; she is much older than yourself — 
 
 Lady Constantine's indignant flush forsook her, and 
 pale despair succeeded in its ftead. Alas, it was true: 
 handsome and in her prime she might be, but she was too 
 old for Swithin ! 
 
 " — and she is so impoverished. . . . Beyond this, 
 frankly, I don't think well of her. I don't think well of 
 any woman who doles upon a man younger than herself. 
 .... To care to be the first fancy of a young fellow like 
 }'0u shows no great common sense in her If she were 
 worth her salt she would have too much pride to be intimate 
 with a }outh in }-our unassured position, to say no worse. ' 
 (Viviette's face, by this time, tingled hot again.) "She 
 is old enough to know that a liaison with her ma\', and 
 almost certainly would, be your ruin; and, on the o:her 
 hand, that a marriage would be preposterous, — unless she 
 is a complete fool, and in that case there is even more rea- 
 son for avoiding her than if she were in her few senses. 
 
 "A woman of honorable feeling, nephew, would be 
 careful to do nothing to hinder you in your career, as this 
 putting of herself in your way most certainly will. Vet I 
 hear that she professes a great anxiety on this same future 
 of yours as a physicist. The best way in which she can 
 show the realitv of her anxiety is by leaving you to yourself."
 
 296 TfVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Leaving him to himself! She paled again, as if chilled 
 by a conviction that in this the old man was right. 
 
 . . . " She'll blab your most secret plans and theories 
 to every one of her acquaintance, and make them appear 
 ridiculous by announcing them before they are matured. 
 If you attempt to study with a woman, you'll be ruled by 
 her to entertain fancies instead of theories, air-castles in- 
 stead of intentions, qualms instead of opinions, sickly pre- 
 possessions instead of reasoned conclusions. . . . 
 
 "A woman waking your passions just at a moment when 
 you are endeavoring to shine intellectually is like stirring 
 up the mud at the bottom of a clear brook.' All your 
 brightness and sparkle are taken away; you become mop- 
 ing and thick-headed; obstructions that before only brought 
 out your brilliancies now disfigure your each dull attempt 
 to surmount them." 
 
 Thus much the letter; and it was enouirh for her, in- 
 deed. The flushes of indignation which had passed ovci 
 her from time to time, as she gathered this man's opinion 
 (sf herself, combined with flushes of grief and shame when 
 she considered that Swithin, her dear Swithin, was perfectly 
 acquainted with this cynical view o\ her nature; that, re- 
 ject it as he might, and as he unquestionably did, such 
 tioughts (if her had been implanted in him, and lay in 
 liini; stifled as they were, tiiey lay in him like seeds too 
 deep for germination, which accident might some day 
 hiing near the surface and aerate into life. The humilia- 
 tion of such a possibility was almost too much to endure; 
 the mortification — she had known nothing like it till now. 
 But this was not all. Those tingling emotions were suc- 
 ceeded by feelings in comparison with which resentment
 
 TIFO ON A TOWER. 297 
 
 and mortification were happy moods, — a miserable con- 
 viction that this old man, who spoke from the grave, was 
 not altogether wrong in his speaking; that he was only 
 half wrong; that he was, perhaps, virtually right. Only 
 those persons whom nature has unhappily endowed with 
 that apprcciativeness of others' positions v.hicli empowers 
 them to observe themselves fn^n the outside can under- 
 stand the smart of such convictions against self, — the wish 
 for annihilation that is engendered in the moment of de- 
 spair at feeling that at length we, our own last firmest 
 friend, cease to belie\e in our own cause. 
 
 Viviette could hear the people coming out of church 
 on the other side of the garden wall; their footsteps and 
 their cheerful voices died away. The bell rang for lunch, 
 and she went in. But her life during that morning and 
 afternoon was wholly introspective. Knowing the whole 
 circumstances of his situation as she knew them now, 
 as she had never before known them, ought she to make 
 lierself the legal wife of Swithin St. Cieeve, and so secure 
 her own honor, at any price to liim .? Such was the 
 formidable question which Lady Constantine propounded 
 to her startled understanding. As a subjectively honest 
 woman alone, beginning her charity at home, there was 
 no doubt that she ought. Save thj-self was sound Old 
 Testament d(jctrine, and not altogeUier discountenaucid 
 in the New. But was there a line of conduct v>hich 
 transcended mere self-preservation, and would it not be 
 an excellent thing to put it in practice now.? 
 
 That she had wronged St. Cieeve by marrying hhm, 
 that she would wrong him infinitely more by compleiing 
 the marriage, there was — in her opinion — no doubt
 
 2y8 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 She in her experience had sought out him in his in 
 experience, and had led him Hke a child. She remem- 
 bered, as if it had been her fault, though it was in facl 
 only her misfortune, that she had been the one to go 
 for the Hcense, and take up residence in the parish in 
 which they were wedded. He was now just one and 
 twenty. Without her, he had all the world before him, 
 four hundred a year, and leave to cut as straight a road 
 to fame as he should choose. With her, this story was 
 negatived. Beyond leading him to waste the active 
 spring-time of his life in idle adoration of her as his 
 sweetheart, and depriving him of his inestimable inde- 
 pendency by allowing him to make her his wife, she had 
 indirectly been the means of ruining him in the good 
 opinion of Bishop Helmsdale, — a man who was once his 
 father's acquaintance, and who had been strongly disposed 
 to become the younger n^ iVs friend. Encouragement 
 and aid from the Bisho; 'add have been of no mean 
 value to a vouth without backers of any kind. 
 
 On the other hand, what had he gained by his alliance 
 with hcr.^ Well, an equatorial telescope, — that was about 
 all; while to set against this there was the disinclination 
 to adventure further which her constant presence had 
 imparted; the yoke with a woman whose disparity of years, 
 uiough immaterial just now, would operate in the future 
 as a wet blanket upon his social ambitions; that content 
 with life a.-, it was which she hatl noticed more than once 
 in him latterly, and which was imperiling his scientific 
 spirit by abstracting his zest for progress. 
 
 It was impossible, in short, to blind herself to the 
 inference that marriage with her had not benefit d. i i.uj.,
 
 Tiro OM A TOWER. 299 
 
 as a man who — in her fond belief— had a great work to 
 do, to the extent they both had expected. Matters might 
 improve in the future; but to take upon herself the whole 
 liability of Swithin"s life, as she would do by causing him 
 to sacrifice the help his uncle had offered, was a fearful 
 responsibility. How could she, an unendowed woman, 
 replace such assistance .' His recent visit to Greenwich, 
 which had momentarily revived that zest for his pursuits 
 that was now less constant than heretofore, should by rights 
 be supplemented by other such expeditions. It would 
 be true benevolence not to deprive him of means to con- 
 tinue them, and so to keep his ardor alive, regardless of 
 the cost to herself 
 
 It could be done. By the extraordinary favor of a unique 
 accident, she had now an opportunity of redeeming Swith- 
 in's seriously compromised future, and restoring him to 
 a state no worse than his first. His annuity could be 
 enjoyed by him, his travels undertaken, his studies pur- 
 sued, his high vocation initiated, by one little sacrifice, 
 — that of herself She only had to refuse to legalize their 
 marriage by repeating it, to part from him forever, and 
 ■all would be well with him thenceforward. The pain to 
 him would after all be but slight, whatever it might be 
 to his wretched Viviette. 
 
 Such passion as he had shown for her, boyish and never, 
 (leihaps, ver\- strong, had, in the inevitable course of 
 marriage on such terms, been softened down to mild 
 affection. She had seen only too clearly this morning 
 that, owing to his Greenwich visit, she had again sunk 
 to a second place in his heart, if she had ever occupied 
 a higher; his darling science reasserting its right to the
 
 jOO TPi^O OAT A TOWEk. 
 
 first. It was the ordinary fate of scientific men's wives- 
 she should have thought of it before. Was there not, 
 then, something reactionary and selfish in her persisting 
 to chnch a union for the assurance of her individual 
 composure, now that her conception of that course as 
 an advantage to him had been proved wildly erroneous } 
 
 The horror of retaining him at her side lay not only in 
 the fact itself of injury to him, but in the likelihood of his 
 living to see it as such, and reproaching her for selfishness 
 in not letting him go, in this unprecedented opportunity 
 for correcting a move proved to be false. He wished to 
 examine the Southern heavens, — perhaps his uncle's letter 
 was the father of the wish, — and there was no telling what 
 good might not result to mankind at large from his exploits 
 there. Why should she, to save her narrow honor, waste 
 the wide promise of his ability 1 True, an objector might 
 have urged, on her side, that her dear Swithin's wondrous 
 works among the children of men existed as yet only in 
 her imagination, while the present quandary was an un- 
 questionable fact. But Lady Constantine would have been 
 the first to deprecate the ungenerousness of such a skepti- 
 cal reason er. 
 
 That in immolating herself by refusing him, and leaving 
 him free to work wonders for the good of his fellow-crea- 
 tures, she would in all probability add to the sum of 
 human felicity consoled her by its breadth as an idea, even 
 while it tortured her by making herself the .scape-goat or 
 single unit on which the evil would fall. Ought a possibly 
 large number, Swithin included, to remain unbenefited 
 because the one individual to whom his release would be 
 an injury chanced to be herself.' Love between man and
 
 TlVO OAT A TOWEK. %o\ 
 
 woman, whicli in Ilumer, Moses, aiul oilier early exhibi- 
 tors of life is mere desire, liad for centuries past so fir 
 broadened as to include sympathy and friendship; surely, 
 it should, in this advanced stage of the world, include 
 benevolence also. If so, it was her duty to set her young 
 man free. 
 
 Thus she labored, with a generositv more worthv even 
 than its object, to sink her love for her own decorum in 
 devotion tt) the world in general and Swithin in particu- 
 lar. To counsel her activities by her understanding, rather 
 than by her emotions, as usual, was hard work for a ten- 
 der woman; but she strove hard, and made advance. The 
 self-centered attitude natural to one in her situation was 
 becoming displaced by the sympathetic attitude, which, 
 though it had to be artificially fostered at first, gave her, 
 by degrees, a certain sweet sense that she was rising above 
 self-love. That maternal element which had from time 
 to time evinced itself in her affection for the youth, and 
 was imparted by her superior ripeness in experience and 
 }ears, appeared now again as she drew nearer the resolve 
 not to secure propriety in her own social condition at the 
 expense of this youth's earthly utility. 
 
 Unexpectedly grant! fruits are sometimes borne of mean 
 roots. The illiberal letter of Swithin's uncle was sua:- 
 gesting to Lady Constantine a more comprehensive mor- 
 ality than the highest efforts of direct instructors had ever 
 been able to instill. To love him so far better than her- 
 self as this was to surpass the love of woman as convention- 
 ally understood, and as mostly existing. 
 
 Before, however, clinching her decision by any definite 
 step, she worried her little brain by devising every kind
 
 302 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 of ingen.'ous scheme, in the hope of lighting on one that 
 might show her how that decision could be avjided, with 
 the same good result. But to secure for him the advan- 
 tages offered, and to retain him likewise, — reflection only 
 showed it to be impossible ! Yet to let him go forever 
 was more than she could endure, and at length she jumped 
 at an idea which promised some sort of improvement on 
 that design. She would propose that reunion should not 
 be entirely abandoned, but simply postponed, — namely, 
 till after his twenty-fifth birthday, when he might be hei 
 husband without, at any rate, the loss to him of the income. 
 By this time he would approximate to a man's full judg- 
 ment, and that painful aspect of her as one who deluded 
 his raw immaturity would have passed forever. 
 
 The plan somewhat appeased her disquieted honor. To 
 let a marriage sink into abeyance for four or five years was 
 not to nullify it; and though she would leave it to him to 
 move its substantiation at the end of that time, without 
 present stipulations, she had not much doubt upon the 
 issue. 
 
 The clock struck five. This silent mental debate had 
 occupied her whole afternoon. Perhaps it would not 
 have ended now, but for an unexpected incident, — the 
 entry of her brother Louis. He came into the room where 
 she was sitting, or rather writhing; and after a few words 
 to explain how he had got there, and about the mistake 
 in the date of Sir Blount's death, he walked up close to 
 her. His next remarks were apologetic in form, but in 
 essence the)' were bitterness itself 
 
 "Viviette," he said, "I am sorry for my hasty words 
 to you when I last left this house. I readily withdraw
 
 Tft^O OAT A TOWER. 303 
 
 them. My suspicions took a wrong direction. I think 
 now tliat I know the truth ! You have been even mad- 
 der than I supposed ! " 
 
 "In what way } " she asked distantly. 
 
 "I had lately thought that unhappy young man was 
 only your too-favored lover." 
 
 "You thought wrong: he is not." 
 
 "He is not, — I believe you, — for he is more. I now 
 am persuaded that he is your lawful husband. Can you 
 deny it 'i " 
 
 "I can." 
 
 "On your sacred word ! " 
 
 "On my sacred word, he is not that, either." 
 
