UC-NRLF 
 
THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 ALUMNUS 
 BOOK FUND 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTEK. 
 
 Naoel 
 
 BY JUSTIN MCCARTHY, 
 
 i S * 
 
 AUTHOR OF "THE WATERDALE NEIGHBORS," &c. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 FRANKLIN SQUARE. 
 1869. 
 
ALUMNUS 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 RETROSPECT ; AND MIST. 
 
 IT is a wet Sunday evening in the leaden heart 
 of London. I am now in the Bloomsbury re- 
 gion; and perhaps I need hardly say that no- 
 thing on earth could be more dull, dingy, and 
 impicturesque in itself than the prospect from 
 my windows. Yet just now, in the deepening 
 gloom of a rainy dusk, I seem to look on some- 
 thing not unlike one of the most picturesque 
 and romantic scenes whereon my eyes have ever 
 rested. " Ich weiss nicht was soil es bedeuten ; " 
 but the ridges of the houses opposite begin to 
 show through the steaming mist fantastically 
 like the outlines of the hills I used to see every 
 day years ago, and the broad blank lying be- 
 tween me and over the way may easily enough 
 seem filled by the stretch of bay I have watched 
 when it lay wild and^ drear on the wet evenings 
 -of late autumn like 'this. The kindly, loving, 
 artistic fog and rain, which now hide all but 
 the faint and softened outlines of our street, 
 have done this for me; and lo! in Bloomsbury 
 I am looking upon sea and hill once more. 
 The very sounds of London city-life come to 
 help out the illusion. That cry of the oyster- 
 man below is a good deal more like the scream 
 of some sea-bird than most theatrical imitations 
 are like the reality. The church-bells clinking 
 and tolling for evening service are to me now 
 the bell of the church to which I used to be 
 conducted when a boy on Sundays, and with 
 which so many of the associations of my after- 
 life inevitably connect themselves. It used to 
 be a dreadful ceremonial, that service, to us 
 boys, on the fine Sundays of summer. It was 
 bad enough in winter; but in summer it be- 
 came unspeakably more torturing. There was 
 a window in the church close to where we used 
 to sit poor little weary, yawning martyrs and 
 the branches of an elm flapped unceasingly on 
 the panes. Tantalus-torture was it to watch 
 the tender, lucent leaves, free in the glorious 
 air of May or June, as they flickered across the 
 window, and seemed to whisper of the blue sky 
 and the shingly strand and the waves of trans- 
 parent emerald which they could see and we 
 could not; while the organ pealed and the 
 clergyman preached the long sermon to which 
 we never listened. I do not know how it is, 
 that when I thus sit alone of nights and do not 
 feel inclined to read, or steadily to go to work 
 at something, every object I see, flame, cloud, 
 or even chimney-pot, reminds me in mn inde- 
 
 scribable, irresistible way, of some object be- 
 longing to the dear, dull little sea-port town 
 where I, Emanuel Temple Banks, was born 
 some five-and-thirty years ago. 
 
 I have now written my full name, but it is 
 long since I have been known otherwise than as 
 Emanuel Temple. I pruned my name down to 
 its present brevity for reasons which shall be 
 explained in due time. I was called "Emanuel 
 Temple" because my mother had a proper wo- 
 manly objection to commonplace or vulgar 
 names, and since we could call ourselves no- 
 thing better than Banks, resolved that we 
 should at least have euphonious and elegant 
 Christian names. Therefore, instead of be- 
 coming, as was suggested, John Banks and 
 Peter Banks, my brother and I became Eman- 
 uel Temple Banks and Theodore Eustace Banks 
 respectively. I scarcely know by what process 
 Theodore Eustace and myself were brought up. 
 We were the only children I the elder by a 
 year a nd my father died when I was six years 
 old. He had owned fishing-boats, and was 
 doing well, until, at the instigation of my mo- 
 ther, he unfortunately took to immature build- 
 ng speculations, and failed accordingly, fishing- 
 joats and all going down in the land-wreck, 
 ndeed, my poor father did not remain long 
 ,fter the ruin of his venture, and my mother 
 lad to live by making gloves and trying to let 
 odgings. She had been a genteel woman of 
 ler class at one time ; and being engaged in 
 ne of the few pretentious millinery shops in 
 ur little town, was regarded by her friends as 
 laving made quite a sort of mesalliance when 
 she married my father, who was then only a 
 good-looking young boat-builder, with a fine 
 voice for singing. ' She was very sentimental 
 then, was poor mother so she has often told 
 me an d those were the days when the heart 
 of sentimental womanhood was divided between 
 the Corsair and the Lady of the Lake. My mo- 
 ther loved both, but leaned to the Corsair ; and 
 found a resemblance between that hero and my 
 father. To her latest days she was fond of re- 
 peating whole strings of "My own Medora," 
 and Ellen and James Fitzjames and I doubt 
 much whether Locksley Hall and Maud are often 
 recited and raved about and glorified in the 
 shops of provincial milliners just now. Poetry 
 and romance seem to have taken a terrible grip 
 of the female heart at that time, and to have 
 released the squeeze in our days. 
 
 Besides being romantic, my mother was like- 
 se religious a combination which also does 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 not seem to flourish in our time. Heaven only 
 knows how painfully she labored and strove to 
 give and get us some education in religion and 
 poetry. She loved her sons dearly, weakly, 
 and her most passionate prayer of nights was 
 that they might never, never leave her. The 
 dearest wish and ambition of her heart would 
 have been that one of the two might become a 
 gentle clergyman, and the other, whatever his 
 ordinary pursuits, a church-warden. If she had 
 lived until now, oh ! what a Ritualist she would 
 have been ! Her prayers for the future of her 
 sons were not even half granted. One of the 
 sons went, very young, to America, and became 
 a Rationalist. The other came up to London 
 and turned opera-singer. 
 
 As soon as I could write a decent hand some 
 good-natured person got me a situation in the 
 office of an attorney and land-agent. I began 
 as the youngest and lowest of clerks a sort of 
 cross between a messenger and a scrivener's ap- 
 prenticenever, of course, intended to develo 
 into that pretentious grub the articled clerk 
 who in his time develops into the attorney, 
 had five shillings a week to begin with, and 
 think the head clerk had a hundred and fift 
 pounds a year. Perhaps, but for subsequen 
 events, I might have worked up to hold tha 
 position,, and receive that emolument, in m v 
 turn. Indeed, I mounted very steadily up t" 
 thirty shillings a week, but there I stopped and 
 got off the ladder. Before I had attained tha 
 eminence, however, my brother, who had tried 
 one or two situations unsuccessfully, and wa 
 always alarming my mother with his longing 
 and projects for going to sea, compromised mat 
 ters by resolving to seek his fortune in Amer 
 ica. My mother had to consent at last in- 
 deed, hard times allowed her no choice and 
 some poor outfit was scraped together. It was 
 arranged that I must stay at home and work 
 for mother until her sons should become wealthy 
 men, when we were to live in one country 
 and one home, and she was to keep house foi 
 both. We had much crying and feeble keep- 
 ing-up of each other's spirits, and we parted full 
 of grief, but not without hope. Theodore 
 Eustace took with him the latch-key of our 
 door, with which he used to let himself in of 
 nights, promising himself and us that he would 
 return before long, laden, doubtless, with wealth, 
 arrive unexpectedly, and opening the door soft- 
 ly, steal in upon my mother and me as we sat 
 some evening by the fire and talked of him. 
 
 He wrote to us when he got a situation in a 
 dry-goods store, Broadway, New York, and very 
 soon after, when he lost it ; when he went out 
 next and became successively a hawker, a rail- 
 way-clerk, a photographer, an electro-biologist, 
 a newspaper correspondent, and a farmer. In 
 each successive calling he was most positively to 
 succeed, and to make up for all the time never 
 very much, that was one comfort which he had 
 lost in the vocation just abandoned. He never 
 remitted any thing except a sketch of a forest 
 clearing, and a dried mosquito as a specimen 
 
 of the animal life of the New World. I think 
 my mother placed the mosquito's corpse ten- 
 derly in her bosom. He has sown all his wild 
 oats long since. He was lately married for the 
 third time, and I believe got money, or prop- 
 erty of some sort, with each of the wives. He 
 was just the sort of bright, exuberant, reckless, 
 blundering, soft-hearted fellow whom a certain 
 kind of women, and all dogs, and all animals 
 of tender natures indeed, instinctively take to. 
 He has many children, and is well-to-do now 
 and steady. He still writes, although at long 
 intervals. He says he has the latch-key still, 
 which I doubt Theodore Eustace was seldom 
 very literal in his statements. But even if he 
 has, it will never open the door for which he 
 meant to use it. Were he to return to our old 
 street, so sunny and pleasant in summer, with 
 its glimpse of the sea through every lane, ho 
 would find no creature there whom once he 
 knew ; and the place itself would know him no 
 more. The little row of houses in which we 
 lived has been pulled down long since to make 
 way for more pretentious habitations marine 
 residences, semi-detached villas, sea-side board- 
 ing-houses, and the like. In my own season of 
 success I often contemplated a tour through 
 America as a "star." I thought of setting 
 New York wild with admiration, filling my 
 brother's heart with ecstasy, and cramming his 
 house with presents. Something, however, al- 
 ways intervened to postpone the journey, and 
 before I had finally made up my mind the best 
 of my voice had gone, and my reputation was 
 pulled down, like our old house, to make way 
 for a new erection upon a more secure basis. * 
 From my father I had inherited a good voice, 
 et prceterea nil. There are families through 
 which a good voice appears to move in order 
 of primogeniture ; and I have observed that a 
 fine tenor, thus bequeathed, rarely seems an in- 
 heritance which brings much worldly providence 
 or prosperity. My father was always under the 
 impression that he only wanted a lucky chance 
 to have made him another Incledon, who was 
 of course his hero, and whose rolling, quaver- 
 ng, florid style, unknown to this generation, he 
 did his best to imitate. I can not help think- 
 ng the fishing-boats and the building specula- 
 ions would have fared a good deal better if my 
 ather had had no more voice than a grasshop- 
 >er, and had therefore found no admiring idlers 
 o persuade him that he was another Incledon. 
 However, it is quite certain that at an early- 
 age my voice became remarkable ; and some 
 of my father's whilom admiring idlers did gen- 
 rously take me in hand and provide me with 
 not very inadequate training. My mother's 
 read of my developing power was turned into 
 onfidence and pride when I began to sing in 
 lie choir of our church on Sundays. I paused 
 ot in my progress until I had actually been 
 )romoted to the post of primo ttnore there, at a 
 enumeration of twenty pounds a year. 
 This seemed to us what sea-coast people call 
 the third wave" of promise, on which we were 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to be safely lifted into prosperity. But it came 
 a little too late. My mother's life had long 
 been on the wane. Grief, anxiety, poverty, 
 late long sewing, had been doing for years their 
 combined best with her, and at last she utterly 
 broke down. I was nineteen years old when I 
 found myself watching, in the gray of a cold 
 spring morning, with our clergyman and one 
 or two kindly old women, by the side of the 
 bed in which my mother recovered at last from 
 all sickness and all sorrow. A pale, wan ray 
 of the rising sun gleamed upon the cold face 
 whereon so little of the sunshine of happiness 
 had rested. A quaint little burial-ground clings 
 and straggles along the side of one of the hills 
 which rises over the bay. You may count ev- 
 ery tombstone and grave-hillock from the deck 
 of any of the fishing-boats that toss in the surf 
 beneath. Many a monument is erected there 
 by the widow of some lost skipper or mate in 
 memory of the husband whose bones have been 
 tossed ashore on some Pacific island, or have 
 been gnawed and mumbled by the Arctic bear. 
 There we laid my mother, disturbing for the 
 purpose some of the ashes which had been cof- 
 fined when my father was buried. I came 
 away from the grave alone. The scene I saw 
 as 1 turned away is before m.e now. I see it 
 clearly as clearly as then. The hills we used 
 to think them mountains that embraced the 
 long, narrow stretch of bay in their arms ; the 
 far line of the horizon; the straggling white 
 town just under my feet; the strand whereon 
 lay the hauled-up fishing-boats ; the merchant- 
 brigs and the coal-schooners anchored ; the one 
 war-sloop ; the tree-tufted summit of one hill, 
 conspicuous among its bare and bald compan- 
 ions ; and over all the gray sky breaking faint- 
 ly into sunlight as over my own life the mist 
 of sadness and loneliness just breaking a little 
 with the purple light of youth. 
 
 I am not going to write of my grief and lone- 
 liness. I suffered bitterly and heavily, but the 
 passing away of a year or so softened the grief 
 into a gentle memory. At twenty I was full 
 of hope and spirits again, secretly perhaps even 
 proud of my desolate independence, and be- 
 lieving myself a personage of rare endowments, 
 destined to some special and wonderful career. 
 But because of my mother's death, and other 
 and earlier associations too, the gray days of 
 spring have always worn for me the most mel- 
 ancholy and dispiriting aspect. I see the early 
 spring, not in budding brightness and beauty 
 and hope, as poetical people tell me they see 
 it, but dim, dreary, boding, suggestive of lone- 
 liness, associated with partings, graves, and 
 death. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 CHRISTINA BRAUN. 
 
 I WAS, then, an attorney's clerk all the week- 
 days up to five or six o'clock, and a singer of 
 sacred music every Sunday a singer in that 
 
 same little church the sermons and the bough- 
 shaded windows of which used to distract me 
 so when a boy. 
 
 I was growing a sort of little celebrity in our 
 small town because of my voice and my sup- 
 posed musical genius. I mean that I was get- 
 ting to be known among all that small middle 
 class whose highest reach toward society was 
 the patronage of the clergyman's wife or the 
 attorney and his family. Our town was divid- 
 ed morally, and indeed one might say geograph- 
 ically, into three sections. There were "the 
 townspeople" ourselves who lived in the 
 streets on what I may call the middle terrace 
 of the ascent on which chance had placed us. 
 We were all traders, shop-keepers, clerks, mas- 
 ter carpenters, a few engineers, two or three 
 teachers of French and music, a good many 
 principals of small English schools, a good 
 many civil servants of the unpretending class. 
 Beneath us stretched, reaching to the water's 
 edge, and straggling away rather toward the 
 rising sun, a lower plateau of population, con- 
 sisting of public house keepers, rope- makers, 
 block-makers, fishermen, sailors, and nonde- 
 script poor people of all kinds poor people 
 avowing and indeed going in for pauperism. 
 Above us, and stretching away westward, were 
 the villas and mansions of the gentry, the swells 
 who only carne into the town to buy at the 
 shops, or to reach the sea. Of these it is 
 enough to say for this story has little to do 
 with the aristocracy of the earth that a noble- 
 man who owned nearly all the country round 
 and half the town was the apex of the pyra- 
 mid, and the base was formed by the fashion- 
 able doctor of our district, the attorney in 
 whose office I worked, two or three clergy- 
 men, the collectors of customs and excise, and 
 a few retired naval officers. Now these three 
 sections were each a world to itself. Nobody 
 on the higher plateau knew any thing about us 
 except as people who made things or had things 
 to sell ; we knew little of the lower plateau ex- 
 cept in an equally general sort of way. There- 
 fore when I say that I was becoming a sort of 
 small celebrity, I mean of course only in my 
 own middle sphere. The gentlemen and la- 
 dies above knew and cared just as much about 
 me and my like as the tarry lads of the lower 
 town did, or indeed as the crabs and star-fish 
 on the beach might have done. If any grand 
 personage or grand personage's wife had been 
 attracted by my singing at church some day, 
 and had been good enough to ask the clergy- 
 man who the singer was, the answer would 
 have been, " Only a young man from the town," 
 and that would have settled the matter. That 
 was enough to know ; that was all any body 
 could want to know. 
 
 But I was getting to be talked about among 
 people of my own world. I used to be invited 
 out to small evening parties, where, lonely as I 
 was and at. this period having reached the 
 cynical stage, and being professedly scornful of 
 earth's joys I went very delightedly. I bought 
 
8 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 kid gloves, and wore my collar turned down. 
 Those Avere not days when even a musical as- 
 pirant could venture upon a mustache in a town 
 like ours, or I doubt not that I would have 
 wrestled with Nature to extract by unknown 
 philters and essences the precious ornament 
 from her gift. Of course I was a good deal 
 vain of my voice and my personal appearance. 
 Kind Heaven, which had taken from me so much 
 that was dear, had left me youth's delicious 
 consolation vanity. Had I not been such a 
 self-conceited ass just then, I must needs have 
 been very unhappy. 
 
 We used to practice we did not call it "re- 
 hearsing" three or four times a week in the 
 choir of the church, the organist being intrusted 
 with the keys for the purpose, "We" were 
 generally four. First was Miss Griffin, the or- 
 ganist, who could sometimes pipe a flat and fee- 
 ble note of her own. Miss Griffin was a spin- 
 ster fast falling into years nay, it seemed to 
 me then quite stricken in years, although I know 
 now that she could not have been far past thirty. 
 But she was very old-maidenish in appearance, 
 with dull hair done into old-fashioned spiral 
 ringlets ; a sharp-nosed and perhaps frosty, but 
 withal very kindly, little dowdy. Next in years 
 but with such an interval! came our bass, a 
 stout young fellow, son of a master carpenter. 
 Then came the tenor, Emanuel Temple Banks ; 
 and last came the soprano, a girl of German 
 parentage and birth, Christina Braun. 
 
 Christina, I should think, was then just a lit- 
 tle younger than myself. She was the daughter 
 of a German toy-maker, w r ho half mechanist, 
 half artist, whole dreamer had striven to make 
 and sell playthings of a new kind, with a scien- 
 tific, philosophical, and moral purpose about 
 them, for the assthetical entertainment and cul- 
 ture of children. The philosophical toy-maker 
 did not succeed in winning much of the sympa- 
 thy of our town for his refined and lofty pur- 
 pose. He failed altogether, became bankrupt, 
 gave up all struggle thenceforward, and resigned 
 the conduct of existence into the hands of his 
 daughter, who sang in churches and chapels and 
 elsewhere for the means of living. 
 
 I used to think Christina a wonderful young 
 person because she had been born in Germany 
 and could speak German. She had at this 
 time been many years in England, and must 
 have been quite a child when she left her native 
 country. We used to pronounce her name as 
 if it were similar in sound with the name of the 
 familiar substance sold in pork-shops. Being 
 at this time of my life still rather shy so far as 
 girls were concerned, I knew little or nothing 
 of Miss Braun for months and months, but that 
 she had a strong voice and fine eyes, and that 
 she had a happy capacity for talking freely 
 enough when any one chose to speak, and re- 
 maining contentedly silent Avhen no one did so 
 choose. She was a remarkable girl to look at. 
 She had a great fleece of fair hair thrown ba<ck 
 off her forehead, and only kept up in some way 
 or other from falling about her shoulders and 
 
 waist, which, indeed, it did more than once in 
 the choir, to the great annoyance and scandal 
 of Miss Griffin, who, I think, by the look that 
 came into her eyes, always regarded this little 
 mischance as a pure piece of coquetry. Chris- 
 tina had beautiful, deep-shining eyes, dark gray 
 in color much darker, indeed, than the tinge 
 of her hair would have led one to expect. She 
 had a bright complexion and a rather large 
 mouth, from which issued when she sang a 
 strange and almost startling voice : we used to 
 consider it somewhat coarse. I don't think I 
 thought her a handsome girl; I rather fancy 
 she seemed to me all hair and eyes. But I 
 have hardly any distinct impression of our ear- 
 liest meetings, and I positively can not by any 
 effort of memory recall my first sight of one 
 who afterward exercised such an influence over 
 my life, and whom I once so deeply loved. 
 There is no mystery about the story I purpose 
 to tell, and I make known at once that every 
 thing in my existence which is worth recording 
 is in some way associated with the memory of 
 Christina Braun. 
 
 We four, then Miss Griffin, our basso, Chris- 
 tina, and I used to foregather in the church 
 choir of evenings ; and after having practiced as 
 we considered long enough, would very often con- 
 clude by going to Miss Griffin's to tea, and there 
 compensating ourselves with the newest operatic 
 pieces for our enforced devotion to sacred music. 
 Miss Griffin and her mamma taught music, and 
 some of their pupils used to help us out occa- 
 sionally with duets, trios, choruses, and the 
 like. I remember nothing particular about the 
 mamma, except that she was an odd, vivacious, 
 flighty little old personage, who could speak 
 French. I don't know why she considered it 
 proper always to address Christina Braun in 
 French, or why she assumed that a German 
 girl must necessarily be able to understand that 
 language. But she always did so. "Eh bien, 
 Christina, chere petite" was her usual greeting; 
 and during the course of any conversation, if she 
 had occasion to address a word to the tall and 
 plump chere petite, Mrs. Griffin always lapsed into 
 French, and Christina, with perfect docility and 
 gravity, as regularly replied in the same tongue, 
 which she seemed to speak with fluency. 
 
 Sometimes I was the only gentleman among 
 all these ladies; and this, perhaps, may partly 
 account for the slight attention I used to bestow 
 upon Christina Braun. Our bass singer did not 
 always come with us to Miss Griffin's, and even 
 when he did he was not much of a squire of dames 
 or demoiselles. On entering the little drawing- 
 room first-floor front, over a bonnet-shop he 
 usually laid his hat somewhere on the ground, 
 sat on the edge of a chair, swallowed his tea, 
 bending far over the table for the pm-pose, and 
 generally said nothing more than "Yes, miss," 
 or "No, miss," in answer to any question ad- 
 dressed to him. He was a fine-looking young 
 fellow, tall, robust, manly; and, although scarce- 
 ly older than myself, he had his face already 
 fringed with a luxuriant, soft, black beard, the 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 possession of which I secretly envied him. Si- 
 lent as he was in general, I could notice that 
 when he got side by side with Christina Braun 
 he could talk well enough to her ; and almost 
 always whe'n he came to Miss Griffin's I ob- 
 served that he took charge of Christina to see 
 her to her home on our early breaking up. I 
 think I was somewhat amused at the time by ob- 
 serving this fact and founding conjectures on it. 
 The polite reader need hardly be told that a 
 much loftier position in society is asserted by a 
 lawyer's clerk than could possibly be claimed 
 even by the most presumptuous carpenter ; and 
 I therefore felt myself warranted in taking quite 
 a lordly and patronizing interest in the love- 
 making of my humble acquaintance ; for I felt 
 convinced that our stout basso was in love, and 
 I envied him that privilege. Yes, more even 
 than his beard did I envy him his state of mind 
 and heart. At this season of my life I had be- 
 gun to long to fall in love. I envied every 
 young man whom I saAV on Sunday evening 
 with some girl hanging on his arm or walking 
 with downcast eyes by his side. I trolled out 
 to myself of nights the words of " Sally in our 
 Alley;" and I envied the hero of the ballad, 
 for all his harsh master and his jeering neigh- 
 bors. If some woman would only love me, 
 walk thus of Sundays with me, lean on my arm, 
 blush when I spoke! Nay, if some woman 
 would even reject my love, blight my young 
 hopes, crush me in the bud, reduce me to de- 
 spair ! At the stage of mental and moral de- 
 velopment I had then reached despair and ruin 
 seemed on. the whole a finer and more enviable 
 destiny than success and joy. To live in love 
 would be happy ; but to die for love would be 
 the lordliest fate. 
 
 My life seemed safe enough so far as love's 
 despair could threaten it. I had no one to 
 love. I could not, no, I could not love Miss 
 Griffin, strove I never so wildly. I feel well 
 assured she would have accepted gladly the 
 poorest tribute of homage, even if it lasted but 
 a few short weeks, to cheat her into the belief 
 that she had not quite passed out of date, and 
 could yet move at least one heart. All our 
 literature and our moral lessons now ring the 
 changes upon the nobleness of self-sacrifice. 
 What finer self-sacrifice could any one make 
 than to persuade a kind and true-hearted old 
 maid of a certain age that he had really fallen 
 in love with her, and brighten her life by giving 
 up his own to sustain the beatifying delusion ? 
 A more pious fraud could not be accomplished 
 than to practice such a generous piece of cheat- 
 ing on such a woman as poor, elderly, warm- 
 hearted, loving, unloved Miss Griffin. I com- 
 mend the idea to some novelist. Why not 
 make a story out of it ? But I own that, even 
 had the idea occurred to me at the right time, 
 I should not have dreamed of putting it into 
 practice ; and even if I had dreamed of it, I 
 should never have done it. 
 
 There was none of Miss Griffin's pupils who 
 could have served as an object for my adora- 
 
 tion. They were all in trowsers and short 
 frocks; and at that time of my life girls in 
 trowsers were my abhorrence. 
 
 When haply my thoughts sometimes turned 
 to Christina Braun, she seemed too calm and 
 silent, and too fond of music. In those days I 
 did not much care for any singing but my own. 
 There are only too many people who, if they 
 would but confess it, are in just the same state 
 of mind people who have, of course, none of 
 the true artist's love of music, as, honestly, I 
 never had. People like us in that way often 
 delight in our own singing, if we can sing, not 
 out of mere self-conceit and egotism, but because 
 to us that music which our own voices give out 
 is the fullest expression, the strongest invoca- 
 tion, of feeling and association. Many tenors 
 of the richest tone, and sopranos thrilling up to 
 the ceiling, have I heard without feeling one 
 throb of the emotion which used to swell with- 
 in me long ago as I sang old church-hymns or 
 new sentimental ballads of love, longing, and 
 despair for my own delight, and quite alone. 
 But it was easy enough even for me then to see 
 that Christina Braun loved music for its own 
 sake, and, like most persons who do thus appre- 
 ciate and love it, she seemed, to ordinary ob- 
 servers, to care about little else. 
 
 Apart from all this, however, I had arranged 
 in my own mind that Christina Braun and the 
 carpenter's son were what we used to call 
 "sweet-hearts." 
 
 After some time I began to observe that 
 Christina ceased to make one in our mild gath- 
 erings in Miss Griffin's drawing-room. Indeed 
 the latter lady and I sometimes had tea tete-a- 
 tete or nearly so, her mother only flitting flight- 
 ily in and out and it was dull entertainment 
 for both parties. I would gladly have evaded 
 all such soirees, but that I was ashamed or un- 
 \villing to desert poor Miss Griffin, and perhaps 
 did not always know what to do with myself 
 or where else to go. The time for sitting alone 
 in contented gloom, and smoking a pipe long 
 evenings through, had not nearly con*ie as yet. 
 
 Sometimes a fearful thought crossed my mind. 
 Could it be possible that Christina imagined 
 Miss Griffin and I were lovers, and liked to be 
 left alone ? I tried to shut out this alarming 
 idea. I vowed not to go any more to a tete-a- 
 tete tea ; I even attempted awkwardly to pay a 
 mild attention to Christina herself in the hope 
 of thus repelling suspicion. I invited her to 
 come with me to a concert somewhere we had 
 not the rules of Belgravia or even Bloomsbury 
 to govern our social relationships there but 
 Christina refused in so decided a tone as to 
 make my doubts a dead certainty. I began to 
 feel convinced that I had guessed but too well. 
 Christina must suppose me deeply in love with 
 Miss Griffin perhaps solemnly engaged to her 
 to Miss Griifin, whose age was so undeniable, 
 and who carried the stigma of old maid brand- 
 ed on her very skirts and ankles ! 
 
 One evening we three we three ! walked 
 home together, as usual, but were unusually 
 
10 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 dull and silent. Christina declined entering 
 when we arrived at Miss Griffin's door this 
 time indeed the invitation being very faintly 
 pressed. I was plucking up heart of grace to 
 make my excuses too, when Miss Griffin cut me 
 short by a look of portentous mystery, and the 
 words, "You really must come in, Mr. Banks ; 
 I want to speak to you" words which, how- 
 ever, were not spoken until just after Christina 
 had nodded her head to us and gone on her 
 way. 
 
 I followed Miss Griffin up stairs in perhaps 
 something like an agitated condition of mind. 
 I did not quite know whether under certain 
 circumstances strong-minded ladies not young 
 did not think it allowable to interrogate young 
 men touching the nature of their intentions. 
 
 Miss Griffin was any thing but a strong-mind- 
 ed woman, and just now did not seem to have 
 been thinking about me at all. She burst out 
 with her communication all at once. 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Banks, I must send Christina 
 Braun" (pronounced, as I have said before, 
 ^Brawn") "out of the choir. She must not 
 sing with us any more." 
 
 Did I feel relieved to hear that the question 
 was of Christina's rejection, and not of my ac- 
 ceptance? Perhaps so. But I certainly felt 
 much surprised. 
 
 "What on earth has she been doing?" 
 " I am so sorry to hear it ; indeed, it's quite 
 put me out; you can't think how much." 
 "Yes; but what is it?" 
 "I am afraid she is not a good girl. She 
 sings every night at a singing-house !" 
 " At a singing-house ?" 
 "Yes; a common low singing- house, Mr. 
 Banks and I don't see what there is to laugh 
 ata horrid place, where soldiers and sailors 
 and I don't know what all sorts of low people, 
 . in fact go in and drink and listen to her. It's 
 been all found out ; and Mr. Thirlwall (the cler- 
 gyman) says he can't have a girl in the choir 
 who sings for soldiers and sailors in a common 
 drinking-house. I don't know what to do about 
 it ; and I declare it has put me in such a way, 
 you can't think. Perhaps she is not so bad ; 
 and then it's all very well for Mr. Thirlwall to 
 talk, but, my goodness ! who is to fill her place, 
 with such a voice as she has, and such an ear for 
 music ? But I can't keep her unless she prom- 
 ises never to go there any more." 
 
 "Then you have not spoken to her yet about 
 it?"' 
 
 "No, not yet. I thought I would ask you 
 something about it first. I thought perhaps 
 you could advise me ; you, who are a man of 
 business and know something about the world." 
 "Well, I am sure I don't see much harm in 
 the whole affair, and I think Mr. Thirlwall is 
 a venerable goose. Miss Braun seems a very 
 quiet, respectable sort of girl" (I thought of 
 the carpenter's love-suit, and felt quite a lord- 
 ly spirit of patronizing pity), "and then what 
 can she do if she's very poor and has no other 
 way of living ? The reverend man docs not 
 
 expect her to live on fifteen pounds a year, paid 
 in rather irregular installments ?" 
 
 " Yes, that is all quite true ; and indeed it is 
 just what I said myself to Mr. Thirlwall only 
 of course I put it more politely and he says it 
 is true too ; for he's a just man, Mr. Banks 
 though you always seem inclined to laugh at 
 him. But what can he do? He has been 
 preaching from the pulpit time after time 
 against those very singing -houses, and how 
 can he have people looking up from their seats 
 in the church, and perhaps some of them rec- 
 ognizing a singer from such a place among the 
 faces in our choir? You know yourself that 
 would never do." 
 
 It occurred to me at the moment that per- 
 haps the worshiper who visited the wicked 
 singing -house, and was thereby enabled to 
 recognize one of its performers, would have 
 scarcely a clear right to object to the chorister 
 who sang there. But I saw no use in urging 
 this point to a logical conclusion, and merely 
 suggested that perhaps the place was not so 
 dreadfully bad after all. 
 
 "That is what I was just thinking of. I 
 should really like to know something of it. It 
 would never do to give up the poor girl without 
 knowing whether there is any harm in what she 
 is doing. I actually thought of going there my- 
 self; I did, really." 
 
 "Oh, you can't go, that is quite out of the 
 question ; but if you like I'll go, and bring you 
 a faithful report." 
 
 " That is what I should like of all things. I 
 can depend upon your judgment. .And at all 
 events one ought to know something about the 
 right and wrong of the affair. I believe in law, 
 Mr. Banks, a person is innocent until you can 
 prove her guilty." 
 
 "That is considered one of the great princi- 
 ples of British law, Miss Griffin." 
 
 " Yes ; and I think it's very proper too ; and 
 I only wish people would do the same in every 
 thing else as well as law." 
 
 It was settled, then, that I was to visit and 
 report on the obnoxious singing-place. I had 
 heard of it once or twice before ; and of sundry 
 of its predecessors which had all in succession 
 withered and disappeared. Up to this time I 
 had never been out of my native town, and of 
 course had never been in a singing -saloon. 
 Our town was an unspeakably dull spot. At 
 this time it was not even visited by a railway, 
 and it depended for its sole excitement upon 
 the changing of a regiment in the barracks or 
 the occasional visit of a war-frigate to the har- 
 bor. O\ving to the social and topographical pe- 
 culiarities I have already mentioned which di- 
 vided us, like all Gaul in Cesar's day, into three 
 parts, any sort of amusement which might be 
 devised for the gratification of the floating pop- 
 ulation in the lower plateau, was not likely to 
 excite either interest or alarm in the higher re- 
 gions. Our middle class were little given to 
 revelry. Every window in their quarter was 
 duly shuttered and barred by eleven o'clock. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 11 
 
 and their warmest stimulant was a controver- 
 sial sermon. But of late there had unques- 
 tionably been some stir created by the success- 
 ful establishment, after many failures, of a fa- 
 mous singing-saloon, modeled after the fashion 
 of metropolitan dissipation. Not a noisy, harm- 
 less "free-and-easy," where Snug the joiner and 
 Quince the carpenter might smoke their pipes 
 and be knocked down in turn for their favor- 
 ite and special song ; where Bottom the weav- 
 er might deliver his choicest sentiment, and 
 Starveling the tailor might have the formal 
 permission of his wife to remain half an hour 
 later on the Saturday night. This was not the 
 sort of thing that now invaded us. It was a 
 place where professional singers women too, 
 look you, nearly as bad as dancers, not to say 
 actresses came and sat on a platform and sang 
 for money. This was then a dreadful innova- 
 tion. The singing -saloon itself is now well- 
 nigh obsolete. The rising generation hardly 
 knows what it was like. The music-hall with 
 its plate-glass, its paintings, its private boxes, 
 its concerted music, and its Champagne, has 
 banished it ; and the audacious novelty of my 
 young days is a forgotten, fogyish old institu- 
 tion now. But this particular place of which 
 I speak was really creating something like a 
 stir among our quiet and respectable burgesses 
 just then. It was established immediately in- 
 side the frontier line of our Alsatia ; and it is 
 certain that some of our fathers of families 
 had been to visit it, and had talked with quite 
 a dangerous slyness of its attractions, and had 
 made up parties with some of their friends to 
 go and see it again. All this created naturally 
 a considerable fluttering of angry petticoats in 
 domestic circles, and brought severe and direct 
 condemnation from offended pulpits. And so 
 I had hedxd of the place in question, and had 
 even been making up my mind to visit it be- 
 fore chance sent me there as the special com- 
 missioner of Miss Griffin. 
 
 The following night I went alone, and had 
 no difficulty in finding the place. Indeed, 
 when you began to descend from the old square, 
 which was the last strong-hold of respectability 
 and middle class, down a steep street with steps 
 breaking its precipitate fall, a street that was 
 the main artery of the lower town, you came 
 almost at once upon the obnoxious saloon. It 
 was in a large public house, occupying a cor- 
 ner where a cross-street ran off, and showing, 
 like Janus, a double front. The place looked 
 cheery enough from the outside. The night 
 was chill and Avet ; and the bright crimson cur- 
 tains draping the windows of the upper room 
 where the musical performances were going on, 
 tempted one with visions of ineffable comfort 
 and warmth out of the wintry plash and drizzle 
 of the sodden streets. I went up stairs. There 
 was no payment at the doors, the musical en- 
 tertainment being supported in the recognized 
 style by indirect taxation levied upon the "or- 
 ders." I entered the Circean bower. It was 
 but a small and poor imitation of a Strand or 
 
 Covent Garden Cave of Harmony, but as it had 
 looking-glasses, crimson curtains, velvet cush- 
 ions, a platform with foot-lights, and an orches- 
 tra, it seemed splendid enough in my confused 
 provincial eyes. I gave an order for something 
 in a rather ineffectual attempt at a careless tone, 
 and dropped into the first available seat. There 
 was rather a numerous audience including, 
 however, only one or two sailors and no sol- 
 diers. Most of the company seemed to me to 
 be smart young artisans, mingled with elderly 
 tradesmen of the unpretentious class ; and there 
 were a few young assistants from shops, who 
 looked quite swellish in their well-made clothes 
 and gloves. No ladies were there ; Miss Grif- 
 fin would have presented herself in vain. Most 
 of the company were smoking, by which I was 
 innocently surprised to find that the singers 
 were not in the least disconcerted. Of the 
 " audience" a very few were actually listening 
 to the music ; the greater number were chatting 
 unconcernedly round their little tables ; one or 
 two were asleep. I had, however, listened with 
 the gravest appearance of interest to a senti- 
 mental and a comic song before I came to my- 
 self sufficiently to observe even this much of 
 the aspect of the place. 
 
 When I said there were no women present 
 I meant, of course, among the audience. For 
 when I began to look collectedly around me I 
 saw that there were girls on the platform, and 
 that among them was Christina Braun. She 
 was dressed in white poor white muslin only ; 
 but she seemed to my eyes to be wearing a mag- 
 nificent costume. Her arms and shoulders 
 were bare, and were both white and plump, 
 and her fleece of light hair fell around her. 
 She presently came on to sing, and she seem- 
 ed to be a favorite, for she was welcomed by 
 a burst of applause, and most of the company 
 stopped their talkf while some demanded silence 
 by tapping their pipe-bowls on the table. Chris- 
 tina sang in clear and strong tones some ballad 
 not at all a Circean strain, but some good 
 moral-purpose song about universal brother- 
 hood and being kind to our neighbors. She 
 sang it with sweetness and force, but with hardly 
 any indication of feeling, certainly with no gleam 
 of emotion perceptible in her eyes. Being, how- 
 ever, vehemently encored, she chose, as seem- 
 ed to be expected, a totally different kind of 
 song. It was what we used to call a "nigger 
 melody" a sort of novelty then, with a refrain 
 about courting down in Tennessee, or Alabama, 
 or some other such place. 
 
 I scarcely knew what it was all about ; but 
 I soon knew that I had never heard such spirit, 
 such archness, such wild wayward humor, such 
 occasional ebullitions of tender thrilling emotion 
 conveyed in song before. No, never ! Night 
 after night had I heard this girl sing her devo- 
 tional hymns in the clearest tones, vacant of 
 any emotion whatever ; but now, as she sang 
 some trumpery little serio-comic love-song, her 
 dark gray eyes gleamed and filled with light ; 
 under her shadowy long lashes the eyes some- 
 
12 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 times looked so dark and deep as to seem in 
 startling contrast with her bright fair hair ; her 
 voice swelled, soared, sank, shaded itself away 
 into an infinite variety of expression ; she gave 
 life and speech to the very rattle of her banjo ; 
 she made the ballad utter a thousand emotions 
 which were no more in the words she sang than 
 in the instrument she struck, or the smoky, beery 
 crowd, whose glasses jingled with their noisy and 
 honest acclamations. What a soul of feeling, 
 what a capacity deep, boundless, daring a 
 capacity for love and triumph, and passion and 
 sorrow spoke in the tones of that voice and 
 the flash of that eye ! For me, I felt partly as 
 I used to feel when sitting alone and singing, 
 only with how much of a difference ! With 
 what a change from dreamy, vague, and fluctu- 
 ating emotions, idly rolling in like the waves on 
 the windless shore, and the warm, tumultuous, 
 passionate rush of the new tide of love and 
 youth and manhood breaking in upon my life 
 at last ! I began life, I began love, with the 
 hearing of that song ! I dare say it was poor, 
 coarse, untutored singing ; untrained, and even 
 in some sense uncouth, it must have been; 
 commonplace it certainly was not, I know 
 that I heard the singer unnumbered times in 
 the prime of her years and her triumph ; and I 
 do not believe I ever recognized her genius 
 more clearly than when I heard her sing that 
 poor little ballad in the public house of the old 
 sea-port. My rapture must upon that occasion 
 find some outlet, and I therefore made instant 
 acquaintance with a dull and elderly man near 
 me : he seemed to me, I don't know why, to 
 look like a saddler. 
 
 " Splendid !" I exclaimed, addressing him. 
 "Yes, pretty tidy," rejoined the dull man; 
 and he looked round for the waiter and knocked 
 his empty glass against the table a signal for 
 a refilling. 
 
 " I know her," I added, confidentially. 
 "Know who?" asked the dull man. 
 "Her the singer." 
 
 "Ah !" He did not seem to care whether I 
 knew her or not. 
 
 ^ " She's a foreigner, " I added, especially proud 
 of knowing a foreigner. 
 
 " Ah ! I never liked the French I don't be- 
 lieve in 'em. By what I can make out they 
 ain't good for much." 
 
 ;< But she's not French she's German." 
 "Don't like Germans, they're a dirty set. 
 They eat candles, I'm told." 
 
 This irrelevant and detestable observation so 
 utterly disgusted me that I withdrew at once 
 from the conversation. 
 
 I should much have liked to wait for the close 
 of the entertainment and to speak to Christina; 
 
 but I feared she might suppose I had come as a 
 spy or tell-tale, so I slunk very much indeed as 
 if I were a spy or tell-tale from my seat, which 
 was near the door, and went down stairs. I did 
 not gain much by my caution and my flight, for, 
 descending rapidly, I ran against some one com- 
 ing as rapidly up, and I recognized my friend 
 
 the basso, the bearded young carpenter. We 
 saluted each other, but he did not seem particu- 
 larly glad to see me, and he ran past .without 
 staying to speak a word. I wished I had not 
 met him, for I feared that in the too-probable 
 event of poor Christina's dismissal he might re- 
 gard me and report me as a spy, and I had an 
 instinctive knowledge that he had come to see 
 her home ; and I envied him nay, already I 
 almost hated him. 
 
 Drizzling and dismal as the black skies were, 
 sloppy and slushy as the streets were, I did not 
 hurry home. On the contrary, I turned delib- 
 erately away from home, and straggled, like the 
 town, down hill to the water. From the door I 
 had just quitted I could hear the creaking of the 
 spars of ships that tossed and dragged at their 
 anchors, the whistling of the sullen wind through 
 their cordage, the heavy surge of the waves 
 along their sides. A few strides down an oozy 
 lane and I could see the lights at mast-heads, 
 and even discern through the mist and dark- 
 ness the white tops of the rushing waves. I 
 made my way, stumbling among upturned boats 
 and anchors and chains, down to the very edge 
 of the water. The town was not well-lighted 
 any where ; toward the harbor its darkness grew 
 Cimmerian. The inhabitants had all that mys- 
 terious objection to seeing their seaward way at 
 night which used to be so common a character- 
 istic of people living in sea-port towns in the 
 years when French treaties were not. Indeed, 
 many of our people would have abolished moon- 
 ight if they could, although these very same 
 Dersons were strangely given to lurking about 
 he shore and staring seaward at extraordinary 
 hours of the night. This night, however, no 
 stealthy figure peered from the strand : I had 
 it all to myself, and I exulted in being alone. 
 
 Born as I was within sound of the waves, it 
 has always seemed to me that in any hour of 
 deep emotion I ought to rush to the sea-side 
 and make the noisy water my confidant. This 
 night I felt that I must find the shore, and re- 
 lieve my new-born passion by mingling its ut- 
 terances with the roar of the waters. Alone on 
 that strand what strange fooleries I enacted ! 
 I stamped up and down the shore, I sang wild 
 snatches of Christina's song, I shouted mad 
 fragments of incoherent melody and semi-artic- 
 ulate words of passion and love. I was mad, 
 and I was happy ; this at last was living ! All 
 the delight that an explorer may find when he 
 first breaks into a new sea that a Bedouin 
 may feel when he first mounts an untamed 
 horse I felt, now that I knew myself to be 
 tossing at last on the waves of passionate love. 
 Lucky for me that I was alone, and that the 
 night was so dark. Any one seeing my ges- 
 tures, hearing my cries, must have taken me 
 for a lunatic. I waited on the strand until my 
 emotions had worked off their first vehemence ; 
 perhaps I waited too until I thought the enter- 
 tainment at the singing-saloon must be nearly 
 over. Then I went back to the street whence 
 I had come, and watched the people coming out. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 13 
 
 After the last of the audience had melted away 
 came out a cluster of the performers ; among 
 them I could clearly enough distinguish the fig- 
 ure of Christina I had keen eyes for her form 
 now an d m y friend the basso was escorting 
 her home. A strange, fierce pang shot through 
 me. I had learned to feel two new passions in 
 a few short hours love and jealousy. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A SEA-FIGHT. 
 
 I DID not go near Miss Griifin next day. I 
 postponed making any report of my previous 
 night's visitation. What report could I make 
 but that I had been present at a very dull and 
 harmless entertainment ? unless I chose to add 
 the truth that I had come away madly in love 
 with the eyes and the voice of a girl whom I 
 had been in the habit of seeing three or four 
 times a week for months and months, and about 
 whom I never before cared a straw. Mine was 
 certainly not love at first sight, but it had all 
 the suddenness and unreasoning fierceness of 
 that romantic form of the passion. I have not 
 read in books much about such a love as mine, 
 which neither flamed out at the first glimpse of 
 the object, nor- grew up with the gradual devel- 
 opment of intimacy and appreciation. I was 
 as one who walks in the sun of some tropical 
 climate uninjured and unheeding for days, and 
 whom suddenly, in some unexpecting moment, 
 a flash, sharp as the cleave of a sabre, strikes 
 and cuts down. Yes, my love was like a sun- 
 stroke. I do not know how to describe it bet- 
 ter. 
 
 Of course I went again to the music-house ; 
 I went the next night. The company was of 
 the same general character ; the singers were 
 the same. The moment I entered I saw that 
 Christina's eyes turned on me, and I blushed 
 like a great girl. Some male singer came on 
 with his dreary comic song, and she disappeared 
 from the platform. Had she gone for the night ? 
 What a cruel disappointment! I stared dis- 
 consolate and confounded into my beer-glass, 
 and was positively pitying myself for my priva- 
 tion, when one of the waiters, who were per- 
 petually buzzing about the tables to remind 
 any laggard guests of the necessity of renew- 
 ing their orders, came up to me, and leaning 
 over my shoulder, said, 
 
 "Lady wants to speak to you, Sir." 
 I started. 
 
 ' ' Lady ! what lady ?" 
 "Profesh'nal lady, Sir. Behind the plat- 
 form, Sir. This way, please." 
 
 I followed him. I was crimson all over, and 
 did not venture to look up, fearing that the 
 eyes of a whole curious company must be fixed 
 on me. As a matter of fact, I don't suppose 
 any body in the room took the slightest notice 
 I was trembling with anxiety, hope, fear, sur 
 prise, excitement of the most complicated kind 
 
 The waiter drew aside a curtain for me, and I 
 entered a small sanded room, or rather a mere 
 space, behind the platform ; and I saw Chris- 
 tina there alone. She had her head turned 
 away when I came in ; at the sound of my en- 
 trance she looked quickly round, and there was 
 an angry light in her deep gray eyes. 
 Her first words utterly abashed me. 
 "Why do you come here?" she said, in a 
 voice purposely kept low, and with the foreign 
 accent more strongly perceptible than usual, 
 owing to the kind of excitement under which 
 she spoke. " Why do you come here to watch 
 me and tell bad of me ? Have I ever done you 
 any harm ?" 
 
 "Oh, Christina Miss Braun, I mean how 
 can you say such a thing ?" and I broke down 
 in mere stammering. 
 
 "Have you not come here to watch me to 
 spy on me ?" 
 
 "No. I have not, indeed." 
 " It's a lie !" she exclaimed, so loudly that I 
 involuntarily glanced in the direction of the 
 audience, fearing the words must have been 
 heard. " It's an untruth. I know you were 
 sent here." 
 
 "I was not sent here. Miss Griffin asked 
 me to come here ; and " 
 "And yon came!" 
 
 She made a triumphant gesture expressive 
 of conviction and scorn. I certainly felt not 
 unlike a detected spy ; and I looked, no doubt, 
 very foolish. 
 
 "Yes, I came; but I did not come to to 
 find out any thing bad, or to do you harm. I 
 came to do you good ; and Miss Griffin only 
 wanted to do you good." 
 
 "Thank you both." She laid a malicious 
 emphasis on the word "both." "I am much 
 obliged to you both. Heart-felt thanks to you 
 both. But I don't want any one to try to do 
 me good." 
 
 I wished to be your friend." 
 I have not many friends I am poor and 
 miserable ; and I have an old man to support 
 whom I love and whom I would die for ; and 
 you come and find out that I am trying to make 
 a living, and without wrong to any one, or my- 
 self, or God, and you tell of me at the church. 
 Go away ; it is not like a man. It is not like 
 an Englishman." 
 