 "Thank Heaven for that assurance!" said Louis, ex- 
 haling a breath of relief "I was not so positive as I 
 pretended to be, but I wanted to know the truth of this 
 m}-stery. Since you are not fettered to him in that way, 
 I care nothing. " 
 
 Louis turned away, and that afforded her an opportu- 
 nity for leaving the room. Those few words were the last 
 grains that had turned the balance, and settled her doom. 
 She would let Swithin go. All the voices in her world 
 had seemed to clamor for that consummation. The 
 morning's mortification, the afternoon's benevolence, and 
 the evening's instincts of evasion had combined to carry 
 the point. 
 
 Accordingly, she sat down and wrote to Swithin a sum- 
 mary of the thoughts above detailed. "We shall separ- 
 ate," she concluded: "you to obey your uncle's orders 
 and explore the Southern skies; I to wait as one who can 
 implicitly trust you. Do not see me again till the years
 
 304 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 have expired. You will find me still the same. I am 
 your wife through all time. The letter of the law is not 
 needed to reassert it at present; while the absence of the 
 letter secures your fortune." 
 
 Nothing can express what it cost Lady Constantine to 
 marshal her arguments; tut she did it, and vanquished 
 self-comfort by a sense of the general expediency. It may 
 unhesitatingly be affirmed that the only ignoble reason 
 which might have dictated such a step was non-existent; 
 that is to say, a serious decline in her affection. Tenderly 
 she had loved the youth at first, and tenderly she loved 
 him now, as time and her conduct after proved. 
 
 Women the most delicate get used to strange moral sit- 
 uations. Eve probably regained her normal sweet com- 
 posure about a week after the Fall. On first learning of 
 lier anomalous position Lady Constantine's cheek had 
 blushed hot, and her instincts prompted her to legalize 
 her marriage without a moment's delav. Heaven and 
 earth were to be moved at once to effect it. Day after day 
 had passed; her union had remained unsecured, and the 
 idea of its nullity had gradually ceased to be strange to 
 her, till it became of little account beside her generous re- 
 solve for the young man's sake.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVl. 
 
 'T'^HE immediate effect upon St. Cleeve of the receipt of 
 her well-reasoned argument for retrocession was, nat- 
 urally, a bitter attack upon himself for having been guilty 
 of such cruel carelessness as to leave in her way the law- 
 yer's letter that had first made her aware of his uncle's pro- 
 vision for him. Immature as he was, he could realize 
 Viviette's position sufficiently well to perceive w'hat the poor 
 lady must suffer at having suddenly thrust upon her the 
 responsibility of repairing her own situation as a wife by 
 ruining his as a legatee. True, it was by the purest inad- 
 vertence that his pending sacrifice of means had been dis- 
 covered; but he should have taken special pains to render 
 such a contretemps impossible. If, on the first occasion 
 when a revelation might have been made with impunity, 
 he would not put it in the power of her good nature to 
 relieve his position by refusing him, he should have shown 
 double care not to do so now, when she could not exer- 
 ^cise that benevolence without the loss of honor. With a 
 young man's inattention to issues, he had not considered 
 how sharp her feelings as a woman must be in this con- 
 tingency. It had seemed the easiest thing in the world to
 
 3o6 TIVO ON" A TOWER. 
 
 remedy the defect in their marriage, and that therefore 
 there was nothing to be anxious about. And in his inno- 
 cence ol any thought of securing the bequest, by talcing 
 advantage of the loop-hole in his matrimonial bond, he 
 undervalued the importance of concealing the existence of 
 that bequest. 
 
 The looming fear of unhappiness between them revived 
 in Swithin the warmest emotions of their earlier acquaint- 
 ance. Almost before the sun had set he hastened to Wel- 
 land House in search of her. The air was disturbed by a 
 slifT summer wind, productive of windfalls and premature 
 descents of leafage. It was an hour when unripe apples 
 .shower down in orchards, and unbrowned chestnuts de- 
 .scend in their husks upon the park jlades. There was 
 no help for it this afternoon but to call upon her in a di- 
 rect manner, regardless of suspn ions. He was thunder- 
 struck when, while waiting in the full expectation of be- 
 ing admitted to her presence, the answer brought back to 
 him was that she was engaged. 
 
 This had never happened before in the whole course of 
 their acquaintance. But he knew what it meant, and 
 turned away with a vague disquietude. He did not know 
 that Lady Constantine was just above his head, listening to 
 his movements with the liveliest emotions, and, while 
 praying for him to go, longing for him to insist on &cc.\ni^ 
 her and spoil all. But the faintest symptom being always 
 sufficient to convince him of having blundered, he unwit- 
 tingly took her at her word, and went rapidly away • 
 
 However, he called again the next day; and she, hav- 
 ing gained strenjfth by one victory over herself, was ena- 
 bled to repeat her refusal with greater ease. Knowing
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. . 307 
 
 this; to be the only course by which her point could be 
 maintained, she clung to it with strenuous and religious 
 pertinacity. 
 
 Thus immured and self-controlling she passed a week. 
 Her brother, though he did not live in the house (prefer- 
 ring the nearest watering-place at this time of the year), 
 was continually coming there; and one day he happened 
 to be present when slie refused Swithin for the third time. 
 Louis, who did not observe the tears in her eyes, was 
 astonished and delighted: she was coming to her senses 
 at last. Believing now that there had been nothing more 
 between dicm than a too plainly shown partiality on her 
 part, he expressed his commendation of her conduct to 
 her face. At this, instead of owning to its advantage also, 
 her teari burst forth outright. 
 
 Not knowing what to make of this, Louis said, "Well, 
 I am simply upholding you in your course." 
 
 "Yes — yes — I know it!" she cried. "And it is my 
 deliberately chosen course. I wish he — Swithin St. Cleeve 
 — would go on his travels --at once, and leave the place. 
 Four hundred a year has been left him for travel and 
 studv of the Southern constellations; and I wish he would 
 use it. You might represent the advantage to him of the 
 course, if you cared to. " 
 
 Louis thought he could do no better than let Swithin 
 know this as soon as possible. Accordingly, when St. 
 Qleeve was writing in the hut, the next day, he heard the 
 crackle of footsteps over the fir spikelets outside, and 
 jumped up, supposing them to be hers; but to his disap- 
 pointment it was her brother who appeared at the door. 
 
 "Excuse my invading the hermitage, St. Cleeve," he
 
 3o8 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 said in his careless way. " But I have heard from my sis- 
 ter of your good fortune. " 
 
 " My good fortune .' " 
 
 " Yes, in having an opportunity for roving: and with a 
 traveler's conceit I couldn't help coming to give you the 
 benefit of my experience. When do you start .' " 
 
 "I have not — formed any plan as yet. Indeed, I had 
 not quite been thinking of going" — 
 
 Louis stared. ' ' Not going .? Then I may have been 
 misinformed. What I have heard is that a good uncle has 
 kindly bequeathed you a sufficient income to make a sec- 
 ond Isaac Newton of you, if you only use it as he directs." 
 
 Swithin breathed quickly, but said nothing. 
 
 "If you have not decided so to make use of it, let me 
 implore you, as your friend, and one nearly old enough 
 to be your father, to decide at once. Such a chance does 
 not happen to a scientific youth once in a century.'' 
 
 "Thank you for your good advice, — for it is good in 
 itself, I know," .'aid Swithin, in a low voice. "But — has 
 Lady Constantire spoken of it at all .' " 
 
 " She thinks is I do." 
 
 "She has spoken to you on the subject ! " 
 
 "Certainly. More than that, it is at her request — 
 though I did not intend to say so — that I come to speak 
 to vou about it now." 
 
 "Frankly and plainly," said Swithin, his voice trem- 
 bling with a compound of scientific and amatory emotion 
 that defies definition, "does she say seriously that she 
 wishes me to go .' " 
 
 "She does." 
 
 "Then go I will," replied Swithin firmly. 'I have
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 309 
 
 been fortunate enough to interest some leading astrono- 
 mers, including the Astronomer-Royal; and in a \etter re- 
 ceived this morning I learn that the use of the Cape ob- 
 servatory has been offered me for any Southern observations 
 I may wish to make. This offer I will accept. Will you 
 kindly let Lady Constantine know this, since she is inter- 
 ested in my welfare .' " 
 
 Louis promised, and when he was gone Swithin looked 
 blankly at his own situation, as if he could scarcely believe 
 in its reality. Her letter to him, then, had been deliber- 
 ately written, she meant him to go. But he was deter- 
 mined that none of those misunderstandings which ruin 
 the happiness of lovers should be allowed to creep in in 
 the present case. He would see her, if he slept under 
 her walls all night to do it, and would hear the order 
 to depart from her own lips. This unexpected stand she 
 was making for his interests was winning his admiration 
 to such a degree as to be in danger of defeating the very 
 cause it was meant to subsei-ve. A woman like this was 
 not to be forsaken in a hurry. He wrote two lines, and 
 left the note at the house with his own hand: — 
 
 The Cabin, Rings-Hill. 
 
 I)e.\REST VivietTE, — II you insist, I will go. But letter-writini^ 
 will not do. I must have the command from your own two lips; 
 otherwise I shall not stir. I am here every evening at seven. Can 
 
 This note, as fate would have it, reached her hands in 
 the single hour of that week when she was in a mood to 
 comply with his request, — whilst moved by the reflex
 
 3IO TIVO 0/V A TOWER. 
 
 emotion that had followed Louis's praise of her for dis- 
 missing Swithin. She went upstairs to the window that 
 had so long sen'ed purposes of this kind, and signaled 
 "ves." 
 
 St. Cleeve soon saw the answer she had given, and 
 watched her approach from the tower as the sunset drew 
 cu. The vivid circumstances of his life at this date led 
 lii;n ever to remember the external scenes in which they 
 were set. It was now early autumn, — the time of phe- 
 nomenal irradiations. To-night the west heaven gleamed 
 like a foundry of all metals, common and rare; the clouds 
 were broken into a thousand fragments, and the margin 
 of every fragment shone. Foreseeing the disadvantage and 
 pain to her of maintaining a resolve under the pressure 
 of a meeting, he vowed not to urge her by word or sign; 
 to put the question plainly and calmly, and to discuss it 
 with her on a reasonable basis only, like the philosophers 
 they assumed themselves to be. 
 
 But this intention was scarcely adhered to in all its in- 
 tegrity. She duly appeared on the margin of the field, 
 flooded with the metallic radiance that marked the close 
 of this day; whereupon he quickly descended the steps, 
 and met her at the cabin door. As the evening grew 
 darker and darker, he listened to her reasoning, which 
 was precisely a repetition of that already sent him by 
 letter, and by degrees accepted her decision, since she 
 v/ould not revoke it. Time came ior them to say good- 
 bye, and then 
 
 " He turned, and saw the terror in her eyes. 
 That yearned upon him, shining in such wise 
 As a star midway in the midnight fixed,"
 
 TIVO O.V A TOWER. 31 1 
 
 It was the misery of her own condition that showed forth, 
 hitherto obscured by her ardor for ameHorating his. They 
 closed together and kissed each other, as though the emo- 
 tion of their whole year and a half's acquaintance had set- 
 tled down upon that moment. 
 
 " 1 won't go away from you," said Swithin, huskily. 
 " Why did you propose it for an instant ? '' 
 
 Thus the nearly ended interview was again prolonged. 
 Time, however, was merciless, and the hour came when 
 she was compelled to depart. Swithin walked with her 
 towards the house, as he had walked many times before, 
 believing that all was now smooth again between them, 
 and caring, it must be owned, very little for his fame as 
 an expositor of the Southern constellations just then. 
 
 When they reached the silent house he said what he had 
 not ventured to say before: " Fix the day. You have de- 
 cided that it is to be soon, and diat I am not to go .' " 
 
 But youthful Swithin was far, very far, from being up 
 to the fond subdety of Viviette this evening. " I cannot 
 — decide here," she said gently, releasing herself from his 
 arms. "I will speak to you from the window. Wait for 
 me." 
 
 She vanished; and he waited. It was a long time be- 
 fore the window opened, and he was not aware that, with 
 her customary complication of feeling, she had knelt for 
 s^jme time inside the room before looking out 
 
 " Well .'" said he. 
 
 "It cannot be," she answered "I cannot ruin you. 
 But the day after you are five and twenty our marriage 
 shall be confirmed, if you choose." 
 
 "Oh, my Viviette, how is this.'' " he cried.
 
 312 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Swithin, I have not altered. But I feared for my 
 powers, and could not tell you whilst I stood by your 
 side. Take the bequest, and go. You are too young 
 — to be fettered. I should have thought of it ! Do not 
 communicate with me for at least a year; it is imperative. 
 . . . Do not tell me your plans. If we part, we do part. 
 I have vowed a vow not to further obstruct the course you 
 had decided on before you knew me and my puling ways; 
 and by Heaven's help I'll keep that vow. . . . Now go. 
 These are the parting words of your own Viviette ! " 
 
 Swithin, who was stable as a giant in all that appertained 
 to nature and life outside humanity, was childishly flexible 
 in social matters. He was quite awed by her firmness, 
 and looked vacantly at her for a time, till she closed the 
 window. Then he mechanically turned, and went as she 
 had commanded.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 A WEEK had passed away. It had been a time of 
 cloutiv mental weather to Swithin and Viviette, but 
 the onh- noteworthy fact about it was that what had been 
 planned to happen therein had actually taken place. Swith- 
 in had gone from Welland, and would shordy go from 
 England. Lady Constantine became aware of it by a note 
 which he posted to her on his way through Warborne. 
 There was much evidence of haste in the note, and some- 
 thing of reserve. The latter she could not understand, 
 but it might have been obvious enough if she had considered. 
 On the morning of his departure he had sat on the edge 
 of his bed: the sunlight streaming through the early mist; 
 the house-martins scratching the back of the ceiling over 
 his head, as they scrambled out from the roof for their 
 day's gnat-hunting; the thrushes cracking snails on the 
 garden stones outside with the noisiness of little smiths at 
 work on little anvils. The sun in sending its rods of yel- 
 low fire into his room sent, as he suddenly thought, men- 
 tal illumination with it. For the first time, as he sat there, 
 it had crossed his mind that Viviette might have reasons 
 for this separation which he knew not of There might be
 
 314 T^VO ON A TOWER. 
 
 lamily reasons, — mysterious blood necessities, which aie 
 sa:d to rule members of old musty-mansioned families, 
 and are unknown to other classes of society; and they mav 
 have been just now brought before her by her brother Lou- 
 is, on the condition that they were religiously concealed. 
 
 The idea of some family skeleton, like those he had read 
 of in memoirs, having been unearthed by Louis, and held 
 before her terrified understanding as a matter which ren- 
 dered Swithin's departure and the neutralization of the 
 marriage no less indispensable to them than it was an ad- 
 vantage to himself, seemed a very plausible one to Swithin 
 just now. Viviette might naturally have taken Louis into 
 her confidence at last, for the sake of his brotherly advice. 
 Swithin knew that of her own heart she would never wish to 
 get rid of him; but coerced by Louis, might she not have 
 grown to entertain views of its expediency.-' Events made 
 such a supposition on St. Cleeve's part as natural as it was 
 inaccurate, and, conjoined with his own excitement at the 
 thought of seeing a new heaven overhead, influenced him 
 to write but the briefest and most hurried final note to her^^ 
 in which he fully obeyed her sensitive request that he 
 would omit all reference to his plans. These, at the last 
 moment, had been modified to fall in with the winter ex- 
 pedition formerly mentioned, to observe the transit of Ve- 
 nus at a remote southern station. 
 
 The business being done, and himself plunged into 
 the preliminaries of an important scientific pilgrimage, 
 Swithin acquired that lightness of heart which most men 
 feel in forsaking old love for new adventure, no matter 
 how charming may be the girl they leave behind them. 
 Moreover, in the present case, the man was endowed with
 
 TH'O ON A TOWER. 3I5 
 
 that school-boy temperament which does not see, or at 
 least consider with much curiosity, the effect of a given 
 scheme upon others than himself. The bearing upon 
 Lady Constantine of what was an undoubted predicament 
 for any woman was forgotten in his feeling that she had 
 done a very handsome and noble thing for him, and that 
 he was therefore bound in honor to make the most of it. 
 
 His going had resulted in anything but lightness of 
 heart for her. Her sad fancy could, indeed, indulge in 
 dreams of her yellow-haired laddie without that formerly 
 besetting fear that those dreams would prompt her to 
 actions likely to distract and hinder him. She was 
 wretched on her own account, relieved on his. She no 
 longer stood in the way of his advancement, and that 
 was enough. For herself, she could live in retirement; 
 visit the wood, the old camp, and the column, and, like 
 CEnone, think of the life they had led there, — 
 
 " Mournful Qinone, wandering forlorn 
 Of Paris, once her playmate on the hills; " 
 
 leaving it entirely to his goodness whether he would come 
 and claim her in the future, or desert her forever. 
 
 She was diverted for a time from these sad performances 
 by a letter which reached her from Bishop Helmsdale. 
 To see his handwriting again on an envelope, after think- 
 ing so anxiously of making a father confessor of him, 
 startled her out of her equanimity. She speedily regainevl 
 it, however, when she read his note. 
 
 Thf Palace, Melchester, | 
 Au^usi 15, 18 — . f 
 
 My dear Lady Constantine, — 1 am shocked and grieved that, 
 in the strange dispensation of thmgs here below, my offer of marriage
 
 3l6 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 should have reached you ahnost simultaneously with the intelligence 
 that your widowhood had been of several months' less duration than 
 you and I and the world had supposed. I can quite understand that, 
 viewed from any side, the news must have shaken and disturbed you; 
 and your unequivocal refusal to entertain any idea of a new alliance 
 at such a moment was, of course, intelligible, natural, and praise- 
 worthy. At present I will say no more beyond expressing a hope 
 that you will accept my assurances that I was quite ignorant of 'he 
 news at the time of writing, and a sincere desire that, in due time, 
 and as soon as you have recovered your equanimity, I may be al- 
 lowed to renew my proposal. 
 
 I am, my dear Lady Constantine, 
 
 Yours ever sincerely; 
 
 C. Melchester. 
 
 She laid the letter aside, and thought no more about 
 it, beyond a momentary meditation on the errors into 
 which people fall in reasoning from actions to motives. 
 Louis, who was now again with her, became, in due 
 course, acquainted with the contents of the letter, and 
 was satisfied with the promising position in which matters 
 stood all round. 
 
 Lady Constantine went her mournful ways as she had 
 planned to do, her chief resort being the familiar column, 
 where she experienced the unutterable melancholy of see- 
 ing two carpenters dismantle the dome of its felt covering, 
 detach its ribs, and clear away the inclosure at the top, 
 till everything stood as it had before Swithin had bet-r 
 known to the place. The equatorial had already been 
 packed in a box, to be in readiness if he should send for 
 it from abroad. The cabin, too, was in course of demo- 
 lition, such having been his directions, acquiesced in by 
 her. before he started Yet she could not bear the idja
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 317 
 
 that these structures, so germane to the events of their 
 romance, should be removed as if removed forever. Going 
 to the men, she bade them store up the materials intact, 
 that they might be re-erected if desired. She had the 
 junctions of the timbers marked with figures, the boards 
 numbered, and the different sets of screws tied up in in- 
 dependent papers for identification. She did not hear the 
 remarks of the workmen when she had gone, to the effect 
 that the young man would as soon think of buying a hal- 
 ter for himself as come back and spy at the moon from 
 Rings-Hill Speer, after seeing the glories of other nations, 
 and the gold and jewels tliat were found there, or she 
 might have been more unhappy than she was. 
 
 On returning from one of these w-alks to the column, a 
 curious circumstance occurred. It was evening, and she 
 was coming as usual down through the sighing plantation, 
 wending her way between the ramparts of the camp to- 
 wards the outlet giving upon the field, when suddenly, in 
 a dusky vista among the trunks, she saw, or thought she 
 saw, a golden-haired toddling child. 
 
 The child moved a step or two, and vanished behind a 
 tree. Lady Constantine, fearing it had lost its way, went 
 quickly to the spot, searched, and called aloud. But no 
 child could she perceive or hear anywhere around. She 
 returned to where she had stood when first beholding it, 
 and looked in the same direction; but nothing reappeared. 
 The only object at all resembling a little boy or girl was 
 the upper tuft of a bunch of fern, which had prematurely 
 yellowed to about the color of a fair child's hair, and 
 waved occasionally in the breeze. This, however, did not 
 surficiently explain the phenomenon, and she returned to
 
 3lS TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 inquire of the man whom she had left at work removing 
 the last traces of Swithin's cabin. Bat he had left with her 
 departure and the approach of night. Feeling an inde- 
 scribable dread, she retraced her steps and hastened home, 
 doubting if she had been mistaken, yet half believing 
 that her imagination must have played her some trick 
 that day. 
 
 The tranquil mournfulness of these few days of solitude 
 was terminated in a most unexpected manner. The morn- 
 ing after the above-mentioned incident, Lady Constantine, 
 after meditating a while, arose with a conviction. She re- 
 alized a condition of things that she had never anticipated, 
 and for a moment the discovery so overwhelmed her that 
 she thought she must die outright. In her terror she said 
 she had sown the wind to reap the whirlwind. Then the 
 instinct of self-preservation flamed up in her like a fire. Her 
 altruism in subjecting her self-love to benevolence, and let- 
 ting Swithin go away from her, was demolished by the new 
 necessity, as if it had been a gossamer web. 
 
 There was no resisting or evading the spontaneous plan 
 of action which matured itself in her mind in five minutes. 
 Where was Swithin .' How could he be got at instantly .' 
 That was her single thought. She searched about the room 
 for his last short note, hoping, yet doubting, that its con- 
 tents were more explicit on his intended movements than 
 the few meager syllables which alone she could call to mind. 
 She could not find the letter in her room, and came down- 
 stairs to Louis as pale as a ghost. 
 
 He looked up at her, and with some concern said, 
 "What's the matter.?" 
 
 "I am searching everywhere for a letter, — a note from
 
 TIVO ON A TOIVF.R. 319 
 
 I^lr. St. Cleeve; just a few words, telling me vvhen the Oc- 
 cidental sails, that he goes in ! " 
 
 "Why do you want that unimportant document? " 
 
 "It is of the utmost importance that I should know 
 whether he has sailed or not ! '' said the poor lady, in ag- 
 onized tones. " Where can that letter be ! " 
 
 Louis knew where that letter was, for, having seen it on 
 her desk, he had, without reading it, torn it up and thrown 
 it into the waste-paper basket; thinking that the less that 
 remained to remind her of that voung philosopher the bet- 
 ter. "I destroyed it/" he said. 
 
 " Oh, Louis, why did you } " she cried in despair. " I 
 am going to follow him,— I think it best to do so, — and I 
 want to know if he is gone, and now the date is lost I " 
 
 " Going to run after St. Cleeve I '' 
 
 " Yes, I am ! " she said, with vehemence. "I must see 
 him. I want to speak to him as soon as possible." 
 
 " Good God, Viviette, are you mad ? '' 
 
 "Oh, what was the date of that ship.' But it cannot 
 be helped. I start at once for Southampton. I have 
 made up my mind to do it. He was going to his uncle's 
 solicitors in the north first; then he was coming back to 
 Southampton. He cannot have sailed yet." 
 
 "I believe he has sailed," muttered Louis, sullenly. 
 
 She did not wait to argue with him, but returned up- 
 stairs, where she rang to teh Green to be ready with the 
 pony tc drive her to Warborne station in a quarter of an 
 hour.
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 VIVIETTE'S determination to hamper Swithin no 
 lono-er had led her, as has been shown, to thwar! 
 anv weak impulse of hers to write and entreat his return, 
 by forbidding hirn to furnish her with his foreign address. 
 His obedient disposition, his fear that there might be 
 other reasons behind, made him obcv her command only 
 too literally. Thus, to her terror and dismay, she had 
 placed a gratuitous difficulty in the way of her present 
 endeavor. 
 
 She was ready before Green, and urged on that factotum 
 so wildly as to leave him no time to change the corduroys 
 and skitty-boots in which he had been gardening. He 
 therefore turned himself into a coachman as far down as 
 his wa-st merely, putting on his proper coat, hat, and 
 waistcoat, and wrapping a rug over his horticultural half 
 below. In this compromise he appeared at the door, 
 mounted, and reins in hand. 
 
 Seeing how sad and determined Viviette was, Louis pitied 
 her so far as to put nothing in the way of her starting, though 
 he forbore to help her. He thought her conduct sentimen- 
 tal foolery, the outcome of mistaken pity, and ' ' such a 
 kind of gain-giving as would trouble a woman; " and he
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 32 1 
 
 decided that it would be better to let this mood burn 
 itself out than to keep it smouldering by obstruction. 
 
 " Do you remember the date of his sailing? " she said 
 finally, as the pony carriage turned to drive off. 
 
 " He sails on the 25th; that is, to-day. But it may 
 not be till late in the evening." 
 
 With this she started, and reached Warborne in time 
 for the up-train. How much longer than it really is a 
 long journey can seem to be was fully learnt by the un- 
 happy Viviette that day. d'he changeful procession of 
 country-seats past which she was dragged, the names and 
 memories of their owners, had no points of interest for her 
 now. She reached Southampton about midday, and drove 
 straight to the docks. 
 
 On approaching the gates, she was met by a crowd of 
 people and vehicles coming out, — men, women, children, 
 porters, police, cabs, and carts. The Occidental had just 
 sailed. 
 
 The adverse intelligence came upon her with such odds, 
 after her mornings tension, that she could scarcely crawl 
 back to the cab which had brought her. *But this was 
 not a time to succumb. As she had no luggage she di.s- 
 missed the man, and, without any real consciousness of 
 what she was doing, strolled awa}', and sat down on a 
 pile of merchandise. 
 
 After long thinking her case assumed a more hopeful 
 complexion. Much might probably be done towards com- 
 municatinir with him in the time at her command. The 
 obvious step to this end, which she should have thought 
 of sooner, wduld be to go to his grandmother, in Welland 
 Bottom, and ilrjre obtain his il!nerar\- in detail, — no doubt
 
 322 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 well known to Mrs. Martin. There was no leisure fof 
 her to consider longer, if she would be home again thai 
 night; and, returning to the railway, she waited on a seat, 
 without eating or drinking, till a train was ready to take 
 her back. 
 
 By the time she again stood in Warborne the sun rested 
 his chin upon the meadows, and enveloped the distant 
 outline of the Rings-Hill column in his humid rays. 
 