 "But I swear to you, Miss Braun, that you 
 are wrong and unjust. You don't know me, 
 or you never would speak as you have done. I 
 am utterly incapable of the wretched meanness 
 you think me guilty of. I wish I could say all 
 I feel, but I can't I can't ; and I dare ^say I 
 look to you like a convicted spy, or an idiot, or 
 something equally abominable." 
 
 'You came last night to see if I was here?" 
 'I did." 
 
 So ! You saw that I was here ?" 
 I did." 
 
 Then was that not enough ? Why did you 
 come again to night ?" 
 
 "I came to hear you sing ! Heaven knows 
 
H 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I came for that and nothing else. It it de 
 lights me. I could not stay away. I wi 
 come again and again, unless you bid me no, 
 But do not bid me not to come, for I woul 
 rather be dead than not hear you sing. " 
 
 " Hush," she said, in a low and gentle tone 
 " they outside may hear us." As I found cour 
 age to look up, I saw that her lips were trem 
 bling and that her cheeks were crimsoned. Ha< 
 my burst of sudden eloquence not been inter 
 rtipted, it would infallibly have ended with a 
 fervent declaration of love then and there. She 
 imposed silence on me by a gesture which had 
 I thought, as much entreaty as command in it. 
 and then said, "I must go; it is my time tc 
 sing. But I believe you ; and I was wrong and 
 angry. You don't know what it is to be a pooi 
 girl, trying to live honestly, and watched and sus- 
 pected. I beg you for pardon. Good-night.' 
 She disappeared ; and I heard her voice in t 
 moment thrilling from the platform. I, too, 
 came in front again, and found my way back 
 to the seat I had left. 
 
 I would have sat the whole entertainment 
 out, but that I hated the idea of meeting the 
 young carpenter and seeing him give his arm 
 to Christina. I waited and waited, every mo- 
 ment dreading to see him make his appearance. 
 Often as I turned toward the platform, her eyes 
 never met mine. At last I made up my mind 
 and left the room. Luck was against me ; at 
 the door below I met my rival. This time he 
 did not pass me with a salute. He looked 
 fiercely at me, and his lips quivered with ex- 
 citement. 
 
 "What d'ye come here for?" he asked. 
 " What's that to you ?" was my school-boyish 
 reply. I was not in years much beyond the 
 school-boy age. 
 
 "It's this to me look here, it's this: you 
 come here to watch that girl, and spy upon her, 
 and fetch and carry stories about her, to get 
 her dismissed from the choir ; I dare say that's 
 why you come here." 
 
 " You are a liar !" was my fierce reply " an 
 impertinent liar!" 
 
 He turned pale ; but not at all with fear. 
 "Do you mean to say," he asked, "that 
 you've not been sent here as a spy on her ?" 
 
 " I mean to say nothing to you, or any fellow 
 like you, except just what I have said." 
 
 "Yes, you can talk in that way here," he 
 said, significantly; "but would you say so any 
 where else ?" 
 
 "Any where you like ; and the sooner the 
 better. " My pent-up feelings sought any man- 
 ner of outburst as a relief. 
 " Come this way, then." 
 My rival led the way down the oozy, plashy 
 lane I have already described to the strand. 
 It was nearly as dark as the night before: it 
 was quite as lonely. The few twinkling lights 
 at the far mast-heads of anchored vessels alone 
 broke the gloom. Unless we stood pretty close 
 together we could hardly see each other, and 
 my foe strode on so impatiently that I some- 
 
 times lost sight of him altogether for a moment 
 and i was once or twice almost under the ne- 
 cessity of having to raise an undignified halloo 
 How he managed to get on without stumbling 
 - can not imagine; every other moment my 
 feet were tripping over huge stones or coils of 
 chain, and once I literally fell forward right 
 over an upturned boat. I began to think the 
 whole proceeding rather an absurd one ; but I 
 had been grievously insulted, and although now 
 a mimon of the law, professionally bound, one 
 would think, to abstain from deeds of violence 
 yet it must be remembered that I was the son 
 >f a boat-builder who had been a sailor in his 
 day, and that not many months ago I was a 
 school-boy. Yet I much wished the duel to 
 come oft' quickly, and while my blood was tip ; 
 'or I felt the ridiculous features of the business 
 Becoming every moment more impressive, and 
 I began to think that an attorney's clerk box- 
 ng with a carpenter a poetic and musical 
 ,-oung lover fighting a vulgar rival with fists 
 vould be outrageously absurd, unpicttiresque, 
 >nd unheroic. 
 
 At last my pertinacious and thrice-accursed 
 ormentor came to a pause on a clear spot or 
 vhat seemed clear. 
 
 "Now then," he said, "there's nobody here. 
 Vhat have you got to say ? Are you not a spy 
 ,nd a sneak?" 
 
 This was too much ; and as I had given my 
 nswer in words before, I thought a repetition 
 f it would -be mere tautology. I was glad, too, 
 o bring my scruples and hesitations to a violent 
 nd. I simply hit out, and caught my antago- 
 ist fairly on the left eyebrow. 
 
 Then began the fight. It was hearty, vigor- 
 us, and funny. I don't know whether many 
 f my readers have fought a battle on the sea- 
 hore at an advanced hour of a dark winter 
 ight. The sensations it produces are decided- 
 V odd, tantalizing, and bewildering ; but it has 
 s peculiar enjoyment too. At least this battle 
 f mine seemed a positively delightful relief 
 rom my previous frame of mind. I very soon 
 found that my antagonist was far stronger than 
 I. He had indeed arms of iron ; and he took 
 his punishment with unruffled countenance. 
 The punishment was pretty hard, for he had no 
 gleam whatever of scientific knowledge, and ex- 
 posed himself constantly to a smart blow on the 
 face. But he seemed to care no more for the 
 blows than if they had been the pepperings of a 
 hail-shower, although, dark as it was, I could 
 see that his face was bleeding in many places. 
 His mode of fighting was an odd and self-ac- 
 quired process altogether. He never hit straight 
 out, but leveled huge, tremendous, swinging 
 blows at the side of the head, literally leaping 
 off his feet at each stroke, so as to lend it a 
 more furious momentum. I was inclined to 
 laugh at first, but I soon found it was no laugh- 
 ing matter, for the first touch I got of one of 
 these odd blows and I only got a touch, for I 
 sprang aside in time nearly knocked all my 
 senses clear away. If he had been prompt to 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 follow up his victory, the combat was over there 
 and then! As it was, I felt pretty sure that 
 should I be unlucky enough to come in for the 
 full force and swing of one of those swashing 
 blows, it would be enough for rne ; and I tried 
 with desperate energy all such resources of sci- 
 ence and strength as I had to bring the fight to 
 a conclusion. He bore my hammering as coolly 
 as if he were -of iron ; and alas ! I think he ac- 
 quired at last a sort of rude notion of stratagem 
 wholly his own. He threw himself quite open 
 in the most tempting fashion to one of my 
 straightforward blows, took it without even 
 shaking his head, and while I was in the very 
 act of giving .it, suddenly leaped upright, swung 
 his huge flail of an arm, and crash across the 
 side of my head came all the full fury of his 
 blow. Meteors in a rnqment danced and 
 sparkled all around me ; stars, comets, flashes 
 of lightning blazed upon my eyes ; thunders 
 indescribable rattled round my ears and brain ; 
 the earth heaved beneath ine; the dark sky 
 came crashing down upon me. I seemed as if 
 I were cast loose from all gravitating principle 
 and whirling through space, now head up, now 
 heels up and at last I came with a cruel bang 
 down to earth again and then I felt for half a 
 second a soft, sweet, melting sensation of lan- 
 guid rest, like that produced to a bruised man 
 by the bleeding of a vein, and I just heard 
 something like a shriek, and then I was asleep. 
 
 The plain practical English of all my sensa- 
 tions was that I had been fairly knocked off my 
 feet by a stunning blow, had fallen with my 
 head crashing against a stone, and had then 
 and there fainted. 
 
 When I opened my eyes I saw at first no- 
 thing but the stars. I remained feebly con- 
 templating them a moment, as if that were all 
 I had to do in existence. Then I saw some 
 dark object interpose itself between me and 
 the constellation of Orion, and I recognized the 
 face of my conqueror, and I think I endeavor- 
 ed to frown defiance ; but the face was in a 
 moment withdrawn. Then I somehow became 
 conscious that a soft hand was passing along 
 my forehead, that a handkerchief, or something 
 of the kind, was pressed gently but firmly on 
 the place where the stone had cut me ; and at 
 last I came to understand that I was lying on 
 the beach with my head in a woman's lap. 
 
 Unconsciously I spoke half aloud the word 
 "Christina!" 
 
 ' ' Oh, thank God ! " said Christina's own voice, 
 "he's alive." 
 
 " Yes, thank God !" muttered the deep voice 
 of the poor basso; "I didn't mean to do it, 
 Christina I didn't indeed. I wish he had 
 done it to me." 
 
 "For shame!" replied Christina, still in a 
 sort of whisper. " Shame to you so strong 
 and huge to fight with him ! " 
 
 I began now to see things a little clearer ; 
 and I scrambled to my feet, still somewhat 
 staggery, perhaps, but quite able to speak up 
 for myself. 
 
 " It's no fault of his," I said ; "and I'm quite 
 well able to fight him. Look at his face, Miss 
 Braun, and see if he hasn't got the worst of it. 
 And it was all my fault, too." 
 
 Christina rose to her feet. "NoAV, shake 
 hands," she said, " and don't be fools any more." 
 
 My antagonist advanced sheepishly, and held 
 out the brawny fist which had proved such a 
 rough play-fellow. 
 
 "I I hope you'll forgive me," he said, with 
 one glance at me and another at Christina. 
 " I was quite wrong altogether ; and I know it 
 now, and I'm sorry. I'm sure I don't bear any 
 malice, if you don't ; and and how do you 
 feel now ?" 
 
 I assured him, in all sincerity, that I bore no 
 malice whatever ; and I likewise affirmed, per- 
 haps not quite so sincerely, that I felt perfectly 
 well never better in my life. Indeed, I was 
 recovering fast. I had only had a stunning 
 blow and a cut head. At twenty years one 
 soon gets over such trifles as these. 
 
 I then learned that when Christina was leav- 
 ing the singing-room she inquired for her reg- 
 ular escort, and was told that he had gone down 
 toward the strand with me. Something led her 
 to suspect that we had quarreled, and she fol- 
 lowed us, but arrived only in time to Avitness 
 the ignominious fall and utter defeat of one 
 combatant. I ought to have been delighted at 
 my defeat, for it brought such tender interest 
 and anxiety about me ; but I was not delight- 
 ed. The one thing present to my mind all 
 through was that I had been " licked," and that 
 she saw it. "Earl Percy sees my fall," is the 
 reflection that lends most bitterness to the fate 
 of the old hero in the ballad. What is the hu- 
 miliation of a chief before any foe compared 
 with that of a youth who is beaten under the 
 very eyes of the girl he loves ? The pity and 
 kindness of Christina were bitter to me. 
 
 On the other hand, my rival's victory did not 
 seem to have crowned him with joy. He had 
 a crest-fallen, humbled, spaniel-like demeanor. 
 We both walked home with Christina, who in- 
 sisted on giving me her arm instead of taking 
 mine, on the ground that I must be far too weak 
 not to need support. 
 
 When we reached her door I heard my con- 
 queror say to her in a low tone, 
 
 " You are not angry with me any more ?'' 
 
 " No," was the answer, given, I am bound to 
 say, in any thing but a forgiving tone. " Why 
 should I be angry ? Good-night." 
 
 " Ah, but you are angry. Don't, Christina !" 
 
 " Good-night." 
 
 He was going away, depressed and silent, 
 when she called him back and held out her 
 hand. 
 
 "No, Edward, I am not angry. I was, but 
 I am not any more." 
 
 " And may I come for you to-morrow night ?" 
 
 "If you like." 
 
 "If I like!" 
 
 He turned away rejoicing. 
 
 She held out her hand to me without saying 
 
16 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 a word. But her eyes met mine : and some- 
 how I went away rejoicing too. 
 
 Next day I called upon Miss Griffin. I hard- 
 ly knew what to say to the good spinster, and 
 was much in hope, as I passed up through the 
 bonnet-shop, that the organist might be not at 
 
 home. She was in. I went up stairs and 
 knocked at the little drawing-room door. Just 
 then I heard voices inside, and I would have 
 retreated ; but it was too late. Miss Griffin's 
 shrill tones were heard : 
 "Is that Mr. Banks?" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 17 
 
 "Yes, Miss. Griffin." 
 " Come in, Mr. Banks, please." 
 I entered. Miss Griffin was standing up 
 near her piano, on which she rested one hand, 
 the fingers of which were excitedly playing an 
 imaginary and rapid tune on the walnut. CHris- 
 tina Braun stood in the middle of the room, 
 and looked flushed and angry. My face flush- 
 ed more deeply than hers at the mere sight of 
 her. Miss Griffin's mamma was playing with 
 a parrot in a corner. Seeing that Christina 
 and Miss Griffin had evidently been engaged in 
 excited colloquy, I made for the mamma, and 
 would have at once pretended to bury myself 
 in conversation with her, but she waved me off 
 with the back of her hand, and with a warning 
 gesture directed toward the two principal' per- 
 sonages in the room, as one who should say, 
 "Forbear, young man; something highly im- 
 portant is going forward. Disturb it not by 
 idle words." So I stood transfixed and said 
 nothing, and no one said a word to me. 
 
 " There's no use in talking, Christina Braun," 
 Miss Griffin went on ; "I can't have you sing- 
 ing any longer in my choir unless you give up 
 that horrid, odious, abominable place. Mr. 
 Thirlwall won't have it; he would not allow 
 me to have any one who sings there." 
 
 "What harm is that place ?" Christina asked, 
 in a tone half pleading, half angry ; "I would 
 not go there if I could help it. I go there, be- 
 lieve it, not for my pleasure. I go there be- 
 cause I must live, and my father must live. 
 You have not a father, Miss Griffin." 
 
 Mamma pursed her mouth, raised her eye- 
 brows, lifted her hands, and silently appealed, 
 first to me and then to the parrot, against the 
 boldness of this remark. It seemed positively 
 to insinuate a comparison between Christina's 
 father and the late Mr. Griffin. 
 
 "And," added Christina, "they pay me more 
 money than the church can give." 
 "Oh, Christina!" 
 " I speak to no one there." 
 " But you must know it is not a proper place 
 for a girl." 
 
 " I do not know that it is not a proper place. 
 Did we not often sing songs yes, well, and 
 also play waltzes, in the choir when there were 
 not people praying below ?" 
 
 "Christina, it isn't the singing of the songs, 
 as you know very well ; it's the people the 
 kind of people who go there." 
 
 "I do not speak to the people, they do not 
 speak to me, except they who sing as my- 
 self." 
 
 "Really, Miss Griffin," said I, striking in, 
 "there is no harm whatever in the place, and 
 I think it's quite absurd and ridiculous of Mr. 
 Thirlwall to go on in such a way. He's a reg- 
 ular old idiot, I think, and an ancient humbug 
 toa." 
 
 " Thank you, Mr. Banks ; I am much obliged 
 to you for your kind and respectful way of speak- 
 ing of our clergyman, and the considerate man 
 ner in which you assist me in keeping up the dis- 
 B 
 
 cipline of the choir. For you, Christina, you do 
 not know what may become of you." 
 
 ; < Nothing will become of me, God helping 
 nothing of harm. And I may as well begin, 
 Miss Griffin. Once I shall go upon the theatre 
 and sing there " 
 
 At this point Miss Griffin seemed to think 
 the discussion had gone quite far enough. She 
 ceased to beat her silent tune upon the piano ; 
 but she came round to the front of the instru- 
 ment, deliberately took off the music-book which 
 stood on the little frame, shut the book up, put 
 down the frame, and then closed the piano with 
 a solemn bang. There was no obvious occasion 
 for this performance. I interpreted it to be a 
 sort of formal and ceremonial act of excommu- 
 nication. 
 
 It seemed, however, to have relieved Miss 
 Griffin's mind of some of its anger. She turned 
 to Christina now with an expression of face 
 rather grieved than severe. The excommuni- 
 cation once fairly done, she seemed stricken 
 with pity for the outcast. 
 
 " Well, Christina," she said, " if I am to un- 
 derstand that you will not give up that place ' 
 
 "Will not give it up ? I can not give it up." 
 
 "Then I am very, very sorry; and I would 
 keep you if I could indeed I would, although 
 perhaps you don't think it now; but I must 
 not do it, for you see, Christina, if you have a 
 father to support, I have a mother, and I can't 
 battle against what people say; and so we must 
 part. I hope you will do well, Christina, wher- 
 ever you go ; only I do hope you will never be 
 tempted to sing in any of those Romanist places, 
 whatever they may offer you ; and remember 
 to be a good girl, and never to give up your 
 church." 
 
 "The church," said Christina, with a flash 
 of something like scorn crossing her face, "has 
 given me up, I think.. But I blame you not at 
 all, Miss Griffin ; you were very kind to me al- 
 ways always." 
 
 Poor Miss Griffin was quite dissolved in tears. 
 The very kindliest of mortals, she was in an- 
 guish at the part she had to play in the trans- 
 action, and still more, I fully believe, at the 
 thought of the awful ruin of all heavenly pros- 
 pects which she clearly saw impending over one 
 who refused to follow the behests of her clergy- 
 man, and who sang nigger-melodies for sailors. 
 
 Christina bade Miss Griffin good -by; and 
 both were in tears. Then the outcast walked 
 toward Miss Griffin's mamma and held out her 
 hand. But the mamma's dignity was hurt at 
 the disobedience and disrespect, and she drew 
 back, executed the most formal of bows, and 
 said, "Adieu, Mademoiselle." 
 
 Then came my turn. Christina held out her 
 hand to me, and her eyes met mine. I took 
 her hand and pressed it to my lips. A slight 
 shriek from mamma testified to her sense of my 
 scandalous conduct. Miss Griffin was absorbed 
 in tears and did not see it. 
 
 Christina left the room, and I hurried after 
 her. 
 
18 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Mr. Banks," I heard Miss Griffin call out, 
 " please don't go yet. I want to speak to you 
 particularly about the choir." 
 
 "In five minutes, two minutes, Miss Griffin," 
 was my retreating answer ; and ^ relieved my- 
 self by adding, in a lower tone, " the choir may 
 go to the devil." 
 
 I overtook Christina at the door. 
 
 She abandoned the choir, then and there, 
 never reappearing within its precincts. 
 
 And I went that night, and many nights suc- 
 cessively, to the condemned and fatal singing- 
 saloon. 
 
 In little more than a week a considerable 
 change was brought about in the relations of 
 the personages of this story. There was first 
 a sort of break-down in the arrangements of the 
 choir, and one Sunday the audience had to be 
 content with merely an instrumental perform- 
 ance. Soon a new bass, a new tenor, and a 
 new soprano gladdened the pious ears and 
 hearts of the congregation. For immediately 
 on Christina's abandoning the choir Ned Lam- 
 bert did what I had felt sure he would do he 
 gave up his post and sang bass for that congre- 
 gation no more. I had made up my mind nev- 
 er to go near the place again, once Christina 
 abandoned it ; and I was only sorry the sacri- 
 fice was not a far greater one (really it was not 
 quite insignificant), that I might have had the 
 proud consciousness of voluntary martyrdom. 
 
 The affair created quite a little stir in our 
 microcosm. It was talked of for fully three 
 weeks at least, three Sundays. I attended 
 church the first Sunday, as unprofessional wor- 
 shiper, in the hope that Mr. Thirlwall might 
 make some allusion to us in his sermon. But 
 he did not, and I was disappointed. Many 
 eyes were turned on me, however ; and people 
 coming out of church and passing me whispered 
 and shrugged their shoulders, and I felt rather 
 proud. The general conclusion of the congre- 
 gation was that we three Christina Braun, 
 Edward Lambert, and myself were simply go- 
 ing to the devil. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 "FAR ABOVE SINGING." 
 
 MR. BRAUN and his daughter still occupied 
 the house in which the former had endeavored 
 in vain to win the childhood of our town to 
 philosophy and science by the royal road of 
 amusement. Our childhood absolutely refused 
 even toys, if any manner of instruction and 
 moral purpose were to come with them ; and 
 therefore, while Mr. Braun still technically oc- 
 cupied the house, his actual occupancy was con- 
 fined to three small rooms on the second-floor. 
 He had been driven back in this way from stage 
 to stage, his domain growing gradually smaller 
 and smaller, like the Pope's, until even the lit- 
 tle Leonine City now left him seemed itself 
 only the final halting-place before absolute sur- 
 render of all temporal endowment. The shop 
 
 was let to a watch-maker ; the first-floor was oc- 
 cupied by a hair-dresser; and as one of the 
 plates on the street-door bore the name of 
 "Miss Muncey, milliner," and I sometimes did 
 meet lank and lymphatic young women on the 
 starts, I had to infer that the third-floor the 
 garrets, in fact constituted the work-rooms 
 and show-rooms of Miss Muncey. 
 
 The little sitting-room occupied by the 
 Brauns was perhaps as poorly furnished an 
 apartment as any could well be which did not 
 proclaim actual destitution. A few of the poor- 
 est cane-chairs, and not more than a few ; an 
 arm-chair, covered with the cheapest flowered 
 calico ; a central table of deal, with a faded, 
 over-washed cover; these and an infirm sofa 
 made up the principal part of the stock of fur- 
 niture. There was, however, a piano of good 
 tone a relic of better days with which Chris- 
 tina would not part, and which, indeed, was 
 her sole capital and "plant" as a musician. 
 There were always flowers in the room, and bo- 
 tanical specimens carefully pressed and tasteful- 
 ly displayed ; there were two or three pretty 
 vases of Bohemian glass ; there was Mr. Braun's 
 flute, really a handsome article, with old-fash- 
 ioned silver keys; there was his pipe, huge, 
 and likewise silver-mounted. These and other 
 stray properties gave an appearance to the room 
 which at least suggested refinement, and some- 
 thing like ornament. And I should not surely 
 omit to mention a beautifully carved and pol- 
 ished book-case, small, but of genuine oak and 
 admirable workmanship ; and I knew the mo- 
 ment I saw it whose hand had wrought it, and 
 whose gift it was. "It was given to my fa- 
 ther," said Christina to me afterward, "not to 
 me. I would not have taken it, though I know 
 poor Ned would have been vexed by a refusal ; 
 and so I am glad he didn't offer it to me." 
 
 It was easy to understand, after an evening 
 spent in this little room, why the burden of life 
 had fallen so heavily and so early upon my 
 poor Christina. Her father had entirely given 
 up all idea of struggling any longer with the 
 world, although he was far from being too old 
 for stout and stiff exertion. He was the gen- 
 tlest and the feeblest being I ever met. He was 
 a small, very small man, with a pale, thin, 
 clearly-marked, handsome face ; a benevolent, 
 mild, and placid expression ; soft, silky, scantv 
 gray hair; and large, dark, gray-blue eyes. 
 His eyes were precisely like his daughter's, 
 much darker than his complexion would have 
 led you to expect ; but there the resemblance 
 ceased. Mr. Braun spoke English admirably ; 
 he played the piano and the flute well ; he was 
 an accomplished botanist, and knew a good deal 
 about chemistry and astronomy. He talked 
 much of flowers, of stars, of the poetry of na- 
 ture, of shadows and sunrises, of beautiful and 
 gentle things generally; and of the poets and 
 writers Avho sang and discoursed of such things. 
 When he was not playing his flute he common- 
 ly sat and smoked his pipe, the bowl of which 
 rested on the ground, all the evening through. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 He always rose early, and walked on the hills 
 or by the sea ; rose none the less early though 
 he had been out on the strand watching some 
 planet or constellation till long past midnight ; 
 and while Christina provided him with fc the 
 means of living, he repaid her with fresh flow- 
 ers, and observations on the heavens, and the 
 beauty of life, and the divine purpose in every 
 thing. He was, indeed, a thoroughly imprac- 
 ticable, well-meaning, good-for-nothing, lovable 
 old man. He would have provoked me terri- 
 bly, I think, if I were his son ; but he did not 
 seem to provoke Christina. She appeared to 
 take it as quite a matter of course that her fa- 
 ther should smoke his pipe, or botanize, while 
 she toiled to get money and provide dinner, and 
 make the two ends meet. He was always sweet, 
 mild, and happy. He had been blessed, or 
 cursed, with that calm, light nature which can 
 put away trouble or responsibility in a moment, 
 and find enjoyment any where. He had lost 
 wife and children six children all of whom 
 he dearly loved ; but he lived on tranquil, and 
 spoke of them as having been happily trans- 
 ferred to amaranthine bowers, where they had 
 only to await his coming. What he had him- 
 self done to merit that sure translation to im- 
 mortal bliss I never could learn ; but it was clear 
 that his mind was quite made up on that point. 
 So, too, of his daughter. She reverenced in 
 him, as pure and lofty religious feeling, that 
 which I always regarded merely as the physical 
 placidity of a temperament not susceptible of 
 any strong or keen emotion. An innocently 
 selfish, mildly egotistic man, you could not help 
 loving him, and I at least could not help some- 
 times despising him. While the stars shone, 
 while the flowers bloomed, when the snow cov- 
 ered the ground and the frost made the bram- 
 bles look like sprays and spars of crystal, he 
 was happy, and could not be otherwise. He 
 could forget hunger in the contemplation of a 
 flower ; all humanity in the polishing of a stone. 
 He cared as little for active thought as for ac- 
 tive pursuits ; and knew less of politics than an 
 American infant generally does. The political 
 agitations, struggles, sufferings, aspirations of 
 his own countrymen, inspired him only with 
 a tranquil scorn. He often asked, with utter 
 contempt in his tone, what it mattered who 
 owned the Khine, so long as men could see its 
 waters shining as brightly as ever in the sun, 
 and darkening as before in the shadows of the 
 everlasting hills. 
 
 "German unity!" he would say, scornfully 
 " Germany has unity. Has she not Goethe and 
 Novalis and Jean P.aul? has she not Fichte? 
 Hapsburg owns not less Kant than Branden- 
 burg; Bavaria can sing the songs of Uhland 
 and Arndt, as well as Suabia. Our unity is in 
 our soul, and our language, and our worship of 
 the beautiful and divine. The rest is nothing 
 no, nothing at all, or mere smoke and cloud 
 veiling the glow of the heaven, as Faust him- 
 self has said.'' 
 
 Mr. Braun never looked one moment beyond 
 
 the present, and was angry in his mild way with 
 any one who did. He was displeased with 
 Christina for singing of nights in the Cave of 
 Harmony, not because he had any objection to 
 the place, or the company, or the kind of life 
 to which it introduced her ; not because it over- 
 tasked her, or threatened to wear out her voice, 
 or endangered her in any way ; but because she 
 had to leave him for some hours every evening, 
 and he was lonely without her. So he was 
 vexed with her, and chafed in his own small 
 way, and was jealous, as if her leaving him was 
 a willful act of neglect, or indifference to his 
 happiness. He did not concern himself to 
 think who would pay the rent if poor Christina 
 had not always had spirit and sense enough to 
 act for herself. A sort of philosopher, he was 
 perhaps wise in his own conceit of life's theory 
 and purpose; but philosophers of that school 
 ought never to have any children. I have oft- 
 en thought that when Morality blames Eous- 
 seau for having abandoned his children to a 
 foundling hospital, it blames him for one of the 
 only wise things he ever did. Better to confide 
 them to the care of any institution, managed 
 by any sane and human creatures, than to keep 
 them under his own melancholy and imbecile 
 charge. 
 
 I took lessons in German from Mr. Braun. 
 I really wanted to learn the language, partly 
 for its own sake, and more because it was Chris- 
 tina's native tongue. But of course my chief 
 reason was to have a plausible excuse for com- 
 ing often to the house. After the lapse of a 
 quarter I paid him some money. He took it 
 passively, and laid it beside him. Christina 
 coming in soon after found the money, made 
 inquiry about it, and gave it back to me. I 
 would have resisted, but she flushed so angrily 
 that I pocketed it without further objection. 
 
 "My father knows nothing about money," 
 she said, " and never did. I arrange all that ; 
 it is good enough task for women. He was 
 made for something much better, and we al- 
 ways liked to spare him. I know he never 
 meant to take any money from you ; you have 
 lost enough by us already." 
 
 For she would insist upon regarding my with- 
 drawal from the choir as a high, mighty, and 
 chivalrous sacrifice. 
 
 " You took this in mistake, father?" she said, 
 appealing to him; "you were not thinking; 
 you took it, not observing ?" 
 
 "Versteht sich," he placidly replied, waving 
 away with his hand a cloud of smoke, and sol- 
 emnly indifferent to the whole business. I said 
 no more, and what future lessons I received 
 were accepted without talk of payment. 
 
 I do not know what was the special charm 
 which made me so suddenly fall in Jove with 
 Christina Braun. Falling in love is indeed the 
 most exact description of what befell me. From 
 a smooth level of calm indifference I literally 
 fell into a glowing deep of love. Nor did this 
 condition seem likely to change. It was im- 
 possible for me not to continue loving her. To 
 
20 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 begin with, she was intensely, exuberantly, an 
 above all things, feminine. In every glance an 
 movement she now seemed to my opened eve 
 to diffuse some vague sense of womanhood a] 
 around her. As one is conscious of the pres 
 ence of flowers which he does not see, as on 
 feels the air surcharged with electricity before 
 the thunder-storm, so I always felt the influ 
 ence, the sensuous influence if you will, of ideal 
 ized womanhood when Christina was near. ! 
 do not know whether this sort of feeling ca"n b 
 made intelligible in any words of mine, but ^ 
 can not better describe the sensation of delight 
 refinement, and romantic love which her men 
 presence awakened in my soul. As I look back 
 now, all the purple light of youth, all the gla- 
 mour of poetry, all the bewitching illusions of 
 music, seem to glorify that time when first 
 Christina's presence grew a familiar influence 
 to me. 
 
 There was an extraordinary quality of quiet 
 energy in her which amazed me when I came 
 to appreciate it. It was not the energy which 
 fusses and bustles to most young men a terri- 
 bly disenchanting and disagreeable quality. It 
 was an energy which made itself silently felt : 
 a great self-sufficing quality. The early ne- 
 cessity of thinking and acting for two, the im- 
 possibility of consulting with one who was as 
 useless for consultation as a baby, had doubt- 
 less forced this quality into regular action. 
 Christina seemed to be of that class of women 
 who can make something almost out of nothing. 
 For easy and prompt adornment of her grace- 
 ful figure she had a positive genius. I have 
 often wondered and admired to see what a 
 splendid simulation of imposing concert-cos- 
 tume she could confer upon herself with a little 
 white muslin and a few scraps of ribbon and 
 roses ; and she could put on an old shawl in 
 a style that Lady Hamilton might have en- 
 vied. 
 
 I grew into the habit of spending every dis- 
 engaged hour and nearly the whole of every 
 Sunday in the familiar little room over the 
 watch-maker's and under the milliner's. We 
 sang, we played, we read, we recited, we talked 
 German, we had very, very humble and modest 
 suppers; we were immensely .sociable, uncon- 
 strained, full of sentiment, full of laughter, and 
 happy. Edward Lambert came sometimes and 
 took lessons on the flute from Mr. Braun, for 
 which I know he contrived delicately to make 
 some return in one way or another. A patient, 
 manly creature, he sometimes spent his whole 
 evening at his flute-lesson, while Christina and 
 I talked or sang duets on the nights when she 
 was free. I knew that he loved her, dearly and 
 disinterestedly, without selfishness and without 
 hope. I knew that she regarded him as one 
 might regard a fond and faithful Newfoundland 
 dog. After a while he ceased to come very 
 often, and when he did come he talked chiefly 
 to Mr. Braun. 
 
 These were pleasant times, and free. They 
 gave a sort of mild foretaste or breath of the Bo- 
 
 hemian life which awaited some of us. What- 
 ever of intellectual culture I have ever had I 
 owe its development to these days and evenings, 
 to that mild old man, to that girl. I learned 
 to read French and Italian and German, and 
 to speak these languages fluently enough, if 
 not always very gracefully and grammatically. 
 Years and years after a Frenchwoman told me 
 I spoke French like a German and not like an 
 Englishman. A more happy, harmless life no 
 youth could well have spent. 
 
 Was I very much grieved when Ned Lam- 
 bert left our little circle and went away to Lon- 
 don? This happened when the kind of life, 
 blended of Arcadia and Bohemia, which I have 
 been describing, had lasted nearly a year. Well, 
 I parted from the good fellow with a pang ; but 
 I must assuredly have felt relieved when he 
 went away. He was an ambitious young fel- 
 low enough ; and his ambition was to become 
 something like an artist. Therefore he made 
 up his mind to be an organ-builder; and a 
 chance opened for him through some friends 
 in London, of which he willingly availed him- 
 self. I happened just to come in*to Mr. Braun's 
 on the day when Lambert was taking his final 
 leave. He was holding in his hand a little 
 purse, a parting keepsake from Christina, and 
 twisting it awkwardly between his fingers. 
 
 " When shall we three meet again ?" I be- 
 gan, endeavoring to say something pleasant. 
 
 "We three? we four!" interjected Mr. 
 Braun. " I am not to be left out of the pros- 
 pect. I hope to be at the next meeting too." 
 
 "It must be in London, then," murmured 
 poor Ned, disconsolately. "I sha'n't come 
 back here ever again ever again." 
 
 The last time I saw Lambert not long since 
 he told me that through all the intervening 
 years he never did return to the old town, and 
 never would. 
 
 "In London, then," said I; "for London 
 we are all bound. We are not going to stop 
 -n this old place all our lives, while Ned Lam- 
 )ert becomes a great man, and makes a for- 
 tune in London." 
 
 'I'm not likely to come to much," said Lam- 
 >ert; "and I don't want to make a fortune 
 
 )W." 
 
 I saw tears sparkle in Christina's eyes. 
 " Good-by, Edward," she said ; " but not for- 
 ever! Oh no, not forever! You have been 
 cinder and better than a brother to me for ever 
 o long; and I shall never, never forget you." 
 
 She put her arm over his shoulder, drew him 
 [own toward her, and kissed him twice. Then 
 he turned and went abruptly into her own room, 
 ^ed Lambert tossed his hand in the air as a 
 cind of silent -parting salute to us, and in a 
 noment we heard his rapid steps descending 
 he stairs. 
 
 ' He is a good lad, Edward Lambert, " said 
 VIr. Braun ; " a kind, true-hearted boy. He 
 oes remind me of some of our German youth, 
 vith his large grave face, and his strong hands, 
 nd his soft heart. He is fond of Christina ; 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 21 
 
 and he did ask her to marry him ach, Gott, 
 yes ! and last night again. But she could not 
 love him in that way, Emanuel. She could not 
 love him to marry him, as you know." And the 
 kind old man looked at me with beaming, gen- 
 tle eyes. 
 
 Yes ; I did know it by this time. I must 
 have been stupidly undeserving of any woman's 
 regard if I had not felt before now that Chris- 
 tina Braun loved me. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 DEATH IN ARCADIA. 
 
 NONE of us liked the singing-saloon. Not 
 that there was any thing bad about it ex- 
 cept its name ; that, in a small country town, 
 was quite enough. In our town it did not 
 much matter whether a man, woman, or insti- 
 tution was really bad or good. The sole ques- 
 tion was whether he, she, or it had a bad name. 
 So it had long been our object that Christina 
 should abandon the music-hall, and try to live 
 by teaching singing arid the piano. At last we 
 resolved that a day-school should be opened. 
 Yes ; Mr. and Miss Braun's school French, 
 German, and music. We advertised in the lo- 
 cal paper rather a stretch of boldness on our 
 part in those quiet days and I brought in a 
 copy of the paper that same evening, over which 
 we gazed and laughed a good deal. Young la- 
 dies and gentlemen were to be taught ; and of 
 course perfectly original plans were to be adopt- 
 ed in the teaching of every thing. A great 
 brass plate was got and engraved with the le- 
 gend, " Mr. and Miss Braun's School." I 
 crossed the street furtively to look at it, and re- 
 port as to the effect ; and the thing was so far 
 accomplished. 
 
 Not many pupils came at first. The story 
 of Christina's nightly performances had of 
 course got abroad, and made mammas feel shy 
 of such an instructress. Gradually, however, 
 a few were got together, all from the humbler 
 ranks of our middle plateau; these brought 
 more ; and the terms being moderate, and a 
 good deal taught for the money, things began 
 to look a little more prosperous. 
 
 Still, this was clearly not the kind of field 
 which Christina's ambition would have sought. 
 We had often indulged and talked over wild 
 hopes that at some distant period we might sing 
 together, prima donna and prirno tenore, upon 
 some great stage, with half a metropolis for our 
 audience. "I saw Rubini," Mr. Braun would 
 sometimes repeat, "in Italy, when he was your 
 age Ja wohl, I knew him too and he had not 
 a finer voice. No; that had he not." I re- 
 port this eulogy of my voice without a blush. 
 The tribunal which is proverbially wiser than 
 Voltaire has since decided, very conclusively, 
 that my voice is not quite equal to Rubini's. 
 But at the time the praise was spoken it had 
 some effect upon me other than to make me 
 smile. 
 
 In fact it had bedome gradually understood 
 that the musical and other fortunes of Christina 
 and myself were to be associated in life and for 
 life, whenever fate and favor should allow us to 
 begin the struggle together. We were to make 
 a great name in Florence, in Paris, in London. 
 I need not say that we did not pause to con- 
 sider whether any difficulties were likely to 
 arise in the way of a pair who began by getting 
 married as a preliminary to seeking their for- 
 tune. As to our solitary counselor, he would 
 have seen no objection whatever to any scheme 
 which seemed graceful, disinterested, and some- 
 what romantic ; and even if the scheme had 
 none of these recommendations, he would have 
 become reconciled to it or any thing else in a 
 quarter of an hour. So far, then, the common 
 obstructions to the course of true love did not, 
 m our case, rise to disturb the smoothness of 
 the current. There were only three persons in 
 the world to be consulted, or who cared a straw 
 about the matter, and they were quite in har- 
 mony on the subject. 
 
 At least we were quite in harmony so far as 
 the love and the main wish of two lives were- 
 concerned. But the feelings of Christina and 
 myself did not always flow in the same channel. 
 She was a true-born artist ; I never was, ex- 
 cept in the merely technical sense, an artist at 
 all. She would have given up a fortune for a 
 lyric success ; if I were assured of an easy in- 
 come, I should no more have thought of be- 
 coming a professional singer than of becoming 
 an amateur fireman. Moreover, all her plans 
 and projects now were for splendid success un- 
 der my leadership. Like all women who have 
 any imagination, she saw her lover as a hero 
 destined to triumph on every field he chose to 
 enter. She always arranged the plan of the 
 future as if we could not fail. I looked for- 
 ward with a secret dread of failure to every un- 
 dertaking in which I was likely to bear a part. 
 For all that is talked of man's idle self-conceit, 
 I think an ignoble distrust of our own capabili- 
 ties is one of the commonest of masculine weak- 
 nesses. In my case, indeed, my distrust was 
 well justified in one sense; but it helped, more 
 than any thing else, to spoil some part of my 
 life. Christina really knew what she could do ; 
 and she was only waiting for the time to do it. 
 She was quite happy, cooking her father's sau- 
 sage and lighting his pipe; but all the time she 
 knew herself an embryo prima donna, and re- 
 garded the musical world as only waiting for 
 her. There were times when I felt something 
 like a pang of pity for her inexperience, and 
 her confident, sanguine nature. I ought rather 
 to have pitied my own inferior courage, miser- 
 ably inferior endowments, inferior organization 
 altogether. Knowing what she became know- 
 ing what, under brighter auspices, .she might 
 have become it now seems to me the very 
 blindness of affection which made her dream 
 for a moment of placing herself and her career 
 under the guidance and guardianship of one so 
 miserably unworthy. 
 
22 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER 
 
 I often wondered how, with her ideas and he 
 hopes, she could have endured singing in a vu 
 gar provincial music-hall. I told her as much 
 "I would sing any where," she said, "rath 
 er than be in debt. Father could do nothing 
 and I must use every power I have, or he mus 
 starve. I would have sung my songs in th 
 streets rather than see him troubled to ge 
 bread. So little makes him happy, that i 
 would be a shame if he were to want an 1 
 thing; and then he is old, and he remain 
 not long, perhaps;" and tears stood in he 
 eyes. "I sang in a concert -saloon in Co 
 logne, a room near the theatre ; I -wonder ii 
 it's there now ? I could find it in a moment 
 if I were there ; we will go there one day anc 
 look at the outside of it ; but only the outside 
 for I hated the place itself. Yes, I sang there 
 when I was a little one yes, only ten years old. 
 "But you were not born in Cologne ?" 
 "No, no; much farther away from this 
 across the Vistula." (She mentioned an old 
 historic Prussian town.) "We only came to 
 Cologne when we were coming to England; 
 and we only came to England to go to Ameri- 
 ca. But father has not the art of getting for- 
 ward in any thing ; and so we remained a whole 
 year in Cologne on our way to England, and 
 now we have been many years in England on 
 our way to America ; and I don't suppose we 
 shall ever get there, unless we go there some 
 day to visit your brother, Emanuel." 
 
 "But we shall visit your birth-place some 
 day, shall we not, dearest ?" 
 
 "I don't know, Emanuel; I don't like to 
 think of it. I was not happy there oh, not 
 happy at all, but very miserable ; and I do not 
 want ever to see the place any more. It is like 
 a discord, or a broken string, or a harsh note, or 
 something of that kind, coming in to some beau- 
 tiful delicious piece of music, when I turn from 
 now to then. It was all so dull, and without 
 color, and sad and harsh. My father and broth- 
 er never could agree." (I should mention that 
 I was aware of one of Mr. Braun's sons being 
 still alive.) "Louis was very harsh to father, 
 and not forbearing. I don't remember what it 
 was all about ; but I can guess now that Louis 
 thought well, I suppose he thought my father 
 had not been very prudent or persevering ; but 
 I know he was harsh, and he scolded, and his 
 wife scolded. She was very cold and hard and 
 religious, and she always scolded me. One day, 
 I remember, she told me I had too great an ap- 
 petite, and ate too much for a little beggar-girl ; 
 and I cried half the night through, and then got 
 up and tried to steal away, to drown myself from 
 one of the old bridges. But an old night-watch- 
 man found me I remember him so well ; he 
 had a horn and a spear of some kind and he 
 brought me back ; and she beat me, and I so 
 hated her ! At last father said he would go 
 away, and I was delighted. I did not care 
 where we went any where, so that we went 
 away. Louis, indeed, was not bad, for he gave 
 us money to go ; and she was not bad either. 
 
 I think she must have been a good woman, but 
 hard ; and then she had children of her own. 
 and we were mere dependents. So I came to 
 sing in Cologne, Emanuel, and then here ; and 
 so ends my long, long story." 
 
 During the whole of the story, which she told 
 in a dreamy kind of tone, her eyes and lips had 
 marked its incidents with the symphony of deep 
 expression. She lived the old life quite over 
 again, as she thus ran it through for me. I 
 was glad when the story was done, so painful 
 was the emotion it had evidently caused her. 
 
 " How happy for me, dearest Christina, that 
 you did not go to America ! I only wish I had 
 known you sooner, and were rich for your sake, 
 and you should never have sung in a wretched 
 saloon." 
 
 " I sang very badly in the place here lately ; 
 but I think it was because the people there 
 knew nothing about singing, and there was 
 no use in trying to sing well. " 
 
 "You sang only too well for me; you be- 
 wildered me. I never heard such singing be- 
 fore indeed, I never heard any singing before, 
 *n the true sense." 
 
 "Ah, I always sang my best when you were 
 ihere. I saw you the very first night, and sang 
 for you. I loved you even then, Emanuel, 
 though I thought you came with no good-will 
 :o me. Was I not angry and rude ? Ach ! I 
 hink I loved you always, before even that night 
 yes, from the very first." 
 
 "And will always, to the very last?" I whis- 
 pered. 
 
 'Always oh, always if you remain still 
 vhat you are, what I believe you to be. And 
 f not, then " 
 " Then, dearest ?" 
 
 " Then all my light will go out, Emanuel, 
 and I shall be miserable forever. Oh, if I ever 
 hink you do not love me beyond every thing in 
 his world, then I shall hate you no, I don't 
 >elieve I ever could hate you ; but I shall be 
 vretched, and perhaps make both of us unhap- 
 >y for our lives. But I think that you will 
 lever change ; I knew from the very first that 
 ou would some time come to love me ; and 
 :ow I know that you will love me always. Ah, 
 ow bright life is now!" 
 
 Her eyes sparkled in tears. We were alone 
 t this time in the little old room. She seated 
 erself at the piano* and sang one of her Ger- 
 man hymns with even more than her wonted 
 assion of pathos. I sat listening in the deep- 
 ning twilight of the calm summer evening, 
 appy transcendently rapturous and happy. 
 
 Those were bright days. I have lingered 
 >ng over them here, although they sounded 
 ut as the overture of my life, and reallv 
 >rmed no part of the drama itself. I have 
 ngered over them because they were so hap- 
 y, and because they were so brief. 
 
 How long might we have gone on thus peace- 
 illy and happily, content with merely playing 
 "le prelude of real existence? When should 
 e have married, and begun the business of 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 23 
 
 our life-drama in good earnest? These are 
 speculations which I used to be fond of going 
 over and over in my mind, but which I can 
 hardly expect any body else to follow with in- 
 terest. I dismiss them here from my pages ; 
 but the words I have written may remain, for 
 they will serve to indicate thus early that the 
 drama was never played out as we had pre- 
 arranged it. 
 
 The first discordant note which Fate struck 
 in was the death of Christina's father. The 
 mild old man passed suddenly but very quietly 
 out of life. One evening he complained of 
 having a headache and cold feet. When I 
 came that night a doctor was with him. I re- 
 mained all night. Whatever malady had seized 
 my poor old friend kept a firm hold. Toward 
 morning he talked a good deal, now in English, 
 now in French, now in German, intelligibly but 
 not coherently, of his early home, his wander- 
 ings, his lost wife (whom now he saw in Chris- 
 tina), his family one by one, his flowers. He 
 murmured stray scraps of German poems: 
 "Ucber alien Gipfeln ist Euh" those exqui- 
 site, mournful, consoling lines which came from 
 Goethe's soul and hung late upon his dying lips ; 
 and he whispered now that he was going to 
 learn all the secrets of the Creation ; and he 
 repeated faintly two lines from Uhland : 
 " Da sind die Tage lang geuug, 
 
 Da sind die Niichte mild." 
 
 Toward the end he brightened up into clearer 
 consciousness, and called Christina by her name. 
 I remember with a peculiar pang how he touch- 
 ed Christina's hand and then mine, smiled upon 
 us in the old gentle way, full of trust and seren- 
 ity, and so died. He looked only a little paler 
 and milder in death than in life. 
 
 After this came a long sad interval, sweet- 
 ened, I must own, to me by the consciousness 
 that my presence and my love must be still 
 more needful to Christina than before. 
 
 the close of summer when the dusk seems to 
 descend suddenly like a veil ; and as I looked 
 admiringly and lovingly on her face, turned in 
 profile to me and gazing westward, the roseate 
 light which shone on it suddenly went out, and 
 her cheek seemed pale and melancholy. As 
 the room appeared to darken she looked away 
 from where the light in the west had been, and 
 turned toward me smiling, with a sweet, sad 
 expression, which I see even now. 
 
 "Emanuel," she said, "you have made me 
 
 h a ppy_happy, although we have lost my poor 
 
 father. I never before knew what it was to 
 
 feel even an hour's happiness. My life was 
 
 always cold and hard, and I did not hope for 
 
 much better on earth. Now I believe in hap- 
 
 >iness, for I believe in love. Do you know that 
 
 : tried all I could to love poor Edward Lam- 
 
 )ert ; he was so fond of me, and so good ; but 
 
 I could not. I did my best: I wished and 
 
 rayed to love him, and I could not. I do not 
 
 uiow what would have happened to me but 
 
 or you. I know I never could have staid with 
 
 my 'brother in that place, which would be 
 
 strange to me now. I think I should have 
 
 lad to find out the old bridge where I was 
 
 going to drown myself before, and complete 
 
 the work this time. What would have become 
 
 of me if I had gone there ?" 
 