 Hiring an empty fly that chanced to be at the station, 
 she was driven through the little town onward to Welland, 
 which she approached about eight o'clock. At her re- 
 quest, the man set her down at the entrance to the park; 
 and when he was out of sight, instead of pursuing her 
 way to the house, she went along the highroad in the 
 direction of IMrs. Martin's. 
 
 Dusk was drawing on, and the bats were wheeling over 
 the green basin called Welland Bottom, by the time she 
 arrived; and had any other errand instigated her call she 
 would have postponed it till the morrow. Nobody re- 
 sponded to her knock, but she could hear footsteps going 
 hither and thither up-stairs, and dull noises as of articles 
 moved from their places. She knocked again and again, 
 and ultimately the door was opened by Hannah, as usual. 
 
 "I could make nobody hear," said Lady Constantine, 
 who was su weary she could scarcely stand. 
 
 "I am very, very sorry, my lady," said Hannah, slightly 
 awed on beholding her visitor. "But we was a-putting 
 poor Mr. Swithin's rooms to rights, now that he is, as a 
 woman may say, dead and buried to us; so we didn't hear 
 your ladyship. Til call Mrs. Martin at once. She is up 
 in the room that used to be his work-room."
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 323 
 
 Here Hannah's voice implied moist eyes, and Lady 
 Constantine's instantly overflowed. 
 
 "No; I'll go up to her, " .said Vivit.-lte; and almost in 
 advance of Hannah she passed up the shrunken ash stains. 
 
 The ebbing light was not enough to reveal to Mrs. 
 Martin's aged gaze the person.ilily of her visitor till Han- 
 nah explained. " I'll get a light, my lady," said she. 
 
 ' No, I would rather not. What are you doing, Mrs. 
 Martin V 
 
 " Well, the poor misguided boy is gone, and he's gone 
 for good to me. I am a woman of over fourscore }cars, 
 my Lady Constantine; my junketing days are over, and 
 whether 'tis feasting or whether 'tis sorrowing in the land 
 will soon be nothing to me. But his life mav be lono 
 and active, and for the sake of him I care for what I shall 
 never see. and wish to make pleasant what I shall never 
 enjoy. I am setting his room in order, as the place will 
 be his own freehold when I am gone; so that when he comes 
 back he may find all his poor jim-cracks and tranglej's as 
 he left 'em, and not feel that I have betrayed his trust. " 
 
 Old Mrs. Martin's voice revealed that she had burst 
 into such few tears as were left her, and then Hannah 
 began crying, likewise; whereupon Lady Constantine, 
 whose heart had been bursting all day (and who, indeed, 
 considering her looming trouble, had reason enough for 
 tears), broke into bitterer sobs than either, — sobs of abso- 
 lute pain that could no longer be concealed. 
 
 Hannah was the first to discover that Lady Constantine 
 was weeping with them, and her feelings being probably 
 the least intense among the three, she instantly controlled 
 herself
 
 324 TPVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Refrain 3'ourself, my dear woman," she said haslilj 
 to Mrs. Martin. "Don't ye see how it disturbs my lady .' " 
 And turning to Viviette she whispered, " Her years be so 
 great, your ladyship, that perhaps ye'll excuse her for 
 [)ursting out afore ye .^ We know when the rriind is dim, 
 my lady, there's not the manners there should be; but 
 decayed people can't help it, poor old soul ! " 
 
 "Hannah, that will do now. Perhaps Lady Constan- 
 tine would like to speak to me alone," said Mrs. Martin. 
 And when Hannah had retreated Mrs. Martin continued, 
 "Such a charge as she is, my lady, on account of her great 
 age ! You'll pardon her biding here as if she were one of 
 the flimily. I put up with such things because of her 
 iong service, and we know that years lead to childishness." 
 
 "What are you doing.' Can I help you;" Viviette 
 asked, as Mrs. Martin, after speaking, turned to lift some ' 
 large article. 
 
 "Oh, 'tis only die rames of a telescope that's got no 
 works in his inside," said Swithin's grandmother, seizing 
 the huge pasteboard tube that Swithin had maile and 
 abandoned, because he could get no lenses to suit it. 
 "I am going to hang it up to these hooks, and. there it 
 will bide till he comes again." 
 
 Lady Constantine took one end, and the tube was hung 
 up against the whitewashed wall by strings that the old 
 women had tied round it. "Here's all his equinoctial 
 line.s, and his topics of Capricorn, and I don't know what be- 
 sides, " Mrs. Martin continued, pointing to some charcoal 
 scratches upon the wall. "I shall never rub 'em out; no, 
 though 'tis such untidiness as I was never brought up to, 
 I shall never rub 'em out."
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 325 
 
 "Where lias Swilhin gune to first?" asked Viviette 
 anxiously. ' ' Where does he say you are to write to 
 him ? " 
 
 " Nowhere yet, iny lady. He's going traipsing all over 
 Europe and America, and then to the South Pacific Ocean 
 about this Transit of Venus that's going to be done there. 
 He is to write to us first, — God knows when ! — for he said 
 that if we didn't hear from him for six months we were 
 not to be gallied at all." 
 
 At this intelligence, so much worse than she had ex- 
 pected. Lady Constantine stood mute, sank down, and 
 would have fallen to the floor if there had not been a chair 
 behind her. Controlling herself by a strenuous effort, she 
 disguised her despair, and asked vacantly, "From Amer- 
 ica to the South Pacific — transit of Venus.''" (Swithin's 
 arrangement to accompany the expedition had been made 
 at the last moment, and therefore she had not as yet been 
 informed. ) 
 
 "Yes, — to a lone island, I believe." 
 
 "Yes, — a lone islant, my lady," echoed Hannah, who 
 had crept in and made herself one of the family again, in 
 spite of Mrs. Martin. 
 
 "He is going to meet the English and American as- 
 tronomers there at the end of the year. After that he will 
 most likely go on to the Cape." 
 
 " But before the end of the year, what places did he tell 
 you of visiting } " 
 
 "Let me collect myself He is going to the observa- 
 tory of Cambridge, United States, to meet some gentlemen 
 there, and spy through the great refractor. Then there's 
 the observator}' of Chicago, and I think he has a letter to
 
 326 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 make him beknown to a gentleman in the observatory al 
 Marseilles; and he wants to go to Vienna; and Poulkowa, 
 too. he means to take in his way, — there being learned in- 
 struments and a staff of astronomers at each place." 
 
 "Does he take Europe or America first.?" she asked 
 faintly, for the account seemed hopeless. 
 
 Mrs. Martin could not tell till she had heard from 
 Swithin. It depended upon what he had been advised 
 to do by his great-uncle's solicitor. 
 
 Lady Constantine bade the old people good-bye, and 
 dragged her weary limbs homeward. The fatuousness of 
 forethought had seldom been evinced more ironically. 
 Had she done nothing to hinder him, he would have kept 
 up an unreserved communication with her, and all might 
 have been well. 
 
 For that night she could undertake nothing further, and 
 she waited for the next day. Then at once she wrote two 
 letters to .Swithin, directing one to the jNIarseilles observa- 
 tory, one to the observatory of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
 as being the only two spots on the face of the globe at 
 which they were likely to intercept him. Each letter stated 
 to him the urgent reasons which existed for his return, and 
 contained a passionately regretful intimation that the an- 
 nuity, on which his hopes depended, must of necessity be 
 sacrificed by the completion of their original contract, 
 without delay. 
 
 But letter conveyance was too slow a process to satisfy 
 her. To send an epitome of her. epistles by telegraph 
 was, after all, indispensable. Such an imploring sentence, 
 as she desired to address to him it would be hazardous to 
 dispatch, from XVarborne; and she took a dreary journey to.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 327 
 
 Southampton, on purpose to send it from an office at 
 which she was unknown. 
 
 Here she handed in her messages in dupHcate, address- 
 ing th_in as slie had addressed the letters, and again re- 
 turncil home. 
 
 With regard to Marseilles, she assumed that an answer 
 might be e.\{)ected in a day, if he had gone there. She 
 waited two days, three days; and there being no return 
 telegram from Marseilles, the inference was that he had 
 gone to America. For an answer to her American tele- 
 gram she ought to wait a week or ten da)s longer, to al- 
 low him time to get to Cambridge and receive it. 
 
 Then she considered the weakness, the stultifying nature, 
 of her attempt at recall. 
 
 Events mocked her on all sides. By the flivor of an 
 accident, and by her own immense exertions against her 
 instincts, Swithin had been restored to the rightful heri- 
 tage that he had nearly forfeited on her account. He had 
 just started off to utilize it; when she, without a moment's 
 warning, was asking him again to cast it away. She had 
 set a certain machinery in motion, to stop it before it had 
 revolved once. 
 
 A horrid apprehension possessed her. It had been 
 easy for Swithin to give up what he had never known the 
 advantages of keeping; but having once begun to enjoy 
 his possession, would he give it up now } Could he be 
 depended on for such self-sacrifice.' Suppose there ar- 
 rived no reply from him for the next three months, 
 and that, w^hen his answer came, he were to inform her 
 that, having now fully acquiesced in her original decision, 
 • he found the life he was leading so profitable, as to be un-.
 
 328 TWO ox A TOWER. 
 
 able to abandon it, even to please her; that he was viry 
 sorry, but having embarked on this course by her advice, 
 he meant to adhere to it by his own. 
 
 There was, indeed, every probability that, moving abaut 
 as he was doing, and cautioned as he had been by her 
 veiy self against listening to her too readily, she would re- 
 ceive no reply of any sort from him for three, or perhaps 
 four, months. This would be on the eve of the transit, 
 and what likelihood was there that a young man, full of 
 ardor for that spectacle, would forego it at the last mo- 
 ment to return to a humdrum domesticity with a woman 
 eight years his senior .-' 
 
 If she could only leave him to his career, and save her 
 own situation also ! But at that moment the proposition 
 seemed as impossible as to construct a triangle of two 
 straight lines. 
 
 In her walk home, pervaded by these hopeless views, 
 she passed near the dark and deserted tower. Night in 
 that solitary place, which would have caused her some 
 uneasiness in her years of blitheness, had no terrors for 
 her now. She went up the wintiing path, and, the door 
 being unlocked, felt her way to the top. The open sky 
 greeted her as in times previous to the dome and equato- 
 r'.d period; but there was not a star to suggest to her in 
 which direction Swithin had gone. The absence of the 
 dome suggested a way out of her difficulties. A leap in 
 the dark, and all would be over. But she had not reached 
 that stage of action as yet, and the thought was dismissed 
 as quickly as it had come. 
 
 The new consideration which at present occupied hei 
 mind was whether she could have the courage to leave
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 329 
 
 Svvithin to himself, as in tlie original plan, ar»d singly 
 meet her impending trial, despising the shame, till he 
 should return, at fiveand-twenty, and claim her. \'et 
 was this assumption of his return so very safe? How- 
 Altered things would be at that time ! At twenty-five he 
 would still be young and handsome; she would be three- 
 ■iiul thirty, faded, middle-aged, and homely. A fear sharp 
 as a frost settled downi upon her that in any such scheme 
 as this she would be building u[)on the sand. 
 
 She hardly knew how she reached home that night. 
 Entering by the lawn door, she saw a red coal in the di- 
 rection of the arbor. Louis was smoking there, and he 
 came forward. 
 
 He had not seen her since the morning, and was natu- 
 rally anxious about her. She blessed the chance which 
 enveloped her in night, and lessened the weight of the 
 encounter one half by depriving him of vision. 
 
 " Did you accomplish your object.' " he asked. 
 
 ' ' No, " said she. 
 
 " How was that.? " 
 
 " He has sailed." 
 
 "A very good thing for both, I say. I believe you 
 would have married him, if you could have overtaken 
 him." 
 
 " That would I ! '' she said fervently. 
 
 " Good God ! What! Would you marry anybody or 
 anything.'" asked Louis, aghast. 
 
 "I would marry a tinker, for that matter," she .said 
 recklessly. "Only I should prefer to drow-n myseli 
 
 Louis held his breath, and stood rigid, such McLs the 
 force of the meaning her words conveyed.
 
 330 TIVO ON A TO WEE. 
 
 " But Louis, you don't know all I " cried poor Viviette 
 "I am not so bad as you think! Mine has been folly, 
 not vice. I thought I had married him — and then I 
 found I had not — the marriage was invalid — Sir Blount 
 was alive. And now Swithin has gone away, and will 
 not come back for my calling. How can he .'' His for- 
 tune is left him on condition that he forms no legal tie. 
 Oh, will he, will he come again ! " 
 
 "Never, if that's the position of affairs," said Louis 
 firmly, after a pause. 
 
 " What then shall I do } " said Viviette. 
 
 Louis escaped the formidable difficulty of replying by 
 pretending to continue his Havana; and she, bowed down 
 to dust by what she had revealed, crept from him into the 
 house. Louis's cigar went out in his hand, as he stood 
 looking intenUy at the ground.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 LOUIS got up the next morning with an idea in his 
 head. He had dressed for a journey, and break- 
 fasted hastily. 
 
 Before he had started Viviette came down-stairs. Louis, 
 who was now greatly disturbed about her, went up to his 
 sister and took her hand. 
 
 " Aux grands 7natix les grands remeJes," he said grave- 
 ly. ' ' I have a plan. " 
 
 " I have a dozen," said she. 
 
 "You have.?" 
 
 "Yes. But what are they worth.? And yet there 
 must, there must be a way ! " 
 
 "Viviette," said Louis, "promise that you will wail 
 till I come home to-night, before you do anything." 
 
 Her distracted eyes showed but slight comprehension 
 of his request, as she said, " Yes." 
 
 An hour after that time Louis entered the train at War- 
 borne, and was speedily crossing a country of ragged wood- 
 land, which, although intruded on by the plow at places, 
 remained largely intact from prehistoric times, and still 
 abounded with yews of gigantic growth, and oaks tufted 
 with mistletoe. It was the route to Melchester.
 
 33 a TPVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 On setting foot in that city, he took the cathedial spire 
 as his guide, the place being strange to him; and went 
 on till he reached the archway dividing Melchester sacred 
 from Melchester secular. Thence he threaded his course 
 into the precincts of the damp and venerable Close, level 
 as a bowling-green, and beloved of rooks, who from their 
 elm perches on high threatened any unwary gazer with 
 the mishap of Tobit. At the corner of this reposeful spot 
 stood the episcopal palace. 
 
 Louis entered the gates, rang the bell, and looked 
 around. Here the trees and rooks seemed older, if pos- 
 sible, than those in the Close behind him. Everything 
 was dignified, and he felt himself like Punchinello in the 
 king's chambers. Verily, in the present case, Glanville 
 was not a man to stick at trifles any more than his illus- 
 trious prototype; and, on the servant bringing a message 
 that his lordship would see him at once, Louis marched 
 boldly in. 
 
 Through an old dark corridor, roofed with old dark 
 beams, the servant led the way to the heavily molded 
 door of the Bishop's room. Dr. Helmsdale was there, 
 and welcomed Louis with considerable stateliness. But 
 his condescension was tempered with a curious anxiety, 
 and even with nervousness. 
 
 He asked in pointed tones after the health of Lady 
 Constantine; if Louis had brought an answer to the letter 
 he had addressed to her a day or two earlier; and if the con- 
 tents of the letter, or the previous one, were known to him. 
 
 "1 have brought no answer from her," said Louis. 
 "But the contents of your letter have been made known 
 to me. "
 
 riVO ON A TOWER. 333 
 
 Since entering the building Louis had more than once 
 felt some hesitation, and it niiglit now, with a favoiing 
 manner from his entertainer, have operated to deter him 
 from going further with his intention. But the Bishop 
 had personal weaknesses that were fatal to sympathy for 
 more than a moment. 
 
 "Then I may speak in confidence to you as her nearest 
 relative,'" said his lordship, "and explain that I am now 
 in a i)osilitin with regard to Lady Constantine which in 
 view of the important office I hold I should not have cared 
 to place myself in, unless I had felt quite sure of not being 
 refused by her. And hence it is a great grief and some 
 mortification to me that I was refused; owing, of course, 
 to the fact that I unwittingly risked making my proposal 
 at the very moment when she was under the influence of 
 those strange tidings, and hence not able to judge what 
 was best for her. " 
 
 The Bishop's words disclosed a mind whose sensitive 
 fear of danger to its own dignity hindered it from criti- 
 cism elsewhere. Things might have been worse for 
 Louis's Puck-like idea of mismating his Hermia with 
 this Demetrius. 
 
 Throwing a strong flavor of earnestness into his mien, 
 he replied, "Your lordship, Viviette is my only sister; I 
 am her only brother and friend. I am alarmed for her 
 health and state of mind. Hence I have come to consult 
 you on this very matter that you have broached. I come 
 absolutely without her knowledge, and I hope unconven- 
 tionality may be excused in me on the score of my anxiety 
 for her." 
 
 "Certainly. I trust that the prospect opened up by
 
 334 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 my proposal, combined with this other news, has not proved 
 too much for her." 
 
 " My sister is distracted and distressed, Bishop Helms- 
 dale. She wants comfort." 
 
 "Not distressed by my letter ^ " said the Bishop, turning 
 red. " Has it lowered me in her estimation.?" 
 
 "On the contrary, while your disinterested offer was 
 uppermost in her mind she was a different woman. It is 
 this other matter that oppresses her. The result upon her 
 of the recent discovery with regard to the late Sir Blount 
 Constantine is peculiar. To say that he ill used her in 
 his life-time is to understate a truth. He has been dead 
 now a considerable period; but this revival of his memory 
 operates as a sort of terror upon her. Images of the man- 
 ner of Sir Blount's death are with her night and day, in- 
 tensified by a hideous picture of the supposed scene, which 
 was cruelly sent her. She dreads being alone. Nothing 
 will restore my poor Viviette to her former cheerfulness 
 but a distraction, a hope, a new prospect." 
 
 ' ' That is precisely what acceptance of my offer would 
 afford." 
 
 " Precisely," said Louis, with great respect. "But how 
 to get her to avail herself of it, after once refusing you, is 
 the difficulty, and my earnest problem ! " 
 
 "Then we are quite at one ! " 
 
 "We are. And it is to promote our wishes that I am 
 come, since she will do nothing of herself" 
 
 "Then you can give me no hope of a reply to my sec- 
 ond communication.?" 
 
 "None whatever, by letter," said Louis. " Her impres- 
 sion, plainly, is that she cannot encourage your lordship.
 
 TJVO ON A TOWER. 335 
 
 Yet, in the face of all this reticence, the secret is that she 
 loves you warmly." 
 
 " Can you indeed assure me of that ? Indeed, — indeed ! " 
 said Bishop Helmsdale musingly. "Then I must try to 
 see her. I begin to feel — to feel strongly — that a course 
 which would seem premature and unbecoming in other 
 cases would be true and proper conduct in this. Her 
 unhappy dilemmas, her unwonted position, yes, yes, I see 
 it all ! I can afford to have some little misconstruction 
 put upon my motives. I will go and see her immediately. 
 Her past has been a cruel one; she wants sympathy, and 
 with Heaven's help I'll give it." 
 
 "I think the remedy lies that way," said Louis gently. 
 " Some words came from her one night which seemed to 
 show it. I was standing on the terrace: I heard some- 
 body sigh in the dark, and found that it was she. I asked 
 her what was the matter, and gently pressed her on this 
 subject of boldly and promptly contracting a new marriage 
 as a means of dispersing the horrors of the old. Her an- 
 swer implied that she would have no objection to do it, 
 and to do it at once, provided she could remain externally 
 passive in the matter: that she would tacitly yield, in fact, 
 to pressure, but would not meet solicitation half-way. 
 Now, Bishop Helmsdale, you see what has prompted me. 
 On the one hand is a dignitary of high position and integ- 
 rity, to say no more, who is anxious to save her from the 
 gloom of her situation; on the other is this sister, who will 
 not make known to you her willingness to be saved, — 
 partly from apathy, partly from a fear that she may be 
 thought forward in responding favorably at so early a mo- 
 ment; partly, also, perhaps, from a modest sense that there
 
 336 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 would be some sacrifice on your part in allying yourself 
 with a woman of her secluded and sad experience." 
 
 "Oh, there is no sacrifice ! Quite otherwise. I care 
 greatly for this alliance, Mr. Glanville. Your sister is very 
 dear to me. Moreover, the advantages her mind would 
 derive from the enlarged field of activity that the position 
 of a bishop's wife would afford are palpable. I am in- 
 duced to think that an early settlement of the question, 
 an immediate coming to the point, which might be called 
 too early in the majority of cases, would be a right and 
 considerate tenderness here. My only dread is lest she 
 should think an immediate following up of the subject 
 premature. And the risk of a rebuff a second time is one 
 which, as you must perceive, it would be highly unbe- 
 coming in me to run.'' 
 
 "I think the risk would be small, if your lordship 
 would approach her frankly. Write she will not, I am 
 assured; and having her interest at heart, it was that which 
 induced me to come to you, and make this candid state- 
 ment in reply to your communication. Her late hu.sband 
 having been virtually dead these four or five years, believed 
 dead two years, and actually dead nearly one, no reproach 
 could attach to her if she were to contract another union 
 to- morrow. " 
 
 "I agree with you, Mr. Glanville," said the Bishop, 
 warmly. " I will think this over. Her motive in not re- 
 plying I can quite understand; your motive in coming I 
 can also understand and appreciate in a brother. If I feel 
 convinced that it would be a seemly and expedient thing, 
 I will come to Welland to morrow. " 
 
 The point to which Louis had brought the Bishop being
 
 TtVO ON A TOWER. 337 
 
 SO satisfactory, he feared to endanger it by another word. 
 The interview having ended as far as its object was con- 
 cerned, he went away almost hurriedly, and at once left 
 the precincts of the cathedral, lest another encounter with 
 Bishop Helmsdale should lead the latter to take a new 
 and slower view of his duties as Viviette's suitor. 
 
 He reached Welland by dinner-time, and came upon Vi- 
 viette in the same pensive mood in which he had left her. 
 It seemed that she had hardly moved since. 
 
 " Have you discovered Swithin St. Cleeve's address.'*" 
 she said, without looking up at him. 
 
 "No," said Louis. 
 
 Then she broke out with indescribable anguish: "But 
 you asked me to wait till this evening; and I have waited 
 through the long day in the belief that your words meant 
 something, and that you would bring good tidings 1 And 
 now I find your words meant nothing, and you have not 
 brought good tidings ! " 
 
 Louis could not decide for a moment what to say to this. 
 Should he venture to give her thoughts a new course by a 
 revelation of his design .-^ No; it would be better to pro- 
 long her despair yet another night, and spring relief upon 
 her suddenly, that she might jump at it, and commit her- 
 self without an interval for reflection on certain aspects of 
 the proceeding. 
 
 Nothing, accordingly, did he say, and, conjecturing that 
 she would be hardly likely to take any desperate step that 
 night, he left her to herself 
 
 His anxiety at this crisis began to be great. Ever}'thing 
 depended on the result of the Bishop's self-communion. 
 Would he, or would he not, come the next day } Perhaps
 
 338 TIVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 instead of his important presence there would appear a 
 letter postponing the visit indefinitely; if so, all would be 
 lost. The Bishop was as abjectly in love as only pompous 
 people can be; and this thought gave him hope. 
 
 Louiss suspense kept him awake, and he was not alone 
 in his sleeplessness. Through the night he heard his sis- 
 ter walking up and down, in a state which betokened that 
 for every pang of grief she had disclosed twice as many 
 had remained unspoken. He almost feared that she might 
 seek to end her existence by violence, so unreasonably 
 sudden were her moods; and he lay and longed for the day. 
 
 It was morning. She came down the same as usual, 
 and asked if there had arrived any telegram or letter; but 
 there was neither. Louis avoided her, knowing that noth- 
 ing he could say just then would do her any good. No 
 communication had reached him from the Bishop, and 
 that looked well. By one ruse and another, as the day went 
 on, he led her away from contemplating the remote possi- 
 bility of hearing from Swithin, and led her to look at the 
 worst contingency as her probable fate. It seemed as if 
 she really made up her mind to this, for by the afternoon 
 she was apathetic, like a woman who neither hoped nor 
 feared. 
 
 And then a fly drove up to the door. 
 
 Louis, who had been standing in the hall the greater 
 part of that day, glanced out through a private window, 
 and went to Viviette. "The Bishop has called," he said. 
 "Be ready to see him." 
 
 ' ' The Bishop of Melchester ^ " said Viviette, bewildered. 
 
 "Yes. I asked him to come. He comes for an an- 
 swer to his letters. "
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 339 
 
 "An answer — to — his — letters? " she murmured. 
 
 "An immediate reply of yes or no." 
 
 Her face showed the workings of her mind. How en- 
 tirely an answer of assent, at once acted on for better or 
 for worse, would clear the specter from her path, there 
 needed no tongue to tell. It would, moreover, accom- 
 plish that end without involving the impoverishment of 
 Swithin, the inevitable result if she had adopted the legiti- 
 mate road out of her trouble. Hitherto there had seemed 
 to her dismayed mind, unenlightened as to any course 
 save one of honesty, no possible achievement of bolh her 
 desires, — the saving of Swithin and the saving of herself. 
 But behold, here was a way ! A tempter had shown it to 
 her. It involved a great wrong, which to her had quite 
 obscured its feasibility. But she perceived now that it was 
 indeed a way. Nature was forcing her hand at this game; 
 and to what will not nature compel her weaker victims in 
 extremes .'' 
 
 Louis left her to think it out. When he reached the 
 drawing-room Dr. Helmsdale was standing there, with the 
 air of a man too good for his errand, — which was, indeed, 
 not lar from the truth. 
 
 "Have you broken my message to her.'" asked the 
 Bishop sonorously. 
 
 "Not your message; your visit," said Louis. "I leave 
 the rest in your lordship's hands. I have Qone all I can 
 for her. " 
 
 V'iviette was in her own small room to-day. Feeling 
 that it must be a bold stroke or none, Louis led the Bish- 
 op across the hall till they reached the apartment, opened 
 the door, and, instead of follo-.ving, shut it be!;ind \\m,.
 