 " What would have become of we?" I asked, 
 with something of reproach at least in my 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CHRISTINA AND I. 
 
 THE same little room, unchanged save for 
 the absence of one of its old inmates, whose 
 flute, pipe, and books stood untouched in their 
 familiar former places. Christina and I were 
 alone. We had been talking long and earn- 
 estly. She arose and went to the window 
 and" looked silently and thoughtfully into the 
 soft summer night- air. The breath of an ex- 
 quisite day still haunted somehow the very 
 pavement of the street below, and seemed to 
 soften the hum and the tread of the people 
 who passed under our window. The stars 
 were faint in the violet sky, from which the 
 light of day had not yet wholly faded. 
 
 Christina remained for a while motionless 
 and silent, one hand keeping back her hair 
 the other arm resting on the side of the open 
 window. This was one of those evenings a 
 
 voice. 
 "I 
 
 don't know. I thought perhaps you 
 would have been as happy without me but 
 stop, don't scold me indeed I don't think so 
 now. If I succeeded in the world 
 
 And didn't fling yourself from the bridge." 
 And didn't fling myself from the bridge 
 don't laugh at me, that was quite a possibility 
 t oo if i didn't drown myself, but lived and 
 succeeded, and made a great noise in the 
 world, and got money, then you should have 
 heard of me, for I would haVe come to you. 
 If not, then you should never have heard or 
 known any thing more of me. I think that is 
 what I meant to do, if I clearly meant to do 
 any thing. But you have changed all that, 
 Emanuel, and it only remains " 
 
 "It only remains to arrange our plans and 
 to be happy." 
 
 "We will think of our plans to-morrow, 
 when we are a little more calm and composed. 
 All this has come on us rather suddenly, and I 
 scarcely slept last night, Emanuel, with think- 
 ing of you, and how soon I must leave you. 
 Then, even when I fell asleep at last toward 
 morning, I had such a horrid dream ; I dreamt 
 that you yourself, with your own lips, told me 
 calmly I had better go that we had better sep- 
 arate ; and I awoke in misery. But that, thank 
 Heaven ! has not come true, and I feel that we 
 are acting the wisest part. Life is not long 
 enough for separation, is it, dearest? and I 
 know my Emanuel will not suffer loss in the 
 end by his sacrifice. I see the future all bright 
 before us as bright as the sky was just now 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 that is, before the evening's red had faded an 
 the darkness come up." 
 
 Sacrifice ! My sacrifice apparently was tha 
 I consented to be loved as a man does not ex 
 pect to be loved a second time in this world. 
 
 Let me explain the source and meaning o 
 the conversation I have just described. 
 
 The death of Christina's father ought, in ac 
 cordance with ordinary usage and respect fo 
 public opinion, to have somewhat changed th 
 manner of our intercourse ; but it did not 
 still spent every evening with Christina as be 
 fore. I sat beside her while she made he 
 mourning-dress ; I was beside her in the deep 
 est of her affliction, and in its gradual subsi 
 dence. When the funeral had been long over 
 and the clergyman and one or two other friend 
 who came out of mere kindness had ceased t( 
 visit her, I came regularly every evening, an 
 sat for hours with her just as before. I can 
 say literally that all the time I did not give tc 
 business or to sleep I gave to her. I alway 
 left her with reluctance, though the separation 
 was but for a few hours. I always hastenec 
 eagerly to her, although only a few hours hac 
 passed since our last meeting. We walked 
 together of evenings on the hills and by the 
 sea, and watched the line of light that streamec 
 from the. west until it seemed to fade into th 
 waves and the night and the stars came up. l 
 learned from her to know each constellation 
 that lights our northern horizon. Her father 
 had taught her, like himself, to live among the 
 stars and love them. I loved to hear her talk 
 as much as to hear her sing ay, "far above 
 singing." My whole nature was quickened 
 and purified by hers ; it was the old, old story 
 of Cymon and Iphigenia over again. 
 
 Of course it must have been dreadfully im- 
 proper, not to say dangerous, thus to spend 
 long evenings after evenings together and 
 alone. But we never thought it so, and indeed 
 never thought about the matter at all. I know 
 that nothing could have been purer than our 
 love, more innocent than our intercourse. I 
 do not recommend that sort of thing as a rule 
 I see all the danger of it ; I see that the two 
 very best people in the world and we, good 
 lack, were not even the second-best might 
 have found reason to repent such heedless self- 
 confidence. But it is certain that we trod the 
 furnace unscathed nay, that we did not even 
 know we were girt with fire from which ordi- 
 nary eyes would say there was no escaping. I 
 do not well know what preserved us ; perhaps 
 our very unconsciousness of danger, perhaps 
 poetry, perhaps music, perhaps sentimentality, 
 perhaps that generous subtle fire of youthful 
 love which has so little of the animal oil in its 
 composition. I can only say that, when we 
 were driven out of our terrestrial paradise, we 
 had at least no cause to blush, or hang our 
 heads, or cover ourselves, because of shame. 
 
 Of course, however, this was not the view of 
 the matter taken by our neighbors. It was not 
 likely that in such a miserable little town, en- 
 
 slaved by the judgment of Mrs. Grundy, con- 
 duct like ours could escape gossip and criticism. 
 The people living in the same house with Chris- 
 tina knew of our meetings; pupils of Chris- 
 tina's called occasionally in the evening and 
 found us together ; many good-natured persons 
 began to talk about us, of whom, I can say in 
 all sincerity, we had never conversed. This 
 kind of talk must at last reach Christina's ears ; 
 and it did. 
 
 One evening when I came as usual I was told 
 that she was not at home ; and I was much sur- 
 prised, knowing how few acquaintances she had, 
 and how little she cared to visit any of them. 
 The next evening the same thing occurred. 
 The next day I wrote her a letter asking, some- 
 what warmly, for an explanation. I received 
 a reply full of love and tenderness, begging of 
 me not to come that evening, but promising to 
 write again. I did not grow jealous, or sus- 
 picious, or angry. I knew that Christina's 
 heart lay open to me; but I became alarmed, 
 expectant of some evil news ; restless, sad. I 
 think I had" from the beginning a foreboding 
 that something disagreeable would reach us 
 from her brother. Immediately on poor Mr. 
 Braun's death Christina had written to her 
 brother, acquainting him with the event, de- 
 scribing exactly and frankly her own position 
 and prospects, and asking simply for any advice 
 he could give. For weeks no answer came ; 
 but we were not much surprised. In those 
 days railways did not traverse East Prussia 
 and connect Ostend with St. Petersburg. 
 
 At last I received a little note from Christina, 
 written in apparent haste, and asking me to see 
 tier that evening. I went at the earliest possi- 
 ble moment. It was the evening with which 
 this chapter opens. 
 
 I hurried up stairs, and found her door open. 
 [ went in, and saw her alone, kneeling on the 
 loor, and engaged in packing up some clothes, 
 books, and music. She looked up, and there 
 was so sad an expression in her face that I posi- 
 tively started. 
 
 "Christina, my dearest," I said, kneeling on 
 he ground beside her, "what on earth has hap- 
 pened? Why do you look so sad and why 
 vould you not see me before ?" 
 
 "I am going away, Emanuel," she replied, 
 n a very faltering voice. 
 
 ' ' Going away ! Going where ? Away from 
 me? No, that I know you are not." 
 
 "Ah, yes; it is quite true. I am going to 
 Reichsberg I must go!" 
 
 "Never! you shall not!" 
 
 "I must, indeed. See, Emanuel, here is 
 ly brother's letter. Read what he writes." 
 
 I took the letter and tried to read it. It was 
 
 n German, written in a dreadful character, 
 
 vhich danced before my eyes maddeningly. 
 
 ifter some impatient bungling efforts I thrust 
 
 into her hand. 
 
 "Read it, Christina," I said; "and let me 
 now the meaning of all this, for Heaven's 
 ake!" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 25 
 
 She read me the letter. It was long, well- 
 meaning, cold but not unkindly, intensely mor- 
 al, pious, and philistinish. It expressed well- 
 regulated regret for the death of Mr. Braun, 
 but it made it a duty to allude rather pointedly 
 to his faults and his weaknesses. It showed 
 
 how these faults and weaknesses had now left 
 the daughter, whom he, the father, so profess- 
 ed to love, homeless and unprovided with any 
 means, at scarcely nineteen years of age, in a 
 far-off foreign country. It expressed a hope 
 that Mr. Braun had found in dying that spiritual 
 
26 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 comfort and faith which he ostentatiously re 
 jected during his lifetime. 
 
 All this I listened to somewhat impatient 
 as Christina put into half-intelligible Englis 
 its long sentences. But the point of the stor 
 lay in the concluding passages, and these soo 
 secured my whole attention. Louis Braun di 
 approved and deplored the kind of life his sist< 
 had led as a singer, utterly demurred to her ide 
 of ultimately going on the stage, and enjoinec 
 nay insisted, on her immediately leaving En 
 gland and placing herself under his protectior 
 He inclosed some abominable Prussian note 
 for the purpose of assisting her to undertak 
 the journey, which he recommended her to mak 
 by way of steamer or sailing vessel from Londo 
 or Hull to Dantzic. 
 
 "It's kind of Louis," Christina stammerei 
 out, when she had read to the end. " You see 
 Emanuel, he has a good heart, and means fo 
 the best. I can do nothing else. I must go 
 and I will help him in his business, and atten< 
 to his shop. But I will go on the stage an< 
 sing yet one day, for all that." 
 
 "You shall not go to him!" I exclaimed 
 "You shall be the servant of no brother, am 
 attend to no shop. What right has your broth 
 er to control you ? What has he ever done fo 
 you, that he should attempt to order you abou 
 in that way? What account of your movements 
 have you to render to him ? Leave it to me 
 I'll write to him." 
 
 " Louis knows not one word of English 
 and, dear Emanuel, I don't think your German 
 would be quite certain to explain itself clearly 
 to him." 
 
 "Now, I know you don't think of going," I 
 said, warmly clasping her; "you never could 
 smile in that way if you thought of leaving me. 
 Write yourself, then, and tell your brother that 
 he may go I mean that when you really need- 
 ed his protection he did not ofter it, and that 
 now you don't want it, and will have none of it. 
 No, don't write that of course you would not 
 but write and tell him you will not and can 
 not go." 
 
 "But what can we do, Emanuel ?" she asked, 
 looking up at me with her large eyes, now all 
 sadness and seriousness. " My brother's letter 
 is not all ; but my pupils I did not like to tell 
 you before are all dropping away. Yes, it is 
 quite true; soon, I fear, I shall have none. The 
 people here talk so much ; and now they talk 
 of us, who never did them any harm. Yester- 
 day a lady who had always been my good friend 
 took away her three girls. After "the holidays 
 some always do not come back ; and this time 
 I shall have very, very few. I met Miss Griffin 
 a week ago, and she spoke very strangely and 
 coldly to me. I do not care about my brother 
 much I hardly know him at all; but I see that 
 I had better go to him, and even for your sake 
 I must go ; and perhaps oh, perhaps, my own 
 dear Emanuel we may meet once again." 
 
 "Once again! We will never part never! 
 Why can not we at once put a stop to the talk of 
 
 all these people ? Why can not we be married 
 now to-morrow ? We do not want much to 
 make us happy. Listen, Christina hear what 
 a salary I have ; in a place like this we might 
 live on it forever ;" and I whispered its amount 
 about as much as a fast young Londoner might 
 spend in gloves and cigars. 
 
 Christina made no answer. Was she over- 
 whelmed by the largeness of my means, or ren- 
 dered aghast by their smallness ? 
 
 "We shall be the happiest people in the 
 world," I urged. "You can give music-les- 
 sons, if you like ; or we will give concerts to- 
 gether. Why, the singers at that concert in 
 the Assembly Rooms last night were good-for- 
 nothing humbugs, I have been told; and yet 
 people paid to hear them just because they 
 came from London. I am sure no one of them 
 had a voice any thing like yours. We only 
 want to get known. We can't give musical en- 
 tertainments together now, that's quite clear; 
 but Mr. and Mrs. Emanuel Temple Banks would 
 sound famously, nicht wahr?" said I, endeavor- 
 ~ng to become jocular. "Or suppose I come 
 out as a blind singer, like Vult, in the story 
 Richter's story your poor father read to us so 
 patiently when we were not listening to half of 
 t? Suppose I be a blind singer, and you my 
 wife or sister, sustaining and guiding ine ? I 
 hink it would draw splendidly." 
 
 " Nonsense, Emanuel ; you must not talk 
 such nonsense," said Christina, smiling never- 
 heless, though perhaps a watery smile. " We 
 can not be married yet ; it would be too rash ; 
 ind what would people say ?" 
 
 4 ' What should we care ? Let them say what 
 
 hey please. It doesn't appear that the people 
 
 vho concern themselves about us say such very 
 
 nattering things already that we need court their 
 
 good opinion. Let them speak well or ill of us 
 
 there is a world elsewhere," I exclaimed, in 
 
 plendid Coriolanus fashion. 
 
 "There is, there is indeed, Emanuel!" she 
 aid, springing up and with brightening eyes ; 
 ' there is a world elsewhere, thank Heaven ! 
 which is not like this narrow and miserable lit- 
 le place. Oh, who would live here and stag- 
 late, when there are places Avhere life has a 
 hance of success!" 
 
 I saw that she was yielding, and I pressed 
 tiy advantage. I clasped her in my arms, and 
 owed I would not release her until she had 
 ledged herself never to leave me. 
 
 "How could I refuse any longer?" she said 
 t last. "You have prevailed, my own ; ah, I 
 m afraid I Avas only too willing that you should 
 revail. If you are not unwilling to sacrifice 
 ourself for a poor singing girl, what can she 
 o but accept the sacrifice when she loves you 
 o dearly as I do ?" 
 
 It was then that she gently withdrew from 
 te for a moment, and went to the window, as 
 e saw her at the opening of this chapter. 
 Dost thou look at the stars, oh my star ?" 
 We spoke but little of our plans and pros- 
 ects that night ; we were too happy for talk. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 27 
 
 Strange thing in mortal life, we knew we were 
 happy ! It is not retrospect alone which throws 
 for me a golden glory round that unforgotten 
 evening ; I knew at the hour that a golden at- 
 mosphere floated round us both. 
 
 Christina had utterly flung away the early 
 doubt and despondency of the evening, and re- 
 turned to the old joyous self-confidence. She 
 looked at the future with the brightest eyes. 
 
 "No chance of our failing, Emanuel," she 
 said, ecstatically. 
 
 "And even if we do fail, my dearest," I re- 
 plied, " what then ? We shall be none the less 
 happy. I do not care one rush for any success 
 in life while we can live for each other and be 
 happy. We only value life itself that we may 
 love each other and be happy." 
 
 She smiled a triumphant smile. "Have no 
 fear," she said ; "we shall have love and hap- 
 piness and success too. I know we shall; I 
 see the future as clear as to-day. Now, dear- 
 est, you must go. I shall see you to-morrow 
 night, shall I not ?" 
 
 Needless to give my answer rather, I should 
 say, to describe it. As I was leaving, my eye 
 fell upon the trunk which she had been packing 
 when I came in. 
 
 " You may undo your work of packing now, 
 liebchen," I said, smilingly. 
 
 "Nay, is it worth while?" she asked, smiling 
 with a significance I did not understand. " Re- 
 member the world elsewhere." 
 
 Need I say how we parted ? Need I tell how 
 often I walked backward and forward under 
 her window that night ? Need I say that I felt 
 the happiest and the proudest of human creat- 
 ures ? Need I say how I lay awake, and tossed 
 half the night through, recalling every word, 
 every glance, every kiss ; how I shaped out plan 
 after plan for our future path of life ; how I felt 
 all the passion and the ecstasy, without any of 
 the doubts and feverish fears and torturing 
 pangs, of love? 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PATHS DIVIDE. 
 
 I HAVE already said that the one thing which 
 gave me any uneasiness as to the future was 
 Christina's passionate desire to go on the stage 
 This had not, indeed, been a discordant note in 
 our harmony ; but it was one I always endeav- 
 ored not to touch. I kept the question as mucl 
 as I could out of sight ; I compromised with 
 it, made myself believe it would arrange itself 
 somehow. In fact, I was afraid of it, but stil" 
 kept hoping it would come to nothing ; for th< 
 more and more I loved Christina, the more anc 
 more I wished to keep her wholly to myself 
 the more jealous I grew of any art, any profes 
 sion, which could divide her thoughts with mi 
 and my love. I could have lived in a deser 
 island with her forever yes, I still think 
 could and never wearied of her, or longed fo 
 other companionship. Doubtless to most per 
 
 ons such a profession will seem merely the 
 onscious or unconscious exaggeration of senti- 
 nent; doubtless in their case it would be so. 
 f m speaking of myself of my own heart, and 
 f what I know. I could have lived with her 
 we two alone a long life through, and known 
 
 weariness or change if she knew none. The 
 rst strong emotion of all my life was love for 
 er ; and the more I grew to love her, the more 
 ealous I became of the art which she so loved. 
 
 I should have been glad to compromise for a 
 ife of music-teaching and singing at concerts 
 nd oratorios, and such milder and safer paths 
 )f the lyric art. Indeed, I had myself had sev- 
 ral engagements at local performances of the 
 dnd, and was, as I have mentioned already, 
 becoming a sort of small, very small, celebrity. 
 I was saving a little money to begin married 
 ife withal, and was very economical and care- 
 jil, my whole heart being set on one object ; 
 nevertheless, the general impression of respect- 
 able and good people in our circle still was that 
 [ was simply going to the devil. 
 
 Now the attorney in whose office I daily 
 worked was a very respectable man. He was 
 a pious man, and sang very loud in church. He 
 was also a very pompous man. He had a very 
 respectable, pious, and pompous wife. He con- 
 sorted with the rector ; he sometimes dined with 
 the local lord ; and at the annual flower-show 
 lis wife was always taken notice of and politely 
 spoken to by an evangelical countess, and by 
 the wives of the county members. 
 
 The very morning after I had made my pact 
 with Christina, I was summoned to my employ- 
 er's room almost immediately on his reaching the 
 office. When I came into the presence of Mr. 
 Bollington that was his name I saw, by the 
 very way in which he settled his neck into his 
 collar, that something was up. I may say that 
 
 1 never liked Mr. Bollington ; his manner some- 
 how seemed always to convey to me the idea 
 that he regarded a salaried clerk as simply a 
 poor devil. 
 
 " Oh, ah, Mr. Banks," he began. " Yes ; I 
 want to speak to you. Close the door. Thank 
 you ; that'll do. Mr. Banks, I hear you are 
 getting very much into the way of singing at 
 nights at concerts and oratorios, and all that 
 kind of thing. Now, that is not quite a legal 
 sort of thing, nor quite respectable in our line 
 of business ; and I am rather afraid it will tell 
 against us, you know. I am very particular, 
 Mr. Banks, as you know. Law is rather a par- 
 ticular sort of business. People say law is jeal- 
 ous, and won't have any rival, don't they? I 
 think some poet or novelist, or somebody, says 
 something of the kind. I don't think it will do, 
 Mr. Banks ; I don't indeed. Law is drier and 
 duller than music; but I think you'll find it 
 better in the long-run." 
 
 I was a good deal embarrassed by this ad- 
 dress. I had no respect for Mr. Bollington ; I 
 knew him to be merely a stupid, respectable old 
 ass; but respectability has somehow an awful 
 sort of halo of divine right yet lingering about 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 it, and it impresses the Bohemian more than h 
 cares to acknowledge. I, an embryo Bohemian 
 had always to make a little mental struggle t 
 assert myself against this respectable membe 
 of society. Now, however, there were othe 
 reasons to embarrass me ; he seemed actual! 
 inspired with a purpose to destroy all my proj 
 ects. 
 
 I stammered out something about being fon 
 of music, and not seeing any harm in such de 
 votion. 
 
 " Pardon me ; I have not said there was an 
 harm. A taste for music is very respectable 
 and I am the last man in the world likely t 
 find fault with an inclination which some of th 
 most respectable persons I know, even in mj 
 profession, cultivate in a manner which, in 
 fact, adds to their respectability, I may say 
 But that is in an amateur way, Mr. Banks ; in 
 an amateur way. It is quite different when 
 one comes to be a professional performer ; anc 
 I hear, Mr. Banks, that you have been going 
 quite into the professional line of late. Now 
 you have not consulted me on the subject, or 
 ascertained whether I considered such an occu- 
 pation quite consistent with your position here 
 and I have therefore found it necessary to senc 
 for you, and, in fact, to open the subject my- 
 self." 
 
 "I really didn't suppose," I said, "that you 
 could have any objection to my improving my 
 income by any means any honorable means, 
 of course which did not interfere with my 
 character or my business here. I have not 
 been inattentive to the office." 
 
 " Pardon me ; I have made no charge of the 
 kind." 
 
 "I do not see why one may not have differ- 
 ent occupations at different hours of the day." 
 "In a general way there may be no objec- 
 tion. Many occupations admit of such com- 
 bination ; but Ave are now speaking of a partic- 
 ular case. This firm, Mr. Banks, has a char- 
 acter for strict attention to business, and busi- 
 ness of a peculiar and exclusively respectable 
 kind. I don't say that in a certain kind of low 
 criminal business, for example, there is neces- 
 sarily any reason why a solicitor should object 
 to his clerk singing at concerts after office- 
 hours. I think it quite possible that such sing- 
 ing and a certain kind of criminal business might 
 combine very well. But ours is not a business 
 of that class, Mr. Banks. Our clients are of 
 quite a different order of life, and they have 
 strong and very proper views on the all-import- 
 ance of respectability." 
 
 "But really, Mr.* Bollington" I had now 
 quite reasserted myself; stupidity had washed 
 all the imposing gilt off respectability, and I 
 could have laughed at or sworn at it "really, 
 Mr. Bollington, I don't quite see that I am 
 bound to give up every thing to such views." 
 
 " Not bound at all, Mr. Banks ; certainly not 
 bound. You are not an articled clerk, and 
 are quite free to act as you please. Let the 
 conversation close for the present. Be so good 
 
 as to think the matter over. I am sure yon 
 understand my determination. You can there- 
 fore decide for yourself, and let me know, and 
 we can recur to the subject, if necessary, say the 
 day after to-morrow. And now, Mr. Banks, 
 about the papers in the case of Davys and Pon- 
 typool, if you please. " 
 
 This was of course an ultimatum. A greater 
 contretemps could hardly have occurred. All 
 my plans for the present were based on that 
 very combination of music and law which Mr. 
 Bollington declared to be only possible, if at all, 
 in the case of a very low sort of criminal busi- 
 ness. This was a sharp and sudden blow to 
 me ; and I had the whole day to bear it before 
 I could pour out my bad news and my feelings 
 to Christina. 
 
 Grimly enough I went to her lodgings that 
 evening. I thought the very sky looked gray 
 above 1 me ; and Christina's gladsome, confident 
 eyes were a sort of new pang and reproach to 
 me. 
 
 "Oh, Emanuel, I am so delighted to hear 
 it!" was the reply with which she broke out 
 when, with a sad face, I had got through my 
 dismal news. " I am delighted from my heart 
 to hear it ! Why should you stay in so miser- 
 able a place, and be paid a few wretched shil- 
 lings a week, you who are better than them all ; 
 you with your voice and your talents for you 
 know I never would care for mere voice ? No ; 
 you are rid of it all now, and are free. Now 
 you will have to throw your soul into the art 
 you are fitted for, my dear Emanuel. Ill news, 
 dear ! This is the best and brightest of news 
 ;o Christina. I always feared that you would 
 36 content to work and wait here, and I have 
 lad enough of working and waiting. You are 
 so easily contented oh, far too easily content- 
 ed 1 but only because you are modest of your 
 alents, and do not know what you deserve and 
 what you can be, as I do. No, no ; my Eman- 
 uel will be no more a slave, but an artist. Tell 
 lim so, and be free." 
 
 There was something pitiful to me in hearing 
 he enthusiastic girl run on in this wild way. 
 
 "Alas, Christina," I said, "it is not so easy 
 o make a great way in the world as you think 
 you girls, with your vivid imagination and 
 your confidence. You see me with eyes which 
 ill guide nobody else. Think how difficult it 
 s to get on in this place." 
 
 "In this place ! Yes ; but who would think 
 f this place ? Leave it, my Emanuel ! Lon- 
 on and Paris these are the places for us. 
 ^Vhy delay here at all ? why not go to London 
 t once, and together ? why, dearest Emanuel, 
 'hy?" 
 
 Her impatience rose to something like wild- 
 ess. 
 
 "Because, my love," I said, looking as wise 
 nd as cheerful as I could contrive to do "be- 
 ause in London people who have neither mon- 
 y nor friends may have to starve." 
 
 " But we have some money. I have saved 
 ome ; a little and not so very little. See !" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 And she showed me in triumph a few poor 
 sovereigns heaped up in a drawer, where any 
 body who chanced to enter her room might 
 have found, and, if so inclined, stolen them. 
 I could hardly keep back my tears I was only 
 a boy, after all ; and there was something un- 
 speakably pitiful and touching in the pride and 
 confidence built upon the few poor golden coins. 
 "My dearest, your money and mine would 
 not keep us long in London. People must en- 
 deavor to make a beginning where they have 
 friends." 
 
 "Then you are content to give up your ca- 
 reer ; give up your chance of becoming a great 
 artist as I know you would be?" 
 
 "No, not give up, my own Christina, but 
 just wait only a little for a better chance. 
 Listen, you wild girl ; we must give up some- 
 thing " 
 
 "But listen, Emanuel. I have set my very 
 soul on being a great singer, and on your being 
 one too. You may think me a mad creature ; 
 but I know that in this I am wiser than you. 
 Don't stop on the way, and don't be afraid. I 
 am not afraid ; why should you a man ?" 
 
 "You are not afraid," I said, taking both 
 her hands, and trying to pet her into calmness, 
 " because you are a generous, imaginative, dar- 
 ling girl, who, once you love a man, think the 
 world must see him .as you do, and that he 
 must turn out something great. I know more 
 of the world, and of myself, than you do. 
 only ask that we should be patient for the sake 
 of each other. I can not do any thing which 
 might make you unhappy. You may be ready 
 to sacrifice yourself; but don't ask me to sacri- 
 fice you." 
 
 "Listen, Emanuel," she said, disengaging 
 her hands from mine, and then laying one arm 
 on my shoulder and looking earnestly, implor- 
 ingly at me (I see her deep dark eyes and eager 
 trembling lips even now this moment); "do 
 not talk of waiting and of patience, and of 
 living a life of dull, stupid plodding in this 
 hateful place. Only last evening you appealed 
 to me and persuaded me ; let me now per 
 suade you. Do you think me bold to speak in 
 this way ? Yes, I am bold now, because I lov 
 you so, because you are all in the world to me 
 and I tremble to think of our separation." 
 
 "Separation? Who speaks of separation 
 What could separate us ?" 
 
 "You do not know; I do not know; anj 
 thing, any delay a night's reflection ma) 
 change our fortunes, may change our hearts 
 I tremble to hear you talk as if you only wishe< 
 to cling to this place forever." 
 
 "And I tremble to hear you speak as if am 
 bition, and not love, were your impulse, Chris 
 tina! Yes, I could be happy with you here 
 even here, forever!" 
 
 "But let us not talk of that. I could no 
 see you condemned to an ignoble, stupid lif 
 here; I love you far too deeply. Your am 
 bition is mine ; your success would be mine 
 Oh, Emanuel, love me and my ambition too, o 
 
 ou can not love me, you can not understand 
 me at all!" 
 
 If the choice were between your love and 
 our ambition," I said, sullenly, "I know which 
 rould win." 
 
 You can't divide them ; they are one and 
 
 same. They are as my heart and my soul. 
 )h, Emanuel, you know I love you. I have 
 o one on earth whom I care for but you." 
 
 "And yet if it were a choice between giving 
 ip your chance of a career, your dream of a 
 areer " i wa s now bitterly jealous of her am- 
 dtion, and spoke in almost savage tones "yon 
 vould throw me away without a thought. Do 
 ou call that love ?" 
 
 " No," she replied, vehemently, and turning 
 rom me, "I do not. But I loved an ambi- 
 ious man, a brave man, an artist, and not a 
 lave." 
 
 Had she struck me in the face I could not 
 have felt the blow more heavily. A surprised, 
 passionate, injured cry was breaking from my 
 ips. I repressed it with all the force of energy 
 ; could call up ; but I turned away, and, sit- 
 ing on the nearest chair, covered my face with 
 my hands. 
 
 I do not know how many minutes or seconds 
 I had sat thus. It seemed to me a long inter- 
 al of bewildered pain and bitterness. I felt 
 at last a hand laid on mine, and a sweet, pite- 
 ous voice murmured "Emanuel!" I allowed 
 he hand that covered my face to be drawn 
 away ; and then I saw that Christina was kneei- 
 ng at my feet, and looking up at me with eyes 
 full of tears. 
 
 ; '0h, forgive me!" she exclaimed; "my 
 dear, dear Emanuel, forgive me ; I did not 
 know what I was saying." 
 
 " You have cruelly misinterpreted me, Chris- 
 tina." 
 
 " I have indeed ; and that is the second time 
 in our lives I have done so. But I will do so 
 no more. How could I use such cruel, shame- 
 ful, false words to you ! But I was disappoint- 
 ed ; oh, so bitterly disappointed ! and I was 
 mad." 
 
 "Dearest Christina, you know if you do 
 not, at least Heaven'knows that I only think 
 of your happiness, that I only shrink from ex- 
 posing you to utter poverty." 
 
 "But what else have I suffered from my 
 birth ? I am well used to poverty. Ah, if you 
 did but know all ! I prefer any poverty, even 
 alone, to going to my brother. Why should I 
 fear it with you ? But I will not talk in that 
 way any more ; I was foolish and wild ; and you 
 were right not to heed my folly. You are calm 
 and have sense, and you know the world." 
 
 "You are a true woman, a true heroine," I 
 said, my bitterness wholly melted away by her 
 sweetness and submission, " and you would 
 rather have the courage which springs with- 
 out counting the consequences than that which 
 calculates and waits. So would I, perhaps, if 
 the consequences only affected myself alone ; 
 but a man who has the happiness of the wo- 
 
30 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 man he loves placed in his hands must no 
 plunge headlong with her and himself too 
 No, my dearest, the courage which endures i 
 often the best. We can wait for our career. 
 . "We must wait indeed, Emanuel; and per 
 haps a long time. You must have thought nn 
 a wild, romantic fool. I am sorry now, for '. 
 see that you are right." 
 
 " Then I have convinced you ?" I asked, joy 
 ously, proud of my pitiful and jealous prudence 
 as if it were any thing but faint-heartedness 
 suspicion, and folly. 
 
 "You have convinced me," she said, in a low 
 sad voice. "Let us not speak of it now any 
 more, Emanuel ; at least for to-night. I wil 
 sing you something." 
 
 She sat down to her piano and sang, and I 
 listened until the dusk deepened into night. 
 We parted with affection ; but there was a 
 sadness in her manner which I might have 
 thought ominous. As I stood a moment be- 
 low her window I heard her still faintly sing- 
 ing, and knew that she was not sitting but 
 moving through the room. I walked slowly 
 away, often looking back; suddenly I heard 
 her window raised, and, turning round, I could 
 see, in the deep purple of a late summer night, 
 the outline of her head and neck dark against 
 the sky. I thought jshe beckoned to me, and I 
 hurried back. 
 
 " Only to say good-by," she said in a whis- 
 per; and she seemed strangely fluttered and 
 excited. "I only wanted to say good-by once 
 more, dearest; just good-by." 
 
 As she leaned from the window a rose she 
 was wearing in her breast fell at my feet. I 
 took it up and put it to my lips. Some com- 
 ing footsteps were heard, and she whispered in 
 a very faint, very sad tone the word "Ade." 
 Then she quickly closed the window and drew 
 the curtain, and I could see her no more. 
 
 Her voice lingered in my ears as I went slow- 
 ly home, and was in my dreams all night. I 
 longed for the next night, that I might listen 
 to it again. 
 
 So the next day dragged heavily through, 
 and I was impatient of i^;, of myself, of every 
 thing, feverishly anxious to meet her again; 
 haunted fretfully by a fear that I had made 
 myself look mean in her eyes ; by a doubt 
 whether, after all, my wisdom had not been 
 folly ; by a vague foreboding of disunion be- 
 tween us. I made many mistakes and blun- 
 ders that day ; and Mr. Bollington more than 
 once put up his double eye-glass and looked at 
 me with cold significant scrutiny. 
 
 At last the hour came for leaving the office. 
 I was at the door, rejoiced to be free in the 
 evening sunlight, when a small boy, whom I 
 knew well, came up and handed me a letter. 
 The urchin was the youngest son of the poor 
 watch-maker who had the shop over which 
 Christina lived, and he was often bribed with 
 buns, apples, and half-pence to act as letter- 
 earner between us. So I knew at once what 
 he came for, and I snatched at his letter. 
 
 "Oh, but stop," said the young varlet; "is 
 the office closed for the day?" 
 
 "Yes, Tom; what of that?" 
 
 "And you are home for the day?" 
 
 " Yes, yes. Why do you ask questions, you 
 little imp ?" 
 
 "Because she told me I wasn't to give it to 
 you until you were coming away. I've had it 
 in my pocket ever so long. " 
 
 So he gave me the letter, and darted down 
 the street, alternately whooping and whistling. 
 
 I opened it, and read : 
 
 "Mr WELL -BELOVED, Farewell! I have 
 thought and thought, and I see we must not 
 marry yet. Oh, forgive me, Emanuel, and be 
 not so very sorry or lonely. I think we must 
 not meet for a long time. I am gone away, 
 and you must not think of following me or 
 seeking me ; for the Heaven has told me that 
 now I could only be an encumbrance to you, 
 and that if we were married now, you would 
 be sorry one day. I go away that I may some 
 time be able to help you. If ever I can, then 
 we shall meet again, for I will find you and 
 come to you. If not, then far better we meet 
 no more. Either way it will be better, and 
 you will thank me some time, and say Chris- 
 tina had right. I love you still ; all the same 
 as ever. Still love me : farewell, and think of 
 me often, as I shall never, never forget you. 
 "CHRISTINA." 
 
 This was all. The letter was written in the 
 quaint half- German character and the con- 
 strained foreign style which I knew so well. 
 '. turned down a dark lane out of the sunny 
 street ; the ground seemed to heave under my 
 eet, and black spots danced before my eyes in 
 he sunlight. I was not far from the sea my 
 >ld, old confidant ; and I hurried to it as if my 
 ost love were to be found by its margin. Stag- 
 gering, slipping, with dazed eyes and choking 
 hroat and bursting heart, I reached the strand, 
 ind flung myself down, and read the letter again 
 ind again and again. And then I laid my head 
 pon the ring of a rusty anchor, and I broke into 
 i boyish passion and tempest of tears. She had 
 made her choice and left me ! Of the beau- 
 iful happy life that had grown up around us, 
 nd that seemed destined to live with our lives, 
 here was nothing left me but my memory, my 
 rief, my agony a few letters, and the flower 
 hat last night had fallen from her breast. 
 
 From that time I never saw her face for ten 
 ong years. 
 
 Did I make any effort to recover her ? Did 
 
 not ? All I could learn at her lodgings was 
 imply that she had gone by the London coach, 
 nd that she had said she was going to her broth- 
 r's. I hurried up to London by the very next 
 oach with what result I need hardly say. Ut- 
 erly a stranger in the metropolis, my search 
 lere was quite thrown away. I could only 
 earn at the coach-office that such a girl had 
 ctually traveled to town the day before, and 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 31 
 
 that was all any body knew of her. I wasted 
 days in hunting about the docks for Dantzic 
 or Konigsberg ships or steamers. I found no- 
 thing of her. Then I bethought me that she 
 might have gone to Hull, and I too went to 
 Hull ; of course utterly too late to have stopped 
 her even had she gone there. I had made up 
 my mind to follow her, when it occurred to me 
 that perhaps, after all, she had relented and 
 written to me some word of comfort and guid- 
 ance, and I hurried back to my native town. 
 No letter awaited me, and I resolved at least 
 to try the last chance and follow her to her 
 brother's. I remembered the name of the 
 street in which her brother lived, and it could 
 not be difficult to find the house. Besides, I 
 was now seized with a detestation of our town 
 and all that belonged to it ; and it seemed to 
 me that I must leave it or go mad. The 
 thought of living there without her, of toil- 
 ing there uncheered and unloved, of spend- 
 ing drear evenings alone where I had been so 
 happy, of looking up at the window where she 
 could no longer be seen; all this was simply 
 intolerable to me. I had never entered my 
 old employer's door from the evening when I 
 received Christina's letter. What Mr. Bol- 
 lington thought of me, or whether he thought 
 about me at all, I cared nothing. I sent no 
 explanation or word of any kind. I had some 
 little money saved ; I sold some few poor things, 
 and got a little more money ; and I took a pas- 
 sage in a Baltic vessel which was to put in at 
 Dantzic. One fair sweet autumn evening I 
 looked back on the strand where I had read 
 Christina's letter, and watched the white houses 
 of the old town of my childhood, and the hill 
 whereon was my mother's grave, until all sank 
 out of sight, and with them closed the first 
 bright chapter of my life. 
 
 The weather changed, and we had a rough, 
 slow, miserable passage. Our wretched heavy 
 old tub was beaten about the North Sea and 
 the Baltic so long that it seemed to me as if 
 life had been actually changed into a perpetua 
 tossing on broken wintry waters. At last we 
 reached Dantzic, and I made my way to Chris- 
 tina's native town a town of canals and islands 
 and numberless bridges, and steep, narrow, dark 
 ling streets, with whole populations living in each 
 house. 
 
 I found Christina's people at last. They re 
 ceived me at first coldly, and even harshly, re 
 garding me as her evil genius ; but having a 
 length come to understand that she had re 
 nounced me, they lapsed into pity and were 
 kind. But they knew nothing about her ab 
 solutely nothing. She had not come there- 
 she had not written any reply to their last let 
 ter. My coming first told them that she ha< 
 'left her old home. My journey had been utter 
 ly fruitless and futile. 
 
 I took a passage again for England. Sick a 
 heart, and weak in frame, with only two or thre 
 sovereigns left, I landed one wet, foggy evenm 
 near the Tower of London. As I stepped ashor 
 
 said to myself, " Here, then, in London will I 
 tay. I accept battle here. I will succeed here 
 r fail. I will live here, if I can ; if not, I do 
 ot much care how or how soon I am to die 
 ere. Here I shall meet Christina again, or 
 owhere." 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 FROM ARCADIA TO BOHEMIA. 
 
 So I kept my word, and drudged for years in 
 he solitude and darkness of London poverty 
 nd struggle. I gave myself up to the teaching 
 f music and to concert-singing, when I could 
 ;et a decent engagement, or indeed any en- 
 gagement at all. Understand that mine was 
 or a long time a hard struggle. I lived in a 
 garret I was familiar with hunger. The de- 
 ails of the first few years may be spared. Sto- 
 ies of struggles in London by rising young men 
 lave all a sort of family resemblance ; indeed, 
 hey are as much alike as Lely's court beauties ; 
 and if they sometimes differ in catastrophe 
 ne adventurous career ending in Westminster 
 Abbey, and another in the Lambeth Work- 
 ) OUse go one court beauty may have died in 
 ,he purple, and another in the lazar-house. I 
 do not care to weary the reader with a minute 
 account of my struggles for a living ; I only ask 
 him to understand that they were real and hard ; 
 hat for a time they regularly included actual 
 want ; that they often meant destitution ; that 
 lunger was a common condition ; that once or 
 twice I thought it likely enough my fate must 
 be to die of starvation. Let us pass over all 
 this, and come to a time when I began to have 
 a certain income, however small ; when I had 
 a few substantial engagements as a teacher of 
 singing and music ; and was beginning to think 
 of struggling my way to Italy in the hope of re- 
 turning thence a qualified candidate for a place 
 on the lyric stage. For on this I had set my 
 heart. Pride, disappointment, baffled love, all 
 conspired to make this seem the necessary task 
 of my life. To prove myself even were it only 
 to myself not a failure, not a coward, was a 
 resolution within me strong and tenacious as 
 revenge. It was, indeed, my revenge. 
 
 I will not say that the memory of Christina had 
 not somewhat softened, faded into a gentler rec- 
 ollection, during all this time. But its impres- 
 sion was always with me, giving sadness or cour- 
 age, hope or despondency, as my chances and 
 my mood would have it ; always, most certain- 
 ly, exalting and purifying the mournful monot- 
 ony of my drudging life by the memory of some- 
 thing beautiful, tender, and distant. For years 
 of my life I was in the habit daily of going up 
 and down the river in the boats, and I became 
 an intense admirer of St. Paul's. I admire that 
 building forgive me if the confession show stu- 
 pidity and want of taste more than Pantheon 
 or Colosseum, than Westminster Abbey or Notre 
 Dame, or Cologne or Antwerp Cathedral, or St. 
 Peter's or St. Sophia's. To look up at it from 
 
32 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 
 Blackfriar's Bridge on a winter evening, when 
 a cold heaven and a few whitening clouds are 
 behind, and the dome seems a mere flat shape 
 against the sky, a mere form and outline, de- 
 lighted me. To see it sparkling in the rosy col- 
 or of a summer morning, with light and shade 
 succeeding each other on its spires and its round- 
 ed sides, or rising out of the masses of sunset 
 cloud -heaps like a glimpse of some glorious 
 heaven-city, was a sight still more exquisite. 
 Even when the November fog is around it, and 
 its outlines can only be seen at broken and vague 
 intervals, it is a delight to think that behind that 
 curtain of vapor lie rich spires and domes which 
 one breath of wind might reveal in all their 
 beauty. In whatever season or hour, it seems 
 to me to romanticize and to sanctify the hideous 
 commonplace stretch of roofs and chimneys, 
 and wharves and the leaden Lethean river, on 
 which it looks. So was the memory of Chris- 
 tina, and the presence of my love and even of 
 my disappointment, in my hard and common- 
 place life. 
 
 Sometimes I have deliberately come to one 
 of the bridges in the early morning, and stood 
 in one of the recesses and watched the different 
 phases of beauty the glorious dome would assume 
 in the glowing light and the changing clouds, un- 
 til perhaps at last the whole air filled with bright- 
 ness, and every cloud vanished, and the dome 
 and cross were alone in the blue heaven. But 
 these were rare enjoyments. Generally I caught 
 glimpses of my favorite building as I made my 
 way among the bustling crowds on the bridges 
 or on Ludgate Hill, or as I passed beneath in 
 one of the penny steamers. So, too, of my 
 memory of Christina. Sometimes I had an 
 hour or a whole evening to give to my boyish 
 love, and I brought her back before my mind 
 and my eyes until she stood as clear and as life- 
 like before me as when we lived in Arcadia to- 
 gether. But these, too, were rare delights. In 
 ordinary life I only caught mental glimpses of 
 her as I fought my way through vulgar diffi- 
 culties, and obtained some mean and common- 
 place advantages. But the influence was there 
 always. I am a believer in beauty and nature 
 and love, and all the rest of it. With a mem- 
 ory like mine, a faint hope, a strong purpose 
 like mine, life could never become wholly vul- 
 gar or contemptible. " So long, " says the great 
 prose-poet whom Christina's father used to read 
 to us in the old nights, "as the sun keeps but 
 the slenderest rim of its disk uneclipsed the 
 world is not given up to darkness." 
 
 All this time, be it understood, my ordinary 
 way of life was very prosaic, poor, and mean. 
 I was now say seven years or so after my 
 coming to London only just lifting my head 
 above mere poverty. I was utterly obscure. I 
 was living in a low and swampy district on the 
 Surrey bank of the Thames, in the Putney di- 
 rection. I lodged there with a poor, respecta- 
 ble, and lady-like old person, whose appearance 
 attracted me when I happened to come that 
 way hunting 'for cheap and airy apartments. 
 
 The neighboring population consisted chiefly 
 of brickmakers and market-gardeners. A park 
 having been promised, a few rows of cheap stuc- 
 coed houses were built, and christened Albert 
 terraces, Garibaldi villas, Alma places, and such 
 other appropriate and attractive names as the 
 whirligig of time chanced to bring within the 
 easy intellectual range of speculating builders. 
 The roads were damp and undrained, and the 
 whole place looked specially cheerless. TBe 
 inhabitants of the terraces, villas, and places in 
 no case belonged to the indigenous population, 
 but were of a half-genteel, half-pauper, and 
 wholly nomad class, like ourselves. Many peo- 
 ple tried letting lodgings or opening schools 
 there, and failed. One or twO persons having 
 privately the care of insane patients, and prob- 
 ably rather anxious to keep them insane, brought 
 them to bide in this dismal swamp. A few gov- 
 ernment civil officers Customs, Inland Rev- 
 enue, etc. who had not risen in their depart- 
 ments, came and settled there. A forlorn 
 water-color painter, a hopeless photographer, 
 were among our neighbors ; in fact, any kind 
 of people who, dreadfully poor, yet would not 
 wholly abandon the appearance of gentility, 
 drifted thither naturally. So long as the villas 
 and cottages were kept in decent repair they 
 looked pleasant enough, and indeed rather fine 
 and imposing. A semi-detached villa, with a 
 vast row of steps and urns at either side, some- 
 what awed the visitor at first; but the urns 
 were full of dry mud and dead leaves and 
 spiders ; the drawing-room was uncarpeted and 
 hardly furnished ; a dirty slatternly servant, or 
 a little girl with a torn frock and curl-papers, 
 opened the door; grass and v/eeds grew upon 
 the sides of the parapets ; the only traffic con- 
 sisted of great coal-wagons going to and from 
 the neighboring railway-stations. The lanes 
 were blocked up with perpetual mud ; the frog 
 looked in at the kitchen-window; the maggot 
 and the worm made themselves free of the back- 
 parlor. Here and there small rows of shops 
 had been begun and suddenly stopped, and no 
 one ever seemed to have any idea of complet- 
 ing them. My landlady's daughter called the 
 whole settlement "a refuge for the destitute." 
 It was decaying, but not venerable ; it was new, 
 but not fresh ; it had all the disadvantages of 
 newness, and all the defects of age. I heard a 
 lady near whom I happened to sit one evening 
 in a river steamer describe it to a companion, 
 when its swampy flats came in sight, as "a 
 deathy place." The phrase was picturesque, 
 effective, and very appropriate. It did look a 
 deathy place ; but it had the advantages to me 
 supreme of being very cheap, and of having 
 easy access to the river, and therefore to town. 
 In this refuge for the destitute, then, began my 
 march to wealth ; in this deathy place opened 
 my struggle for life. 
 
 My landlady and her daughter were poor 
 dreadfully poor. I had seen enough of poverty 
 n my own town, and indeed in my own sur- 
 roundings, but somehow it was not poverty like 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 33 
 
 that of Mrs. Lyndon and her daughter Lilla. 
 Provincial poverty is hardly ever indeed quite 
 the same as London poverty there is all the 
 difference that exists between a thatched hovel 
 and a Drury Lane garret. But that was not 
 the difference here ; Mrs. Lyndon was always 
 clean, neat, and well dressed ; and she always 
 seemed to be able to get mutton-chops for her 
 daughter's dinner. The daughter always dressed 
 like a girl accustomed to wear good clothes, and 
 therefore not afraid to be occasionally shabby. 
 She never looked worse than like a lady in 
 dishabille. There was none of the artful neat- 
 ness, the mournful nervous precision, of con- 
 scious poverty about her. What on earth did 
 they live on, that mother and daughter ? I had 
 been with them now for a long time ; I was con- 
 stantly being consulted by mother and daugh- 
 ter about their pecuniary affairs. I sometimes 
 counted over the amount which I knew the 
 lodgers to pay, and it still left a pound or two 
 of the house-rent unaccounted for, and the rates 
 and taxes altogether unapproached. Every 
 other day some tax-collector called and left a 
 paper. These documents used to lie in little 
 dusty, sooty piles on the chimney-piece ; I do 
 not know that Mrs. Lyndon ever thought about 
 attempting to pay off any of them. I scarcely 
 ever came in at the door without seeing some 
 collector arguing and threatening in vain. I 
 think the dwellers in these neighborhoods used 
 to allow debts of this and other kinds to run up 
 until they reached an insurmountable pile, and 
 then they removed at night to another locality. 
 They were up to all manner of dodges. Some- 
 times the house was taken in the daughter's 
 name ; and this fact enabled the mother, who 
 was always at home, to waive the responsibility 
 away from herself and stave off the collectors a 
 little longer. They seemed ashamed of nothing. 
 Lilla would entertain me sometimes through a 
 whole afternoon's walk with narratives of the 
 straits to which they had been driven, and the 
 success with which they had come through 
 them. You could not contemplate poverty of 
 this sort without an impression that in its mean- 
 ness and its cynicism it bordered on vice j and 
 yet its endurance, its frankness, its cheerful de- 
 termination were dashed with the flavor of a 
 kind of virtue. You must pity people so hard 
 up, and you must also feel a certain contempt 
 for them ; and yet in my case I could not help 
 liking them, trusting in them, and feeling some- 
 thing resembling affection for them. They were 
 in every sense so kind-hearted, in one sense at 
 least so true ; and then we were all so hard up 
 together, that mere necessity and propinquity 
 made us companionable, as people may be who 
 are forced to pass the night beneath the same 
 tree in Hyde Park, or under the same dry arch 
 of the Adelphi. 
 