 340 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 Then Glanville passed an anxious time. He walked 
 from the foot of the staircase to the star of old swords and 
 pikes on the wall; from these to the stags' horns; thence 
 down the corridor as far as the door, where he could hear 
 murmuring inside, but not its import. The longer they 
 remained closeted, the more excited did he become. That 
 she had not peremptorily negatived the proposal at the out- 
 set was a strong sign of its success. It showed that she 
 had admitted argument; and the worthy Bishop had a 
 pleader on his side whom he knew little of. The very 
 weaiher seemed to favor Dr. Helmsdale in his suit. A 
 blusterous wind had blown up from the west, howling in 
 the smokeless chimneys, and suggesting to the feminine 
 mind storms at sea, a tossing ocean, and the hopeless in- 
 accessibility of all astronomers and men on the other side 
 of the same. The Bishop had entered Viviette's room at ten 
 minutes past three. The longhand of the hall clock lay level 
 at forty-five minutes past when the knob of the door moved, 
 and became out. Louis met him where the passage joined the 
 hall. Dr. Helmsdale was decidedly in an emotional state, 
 his face being slightly flushed. Louis looked his anxious 
 inquiry without speaking it. 
 
 "She accepts me,'' said the Bishop in a low voice. 
 "And the wedding is to be soon. Her long solitude and 
 sufferings justify haste. What you said was true. Sheer 
 weariness and distraction have driven her to me. She was 
 quite passive at last, and agreed to anything I proposed, 
 — such is the persuasive force of a trained mind ! A good 
 and wise woman, she perceived what a true shelter from 
 sadness was offered, and was not the one to despise 
 Heaven's gift."
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 THE silence of Swithin was to be accounted for by the 
 circumstance that neither to Marseilles nor to America 
 had he, in the first place, directed his steps. Feeling him- 
 self absolutely free, he had, upon arriving at Southampton, 
 decided to make straight for the Cape. His object was to 
 leave his heavier luggage there, examine the capabilities 
 of the spot for his purpose, find out the necessity or other- 
 wise of shipping over his own equatorial, and then cross 
 to America as soon as there was a good opportunity. 
 Here he might inquire the movements of the transit expe- 
 dition to the South Pacific, and join it at such a point as 
 might be convenient. 
 
 Thus, though wrong in her premises, Viviette had in- 
 tuitively decided with absolute precision. There was, a? 
 a matter of fact, no chance of her being able to communi- 
 cate with him for several months, notwithstanding that he 
 might possibly communicate with her. 
 
 This excursive time was an awakening for Swithin. Tc 
 altered circumstances inevitably followed altered views. 
 That such changes should have a marked effect upon a 
 young m;in wIhj had made neither grand tour nor petty 
 one, — will) had. in short, scarcelv been away from home
 
 34 2 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 in his life, — was nothing more than natural. New ideas 
 struggled to disclose themselves; and with the addition of 
 strange twinklers to his southern horizon came an absorbed 
 attention that way, and a corresponding forgetfulness of 
 what lay to the north, behind his back, whether human 
 or celestial. Whoever may deplore it, few will wonder 
 that Viviette, who till then had stood high in his heaven, 
 if she had not dominated it, sank lower and lower, like 
 the North Star. Master of a large advance of his first 
 year's income in circular notes and other forms, he per- 
 haps too readily forgot that the mere act of honor, but foi 
 her self-suppression, would have rendered him penniless. 
 
 Meanwhile, to come back and claim her at the specified 
 time, four years thence, if she did not object to be claimed, 
 was as much a part of his programme as were the exploits 
 abroad and elsewhere that were to prelude it. The very 
 thoroughness of his intention for that advanced date in- 
 clined him all the more to shelve the subject now. Her 
 unhappy caution to him not to write too soon was a com- 
 fortable license in his present state of tensity about sublime 
 scientific things, which knew not woman, nor her sacri- 
 fices, nor her fears. In truth, he was not only too young 
 in years, but too literal, direct, and uncompromising in 
 nature, to understand such a woman as Lady Constan- 
 tine; and she suffered for that limitation in him, as was 
 antecedently probable she would do. 
 
 He staid but a little time at Cape Town, on this first, 
 reconiioitering journey, and on that account wrote to no 
 one from there. On leaving, he found there remained 
 some weeks on his hands before he wished to cross to 
 America, and feeling an irrepressible desire for further
 
 TfVO ON A TOWER. 343 
 
 studies in navigation under clear skies, he took the steamer 
 for INIelbourne; returning thence in due time, and pursu- 
 ing his journey to America, where he landed at Boston. 
 Having at last had enough of great circles and other nau- 
 tical reckonings, and taking no interest in men or cities, 
 this indeflitigablc scrutineer of the universe went immedi- 
 ately to Cambridge; and there, by the help of an intrc-du :- 
 tion he had brought from England, he reveled for a time 
 in the glories of the gigantic refractor (which he was per- 
 mitted to use on odd occasions), and in the pleasures of 
 intercourse with the sciendfic group around. This brought 
 him on to the tirne of starting with the transit expedition, 
 when he and his kind became lost to the eye of civiliza- 
 tion behind the horizon of the Pacific Ocean. 
 
 To speak of their doings on this pilgrimage, of ingress 
 and egress, of tangent and parallax, of external and inter- 
 nal contact, would avail nothing. Is it not all written in 
 the chronicles of the Astronomical Society 1 More to the 
 point will it be to mention that poor Viviette's telegram and 
 letter to Cambridge had been returned long before Swithin 
 reached that place, while her missives to Marseilles were of 
 course misdirected altogether. On arriving in America, 
 uncertain of an address in that country to which he would 
 return, Swithin wrote his first letter to his grandmother; 
 and in this he directed that all communications should be 
 sent to await him at Cape Town, as the only safe spot for 
 finding him sooner or later. The equatorial he also di- 
 rected to be forwarded to the same place. At this dme, 
 too, he ventured to break Viviette's commands, and ad- 
 dress a letter to her, not knowing of the strange results 
 that had followed his absence from home.
 
 344 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 It was February. The transit was over; thj scientific 
 company had broken up; and Swithin had steamed tow- 
 artls tlie Cape, to take up his permanent abode there, with 
 ;i view to his great task of surveying, charting, and theoriz- 
 ing on those exceptional features in the southern skies 
 wliich had been but inadequately treated bytheycunger 
 Herschel. Having entered Table Bay, and landed on the 
 quay, he called at once at the post-office. 
 
 Two letters were handed him, and he found from the 
 date that they had been waiting there for some time. One 
 of these epistles, which had a weather-worn look as re- 
 garded the ink, and was in old-fashioned penmanship, he 
 knew to be from his grandmother, and opened it b^ore 
 he had as much as glanced at the superscription of the 
 second. 
 
 Besides immaterial portions, it contained the following: — 
 
 J reckon you know by now of our main news Uiis fall, but lest 
 you should not have heard of it J send the exact thing snipped out of 
 the new.spaper. Nobody expected her to do it quite so soon; but it 
 is said hereabout that my lord bishop and my lady had been drawing 
 nigh to an understanding before the glum tidings of Sir Blount's a taking 
 of his own life reached her; and the account of this wicked deed was so 
 sore afflicting to her mind, and made her poor heart so timid and low, 
 that in charity to her her few friends agreed on urging her to let the 
 bishop go on paying his court as before, notwithstanding she had not 
 been a widow-woman near so long as was thought. 'I'his, as it turned 
 out, she was willing to do; and when my lord asked her she lol 1 hiin 
 s!ie would marry him at once or never. That's as J ^vas told, ixiA J 
 had it from those that know. 
 
 The cutting from the newspaper was an ordinary an- 
 nouncement of marriage between the Bishop of Melchester 
 and Lady Constantine.
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 345 
 
 Swithin was so astounded at the intelligence of what foi 
 the nonce seemed Viviette's wanton fickleness, that he 
 quite omitted to look at the second letter, and remem- 
 bered nothing about it till an hour afterwards, when sitting 
 in his room at the hotel. 
 
 It was in her handwriting, but so altered that its super- 
 scription had not arrested his eye. It had no beginning, 
 or date; but its contents soon acquainted him with her 
 motive for the precipitate act. The few concluding sen- 
 tences are all that it will be necessary to quote here:^ 
 
 There was no way out of it, even if I could have found you, without 
 infringing one of the conditions I had previously laid down. The long 
 desne of my heart has been not to impoverish you or mar your career. 
 The new desire was to save myself and another. ... I have done 
 a desperate thing. Yet for myself I could do no better, and for you 
 no less. I would have sacrificed my single self to honesty; but I 
 was not alone concerned. What woman has a right to blight a com- 
 ing life to pre-^erve her personal soul ? . . . The one bright spot is 
 that it Kives you and your endowment from further catastrophes, and 
 preserves you lo the pleasant paths of scientific fame. I no longer lie 
 like a log across your path, which is now as open as on the day be- 
 fore you saw me, and ere I encouraged you to win me. Alas, Swith- 
 in, I ought to have known better ! The folly was great, and the 
 suffering be upon my head ! 1 have borne much, and am not unpre- 
 pared. As for you, Swithin, by simply pressmg straight on, your 
 triumph i; assured. Do not communicate with me in any way, — not 
 even in answer to this. Do not think of me. Do not see me ever 
 any more. Your unhappy 
 
 ViVIETTE. 
 
 Swithin's heart swelled within him in sudden pity for 
 her, first; then he blanched with a horrified sense of what 
 she had done, and at his own relation to the deed. He
 
 346 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 felt like an awakened somnambulist, who should find that 
 he had been accessory to a tragedy during a period of 
 unconsciousness. She had loosened the knot of her dif- 
 ficulties by cutting it unscrupulously through and through. 
 The big tidings rather dazed than crushed him, his pre- 
 dominant feeling being soon again one of keenest sorrow 
 and sympathy. Yet one thing was obvious: he could do 
 nothing, — absolutely nothing. The event which he now 
 heard of for the first time had taken place five long, months 
 ago. He reflected, and regretted, and mechanically went 
 on with his preparations for settling down to work under 
 the shadow of Table Mountain. He was as one who sutl- 
 denly finds the world a stranger place than he thought; but 
 is excluded by age, temperament, and situation from be- 
 ing much more than an astonished spectator of its strange- 
 ness. 
 
 The Royal Observatory was about a mile out of the town, 
 and hither he repaired as soon as he had established him- 
 self in lodgings. He had decided, on his first visit to the 
 Cape, that it would be highly advantageous to him if he 
 could supplement the occasional use of the large instru- 
 ments here by the use at his own house of his own equa- 
 torial, and had accordingly given directions that it might 
 be sent over from England. The precious possession now 
 arrived; and although the sight of it — of the brasses on which 
 her hand had often rested, of the eye-piece through which 
 her dark eye had beamed — engendered some decidedly 
 bitter regrets in him for a time, he could not long afford 
 to give to the past the days that were meant for the future. 
 
 Unable to get a room convenient for a private observa-
 
 TfVO ON- A TOWER. 34? 
 
 tory, he resolved at last to fix the instrument en a solid 
 pillar in the garden; and several days were spent in accom- 
 modating it to its new position. In this latitude there was 
 no necessity for economizing clear nights, as he had been 
 obliged to do on the old tower at Welland. There it had 
 happened more than once, to his sorrow, that, after he had 
 waited idle through days and nights of cloudy weather, 
 poor Viviette would fix her time for meeting him at an 
 hour when at lasf he had an opportunity of seeing the sky; 
 so that m giving to her the golden moments of cloudles?- 
 ness he was losing his chance with the orbs above. But 
 here there was clear atmosphere enough for both science 
 and love, had an object for the latter been present with him. 
 
 Those features which usually attract the eye of the visi- 
 tor to a new latitude are the novel forms of human and 
 vegetable life, and other such sublunary things. But our 
 young man glanced slightingly at these: the changes over- 
 head had his attention. The old subject was imprinted 
 there, but in a new type. Here was a heaven fixed and 
 ancient as the northern; yet it had never appeared above 
 the Welland hills since they were heaved up from beneath. 
 Here was an unalterable circumpolar region: but the polar 
 patterns, stereotyped in history and legend, without which 
 it had almost seemed that a polar sky could not exist, had 
 never been seen therein. 
 
 St. Cleeve, as was natural, began by cursory surveys, 
 which were not likely to be of much utility to the world 
 or to himself He wasted several weeks — indeed, above 
 two months — in a comparatively idle survey of southern 
 novelties; in the mere luxury of looking at stellar objects 
 whose wonders were known, recounted, and classified long
 
 348 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 before his own personality had been heard of. With a 
 child's simple delight, he allowed his instrument to rove 
 evening after evening from the gorgeous glitter of Canopus 
 to the hazy clouds of Magellan. Before he had well fin- 
 ished this optical prelude there floated over to him from 
 the other side of the equator the postscript to the epistle 
 of his poor Viviette. It came in the vehicle of a common 
 newspaper, under the head of "Births: " — 
 
 "April lo. 18 — , at The I'alace, Melchester, Lady 
 Helmsdale, ofason.'"'
 
 CHAPTER XU. 
 
 npHREE years passed away, and Swithin still remained 
 ^ at the Cape, quietly pursuing the work that had 
 brought him there. His memoranda of observations had 
 accumulated to a wheelbarrow load, and he was beginning 
 to shape them into a work of scientific utility. 
 