 A girl like Lilla Lyndon was, to my provin- 
 cial mind, a perfectly wonderful phenomenon. 
 She was extremely pretty, with dark skin and 
 crisp, wavy, dark hair, and bright, laughing, 
 twinkling eyes, and a smile the most confident, 
 r. 
 
 sweet, and winning one could well be gladdened 
 by. She had plenty of talk, and she talked in 
 a voice just a little sharp, but with a charming 
 accent ; and, in whatever poverty and privation, 
 she had something like the manners of a lady. 
 But these were not the peculiarities which most 
 struck me. I was principally surprised by her 
 inexhaustible knowledge of practical life. How 
 old was she ? Hardly twenty, I should think, 
 at the time I am now telling of, and yet she 
 seemed to know London, its ways, its people, 
 its life, its tricks and dodges, high and low, to 
 the very heart. No royal road was that which 
 had led to such learning ! Many a hard strug- 
 gle must have been battled through before such 
 sad practical experience of the world's war- 
 fare could be got into that pretty little curly 
 
 Lilla always dressed with an appearance of 
 fashion. If a new style of bonnet came in, I 
 sometimes found her at night working away at 
 her own old bonnet, and next day it was con- 
 verted into a very deceptive imitation of the 
 reigning mode. She reconstructed her dresses 
 as often as the British Board of Admiralty re- 
 construct their war-ships. When crinoline came 
 in she was in the front of the fashion, with pet- 
 ticoats wide enough for a duchess. She was 
 always doing some mending work to stockings 
 and slippers. She was absolutely without hy- 
 pocrisy or deceit of any kind ; even the pardon- 
 able feminine deception which keeps ready to 
 hand a piece of crochet-work or bead-orna- 
 mentation to be produced the moment a tap at 
 the door announces a visitor, while the real 
 piece of work, the pair of stays or flannel petti- 
 coat in process of repair, is hastily thrust under 
 the sofa-cushion. Whatever Lilla Lyndon was 
 doing when you came in, that she kept on doing 
 as unconcernedly as before. You found her 
 darning a stocking, perhaps, and she continued 
 the work sometimes, it may be, calling your 
 special attention to the frayed and tattered 
 condition of the article. You found her in curl- 
 papers, and she volunteered the admission that 
 she was too lazy to take them out when getting 
 up that morning, or that she wanted her hair to 
 be in particularly good curl that evening per- 
 haps because her uncle was going to take her 
 somewhere. She was ashamed of nothing that 
 she did. Let me do prompt justice to a clever 
 and pretty girl, and say, to prevent my readers 
 from misjudging her, that she never did any 
 thing to be ashamed of, except talk over cred- 
 itors, and go in debt when she had no prospect 
 of paying. She was honest in every way ex- 
 cept as regarded creditors; and you could as 
 easily have convinced a cat that it is dishonor- 
 able to steal cream as induced Lilla, Lyndon at 
 this period of her life to believe that the laws of 
 morality have any thing to do with the relations 
 between debtor and creditor. 
 
 Lilla's uncle was for some time a mysterious 
 and mythical personage to me. The very first 
 day I became acquainted with mother and 
 daughter I heard of the uncle, who was a mem* 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 her of Parliament, and had an estate in Leices- 
 tershire, and who would not do much for them 
 now, but they hoped would do something some 
 day for Lilla. They did not boast of him by 
 any means in the manner of ordinary poor peo- 
 ple dragging in a story of a rich relation, but 
 simply referred to him as their one sole possi- 
 ble resource and holdfast in utter emergencies. 
 Gradually I came to hear of the various arts and 
 expedients by which Lilla contrived from time 
 to time to coax or wring a few pounds out of 
 him. Mrs. Lyndon never ventured to go near 
 him. There was a sort of treaty, I fancy, that 
 she was never to intrude on him. I could gath- 
 er from them that he could never forgive her for 
 having been virtuous, and having thus rendered 
 it necessary for his brother, when he fell in love 
 with her, a poor girl, to marry her. He was 
 now more angry with her than ever because she 
 was poor and lonely, old and shabby. No doubt 
 many of her shifts and schemes and pressing 
 appeals for money often made the relationship 
 seem a very discreditable thing. The mother 
 and daughter had not known him very long. 
 Lilla's childhood had been passed in Heaven 
 knows what poverty and meanness, her mother 
 never daring to apply to the wealthy and offend- 
 ed relative. Lilla herself told me, with some 
 pride and much laughter, how she, being driven 
 to utter desperation one day, determined upon 
 hunting down her uncle, and how she found 
 him out in his great house in Mayfair, and faced 
 the powdered servants, and insisted upon seeing 
 him ; how she waited outside the hall-door for 
 two mortal hours, very cold, very hungry, but 
 resolute, and prepared for the encounter by 
 being dressed in whatever finery she had got ; 
 how at last she saw him, and was rather gruffly 
 received ; how she began to cry, thinking that 
 the proper way to soften a cruel uncle, but was 
 soon undeceived by the cruel uncle telling her 
 sternly that he hated crying women, whereupon 
 she desisted from weeping, the more readily be- 
 cause she had not the least inclination to cry ; 
 and how at last she compelled him to admit the 
 relationship, and came away with a permission 
 to call again and a ten-pound note. This pres- 
 ent she changed at the nearest shop, and treat- 
 ed herself forthwith to a pair of gloves, a new 
 bonnet, a fowl to be brought home for dinner, 
 and a hansom cab to her own door. 
 
 Since then she had never lost sight of him. 
 He must either have begun to accept her exist- 
 ence and her visits as a kind of dispensation not 
 to be any longer resisted, or she must have 
 really succeeded, with her pretty face, genteel 
 figure, and coaxing ways, in making him fond 
 of her. He was a widower, and had daughters 
 of his own ; but they would never see Lilla, 
 who, for her own part, was only too happy to 
 escape seeing them ; and all her visits, there- 
 fore, were paid in the absence of these inflexible 
 ladies. Mr. Lyndon seemed to me, by Lilla's 
 own admission, to have done a good deal for 
 her. He had obtained for her situations as 
 governess in various families in London, in 
 
 Cheltenham, in Edinburgh, in Bath, in Scar- 
 borough ; but she always quitted her place 
 somewhat abruptly, and came back to her mo- 
 ther reveling and rejoicing in her freedom, 
 which she celebrated by laying out part of the 
 balance of her salary in a fowl, or oysters, or a 
 lobster, or something nice for supper. Terrible 
 trouble had she each time to make her explana- 
 tions and excuses to her uncle, and cozen him 
 into forgiving her. From various hints and 
 stray words, I conjectured that she did not get 
 on well with the ladies of any family ; and I 
 fancy she had the evil fate, either by intention 
 or innocent inadvertence, to attract a good deal 
 too much of the notice of the husbands, broth- 
 ers, sons, friends, and male visitors generally, 
 of the houses into which she was successively 
 introduced. 
 
 I often marveled that, in a place like London, 
 so quick and clever a girl as Lilla could find no 
 way of converting her energy and ingenuity into 
 money. But practical capacity of this kind she 
 seemed not to have, or not to care about exert- 
 ing. I began to find, too, that the counsels of 
 her mother did not much tend to make her in- 
 dustrious to any purpose. 
 
 " My Lilly is a good girl," poor Mrs. Lyndon 
 would say to me ; " a good girl, Mr. Banks, al- 
 though I say it. She ought to be a lady ; arid 
 perhaps she will be one day. If I were dead 
 and out of the way, I think, perhaps, they would 
 make her a lady. She isn't fit to lead this kind 
 of life ; she's too delicate and too refined ; any 
 body can see that. She can't eat the kind of 
 dinners I have to set before her sometimes, poor 
 child." 
 
 Lilla was immensely fond of the pastry-cook's 
 shop, and had a taste for lobster-salad as finely 
 developed as ever I saw. There was something 
 unspeakably touching in the manner and tone 
 of the old woman when she spoke of this boun- 
 cing London lass, and the sincerity with which 
 she evidently regarded her as too delicate and 
 fragile for the coarse world around. 
 
 "She isn't strong like me," the emaciated 
 old creature would say, the tears blinking in 
 her sad and faded eyes. "I was a farmer's 
 daughter, Mr. Banks, passing half my days in 
 the fields and the open air, not like a poor, 
 peaky Londoner. I was a fine, stout, rosy girl 
 at Lilly's age; and long before that I could 
 cook and bake and brew, and put my hand to 
 every thing about the farm. Once we had a 
 great harvest-home dinner, and I cooked a 
 beautiful fawn for the day ; and oh, bless you, 
 the praise I got for it! My father called me 
 up to the table, and the farmers all drank my 
 health, and told me I'd make such a splendid 
 farmer's wife. I was that proud, I can tell you ; 
 and I didn't expect then to be living in London 
 a poor old woman. But my poor Lilly was 
 brought up in town, and I never had much to 
 give her, dear child ; and she can't be expected 
 to look strong and well as country girls do." 
 
 Mrs. Lyndon was not a widow. That piece 
 of information had been volunteered to me bv 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 35 
 
 Lilla. Lilla told me her father had deserted 
 them, and gone abroad somewhere, and had 
 not since been heard of. 
 
 Sometimes when I came home late at night 
 I used to find my way down to the kitchen, 
 where the embers of the fire were generally 
 burning, and where I could smoke a pipe with 
 a clear conscience, having no curtains to fumi- 
 gate and no one to render uncomfortable. One 
 night, as I was going down, I was surprised to 
 see a light below. Thinking the gas had been 
 left burning by mistake, I went down; and 
 when just on the last stair I saw that Mrs. Lyn- 
 don was still up. She was seated with her back 
 to me, and leaned over the table. Was she 
 asleep ? I stooped forward to see. No ; she 
 was awake, and bent over something which she 
 was moving between her hands. Old stories 
 of misers in the depth of lonely night counting 
 their secret stores of gold came whimsically 
 enough to my mind. She had no gold, how- 
 ever ; only a decayed old pack of blackened 
 cards spread before her. I softly withdrew ; I 
 had seen enough ; I had fathomed all the poor, 
 sad little mystery with one involuntary glance. 
 I too was of Arcadia ; I too had come up from 
 the country, where superstitions are still a faith, 
 and omens and divinations defy Hamlet's phi- 
 losophy. I knew at once that Mrs. Lyndon was 
 trying some feeble, sad, sibylline work. Poor 
 old creature, with her early and childish coun- 
 try superstitions still clinging round her, she 
 was sorting the cards to discover in them some 
 tidings of the husband who had deserted her 
 some hint as to the fortunes of the daughter 
 whom she was breaking her heart to bring up 
 as a lady. 
 
 Late that night I heard a hansom cab drive 
 up to the door. I was reading something in 
 my own room, and I looked out of the window. 
 Some one got out of the cab and handed Lilla 
 to the door-step. She was in opera costume 
 wherever on earth she had got it and she 
 looked indeed very attractive, and apparently 
 very joyous, as she tripped up the steps. It 
 was an elderly gentleman who accompanied 
 her. I could see his iron-gray hair and rather 
 red face. Lilla opened the door with her latch- 
 key, while he got into the cab and drove off. 
 I could hear him giving directions to the cab- 
 man in a peculiarly strident voice. Lilla crept 
 very softly down stairs, where I suppose her 
 mother was still sitting up for her. 
 
 Next morning I chanced to meet my young 
 friend. 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Banks," she broke out, "I have 
 such a headache !" 
 
 "You were dissipating last night," I an- 
 swered. "That is what comes of late hours." 
 
 " How do you know ? Did you see me come 
 in?" 
 
 "Yes, that I did." 
 
 " I am so glad ! Did I look well ?" 
 
 "Charming." 
 
 " Did I really ? Yes ; my uncle took me to 
 the Opera, and gave me the dress and cloak to 
 
 go in was not that kind of him ? and it was 
 o delightful ! " 
 
 "The music ? What opera was it ?" 
 
 "Oh! Fidelio. But I didn't care about the 
 music ; at least, I mean I didn't care so much 
 bout it. I was so happy, and delighted with 
 every thing, and especially myself. I was a 
 ady for a whole night ! And we were in the 
 stalls I love the stalls ! I never was there be- 
 fore an d we had supper afterward ! And we 
 drove home in a hansom. Now I have a head- 
 ache ; but I don't mind, for it's such a long 
 ime since I had a new dress; and I was so 
 nappy." 
 
 I could not help thinking of the poor old mo- 
 ;her in the damp kitchen, spelling over her pack 
 of cards. 
 
 Indeed, I could never look at that poor old 
 woman without wondering for what unknown 
 jurpose she was ever sent upon earth, in what 
 nscrutable way Heaven would compensate her 
 n some world hereafter for her joyless drudgery 
 lere. Not merely was she not happy herself, 
 but, with the kindliest heart, the most unselfish 
 nature in the world, she did not seem to have 
 ;he power of making any one else happy. What 
 lopeless misfortune had crushed her into beg- 
 garly inertness so voting I did not know : but 
 so long, at least, as Lilla's memory seemed to 
 go back, the lives of the pair had been one un- 
 intermittent, humiliating, demoralizing battle 
 with poverty. Poverty and drudgery appeared 
 to have crushed quite out of Mrs. Lyndon all 
 the feeling of religion which every where but 
 in London seems to cling to the old and the un- 
 fortunate. The butcher and baker left her no 
 time to think of heaven. Her one thought was 
 for her daughter : to get the pretty girl enough 
 to eat, to cook tender chops for her, to have lit- 
 tle dainties for her breakfast and her supper, to 
 keep her in clothes, to guard her against con- 
 sumption, to dream of her one day becoming a 
 lady. 
 
 As for the daughter, she was simply a kind- 
 hearted, bright, clever little heathen, not surely 
 incapable of conversion and training if any high- 
 minded creature could but take her in hand. 
 Just now no Fayaway, no naked girl of South 
 Sea islands, could be a more thorough pagan 
 than my graceful and pretty friend Lilla Lyn- 
 don. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 LILLA WOULD SERVE ME. 
 
 MEANWHILE I am free to own that I liked 
 the company of my pretty pagan; indeed it 
 brightened life very much to me. When I was 
 most lonely and unfriended these people had 
 been strangely kind to me, and our common 
 poverty and struggles made us I was almost 
 about to say unnaturally certainly unusually 
 familiar and friendly. Ofcourse no young man 
 of my age could ever be wholly indifferent tq 
 the company of a pretty and attractive girl ; and 
 
36 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I really grew quite fond of Lilla. I was not in 
 the least in love with her ; nor did she, I feel 
 assured, ever think of me in the light of a pos- 
 sible lover ; but we were very friendly and fa- 
 miliar, and indeed, in a sort of quiet, confident 
 way, attached to each other. A happy Bohe- 
 mian independence of public opinion emanci- 
 pated our movements. She and I generally 
 walked out together on Sundays in the desolate 
 suburbs, or across the swamp which was under- 
 going slow conversion into a park. Sometimes, 
 as I came home in the evening after giving some 
 music-lessons or, for that matter, tuning a pi- 
 ano I met her going toward town, and I turned 
 back and walked with her. Much amazed I used 
 to be at first by her close knowledge of the short- 
 est way to get every where, and of every shop 
 where the best things to eat, or wear, or drink 
 were to be had at the lowest possible prices. 
 
 Our talk was generally lively enough ; but 
 there were days when I became so saddened by 
 my memories and my dull prospects that I 
 really could not brighten; and then Lilla, in 
 order to encourage me, told me all kinds of 
 stories of her own occasional trials and dis- 
 tresses, as well as of people she had known, 
 who, having been reduced to the very depths 
 of despair, fell in with some lucky fortune, and 
 were raised at once to high position and afflu- 
 ence. Most of those stories, to be sure, were 
 told of young women reduced to serve in shops, 
 whom some men of enormous wealth fell in love 
 with and married ; so that I could scarcely de- 
 rive much encouragement from their applica- 
 tion to my own personal condition. But it was 
 easy to see with what a horizon fortune had 
 bounded poor Lilla's earthly ambition. She 
 had no genius for any work that did not direct- 
 ly conduce to personal adornment, and she had 
 a very strong desire for wealth and ease. 
 
 " My only chance," she said frankly one day, 
 "is to marry somebody who has money. I am 
 sick of this place and this life. If I married a 
 rich green-grocer even, I should be far, far hap- 
 pier than I am. I should have a home for my 
 mother, and a cart to drive about in on Sun- 
 days, when the green-grocer did not want it 
 for his business ; and then mother and I would 
 leave him at home on the Sundays to smoke in 
 the back-kitchen while we went out for a drive ; 
 and we could call for you and take you with 
 us. I must marry somebody with money." 
 
 " Suppose, in the mean time, somebody with- 
 out money comes in the way, and you fall in 
 love with him ?" 
 
 " Love ? Nonsense ! Love is a luxury be- 
 yond my means, Sir. Besides, do you know, I 
 think debts and poverty make some of us cold- 
 hearted or no-hearted, and we are not capable 
 of falling in love. Seriously, I don't think I 
 could be." 
 
 "Then I hope no friend of mine will fall in 
 love with you." 
 
 "I am sure I hope not unless he has money. 
 I don't believe I have such a thing as a heart." 
 
 " You ought to have told me all this before, 
 
 Lilla. How do you know what agony you may 
 be inflicting on my heart ?" 
 
 I thought she would have laughed at this, but 
 she looked at me quite gravely, and even sym- 
 pathetically. 
 
 "Ah, no !" she said, quietly ; " you are safe 
 enough from me at least; I can see that." 
 
 " Why, Miss Lyndon ? Pray tell me. " 
 
 " Don't ask me ; but don't think me a fool. 
 Have I not eyes ? Can't I. see that your heart 
 is gone long ago in some disastrous way or oth- 
 er, and that you can't recover it ; and don't you 
 think I am sorry for you ? Yes, as much as if 
 you were my brother." 
 
 "Ah, Lilla, you have far more heart than 
 you would have me think. Not your eyes saw, 
 but your heart." 
 
 And we neither spoke any more on that sub- 
 ject. But I knew that under my pretty pagan's 
 plump bosom there beat a heart which the love 
 of lobster-salad, and the hopes of a rich hus- 
 band, and all the duty of dodging duns, could 
 not rob of its genial blood-warmth. 
 
 Lilla had, like most London girls of her class 
 and temperament, a passion for the theatre. 
 She knew the ways of every theatre, and some- 
 thing about the private lives of all the actors 
 and actresses, and who was married to whom, 
 and who were not married at all, and who was 
 in debt, and who made ever so much money in 
 the year, and spent it or hoarded it, as the case 
 might be. She pointed you out a small cigar- 
 shop, and told you it was kept by the father of 
 MissVashner, the great tragic actress; she called 
 your attention to a small coal-and-potato store, 
 and told you it was there Mr. Wagstaffe, the 
 great manager, began his career ; she glanced 
 at a beery, snuffy little man in the street, and 
 whispered that he was the husband of the dash- 
 ing Violet Schonbein, who played the male parts 
 in the burlesques and pantomimes, and whose 
 figure was the admiration of London. Her in- 
 terest did not lie so much in the stately opera- 
 houses, or even the theatres where legitimate 
 tragedy yet feebly protested its legitimacy and 
 divine right, as in the small pleasant houses 
 where comedians and piquant actresses could 
 always fill the benches. She knew where the 
 best seats were, and how to make use of an 
 order to most advantage ; and, indeed, seemed 
 hardly ever to have gone to a theatre except in 
 the company of somebody armed with such a 
 missive. She had been to parties of all kinds 
 to Kew, to Richmond, to Vauxhall (yes, I 
 think there was a Vauxhall then), to Green- 
 wich, to Dulwich, to Rosherville. She ap- 
 peared to have an intimate knowledge of all 
 places where supper was to be most comforta- 
 bly and cheaply had in the neighborhood of 
 each theatre. She had been to the Derby; 
 and she never missed seeing the Queen going 
 to open Parliament, or even the Loj-d Mayor's 
 Show. She knew all about the great people 
 of London the Duchess of Sutherland, Lady 
 Palmerston, and the like ; and, by some strange 
 process of information, she often used to get to 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 37 
 
 know beforehand when grand balls were given 
 jn the neighborhood of Belgrave Square or 
 Park Lane, and she loved to go and watch at 
 the doors to see the ladies pass in. Her uncle, 
 she told me, had often promised to take her to 
 the Ladies' Gallery of the House of Commons 
 to hear a debate, but as yet he had not carried 
 out his promise. He took her to the National 
 Gallery and the Royal Academy's Exhibition ; 
 but she did not much care about these places 
 of entertainment, and could not tell the name 
 of any picture or painter afterward. Mr. Lyn- 
 don, M.P., clearly wanted to impress her with 
 the necessity of some sort of mental culture, for 
 he sent her a new piano and a heap of books, 
 and made her promise to learn. She might 
 have mastered most studies quickly enough had 
 she but shown the same aptitude for them which 
 she had for picking up the private histories of 
 actresses and great ladies, for turning and trim- 
 ming old dresses, for reviving decayed bonnets, 
 and for stimulating flat porter, by the applica- 
 tion of soda, into a ghastly likeness of bottled 
 stout. 
 
 I thought her naturally so clever, and indeed 
 I felt such a warm interest in her, that I set to 
 work to teach her something. The piano she 
 played very badly, and that I could teach her ; 
 singing I was likewise qualified to instruct her 
 in ; and French I spoke fluently enough. These, 
 then, I offered, and in fact was determined, to 
 teach her ; and she was very glad to learn, and 
 when she was in humor for it, very quick and 
 docile. What she went about teaching in the 
 families where she had tried to be governess I 
 never could guess. Just now I was glad she 
 knew so little, and that there were some things 
 I could teach her. I had nothing to do half 
 my time ; I was lonely and unfriended ; these 
 people had been kind to me, as indeed kind- 
 ness was a part of their nature, and I felt so 
 grateful that I was only too glad to have any 
 chance of showing my gratitude. So I became 
 Lilla's music-master and French teacher when 
 I could and when she would ; and Mrs. Lyn- 
 don was delighted. The good woman trusted 
 me entirely. She had so often told me what 
 her dreams and hopes for her daughter were, 
 that she knew so poor a caitiff as myself woulc 
 never be mean enough to play Marplot by mak- 
 ing love to Lilla. We were all poor together, 
 and Mrs. Lyndon felt that hawks would noi 
 pick hawks' eyes out. 
 
 Little or nothing in this story turns upon mj 
 pupil-teaching of Lilla. In a direct sense, no- 
 thing came of it. I mention it here only t< 
 explain the fact that Lilla and her mother go 
 to think themselves deeply indebted to me, anc 
 that Lilla in particular was determined to make 
 me some return. 
 
 One evening I was walking rather listlessly 
 along Sloane Street, feigning to myself that ; 
 had business in town, when I met Lilla return 
 ing homeward. She was all flushed and beam 
 ing, evidently under the influence of some piece 
 of splendid good news. 
 
 " I have such news for you !" she said. "I 
 iave been to my uncle's, and I have talked to 
 im about you." 
 "About me?" 
 
 "Yes. I always wanted to speak to him 
 ,bout you, and I made up my mind to go up 
 pecially to-day and do it. I told him all 
 about you ; how you were living in our house, 
 and how kind you had always been to mamma 
 and me which I'm sure we don't forget 
 vhenever we needed it; and Heaven knows 
 we always do need it, for we never yet were 
 able to pay any thing at the right time." 
 
 'Well, well, pass over all that, and come 
 back to Mr. Lyndon." 
 
 Yes, I told him all about you, and how 
 were better tmtn a colony of sons to mam- 
 ma, and a whole schoolful of brothers to me, 
 and how you teach me this and that every 
 thing in fact. I can tell you your ears ought 
 to have tingled, for such praise as I gave you 
 mortal man never yet deserved. I told him 
 what a singer you were ever so much better 
 than Mario, I said ; at which I promise you he 
 smiled v%ry grimly, and grumbled out that he 
 had heard of too many singers who were ever 
 so much better than Mario. But I told him 
 that you were, and no mistake. And then I 
 said you wanted to get on the stage, only 
 that you had no friends; at which he smiled 
 again, and said a man who could sing better 
 than Mario didn't much stand in need of 
 friends." 
 
 "Well, but, Lilla, I don't quite see." 
 
 "Don't you? No, I dare say you don't; 
 but I just do. Why, did I never tell you that 
 my uncle knows all the great swells about the 
 theatres ? C^i yes. He once had a share in a 
 theatre with a tremendous swell, Lord Loreine, 
 and he adores operas and singers, and he gives 
 dinners at Greenwich to prima donnas. He is 
 constantly behind the scenes every where odd 
 places for him to go to, I have often told him 
 and every great singer who comes out he al- 
 ways meets. Who is Reichstein ? Is it a man 
 or a woman ?" 
 
 "Reichstein is a woman." 
 
 "Who is she?" 
 
 "A singer a great success in Paris, I'm 
 told. I don't know much about her hardly 
 any thing, in fact. But she is new in Paris, 
 and I believe a success." 
 
 "Well, he has been to Paris indeed, he 
 only came home last night and he is in such 
 a state about Reichstein, who is to come out in 
 London and make a wonderful success. I was 
 ashamed to confess that I never heard of Reich- 
 stein before, and didn't know, in fact, whether 
 it was a man or a woman ; and besides, I told 
 him I wanted to talk about you, and not about 
 Reichstein." 
 
 " What did he say ?" 
 
 " He laughed, and said ' Reichstein could do 
 more for your friend' (my friend, you under- 
 stand) ' than I could.' In fact, he was in such 
 a delightful good-humor that I might have said 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 any thing to him to-day. You are to come and 
 see him. Oh yes, you are ; you'll find him very 
 friendly." 
 
 "But, indeed, Lilla " 
 "No, no; I can't. hear any modest plead- 
 ings. You are to come ; I am to bring you. 
 You may be sure he'll like you ; and, do you 
 know, I really begin to think your fortune is 
 made. Perhaps you may sing as primo tenore 
 with what's-her-name, Reichstein, some time. 
 And I shall go to hear you, and fling a bouquet 
 to you mind, not to her so be sure you keep 
 it for yourself; and then you must redeem your 
 promise, and take me to the Derby." 
 
 " Hear me swear ! You shall accompany me 
 to the Derby. We'll have a carriage and, at 
 least, four horses the very first Derby-day after 
 I have sung as primo tenore with Mile. Reich- 
 stein." 
 
 " Well, you may laugh now ; but I promise 
 you I'll make you keep your word. Far more 
 unlikely things have happened. But now tell 
 me when you are coming to see my uncle." 
 
 I had not the remotest idea of presenting 
 myself or being presented to Lilla's urifcle. All 
 I had heard of him pictured him to me as a cold, 
 purse-proud, selfish, sensuous man not, indeed, 
 incapable of doing a generous thing for a poor 
 dependent, but quite incapable of feeling any 
 respect for poverty of any kind. His photo- 
 graph, which Lilla often showed me, quite con- 
 firmed my notions of him. Egotism and pride 
 were traced in every line of the face of the 
 straight square forehead, of the broad jaw 
 even the unmistakable sensuousness of the full 
 lips and the wide mouth did not soften the gen- 
 eral hardness of the expression. I can not tell 
 why, but I always detested the man. Patron- 
 age of any kind I must have hated ; but to be 
 patronized by this rich man was utterly out of 
 the question. 
 
 Yet I could not but feel grateful for the 
 kindly manner in which poor Lilla had en- 
 deavored to serve me. This was surely disin- 
 terestedness on her part. She so often had to 
 solicit favors of her uncle upon her own ac- 
 count, that one might have imagined a shrewd 
 and worldly girl would be very careful indeed 
 not to weaken any influence she might have, 
 not to discount any future concessions, by ask- 
 ing his good offices for another. Therefore, 
 while I attached not the slightest importance 
 to the promised influence, and would not have 
 availed myself of it were it really to make my 
 fortune in an hour, I took good care, the reader 
 may well believe, to let Lilla see that I was not 
 ungrateful. Nor did I dash her little pride and 
 triumph by telling her that I would not go to 
 see her uncle. But I temporized ; and fortune 
 gave me a ready way of doing it. I had been 
 for some little time in negotiation about an en- 
 gagement to join a company who were to give 
 concerts in some of the provincial cities and 
 towns ; and this very day I had accepted the 
 terms, and duly signed the conditions. I had 
 therefore to leave town at once, and should 
 
 probably be away for two or three months at 
 the least. 
 
 This therefore gave me a satisfactory plea for 
 postponing my visit to Mr. Lyndon. 
 
 Lilla was a little cast down ; but as she knew 
 I had long been anxious to secure this very en- 
 gagement my first of any note she brightened 
 up immediately, and gave me her warm con- 
 gratulations. 
 
 "When I get back, Lilla, you shall make 
 my fortune." 
 
 " How glad I shall be ! Do you know that 
 I really hope you may not quite take the prov- 
 inces by storm,, and so find the way made clear 
 to you, without my having any thing to do with 
 it? I do, indeed. I want so much to be the 
 means of doing some good for you." 
 
 "You need not fear, Lilla. Fortune will be 
 in no hurry to interfere with your kindly pur- 
 pose. " 
 
 "But stop. I have actually done something 
 for you already. I have given you a name." 
 
 ' ' Indeed ! How is that ?" 
 
 "Well, of course you can't call yourself 
 Banks when you go on the stage. Banks 
 would never do; there couldn't be a great 
 Banks. Then you always say you never 
 would consent to take any ridiculous Italian 
 name." 
 
 "Never." 
 
 "Well, I have given you a delightful name, 
 which is all your own, by the simplest process 
 in the world. Temple Banks is absolutely ri- 
 diculous; people would always keep calling 
 you Temple Bar. Now don't be angry." 
 
 "Indeed I am not." 
 
 "You got quite flushed when I laughed at 
 your name, though; but no matter. Leave 
 out the Banks altogether, and there you are 
 Emanuel Temple ! What can be prettier 
 and softer? All liquids, positively. Well, I 
 have made you Emanuel Temple, and nothing 
 else. I spoke of you to my uncle as Emanuel 
 Temple. He has written down your name in 
 his memorandum-book as Emanuel Temple. I 
 have launched you as Emanuel Temple, and 
 Emanuel Temple you shall remain." 
 
 Nobody much likes any chaff about his name. 
 I did not at first quite relish my young friend's 
 remarks, but I soon saw there was some sense 
 in them. I had indeed, for many reasons, de- 
 termined on changing my name in some way, 
 and this slight alteration would do as well as 
 any other. So I went through the provinces as 
 Emanuel Temple, and I have never since been 
 publicly known by any other name. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 I MAKE A NEW ACQUAINTANCE. 
 
 SOME few weeks of professional wandering 
 among chilling audiences in country towns, 
 meeting with tolerable success in most places, 
 brought me to Dover, and the first glimpse of 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the sea I had enjoyed for years. I felt boyish 
 again at the sight of my old confidant ; and the 
 shining track of the moon across the water 
 seemed to mark out a bright path back to the 
 delightful dream-land, the far-oif, fading Island 
 of the Blest, with its "light of ineffable faces," 
 whither my boyhood and my first love were ban- 
 ished, the one seemingly as much lost to me as 
 the other. Not for years had I thought so bit- 
 terly, so passionately, of Christina as during my 
 short stay in Dover by the sea. And yet she 
 seemed to me almost like a creature in a dream 
 like some beautiful spirit-love, which had de- 
 scended upon me while I lay in ecstatic delirium, 
 and faded with my waking. I can almost be- 
 lieve the stories of men who have fallen madly 
 in love with the daughters of dreams, and pined 
 and "sickened away their lives in longing after 
 the unreal, and were glad to die, that they 
 might be relieved of the vain tormenting wish. 
 I pass, however, from recalling these purely 
 personal and egotistical recollections to the sub- 
 ject which I meant to speak of when I recurred 
 to my visit to Dover. An accidental meeting 
 there threw me in the way of making an odd 
 acquaintanceship, which had no little influence 
 afterward on one part at least of my fortunes, 
 and those of two distinct and divided sets of 
 persons, whose histories make indirectly a chap- 
 ter of mine. 
 
 One evening, after I had sung at a concert 
 and been somewhat applauded, I went to have 
 my customary stroll by the sea. I turned into 
 a cigar-shop in one of the steep, stony, narrow 
 little streets, chiefly made up of oyster-shops 
 and public houses, which alone are astir in 
 Dover after nightfall. I asked for a cigar, 
 hardly observing that somebody else was be- 
 ing served with something by the young woman 
 who stood behind the counter. 
 
 " Glad he's come in !" said a full mellow male 
 voice; "very glad. He'll decide ; he looks a 
 sort of person who ought to know." 
 
 It did not occur to me that this could well 
 have any reference to myself, and so I asked 
 again for a cigar. I noticed then that the girl 
 was flushed in the face, and was biting her lips, 
 half amused and half angry. 
 
 "Shall I refer it to him?" said the male 
 voice again. 
 
 " I really don't care," replied the girl, " whom 
 you refer it to ; I've told you the price and the 
 quality, that's all." 
 
 I looked round, and saw that there was seat- 
 ed on a chair at my left a short, stout, well- 
 preserved elderly personage, with black, beady, 
 twinkling eyes, shining white teeth, a rubicund 
 complexion, and a black wig. His opened lips 
 had a full, sensuous expression, and there was 
 a dash of something in his whole face which 
 vaguely spoke of cruelty, or marked eccentric- 
 ity, or something else that is out of the common 
 place character of the everyday Briton. There 
 was an odd, indefinable mixture about his ap- 
 pearance and manner of the broken down gen- 
 tleman and the artist. I should say that he was 
 
 irobably a naturalized Bohemian one not born 
 mong the gipsies, but who perhaps had stray- 
 d into their encampments in early life, or got 
 hanged at nurse. His uncommon appear- 
 ,nce and queer ways struck me at once. I 
 ibserved that his hands were small, fat, and 
 jeautifully white. 
 
 "Then we refer the case to arbitration," 
 :omplacently remarked this personage ; and, 
 till remaining in his chair, he touched his 
 tat very graciously to me, and with a wave 
 >f his hand invited my attention. "We have 
 lad a dispute, Sir, I and this young lady her 
 tame is Fanny ; I address her by her name be- 
 ause we are old acquaintances; I have been 
 icre twice, I think touching the quality of 
 hese cigars. She declares them to be prime 
 Havanas, and has the conscience to ask eight- 
 >ence each. / represent them to be rather in- 
 'erior Veveys, and suggest one penny each, or 
 leven for sixpence. On these terms I am wili- 
 ng to treat for one shilling's worth. I tell her 
 'rankly it is no use trying to deceive me. I 
 lave been to Havana, and I have only just 
 come back from Switzerland ; and I remark 
 ;o her that I rather think I saw the light at 
 east ayear or two before she did, and that, 
 generally speaking, I have not knocked about 
 he world for nothing. She refuses to admit 
 he force of these arguments. Fortunately you 
 lave come just in time to arbitrate. You seem 
 ;o me a man who ought to know tobacco from 
 dock-leaves and brown paper. Come, then, 
 low say you Havana or Vevey ?" 
 
 " I am afraid I must decline to arbitrate. I 
 riave not been to Havana." 
 
 " But you are not a Dover man ? You don't 
 belong to this confounded dirty, Disgraceful lit- 
 tle place? Don't tell me." 
 
 "No, I am not a Dover man." 
 
 " Of course not ; I knew it. You see, Fan- 
 ny, it's no use trying to deceive me. Take ex- 
 ample, sweet girl." , 
 
 The sweet girl only tossed her head and 
 looked remarkably sour. 
 
 "If you're not going to 'ave the cigars," she 
 said, " I just wish you'd put them down, and 
 not bother." 
 
 "Fanny, you rush to conclusions with the 
 impetuosity of your sex. It must be some- 
 thing, I fancy, in the nature of petticoats that 
 makes the wearers of them so quick in their 
 conclusions. No, Fanny, I shall not put the 
 cigars down, because I do mean to ' 'ave them,' 
 as you express it, with the delicious disregard 
 of aspirates peculiar to our common country. I 
 mean to ' 'ave them' and to pay for them, fail- 
 being, even at your own price ; but I am anx- 
 ious to convince you that, though you may ex- 
 tort my money " 
 
 "Extort, indeed! I don't care, I'm sure, 
 if you 'ave them or don't 'ave them." 
 
 " ' 'Ave them or don't 'ave them.' Innocent 
 accents ! As I was observing when I was in- 
 terruptedpray don't go, Sir, one moment I 
 want to convince you that you can not cheat 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 'NO, I AM NOT A DOVEB MAN. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 me, or confound my sense of justice. You may 
 fret me, but you can not play upon me. I am 
 only for justice. All my life through I have 
 stood up for justice, and I never could get it. 
 The whole world and his wife were against me, 
 may God curse them all! Look here, Sir!" 
 And he jumped off his seat, and came close up 
 to me, throwing his hat back off his forehead 
 as he did so, and much disarranging his wig 
 meantime. "Have you ever been conspired 
 against, and hated ?" 
 
 "No, I think not; I don't know at least; 
 and pardon me if I say I don't much care/' 
 
 " And do you think / care. Not I. They 
 have done their best for years, and I have stood 
 out against them, and defied them, and bade 
 them go to the devil; and just because they 
 wouldn't go, and wanted me very particularly 
 not to go either, I did my utmost to go there as 
 fast as possible." 
 
 " Which I do believe you're going," muttered 
 the girl, with a glance at me. 
 
 " I am a victim, Sir, to my sense of justice, 
 and my determination not to be conquered. I 
 left England when they wanted me to stay 
 here ; I come back now because I know they 
 want me away. I'll spoil their game. There 
 are people would rather see all the Beelzebubs 
 and Molochs and Asmodeuses, and the rest of 
 them, than me. Therefore I come. ' Confound 
 their politics; frustrate their knavish tricks!' 
 Good-evening, Sir. Or, stay, are you walking 
 my way, and will you permit me to walk a lit- 
 tle with you ?" 
 
 I was 'about to decline very firmly the prof- 
 fered companionship, but a supplicating look 
 from poor Fanny seemed to beg of me to take 
 him out of her way, wheresoever he might then 
 desire to go. So I was pleased to be able to 
 oblige the perplexed lass, who seemed half 
 talked to death already ; and it really did not 
 much matter to me whether I endured my new 
 acquaintance's company for a few minutes lon- 
 ger or got rid of him at once. So I expressed 
 myself as quite delighted to have the pleasure 
 of his company, and I was thanked by a glance 
 of gratitude from under Fanny's eyelids. 
 
 " Good-night, then, Fanny. Farewell, along 
 farewell, my Fanny ; perchance I may revisit 
 thee no more. I take these six Havanas we'll 
 call them at your own valuation. This gen- 
 tleman and I are too much pressed for time to 
 enter on the business of an arbitration now; 
 and besides, I don't think I could trust him 
 for he is young, Fanny, and inexperienced to 
 arbitrate between me and so pretty a girl as 
 yourself. Between man and man is easy arbi- 
 tration, Fanny ; but between man and woman 
 is trying work. Six cigars at eightpence each ; 
 six times eight, forty-eight four shillings. The 
 roof does not fall in, Fanny ! I perceive that 
 the Powers above have no intention of interfer- 
 ing to punish or prevent fraud ; and I have only 
 to pay. There are the four shillings. Fare- 
 well, Fanny; repent, and remember me! 
 Now, then, Sir, at your service." 
 
 I followed my whimsical acquaintance. I 
 )bserved that all his clothes were of foreign cut 
 and fashion, and looked rather decaying. In- 
 deed, he might have been taken for a shabby 
 old Frenchman who had once been in good so- 
 ciety, but for his voice and accent. These were 
 unmistakably English. His voice was pecul- 
 arly sweet, full, and mellow, and its natural in- 
 ;onation when he dropped the manner of roist- 
 ering buffoonery, which seemed to me purpose- 
 y put on, was 'decidedly that of an educated 
 English gentleman. 
 
 ; < That's a pretty little devil," remarked my 
 friend as we emerged from a dark street sud- 
 denly into the moonlight of the quay. 
 
 ' The girl in the shop?" 
 
 ; 'As if you didn't know at once whom I 
 meant ! Of course the girl in the shop I dare 
 say you'll be found dropping in upon her again. " 
 
 "Not likely at all." 
 
 "Lord, Lord, how this world is given toly- 
 ng ! Don't be offended, Sir ; I have only been 
 quoting Jack Falstaff." 
 
 "I know, and I am not offended." 
 
 !< Thanks ; I begin to think you are rather a 
 good sort of fellow in your way, and I only of- 
 fend, people I don't like. But you know very 
 well, you sly rogue, you'll be looking in upon 
 ittle Fanny" again. I saw telegraphic glances 
 sassing between you." 
 
 " I don't care one rush ever to see her again. 
 and I don't mean to." 
 
 " How odd ! They tell me young fellows in 
 England are greatly changed since my time. 
 Apparently so. When I was your age I should 
 have liked to see such a girl more than once. 
 Even now, I can assure you, I am a martyr, a 
 positive martyr, to my general affection for the 
 petticoat. But look there ! God ! how can a 
 man talk of petticoats, and such fribbles and 
 frou-frou, when he has a sight like that before 
 him ?" 
 
 He pointed to the sea. We had reached a 
 part of the road from which you looked, on the 
 one hand, at the grand old castle and the white 
 cliffs ; on the other, out across the waves, where- 
 on the soft moonlight of late summer seemed 
 floating. The muffled, gentle thunder of the 
 waters rolling languidly and heavily on the 
 strand was in our ears ; the scent of the salt 
 sea in our nostrils ; the summer air all around 
 us ; the moon and the sea before our eyes. It 
 was indeed a scene to refine even vulgarity, to 
 solemnize frivolity. 
 
 My friend took off his hat, and stood gazing 
 on the sea. Presently I heard him murmur, in 
 his deep soft tones : 
 
 "For I have loved, O Lord, the beauty of 
 thy house, and the place where thine honor 
 dwelleth." 
 
 He presently turned to me : 
 
 " Do you think it will avail a man hereafter 
 to plead' that he has loved the beauty of His 
 house ?" 
 
 "Surely, surely; at least I hope so." 
 
 " Then you are an artist." This was said in 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the tone of one who has suddenly made a grat- 
 ifying discovery. 
 
 "Well, a sort of artist; at least not wholly 
 without some kind of artistic taste." 
 
 " You believe in beauty, don't you ? Now, 
 don't give me any vague commonplace answer 
 I hate cant and parroting of any kind. If 
 you don't believe in it, or if you don't quite 
 know what I mean when I ask you the question, 
 then say you don't, and let there be an end of 
 it. A man may be a devilish good fellow al- 
 though he has no more soul for beauty than that 
 rock yonder >. and let me tell you a man may be 
 a devilish bad fellow, and guilty of pretty well 
 every sin that ever came in his way, although 
 he is open at every pore to the contagion of 
 beauty wherever it shows itself, in a wave or a 
 moonbeam or a woman's bosom. The thing is, 
 do you believe in beauty ? Because, if not, we 
 had better walk on, and talk about oysters and 
 cigars. " 
 
 I never was fluent with confessions of faith 
 on the spur of the moment ; and I was not quite 
 clear about the perfect sanity of my companion. 
 However, I answered quite truly that I thought 
 I might describe myself as, in his sense, a be- 
 liever in beauty. 
 
 "Good we are companions. Now, then, 
 let us look at that scene for a little, and, like a 
 good fellow, don't keep talking all the while." 
 (I had not uttered six sentences the.? far during 
 our walk.) " Such a sight must be enjoyed in 
 silence. It is holy; yes, damn me, but it is." 
 After this pious affirmation he relapsed into 
 silence only, however, for a few minutes. 
 
 "I have been an artist," he said ; " at least 
 I tried to paint pictures. I think they were 
 very good, but they didn't come to any thing ; 
 in. fact, with me nothing comes to any thing. I 
 was brought up to be a gentleman, and that 
 didn't prosper much with me. I've been a bal- 
 lad-singer fact ! give you my word on it. I've 
 sung in London squares, outside the windows 
 of houses Avhere I've many a time dined ; and 
 they've sent out the confounded flunky to tell 
 me to move on. True, every word of it!" 
 And he burst into a loud peal of laughter which 
 waked the echoes of the cliffs, and sounded like 
 a startling, hideous profanity of the stillness 
 and the scene. 
 
 "The singing did not prosper?" I asked, 
 calmly, not out of any particular curiosity, but 
 to interpose any question which might check his 
 dissonant mirth. 
 
 "Not it ! Nothing, I have told you already, 
 ever does prosper with me ; and yet they can't 
 get rid of me, I can tell you." 
 
 ' ' Yes, they. What is it to you who they are, 
 or what their accursed names are?" 
 
 "I assure you, I don't want to know at all." 
 "They? I'll tell you who they are. The 
 Pharisees, the publicans, the respectable hypo- 
 crites, the cold, confounded, bloodless, sinless 
 devils. Look here, and answer me truly did 
 you ever do a virtuous action ?" 
 
 "Eeally, that depends" 
 "No, it doesn't; it depends on nothing. 
 Did you ever do any thing that was really vir- 
 tuous and self-denying, that you would much 
 rather not have done, but did because virtuous 
 people asked you to do it ? Any thing of that 
 sort have you ever done ?" 
 
 "Well, if you press me for an answer, I must 
 say I don't believe I ever did." 
 
 "Of course you never did. Well, I did 
 once ! You'll not catch me doing such a thing 
 again, I can tell you ; it played the devil with 
 me. I've done and I had done before that 
 about every foolish and bad thing a man could 
 do ; but I might have been forgiven every thing 
 except the one sacrifice to virtue. And it was 
 such a sacrifice ! If you only knew ! No mat- 
 ter. Are you leaving Dover soon ?" 
 "In a day or two." 
 " Going over, no doubt?" 
 He nodded in the direction where the French 
 coast lay, now, of course, wholly lost to sight. 
 
 " No. I am going to visit a few towns here 
 in the south." 
 "And then?" 
 "Then to London." 
 "Where you live ?" 
 "Where I live." 
 
 "Good. I am going to live there too un- 
 less I happen to starve there for a while. I 
 have a few coins left. I should think a week 
 of very rigid economy would play them out, and 
 Heaven knows into what company of thieves I 
 may fall meantime." 
 
 Something prompted me to say, with, more 
 emphasis than if the words were merely formal, 
 " I hope we may meet in London." 
 He laughed a short laugh. 
 "Well," he said, "/ hope so too; but if, as 
 the final result of our meeting, you are particu- 
 larly glad of the acquaintance, I think you'll be 
 about the first that ever had occasion to express 
 such a sentiment. And yet I love mankind ; 
 and I really don't try to do harm to any body, 
 except to some very, very near and dear rela- 
 tives. I suppose London stands where it did, 
 and is much the same as usual ?" 
 
 "Just as it was so long as I can remember it." 
 "I thought so. All the young men wise, 
 and all the young women virtuous. All the 
 marriages made in heaven, and all husbands 
 devoted to their wives. All brothers, of course, 
 living together in love and harmony. A blessed 
 place ! Naturally just the place for me : so I 
 am going there. I have not been there for 
 years ; but I am glad to hear that its beatific 
 condition remains still unaltered." 
 
 He snapped his fingers, and turned abruptly 
 away from me. Just as I thought I had got 
 rid of him, however, he wheeled round and 
 came sharply up to me again. 
 
 "Do you know any body in London?" he 
 asked. 
 
 " Very few people. In your sense I should 
 perhaps say nobody." 
 
 " Any members of parliament, for example ?" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 43 
 
 "Not one." 
 
 " Ah, that's a pity ! Some of them are such 
 noble fellows ; 7 know some of them. I know 
 one in particular, and I am very fond of him. 
 His name is Tommy Goodboy. An odd name, 
 isn't it? But it's his name. Don't look in 
 Dod when you get home for Tommy Goodboy, 
 Esq., M.P., because he doesn't give his real 
 name when he goes to the House of Commons. 
 But he's Tommy Goodboy. You remember 
 the story of Tommy and Harry ? Harry didn't 
 care ; and so a roaring lion came and ate him 
 up. That was convenient for the good people, 
 the respectable and well-behaved people. The 
 deuce of the thing would have been if Harry 
 didn't get eaten, but came back all alive, and 
 kept tormenting Tommy out of his wretched, 
 pitiful existence, disgracing him, crouching at 
 his door like Lazarus, and offending the guests 
 whom Tommy invited to dinner. By-the-way, 
 I take it for granted you are hard up?" 
 
 "Well, I certainly am not Dives. No beg- 
 gar would care to wait at my door." 
 
 * ' No, I thought not. You dress well enough ; 
 but there is something unmistakable about the 
 cut of the man who is hard up. ' Poor devil' 
 is written in every line of you ; and yet I should 
 say you are a sort of fellow who will burst out 
 of all that and get on. Unlike me in that re- 
 spect ; I am a poor devil, and I never shall get 
 on. Good-night. I dare say we shall meet 
 again somewhere. I am going back to the 
 town. I know a very pleasant place where 
 oysters are eaten, and brarfdy is drunk, and 
 songs are sung ; and I am a sort of king of the 
 feast there. They are all low scoundrels, and 
 I'm a kind of lord and patron among them. I 
 don ! t suppose it's any use asking you to come." 
 "Thanks, no; not the slightest." 
 "No, you don't seem just the sort of person 
 to enliven a convivial gathering. I know,what's 
 the matter with you. Don't be cast down, man ; 
 . you and she will meet again yet." 
 
 His idle words did, I suppose, make me give 
 a slight start ; for he laughed his chuckling, 
 rolling laugh, and said : 
 
 " So I have touched you ! I thought as much. 
 Confound it, man ! you're as fortunate as one 
 of Virgil's rustics, if you only knew your owi 
 good luck. The best thing that can happen to 
 you is never to see her again ; and to keep \\\ 
 your poetry, and romance, and despair, and al 
 the rest of the nonsense. Take my word for 
 it, if you have the misfortune to marry her. 
 you'll soon find the, poetry and the romance 
 sponged out, and you'll be glad to join me al 
 the oysters and the brandy ! Despairing lover, 
 I envy you from my soul ! By God, I do ! I 
 would give the crown of England, if I had it 
 to be young like you, and to be disappointed in 
 love. It's glorious ! Confound it, you've mad 
 me so envious that I'll leave you with a parting 
 malediction. May the devil inspire her to mar 
 ry you !" 
 
 He burst into his laugh again, and trottec 
 away at last townward. I was glad to get ri 
 
 f him ; indeed, for the last few minutes of the 
 onversation I was plagued by a strong desire 
 
 kick him a performance hardly practicable > 
 eeing that he was old enough to be my father, 
 nd only half my size. Yet it was strange with^ 
 
 what interest I had been studying his face, his* 
 -oice, his gestures all the time that he was speak- 
 ng. I felt perfectly satisfied that I had never 
 een him before, and yet there was something 
 ormentingly, tantalizingly familiar to me in his 
 eatures. It was some shadowy, quick-darting 
 esemblance which every now and then seemed 
 just on the point of revealing itself, but always 
 anished at the most critical moment. As one 
 ortures himself in trying to recall a name which 
 s every instant on the tip of the tongue and yet 
 will not come out, so I perplexed myself in 
 ain endeavors to read the riddle of his face 
 and voice. Strangely, too, it seemed to remind 
 me, as well as I could understand my own sen- 
 sations, not of one, but of two faces I had some- 
 where seen. The upper part of the face, the 
 bright twinkling eyes, the straight short nose, 
 he cheek-bones just a little high, the white 
 forehead these were features which reminded 
 me of something that brought with it genial and 
 kindly associations ; while the sensuous lips and 
 cruel jaw recalled something which was harsh 
 and displeasing to remember. I racked my 
 brain again and again ; and indeed I think that 
 
 1 dreamed of the creature half through the 
 night, and thought I saw him turning before 
 my eyes into the successive resemblances of 
 nearly every man I knew. But I awoke in the 
 morning with the riddle still unexplained, and 
 at last I resolutely pu it aside altogether. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 MY NEW FRIEND IN A NEW CHARACTER. 
 
 THAT night we gave another concert ; it was 
 well attended, and successful. When I came 
 on to take part in a duet with some woman I 
 naturally looked round the hall, and to my min- 
 gled amusement and vexation I saw my friend 
 of the previous night seated in the reserved 
 part of the hall, and listening with his head a 
 little to one side, and all the manner of a pro- 
 fessed connoisseur. He beat time gently with 
 his fingers ; he nodded his head and smiled a 
 sweet approving smile when some passage was 
 specially well executed ; his brows contracted 
 and he shook his head in indignant remon- 
 strance at any thing out of time or tune. To 
 do him justice, he really did seem to know 
 something about the music, which hardly any 
 body else among the audience did. Therefore 
 he took quite a leading part in the reserved 
 seats, looked blandly but commandingly around, 
 and intimated with eye or gesture where ap- 
 plause might properly be awarded ; frowned 
 fiercely down any untimely burst coming in at 
 a wrong place; shrugged his shoulders and 
 shuddered when a breath of wholly unmerited 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 approval floated past him; cried bravo to a I finally nodded a good-humored, peremptory 
 singer, brava to a songstress, bravi when more adieu, and literally broke away from him' 
 than one performer conquered his approval; Whereupon my friend first stamped on the 
 
 pavement, muttered something about canaille, 
 
 expressed in audible tones his final verdict on 
 ^ach performance ; and, in short, conducted 
 himself quite as one whose judgment artists 
 and audience had alike agreed to recognize. 
 Whether he remembered me or not I could not 
 guess, for his face gave no token of recognition. 
 But when I came on, I observed that he took, 
 with an air of gracious friendliness, the pro- 
 gramme from the lap of a lady who sat next 
 him, and raising a double eye-glass which he 
 wore, looked down the bill apparently to dis- 
 cover my name. He was very patronizing in 
 his treatment of me ; only shrugged his shoul- 
 ders once or twice, and several times tapped 
 his palms together and cried ' ' bravo ! " Indeed, 
 I think he encouraged, at all events he per- 
 mitted, an encore of one of my ballads. He 
 showed to most advantage, however, during 
 
 then swore a round Saxon oath or two, then 
 burst into a loud laugh, and went laughing and 
 stamping down the street. 
 
 I passed him quite closely. He did not ob- 
 serve me ; at least he took no notice whatever 
 of me. He was talking to himself. 
 
 " The society of the just declines to have me 
 this night," I heard him say. "I have given 
 it the chance, once, twice. The stuck-up Brit- 
 oness scorns my attentions, confound her ! I 
 wish she was Boadicea, and I one of the Roman 
 conquerors, furnished with a good birchen rod. 
 Neither will the frog-eating, fantastic fribble of 
 France invite me to sup with himself and his 
 wife. Afraid to run such a risk with her, no 
 doubt. I don't wonder. I can't sit at good 
 men's feasts to-night. No help for it. There 
 
 the second part of the concert, which was made are worse things than bad men's feasts, that's 
 
 up of selections from an oratorio. Impressed 
 strongly by his manner, and apparently anxious 
 to do some act of homage to so accomplished 
 critic, the lady next him offered to allow him 
 to read from the score of the oratorio she had 
 with her. His manner of surprised, amused, 
 pitying, condescending rejection of the proffered 
 kindness was sublime. The shrug of the shoul- 
 ders, the raising of the eyebrows, the graceful, 
 lordly waving of the disclaiming hand, the bend 
 of the head, the benign, superior smile, all said 
 as plainly as words could have spoken it : " My 
 dear Madame, do you really suppose there is 
 one note, one half-note of this music that is not 
 familiar to me as the letters of the alphabet ? A 
 thousand thanks for your well-meant offer ; but 
 pardon me if I say that it really does amuse me." 
 When I was leaving the hall at the end of 
 the performance I caught another glimpse of 
 my friend. He was making himself painfully 
 attentive to two ladies, perhaps those who had 
 sat next to him, by insisting on opening their 
 carriage-door for them, handing them in, ar- 
 ranging their skirts, and otherwise playing the 
 gallant, much to their apparent vexation. He 
 then shut the carriage-door, took off his hat and 
 bowed profoundly, and in a loud tone gave the 
 coachman his order for "home." I watched 
 him for a while with considerable amusement. 
 He then stood on the pavement and scrutinized 
 the crowd coming out. A lady and gentleman 
 came out, talking together in French. The 
 sound struck my friend's ears ; he at once ap- 
 proached them, took off his hat, made a bow, 
 and addressed them in a voluble stream of 
 French, accompanying his words with such ges- 
 tures and shrugs and elevation of eyebrows, that 
 he seemed to have transformed himself into a 
 very Frenchman all in a moment. I do not 
 know whether he was really passing himself off 
 as a Frenchman, but the persons he addressed 
 stopped and conversed with him for a moment 
 or two, then seemed to be puzzled by him, then 
 
 one comfort." 
 
 I did not care to give him the chance of fas- 
 tening on me, whether he chose to regard me 
 as of the good or of the bad ; so I hurried away, 
 and so far I escaped. 
 
 I walked and smoked a good deal by the sea- 
 side that night, and enjoyed the solitude and 
 the beauty of the place. In a very few days I 
 was to return to London, after an absence that 
 had now spread over some months my first 
 absence, even for a week, since I had come to 
 live in the great city. I thought of Lilla and 
 her good-natured undertaking to make my for- 
 tune through her uncle's influence, and 'won- 
 dered how I should be able to get rid of the 
 offer without wounding her, or seeming un- 
 grateful for her kindness. If I could only 
 spread out my provincial engagement for even 
 a fortnight or three weeks longer, the season 
 would be over by the time I had returned to 
 town, and Mr. Lyndon would probably have be- 
 taken himself to Ems, or Baden, or Florence, 
 and the difficulty would be obviated for another 
 season at least. 
 
 I could not think of such things without 
 meditating rather sadly over my own dreary 
 life and blank future, and then falling into the 
 old, old track of thought about my lost Christina, 
 who had so literally disappeared out of my life. 
 Strange, that in wandering about London I had 
 never met even Ned Lambert, our quondam 
 )ass-singer ; who might perhaps have told me 
 something of her whose face would at least 
 lave recalled more vividly the associations of 
 he dear, fading days of long ago. Poor Ned 
 Lambert! he must have suffered much. But, 
 good Heavens, what could his sufferings have 
 )een to mine ! He at least was not first raised 
 ip to happiness and then flung down to despair ; 
 while I O Heaven, how happy I was once ! 
 
 Of late I found myself growing quite moody 
 nd moping. I began to think I was getting 
 prematurely old, and to look out of mornings 
 
 evidently became anxious to shake him off, j for gray hairs at eight-and-twenty ! 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 45 
 
 I turned away from the sea-shore, and walked 
 homeward through the town. Passing through 
 one of the streets I heard noise, clamor, shout- 
 ing, cursing, stamping apparently going on in 
 a low public house, the light from whose win- 
 dows was the only bright spot along that side 
 of the street. As I came up to the place its 
 swing-doors were suddenly flung open, and the 
 "row" streamed out upon the pavement. It 
 assumed the form of a little crowd of men hus- 
 tling and rushing round some central figures. 
 There were shouts of " Give it him !" "Let 'im 
 'ave it!" "No!" "Shame!" "Don't hit him !" 
 "Knock him down!" "Damnation French- 
 man!" " Dirty foreigner !" " Call the police !" 
 and so forth. I could see that the fat, bare- 
 headed landlord, and the almost equally fat 
 bar-man, were wildly endeavoring to restore or- 
 der, or keep the whole company out, while the 
 bar-maid stood at the door and vainly screamed 
 for the "Perlice!" 
 
 I do not feel much interest in "rows," and 
 would gladly have passed on, but the "row" 
 broke around me, so to speak, split into waves 
 upon the sudden and unexpected opposition of 
 my advancing form, and I found myself some- 
 how in the very midst of it. Then I saw that 
 the central figures were a big, stout, lubberly- 
 looking cavalry soldier, and a small man, who 
 was clinging to the hero's neck. In the latter 
 figure I at once recognized my fantastic friend 
 of the black wig. He was jabbering away in a 
 jargon of French and broken English, and was 
 clinging to his antagonist like a savage little 
 bull-dog. Just as I was rushing in to endeavor 
 to get him away the big soldier succeeded in 
 shaking himself free from my friend's grip, and 
 then took the little man bodily oft' his feet, and 
 flung him on the pavement, amidst a yelling 
 chorus of cheers and laughter, broken by a few 
 cries of "Shame !" 
 
 "For shame, you cowardly ruffian!" I ex- 
 claimed, utterly ignorant as I was of the merits 
 of the quarrel. "Don't you see he is an old 
 man? Fight your match, you blackguard, if 
 you want to fight!" 
 
 I fully expected to have had to accept a prac- 
 tical challenge on my own account, and stood 
 therefore quite ready, the first moment the sol- 
 dier made an attack on me, to hit hard and 
 home. He was a floundering, awkward sort 
 of fellow. I was stoxit and sinewy at that time, 
 and had some little science. I did not despair 
 of finishing off the battle in a well -employed 
 minute or so. 
 
 But to do the honest warrior justice, he 
 seemed rather ashamed of his part in the trans- 
 action. 
 
 "Who wants to fight him?" he asked in a 
 growling tone, and with a sheepish expression. 
 "He ain't that old neither; but I didn't want 
 to have any thing to do with the dirty little 
 Frenchy. 'Twas all his work. Why didn't he 
 let me alone ? Why did he keep badgerin' of 
 me, and worryin' of me, and insultin' of me and 
 my red coat, all the evening?" 
 
 There was a chorus of approbation, and the 
 bar-man cried, "Hear, hear!" 
 
 Meanwhile my little friend jumped to his feet 
 again, and began to dance around us on the 
 pavement without hat or wig, presenting so out- 
 rageously ridiculous a spectacle that I could 
 not wonder at the roar of laughter with which 
 he was greeted. I kept between him and the 
 soldier as well as I could, and I at last seized 
 him fast round the arms, while he, endeavoring 
 to break away and get at his antagonist, dragged 
 and whirled me round on the pavement in a 
 manner the most grotesque arid ludicrous. 
 
 "Let him come!" roared the absurd little 
 beast, in his ridiculous jabber. " Cochon dun 
 Anglais! God dam John Bull! Poltroon of 
 militaire! I am not so old, moi, but I can teach 
 ce gros militaire his own boxe. Coward En- 
 glish! English dam! Fight you all round! 
 Sacre-e-e-t!" 
 
 The absurdity and whimsicality of the whole 
 scene, and of this ridiculous little being's non- 
 sensical part in it, were altogether too much for 
 me, and I too joined in the burst of laugh- 
 ter. 
 
 "Come, come," I said at last, shaking my 
 old friend rather roughly by the collar, "don't 
 make a fool of yourself any more. You have 
 had enough of this for one night. Come away 
 with me." 
 
 "Will ze gros militaire make apology?" 
 
 A renewed burst of laughter followed this, in 
 which the gros militaire himself joined. 
 
 "Do take him away, like a good gentleman," 
 said the landlord to me. " I do think he's the 
 most worriting little creature as ever I saw. 
 He's been insulting every one in my bar to- 
 night. He kissed my bar-maid, and he wanted 
 to kiss my wife ; and he's been so down upon 
 that there soldier as flesh and blood wouldn't 
 stand it, telling him the English soldiers were 
 all cowards, and that the French were coming 
 over to thrash us all and carry off our wives, 
 And I tried to get rid of him quietly, and he 
 wouldn't go, and I tried to keep order ; but you 
 know it's hard for Englishmen to stand being 
 insulted by a d d little Frenchman ; and the 
 soldier didn't hit him at all, but only wanted 
 just to put him out of the place." 
 
 "Well, take all these people in again, and 
 I'll get him out of this. No, you sha'n't. " This 
 last assurance was given to my impetuous friend, 
 who was plunging and struggling so that it some- 
 times took all the vigor of my eight-and-twenty 
 years to keep him back, and indeed I sometimes 
 felt tempted to let him rush on and get smoth- 
 ered or set upon by the cavalryman. The crowd, 
 however, seeing that the fun was probably over, 
 began to straggle back, laughing, into the pub- 
 lic house ; the bar-man and the bar-maid had 
 returned to their duties ; the soldier was only 
 too glad to get out of the whole business ; and 
 I was nearly master of the situation. 
 
 "Here's his hat," said the landlord. 
 
 "And here's his wig !" exclaimed a by-stand- 
 er, with a burst of laughter. 
 
-IG 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 The soldier having by this time disappeare< 
 behind the swing-doors of the public house, hi 
 antagonist allowed himself to be quietly coiffe 
 and having shrugged his shoulders several times 
 and exclaimed that the chasseur acknowledgec 
 himself vaincu, he made a low bow to the fev 
 remaining spectators, thanked ces braves Anglai 
 for the fair play of the boxe, and, leaning on my 
 arm affectionately, consented to be led away 
 The disgust I felt at the whole business ne 
 words can express. But that I looked at hi 
 withered face, and saw the deepening ruts of 
 Time's track so plainly in it, I should have re 
 gretted that I had not left the soldier and him 
 self to settle the business between them. 
 
 When we had got a few paces from the scene 
 of conflict my companion burst into a long pea! 
 of rolling laughter. 
 
 "That was capital," he chuckled. "Did 
 you ever see such fun ? I suppose I may drop 
 the Frenchman now, and return to my allegi- 
 ance as a native-born subject of happy and 
 glorious, long to reign over us, Victoria, Queen 
 of Great Britain and Ireland." 
 
 "What on earth led you to carry on all that 
 absurd buffoonery?" 
 
 "If I know, may I be condemned to the 
 eternal society of British respectability ! Give 
 you my word, my dear young friend whose 
 name I have not yet the honor of knowing I 
 can no more tell you why I chose to assume 
 the manners, prejudices, and lingo of Albion's 
 hereditary enemy than I could solve the mys- 
 tery of man's hereafter. What then ? We are 
 all creatures of impulse. I have been espe- 
 cially so from the date of my first misfortune 
 of course I mean my birth. I looked into that 
 atrocious den there with no object whatever. I 
 might have come harmlessly away in five min- 
 utes, when the evil destinies would have it that 
 my wandering eyes fell upon that hapless soldier. 
 He was the centre of an admiring bumpkin or 
 costermonger group; he was telling, I think, 
 his adventures atrocious lies, of course, every 
 one in China, or the Khyber Pass, or Syria, 
 or some other place ; and he was evidently im- 
 mensely proud of being a British soldier. May 
 I perish if I could resist the temptation to make 
 him and the rest of them uncomfortable ! The 
 one thing I hate in life is smug and sleek re- 
 spectability and self-conceit, in any sphere what- 
 ever. In that moment I became a Frenchman 
 positively for the time being I was a French- 
 man. I soon disturbed the harmony of the 
 festive hour. I confuted my red-coat with im- 
 promptu facts and impossible geography. I be- 
 wildered him so far that before long he couldn't 
 have told whether he did or did not take part in 
 the battle of Plassy, and whether Marshal Ney 
 did not lick the English there. I contradicted 
 and chaffed him, every word he said ; I kissed 
 the bar-maid because he seemed spoony abotit 
 her; I winked ostentatiously at the landlord's 
 wife, until mine host grew purple with jealousy 
 and fear I really believe I kissed her too ; and 
 finally " 
 
 "Finally, they kicked you out." 
 "No, they didn't. The soldier tried to put 
 me out and couldn't, and then the whole of them 
 fell on me somehow; and I have no doubt they 
 would all have wreaked their base vengeance 
 on me but that you came gallantly up to the 
 rescue. I owe you something for that. So 
 much the worse for you. The people I owe 
 any thing to are seldom any the better for it. 
 Yet I like you ; I did from the first. You look 
 so confoundedly out of sorts." 
 " Thank you." 
 
 _ "Yes, you do. I hate success and respecta- 
 bility. I hate virtue, and domestic happiness, 
 and the proprieties, and all that revolting stuff. 
 I detest children and wives, and people who 
 parade their chubby, insolent happiness. Stand 
 there just there in the moonlight a little, and 
 let me look at you." 
 
 I complied with his wish. He planted me 
 as a painter might his model, fell back to a 
 proper distance, and steadily surveyed me with 
 his piercing, glittering, small black eyes. 
 
 "Yes, that will do," he said, reflectively. 
 
 Nothing about you to offend me. You don't 
 seem to me to have tasted much success in life, 
 or to be particularly happy. You, I should say, 
 are at odds with the world, and likely to be for 
 a time at least, and then, perhaps, you may 
 come out all right ; and if you do, I don't want 
 :o see any more of you from that time forth. 
 Did you ever hear of Swift and his sceva indig- 
 natio, which could only leave him with his life ?" 
 " Yes, I have heard of Swift, and know all 
 about his sceva indignatio." 
 
 "Well, i think that's my curse. I writhe 
 inder it, and I live to make others writhe. 
 That one resemblance you need not tell me it 
 s the only one I bear to Jonathan Swift. 
 How the devil, though, do you know it is the 
 >nly one ?" 
 
 " I didn't say I knew any thing about it. You 
 may be twice as great a man as Swift for aught 
 ~ know to the contrary." 
 
 * ' Of course I may to be sure I may. Then 
 why did you sneer when I spoke of a resem- 
 " dance between Swift and myself?" 
 
 "I didn't sneer. I smiled at the notion." 
 
 " Don't smile any more until you know what , 
 -ou are smiling at. However, I don't mind* 
 >eing frank and humble for once, and confess- 
 ng that in the matter of genius I am decidedly 
 nferior to Swift. Also that the world has neveV 
 ecognized me as it did him. But one thing is 
 ertain: Swift never locked up in his heart a 
 reater treasure of hate than I do. How old 
 re you?" 
 
 " Twenty-eight, I think, or thereabouts." 
 
 " Don't you find the world a devilish place ?" 
 
 "How devilish?" 
 
 "Full of devils. Here, there, and every 
 here devils all around us. If I were in- 
 ined to be an atheist which, thank God, I 
 ever, never was I should be forced to believe 
 in God because I see so much of the devil. 
 Don't you think with me ?" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 47 
 
 " Oh yes, quite so ; no doubt. In fact, I am' 
 rather in a hurry now, and can't stay to discuss 
 theology." 
 
 "Another sneer! This time an inexcusable 
 one, for it is a sneer against religion. Young 
 man, whatever you do, be religious always." 
 
 I was turning away, utterly disgusted at the 
 hideous profanation of his language. He saw 
 disgust painted on my features, and he seized 
 me by the arm : 
 
 "Stay; don't go yet. Don't you sha'n't. 
 You think me a hypocrite ?" 
 
 " I do ; and I am sickened by such talk. Let 
 me go, and good-night." 
 
 "No; just listen to me. I am not a hypo- 
 crite ; no, by God ! He hears me, and He 
 knows ! If I had been, I must have succeeded 
 in life, and been respectable, and had carriages 
 and fine horses, and sat in Parliament as Tom- 
 my Goodboy. But I could not; I would go 
 my own way to the devil if need be and yet 
 loving religion all the time. What else is my 
 hope and my consolation? Do I not read in 
 th Psalms of David how he curses his enemies ? 
 and these words teach me how to curse mine. 
 Do I not read how Dives at last went down to 
 hell" 
 
 "For shame, for shame! You are growing 
 old, and should read the Holy Scriptures to some 
 other purpose, or not at all. Let us say no more 
 of it and good-night." 
 
 "Good-night, then and go to the devil. I 
 say, shall we meet in London ?" 
 
 '"I hope not." 
 
 "Then I hope we shall and I am sure we 
 shall ; I see it in the future that we are to be 
 thrown together a good deal somehow." 
 
 Confound it ! This very thought was at the 
 moment pressing painfully on my own mind. 
 Just as I still kept thinking his face not unfa- 
 miliar to me, and wondering where I could have 
 seen one like it before, so I began now to be 
 weighed down with a hideous foreboding that 
 this creature and I were likely to be brought to- 
 gether in some close and disagreeable way here- 
 after. The very nourishing of this thought drew 
 with it a hesitation which unconsciously checked 
 my abrupt breaking away from my companion. 
 Involuntarily, irresistibly, I once more set myself 
 to scan and study his features, in the vague hope 
 of reading there some clew to my forebodings. 
 
 "I see you don't like the prospect," he re- 
 marked, with a chuckle; "but you need not 
 much fear : you have no money, I know. Lucky 
 for you, for I must get money somehow ; and I 
 am such a hand at billiards and cards ! But I 
 can't wait for these slow and steady acquisitions 
 when I get to London. I must have something 
 to open the campaign with. Gare to Goodboy ! 
 Good-by to you for the present ; we'll meet again. 
 Just now take your face hence. Thanks for de- 
 fending me so valiantly. Next time that, in the 
 capacity of a discharged caporal, I am engaged 
 in vindicating the honor of France against some 
 gigantic beef-eating Briton, I'll endeavor to have 
 you close at hand." 
 
 At last he went away ; and I could hear him 
 trolling Partant pour la Syrie in a wonderfully 
 sweet and mellow voice as he disappeared from 
 my sight. 
 
 Much relieved by our separation, I went 
 briskly home ; sincerely, though somehow not 
 very hopefully, praying that London might 
 prove kind enough to hold us two without 
 bringing us together. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 GREETING AND FAREWELL. 
 
 THE season was fading when I returned to 
 London. Even in our dull and barbarous dis- 
 trict people were beginning to make ghastly 
 affectation of going out of town ; while in the 
 streets which society and civilization claimed 
 for their own the windows were darkening one 
 after another, much as the colored lamps of an 
 old-fashioned illumination, before the universal 
 reign of gas had set in, used to fade and die to- 
 ward morning. 
 
 Lilla had a rapid summary of news for me. 
 "Nothing much" had occurred, as she phrased 
 it ; her uncle had not yet left town ; he had 
 had a quarrel with his daughters, and she had 
 an idea that it was all about the Opera and 
 Mademoiselle Reichstein. Oh, hadn't I heard ? 
 Mademoiselle Reichstein had made such a suc- 
 cess ! Oh yes splendid ! But she had broken 
 off her engagement rather suddenly, and she 
 wanted to go to the other opera-house, and there 
 was quite a turmoil about it; and Lilla be- 
 lieved there was going to be a lawsuit. But, 
 however that might be, Mr. Lyndon was quite 
 infatuated about her ; and people would keep 
 saying that he wanted to marry her ; and his 
 daughters were in such a way about it, and 
 there was a row in the building, Lilla believed. 
 She 'was quite delighted at the prospect of a 
 "row" continuing and growing to be some- 
 thing serious, for she utterly detested Mr. Lyn- 
 don's daughters ; and she was going to be in- 
 troduced to Mademoiselle Reichstein. 
 
 "But if your uncle marries, Lilla, that will 
 be rather a bad thing for you ?" 
 
 "Yes; but I don't believe it will come to 
 any thing. I should think a woman so young, 
 and with such a career before her, isn't going 
 to marry a man who has daughters quite as old 
 as herself and once and a half as tall. If I 
 were she, I knoAV that nothing on earth should 
 induce me to do such a thing. Oh, how I 
 envy her! How happy some people are! 
 What success they have, and gifts, and beau- 
 ty ! And what a miserable life a girl like me 
 is doomed to lead ! Here in this wretched old 
 den ! I wonder how one can live through it. 
 I never cross the bridge but I think how sad 
 and dreary my life is, and how much I should 
 like to drown myself if I had the courage. She 
 must be as happy as a queen. I envy her, and 
 I admire her too." 
 
48 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Have you seen her?" 
 "No; her portrait only ; and it was a wretch- 
 ed portrait too a thing in a music-shop, with 
 some rubbishy piece of music appended : but it 
 made her beautiful and queenly, and sad too, 
 I thought. But I am to see her. Is it possi- 
 ble you did not hear of her success down in the 
 country ?" 
 
 " Oh yes, of course I did. But I am tired 
 of all the singers who are every one in turn to 
 surpass Jenny Lind and Grisi, and who disap- 
 pear in a season." 
 
 "But the town is ringing with her." 
 "Yes, so it was with Mademoiselle Johanna 
 Wagner; so it was with no end of women. 
 Where are they all now ?" 
 
 " Well, I don't know ; but I have quite made 
 up my mind that this one shall succeed and 
 have a splendid career, and come to know me 
 and be very fond of me, and take me behind 
 the scenes, and have me in her box ; and please 
 don't destroy my delicious dream. I have not 
 many pleasant dreams here, I can tell you. I 
 never saw success in a living form face to face 
 before ; and pray don't convince me that I am 
 not really to see it now. If you have come 
 back cynical and out of humor, pray go away 
 again on your travels ; although we were pre- 
 cious lonely without you, I can tell you that. " 
 " Were you lonely without me ?" 
 " Oh yes, very. Mamma thought you would 
 never come back." 
 "And you, Lilla?" 
 "Yes ; I too was very lonely." 
 "And you were glad when I came back ?" 
 "Glad? Yes, surely. You don't suppose 
 I was not glad ?" 
 
 The frank look of kindly affectionate surprise 
 with which Lilla spoke these words had a warm- 
 ing, almost a thrilling influence on me. I think 
 I had begun of late to form a kind of vague idea 
 that Lilla might easily be induced to fall in love 
 with me. I certainly did not love her, and I 
 saw nothing in her manner toward me which 
 spoke of love. But we were so much thrown 
 together, we were both so lonely, that I some- 
 times began to ask myself whether it would not 
 be possible for me to descend from my pinnacle 
 of sublime isolation and despair, and lift her to- 
 ward my heart. I look back now upon myself 
 and my ways at that time with the feeling which 
 I suppose most people entertain toward their 
 youth, curiously blended of regret and admira- 
 tion and contempt. What a vain creature I 
 was, and yet how stupidly timid and diffident ! 
 What a fool I was, and how convinced of my 
 own wisdom ! How miserable I was, and how 
 happy ! What an admiration I had for my own 
 merits, and yet what a rapturous and servile 
 gratitude I felt to any woman who seemed to 
 cast a favoring eye upon me ! I kept thinking 
 complacently whether I really could accept Lil- 
 la's love, without asking myself whether any 
 consideration on earth could induce her to ac- 
 cept me as a lover ; and yet all the time I was 
 filled with a sense of humiliating gratefulness 
 
 to the girl for having condescended to be 
 friendly and kindly to me. Of course I thought 
 to myself, if I could make up my mind to come 
 down from my clouds and try to love her, I 
 must tell her openly, tragically, that I was' a 
 blighted being, that I had hardly any heart left 
 to give, and so forth. Even then I had a faint 
 doubt whether this would not be a little too 
 much in the style of Dickens's Mr. Moddle, 
 with whom I knew Lilla to be well acquainted ; 
 and what a pretty thing it would be if she were 
 only to burst out laughing at my lachrymose 
 avowal ! 
 
 Yet the moment was tempting ; the situation 
 became critical. Lilla had her levities and her 
 faults, that was plain enough; only a lover's 
 eye could be blind to them, and I was not a 
 lover. But they could surely be ameliorated, 
 eradicated gently by patience and superior wis- 
 dom mine, par exemple. Who did not once 
 believe himself capable of reforming any one 
 on whom he chose to try his hand ? I am slow 
 to believe in my own or any body else's reform- 
 ing capabilities now; but I suppose I then 
 thought that, if I but condescended to attempt 
 the task, I could remove all the weaknesses and 
 defects from poor Lilla's nature, and replace 
 them by some splendid grafts of earnestness 
 and lofty purpose. 
 
 However this may be, Lilla's friendly admis- 
 sion that she was lonely in my absence had sent 
 a strange, sweet vibration through me. When 
 this conversation occurred we were crossing St. 
 James's Park. Thus far our roads lay togeth- 
 er, and when there was a possibility of such 
 companionship, we always took advantage of 
 it. It was a beautiful evening, and the light of 
 the setting sun threw a poetical glory over even 
 the arid gravel and stunted trees of the park. It 
 was a dangerous time and hour to walk with a 
 pretty woman, and hear her tell you that she 
 had been lonely in your absence. 
 
 I glanced at Lilla. Her eyes were downcast 
 only, I now believe, because the level rays of 
 the evening sun threatened them and there 
 was a faint crimson on her cheeks. She was 
 silent. I felt my soul dissolving in senti- 
 ment. 
 
 " Then you were really glad of my return, 
 Lilla, and you thought of me in my absence ?" 
 
 She looked up quickly, smilingly, perhaps 
 just a little surprised. 
 
 " Thought of you ? Oh yes, always ! How 
 could I help thinking of you ?'' 
 
 What I might have poured out in another 
 second I am glad to say that I can never know. 
 It would undoubtedly have been some idiotcy 
 to be bitterly regretted by myself afterward ; 
 and, as I now know, not likely to have caused 
 icr any particular delight then, even if she had 
 not laughed at it. But she suddenly stopped > 
 in her sentence, and caught me by the arm, and 
 a carriage drove past us from behind. Two 
 ladies were in it, and a gentleman whose iron- 
 gray hair and purpling complexion I knew at a 
 ;lance. I only saw the bonnets of the ladies. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Lilla bowed to her uncle, and I saw her cheek 
 redden. 
 
 < l It's my uncle, " she said ; ' ' and I know I 
 am sure one of the ladies with him is Mdlle. 
 Keichstein. I didn't even get a glimpse of her, 
 did you ?" 
 
 " No ; I only saw bonnets." 
 
 " Oh, I wish I had seen her ! I am sure it's 
 she ; I am so sorry ! And he saw us. I don't 
 care a bit ; in fact, I am delighted, because now 
 it will remind him of you ; and I didn't like to 
 speak too much about you, or too often, be- 
 cause M 
 
 And Lilla really blushed for the second time 
 that day. 
 
 But the blushing was useless now : the spell 
 was broken ; my sublime self-devotion vanished. 
 Lilla's voice, and her evident first sensation of 
 something like doubt or shame at being seen 
 in my companionship, and her raptures about 
 Mdlle. Keichstein, were enough. How full of 
 kindness for me her whole heart was I could not 
 but see ; and I loved her in one way for that and 
 other things ; but the glamour of the moment was 
 gone, and I left her when our ways divided at 
 Pall Mall a free man, still faithful to my one 
 memory and one love. 
 
 Two or three days passed away before an 
 evening and an event came which I can never 
 forget. I had been in town all day, and came 
 home rather tired just after the last rays of a 
 stormy sunset had sunk below the horizon of 
 the low-lying region where we lived. My room, 
 as I entered it, was in dusk ; but I could see as 
 I came in a letter for me standing on the chim- 
 ney-piece. I went over apathetically and took 
 it in my hand ; biit the sight of the inscription 
 sent a fierce shock through me, and my head 
 throbbed with a wild pain, born of surprise and 
 sudden emotion. I knew that writing well. I 
 put the letter down for a moment, just that my 
 heart might beat less wildly, and my nerves be- 
 come steady. Then I opened it and read : 
 
 " EMANUEL, I have seen you again, and you 
 Xlid not know it. I was near you. After so 
 many years, it was strange. I am glad we did 
 not meet to speak. I only write this word to 
 wish you may be happy always. Nothing is 
 left but greeting, and farewell. 
 
 "CHRISTINA." 
 
 I put the letter down and leaned upon the 
 chimney-piece. I was for a while incapable of 
 thinking. I was literally stricken to the heart. 
 We had been close to each other, and I had not 
 seen her ! If the foolery of our modern days 
 could have truth behind it, and a living man. 
 could really, by help of some spiritualistic in- 
 cantation, be reached by the voice and affected 
 by the presence of some loved being from an- 
 other world, he might feel somewhat as I felt 
 then, but without my bitterness. No voice 
 reaching out of the shadow of the world that 
 lies outside nature could have affected me with 
 a more agonizing sense of unavailable nearness 
 and hopeless distance. Near to me close to 
 
 me her very writing lying on my table and 
 no clew or trace by which a word of mine might 
 reach her! If I could but see her once but 
 speak half a dozen words but tell her of my 
 strong love ! Was it not cruel thus to torture 
 me with such a message ? Why not leave me 
 to my lonely struggle ? I was comparatively 
 happy ; I was almost contented ; I had not for- 
 gotten her, but she had become to me as the 
 dead are, and I had no hope. Bitterly did I 
 now recall my first knowledge of her departure, 
 my first sense of her loss, my first agony of un- 
 certainty and torment. Now all woke up again 
 with keener pain, with a deeper sense of tanta- 
 lized and thwarted love. 
 
 Perhaps she too, like myself, is unhappy, is 
 struggling alone, and has sent out these few 
 words for the poor sake of reaching a friendly 
 ear by some means, as parting voyagers call a 
 greeting to distant friends upon the fading 
 shore, although no answer can reach them. 
 Are we both, then, struggling unaided in this 
 vast London ? Has one city held us all these 
 years, and I never knew it? Is she poor, like 
 me, and hopeless? Or is she married and 
 happy, and having seen me at last by chance, 
 did she but look up for a moment and think of 
 the boy whom years ago she loved, and, im- 
 pelled by meaningless impulse, send him a word 
 of greeting and farewell ? Have I lost her ut- 
 terly and forever, or will some other message, 
 more distinct than this, reach me yet, and gui'de 
 me to her? 
 
 This thought for a while lighted up a hope, 
 a sickly, flickering hope, within me. Perhaps, 
 as she lives, is near me, has seen me, has sent 
 me a message, her mere words do not mean 
 what she feels, and I shall hear from her soon 
 again, and we shall meet. I was somewhat 
 weak of late from over-exertion. I think I 
 must have been weak indeed, in mind as well 
 as in body, when such a hope could inspire me 
 for a moment. Well I knew that even when 
 Christina loved me most, she loved success yet 
 more; and what temptation could my future 
 offer to such a spirit ? I looked from the win- 
 dow, and the drear evening gloom made the 
 flat and swampy places around, the mouldering 
 houses, the blighted trees, look grayer and 
 ghostlier than ever. Heavy rain was now be- 
 ginning to fall, and the sky was all cloud and 
 gloom. Nothing on earth could look more 
 dreary to me than the prospect out of doors, 
 except, indeed, the personal prospect which my 
 soul foreshadowed. Sad and heavy, like that 
 mournful scene below brightened by no ray of 
 light, cheered by no pleasant sound all dim, 
 and misty, and gray. If I could find Christina, 
 should I offer her a share of this one room, look- 
 ing out on that swamp, and get her to canvass 
 for pupils, who might learn music from her at 
 sixpence a lesson, among the dirty children 
 and the unfinished streets all round ? I pic- 
 tured her, as I saw so many women in the 
 neighborhood, struggling for mere life, with 
 children crying round her and cramping her 
 
50 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 very efforts to get them bread, that they migh 
 eat of it and live. Why, there is a peculi 
 expression graven on the faces of a certain clas 
 of women in London, which cuts the very hear 
 to look at. And why should I expect any bet 
 ter fortune for a woman doomed to be wif< 
 of mine ? London garrets swarm with men in 
 finitely better and more worthy of success than 
 I, and yet on whom no gleam of fortune eve 
 falls. 
 
 Once, it is true, I had more courage and more 
 hope. But London struggle has something in 
 it demoralizing. No contrast in life can be 
 more chilling and crushing than that of idea 
 London with actual London in such a case ai 
 mine. To ideal London we look in our ardoi 
 as the youth does to the battle, which he pic- 
 tures as all thrilling with the generous glory of 
 strife, the rush of the exhilarating charge, the 
 clangor of the bugle, the roar of the cannon 
 the cheers of the victor, the honor and the 
 wreath, or the noble, soldier - like, dramatic 
 death. Actual London is the slow, cold camp- 
 ing on the wet earth, the swamp, malaria, the 
 ignoble hunger and thirst, the dull lying in the 
 trenches, the mean physical exhaustion, the un- 
 recognized, unrecorded disappearance. What 
 has become of the poor, raw, boyish recruit who 
 sank exhausted in the mud of the night-march, 
 or was trampled to death in the retreat, or came 
 back with a broken constitution from the hos- 
 pital, to drag out a few obscure and miserable 
 years at home ? I seemed to myself to be like 
 the most ignoble and the most unhappy of them. 
 Should I wish Christina to share such fortunes 
 to become entangled in such a career ? 
 
 Or if she were prosperous, could I beg of her 
 prosperity, and be warmed meekly in the sun 
 of her success ? 
 
 This last idea was so hateful to me that I 
 strode passionately up and down the room to 
 banish it, and felt inclined to invoke curses on 
 myself for the meanness which even allowed it 
 to have an instant's possession of my mind. 
 
 Ah, no ! She is lost, lost forever ! Whether 
 she lives in light or in gloom, she is lost alike to 
 me ! I could not brighten the gloom. I will 
 never stoop to be illumined a pitiful, poor, 
 human planet by the light. I take her fare- 
 well literally and farewell ! 
 
 A tap at the door broke in upon my lonely 
 thoughts. The disturbance was grateful to me ; 
 any intruder would have been welcome at such 
 a time. It was not an intruder, however, who 
 sought to be admitted, but Lilla Lyndon. Her 
 looks showed her to be brimful of some intelli- 
 gence. She was dressed as if she had only just 
 come in, and her cheeks and curls were spark- 
 ling with rain-drops. 
 
 " Do you know where I have been ?" she be- 
 gan. "But you need not try to guess, for you 
 never could succeed. I have been to see Ma- 
 demoiselle Keichstein with my uncle." 
 " Indeed ! Do you like her ?" 
 "Yes, immensely. She is delightful, I think, 
 and so good, and very handsome. You don't 
 
 seem at all interested in her. Wait a bit. I 
 have something to tell you which will interest 
 you, cold-hearted philosopher as you are. But 
 stop are you not well ?" 
 
 "Yes, Lilla, quite well." 
 
 "You don't look like it, then. I'll send 
 mamma to talk to you presently. Perhaps I 
 have something to tell you which will help you 
 to get better." 
 
 "I am not ill, indeed, Lilla." 
 
 "Well, let me get on with my news. My 
 uncle came with me ; but after a while he left 
 me with Mademoiselle Reichstein, and I re- 
 mained for more than an hour," and she sang 
 to me delightfully; and she was so kind and 
 good, and seemed to take such an interest in' 
 me, you can't think ; only I put it down in my 
 own mind to the account of the interest she 
 takes in my revered uncle, who, if he's not very 
 young, at least has plenty of money. However, 
 she took such an interest in me that, when we 
 were alone, I came to the point which I had at 
 heart all through and I spoke to her about 
 you. Ah ! now you begin at last to think it 
 worth while listening to what I say." 
 
 Yes, I must own that even while she spoke a 
 strange boding thrill passed through me, and I 
 held my breath in a kind of agony. 
 
 "I can tell you I spoke highly of you, and 
 told her how fond mamma was of you, and I 
 too. I do wonder what you would have thought 
 if you only knew what I allowed her to think in 
 order to persuade her to take an interest in you. " 
 
 " What did you allow her to think ?" 
 
 "I declare you are quite hoarse, Emanuel. 
 You are in for a bad cold." 
 
 "No, no, Lilla ; do pray go on." 
 
 " AVell, I had rather you guessed at my pious 
 fraud. I didn't exactly say the false word, but 
 I am afraid I gave it out somehow. She asked 
 rje a question about you, and about my interest 
 n you, and I allowed her to think oh, there, 
 I am quite ashamed of myself ; and I suppose a 
 girl better brought up than I would not have 
 done such a thing for all the world. But I have . 
 not been brought up well, and I never could 
 stick at trifles to serve a friend and, in fact, 
 VTr. Temple, I think I alloAved Mademoiselle 
 ieichstein to believe that you and I were en- 
 gaged, and only waited to be married until you 
 had made your way a little. There's the whole 
 ruth out ; and all I can say in my own defense 
 s, that if I had not as much esteem for you 
 and confidence in you, Emanuel Temple, as if 
 ou were my own brother, I would never, never, 
 >ad as I am, have been guilty of any thing so 
 mblushing and unwomanly. There now, how 
 Ireadfully miserable you look ! I really don't 
 ee that you need be so utterly humiliated and 
 shamed I dare say Mademoiselle Reichstein 
 id not think any the worse of you, whatever 
 he may have thought of me." 
 
 I was hardly conscious of any meaning in 
 hese latest words of hers. I was not think- 
 ng of humiliation, or of what she had said on 
 my behalf. One thought, one conjecture, was 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 51 
 
 swelling up within me SQ as to flood and drown 
 every other feeling. 
 
 "I feel greatly obliged to you, Lilla, greatly 
 obliged," was all I could say. 
 
 "And you look it too." 
 
 "But Mademoiselle Keichstein?" 
 
 "Well, Mademoiselle Reichstein was most 
 kind and amiable. She sat quite silent and 
 thoughtful for a while, perhaps considering how 
 best she could lend a helping hand. It must be 
 a far more difficult matter than I thought, for 
 she put her hand over her eyes, and remained 
 thinking quite a time. Then she kissed me, and 
 wished me all happiness. I felt like a shame- 
 faced and convicted liar. Yes, sHe wished hap- 
 piness to me to me, the most unhappy, discon- 
 tented, lonely, hopeless creature under the sun ! 
 and then she sat down and wrote a letter to 
 Princeps the great Princeps himself, the man- 
 ager of the Italian Opera and I saw that she 
 tore up two or three copies before she was satis- 
 fied with the writing (I believe half these prima 
 donnas can't spell) ; and then she read it to me. 
 It was all about you, and making it a personal 
 favor to help you very strongly put, I can tell 
 you. I offered to post it as I came along, in 
 order to be quite sure that it went ; for she said 
 Princeps was not in London now, and it would 
 be impossible for you to see him for some weeks ; 
 and she asked me but this I really ought not 
 to tell you." 
 
 "Tell me all, Lilla all, alll" 
 
 " Good gracious, how hoarse you are ! Well, 
 she is so kind and thoughtful that she begged 
 me not to tell you any thing about the whole 
 affair. People don't always like, she said, to 
 think that they are being helped along, and it 
 would be better if you supposed that you were 
 being sought out for you will be sought out 
 for your own merit only. Was not that con- 
 siderate and delicate ? But I know you have 
 no such nonsense about you, and I want you to 
 know how kind she is, and so I have told you, 
 though I promised I wouldn't the second fib 
 to-day on your account, Mr. Emanuel Temple. 
 Oh, that reminds me that I must have let drop 
 your full name somehow, for she seemed quite 
 to know it." 
 
 Oh, God in heaven ! I stood up and clenched 
 my hands. 
 
 " And now I think that's all ; except that she 
 gave me her picture, and I think her so beauti- 
 ful ! Oh, how I do wish she would marry my 
 uncle ! Why, what is the matter with you ?" 
 
 " Show me the picture, Lilla." 
 
 She Sought in her pocket, then in the bosom 
 of her dress. I stood trembling with excite- 
 ment, keen pains again darting through my 
 forehead, the square of light made by the win- 
 dow rising and falling before my eyes. 
 
 " Surely I can't have lost it ? No, here it 
 is. Is she not beautiful ? Such a mass of 
 hair, and all her own too." 
 
 I took the picture from her. It was one of 
 the old-fashioned daguerreotypes, now as com- 
 pletely gone out of the world as Miss La Creevy's 
 
 ] enameled miniatures. When I first seized it 
 and gazed upon it the light so fell as to blot it 
 out completely, and my impatient eyes only 
 looked upon a blank space. Forcing down 
 my emotions, I brought it to the window, held 
 it in the proper light, and then 
 
 " Lilly, my dear ; Lilly, my own," broke in, 
 thank Heaven! the plaintive tones of Mrs. 
 Lyndon. 
 
 " Yes, mamma ; what's up ?" 
 
 "My child, you mustn't stay in your wet 
 things. Come down, dear ; I want you." 
 
 " Oh, what does it matter ! Yes, I am com- 
 ing. Keep the picture for the present, Eman- 
 uel, and fall in love with it if you can. I 
 would, I know, if I were a man. I'll send 
 up for it presently." 
 