 He had gauged the southern skies with greater results 
 than even he himself had anticipated. Those unfamiliar 
 constellations which, to the casual beholder, are at most 
 a new arrangement of ordinar}' points of light were to 
 this professed astronomer, as to his brethren, a far greater 
 matter. It was below the surface that his material lay. 
 There, in regions revealed only to the instrumental ob- 
 server, were suns of hybrid kind, fire fogs, floating world 
 pollen, globes that flew in groups, like swarms of bees, 
 and other extraordinary sights, which, when decomposed 
 by Swithin's equatorial, turned out to be the beginning 
 of a new series of phenomena, instead of the end of an 
 old one. 
 
 There were gloomy deserts in those southern skies, 
 such as the north shows scarcely an example of; sites set
 
 350 riVO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 apart for the position of suns, which for some unfathom- 
 able reason were left uncreated, their places remaining con 
 spicuous by their emptiness. 
 
 The inspection of these chasms brought him a second 
 pulsation of that old horror which he had used to describe 
 to Viviette as produced in him by bottomlessness in the 
 north heaven. The ghostly finger of limitless vacancy 
 touched him now on the other side. Infinite deeps in 
 the north stellar region had a homely familiarity about 
 them when compared with infinite deeps in the region of 
 the south pole. This was an even more unknown tract 
 of the unknown; space here, being less the historic haunt 
 of human thought than overhead at home, seemed per- 
 vaded with a more lonely loneliness. 
 
 Were there given on paper to these astronomical exer- 
 citations of St. Cleeve a space proportionable to that oc- 
 cupied by his year with Viviette at Welland, this narrative 
 would treble its length; but not a single additional glimpse 
 would be afforded of Swithin in his relations with old 
 emotions. In these experiments with convex glasses, im- 
 portant as they were to eye and intellect, there was little 
 food for the sympathetic instincts which create the changes 
 in a life, and therefore are more particularly the question 
 here. That which is the foreground and measuring base 
 of one perspective draught may be the vanishing-point of 
 another perspective draught, while yet they are both draughts 
 of the same tKing. Swithin's doings and discoveries in 
 the southern sidereal .system were, no doubt, incidents of 
 the highest importance to him; and yet, from our present 
 point of view, they served but the humble purpose of kill- 
 ing lime, while other doings, more nearly allied to his
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 35 1 
 
 heart than to his understanding, developed themselves at 
 home. 
 
 In the intervals between his professional occupations 
 he took walks over the sand-flats near, or among the farms 
 wh'ch were gradually overspreading the moors in the vi- 
 cinity of Cape Town. He grew familiar with the outline 
 of Table-IMountain, and the fleecy "Devil's lable-Cloth " 
 which used to settle on its top when the wind was south- 
 east. On these promenades he would more particularly 
 think of Viviette, and of that curious pathetic chapter in 
 his life with her, which seemed to have wound itself up 
 and ended forever. Those scenes were rapidly receding 
 into distance, and the intensity of his sentiment regarding 
 them had proportionately abated. He felt that there had 
 been something wrong in that period of his existence, 
 and yet he could not exactly define the boundary of the 
 wrong. Viviette's sad and amazing sequel to that chapter 
 had still a fearful, catastrophic aspect in his eyes; but in- 
 stead of musing over it and its bearings, he shunned the 
 subject, as we shun by night the shady scene of a tragedy, 
 and keep to the open road. 
 
 He sometimes contemplated her apart from the past, 
 — leading her life in the cathedral Close at Melchester; 
 and wondered how often she looked south and thought 
 of where he was. 
 
 On one of these afternoon walks in the neighborhood 
 ot" the Royal Observatory, he turned and looked towards 
 the signal-post on the Lions Rump. This was a high 
 promonto.y to the northwest of lable Mountain, which 
 overlooked Table Bay. Before his eyes had left the scene 
 the sign.il was suddenly hoisted on the staff. This an-
 
 352 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 nounced that a mail steamer had appeared in view i ver 
 the sea. He retraced his steps, as he had often done on 
 such occasions, and strolled leisurely across the interven- 
 ing mile and a half, till he arrived at the post-office 
 door. 
 
 There was no letter from England for him; but there 
 was a newspaper, addressed in the seventeenth-century hand- 
 writing of his grandmother, who, in spite of her great age, 
 still retained a steady hold on life. He turned away dis- 
 appointed, and resumed his walk into the country, open- 
 ing the paper as he went along. 
 
 A cross in black ink attracted his attention; and it was 
 opposite a name among the deaths. His blood ran icily 
 as he discerned the word " Helmsdale." But it was not 
 she. Her husband, the Bishop of Melchester, had, after 
 a short illness, departed this life at the comparatively early 
 age of fifty years. 
 
 All the enactments of the bygone days at Welland now 
 started up like an awakened army from the ground. Only 
 a few months were wanting to the time when he would be 
 of an ag-e to marrv withe ut sacrificing the annuitv which 
 formed his means of subsistence. It was a point in his life 
 that had had no meaning or interest for him since his sep- 
 aration from \'iv!ette, for women were now no mure to 
 him than the inhabitants of Jupiter. However, the whirli- 
 gig of time having again set Viviette free, the aspect of 
 home altered, and conjecture as to her future found room 
 to work anew. 
 
 But beyond the simple fact that she was a widow, he for 
 some time gained not an atom of intelligence concerning 
 her. There was no one of whom he could inquire but
 
 TWO OjV a tower. 353 
 
 his grandmother, and she could tell him nothing about 
 a lady who dwelt far away at Melchester. 
 
 Several months slipped by thus: and no feeling within 
 him rose to sufficient strength to force him out of a passive 
 attitude. 
 
 Then, by the merest chance, his granny stated, in one 
 of her rambling epistles, that Lady Helmsdale was coming 
 to live again at Welland, in the old house, with her child, 
 now a little bov between three and four vears of age. 
 
 Swithin, however, lived on as before. 
 
 By the following autumn a change became necessary 
 for the young man himself His work at the Cape was 
 done. His uncle's wishes that he should study there had 
 been more than observed. The materials for his great 
 treatise were collected, and it now only remained for hmi 
 to arrange, digest, and publish them, for which purpose 
 a return to England was indispensable. 
 
 So the equatorial was unscrewed and the stand taken 
 down; the astronomer's barrow-load of precious memo- 
 randa, and rolls upon rolls of diagrams, representing three 
 years of continuous labor, were safely packed; and Swith- 
 in departed for good and all from the shores of Cape 
 Town. 
 
 He had long before informed his grandmother of \.\\i 
 date at which she might expect him, and in a reply from 
 her, which reached him just previous to sailing, she casu- 
 ally mentioned that she frequently saw Lady Helmsdale; 
 that on the last occasion her ladyship had shown great in- 
 terest in the information that Swithin was coming home, 
 and had inquired the time of his return.
 
 354 TfFO ON A TOlfER. 
 
 On a late summer day Swithin stepped from the train 
 at Warborne, and, directing his baggage to be sent on 
 after him, set out on foot for old Welland once again. 
 
 It seemed but the day after his departure, so little had 
 the scene changed. True, there was that change which 
 is always the first to arrest attention in places that are 
 conventionally called unchanging, — a higher and broader 
 vegetation at every familiar corner than at the former time. 
 
 He had not gone a mile when he saw walking before 
 him a clergyman, whose form, after consideration, he 
 recognized, in spite of a novel whiteness in that part of 
 his hair that showed below the brim of his hat. Swithin 
 walked much faster than this gentleman, and soon was at 
 his side. 
 
 "Mr. Torkingham — I knew it was ! " said Swithin. 
 
 Mr. Torkingham was slower in recognizing the astrono- 
 mer, but in a moment had greeted him with a warm shake 
 of the hand. 
 
 " 1 have been to the station on purpose to meet you ! " 
 cried Mr. Torkingham; "and was returning with the idea 
 that you had not come. I am your grandmother's emissary. 
 She could not come herself, and as she was anxious, and 
 nobody else could be spared, I came for her." 
 
 Then they walked on together. The parson told Swithin 
 all about his grandmother, the parish, and his endeavors to 
 enlighten it; and in due course said, "You d.ie no doubt 
 aware that Lady Helmsdale — the Lady Constantine of 
 former days — is living again at Welland. '' 
 
 Swithin said he had heard as much, and added, what 
 was perfectly true, that the news of the Bishop's death 
 had been a great surprise to hira.
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 355 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Torkingham, with nine thoughts to 
 one word; "one might have prophesied, to look at him, 
 that Melchester would not lack a bishop for the next forty 
 rears. Yes; pale death knocks at the cottages of the poor 
 and the palaces of kings with an impartial foot." 
 
 " Was he a — particularly go;xl man '. " asked Swithin. 
 
 " He was not a Ken, or a Flebcr. To speak candidly, 
 he had his faults, of which arrogance was not the least. 
 But who is perfect ? " 
 
 Swithin, somehow, felt relieved to hear that the Bishop 
 was not a perfect man. 
 
 " His poor wife, I fear, had not a great deal more 
 happiness with him than with her first husband. But 
 one might almost have foreseen it: the marriage was hasty, 
 — the icsult of a red-hot caprice, hardly becoming to a 
 min in his position; and it betokened a want of tem- 
 perate discretion which .soon showed itself in other ways. 
 That's all there was to be said against him; and now it's 
 all over, and things have settled again into their old course. 
 But Lady Helmsdale is not Lady Constantine. No; put 
 it as you will, she is not the .same. There seems to be 
 a nameless .something on her mind, a trouble, a rooted 
 melancholy, which no man's ministry can reach. Formerly 
 >he was a woman whose confidence it was easy to gain; 
 :)ut neither religion nor philosophy avails with her now. 
 iJevond that, her life is strangely like what it was when 
 \iiu were with us." 
 
 Conversing thus they pursued the turnpike road, till 
 iheir conversation was interrupted by a crying voice on 
 their left. They looked, and perceived that a child, iq 
 getting over an adjoining stile, had fallen on his face.
 
 $Sb TJFO OAT A TOWER. 
 
 Mr. Torkingham and Swithin both hastened up to helj: 
 the sufferer, who was a lovely little fellow with flaxen hair, 
 which spread out in a frill of curls from beneath a quaint 
 close-fitting velvet cap that he wore. Swithin picked hirr 
 up, while Mr. Torkingham wiped the sand from his lii> 
 and nose, and administered a few words of consolation 
 together with a few sweetmeats, which, somewhat to Swith- 
 in's surprise, the parson produced as if by magic from his 
 pocket. One half the comfort rendered would have sufficed 
 to soothe such a disposition as the child's; he ceased cry- 
 ing, and ran away in delight to his unconscious nurse, 
 who was reaching up for blackberries at a hedge some 
 wa}' off. 
 
 "You know who he i.s, of course," said ]Mr. Torking- 
 ham, as they resumed their journey. 
 
 "No," said Swithin. 
 
 "Oh, I thought you did. Yet how should you .^ It 
 is Lady Helmsdale's bo}', her only child. His fond mother 
 little thinks he is so far awav from home." 
 
 "Dear me — Lady Helmsdale's — ah — how interesting!" 
 Swithin paused abstractedly for a moment; then stepped 
 back again to the stile, where he stood watching the little 
 boy out of sight. 
 
 "I can never venture out-of-doors now without sweetj 
 in my pocket," continued the good-natured vicar; "and 
 the result is that I meet that young man more frequeiitl) 
 than any other of my parishioners. " 
 
 St. Cleeve was silent, and they turned into V.'elland 
 Lane, where their paths presently diverged, and Swithin 
 was left to pursue his way alone. He might have accc)m- 
 panied the vicar yet further, and gone straight to Weiland
 
 nVO ON A TOWER. 357 
 
 House; but, it would liave been difficult to do so then 
 without provoking inquiry. It was easy to go there now: 
 by a cross-path he could be at the mansion almost as soon 
 as by the direct road. And yet Swithin did not turn; he felt 
 an indescribable reluctance to see Viviette. He could not 
 exactly say why. i\Ioreover, before he knew how the land 
 lay, it might be awkward to attempt to call; and this was 
 a sufficient excuse for postponement. 
 
 In this mood he went on, following the direct way to 
 his grandmother's homestead. He reached the garden 
 gate, and, looking into the boskv basin in which the old 
 house stood, saw a graceful female form, moving before the 
 porch, bidding adieu to some one within the door. 
 
 He wondered what creature of that mold his grand- 
 mother could know, and went forward with some hesita- 
 tion. At his approach the apparition turned, and he be- 
 held, developed into blushing womanhood, one who had 
 once been known to him as the village maiden, Tabitha 
 Lirk. Seeing Swithin, and apparently from an instinct 
 tliat her presence would not be desirable just tlien, she 
 moved quickly round into the garden. 
 
 The returned astronomer entered the house, where he 
 found awaiting him poor old Mrs. Martin, to whose earthly 
 course death stood rather as the asymptote than as the end 
 She was perceptibly smaller in form than when he had left 
 her, and she could see less distinctly. A rather affecting 
 greeting followed, in which his grandmother murmured 
 the words of Israel: "Now let me die, since 1 have seen 
 tiiy face, because thoii art yet alive." 
 