 Thank God she was gone ! I could not have 
 endured her presence much longer without be- 
 traying my feelings by a wild explosion. Yes ; 
 it was as I expected the face in the daguerreo- 
 type was tlie face of Christina Braun. Her 
 dream, then, had come true. She had done 
 her part. She was successful. 
 
 Ah, God ! I hardly needed to look at the 
 poor little daguerreotype or to struggle against 
 the growing dusk for a clear sight of that face. 
 By some force of ineffable conviction, the mo- 
 ment Lilla came into the room and spoke of 
 Mdlle. Reichstein, I guessed the truth of which 
 I had never dreamed'before. Often as she had 
 talked to me of Mdlle. Reichstein, the notion 
 had never before occurred to my mind that the 
 successful prima donna could be my lost Chris- 
 tina. But the letter the few lines I had my- 
 self received that night brought her back in 
 my mind as a living reality again, and I knew 
 the whole truth before my eyes or ears had any 
 evidence of it. 
 
 Yes, I am unable to account for it, but I 
 knew it to be the fact that the moment Lilla 
 entered the room and named the name of Mdlle. 
 Reichstein, it came on me with the convincing 
 force of a revelation that she and Christina 
 Braun were one, and that I had lost Christina 
 forever. 
 
 She was successful. Did I not know that 
 she would be some time ? And yet it came on 
 me now with a surprise which was like agony. 
 Like agony ? Nay, it was agony ; for it severed 
 us more, far more, thari death could do. She 
 was lost, lost to me. The one hope which had 
 lighted my lonely life so long had utterly gone out. 
 When, years ago, I used to hold her to my heart 
 and talk to her of her future success, I always 
 spoke of it as conjoined with my own, as the 
 crown of a common happiness. In how many 
 hours of love and hope, in how many happy walks 
 under the summer stars, in how many silent 
 dreams, had we pictured that triumph for her 
 and for me ! We were to make our way to- 
 gether through life, to become successful and 
 famous, and then to come back and amaze the 
 little town, which we magniloquently declared 
 did not know us. Or, if we did not succeed 
 for I at least had my moments of distrust and 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 doubt I always looked forward to our strug- 
 gling and perhaps suffering together, still happy 
 because together. Even our sudden and strange 
 separation I had sometimes regarded as a glo- 
 rious self-sacrifice, to be crowned and rewarded 
 some day. Many a night had I returned sick 
 of heart and weary of foot to my London lodg- 
 ing, and, musing over the hours of happiness, 
 love, and hope I had once enjoyed, been cheer- 
 ed and brightened by the thought that perhaps 
 my struggles here were working in unseen co- 
 operation with hers toward the same end. 
 There was still at least a link of compan- 
 ionship, and a hope that it might draw us to- 
 gether one day. As my eyes were fixed upon 
 the pale, far-off star of my hope, it was some 
 consolation and joy to think that wherever she 
 might be her eyes and her soul were turned to- 
 ward it too. 
 
 And now, behold, one half at least of our most 
 ardent prayer has been fulfilled. She has won 
 all we dreamed of and hoped for. Why do I 
 not rejoice ? I was to have been the first to 
 hail her triumph, and now I greet it with agony 
 and shame ; as if her success were my defeat 
 and humiliation. And*it is so. I feel that no 
 poverty, no failure, no temporary isolation un- 
 der the pressure of misfortune could raise such 
 barriers between her and me as this fatal grant- 
 ing of one half our prayer. Poor people may 
 become less poor, or they may grow familiar 
 with poverty and learn to endure it, or they may 
 conquer its pain by the strength of love and hope. 
 But this revelation of her success has sounded 
 the last of love and hope for me. Why, all these 
 years that I have been picturing her heart as 
 turning eternally toward mine, and panting for 
 reunion, she has been simply making her way 
 in the world ! She has run over some of the 
 most thrilling chords of human experience ; she 
 has won every height to which she aspired ; 
 while I have been removing from one town to 
 another, my greatest triumph to exchange a 
 garret for a small back-parlor. I feel crush- 
 ed down by grief and shame. She must de- 
 spise me. She has actually patronized me! 
 The great singer has granted, at the humble 
 petition of a poor girl, a letter of introduction, 
 to help a struggling and obscure poor devil to 
 an engagement in a chorus. I had imagined 
 many a renewal of our former days, many a first 
 greeting after our long separation, many a meet- 
 ing under all conceivable circumstances of joy 
 and of sorrow ; but I had thought of nothing 
 like this. I had forgotten to picture myself as 
 a broken-down beggar petitioning for help ; and 
 her as a triumphant and splendid prima donna 
 granting me the favor at the solicitude of a 
 wealthy and elderly lover. Why, it seems 
 but last week that she wrote those letters 
 I keep in my trunk, full of such love, and 
 tenderness, and admiration admiration for 
 me ! and now I am her debtor for a letter of 
 introduction, obtained through the importunity 
 of Lilla Lyndon and the influence of her rich 
 uncle, in order that, if I am well conducted, I 
 
 may receive perhaps an engagement in the cho- 
 rus of the Italian Opera ! I wonder she did not 
 send me a small present of money ! But per- 
 haps if I obtain a place as chorus-singer through 
 her influence, and conduct myself properly, and 
 never appear to recognize her, she may "assist 
 me in some other way too. She may, for ex- 
 ample, give Lilla the making of some of her fine 
 stage -dresses, or even the place of her own 
 dressing-room attendant; and if Lilla and I get 
 married, the great prima donna may kindly be- 
 come godmother to one of our children ! Ah, 
 but if the prima donna should marry Lilla's rich 
 uncle, then indeed something better could doubt- 
 less be done for Lilla than to marry her to a 
 wretch like me I In the bitterness of my heart 
 it seemed as if my love for Christina had turned 
 into hate. 
 
 I was only aroused from the depth of bitter 
 thought into which I had plunged by my own 
 voice by the sound of a deep, involuntary, ir- 
 repressible groan, wrung from me by agony of 
 love, disappointment, shame, hate. In the si- 
 lent, darkling room the groan sounded hollow 
 and ghostly, as in a vault of death. It aroused 
 me as a dreamer is sometimes awakened by the 
 sound of his OAvn babble or laughter. 
 
 I started up with the resolve to do something. 
 Yes, there was something I could and would 
 do I would see her face to face. I would go 
 to her, speak to her, ask of her how. she dared 
 to insult me with her patronage. I meant no 
 appeal to the love of the old days, no poor and 
 pitiful plaint, no ghastly effort to recall the dead 
 past from the grave. No ; we are parted for- 
 ever ; and I accept my doom, and make no 
 complaint. Only she shall know that I want 
 no patronage, and will stoop to accept none. 
 Let her spare me that. For the sake even of 
 the old days which she has forgotten, for the 
 sake of the love which I would not now have 
 her renew if I could no, by Heaven ! let her 
 spare me that ! Let me but see her, speak to 
 her, vindicate to her face my pride and my in- 
 dependence ; and perhaps perhaps I then can 
 better bear with life. 
 
 Filled with this thought, I went down stairs 
 and tapped at the door of Mrs. Lyndon's room, 
 endeavoring meanwhile to still the fierce beat- 
 ings of my heart, and to keep . some control 
 over my voice and manner. Lilla's voice called 
 to me to come in. I had hoped to find her mo- 
 ther there, thinking I could get on better in 
 ordinary conversation if there were three of us 
 at it than in mere tete-a-tete with my quick and 
 sharp-eyed Lilla. But I could hear Mfs. Lyn- 
 don at work at some cookery-business below in 
 the kitchen, and Lilla was alone. Must I con- 
 fess the truth ? I almost hated the poor girl 
 for her well-meant, kindly, luckless interference 
 on my behalf. 
 
 When I entered, Lilla was apparently in a 
 condition of great comfort and happiness. She 
 was lying, or rather huddled up, on a little 
 sofa, which was drawn over to the table, on 
 which a lamp threw a soft and pleasant light, 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 53 
 
 and she was reading a novel. Lilla loved nov- 
 el-reading. She had a great shawl gathered 
 cozily around her, covering her from neck to 
 f ee t_indeed, I think her feet must have been 
 coiled up under her, sultana fashion, for great- 
 er comfort ; for the night, though in summer, 
 had turned a little chilly, and Lilla had been 
 out in the rain on my behalf. In fact, the 
 poor girl had probably taken off her wet dress, 
 and had wrapped herself in a shawl as an easy 
 substitute. I know she always liked to get the 
 room to herself when she had a novel to read, 
 for her mother was a dreadfully irritating per- 
 son at such a time, full as she always was of 
 anxious questions and perplexing recommend- 
 ations. So Lilla was evidently very happy, and 
 as she looked up at me with her beaming eyes, 
 and her pretty head peeping above the great 
 enveloping shawl, in which the whole of her fig- 
 ure was lost, she must have been very charm- 
 ing to any eyes but mine. In my bitter, dis- 
 eased, distracted state of mind it irritated me 
 to see her looking so cozy and pretty and hap- 
 py. I felt much as an angry man feels when, 
 striding moodily to his fire, he stumbles over 
 the sleek, contented, purring cat that lies bask- 
 ing on the hearth-rug. 
 
 "Have you brought me my picture?" asked 
 my happy Lilla. 
 
 There was an intense odor of savory frying 
 below, which I grieve to think must have con- 
 duced a good deal to the happiness of this good 
 girl's mind. Her harmless and comfortable lit- 
 tle sensuousness was regaled and propitiated on 
 the odor from below, like the good-will of the 
 old gods on the steam of the fat sacrifice. 
 "Yes, I have brought it." 
 "Isn't it lovely ?" 
 "Very." 
 
 "How chillingly you say that! Men have 
 no taste ; and I am sure it is all nonsense to 
 say that we don't admire pretty women more 
 than you do. I am quite in love with that face 
 and hair ; and you don't seem to care a straw 
 about it." 
 
 "Well, I think, I believe I should like to 
 keep it a little longer, just to study it, Lilla, 
 and understand it a little, if you don't object, 
 and will leave it to me only for to-night." 
 
 Had I been asking Lilla to elope with me, 
 or to steal her uncle's purse for me, I could not 
 have preferred the request in more awkward and 
 stammering accents. My pretty one gathered 
 herself into something like a more upright pos- 
 ture on the sofa, and looked at me with all the 
 inquisitive, penetrating brightness of her eyes. 
 " Oh yes, surely. I am very glad you want 
 . to look at it a little more, for I should be so 
 pleased if you came to admire it as I do. But 
 I don't understand you to-night, somehow 
 you don't seem like yourself." 
 
 "All the better if I seem like somebody else 
 any body else, Lilla." 
 
 "Nonsense! Tell me one thing, and speak 
 truly, and without any evasion or chaff are 
 you at all sick ? Because, if you are, I really 
 
 must set mamma at you ; but if not I mean, 
 f there's any thing wrong that isn't sickness, or 
 catching cold, or that sort of thing mamma 
 would be only a bore and a plague to you, and 
 yon had better be let alone. Tell me frankly, 
 Jo you wish to be let alone ?" 
 
 "Indeed, Lilla, I am perfectly well." 
 ; ' Then you want to be let alone ?" 
 " I see you have been reading. What's the 
 novel ?" 
 
 "Oh, a charming thing so beautiful and 
 poetic; only it is so sad The Improvisators; 
 do you know it ? by Hans Christian Andersen, 
 the Danish novelist. I have just been reading 
 such a touching passage. The .hero was in love 
 with an actress, you know, a beautiful creature, 
 and they got separated somehow through a 
 mistake entirely and he never saw her for 
 years and years after; and when at last he 
 came to see her again (on the stage), for the 
 first time since their separation, she was quite 
 withered and old, and her beauty was all gone. 
 It is such a touching chapter. All her youth 
 was gone, and her good looks, and she was old." 
 "Even beautiful actresses, Lilla, must get 
 old." 
 
 "But why were they separated? It is too 
 sad ; I don't like stories that are so sad." 
 "Yet you read it, and think it charming." 
 "Yes, I can't help being delighted with it. 
 But it is too melancholy. I can't bear to think 
 of their long, long separation, and of her being 
 old and withered when at last they met. I sup- 
 pose such things do happen ?" 
 
 " I suppose they do. I think I have heard of 
 such separations, or read of them, perhaps." 
 
 Again Lilla looked curiously at me, and she 
 put down the book. 
 
 "Speaking of beautiful actresses, Lilla," I 
 said, with a supreme effort to be light arid care- 
 less, ' ' does your beautiful friend, Mademoiselle 
 Reichstein, live far from here; and did you 
 walk home through all the rain ?" 
 
 "Yes. It Avas rather a distance ; but I didn't 
 mind in the least. " 
 
 "Did you tell me where it was? I quite 
 forget." 
 
 "In Jermyn Street, just opposite an hotel 
 I don't know the number a very nice place. 
 Some elderly person lives with her a compan- 
 ion, or friend, or something of the kind." 
 
 Mrs. Lyndon just then came up, and pressed 
 me to stay with them and have supper ; but I 
 told them I had to go into town again. I had 
 forgotten to see somebody with whom I had 
 an appointment, and must try to find him now, 
 late though it was. 
 
 I got out of the house somehow. It was now 
 a streaming wet night, and I tramped long 
 enough before I could find an omnibus going 
 my way. When I got at last to the Haymark- 
 et it was half past ten o'clock, and I was very 
 wet. An appropriate hour, a pleasant condi- 
 tion', in which to present myself as a visitor at 
 the door of a lady's boudoir ! I felt a grim and 
 bitter satisfaction in the thought of my forlorn 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and wretched appearance. I almost wished 
 that I were in rags, that I might be the more 
 savagely in contrast with her condition that I 
 might stand in utter wretchedness before her, 
 and, fierce in my desolate independence, fling 
 back her patronage and her written vows of 
 love. I longed to stand before her and say, 
 "Look at this ruined and hopeless wretch, this 
 ragged beggar ! This was your lover ! There 
 are your written vows of love for him, and thus 
 he flings them back to you, with the offer of 
 your queenly patronage. Pauper though he 
 may be, you shall not dare to befriend him. 
 Let the beggar die. He shall not, at least, be 
 fed with the crumbs that fall from your table !" 
 I found the house without difficulty. A 
 waiter standing at the door of Cox's Hotel told 
 me at once where Mdlle. Reichstein the sing- 
 er lodged. The drawing-room windows were 
 all dark. In my savage mood I felt bitterly 
 disappointed at the prospect of not seeing her 
 after all. I knocked at the door. 
 
 Mdlle. Reichsteiu had gone, the servant told 
 me. 
 
 Gone where ? 
 
 She didn't quite know ; somewhere abroad : 
 to Paris, she thought. She went that evening, 
 by the night-mail. 
 
 Could she inquire, and find out for me? 
 She went into the house, but came back to 
 say she really could not get to know. Mdlle. 
 Reichstein had gone certainly to the Continent, 
 with her maid and the other lady ; to Paris first, 
 probably, but the lady of the house thought she 
 was very likely going somewhere farther away. 
 Would she return here soon ? 
 Oh no, certainly not. Not before next sea- 
 son. 
 
 That was all. I could find out nothing else. 
 I turned away from the door with a sickening 
 sense of disappointment and hopelessness. Ah, 
 only the Power above could tell I surely could 
 not how much of a secret, passionate longing 
 to see her again, for any purpose, on any terms, 
 was mingled with my fierce resolve to confront 
 her, and to fling her back her agonizing proffer 
 of service. 
 
 I turned into the glaring, chattering, hell- 
 lighted Haymarket a stricken, hopeless wretch. 
 Despite the rain that still came down pretty 
 heavily, this Babel of harlotry was all alive and 
 aflame with its beastly gayety. 
 
 I strode my way along with head down and 
 reckless demeanor, careless whom I jostled. 
 Blindly I struck up against somebody, who first 
 drew back and swore at me, and then, seizing 
 me by my arm, exclaimed : 
 
 " My heroic preserver ! would you overturn 
 rudely the friend who longed to meet you ? 
 What ! not know me ? How bears himself ce 
 fjros militaire f" 
 
 Of course I knew him. It was my confound- 
 ed friend of Dover. 
 
 ' " I told you we should meet again," he said. 
 "I don't know that it's quite a fortunate thing 
 for you ; but we are all in the hands of the des- ! 
 
 tinies. You see Heaven would bring us to- 
 gether." 
 
 "The devil rather, I should think," was my 
 grumbled answer. 
 
 " Let it be the devil, dear young friend, if 
 you have faith only in him. It cheers me to 
 find that you believe even in the devil ; youth 
 is so unbelieving nowadays. But you are cynic- 
 al to-night, which means, I dare say, that she 
 is faithless or out of humor. Bear up, and let 
 us be merry. Look here : you are wet, so am 
 I ; you are out of sorts, so am I. Let us spend 
 a jovial hour together, and mingle our tears." ' 
 
 I could have welcomed just then the society 
 of Satan. He not appearing, I suffered my 
 other friend to put his arm in mine and lead me 
 away. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 GOODBOY'S BROTHER. 
 
 I AWOKE next morning with a fierce head- 
 ache, a deep sense of moral debasement, and a 
 still deeper sense of savage satisfaction in my 
 own degradation. I contemplated a sort of 
 moral suicide. It seemed like an act of venge- 
 ance on her who had loved- me and now cast 
 me away, thus to crush and ruin the nature of 
 the being to whom she once turned in love. 
 
 I am not fond of oral confessions or moral 
 self-exposures, and therefore I hasten to say 
 that my abasement this my first abasement 
 would have been in the eyes of any ordinary 
 Haymarket habitu6 a very small affair indeed^. 
 I drank too much that night and for the first 
 time that was all. As the next day wore on, 
 and I grew better accustomed to the quite new 
 sense of shame, I frankly told Lilla Lyndon of 
 my excess of the previous night, and she did 
 not seem to think a great deal about the mat- 
 ter. I was, on the whole, rather disappointed 
 that she took it so composedly. Moral suicide, 
 after all, seemed a commonplace process. 
 
 Yet Lilla looked grave and frowned warning- 
 ly at me when she saw me going out again 
 about the same hour that night. 
 
 "Once and away," she observed, "mayn't 
 be very bad ; 'but take care, Emanuel, or we 
 shall all be sorry." 
 
 I was going into the Haymarket, where I had 
 pledged myself to meet my friend again. A 
 queer sort of fascination drew me toward him ; 
 and some words he had let drop the previous 
 night words I now remembered but faintly 
 had keenly quickened my interest in him. 
 When we parted I promised to meet him in the 
 colonnade of the opera-house at nine o'clock; 
 and at nine I was there. Very soon after he 
 made his appearance, and I noted at once that 
 the appearance he made was considerably 
 changed. He was all new, from hat to boots, 
 and his gloves were of dainty lavender. 
 
 "Surprised at the change, my dear young 
 friend?" he observed, complacently. "Don't 
 be ashamed to confess that you have been look- 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 'I TOLA* YOU WE tJUOCJLI) MJiET 
 
56 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 ing at me with eyes of wonder and admiration 
 I am not susceptible of offense ; and the horr 
 age of the ingenuous can never displease tl: 
 serene soul. I was very shabby-looking yeste 
 day, and now I am not so. I do not blush t 
 confess that the change is not wholly owing 1 
 my own merit or industry. " 
 
 " You told me you were a great hand at bil 
 iards, and indeed I saw some evidence of yoi 
 skill last night." 
 
 " So you did. I think I rather astonishe 
 you and the others too. But it isn't that. Yo 
 see me in the sunshine of a prosperity the sourc 
 of which you could never guess. Indeed, 
 upsets the creed of half a lifetime with me. 
 should never have believed it, were I not a liv 
 ing proof of the fact. Listen, youth ; and, i 
 prematurely given over, as you doubtless are 
 to cynicism, learn now a new and refreshin 
 lesson of life. I am a living evidence of a wo 
 man's gratitude." 
 4 'Glad to hear it." 
 "But you don't seem sufficiently startled 
 Did you ever find a woman true and grateful ? 
 "No, by God!" 
 
 "Aha, there you are with your bears! 
 thought as much. There was good earnest in 
 that vow. Will you come with me to my lodg 
 ings ? Yes, I have lodgings-near at hand ; that's 
 part of the mystery. Come Avith me. I long 
 to be a host once more, especially to one who, 
 like myself, so evidently belongs to the brother- 
 hood of poor devils." 
 
 We walked along Jermyn Street. When we 
 passed the house where she so lately lived my 
 eyes turned unconsciously toward it and fixed 
 themselves on it. He, too, was looking that 
 way; it was on the other side of the street. 
 He noticed my gaze. 
 
 " How odd !" he observed ; " you are looking 
 at No. 15 I am looking at No. 15. It can't 
 have the same story for you and for me. Did 
 you catch a sight of some pretty Mary-Jane in 
 smart cap and ribbons ? Frivolous youth I" 
 
 Frivolous youth made no answer, and indeed 
 remained silent until we had reached Bury 
 Street, and gone some way down it. 
 
 My companion stopped at a door, took out a 
 latch-key, opened the* door with it, and waved 
 to me with an air of gracious lordliness to enter. 
 "My lodgings!" he exclaimed; "second- 
 floor front." 
 
 The second-floor front was a small, hand- 
 somely-furnished sitting-room, with bedroom 
 en suite. My friend lighted a lamp, and mo- 
 tioned me to an arm-chair. 
 
 " I took these rooms at once to-day," he said, 
 "on receiving the unexpected mark of grati- 
 tude of which I spoke to you. They are plain 
 but commodious. The engravings on the wall 
 are not remarkable as works of art. Let me 
 see : ' The Happy Days of Charles the First' 
 simple inanity. Her gracious Majesty on horse- 
 back in military habit. Well, well* let us be 
 always loyal, however the court-painter may try 
 us. ' Phoebe' a young woman simpering over 
 
 a fowl of some sort dove, I presume and ap- 
 parently wearing only her chemise, which she 
 has omitted to fasten round the neck : idiotcy . 
 No matter. There's a piano, you see, which is* 
 something. Do you love music ?" 
 
 "Love it, no! No more, that is. Live by it." 
 ' ' Live by it, and not love it ! No, you can't ! 
 Not even in this cursed day of quacks and shams 
 and successful Jack Puddings can any man live 
 by music who does not love it. I only wish the 
 converse of the proposition held equally, and 
 that every one who loved it could live by it. 
 Were that so, some people might have been 
 more virtuous and independent, perhaps, than 
 they are. Now, my young friend, whose name 
 I have not even yet the honor of knowing, but 
 shall presently, perhaps, ask to be favored with 
 there is brandy, there is water, and yonder 
 are cigars. I am going to sing a little, but 
 smoke if you will; it can't put my pipe out." 
 
 He sat down to the piano, his queer little legs 
 hardly touching the ground, and his long arms 
 spreading over the instrument like the wings cf 
 some ungainly bird. One could hardly expect 
 much sweet music from so ridiculous-looking 
 a form, surmounted by a curly black wig but 
 e played with no common skill and with quite 
 uncommon feeling and fervor. Presently he 
 sang, in full, sweet, and solemn tones, the hymn, 
 " Lord, remember David." Strangely pathetic, 
 deep, and passionate sounded that mournful ap- 
 peal as it issued from the lips of this singular 
 and scoffing little creature. I own that it touch- 
 ed me as much as it puzzled me, so profound 
 eemed the sincerity with which the prayer and 
 he plaint went up in that tender, thrilling voice. 
 " Lord, remember David ; teach him to know 
 [*hy ways ! " Every word seemed to come from 
 him with a pathetic, passionate earnestness, so 
 leep that one could almost for the time imagine 
 le heard the half-despairing utterance of some 
 onerous and noble nature crying-out for strength 
 o battle against temptation, and for light to see 
 n the world's foul darkness. I dreaded the 
 lose of the hymn, so much did I shrink from 
 he contrast of levity or profanity with which I 
 elt sure he would instantly follow it. But I 
 yas mistaken. He sat silent a moment or two 
 vhen he had finished, and then jumped up from 
 le piano and walked up and down the room. 
 Vfter a while I could hear him repeating to 
 imself some of the words of the prayer in a low 
 one, as if it refreshed him to dwell on them. 
 
 "Now then," he said at last, "you who live 
 n music, but, I think you said, don't care a 
 urse about it, give us a musical blasphemy I 
 nean, of course, a song from unenthusiastic lips, 
 ome along ; make no apologies or pretexts, 
 dare say I have heard a hundred better singers 
 efore now, so you need not stand on ceremony." 
 I sang something for him, accompanying my- 
 lf. He stood behind me the while, and now 
 nd then uttered a sort of growl of satisfaction 
 r grunt of discontent. 
 
 Ah, I thought so," he observed when I had 
 one ; "yes, I felt sure I could not be mistaken. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 It was you, then, I heard at the Dover concert, 
 Mr. Emanuel Temple! Well, Temple, I've 
 heard a good many worse singers than you, and 
 a few better. I think you ought to get on, 
 though I do fancy somehow that you want soul. 
 But I should say, with training and cultivation, 
 and the advice of qualified critics like myself, 
 for example you ought to make your way, 
 Temple. I advise you to stick to it, Temple. 
 I decline to offer you the blessing of an old 
 man, Temple ; first, because I don't admit be- 
 ing old ; and next, because I fear my bless- 
 ing would be like that of the priest in the 
 story, and worth considerably less than a far- 
 thing. But I have prophesied of singers before 
 now, and prophesied correctly. I was hinting 
 to you just now of that rare and strange thing, 
 a woman's gratitude, and the romantic story is 
 a story of a singer. " 
 
 The glance I had seen him give at the win- 
 dows which were lately Christina's, and the 
 words he let fall immediately after, had aroused 
 my curiosity. But I thought I had observed 
 enough of his perverse and eccentric little na- 
 ture to know that the more readily I displayed 
 my curiosity the less inclined would he be to 
 gratify it ; so I affected an air of supreme cyni- 
 cism, and coolly said : 
 
 " Then you expect me to believe in woman's 
 gratitude ? Thank you ; but I really can't oblige 
 you so far, and I have no faith in romantic sto- 
 ries." 
 
 " Nothing amuses me," he replied, " so much 
 as the pert affectation of cynicism in brats of 
 boys. You know very well, Temple, that if you 
 left your real nature to itself, it would be rather 
 credulous and soft than otherwise. Do you 
 know now that you struck me from the first as a 
 good-natured and simple sort of fellow an hon- 
 est young spooney, in fact ; a lad that any smart 
 girl might turn round her finger a being 
 doomed by nature to be married to a woman 
 who will assume the wearing of the breeches as 
 her natural right ? That is quite my idea of 
 you, Temple ; give you my word, as a candid 
 friend and admirer." 
 
 ''Well, but without occupying ourselves in 
 the discussion of my moral organization, what 
 of your romantic story, and your grateful wo- 
 man ?" 
 
 " You want to hear it, evidently." 
 
 "Not very particularly ; but if you insist " 
 
 " Well, here it is. When I came to London 
 the other day, and while yet casting aoout for 
 the best way to torment my nearest relatives 
 and raise some money, I devoted myself tofld- 
 ner a little on the side of Regent Street, think- 
 ing of the old days, Temple, when I too was a 
 club lounger, and a man about town, and so on. 
 I happened to glance into a photographer's, 
 and there I saw a photograph of a singer, the 
 singer of the season, the woman the two opera- 
 houses have been squabbling about, you know." 
 
 "Yes. Reichstein." 
 
 "Reichstein, of course. In a moment I 
 recognized her as an old friend, Temple." 
 
 "Of yours? She Mdlle. Reichstein an 
 old friend of yours!" 
 
 "Why not? What are you glowering at? 
 She's not an old friend of yours, I suppose; 
 and even if she is, you needn't look daggers at 
 me. Did I say an old friend of mine ? Why, 
 man, I discovered her, I invented her, I created 
 her! I crossed the Channel with her years 
 ago when she was a poor little thing going to 
 Paris, and hoping to get on to Italy, and I took 
 quite a paternal liking to her ; quite paternal, 
 Temple, I can assure you, and for the good 
 reason that she wouldn't allow of any other sort 
 of liking ; and I introduced her in Paris to an 
 Italian fellow whom I knew, a fellow who was 
 mad on two things Music and Italian Revolu- 
 tion ; and he quite took her up, and I only saw 
 her once after in Milan, where he was having 
 her drilled for the Scala. That, too, is four or 
 five years ago ; and to tell you the honest truth, 
 Temple, I never thought of the little thing from 
 that day to the day when I saw her portrait 
 here in this den of thieves." 
 
 "Did you go to see her?" 
 
 "Well, I did call; but she didn't happen to 
 be in, and I was not very sorry perhaps, for, as 
 you can testify, my gifted vocalist, I was not 
 quite in splendid trim about that time. But I 
 left a letter with a mild reminder of my early 
 services and a warm congratulation upon her 
 brilliant success, to which it was .gracefully 
 hinted that my artistic insight had not a little 
 contributed. Then there came an oblique, 
 pathetic intimation that Fortune had not per- 
 haps been quite so favorable to myself; and in 
 short I am afraid it was conveyed more or less 
 vaguely that gratitude and sympathy might not 
 unreasonably take the form of an early and lib- 
 eral remittance." 
 
 I had hard work to keep down my rising 
 disgust and contempt. 
 
 "And the remittance came?" I said, to say 
 something, as I saw he was looking toward me, 
 with his head on one side and his little beady 
 black eyes twinkling inquiringly. 
 
 " Yes, the remittance came, and it was lib- 
 eral ; so liberal in fact that I have put off for 
 the present opening the campaign I am pre- 
 pared to undertake. So you perceive, Temple, 
 that there are women who can be grateful ; per- 
 haps I should rather say that there are men so 
 happily endowed as to be capable of exciting 
 the sentiment of gratitude in woman's breast. 
 Between ourselves, the service I rendered was 
 not very great, for I had actually at the time 
 a sort of general and roving commission from 
 my friend the Italian revolutionary to look out 
 for fine fresh voices wherever they could be 
 picked up he had a mania for establishing an 
 artistic pare aux cerfs of young voices only 
 artistic and vocal, Temple, nothing more; he 
 was a very Bayard or Scipio in that way ; and 
 I simply sent the girl to him, and thought no 
 more about the matter. What of that? It 
 only makes the gratitude more touching. It 
 is a noble and a holy thing, you know, to call 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 up such a feeling; that sentiment in the wo- 
 man's breast is cheaply bought by her at the 
 money." 
 
 "In fact, you place her under a fresh obliga- 
 tion?" 
 
 "Well, as you put it so, yes." 
 
 "And found perhaps a claim hereafter for 
 another remittance ?" 
 
 " That is your sneer, I dare say. No, my 
 scornful young friend, I think I shall be con- 
 tent with that much from that quarter. Let 
 me tell you, however, to show how little I value 
 your feeble-minded insinuation, that I am one 
 of those who are rather proud to be relieved by 
 the soft and generous hand of woman. I think 
 history records that John duke of Marlborough, 
 and other great men, acknowledged a similar 
 sentiment, or at least acted on it. Nature is 
 all symbolic, Temple ; whence do we derive 
 our earliest sustenance? From woman's gen- 
 erous bosom. Go to, then; the meaning of 
 Nature's beautiful parable must be evident to 
 all true and poetic hearts. Mine is essentially 
 a poetic nature ; yours I perceive is not ; you 
 look at the bare rude fact of my pocketing the 
 young woman's money, and do not see the de- 
 lightful illustration of Nature's noblest and old- 
 est purpose which it symbolizes. What's the 
 matter with you ?" 
 
 " I have not been quite well lately ; but " 
 
 "Drink brandy, Temple; drink again." 
 
 "Do you know whether whether this lady, 
 Mdlle. Keichstein, is married ?" 
 
 "Not I. How should I know ; and what do 
 I care ? Very likely she is ; they all get mar- 
 ried, these people. The flag of matrimony is 
 a very convenient emblem." 
 
 I got up to go away ; his talk was hateful to 
 me ; and yet I clung to any feeble hope that I 
 might extract some knowledge about her past 
 life and her probable future. 
 
 "Do you know where she is gone?" 
 
 "Kussia, I believe; but I am not certain. 
 Somebody told me that some rich Londoner, a 
 member of parliament and patron of the drama 
 I don't know him, but, as Charles Lamb 
 said, ' d him at a venture' was always to be 
 seen hanging after her, and making rather an 
 idiot of himself. " 
 
 "Yes, I have heard of that," I interposed, 
 very incautiously; "and I know who it is a 
 Mr. Lyndon." 
 
 "What did you say?" exclaimed the little 
 creature, leaping from the chair in which he 
 sat, and standing upright before me. "What 
 name did you give ?" 
 
 "Lyndon a Mr. Lyndon, a member of the 
 House !" 
 
 " Earth and hell ! Tommy Goodboy ! Tom- 
 my Goodboy himself! Of all the hypocrites of 
 this most hypocritical age, Tommy Goodboy is 
 the greatest hypocrite. Among all the scoun- 
 drels in an age of scoundrelism, no scoundrel 
 like Tommy Goodboy. Look at me, Temple ! 
 I am Goodboy's victim : Goodb'oy stands in my 
 shoes ; Goodboy wallows in my money ! He is 
 
 the head of the family, the respectable citizen, 
 the model man, the patron of every charity, the 
 Maecenas of art ; and I am the ruffian, the out- 
 cast, the billiard-room hanger-on, the frightful 
 example ! " 
 
 An idea at last began to dawn upon me as to 
 the identity of my queer friend. Were these, 
 then, the two faces I had seen vaguely and tan- 
 talizingly shadowed in his? Lilla's face, and 
 Mr. Lyndon's ? Is this creature, this half-crazed 
 sensualist, this selfish loafer, -this wretch living 
 on alms and extorted money, this ^combination 
 of Hircius and Spungius, my poor, pretty, kind- 
 ly Lilla's father ? 
 
 He was now walking up and down the room, 
 throwing his arms wildly about like a little mad- 
 man. I went up to him as gently and kindly as 
 I could. 
 
 "You, then," I said, "are the elder brother 
 of Mr. Lyndon ?" 
 
 "Who the devil else do you think I am? 
 Do you suppose I am proud of being that cold- 
 hearted, sneaking humbug's brother? Yes^I 
 am his brother the brother whom he cheated 
 out of house .and home, out of his father's fa- 
 vor, out of his inheritance, out of every thing 
 that could make life worth having. Was I an 
 idle, good-for-nothing scape-grace ? Of course 
 I was. But what was he ? All that I did open- 
 ly and recklessly, he did cunningly and under- 
 hand. How did he ruin me at last ? By be- 
 traying to my father the one good thing I ever 
 did in. all my life. It's as true as light, Tem- 
 ple. My father cut me off without a rap be- 
 cause I had been d d fool enough to marry a 
 pretty girl instead of seducing her. Whatever 
 misfortune may happen to you in life, Temple, 
 never do a virtuous action. Be warned in time 
 by me. When I die, or hang myself, if there can 
 by any means be raised money enough to set up 
 a tombstone over me, let my epitaph describe me 
 as the man whom Eespectability and Virtue out- 
 lawed and robbed, because he had once in his life 
 only just once failed to behave like a scoun- 
 drel." 
 
 I was on the point of blurting out some hasty 
 words which would have admitted my knowl- 
 edge of Lyndon's wife and daughter. Fortu- 
 nately, however, I restrained myself in time, 
 and recollected how more than doubtful it was 
 whether they would be the better for any in- 
 discretion which put such a creature on their 
 track. Poor, poor Lilla ! with her good heart, 
 her sweet kindly nature, her harmless vanities, 
 and at least not unnatural hopes and aspirings, 
 to think that this unfortunate and worthless 
 wretch, whose chief or sole excuse seemed to 
 be his half-crazed eccentricity, should be her 
 father! I always fancied that the poor girl 
 cherished in her secret heart some fond ro- 
 mantic hope that the lost mysterious father 
 might one day reappear, redeemed, penitent, 
 and splendid, to claim his daughter and lead 
 her into the sphere which she thought her 
 rightful place. I know that she always re- 
 garded her father as some brilliant aristocrat 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 who had stepped down from his high rank for 
 love of her poor mother some Egmont or 
 Leicester to whom Mrs. Lyndon was the Clara 
 or Amy Robsart ; and he filled her imagination 
 even in his fall rather as an archangel ruined 
 than as any commonplace sinner. I know 
 she often hinted as much to me that she se- 
 cretly yearned for him, and waited for him to 
 come some day and redeem her from poverty 
 and meanness, and the society of petty cares 
 and small intelligences ; and to bring her to a 
 sphere where there should be bright surround- 
 ings, and ease and luxury, and a life with many 
 tints in it, and vivid conversation, and books 
 worth reading, and men who could pay grace- 
 ful homage and whom one could marry, and 
 women well-dressed and vivacious and lovely. 
 Often I had thought to myself, in my odd 
 moods of whimsical melancholy, that Lilla's 
 phantom father and my phantom Christina 
 beguiled and befooled us both alike, and to 
 as little purpose ; and I wondered whether, if 
 Lilla could know my story and my dreams as 
 well as I knew and guessed hers, she would not 
 look on me with the same kind of wondering 
 pity wherewith I regarded her. And now, 
 behold, another bond of companionship and 
 union ! Lilla had found for me my lost love : 
 lo, I have found her lost father ! See, Lilla, 
 there he is that broken-down, ridiculous rep- 
 robate yonder, that billiard -room loafer, that 
 ruined, rattlepate wretch in the black wig, who 
 is stamping up and down the room, blasphem- 
 ing as he goes ! 
 "Mr. Lyndon!" 
 
 " My dear young friend, a thousand pardons ! 
 You recall me to myself, and remind me that I 
 am not playing the host to perfection. I am, 
 I fear, a little egotistic sometimes ; but what 
 would you have of a man who has had to con- 
 tend against the world and his wife his own 
 wife, Temple; not the world's, mind for so 
 many years? Adversity, Temple, is the pa- 
 rent of egotism. Pardon my distraction." 
 
 " I was not thinking of that ; I was going to 
 ask a question." 
 
 "Propound. I reserve to myself the right 
 of not answering, should the answer tend to 
 criminate me. In a'moral point of view, Tem- 
 ple, it would not be easy for me to give any an- 
 swer relating to my own personal history which 
 would not tend a little that way. But go on, 
 youth of the gloomy brow." 
 
 " Only this. What about your wife ? You 
 said you were married." 
 
 "Did I admit so much? My old weakness 
 too much confidence and candor. No mat- 
 ter. You ask me what about my wife ? Give 
 you my word, Temple, I don't know ; I don't, 
 really. I have been away so long, knocking 
 about the plains of windy Troy, that I posi- 
 tively don't know where to find my Penelope 
 now that I have come back." 
 "Should you like to?" 
 "Oh dear no not in the least. I couldn't 
 think of it ; she's doubtless very happy, and I 
 
 should grieve to disturb her : or perhaps she is 
 not very happy, and then the sight of her would 
 disturb me. No, Temple, a man of refined taste 
 shrinks from unidealizing if you will allow me 
 ,o use such a word from unidealizing the po- 
 etic perfectness of married life by too much of 
 mlgar intercourse with its prosy details. " 
 
 " Still, as she is your wife " 
 
 "Just so ; there it is, you see. If she were 
 not, then it would be quite a different thing : 
 jut she is my wife, and I know it to my cost. I 
 3aid a heavy debt for the sweet privilege of call- 
 ng her so, and I am not ardent for any more 
 of her mild society. You look horrified, I per- 
 ceive. Erankly, I don't care." 
 
 " She may be poor and lonely " 
 
 " My good fellow, am not / poor and lonely ? 
 Could any one be poorer than I was the other 
 day, and shall be soon again, no doubt? Am 
 I not lonely, or worse than lonely, in having no 
 companionship but that of a silly and moping 
 young moralist like you ? Do you think adding 
 two poor people together produces wealth? 
 Put together cipher and cipher, and see how 
 much better off you are for the result. Be- 
 sides, have I not told you I know nothing, ab- 
 olutely nothing, of her whereabouts ?" 
 
 " But suppose " 
 
 "I don't want to suppose : I decline to sup- 
 pose. I tell you, Temple, I can't live on pap ; 
 some men can, I believe ; I can't. Eood for 
 babes does not nourish me. I lived on it long 
 enough, and you see the result. If there is any 
 thing in life I utterly detest, it is puling, meek, 
 mawkish goodness. I rage at it ; it sets me 
 mad. I long to tear and tatter it." 
 
 "But your child your daughter?" 
 
 ' ' Did I tell you I had a daughter ? Really, 
 you find me in a strangely-confiding mood to- 
 night. Well, I have a daughter; at least, I 
 know I had, and I believe I still have. What 
 then ?" 
 
 " Only one might have thought " 
 
 " Yes, one might, no doubt. One might have 
 thought that the father's heart would melt ; that 
 he would burst into sobs, and exclaim, in bro- 
 ken accents, 'My angel chee-ild!' that he 
 would weep on the neck of the good person who 
 had appealed to his paternal feelings, and be- 
 come a respectable member of society. In the 
 domestic melodrama, Temple, from which I 
 perceive already your principal ideas of life are 
 drawn whmt's the price of the gallery-seats in 
 the Victoria? that sort of thing does, I believe, 
 familiarly occur. But this, Temple, is real life ; 
 and we are not on the stage of the Victoria. I 
 make no doubt my daughter's a very well- 
 brought-up and proper young woman, who 
 would look with horror on such a reprobate as 
 I am ; and I can not say that the voice of Na- 
 ture shrieks very powerfully or plaintively in 
 my ears. No, Temple, it won't do." 
 
 "Then have you really no care for any 
 thing?" 
 
 " Yes !" he answered, in vehement and fierce 
 tones I had long been expecting an outburst 
 
60 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 of passion " for money and for freedom ! Fo 
 money to spend, and for freedom to spend it in 
 Give me these and I will have them, whereve 
 I get them and I can enjoy every thing *ha 
 life gives for enjoyment, from moonbeams am 
 music up to absinthe and madness. But I wil 
 have money, and I will be free ! I will, I will 
 I don't care who or what comes between m 
 and my way of life ; I sweep it out of my roa< 
 and go on. Don't talk to me of nature am 
 domestic affections, and drivel of that kind ; 
 don't want them I've had enough of them t< 
 last my time. Hate is much more in my line 
 than love. I came to London for the double 
 purpose of screwing money out of my thrice 
 accursed brother, and disgracing myself am 
 him at the same time ; and I will do it too ! '. 
 would have done it before now but that tha 
 fool of a woman sent me this money, which ] 
 mean to enjoy before I go to work. Pleasure 
 first, business afterward with me. Go to the 
 devil with your talk about my wife and m} 
 chee-ild ! What is it to you ? Are vou seni 
 as an emissary here from Tommy Goodboy? 
 If you are, go back to him and tell him wha 
 my answer is : tell him I'll make his respecta- 
 bility blush yet, if I can not make his heart of 
 pumice-stone feel." 
 . "I never spoke a word to Mr. Lyndon in mv 
 life." 
 
 "Then perhaps you are an emissary from 
 my wife. If you are, go back and tell her the 
 best thing she can do is to leave me to myself.' 
 "Listen to me, Mr. Lyndon, and don't waste 
 on me all these rhapsodies and ravings. Keep 
 them for somebody on whom they might pro- 
 duce some desirable effect. I assure you they 
 move me only to sincere pity and contempt, 
 never knew until twenty minutes ago who you 
 were, and I never cared. I spoke to you on no 
 one's behalf, at no one's suggestion. I spoke 
 to you only because I thought it hardly possible 
 you could be wholly degraded below the feel- 
 ings of average manhood. I find I was mis- 
 taken. That is enough. I leave you, and only 
 hope we may not meet any more. " 
 
 He threw himself into a chair, leaned back, 
 and burst into a peal of mellow laughter. If I 
 know any thing of reality as distinguished from 
 acting and I ought this was no affectation or 
 sham, but genuine, honest, hearty, irrepressible 
 laughter. He rolled about in his chair, and 
 stamped his feet, and shook his shoulders like a 
 pigmy Sam Johnson in a fit of unconquerable 
 mirth. 
 
 I stood up, angry, and ashamed of being an- 
 gry thinking what a great deal I would give, 
 if I had it, to feel myself at liberty to kick him ; 
 and all the time considering whether I could in 
 any possible way serve poor Lilla's interests by 
 keeping on good terms with him. 
 
 " I protest, Temple," he said at last, when he 
 was able to speak from very laughing, "you do 
 delight me. As good as a play ? Man, you're 
 worth a whole season of broad comedy ! To 
 look at the expression of your face that time, to 
 
 watch your gesture, to hear the earnest elo- 
 quence of your language, was the finest treat 
 any man with a rich sense of humor could pos- 
 sibly have. You are the most delightful of 
 young men " 
 
 "And you are the most scandalous of old 
 reprobates." 
 
 "Coarse, Temple, coarse, and not half so 
 fervent as your graver style. But I see you 
 are waxing wroth at being laughed at. Well, 
 I dare say no one likes being laughed at, and 
 of course the more ridiculous he is the less he 
 likes being treated as such, and I really don't 
 want to offend you ; so let us consider the sub- 
 ject as dropped. Take a little more brandy? 
 No? What, you are not going? Positively 
 offended ! Well, of all the idiots it has ever 
 been my fortune to meet you are the most con- 
 spicuous. Get out! Go to all the devils! 
 Confound you, I am a gentleman, and not a 
 Christy's Minstrel like you ! Insult a gentle- 
 man ! By Jove ! what's the world coming to ?" 
 
 All these concluding sentences were rattled 
 at my ears as I was descending the stairs. Un- 
 til I had fairly quitted the house I could hear 
 him swearing and objurgating. Then, as I 
 passed under the window, I found that he was 
 having recourse to the piano to cool his wrath. 
 I paused a moment out of curiosity. He was 
 singing, to his own accompaniment, "I know 
 that my Redeemer liveth." 
 
 I hurried away. The words, the sweet, pa- 
 thetic, devotional tones, sounded in my ears 
 like hideous blasphemy. 
 
 I walked slowly home, my mind occupied 
 with the uncomfortable discovery I had made, 
 and much perplexed to know whether there 
 was any thing I could or ought to say or do 
 with regard to it. It clearly seemed that I had 
 no right to inflict useless torture on Mrs. Lyn- 
 don or Lilla by telling them any thing about my 
 knowledge of this wretched man. From what 
 le had over and over again told me it was cer- 
 ;ain that he had come to London for the pur- 
 )ose of shaming his brother into supplying him 
 vith new funds, and it was evident that there 
 was no extravagant escapade or exposure of 
 vhich the little wretch would not be capable. 
 On the whole, then, it se*emed to me that the 
 jest thing I could do would be to see Mr. Lyn- 
 don at once, and put him on his guard. Mr. 
 .yndon too might, like a sensible man of the 
 vorld, feel inclined to buy off his disreputable 
 >rother even for Lilla's sake to settle on him 
 ome pension on condition of his living out of 
 England or out of Europe ; and, disagreeable 
 ;s the task would be, I would willingly under- 
 ake the work of negotiation and arrangement 
 n order to ward off vexation and shame from 
 hese two poor women, who had been so kind 
 o me. Yes, that was the best thing to do, and 
 here was no time to be lost, as Mr. Lyndon 
 /ould be leaving town immediately. My mind 
 ras made up. Little as I cared to obtrude my- 
 elf on Lilla's uncle, I determined to see him, 
 n this cause, next day. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Gl 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 AN ODD INTERVIEW' AND AN UNEXPECTED 
 
 MEETING. 
 
 ARE there any poor people who never felt an 
 impress of something like awe and timidity at 
 their first direct contact with wealth ? I have 
 heard and read of noble, independent beings, 
 serene in the unsurpassed and conscious digni- 
 ty of mere manhood, who, in whatever poverty, 
 never felt the faintest flutter of envy, awe, or 
 humiliation when they stood for the first time 
 in the presence of a great man's flunkeys, and 
 asked to see the great man himself. Are there 
 such persons ? I don't say I disbelieve in their 
 existence, but I should like to hear, on the au- 
 thority of some one more skilled than I to pen- 
 etrate the secrets of human consciousness, that 
 there really are beings, of that kind before I 
 quite believe in them. My own impression is, 
 that civilized man or woman of humble class 
 hardly ever yet knocked for the first time at the 
 door "of a great West End mansion without a 
 beating of the heart, a mingling of awe and 
 humiliation. It is very mean and shabby and 
 unworthy, and sa are most of our instinctive 
 impulses, which at last we school down, or are 
 schooled and mastered by. Deep, deep down 
 in our civilized nature is rooted the abject hom- 
 age to wealth. I almost think it begins with 
 the wearing of clothes. I doubt whether the 
 very next stage of civilization after nakedness 
 does not witness the internal growth of that 
 servile sentiment. I think we keep singing 
 our "A man's a man for a' that," and our 
 " Vilain et tres-vilain," in order to drown the 
 feeling or exorcise it, as they play martial airs 
 to keep up the manhood of the raw recruit. Of 
 course we get over it sometimes ; at least, thank 
 Heaven, we do not all succumb to it wholly. I 
 am not much of a sneak myself, and I never 
 yet sought the patronage of a man of rank, or 
 put myself in his way to get his nod, or bragged 
 to my acquaintance that I had met him and I 
 
 . know that I am no whit more independent than 
 many of my neighbors but I have felt the poor 
 
 man's sentiment of awe for wealth; I have 
 done to wealth the involuntary homage of be- 
 ing afraid, and hearing my heart beat, as I 
 stood in its august, unfamilfar presence. Many 
 of my friends are people connected somehow 
 with the world of art, and who- have made their 
 way up from nothing. Some of them have fine 
 West End houses now of their own, and car- 
 riages, and awful footmen in livery ; but I think 
 if I were talking confidentially with each of 
 them in turn over^ cigar and a glass of brandy- 
 and-water, he would frankly admit that one of 
 the most trying moments of his life one of the 
 moments when he found it hardest to keep up 
 his dignity of independent and equal manhood 
 was just the first time when, having knocked at 
 some great man's door, he waited for the open- 
 ing of it and the presence of the flunkey. 
 
 Now I stood this Sunday morning at the door 
 of Mr. Lyndon, M.P., and I realized these sen- 
 
 sations. I had come to ask no favor to seek 
 no patronage to bespeak no recognition to 
 pave the way for no acquaintanceship. If any 
 thing, I was coming out of my regular beat of 
 life rather to confer a favor than to solicit one ; 
 and yet I did feel that ignoble, nervous tremor 
 which the unaccustomed presence of wealth in- 
 spires in the poor man, and which is the base 
 image, the false coin, the bastard brother of the 
 soul's involuntary homage to beauty and great- 
 ness. I knocked at the door, and, as I waited 
 for its opening, I felt so nervous that I grew 
 positively ashamed of myself, and took my cour- 
 age in two hands, as the French phrase goes, 
 and remembered about a man being a man for 
 a' that. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon, M.P., lived in a fine house in 
 Connaught Place, looking straight into Hyde 
 Park. One had to go up high steps to get to 
 the door, which lent additional majesty and 
 dread to the business. It was, as I have said, 
 a Sunday ; and as I came hither I had passed 
 crowds of people streaming out of the doors 
 of fashionable churches, and seen splendidly 
 dressed women, all velvets and satins and feath- 
 ers, assisted into their carriages by footmen who 
 carried gilded prayer-books ; and I wondered 
 whether Mr. Lyndon had been to church, and 
 if so, whether he would have come back from 
 his worship by the time I readied his house, 
 and whether it was a dreadful heathenish sort 
 of thing, a kind of outrage upon Church and 
 State, to ask to see such a man at all on Sun- 
 day. To go to church, too, seemed, in pres- 
 ence of the splendid crowds, so necessary and 
 becoming a part of respectability, that I felt 
 like a social outlaw because I had not been 
 there, and was not much in the habit of going 
 there. My sensations were not the pangs of 
 an awakened conscience, but the kind of feeling 
 which goes through a man who, unshaved and 
 with muddy boots, unconsciously intrudes into 
 the midst of a well-dressed and elegant com- 
 pany. 
 
 When I found out Mr. Lyndon's house I 
 wondered much why such a man, especially if 
 he was in the habit of going to church, could 
 not do something kind and substantial for his 
 niece and his brother's wife, whose chief crime, 
 poor thing, appeared to have been her incon- 
 venient virtue ; and why he would not at least 
 take them out of poverty and debt, and the 
 perpetual presence of temptation. This I was 
 thinking when the door opened, and I stood in 
 the presence of the great man's servant. 
 
 Well, it was not so dreadful after all. I 
 really don't think I minded it in the least after 
 the first sound of my voice. Mr. Lyndon at 
 home? 
 
 Yes, Mr. Lyndon is at home. The servant 
 seemed to say by his look of cold inquiiy, " What 
 then, young man? Admitting that Mr. Lyn- 
 don is at home, which it can't be worth while 
 concealing from you, how can the fact in any 
 way concern you?" 
 
 I mildly asked if I could see him. 
 
G2 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 The man who was civil enough, by-the-way 
 merely asked if I had an appointment ; Mr. 
 Lyndon did not usually see people unless by ap- 
 pointment. The pampered menial of a bloate 
 aristocracy clearly assumed at the first glanc 
 that I was not a visitor, a friend of the family 
 " Will you take in my card, and say I wis' 
 to speak a few words to Mr. Lyndon very par 
 ticularly ? I think he will see me." 
 
 Presently the servant came back and told m 
 that if I would wait a few minutes Mr. Lyndoi 
 would see me. I was shown into a. large, cold 
 handsome room, with the blinds down, and i 
 conservatory at one side. A group of marbl 
 figures, nearly life-size, stood in front of th 
 conservatory. They were the familiar Graces 
 and they were covered over with a shroud of 
 very thick muslin ; so thick > indeed, that the 
 covering seemed put on less as a protectior 
 against dust and discoloration than as, a vei 
 to hide the nakedness of the classic women 
 during the severely proper hours of Sunda 
 service. I did not give much attention, how 
 ever, to these marble forms ; for my eyes were 
 caught by an exquisitely framed photograph 
 of large size, which stood, conspicuous, on the 
 chimney-piece. It was the likeness of Chris- 
 tina once my Christina, when she was poor 
 and obscure, and we were both happy. 
 
 "Please to walk this way, Sir; Mr. Lyndon 
 Avill see you." 
 
 I followed the servant across, an echoing hal 
 and into a library. At a desk in the centre, 
 with letters and papers all about him, with 
 Blue-books piled on the floor near his arm- 
 chair, and on his other side a waste-paper 
 basket overflowing with pamphlets, sat Mr. 
 Lyndon, his eyes still fixed on some document 
 he was rending. 
 
 He was a formal, rather handsome, close- 
 shaven man, wearing the high stand-up collars 
 which now are almost as rare as pig-tails. His 
 thick hair was iron-gray ; his. complexion was 
 fast purpling ; his eyes, when he favored me by 
 looking up, were much lighter than those of his 
 brother or of Lilla they were a cold, steely 
 gray. I marked the rigid expression of his 
 chin and jaw it might have been cruelty, or 
 it might have been stern virtu.e, according as 
 you pleased to construe it ; even in history and 
 in action it is not always easy to distinguish the 
 one from the other. In Mr. Lyndon's case I 
 could not but think that the full, sensuous lips 
 helped one a little to make the decision. 
 
 This, then, was Tommy Goodboy. I am 
 bound to say that from the very first I took 
 a dislike to Tommy Goodboy. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon left me for some seconds plante 
 la without looking at me or speaking. I was, 
 in fact, about to open the conversation, when 
 he suddenly looked up with an air first of irri- 
 tation, then of vacancy ; then he looked down 
 at my card, which was lying before him on his 
 desk, and at last he spoke : 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Temple! Yes, I recollect now. 
 My niece did speak to me about you, and I 
 
 promised her that if I could do any thing but 
 I am sure I don't know. Why did you not 
 come sooner some time in the season, Mr. 
 Temple ? This is no time ; and eveiy body is 
 out of town ; and I am leaving town myself to- 
 morrow ; and, in fact, I am very busy to-day, 
 and hardly counted on being disturbed. I don't 
 usually see any body on Sundays ; but as you 
 have come and I certainly did promise my 
 niece to see you " 
 
 " Excuse me, Mr. Lyndon. I have not come 
 to remind you of your promise, or to ask any 
 favor of you ; indeed, I would accept none even 
 if it were offered, although I feel deeply obliged 
 to Miss Lyndon." 
 
 "To Miss Lyndon?" 
 
 4 ' To your niece. Yes. " 
 
 "Oh, to be sure Lilla Lyndon, my niece. 
 
 " I don't mean to make any demand on your 
 kindness, so far as I am concerned. I hope to 
 be able to work my own way." 
 
 He merely bent his head, as a sort of formal 
 acknowledgment. 
 
 "I have not come on any business of my 
 
 n." 
 
 " Sent by my niece, I suppose ?" 
 
 "No, Mr. Lyndon. She does not know any 
 thing about my coming here." 
 
 He looked down at his papers, and glanced 
 at his watch. The actions were significant ; 
 they said very plainly, "If you have any thing 
 to say, say it at once, and go. " 
 
 "I dare say you consider my visit an intru- 
 ion. " 
 
 " Not at all. At least, that quite depends " 
 
 " I have come about a matter which concerns 
 -ou, or, at least, which I thought might possibly 
 concern you." 
 
 He looked at me with cold surprise. 
 
 " I met lately, more than once in Dover, and 
 lere in London, a person whom I believe to be 
 i member of your family your brother, in fact." 
 He did start a little and wince as I gave 
 lim this piece of news. 
 
 I was not aware that he had returned from 
 ibroad. Are you quite sure ?" 
 
 "Quite sure; at least, he told me so. In- 
 ed, I might have guessed the fact even with- 
 ut his telling me." 
 
 " Well, Sir, if you formed any acquaintance- i 
 hip with the person you speak of and I gath- 
 r from your manner that you did it would be 
 uperfluous to tell you that he is not a person 
 /hose return to England could give any pleas- 
 re to me or to any member of his family. That 
 act it would be idle for me to attempt to dis- 
 uise. I did not know that he had returned to 
 England, or expect his return, or desire to see 
 im. You know, therefore, that you are the 
 earer of unwelcome news. The question I 
 ould ask is, why you have gratuitously taken 
 ti yourself the task of making the announce- 
 lent. I suppose I need hardly say that if you 
 re the bearer of any message, or request, or 
 ny thing of that sort from the person you speak 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 of, you could not possibly present yourself with 
 worse credentials." 
 
 " I have no message or request, and I would 
 not make myself the bearer of any. I assure 
 you, Mr. Lyndon, I am no friend of your broth- 
 er's. No member of his family no, not his 
 nearest relation could feel less inclined for his 
 society than I am. It is just because I think 
 him so objectionable, and so offensive, and so 
 reckless, that I have come here to-day." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Your brother told me over and over again, 
 before I knew his name, that he had come to 
 England resolved to expose, and disgrace, and 
 extort money .from some one. I afterward 
 learned indeed, he told me that you are the 
 person against whom this is to be directed." 
 
 "He means to make some disgraceful exhi- 
 bition of himself, to raise some scandal, in the 
 hope of terrifying or shaming me into buying 
 him off?" 
 
 "He does." 
 
 " He is quite capable of that, or of any thing 
 else outrageous and and, in fact, infamous." 
 
 " I have no doubt he is. He impressed me 
 as being all but insane with hatred and reck- 
 lessness." 
 
 "Ah! but he is not insane. It would be 
 well for his family if he were. He is perfectly 
 sane. Well, have you, then, come for the pur- 
 pose of warning me?" 
 
 "No. Frankly, I tell you that I have not ; 
 at least, not on your own account." 
 
 "Listen to me, Mr. a a Temple. If you 
 should see that person again, you may tell him 
 that he can do his worst. I shall not buy him off 
 no, not by the outlay of a sixpence. It's very 
 kind, no doubt, of you to take the trouble to come 
 here, and all that ; and of course you will under- 
 stand me as expressing my sense of the obliga- 
 tion." 
 
 "Pray don't speak of that. I have not come 
 out of any consideration for which you, Mr. 
 Lyndon, personally have any reason to feel 
 obliged. But " 
 
 My speech was cut short by the entrance of 
 the servant, who handed a card to his master. 
 Mr. Lyndon looked at it, and said with empha- 
 sis: "Certainly. Let him wait; I shall, be 
 disengaged in less than one minute." 
 
 There was no mistaking this. I must come 
 to the point, and make good use of my time. 
 
 "Mr. Lyndon, I have come quite of my own 
 accord, and perhaps very foolishly, to ask you 
 whether you would not do something in this 
 unpleasant business for the sake of your niece. 
 It is such a pity that a girl so young, and so 
 poor, and and " I blurted out "so pretty, 
 should be liable to be tormented and disgraced 
 by a man of that kind. Could you not make 
 terms wi|h him, and buy him off, for her sake 
 and for her mother's ? They have had so much 
 unhappiness and poverty ; and it's such a pity 
 for poor Lilla. " 
 
 " Mr. Temple, you appear to be so intimate- 
 ly acquainted with the personal history of some 
 
 members of my family, that I don't suppose I 
 add any thing to your stock of knowledge when 
 I say that I have already done a good deal for 
 my niece." 
 
 " Yes, I am aware of it. She has told me so 
 often." 
 
 " And that she has no claim on me ?" 
 
 "No claim but close relationship." 
 
 " That she has no claim on me except what 
 I feel inclined to recognize. Now, I have no 
 objection to Lilla herself; indeed, quite the 
 contrary I like her. But I am not going to 
 be made the victim of all her relations. On 
 that I am quite determined." 
 
 " If you could even take her away to the 
 country somewhere ?" 
 
 " I am so little in the habit, Mr. Temple, of 
 discussing my family affairs, even with members 
 of my own family, that I really can not fall into 
 ! the way of talking them over with strangers. 
 Will you allow me again to thank you for the 
 trouble you have taken in coming so much out 
 of your way?" 
 
 "You, Mr. Lyndon, I have once more to say, 
 are in no way indebted to me. I came only 
 because I feel an interest in your sister-in-law 
 and your niece. I fear I have done them little 
 good by my unwelcome interference." 
 
 " You have done them, Sir, neither good nor 
 harm." 
 
 He touched the bell that stood upon his table. 
 
 I hastened out of the room, without even 
 going through the form of a parting salutation, 
 which, indeed, would have been thrown away 
 upon him, as he had already busied himself in 
 his papers with a resolute manner, as if to an- 
 nounce to me that he would not look up again 
 until I had relieved him of my unwelcome pres- 
 ence. 
 
 I was in no pleasant mood as I crossed Hyde 
 Park. Especially was I out of humor with my- 
 self, even more than I was with Mr. Lyndon ; 
 and as before I had seen him I felt an unreason- 
 ing dislike to him, and as now that 1 had seen 
 him and spoken with him I felt a deep detesta- 
 tion for him, it follows that I felt somewhat bit- 
 terly toward myself. I knew that I had made 
 a fool of myself; that I had brought humiliation 
 on myself; and that all this had been done to 
 no purpose, or to an ill purpose. It takes a 
 very brave and loyal nature to enable a man to 
 be content with the knowledge that he has 
 made a fool of himself, even when thereby he 
 has benefited somebody ; but it is gall and worm- 
 wood indeed to know that one has made a fool of 
 himself, and at the same time frustrated instead 
 of serving the object he wished to accomplish. 
 
 So I went, scowling and sullen, across the 
 Park, mentally girding at myself and at the 
 loungers and idlers I met in my way. I don't 
 know why, when a man is in a vexed and sulky 
 humor, he immediately begins to despise his 
 fellow-creatures whom he may happen to meet, 
 and to set them down as frivolous and worthless 
 idlers, gilded butterflies, and so forth. I know 
 that I visited, mentally, the pride and insolence 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 of Mr. Lyndon upon every creature, man and 
 woman, who passed me. Madame Roland in 
 her maiden days, when snubbed by the aris- 
 tocracy of her province, was not consumed by 
 a fiercer flame of democratic passion than I felt 
 that Sunday after I had been a victim to the in- 
 solence of the rich member of Parliament. I 
 dare say if the people I scowled at in Hyde Park 
 could only have known what was passing within 
 my breast, many of them would have felt highly 
 flatterad and delighted. For the aristocrats 
 Madame Roland detested Avere aristocrats. My 
 aristocrats and pampered minions and gilded 
 butterflies were in nine out of ten instances 
 people very much of my own class of life, who 
 had come out on the Sunday to see the riders 
 and the carriages in the Row. 
 
 As I approached the Row a haughty aristocrat 
 passed me rather closely. He was walking, like 
 myself. It Avas like his insolence and the arro- 
 gance of his class ! It Avas his affectation of 
 indifference to saddle or carriage-cushion. He 
 was a tall and, as well as I could see in a pass- 
 ing scowl, a handsome aristocrat. I flung upon 
 him a glance of scorn. He eyed me rather cu- 
 riously ; he even turned back and looked stead- 
 ily after me Avhen he had passed. I too turned, 
 and glared defiantly at him. He Avas, as I have 
 said, tall fully six feet high, I should say, Avith 
 square, broad shoulders ; he Avas dark-haired, 
 and had a magnificent beard of curly, silky 
 black. He was very well dressed indeed, far 
 too handsomely dressed for an aristocrat on a 
 Sunday. He Avas not hurling back glances of 
 scorn at me, but Avas scrutinizing me Avith a 
 grave, earnest curiosity. He advanced a step, 
 then fell back. I too advanced, a sudden light 
 of recognition flashing on me. Then we ap- 
 proached each other rapidly and at once. 
 
 "Ned Lambert!" I exclaimed. 
 
 "Mr. Banks!" said my aristocrat. It was 
 my old friend, the basso-carpenter. 
 
 NOAV that I came to study his appearance, he 
 was not changed as to features or expression. 
 He had groAvn much handsomer he always 
 was a good-looking fellow, remarkable for his 
 fine eyes and his beard, but now he was strik- 
 ingly handsome. He was splendidly built 
 stately as a guardsman, supple as a gymnast. 
 He had still the grave, modest, genial expres- 
 sion Avhich Avas so attractive about him in the 
 old days. He was only too well dressed ; for 
 as one came to look at him attentively there 
 Avas something about him which seemed a little 
 out of keeping with the clothes. Perhaps if I 
 had not known of his origin and his bringing- 
 up, I might never have noticed this ; as it Avas, 
 I thought I could detect the outlines and the 
 movements of the young workman tinder the 
 broadcloth, the shiny hat, the fawn -colored 
 trowsers, the lavender kid gloves. 
 
 We Avere very cordial in a moment. Really 
 it was kind of him to walk with me just there 
 and then ; I was so very carelessly, not to say 
 shabbily, dressed. My old friend and foe did 
 not seem to care. 
 
 "You have been in London long, Mr. Banks ?" 
 asked Lambert. 
 
 I told him how many years. 
 
 "So long, and we never met all that time! 
 I've been away a good deal but still it is odd 
 that Ave should both have been knocking about 
 London so much and never met." 
 
 He soon told me all about himself. He was 
 an organ-builder, and was holding a very 'good 
 position in a great house. He had himself in- 
 vented and introduced some improvements into 
 the construction of the instruments, and though 
 these were not important enough to bring him 
 fame or money, yet they gave him consideration 
 Avith his employers and their patrons ; and he 
 looked forward to an ultimate, perhaps not a 
 very distant, partnership. He had been sent 
 to many foreign cities to represent his principal 
 and. superintend the building and putting up, 
 the repairing and improving, of organs. He 
 had been to the United States ; he had been in 
 St. Petersburg, and Moscow, and Stockholm ; 
 he Avas quite familiar with Rome, and Paris, 
 and Madrid. He had liA T ed ever so many lives. 
 Avhile I had been vegetating by the Lethean 
 Avharf of the Thames's stodgy banks. I felt 
 myself very small indeed as he talked to me. 
 For me, my story was told in two words : Me 
 void. 
 
 There was one subject Ave both seemed to 
 avoid, yet surely Ave both were anxious to ap- 
 proach it. We sometimes beat about it; in 
 this Avay, for example : 
 
 " You have been in London all lately for the 
 most part, I mean, Mr. Banks ?" 
 
 "For the most part, yes. No, though; I 
 was doAvn in the provinces a good deal all the 
 summer." 
 
 "But you were in toAvn some part of the sea- 
 son of the opera season ?" 
 
 " Some part of it ; not lately. I only came 
 back to tOAvn a few days ago." 
 
 He Avanted to know if I knew all aboitt 
 Christina. But I shrank back as yet. It 
 came on in another Avay. He insisted that I 
 must go and dine with him. He lived out St. 
 John's Wood way. 
 
 "Are you married, Lambert?" 
 
 "No." He spoke very sloAvly. "No, Mr. 
 Banks, I am not married, and I am not likely 
 to be. I don't see what I Avant marrying. And 
 you perhaps you are married ?" 
 
 "No. I may take up your own words I 
 am not married, Ned Lambert, and I am not 
 ikely to be. I don't see what I Avant marry- 
 ng. And you knoAv the reason why.-" 
 
 "Ah!" He breathed hard, looked at me 
 Avith a stolen glance of kindness, curiosity, and 
 rity ; but he said no more. 
 
 " Have you seen her, Lambert ?" I broke out 
 at last, and I dreAV him aside under a^lump of 
 rees. " Have you seen her ?" 
 
 I did not name her name what need to 
 pronounce it ? 
 
 "Yes ; oh yes, I've seen her." 
 
 "Lately?" 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 65 
 
 "Lately, and before, and always. I may 
 say; at least, often." 
 
 " You have been seeing her you have been 
 meeting her all this time ?" 
 
 " Yes ; off and on, that is. When I could, 
 and where I could." 
 
 Almost a cry of agony and anger escaped 
 from my lips. All this time, all these years, 
 while I had been groping in the desolation of 
 solitude and darkness, he had known of her 
 whereabouts, had watched her, and spoken with 
 her, and been familiar with her! And faith- 
 fully served her, no doubt! I suppose the 
 fierce light of jealousy and anger flamed in my 
 eyes, for he at once said, gently and firmly : 
 
 " For what I think you mean, Mr. Banks, it 
 was little good to me to see her and speak to 
 her. I tell you honestly, and like a man, I did 
 my very best to make her love me ; and I 
 couldn't succeed. I tell you, too, I was mean 
 enough to try to serve her and help her when 
 she wanted help, and to hope to work on her 
 gratitude in that way ; and it was of no use. 
 She told me so at last; and then I tried to 
 make up my mind as a man to be her friend, 
 and no more ; and I have been trying, and I 
 think I've been succeeding even ; and I fancy 
 I'm growing better, and able to bear it, and to 
 think of her only as a friend. Now I'll not 
 deny that this meeting with you, and bringing 
 back the old times, and talking of her with you, 
 may have thrown me back a little. But I'll get 
 lip again, please God, and get over it. I'm de- 
 termined to get over it, and to be satisfied and 
 happy to be her friend. So you need not feel 
 any thing like anger at me. I have done you 
 no harm, and myself no good." 
 
 Need I deny that a glow of wild and futile 
 delight passed through me? It passed soon 
 away ; Lambert's ill success was but little gain 
 to me. 
 
 " You say you have always been seeing her ; 
 where, for instance ?" 
 
 " In London, here, first of all ; and in Paris, 
 and in Milan, and in Russia. And Paris again, 
 when she made her great success there. And 
 here, the other day, when she came out and 
 carried all before her. J was there. I hoped 
 to be able to throw her her first bouquet ; but, 
 good Lord, there was such q, shower of bouquets 
 came down that mine must have been lost 
 among them!" 
 
 "One word, Lambert. Did she never did 
 she never speak of me?" 
 
 "Not much; very little indeed. I didn't 
 ask. her any questions. I didn't know how you 
 came to be separated, and I don't know now ; 
 and I don't ask you, either, any thing about it. 
 I tell you, however, that I thought badly of you 
 at first ; but afterward I thought I must have 
 done you wrong." 
 
 "Why, Lambert, why?" 
 
 " Because, from some words she once let fall, 
 I thought she had made up her mind not to let 
 any thing stand between her and success on the 
 stage ; and I thought although she never hinted 
 
 such a thing in the least I thought well, I 
 don't quite like to say it." 
 
 "Speak it out, man! Nothing that can be 
 said by any human creature can hurt me more. '' 
 
 "Well, I thought that she had thrown you 
 over. " 
 
 " So she did, Lambert. She threw me over, 
 as you say she left me suddenly. I never 
 knew why ; and I have never seen her since. I 
 ought to hate her and curse her, and I can 
 not." 
 
 " No, no, you ought not to hate her. I don't 
 understand her I never quite could ; but if I 
 know any thing about her, and if she ever loved 
 any one, I think she loved you." 
 
 " Did she not speak of me lately when last 
 she was here ?" 
 
 " Yes, she did ; that was, indeed, almost the 
 only time. I went to see her up in Jermyn 
 Street just the day before she left, and she 
 asked me if I knew that you were living in Lon- 
 don ; and of course I didn't know ; how could 
 I ? London is the grave of provincial friend- 
 ships." 
 
 "Well, and she" 
 
 "She told me you were living in London, 
 and that she believed you were very happy." 
 
 "And did she so calmly, so readily believe 
 that I was happy ? Did she cast me from her 
 mind without a word of regret ?" 
 
 " No, not without a word of regret ; at least, 
 I ought not to say regret, perhaps, for she said 
 she was glad that you were happy." 
 
 "O God!" 
 
 "And she said I might perhaps meet you 
 after she was gone, and, if I did, to give you 
 her remembrances and her good wishes." 
 
 " That was all ?" 
 
 "That was all all she said, at least. I 
 know what I thought at the time." 
 
 "Tell me what you thought. Don't spare 
 me, Lambert ; tell me any thing all. " 
 
 "Then I'll tell you what I thought. I saw 
 how pale she grew, and heard how her voice 
 quivered, and I envied you ; for I thought, 
 ' For all that's come and gone, whatever is the 
 reason of the separation, she thinks of him and 
 loves him still.'" 
 
 "No, Lambert, you are mistaken; you do 
 not understand her. No, she never loved me 
 never. She never cared a rush for me com- 
 pared with her ambition. She despises me 
 now because I have come to nothing so far. 
 She pities me, I dare say, and would fling me 
 an alms if she might ; but she rejoices that she 
 had the good sense and the good fortune to free 
 herself from me." 
 
 Lambert shook his head. 
 
 "I don't quite understand her," he said; 
 "but somehow I think I understand her better 
 than you do. I know well enough how ambi- 
 tious she is, and fond of admiration and applause 
 and success, and all that ; and how proud she 
 is of having pushed her way up and up, from 
 being a po6*r little girl unknown to be the star 
 that she is. I don't think she would let any 
 
66 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 thing stand in the way of her success much 
 But you know as well as I that human nature 
 sounds more than one stop ; and hers has many 
 And I think there is much love in her heart too 
 as I know there is much friendship ; and I don' 
 believe she has ever forgotten you or ceased t( 
 love you. There, it costs me something, I can 
 tell you, to speak these words, and I shall have 
 to smoke away very fiercely for half the nigh 
 to get over this ; but I think it's true. I don' 
 know that it's any good telling you, either ; for, 
 mind, I don't say that it could come to any thing 
 now, even if you were to meet her." 
 
 " No, it could come to nothing. Don't think 
 me^ an idle braggart or a fool, Lambert, or that 
 I am talking after the fashion of the fox and 
 the grapes ; but if she stood there and held out 
 her hand to me, and and offered to marry 
 rne, I would turn away from her and leave her. 
 I would, though I love her now as much as ever 
 ay, far more than ever." 
 
 Lambert again shook his head, and smiled 
 a melancholy smile. 
 
 " No, you wouldn't," he said. " If she stood 
 at the other side of that pathway, and held out 
 her hand and beckoned you to come, you'd 
 come if all the promises and vows and venge- 
 ances, and saints and angels and devils, held 
 you back. I know that / would, and couldn't 
 help myself; and I know that you would too." 
 "It will never be tried, Lambert." 
 "No, it will never be tried. She has gone 
 away for a good long time. She told me that, 
 no matter what offers she might get, she would 
 not come to London next season. She was 
 thinking of going to the States and South Amer- 
 ica ; they are very greedy of new singers now 
 in Brazil. And before she comes back we don't 
 know what may have happened." 
 " She will probably marry." 
 "Perhaps. And you may have recovered, 
 and may be married too." 
 
 " No ; whatever may be possible, that is not. 
 A word or two more, Lambert. Did you know 
 of any one who seemed likely to marry her?" 
 
 "Likely, no; would have liked to marry, 
 yes. No doubt the number of candidates will 
 begin to increase considerably now." 
 
 " Ay, I dare say it will. Did you know any 
 Italian, any musical man, who took her up and 
 helped to bring her out, and who was fond of 
 her ?" 
 
 "I didn't know him; but she often told me 
 of him. It was he to whom she owes much of 
 her success ; so she says, at least ; but I don't 
 think much of that, for her voice and her tal- 
 ents would have won their way some time or 
 other. But I believe he made the way very 
 smooth for her in the beginning, and quite took 
 her under his care, and was better to her than 
 many brothers or fathers could have been. She 
 always speaks of him with great regard ; in 
 fact, with a sort of devotion." 
 
 " Was he is he, do you think, in love with 
 her?" 
 
 "I suppose so," said Lambert, slowly, and 
 
 speaking rather ruefully. "Why not he as 
 well as you and I, and all the rest of us ?" 
 
 " Do you think that she " 
 
 " No, I don't. I know what you were going 
 to ask, and I really don't. I am sure she is 
 very much attached to him, you know, and all 
 that ; and I don't say that if she were to marry 
 for any thing but love she might not marry him 
 out of pure gratitude. But when I spoke to 
 her once about him she was a little angry at 
 first, and said I ought to know better; and 
 then she softened and smiled, and went on to 
 say that in any case his heart had two great 
 Igves already music and Italian revolution 
 and there w*as no place left in it for any woman." 
 
 " He is older than she is ?" 
 
 " Yes ; I should say ten or a dozen years at 
 least. But that's nothing, you know ; he is not 
 old enough to be her father/' 
 
 Lambert had a painfully direct and honest 
 way of extinguishing any hope which he might 
 perchance have lighted. I winced under his 
 last few simple and practical words. 
 
 Another point I was anxious to be informed 
 upon. 
 
 "Tell me, Lambert, do you know any body 
 named Lyndon, who knows her ?" 
 
 "Lyndon, the member for Laceham, the 
 man who lives over in Connaught Place there ? 
 Yes, of course I know him ; that is, I know all 
 about him. In fact, I know him in the way 
 of my own business, and I have heard of him 
 through her." 
 
 "I don't mean him, though I am interested 
 in knowing something about him too. I mean 
 another Lyndon who knows her, and says he 
 helped her forward at the beginning." 
 
 (Christina's name had never once been men- 
 tioned in aur conversation. We only spoke of 
 her.} 
 
 Lambert shook his head. 
 
 "No, I don't know any other Lyndon but 
 the one ; and I don't like him. He is a purse- 
 :>roud, self -conceited, egotistic, unscrupulous 
 man. He has all the proud airs of a born 
 swell, though his father, I hear, made his money 
 "n the pork trade at the time of the French war." 
 
 "But he was, and is, very friendly to her?" 
 
 "Yes, he was and is. I don't like his friend- 
 ship I suppose it is because I don't like him; 
 )ut I hate to hear of his being near her." 
 
 "Well, that is not the man I mean. The 
 Lyndon I speak of helped in some way, or says 
 
 did, to introduce her first to the Italian you 
 lave told me of; and he wrote to her lately, or 
 >ays he did, for some money, and she sent it." 
 
 ' Oh, that fellow ? Yes, there is such a fel- 
 ow : I believe he did, quite in a chance sort of 
 ray, meet her long ago, and he was a sort of 
 nusical jackal whom the Italian employed to 
 liscover fresh and promising voices for him ; 
 ind in that way he introduced them. Yes, he 
 [id write her a begging-letter lately, and she 
 ent him money with a liberal hand, I dare 
 ay. He is an unfortunate scoundrel, I believe. 
 3ut his name is not Lyndon." 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 67 
 
 "He told me it was; and I believe, iu that 
 one instance, he spoke the truth." 
 
 "Perhaps so. But it certainly is not the 
 name he went by that she knew him by. He 
 is a sort of fellow who probably has a whole I 
 stock of names, a perfect assortment to choose ' 
 from." 
 
 We said no more on the subject then. I 
 walked with Lambert to St. John's Wood, where 
 he lived. A beggar would have been interest- 
 ing to me just now if he came from my old 
 home, and was in any way associated with my 
 old life ; and Ned Lambert I had always liked 
 since the time of our memorable battle on the 
 strand, that dark night when, falling and faint- 
 ing, I awoke with my head in Christina's lap. 
 We were, somehow, rowing in the same boat 
 too, and were no longer rivals. Life seemed 
 brighter for me now that I had met him. Since 
 I came to London, seven or eight years ago, I 
 had never spoken with or even seen any one 
 who came from the old home. That whole 
 passage of my life seemed gone and dead. A 
 great sea had risen up and swallowed the green, 
 delicious island under whose palm-trees I had 
 sat happy and idle so long. It was a strange 
 delight now, on this hard gray shore, to meet 
 at length with one who, like me, was once a 
 tenant of the lost home. I felt that I must be 
 Lambert's friend. 
 
 His manner seemed to return the feeling. 
 He was always rather a diffident sort of fellow, 
 slow of speech, and he had not much changed 
 in that respect. Indeed, I noticed one pecul- 
 iarity about him which rather added to his nat- 
 ural diffidence and slowness of speech. He 
 was conscious of his want of early education, 
 at least in manner and speech, and he was al- 
 ways on the watch to correct any error of 
 tongue, or to prevent himself from making any. 
 Therefore he pronounced every word slowly and 
 cautiously, somewhat after the manner of a for- 
 eigner ,, feeling his way into our language; and 
 he lingered with a slight emphasis over words 
 which an uneducated man would be likely to 
 pronounce incorrectly, as if in order to leave no 
 doubt that he was pronouncing them correctly. 
 Sometimes he went a little wrong in an aspirate 
 or an "r," and I observed that when he did so 
 lie always went back deliberately over the word 
 and said it correctly, as one brings a horse up 
 to a fence again and makes him go clean over 
 it when he has failed in jumping it properly the 
 first time. He was always fond of reading and 
 thinking ; when a mere young carpenter his 
 stock of book-knowledge seemed wonderfully 
 out of proportion with his class and his manner. 
 Now he had added to this, and doubtless to new 
 stores of^reading gathered since, all the vast 
 and varied experiences accumulated during 
 travel through many countries by a keen, ob- 
 servant eye, and a robust, intelligent mind. I 
 could see easily enough through his simple, 
 modest pi'ide in his own advancement and ex- 
 periences. I could see cleai'ly that, in his quiet, 
 manly way, he was resolved on being a gentle- 
 
 man in appearance and manner, as he surely 
 was in mind, and that he was training himself 
 for the task. There was so much about him 
 that was strong and self-reliant, that this little 
 trait of weakness or vanity was a softening, 
 childlike peculiarity which made one like the 
 man all the better. 
 
 Some thought of this kind made me fancy 
 that it would rather please Lambert' if I were 
 to make a slight allusion to his improved posi- 
 tion and changed appearance, and I took occa- 
 sion to remark on the fact of my not having 
 recognized him at once when we met. 
 
 "Do you know, Lambert, that I was rather 
 in a cynical and fiercely-democratic mood when 
 I passed you, and I positively scowled at you, 
 believing you to be a bloated aristocrat ?" 
 
 "No; did you, though?" he replied, blush- 
 ing over his dark face like a great girl. 
 
 "Positively I did. Did you not see my 
 scowl ?" 
 
 " Yes ; I did notice somebody looking rather 
 sharply and oddly at me. That first attracted 
 my attention. Then I looked, and I recognized 
 you at once. But you did not seem to know 
 me, or to be inclined to recognize me." 
 
 " How could I recognize you at once ? You 
 have grown such a swell." 
 
 "Have I really? Did I really look at all 
 like well, like what people call a gentleman ? 
 You may laugh at me if you like ; but I should 
 very much wish you to tell me the truth." 
 
 "As I have told you, I scowled at you as 
 you passed, out of my detestation for born aris- 
 tocrats. " 
 
 " Poor born aristocrats ! " said Lambert, smil- 
 ing, "their privileges of birth don't seem of 
 much use when fellows like me could be mis- 
 taken, even for a moment, for one of them. 
 Do you know that I am silly enough to be 
 gratified when you tell me of the mistake, al- 
 though I know very well that the second glance 
 showed you what an error it was ? But I don't 
 think it's any shame for a man to try to educate 
 himself in manner, and I am always trying it. 
 It was a dreadful task at first. When I got to 
 know a few people, and became noticed a little 
 as a man who had some new notions about or- 
 gan-building, and all that, and one or two really 
 great musicians were very kind and friendly to 
 me, it used to be a dreadful trial to have to ob- 
 serve how people came into a room, and sat and 
 talked, and used their knives and forks at din- 
 ner, and drank the right wine out of the right 
 glass, and all the rest of it. The first time I 
 went to an evening party in a white tie and a 
 dress-coat was an agony, I can tell yoii. And 
 then to have to watch one's A's and rs all the 
 time did so intensify the misery. For a long 
 time I acquired a positive reputation for sen- 
 tentiousness because I used to plan out little 
 remarks and replies which should say as much 
 as possible in the fewest words, and should have 
 none of the dangerous words in them. I am 
 getting better now, I think. But to this hour 
 I am afraid of that cursed letter h ; and when 
 
C3 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I find that I must encounter it, I fall hack and 
 have a look at it mentally first, so as to be quite 
 sure that I know what to do with it. Do you 
 know that I feel infinitely more happy and at 
 
 my ease talking French on the Continent, or 
 with foreigners here, than speaking English 
 with Englishmen ? Because, you know, a wrong 
 accent, or even a slip of grammar, isn't any 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 G9 
 
 thing with an Englishman speaking French, but 
 it does so stamp an Englishman talking English. 
 And I am so conscious of my own defects. " 
 
 "Ear too conscious, Lambert; never mind 
 your defects. It may comfort you to hear that 
 I know a man, a literary man and a scholar, 
 too to be sure, he is an Irishman who says 
 that he never yet met or heard an Englishman 
 who did not, some time or other, go wrong with 
 his h, or sound an r where the cynical letter had 
 no business to come." 
 
 "Ah, but there are degrees. There's an al- 
 most imperceptible lapse made once in a twelve- 
 month, and there's a blunder that would be 
 always coming out if one didn't keep close 
 watch over it. No ; you don't know what it is 
 never to have been at school, never to have 
 been taught when young how to pronounce a 
 word, or enter a room, or properly handle a 
 knife and fork. Teaching one's self Latin, or 
 even Greek, is comparatively easy I've done 
 something that way ; but studying the ways of 
 polite society alone out of a printed book of 
 etiquette is cruel work ; " and Lambert laughed 
 genially. 
 
 " Then you shall teach it all to me, Lambert, 
 now that you have mastered the art, for I fear 
 I never could grapple with it alone." 
 
 " No ; you don't want it. With you it's quite 
 different, for you have been at school, and you 
 have always been mixing with people. You 
 have no idea how different is the case of a fel- 
 low who goes into any thing like society for the 
 first time, and finds himself new to the very 
 clothes he wears, not to speak of the ways of 
 the people he meets. I wonder a man ever has 
 the perseverance to go through with it. Many 
 a time I thought it really was not worth the 
 labor and trouble. But I suppose it's some- 
 thing like cigar-smoking it's sickening at first, 
 and it takes a long practice before one can get 
 quite used to it and enjoy it ; but at last one 
 suddenly finds he can't do without it." 
 
 Talking this way we reached pleasant St. 
 John's Wood, and the house in which Lam- 
 bert lived. It was a pretty, fantastic little 
 house, one of a terrace which stood upon the 
 sort of almost imperceptible rise that in the 
 suburbs of London men call a hill. Lambert 
 had the first-floor of the house, and enjoyed a 
 very pretty view over the outskirts of London ; 
 the windows being so placed as not to overlook 
 the vast cluster of streets and spires and domes, 
 fog-surmounted, which lay below. Looking 
 from the room, one might at times catch faint, 
 hazy glimpses of something like the country. 
 Elowers in profusion grew on the patches of 
 garden in front and back of the house ; trailing 
 plants fell from eaves to basement. It was al- 
 together a very pleasant, gracious, and tempt- 
 ing place, and I thought Lambert might well 
 feel glad to return to such a nest every evening 
 from the town. 
 
 The rooms were neatly furnished ; for the 
 most part, of course, the regular furniture 
 chimney-glass, ornaments, pictures of suburb- 
 
 an lodgings in London. But there was a small 
 organ, hardly bigger than a piano, of my friend's 
 own design and construction, with some of his 
 special and newest improvements ; and there 
 were some clever specimens of wood-carving, 
 which he made a frequent recreation, he told 
 me ; and there were books of his own books 
 on carving, on music, on science, Greek Lexi- 
 cons and class-books; and there was a photo- 
 graph over the chimney-piece which caught my 
 eye the moment I went into the room : it was 
 that of Christina. 
 
 Lambert took a book a sort of scrap-book, 
 apparently out of a drawer of his writing-desk, 
 and, turning hastily over its leaves, called my 
 attention to it. 
 
 "Critiques of Aer," he said; "I used to 
 watch for them in the papers, and cut them out 
 and paste them in." 
 
 Yes ; there were criticisms of her perform- 
 ances from the Moniteur, and the Debuts, and 
 the Independence Beige, and the 'National- Zei- 
 tung of Berlin, and the Ost-Deutsche Post of 
 Vienna, the Pungolo of Milan, the Osservatore 
 of Eome, the Opinions of Turin, the Courrier 
 Russe, the Times, the Morning Chronicle (there 
 was a Morning Chronicle then), .the Morning 
 Post, and I know not what other papers. I 
 glanced over them. Often, indeed, the letters 
 danced and flickered before my eyes. I read 
 them Avith amazement, with pride, with delight 
 ah, and with selfish shame and pain as well ! 
 They differed as to minor points of criticism 
 some extolling as a special charm what others 
 deprecated as the one sole defect ; some declar- 
 ing that the voice was incomparable, but the 
 singer had yet much to learn; others insisting 
 that the skill of the musician conquered some 
 vocal defects ; others, again, leaning more on 
 the acting than on the singing. But all rang 
 to the one grand chime success. In Berlin 
 the students of the university had a serenade 
 by torch-light in honor of their gifted country- 
 woman ; in enthusiastic and music-mad St. 
 Petersburg the singer was presented, on the oc- 
 casion of her last performance, with a coronet 
 of gold and a diamond brooch. So on. It 
 was simply success. Christina had succeeded. 
 
 I put the book away, and sat thinking and 
 silent for a few moments. The whole thing 
 was unreal to me ; I was as one who dreams. 
 Only the other day it seemed when she called to 
 me a farewell from her window, and the flower 
 she had worn in her bosom fell on the pavement 
 at my feet. 
 
 I rose and went to the chimney-piece, and 
 looked calmly at her portrait. She had de- 
 veloped, but not much changed. The photo- 
 graph made her look a little older, perhaps, than 
 I could have expected ; but most photographs 
 have that sort of effect. She was certainly 
 very beautiful, and of a beauty which was in 
 no sense commonplace. In a portrait-gallery 
 filled with the pictures of handsome women- 
 most of them even of handsomer women one 
 must, I thought, be attracted at once by that 
 
70 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 striking fae, with its fleece of fair hair and 
 its eyes so large and dark, and the singular soft- 
 ness and sweetness almost a sensuous sweet- 
 ness of the expression on the lips and the out- 
 lines of cheek and chin, contrasting as strange- 
 ly as did the hue of the hair and eyes with the 
 energy and decision which the forehead and 
 brows expressed. 
 
 I looked at it long and silently, compressing 
 my lips the while, and- crushing, with such force 
 of self-control as I could command, all rising 
 emotion down into obedience. But I might 
 have allowed my feelings their full sway with- 
 out fear of observation, for Lambert had quiet- 
 ly left the room the moment he saw me ap- 
 proach the photograph. He did not return for 
 some minutes. I conjectured that he would 
 not return, in fact, until I had given some aud- 
 ible intimation that I needed no longer to be 
 alone. I sat down and played a few random 
 chords on his organ. He presently came in, 
 looking animated and cheerful, and told me he 
 must apologize for having left me, but that he 
 had been compelled to have a long and pro- 
 found consultation with his landlady on the sub- 
 ject of dinner. Dinner came at last, and we 
 drank some -wine, and became very talkative 
 and cordial and friendly. By a sort of silent 
 agreement we avoided all reference to past 
 times, and said no more of her. 
 
 After dinner we opened the windows, lighted 
 cigars, and smoked. Lambert told me, with 
 the innocent, boyish pride which was rather 
 an attractive part of his character, that he was 
 the only lodger ever allowed to smoke in that 
 sacred room ; that the landlady, a most re- 
 spectable old lady, positively insisted that he 
 must have his cigar there whenever he pleased ; 
 and that, whenever he was leaving the place 
 for good, he meant to present her with a set of 
 entirely new curtains. 
 
 " It wouldn't be any use my giving them be- 
 fore," he added; "I should only spoil them, 
 and she would benefit nothing by the transac- 
 tion." 
 
 The evening was calm and sultry, as we sat 
 quietly smoking. Presently I saw Lambert 
 get up and grasp the collar of his coat with one 
 hand, while he looked inquiringly at me. 
 
 "Would you mind," he asked, "if I were 
 to " and he stopped. 
 
 " Mind Avhat ?" I asked in my turn, not hav- 
 ing the least idea of what he meant. 
 
 "Well, just to pull off my coat, you know. 
 It's very hot this evening, and the fact is I 
 haven't got rid of all the old ways yet, It 
 does seem so pleasant still to sit of a Sunday 
 evening in one's shirt-sleeves. I am gradually 
 breaking myself of the fashion ; bnt just now 
 I begin to feel so very comfortable that, if you 
 really didn't mind, and wouldn't be at all of- 
 fended I have a dressing-gown, you know, 
 and rather a handsome one ; but still it isn't 
 quite the same thing, just yet." 
 
 I could not help laughing ; but he was quite 
 grave and earnest. 
 
 " Sit in your shirt-sleeves, by all means, 
 Lambert, if it makes you comfortable," I said. 
 "My poor father was a boat-builder, as you 
 know, in his best days, and he always used to 
 like to sit in his shirt- sleeves of a Sunday even- 
 ing; but I think my mother discouraged and 
 finally abolished the practice in him, and she 
 never allowed me even to attempt it. There- 
 fore I have an enjoyment the less, you see, and 
 I rather envy you your additional comfort." 
 
 So Lambert pulled off his coat, and lay with 
 his lithe, long, manly figure back in his arm- 
 chair, and chatted with additional freedom and 
 fluency all the evening. 
 
 The night passed pleasantly, and it was time 
 for me to go. Ned insisted on walking part of 
 the way with me, and did in fact walk near- 
 ly all the way. We made arrangements, of 
 course, to meet again, and meet often. He in- 
 quired gently and cautiously into my prospects, 
 and hinted in the most delicate manner that he 
 might perhaps be able to give me some advice, 
 or to make me acquainted with somebody whose 
 advice would be better than his. I opened to 
 him freely whatever plans, prospects, and hopes 
 I had. 
 
 "One thing," I said, "I am resolved on, 
 Lambert. I will make a way and a place for 
 myself, and in opera. I will be a primo tenore 
 one day ; I will sing with her, and she shall ac- 
 knowledge that I have something in me ; or I 
 will find a way of dying, if it has to be by a plunge 
 from Waterloo Bridge." We shook hands and 
 separated. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE HEAVY FATHER'S MISTAKE. 
 
 MY parting words to Lambert expressed not 
 too strongly a resolution which had grown up 
 in my mind. I was resolved to slave, and 
 strive, and wear myself out, if need be, in or- 
 der to qualify myself for success in opera, that 
 I might once sing with her, perhaps on equal 
 terms. All other objects in life seemed to be 
 as nothing compared with that thus to tri- 
 umph, thus to prove myself not unworthy of the 
 opinion she once held of me and then come 
 what might ! 
 
 Strangely enough, this determination was not 
 inspire^! by any hope that we might fulfill the 
 other part of our early dreams, and be married. 
 I do not think such a hope ever entered into 
 my ambition and my resolve. She did not love 
 me ; it was only too evident that she could not 
 reallv have loved me at any time as I would 
 have been loved ; and even were it probable 
 or possible that the far-off date of my success 
 could find her still unmarried, I was too proud 
 to think of courting the love of one who had 
 flung me thus away, and left me to my loneli- 
 ness and my misery. No, passionate as was 
 my futile love for her, it was not that which 
 now influenced me to my determination and 
 my hopes. It was the absorbing desire to 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 71 
 
 prove myself not unworthy, not all a failure. 
 To wring that compensation from Fate was 
 now my one sole object in life. 
 