 The form of Hai7nah had disappeared from the kitchen, 
 that ancient servant having been gathered to her fathers
 
 358 TIFO ON A TOWER. 
 
 about six months before, her place being filled by a young 
 girl, who knew not Joseph. 
 
 They presently chatted with much cheerfulness, and 
 his grandmother said, "Have you heard what a wonderful 
 young woman IMiss Lark has become ? — a mere fleet 
 footed, slittering maid when you were last home." 
 
 St. Clee\e had not heard, but he had partly seen, and 
 he was informed that Tabitha had left Welland shortly 
 after his own departure, and had studied music with great 
 success in London, where she had resided ever since till 
 quite recently; that she played at concerts, at oratorios; 
 that she had, in short, joined the phalanx of wonderful 
 women who have sternly resolved to eclipse masculine 
 genius altogether, and humiliate the brutal sex to the 
 dust. 
 
 "She is only in the garden," added his grandmother. 
 "Why don't ye go out and speak to her .^ " 
 
 Swithin was nothing loath, and strolled out under the 
 apple-trees, where he arrived just in time to prevent Miss 
 Lark from going off by the back gate. There was not 
 much difficulty in breaking ice between them, and they 
 began to chat with vivacity. 
 
 Now all these proceedings occupied time, for somehow 
 it was very charming to talk to Miss Lark; and by degree? 
 St. Cleeve told Tabidia of his great undertaking, and of 
 the voluminous notes he had amassed, which would re 
 quire so much rearrangement and recopying by an aman- 
 uensis as to absolutely appall him. He greatly feared he 
 should not get one careful enough for such scientific mat- 
 ter, — whereupon Tabitha said she would be delighted to 
 do it for him. Then, blushing, and declaring suddenly
 
 TIVO ON A TOWER. 359 
 
 that it had grown quite late, she left him and the garden 
 for her relation's house, hard bv. 
 
 Swiihin, no less than Tabitha, had been surprised by 
 the disappearance of the sun behind the hill; and the ques- 
 tion now arose whether it would be advisable to call upon 
 Viviette that night. There was little doubt that she knew 
 Df his coming, but more than that he could not predicate 
 and being entirely ignorant of whom she had around her, 
 entirely in the dark as to her present feelings towards him, 
 he thought it would be better to defer his visit until the 
 next day. 
 
 Walking round to the front of the house, he beheld the 
 well-known agriculturists, Hezzy Biles, Haymoss Fry, and 
 some others of the same old school, passing the garden 
 gate homeward from their work, with bundles of wood 
 upon their backs. Swithin saluted them over the top- 
 rail. 
 
 "Well! do my eyes and ears" — began Hezzy; and 
 then, with a smile almost as wide as the gate, and balanc- 
 ing his fagot on end against the hedge, he came forward, 
 the others following. 
 
 "Says I to myself, as soon as I heerd his voice," Hezzy 
 continued (addressing Swithin as if he were a disinterested 
 spectator, and not himself), "Please God I'll pitch my 
 nitch, and go across and speak to en." 
 
 " I knowed in a winking 'twas some great navigator that 
 I see a standing there," said Haymoss. "But whe'r 'twere 
 a sort of nabt)b, or a diment-digger, or a lion-hunter, 1 
 couldn't so much as guess till I heerd en spak. " 
 
 ' ' And what changes have come over WeJ.land since \ 
 was last at honie ? " asked Swithin.
 
 360 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Sail Cleeve," Hezzy replied, "when you've 
 said that a few stripling boys and maidens have busted into 
 blooth, and a few married women have plimmed and 
 chimped (my lady among 'em), why, you've said anighst 
 all, Mr. San Cleeve." 
 
 The conversation thus begun was continued on diver«. 
 matters, till they were all enveloped in total darkness, when 
 his old acquaintance shouldered their fagots again and pro- 
 ceeded on their way. 
 
 Now that he was actually within hei coasts again, Swith- 
 in felt a little more strongly the influence of the past and 
 Viviette than he had been accustomed to do for the last 
 two or three years. During the night he felt half sorry 
 that he had not marched off to the great house to see her, 
 regardless of the time of day. If she really nourished for 
 him any particle of her old affection, it had been the crud- 
 est thing not to call. A few questions that he had put 
 concerning her to his grandmother elicited that Lady 
 Helmsdale had no friends about her, not even her brother, 
 and that her health had not been so good since her return 
 from Melchester as formerly. Still, this proved nothing 
 as to the state of her heart; and as slie had kept a dead 
 silence since the Bishop's death, it was quite possible that 
 .she would meet him with that cold, repressive tone and 
 manner which experienced women know so well how to 
 put on when they wish to intimate to the long-lost lover 
 that old episodes arc to be taken as forgotten. 
 
 The next morning he prepared to call, if only on the 
 ground of old acquaintance; for Swithin was too straight- 
 forward to do anything indirectly. It was rather too early 
 for this purpose when he went out from his grandmother's
 
 TtVO ON A TOWER. 361 
 
 garden gale, after breakfast, and he waited in the garden 
 While ae hngered his eye fell on the Rings-Hill Speer. 
 It appeared dark, for a moment, against the blue sky 
 behind it; then the lleeting cloiul which shadowed it 
 passed on, and the face of the column brightened into 
 such luminousness that the sky behind sank to the com- 
 plexion of a dark foil. 
 
 "Surely somebody is on the column,'' he said to him- 
 self, after gazing at it a while. , 
 
 Instead of going straight to the great house, he deviated 
 through the insulating Held, now sown to turnips, which 
 surrounded the plantation on Rings-Hill. By the time 
 that he plunged under the trees he was still more certain 
 that somebody was on the tower. He crept up co the 
 base with proprietary curiosity, for the spot seemed again 
 like his own. 
 
 The path still remained much as formerly, but the nook 
 in which the cabin had stood was covered with under- 
 growth. .Swithin entered the door of the tower, ascended 
 the staircase about half-way on tip-toe, and listened, for he 
 (lid not wish to intrude on the top if any stranger were there. 
 Tiie iiollow spiral, as he knew from old experience, would 
 I): ing down to his ears the slightest sound from above; and 
 it now revealed to him the vvords of a dialogue in progress 
 ;ii the summit of the tower. 
 
 "Mother, what shall I do?" a child's voice said. "Shall 
 ! sing.^" 
 
 The mother seemed to assent, for the child began: — 
 
 " The robin has fled from the wood 
 To the snug habitation of tnan,"
 
 362 TIVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 This performance apparently attracted but little attention 
 from the child's companion, for the young voice suggested, 
 as a new form of entertainment, "Shall I say my prayers?" 
 
 " Yes,'' replied one whom Swithin had begun to recog- 
 nize. 
 
 "Who shall I pray for?" 
 
 No answer. 
 
 "Who shall I pray for?" 
 
 ' ' Pray for father. " 
 
 ' ' But he is gone to heaven. " 
 
 A sigh from Viviette was distinctly audible. 
 
 " You made a mistake, didn't you ? " continued the lit- 
 tle one. 
 
 " I must have, — the strangest mistake a woman ever 
 made ! " 
 
 Nothing more was said, and Swithin ascended, words 
 from above indicating that his footsteps were heard. In 
 another half minute he rose through the hatchway. A lady 
 in black was sitting in the sun, and the boy with the golden 
 hair whom he had seen yesterday, was at her feet. 
 
 "Viviette ! " he said. 
 
 "Swithin I — at last ! " she cried. 
 
 The words died upon her lips, and from very faintness 
 ?'ie bent her head. For instead of rushing forward to her 
 he had stood still; and there appeared upon his face a look 
 which there was no mistaking. 
 
 . Yes; he was shocked at her worn and faded aspect. The 
 image which he had mentally carried out with him to the 
 Cape he had brought home again as that of the woman he 
 was now to rejoin. But another woman sat before him, 
 and not the original Viviette. Her cheeks had lost foi
 
 TJFO ON A TOWER. 363 
 
 ever that firm contour which had been drawn by the vig- 
 orous hand of youth, and the masses of hair that were once 
 darkness visible had become touched here and there by a 
 faint gray haze, hke the Via Lactea in a midnight sky. 
 
 Yet to those who had eyes to understand, as well as to 
 see, the chastened sweetness of her once handsome fea 
 tures revealed more promising material beneath than evci 
 her youth had done. But Swithin was hopelessly her 
 junior. Unhappily for her, he had now just arrived at 
 an age whose canon of faith it is that the silly period 
 of woman's life is her only period of beauty. Viviette 
 saw it all, and knew that time had at last brought about 
 his revenge. She had tremblingly watched and waited, 
 without sleep, ever since Swithin had re-entered Welland; 
 and it was for this. 
 
 Swithin came forward, and took her by the hand, whicb 
 she passively allowed him to do. 
 
 "Swathin, you don't love me," she said, simply. 
 
 " Oh, Viviette 1 " 
 
 "You don't love me," she repeated. 
 
 "Don't say it!" 
 
 "Yes, but I will I You have a right not to love me. 
 You did once. But now I am an old woman, and you 
 are still a young man; so how can you love me.'' I do 
 not expect it. It is kind and charitable of you to come 
 and see me here. " 
 
 "I have come all the way from the Cape," he faltered; 
 for her insistence took all power out of him to deny, in 
 mere politeness, what she said. 
 
 "Yes, you have come from the Cape; but not for me," 
 she answ.^red. " It would be absuril if vou had come f^r
 
 304 TJVO ON A TOWER. 
 
 me. You have come because your work there is finished 
 . . . . I like to sit here with my little boy; it is a 
 pleasant spot. It was once something to us, was it not ? 
 But that was long ago. You scarcely knew m,e for the 
 same woman, did you } " 
 
 " Knew you ? Yes, of course I knew you I " 
 
 "You looked as if you did not. But you must not 
 be surprised at me. I belong to an earlier generation 
 than you, remember. " 
 
 Thus, in sheer bitterness of spirit did she inflict wounds 
 on herself by exaggerating the difference in their years. 
 But she had, nevertheless, spoken truly. Sympathize with 
 her as he might, and as he unquestionably did, he loved 
 her no longer. But why had she expected otherwise .-* 
 O woman, might a prophet have said to her, great is 
 thy faith if thou believest a junior lover's love will last 
 five vears ! 
 
 "I shall be glad to know through your grandmother 
 how you are getting on,' she said weakly. "But now 
 — I would much rather that we part. Yes; do not ques- 
 tion me. I would rather that we part. Good-bye ! " 
 
 Hardly knowing what he did, he touched her hand, 
 and obeyed. He was a scientist, and took words literally. 
 There is something in the inexorably simple logic of such 
 men which partakes of the cruelty of the natural laws that 
 are their study. He entered the tower and mechanically 
 descended the steps; and it w-as not till he got half-way 
 down that he thought she could not mean what she had 
 said. 
 
 Before leaving Cape Town he had made up his mind 
 on this one point: that if she were willing to marrry him,
 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 3^5 
 
 marry her lie would, without, kt or hindrance. Thai 
 much he morally owed her, and lie was not the man 
 to demur. And though the Swithin who had returned 
 was not quite the Swithin who had gone away, thougii 
 he could not now love her with the sort of love he had 
 once bestowed, he believed that all her conduct had 
 been dictated by the p)urest benevolence to him; bv that 
 charity which " seeketh not her own." Hence he did 
 not flinch from a wish to deal with loving kindness to- 
 wards her, — a sentiment, perhaps, in the long run, more 
 to be prized than lover's love. 
 
 Her manner had caught him unawares; but now, re- 
 covering himself, he turned back determinedly. Bursting 
 out upon the roof, he clasped her in his arms, and kissed 
 her several times. 
 
 "Viviette, Viviette," he said, "I have come to marry 
 you I " 
 
 She uttered a shriek, — a shriek of amazed joy, — such 
 as never was heard on that tower before or since, and fell 
 in his arms, clasping his neck. 
 
 There she lay heavily. Not to disturb her he sat down 
 in her seat, still holding her fast. The little boy, who 
 had stood with round conjectural eyes throughout the 
 meeting, now came close; and presently, looking up to 
 Swithin, said, " Mother has gone to sleep." 
 
 Swithin looked down and started. Her tight clasp had 
 loosened. A wave of whiteness, like that of marV'.e which 
 has never seen the sun, crept up from her neck, and trav- 
 eled upwards and onwards over her cheek, lips, eyelids, 
 forehead, temples; its margin banishing back the live pink 
 till the latter had entirely disappeared.
 
 366 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 The little boy began to cry; but in his concentralicn 
 Swithiii hardly heard it. "Viviette, Viviette ! " he said. 
 
 The child cried with still deeper grief, and pushed his 
 hind into Swilhin's for protection. ''Hush, hush, my 
 child 1 " said Swithin distractedly. " I'll take care of you. 
 Oh, Viviette I " lie exclaimed again, pressing her face to 
 his. But she did not reply. "What can this be .-^ " he 
 asked himself He would not then answer according to 
 his fear. 
 
 But he had to do so soon. Sudden joy after despair 
 had touched an overstrained heart too smartlv. Viviette 
 was dead. The Bishop was avenged. 
 
 TH£ END.
 
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 THE LIBRARY
 
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