 And if I should fail ? 
 
 Well, I was no idiot, and I thought of that. 
 The most passionate aspiration can not conquer 
 success, nor is it evidence of capacity for suc- 
 cess, unless when it comes as a mere instinct 
 of the nature, like the desire of the water-fowl 
 for the pool, of the young eagle for the flight. 
 I therefore laid little stress on my own mere 
 aspirations, knowing well how greatly they 
 were stimulated by my love and my wounded 
 pride. So I contemplated coolly the possibil- 
 ity, the chance, of utter failure, and I resolved 
 upon my course. Once let it be certain, let it be 
 beyond all doubt and I felt convinced I could 
 judge my own cause impartially and rightly 
 that I was a failure, and I would withdraw in- 
 stantly and forever from these countries, change 
 my name, bury myself in some remote western 
 region of America, and live there, a hewer of 
 wood and drawer of water, till my life should 
 come to an end. 
 
 I have said thus much in explanation of the 
 resolute energy with which I now went to work 
 at musical training, and at saving up money 
 with which to go to Italy and improve myself, 
 and begin a career there which I hoped might 
 wake an echo in England. My friend Lam- 
 bert entered quietly, earnestly into all my 
 plans, calmly assuming my perseverance and 
 my success as a matter of course ; and he lent 
 me valuable assistance by advice and sugges- 
 tion. Lilla, too, was in our full confidence, 
 and was quite delighted with the project, fre- 
 quently reminding me of the magnificent day 
 at the Derby she was to have the first season 
 of my London success. Weeks and months 
 went on, and I began at last to see Italy in 
 the near fore-ground of my hopes. 
 
 Before I proceed to sum up in a few lines 
 one tolerably long chapter of my life a chap- 
 ter as quiet and uneventful to tell of as it was 
 to me momentous I must relate two incidents. 
 
 I went very often to see Ned Lambert ; he 
 very often came to see me. He made himself 
 very friendly and familiar with Lilla and her 
 mother. He would sit for hours listening to 
 the poor old woman telling him of her trials 
 and her disappointments, her feats of cooking, 
 her new and incomparable methods of applying 
 sauce and preserving peaches, Lilla's sicknesses 
 and Lilla's charms. I don't believe there was an 
 ailment Lilla had had, from her first " thrush" 
 to her latest toothache, of which Edward Lam- 
 bert did not hear many times, and seemingly 
 Avith profoundest interest, the full details. Lil- 
 la herself used to grow dreadfully impatient un- 
 der these narratives, and I observed, not with- 
 out curiosity and interest, that she was far less 
 enduring now than she used to be when I was 
 the spell-bound victim. 
 
 Often, therefore indeed, whenever I could 
 I intercepted Mrs. Lyndon, flung myself in 
 her path, and engaged her in colloquial battle, 
 
 in order that Lambert might be saved, and 
 that he might, if he liked, have all the time 
 with Lilla to himself. I thought his eyes rest- 
 ed sometimes fixedly and tenderly on her when 
 he was not near her, with an expression as if 
 he would gladly be beside her ; and I was quite 
 willing to give him the full opportunity, so far 
 as I could bring it about. Soon, too, I began 
 to observe that Mrs. Lyndon watched with 
 somewhat uneasy glances when these twain 
 talked too closely and too long together, and 
 that the pleasure of expatiating to an unresist- 
 ing, patient listener like myself lost some of 
 its charm under such circumstances. These 
 were symptoms, omens perhaps, not to be over- 
 looked. 
 
 One fine starry night of winter, when the 
 hardened snow gleamed glassy on the ground, 
 and the lighted clock of Chelsea Hospital show- 
 ed brightly through the clear and rarefied air. 
 I walked part of the way home with Lambert 
 from our quarter by the Thames. He was un- 
 usually silqnt for a while, then suddenly said: 
 
 "I say, Temple" (he had got into the way 
 now of calling me Temple, and not Banks), 
 " what a very pretty girl your friend Miss Lyn- 
 don is !" 
 
 "Very pretty, and very clever, and very 
 good." 
 
 " Yes, she seems a sort of girl that could un- 
 derstand a fellow, and help him to think, and 
 bring him out. Do you know, I talked to her 
 just now of some new ideas I have got good 
 ideas, I think ; in my 3wn line, of course and 
 she listened to me all the time, and quite un- 
 derstood it all and cared about it. I know she 
 did by the questions she asked. Never mind 
 the answers a girl gives. I don't; they're no 
 test. Some girls will know by the mere ex- 
 pression of your face, if they haven't even been 
 listening to a word, what kind of answers they 
 ought to give. But the questions if they ven- 
 ture upon questions that's the real test. You 
 can't mistake, if you have a question asked. 
 You know at once just how far she has gone 
 with you, and how far she is able to go. Well, 
 Sir, that girl asked me one or two questions 
 that showed she had got rather ahead of me. 
 She did indeed. I'm rather a slow fellow, and 
 she seemed to make a short-cut to cut off the 
 angle, you know, and get to the end directly. 
 It must be very pleasant," he added, with a 
 sort of half sigh, " to have a woman for a friend 
 for a friend who can understand one in that 
 ready sort of way." 
 
 Was the inconsolable becoming consoled ? 
 
 "It must be very pleasant, Lambert," I an- 
 swered, in deep earnestness. " It is a pleasure 
 some of us must go without, and go darkling 
 through life for want of it." 
 
 "She does not seem very happy there, I 
 think," he remarked, with a nod of his head 
 in the direction we had left. 
 
 "No. They are, as you know, very poor." 
 
 "Yes. If ever I marry, it shall be some 
 poor girl, who will have no fortune to throw 
 
72 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER 
 
 in my face, but will owe all to me. I hate th 
 idea of benefiting by one's wife. I'd like to 
 make my way in the world myself, and bring 
 her along with me ; and you know I have no 
 been doing badly so far." 
 
 "Lilla and her mother have both been very 
 kind and good to me. I only wish I had any 
 way of proving mv friendship and gratitude." 
 "Is there not a ready and suitable way?" 
 " Is there ? If there is, I don't know it." 
 " Marry Lilla." He brought out the words 
 very slowly. 
 
 "My dear fellow, you don't know what you 
 are talking about." 
 
 " Yes, I do ; I quite understand why you 
 can not think of such a thing." 
 
 "No, you don't; at least, you only know 
 part of the reason. If I had never met an- 
 other woman I should not wish to marry Lilla 
 Lyndon. I am very fond of her, Lambert, and 
 have good reason to be; but not in that way. 
 My feeling in the matter, however, is not much 
 to the purpose. Something a good deal more 
 to the point is that Lilla Lyndon would not 
 marry me." 
 
 "Do you think not? Now I have often 
 thought " 
 
 " Because you don't know. To begin with, 
 my prospects are all too cloudy, and I am far 
 too poor. Lilla Lyndon does not pretend to be 
 a heroine, and I don't believe she could be hap- 
 py in poverty. She must marry somebody who 
 can make her mother and herself comfortable, 
 or more than merely comfortable ; and I don't 
 blame her for it." 
 
 "Yet I don't think I am sure I am right 
 that she would marry for money. I think there 
 is something better in her." 
 
 "And so do I of late. I don't believe now 
 that she would marry for money ; but I don't 
 think she would go into married poverty love 
 in a garret, and that kind of thing. And I say 
 again I don't blame' her. Some people can do 
 it, and others can't. Let us all try to under- 
 stand ourselves and our capacities. One per- 
 son can stand the night-air without catching 
 cold, and another can not; but there are 
 some who run the risk which they might have 
 avoided, and do catch cold, and are moping 
 and cross about it for weeks after. Others 
 know they can not stand it, and take care 
 not to try; and they are wise. Now, I sup- 
 pose there are plenty of girls Avho have just 
 courage enough to take the plunge, but not 
 courage to bear the consequences without re- 
 gret and lamentation. I think Lilla Lyndon 
 knows that she has had enough of poverty in 
 her domestic life, and she has sense enough to 
 caution her against risking any more of it. She 
 is not fit for the kind of life she leads, and I 
 think it has gone near to spoiling her. A very 
 little of a better 4 sort of existence would soon 
 lift her quite out of the contamination of this." 
 "So it would," said Lambert, eagerly. He 
 had been listening with rather a depressed air 
 to my exordium against poverty. 
 
 "The fact is, Lambert, they talk dreadful 
 rubbish about the blessings of poverty. It is 
 all very well for preachers and philosophers to 
 try to gammon people into making the best of a 
 bad lot ; but there is a sort of poverty which 
 does nothing but degrade. All Lilla Lyndon 
 wants, to be just as good a girl as ever lived, is 
 a certain income, and ease, and no debts." 
 
 Lambert brightened, I thought, under these 
 words. The fact is, I began to perceive that 
 I had been producing, unconsciously, quite a 
 wrong impression. When I was lecturing on 
 the evils of poverty, I only meant to show him 
 how certain little levities and defects had prob- 
 ably arisen in Lilla's character, and thus to en- 
 courage him to pay court to her, if he felt so 
 inclined. To me he appeared quite a rising 
 and prosperous man, and every word I used as 
 an argument against Lilla's marrying into pov- 
 erty was meant as a reason why she ought to 
 marry him. I was fast turning match-maker 
 out of interest in both my friends. But Lam- 
 bert at first thought I was arguing against the 
 prudence of any body thinking of such a girl as 
 Lilla unless he was a man of fortune, and his 
 countenance, transparently expressive, became 
 clouded. It cleared again as he said : 
 
 " Then you don't think she would care about 
 a man only if he was a swell, and had plenty 
 of money, and a house in the West End, like 
 her uncle, and all that ?" 
 
 "No ; I think she is too sensible and spirited 
 a girl to throw away a chance of real happiness 
 for dreams." 
 
 " You see, Temple, it's this way with me. I 
 uppose a man can't always live alone. At 
 least, I think now he can't ; I used to fancy 
 it would be my fate, and that it was the only 
 thing I could endure under in fact, under the 
 circumstances, you know. Now, somehow, I 
 don't think so, since I've seen that girl's bright 
 Tace, and heard her pleasant laugh. And I 
 think there's something in her too I know it. 
 [ don't think I've fallen in love with her ; per- 
 laps I've passed the age for that sort of thing, 
 and I've knocked about a good deal, and I'm 
 not far off thirty years old. But J do like to 
 
 near her, and to hear her talk ; and I think 
 she could brighten a man's life very much. 
 Then I'm getting on very well for a fellow 
 ike me, that is, who came up from nothing; 
 and if things don't take a wonderfully bad turn, 
 [ don't see why I shouldn't soon be able to keep 
 my wife quite like a lady and Lilla Lyndon 
 would look like a lady too, and take the shine 
 out of some of the West Enders, I can tell you." 
 
 " My dear fellow, I wish you good luck and 
 Grod-speed with all my heart. " 
 
 "Yes, that's all very fine, but we mustn't go 
 :oo fast ; I haven't the faintest reason to know 
 :hat she would listen to a word of the kind." 
 
 "Nor I; but I don't know any reason why 
 she shouldn't." 
 
 "Don't you know any reason ?" 
 
 "Not I. How should I?" 
 
 " Unless that, perhaps she knows you a long 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER 
 
 73 
 
 time, you see. and you have been a good deal 
 together, almost like brother and sister." 
 
 "Exactly, Ned; there it is we are very 
 much like brother and sister, and never could 
 or would be like any thing else. Lilla Lyndon 
 has not a friend on earth who thinks more of 
 her than I do, and I'm sure I have no friend 
 more warm and true than she no friend, in- 
 deed, half so warm and true. And that is all ; 
 and if Lilla should marry you, old fellow, which 
 I sincerely hope, she and I will be just the same 
 fast friends as ever, please God." 
 
 We parted without many more words with- 
 out any more Avords, indeed, upon this subject. 
 But it seemed clear enough to me how things 
 would tend. Of Lilla's feelings on the subject 
 I could guess nothing as yet ; but I thought it 
 would not be difficult soon to know all ; and 
 meanwhile I could see no reason why she should 
 not love this handsome, manly, simple, success- 
 ful fellow. 
 
 As for him, I envied him, because he could 
 love and hope. The whole thing gave me sin- 
 cere pleasure, and yet a queer, selfish shade of 
 sadness fell on me, too, as I walked home alone. 
 I could not help thinking somewhat grimly that 
 my condition resembled a little that of a man 
 on board a disabled and sinking ship, who sees 
 the last of his friends safely received in the boat 
 which has no room left for him. 
 
 That was one of the incidents I had to relate 
 before leaping over a few chapters of my life, 
 because it serves to foreshadow and explain 
 what happened duril% the interval. Another 
 incident, seemingly unconnected with this, must 
 be told about the same time, as it tended to- 
 ward the same end. 
 
 One day I had made an appointment with 
 Ned Lambert in town. We were to meet at 
 half past four o'clock, and we had fixed on 
 Palace Yard as a convenient rendezvous. It 
 was a fine frosty evening in late February, and 
 the cheery sunbeams were falling lovingly on 
 the Abbey and on the gilded pinnacles of the 
 Clock-Tower. Palace Yard was full of bustle 
 and life ; carriages and cabs were driving up 
 every moment and depositing members, to make 
 way for whom policemen kept scurrying here 
 and there, and driving back the ever-encroach- 
 ing rows of people who flanked the entrance to 
 the great old Hall. I was somewhat too soon 
 for my appointment, and I knew that Lambert 
 would make his appearance precisely as the 
 clock chimed the half hour not a minute 
 sooner, not a minute later. So I too fell into 
 the crowd, and occupied myself in watching 
 the senators as they rode or drove up, and think- 
 ing what a very fine thing it must be to be one 
 of a body of personages so high and mighty 
 that crowds gathered to see you go to your 
 work, and that, even though you only came up 
 in a hansom cab, a policeman rushed to clear 
 the way, that your august feet might tread an 
 unimpeded pavement. Presently, however, my 
 eyes rested on a figure in the little rank of spec- 
 tators just before my own, the sight of which 
 
 was quite enough to make me fall back pre- 
 cipitately. 
 
 It was Lyndon the wrong Lyndon, the prod- 
 igal son, the outlaw. He was dressed with what 
 I can not help calling studied and artistic pov- 
 erty. His hat was rusty in hue ; his coat was 
 all threadbare, and in one or two places actu- 
 ally torn ; but both were brushed with elaborate 
 care. He had black gloves on, which were 
 gone in the fingers ; his trowsers were strapped 
 down carefully. Looking at him from a pure- 
 ly dramatic point of view, I should say his ap- 
 pearance expressed Honest Poverty in the per- 
 son of a Heavy Father. 
 
 The moment I saw him I was convinced some- 
 thing was " up ;" and I drew back to avoid be- 
 ing seen by his peering black eyes. I could 
 observe, however, that he kept always glancing 
 up toward the Parliament Street end of Palace 
 Yard, 
 
 Presently a carriage drove up, in which I 
 saw a face I knew. It was an open carriage, 
 frosty thougn the day was. Mr. Lyndon the 
 Lyndon in possession, the Tommy Goodboy 
 sat in it, with a pale, handsome, slender young 
 woman, whom I assumed to be one of his daugh- 
 ters. The carriage stopped at the entrance to 
 Westminster Hall. 
 
 "Now," I thought to myself, " we are in for 
 a pretty scene. " t 
 
 I saw the other Lyndon move forward. Sud- 
 denly he drew back, as the strident voice of the 
 M.P. was heard saying, 
 
 "You wait there, Lilla; I'll just take my 
 seat and come back." 
 
 The member got down and strode into the 
 Hall, and the carriage began to withdraw to 
 the other side of the yard. 
 
 I almost thought of profiting by the interval to 
 seize the confounded Heavy Father, expostulate 
 with him, and even drag him away, when I saw 
 him break from the crowd, plunge at the car- 
 riage, and cling to its side. 
 
 "Lilla!" he exclaimed, in tones so loud that 
 even those who were farther off than I from the 
 carriage must have heard the words distinctly 
 "Lilla, my daughter, my beloved daughter ! 
 do you not know your father your outcast, 
 wronged father? Have they, then, taught you 
 to hate, hate, hate me, my sweet child? Get 
 away; don't- attempt to interfere. What busi- 
 ness is it of yours, confound you!" 
 
 These last words were addressed to the first 
 policeman who rushed forward and attempted 
 to drag him away. 
 
 The young lady in the carnage sat pale and 
 apparently bewildered, but without showing any 
 wild affright. She was a handsome girl, with 
 a colorless Madonna face, large deep violet 
 eyes, and dark brown hair. 
 
 " Come, none of this ! " expostulated the po- 
 liceman. "You come away quietly, or I shall 
 have to lock you up." 
 
 "Stand back, minion ! Blue-coated minion, 
 away! That lady is my daughter. May not 
 a father speak with his own child? I appeal 
 
74 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 to my fellow-countrymen, my fellow-English- 
 men here around. They will not allow me to 
 be thus ill-used." 
 
 "Bravo, old cove!" was the remark of one 
 fellow-Englishman. 
 
 "Go it, Wiggy!" cried another sympathizer. 
 
 The general crowd laughed. 
 
 The girl in the carriage looked paler than 
 before, but she fixed pitying eyes on poor bat- 
 tling Lyndon. 
 
 "Don't hurt him," she called to the police- 
 
 The poor man is 
 
 This 
 
 man, in clear, firm tones. 
 mad!" 
 
 " I am not mad ! " screamed Lyndon. 
 hair " and he put his hand to his head, bu 
 stopped. 
 
 I do believe he was about to say, 
 I tear is mine!" but, recollecting that he on' 
 wore a wig, he checked himself in time. " 
 am not mad! That lady is my daughter." 
 
 " No, she ain't," expostulated the policeman 
 " I know that lady well enough. Come awa 
 now, that's a good fellow, and don't make an 
 more row. Come away. Where do you live 
 where are your friends ?" 
 
 "There! my daughter is my only friend 
 Let me go ! Let me know if she casts me off 
 Lilla ! Are you not Lilla ? 
 
 "My name is Lilla," said the young lady 
 looking pityingly at him ; " b^t I do not kno\ 
 you. I am sure," she said to the policeman 
 "the poor man is mad. Pray take him away 
 but deal gently with him ; and let me know 
 please, if you can, something about him. Send 
 .some one to me to Miss Lilla Lyndon, Con 
 naught Place. Has he no friends ? Does no 
 body know him?" 
 
 An impulse I could not resist dragged me 
 into the business. I pushed my way through 
 the crowd ; I took off my hat to the young 
 lady, whose sweet, calm face had attracted me 
 from the first. 
 
 "I know him, Miss Lyndon," I said; "and 
 if he will come with me I shall be happy to 
 take charge of him. " 
 
 "He is mad, is he not?" she asked, bending 
 forward and lowering her tone. 
 "In one sense he is indeed mad. 
 " Can I do any thing for him ? Is he an ob- 
 ject of charity ? Has he no friends ? 
 
 " He has, I believe, no friends none what- 
 ever." 
 
 " You are not, then, a friend of his ?" 
 "Indeed, no ; but I know some members of 
 his family, and should like to take charge of 
 him for their sake." 
 
 By this time, however, Lyndon had quite re- 
 covered himself. His mistake was clear to 
 him now. The name of Lilla had misled him. 
 He really had thought, no doubt, that the Lilla 
 Lyndon before him must be his own daughter. 
 He twisted himself from the hands of the po- 
 liceman, and, coming up to the carriage, took 
 off his hat and made a low bow. 
 
 "I have to ask the lady's pardon," he said, 
 " her very humble pardon. I am not mad ; I 
 
 am as sane as any senator over the way ; but I 
 have made a mistake not so great a mistake, 
 perhaps, as it may seem just now. I am but 
 mad north-northwest, although in this instance, 
 and with the wind southerly too, I have failed 
 to know a hawk from a hernshaw. I have 
 made a mistake, and I apologize for it. What 
 more can a gentleman do ? I am a gentleman, 
 Miss Lilla Lyndon, although I confess that just 
 at present I may not perhaps quite look like 
 one; but you shall know the fact one day. 
 Meanwhile, allow me again to apologize and 
 to withdraw. Enough has been done for fame 
 to-day. My compliments to your dear father. 
 I decline the escort of the police-force, and I 
 repudiate the friendship of Mr. Emanuel Tem- 
 This ha pie. I want no one to take care of me but Prov- 
 idence." 
 
 He again made a low bow, addressed to 
 Miss Lyndon, honored me with a contemptuous 
 glance, pushed his way through the grinning 
 and wondering crowd up to a grinning and 
 wondering driver of a hansom cab, mounted 
 lightly into the cab, and was rattled awav. 
 
 I was backing out of the dispersing "crowd 
 too, when Miss Lyndon again leaned from her 
 carriage, and said, very earnestly, " May I ask, 
 Sir, if you can tell me any thing about that 
 strange man ?" 
 
 " Nothing, Miss Lyndon ; nothing that you 
 could care to hear. " 
 
 "But there is something. Pray what is his 
 name ? Oh, here is papa at last." 
 
 Mr. Lyndon, M.P., caflfe rapidly up, looking 
 red and angry. I took advantage of his com- 
 ing to escape from-an embarrassing question by 
 bowing to the lady and walking away. 
 
 I looked calmly in Mr. Lyndon's face, but 
 sought and made no sign of recognition. I 
 could see that his daughter began at once ea- 
 gerly talking with him, and that she glanced 
 toward me. I could see too that he looked ir- 
 and excited. And I had the comfort 
 of thinking that he would probably set me doAvn 
 as an accomplice and actor in his brother's pleas- 
 ant little performance. 
 
 The whole scene, though it seemed long, had 
 not occupied five minutes, and the little bubble 
 of excitement it had created in Palace Yard 
 oon collapsed and wholly melted away. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon and his daughter drove off; and 
 by the time Ned Lambert came up to his ap- 
 >ointment there was no evidence of any thing 
 unusual having happened. 
 
 I did not tell him any thing about it, although 
 should have been glad enough of a little of 
 lis advice ; but I preferred to think the matter 
 almly over before I took any body, even him, 
 nto my confidence. 
 
 Late that night I was going home alone, 
 aving parted with Lambert. I was walking 
 owly along Piccadilly, when an arm was sud- 
 enly thrust into mine, a burst of mellow laugh- 
 er pealed in my ear, and I found that the de- 
 ested Lyndon was walking beside me. 
 
 Temple," he broke out, "I forgive you! 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 75 
 
 To-day I repudiated you, because I thought 
 you wanted to disavow my acquaintance, you 
 shabby dog, in order that you might stand well 
 in the eyes of my pretty niece. But I am de- 
 lighted to meet you now, for I do so want to 
 talk the matter over ; and you are, I give you 
 my word, my sole confidant." 
 I came to a dead stand. 
 "Pray tell me," I asked, as sternly as I could, 
 " which is your way ?" 
 
 " Just so, in order that you may go the other 
 way. I know all about that, Temple ; and, as 
 I have had occasion to remark to you before, 
 you sometimes adopt a sort of conventional 
 coarseness only fit for the most inferior trans- 
 pontine drama. Don't try that on, Temple. 
 Qualify for the Adelphi, at the lowest, if you 
 will practice stage-talk in private life. Be ge- 
 nial, man, be sociable ! Look at me. Above 
 all, try to be a gentleman. Don't you know 
 that I rather like you ?" 
 
 " Yes ; but then I don't like you." 
 "Coarsely candid. / don't mind. Come, 
 let us move on a little. I am going your way, 
 wherever that is. Don't try to thwart me ; I 
 have a motive in it. I'll follow you, if I can 
 not have the pleasure of your friendly compan- 
 ionship." 
 
 It occurred to me at once that he had now 
 perhaps resolved on changing his tactics, and 
 persecuting his wife and child ; and that he 
 hoped, by finding out where I lived, to come 
 upon their track. So I straightway resolved 
 to baffle him. Like 'Morgrana observing the 
 stranger in the Arabian tale, I at onCe leaped 
 to the conclusion that, whatever he might have 
 in view, it would be for the interest of society to 
 thwart him. So I permitted his companionship, 
 and walked on, resolved to lead him a pretty 
 dance if he hoped to find out my whereabouts. 
 " That was a funny mistake of mine to-day," 
 he chuckled ; " but very natural. I don't know 
 that any harm is done, after all. It's not a bad 
 way of opening the campaign, and giving Tom- 
 my Goodboy a sort of notion of what he has 
 got to expect. What a happy evening he must 
 have spent ! What a string of lies he must have 
 told that fine girl, my niece ! Isn't she a fine 
 girl, Temple ? I feel quite proud of her. 
 foresee that she will prove immensely useful. 
 Goodboy will have to come to terms, or woe 
 upon his life! By-the-way, Temple, do you 
 know any thing of astronomy?" 
 "Nothing." 
 
 " Ah ! what a pity ! Then that magnificen 
 sky over our heads is, I suppose, all a blank to 
 you ! Just a pavement or floor inverted ! ] 
 dare say the floundering Venuses and Cupids 
 on the Hampton Court ceiling would interes 
 you a good deal more than that field of sublime 
 constellations. Well, I tell you frankly, I 
 wouldn't be that sort of fellow, Temple, for any 
 thing you could give me. No, I wouldn't in 
 deed ; I have always noticed, though, that you 
 professional singing-fellows are generally ven 
 stupid. The spiritual nature doesn't seem t 
 
 get developed at all. Wonder how that is? 
 women don't appear to me to be so bad." 
 'Are you walking so much out of your way 
 o philosophize on professional singers?" 
 
 'Acute youth, no, I am not. The fact is, 
 Mr. Temple for I want to get back to a game 
 >f billiards I have begun to think a good deal 
 
 f what you were saying, only too eloquently, 
 
 he other day. It didn't impress me then, as, 
 
 am bound to say, it ought to have done. I 
 
 vas in a frivolous and cynical mood ; unfortu- 
 
 ately, I sometimes am so. I mean the even- 
 ng that you appealed to me so very touchingly 
 ibout my wife and child. You shot an arrow 
 nto the air, Temple, and, although at the mo- 
 nent unheeded, it came down and found its 
 nark a father's heart. I do now long to see 
 my child. I thought I had found her to-day ; 
 alas ! the voice of Nature guided me wrong, or 
 at least not quite right. Temple, conduct me 
 
 my child ! You know where she is. Lead 
 me to her." 
 
 "This sort of stuff," I replied, very calmly 
 and deliberately, "does not impose upon me. 
 [ suppose you want to make your daughter the 
 victim of some such disgraceful exposure as 
 hat to which you tried to subject your niece 
 to-day. That you shall certainly never do by 
 any help or hint of mine. Let that be enough. 
 Were you to parade the streets all night at my 
 side to my disgust were you to dog my foot- 
 steps for a month, you should learn nothing of 
 your daughter from me." 
 
 "Temple, an awful thought flashes on me! 
 
 1 beseech of you to answer me ! Heavens, it 
 can't be! and yet tell me, is my daughter 
 married and to you?" 
 
 " She is not ;" and I broke fiercely away. 
 
 "Thank Heaven for that!" was his fervent 
 and pious exclamation. 
 
 I hurried away. He looked after me for a 
 while, hesitating; then, apparently giving up 
 the idea of forcing any more of his company on 
 me just then, he broke into a loud laugh, sang 
 out " Good-night, Signor Pantalon !" and went 
 chuckling and stamping back in the direction 
 of his favorite Haymarket. 
 
 It was a hideous nuisance to me to have the 
 existence of this dreadful little creature hung 
 as a sort of mysterious burden round my neck. 
 A secret with which I had nothing to do, which 
 I wanted neither to keep nor to disclose, was 
 thrust on me, and seemed to lay a sort of crit- 
 ical and embarrassing responsibility on me. 
 Sometimes I thought of taking Mrs. Lyndon 
 aside and telling her the whole matter, and so 
 putting her on her guard ; again, I turned over 
 in my mind the propriety of trusting to Lilla's 
 natural good sense and courage, and making 
 her the confidante. But so long as there was 
 any chance or possibility of his not finding them 
 out and disturbing or disgracing them, I shrank 
 from adding this fresh and superfluous burden 
 of vexation to their hard lives. It was clear 
 that any chance that Lilla my Lilla might 
 have from the patronage or bounty of her uncle 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 would be utterly gone if once her life becam 
 mixed up with that of her unfortunate fathe 
 I very much mistook the character of Mr. Lyn 
 don, M.P., if that gentleman would not ca 
 off his niece as though she were a plague-ii 
 fected garment, once it became apparent tha 
 recognizing her would be encouraging his ou 
 law brother. Thus far, at least, the crusad 
 of the latter seemed directed only against th 
 inhabitants of the fine house in Connaugh 
 Place. And although I had no doubt that h 
 would in the end, if needful, kick with equa 
 foot at the door of the Chelsea lodging-house 
 yet, until he showed some signs of beginnin 
 to attack, it seemed only raising a needles 
 alarm to put my friends on their guard. 
 
 Positively, I entertained ideas of writing to 
 or waiting on, or throwing myself in the way 
 of Miss Lyndon the other Lilla Lyndon and 
 telling her who the madman was, and appeal 
 ing to her pity and kindliness to prevail upon 
 her father to pension him quietly off, and thus 
 buy his perpetual absence and silence. I feai 
 that pure good-nature toward my friends die 
 not wholly inspire this notion. I own that ] 
 should have dearly liked a few words of con- 
 versation with that sweet, clear voice ; to have 
 looked in those pure, pitying eyes again. Was 
 this, then, one of the proud, cold, puritanical 
 spinsters my Lilla had so often described to me ? 
 She had clearly never seen this one, at least ; 
 and, unless the latter was a very accomplished 
 actress indeed, she could never have heard of 
 any other Lilla Lyndon than herself. For when 
 the little scoundrel claimed her as his daughter 
 because her name was Lilla, her face exhibited 
 only surprise and pity; she showed not the 
 faintest gleam of any comprehension of his 
 meaning or his mistake. 
 
 I could not forget her eyes and her voice. I 
 even walked by Connaught Place several times, 
 hoping to see her, but not confessing to myself 
 that I did so hope. So I temporized and post- 
 poned, and kept my secret, and did nothing 
 more. But I held still to my first impulse, and 
 wished for a chance of trusting to the girl's pure 
 and sympathetic face, and breaking through 
 ceremony and conventionality by appealing to 
 her and telling her all. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 AGAIN AT LAST! 
 
 THIS is not a story of the struggles of a poor 
 artist and adventurer, though so much of my 
 life was indeed just such a story. But lives 
 like mine have been told so often before that I 
 opulcl add little new by dwelling on the profes- 
 sional and adventurous part of my existence, 
 even if I had the art to tell such things as other 
 men have told them. Therefore I frankly in- 
 timated to my readers long ago that I do not 
 mean to enter into the details of my struggles, 
 my disappointments, my privations, my tempo- 
 
 rary-success. Of all these I shall only say, like 
 the fair dame pressed to explain the duties of 
 the cicisbeo, "I beseech you to suppose them." 
 In brief, the professional story of my life is this : 
 I struggled long and wearily. At last I suc- 
 ceeded, for a time. Then I lost the best of my 
 voice, and I faded back into quiet obscurity, 
 not without comfort. For what Carlyle calls 
 four-and-twenty resplendent months I was a 
 brilliant success in the popular sense. I kriow 
 myself, and I know that I never was or could 
 be a great singer. I never was in the high 
 sense an artist. I never had a genius for mu- 
 sic, or for any thing ; but I had my run of suc- 
 cess I had my day. It was a short one, and it 
 is over ; and I don't regret it. "I cease to live," 
 says the poet's Egmont ; " but I have lived !" 
 
 In my days of swift success I came to know 
 a great many authors, sculptors, painters, crit- 
 ics, artists of every class, who had all more or 
 less succeeded in life; and I found that the 
 actor or the singer has some splendid chances 
 which are denied to any other adventurer after 
 Dopular favor. Worst off of all his brethren I 
 ate the literary adventurer, although Thacke- 
 ray, with the complacency of recognized and 
 riumphant genius, pointed out the immense 
 advantage the author enjoys in requiring nei- 
 her patronage nor capital, but only a few sheets 
 of paper and a steel pen. Where is his arena, 
 lis tribune ? He has written his grand tragedy. 
 Very good. Who is going to play it? nay, 
 vhat manager is going to read it? He has 
 inished every chapter of his novel ; and then 
 egins the dreariest part of his business. I re- 
 member literary friends of mine used to say, 
 'hen sometimes the author of " Vanity Fair" 
 howed his grand white head among us, that 
 ie had had toil enough to persuade the public 
 o read what he had written, that he had hawked 
 bout his great book long enough before any 
 ublisher could be induced to run the risk of 
 n-inting it. The difficulty was to get any pub- 
 slier to read it. Change "Vanity Fair" into | 
 picture or a statue, and it would at least have 
 ound a place in an exhibition, where a crowd, 
 oming for the sole purpose of looking at pic- 
 ures and statues, would have seen it, and some 
 ye would surely have found out its worth. To 
 ;ad through thousands on thousands of scrawled 
 
 MS. pages, in the hope of some time coming on 
 a literary treasure, is a wearisome diving process 
 which only stubborn souls long endure ; but to 
 hunt through an art-exhibition is a pleasant and 
 easy work. I rate the chances of the painter 
 or the sculptor, then, rather above those of the 
 literary man. But while it is true that not ev- 
 ery one can get a chance of exhibiting his pic- 
 ture in any gallery, it is also true that even in 
 the gallery it may pass unnoticed of the crowd, 
 who only run to look at the pictures of men 
 with names, or pictures they have been fore- 
 warned to look at. Suppose, however, that 
 every one going into the gallery were compelled 
 to look at every picture in turn were compelled 
 at least to stand before it, and look at that or 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 77 
 
 nothing for a certain number of minutes, would 
 not the obscure artist's chances be immensely 
 increased in value? But this is precisely the 
 condition of the actor or the singer. Once, at 
 the very least, in his three or five acts he is in 
 absolute possession of the audience. No one 
 may speak or sing but he. It is his chance. 
 If he can speak or sing in any way worth listen- 
 ing to there is his opportunity of doing it. I 
 hav*e known scores of men in other professions 
 who only wanted just one such chance to crown 
 their ambition, or, at all events, to crush it, and 
 1 who never got the chance, but went along through 
 life disappointed and embittered, girding at the 
 successful, snarling at popular favor, wailing 
 against destiny, and always convinced that if 
 the world could but have seen or heard them 
 it wo'uld have fallen in homage at their feet. 
 The public, indeed, will not go fishing for tal- 
 ent, like pearl-divers. It is enough to ask that 
 they shall recognize it when set before them. 
 "Genius," says Miirger, "is the sun; all the 
 world sees it. Talent is the diamond in the 
 mine ; it is prized when discovered." This was 
 my chance. I got an opportunity of holding up 
 my poor little artistic diamond. The opening 
 came ; I had the stage all to myself for a few 
 moments, and I really had been gifted by Na- 
 ture with a voice which then, at least, could 
 hardly have failed to make an impression. It 
 made its impression, and I succeeded. 
 
 This was in Italy. I came home to En- 
 gland, after an absence comparatively very 
 short, a success. My way began to be clear 
 before me. I began to have friends, admirers, 
 rivals, detractors, satellites, partisans, and ene- 
 mies. I grew familiar with my own name in 
 print ; I became accustomed to the receipt of 
 anonymous letters some full of praise, not a 
 few full of love, a great many breathing con- 
 tempt and detestation. I began to judge of 
 journals and critics only according to their way 
 of dealing with myself. 
 
 I must say that hardly any kind of life seems 
 to be more corrupting to independent and gen- 
 erous manhood than that which depends upon 
 the public admiration. It is hardly a whit bet- 
 ter than that which hangs on princes' favor. 
 The miserable jealousies, the paltry rivalries 
 and spites, the mean, imperious triumph over 
 somebody else's failure or humiliation, the piti- 
 ful exultation over one's own passing success, 
 the womanish anxiety to know what is said of 
 one, the child-like succession of exaltation and 
 depression, the absorbing vanity, the sickening 
 love of praise, and the nauseous capacity for 
 swallowing it all these seem to be as strictly 
 the disease and danger of artistic life as yellow- 
 fever is of the West Indies, or dysentery of the 
 East. I have indeed known strong natures 
 both in men and women which could defy the 
 contagion, and retain their healthy and self-re- 
 liant simplicity to the last. I have seen, even 
 in stage-life, virgins who could tread those hid- 
 eous hot plow-shares of vanity and jealousy, and 
 come out unscathed. I have known men who 
 
 to the last kept the whiteness of their souls, and 
 never fejt a pang of mean joy over another's 
 failure, or of unmanly pride or unmanly grief 
 at success or failure of their own. But such 
 natures are indeed the rarest of phenomena, 
 and only make the general character of the 
 race show more repulsively. You can't help 
 it ; I mean, we common natures can not help 
 it. Some of us go in resolving that we will not 
 be like the others, that we will not lay down our 
 manhood, and our courage, and our generosity, 
 and succumb to the poisonous atmosphere of 
 praise, and rivalry, and jealousy. But we soon 
 grow like the rest; we rage at a disparaging 
 word ; we swell with pride over the most out- 
 rageous praise ; our bosoms burst with gall when 
 some new rival is spoken of too favorably or ap- 
 plauded too loudly; we rejoice with a base and 
 coward joy, which our lying lips dare not con- 
 fess, when some one whom openly we call a 
 friend makes a failure and falls down. Our 
 nature becomes positively sexless ; and man de- 
 tests woman if she outshines him, just as rival 
 beauties of a fribble season may hate each oth- 
 er. I protest I did not, until I came in for 
 some little artistic success, ever believe it pos- 
 sible I could hate or, indeed, that any man 
 could hate an attractive and pretty woman 
 who had never either slighted or betrayed him. 
 I'soon learned that the wretched creature who 
 lives on the favor*of the public can get to envy 
 and detest any being that stands between him 
 and the sun of his existence. 
 
 From my soul I detested the whole thing. I 
 distinctly saw my moral nature becoming con- 
 taminated by it, and I despised myself even for 
 the momentary pang of pride and envy which I 
 honestly did my best to crush and conquer. I 
 sometimes thought to myself, "The time must 
 soon come, if one of us does not die meanwhile, 
 when I shall meet Christina. Shall I find her 
 even as one of these ? Shall I find that her 
 heart swells with pitiful pride and rankles with 
 paltry spleen ; that she hates her rivals ; that 
 she can swallow any amount of praise, and glad- 
 den in it ; that she can cry when some critic 
 disparages her or praises some one else?" 
 
 I could not believe it ; yet I could not but 
 fear ; I could not but sometimes wish that I had 
 been less fortunate in my personal ambition, and 
 that I were still far removed in obscurity out of 
 her possible path. 
 
 I heard of her often. She was soon to return 
 to England, where her sudden departure and 
 long absence, after so sudden a success, lent 
 new attraction to her. People said she was 
 married. I had heard the statement almost 
 with composure. She had become like a dream 
 to me. When I saw her last I was little more 
 than a boy ; I stood now on the latest verge of 
 my youth : a whole working lifetime lay be- 
 tween. I believed that I had so far disciplined 
 my nature and subordinated early and disap- 
 pointed passion, that I could meet her now 
 again with unmoved politeness, and even on 
 our first meeting look calmly in her face, touch 
 
78 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 her hand without tremor, and congratulate her 
 becomingly upon her great success. 
 
 Yes, they said she was married ; and it was 
 certain that she now described herself as Ma- 
 dame Reichstein, not Mademoiselle Reichstein. 
 Indeed, some maintained that she was not only 
 a wife, but actually a widow. But they said 
 all manner of things about her. Her husband 
 was an entrepreneur ; he was an Australian ad- 
 venturer ; he was a rich Yankee speculator ; he 
 was a scion of a noble Austrian family, who 
 never would look at him after his mesalliance; 
 whoever he was, he had deserted her : no, it 
 was she who had run away from him while they 
 were living at Nice, and actually in their honey- 
 moon ; he used to beat her ; she once tried to 
 stab him : at all events, he was dead now. Nay, 
 there was not a word of truth in all that ; the 
 real fact was, that she never was married at all ; 
 the young nobleman killed himself for love of 
 her, and left her all his property ; and so forth, 
 and so forth. These and countless other stories 
 equally incoherent, extravagant, and contra- 
 dictory passed from mouth to mouth among 
 the people I met who talked about Christina 
 Reichstein. 
 
 I found Ned Lambert, when I returned to 
 England, quite established as the household 
 friend of the Lyndons. He used to come and 
 dine with them almost every Sunday, having 
 made a definite arrangement ft> that effect with 
 Mrs. Lyndon, who was ready enough, and re-, 
 joiced to eke out her housekeeping by such a 
 mode of contribution, and who had indeed quite 
 a genius for cookery. Lambert liked the change 
 immensely. He said he was fond of a good 
 dinner on Sunday, and that when he dined 
 alone at his own lodgings he never ventured 
 to ask his landlady for any thing beyond the 
 cold corpse of a fowl cooked on the Saturday. 
 But it was not his relish for a savory little din- 
 ner which brought him all the way to our dreary 
 district ; and I saw a marked change, both in 
 him and in Lilla, when I once more joined the 
 little circle. Lilla was more thoughtful, more 
 melancholy, less pleasure-loving than before ; 
 he, on the other hand, was generally brighter 
 and more animated, unless when he was study- 
 ing manners and deportment, which indeed he 
 almost always was. Many a time I saw him 
 furtively glance under his* eyes at Lilla, as if 
 to learn from her expression whether he had ac- 
 complished a triumph or committed a solecism 
 of etiquette. I could not resist the temptation 
 to make an inquiry once in Lilla's presence 
 about his Sunday evening relief from coat- 
 sleeves; whereat he looked so distressed and 
 confused that Lilla insisted on having the whole 
 story, and had it accordingly, and laughed very 
 much ; and Lambert at last gave way, and like- 
 wise laughed ; and we all laughed a good deal 
 longer than the story deserved. I was glad to 
 have made Lilla laugh at any one's expense, 
 for, poor girl, she laughed less now than of old 
 days, and her face looked pale and anxious. I 
 soon found out the reason. 
 
 Between Lambert and myself we had boxes, 
 stalls, and so forth, for some theatre almost at 
 will. One night we went Lilla. her mother, 
 Lambert, and myself: Lambert would not stir 
 without Mrs. Lyndon to see a new performer 
 as Claude Melnotte. He, the new Claude Mel- 
 notte, was the idol of one of the colonies, and 
 was a statuesque, handsome, deep-voiced, en- 
 ergetic, wooden-headed sort of actor. I thought 
 the whole thing dreadfully tiresome, and Laln- 
 bert thought so too ; but Lilla was quite melted 
 by it, and streamed with tears. A year before 
 I know that she would have laughed at the busi- 
 ness, or yawned over it. I saw Lambert's eyes 
 resting on her with profound admiration and 
 sympathy ; and he looked up and caught my 
 eye, and gave me a glance, partly whimsical, 
 partly sentimental, partly bashful and apologet- 
 ic, which would have made quite a picture in it- 
 self. She had her depth.8 of sensibility, then, 
 this poor girl, whose bloom the hard coarse grit 
 of London life had so nearly rubbed away. 
 Never did she shed tears at a theatre when 
 I was her companion, or care for any per- 
 formance which was supposed to demand tear- 
 shedding as its tribute. 
 
 I spoke of the change to Lambert himself 
 that night. 
 
 " It's true," he replied, slowly and sententious- 
 ly ; "I have often thought that the best test you 
 could have of a woman's intelligence and of her 
 sympathies would be to watch her demeanor at 
 a theatre. Hear her comments, and observe 
 how she looks ; and the fellow who does not 
 know her then is an idiot, who never could 
 know any thing of her. You can't imagine, 
 Temple, how I hate some women I see at a 
 play : they look so cold and stolid and severely 
 proper and self-contained, that I should like to 
 have them expelled from the presence of art al- 
 together. I wonder how you will feel at the 
 sight of such people when you come on our stage, 
 before our unimpassioned creatures here. It is 
 not like Italy, Temple at least, I fancy so ; and 
 indeed I have heard it from Oh, from many 
 who have felt it." 
 
 "From Madame Reichstein, for example?" 
 I was determined not to shrink from that 
 name, or allow him to suppose that I faltered 
 at it. 
 
 " Yes, from her in especial. She was dread- 
 fully chilled here in London, although they gave 
 her quite unusual honors." 
 
 "She would be. Her enthusiasm and her 
 really lyric nature would naturally chafe against 
 our British composure." 
 
 He glanced at me inquiringly, as if he meant 
 to ask whether this calmness was real or put on. 
 If I had been asked then I could have answered 
 in all sincerity that I believed it real. I know 
 now that it was but an effort of self-discipline. 
 " We had a sort of scene at a theatre one 
 night," he said, rapidly changing the subject; 
 "I mean Lilla Miss Lyndon and I." 
 " Indeed ! What happened ?" 
 " Some fellow mad, I think seized her by 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 79 
 
 the arm, just as I was handing her into a cab 
 her mother was already in and jabbered 
 some insane nonsense at her. I pushed him 
 away, and the wretched creature flew at me 
 like a wild-cat, and there was quite a disturb- 
 ance." 
 
 " Who was he ? What was he like ?" 
 
 "Oh, quite an outre, mad-looking creature, 
 small and old, with a black wtg. I could have 
 crushed him ; but, of course, I wasn't going to 
 hit a poor old bloke old man, I mean ; and so 
 I only dragged him away, and asked a police- 
 man to take charge of him. But he was near 
 raising a perfect mob about us, shrieking out 
 that I was carrying off his long-lost daughter, 
 and I don't know what other rubbish ; and he 
 cut my lip, so that I was a pretty sight, I can 
 tell you." 
 
 "What became of Lilla ?" 
 
 " She comported herself most bravely ; nei- 
 ther screamed nor fainted. I got rid of my lu- 
 natic as soon as I could." 
 
 "Did Mrs. Lyndon see him?" 
 
 "No, she didn't. It so happened that she 
 never got a glimpse of him ; and I was very 
 glad. She is a nervous woman, and would 
 have been greatly frightened by the sight of 
 so extraordinary a creature. Of course I made 
 nothing of it, and I never heard any more about 
 it." 
 
 " You never found out any thing about him?" 
 
 "Never; and I never tried to." 
 
 I said no more on the subject ; I needed no 
 further explanation. 
 
 Some days after this, a few of us Lambert, 
 myself, and one or two rising actors and littera- 
 teurs gave a little fete to some of our friends at 
 Richmond. It was very early in the season. 
 We dined, of coarse, at the Star and Garter. 
 Lilla Lyndon was of the company. We were 
 all very pleasant. I was as happy as a bright 
 sun, delicious air, and joyous company could 
 make any man ; and I, at least, never could be 
 insensible to the mere joy of living, of barely 
 living, under such sun and in such air. I Avas 
 a sort of rising star too, in a very small way, 
 and might have flirted and been flattered a good 
 deal ; and did on this occasion accept my op- 
 portunities. I walked through the gardens, 
 after dinner, with a pretty, vivacious girl lean- 
 ing on my arm ; a girl who had just made a 
 brilliant success in light comedy, and promised 
 indeed to be another Abington or Nisbett, until 
 she married, poor thing, and died in her first 
 confinement. Her people lived not far from 
 Norwood ; and a short time since, walking out 
 from the Crystal Palace all ringing with music, 
 I strayed into a church-yard, and came iipon a 
 tombstone bearing the name of my poor young 
 friend. This Richmond day, however, of which 
 I speak, was darkened by no shadow from the 
 future, and we were all very bright and happy. 
 
 "Look there!" said my companion, sud- 
 denly, and with a joyous laugh. "See how 
 people make love off the stage." 
 
 She directed my attention to two figures in a 
 
 shady little alley of shrubs and trees not far 
 from us. They were Lambert and Lilla Lyn- 
 don. She was leaning on his arm ; her eyes 
 were downcast, her cheeks were crimson, her 
 step was slow. He bent his tall figure over her ; 
 he was pleading earnestly, passionately that 
 any one could see into her ear. It had come, 
 then, just as I thought it would. He loved her : 
 and now he was telling her so ; and I could not 
 doubt what her answer would be. 
 
 Queer pangs shot through me. I was re- 
 joiced at the prospect of the happiness of both 
 my friends. I thought with delight that Lilla 
 would no longer be poor ; that she would have 
 a true home to shelter her, a manly heart to 
 lean on ; that he would have a life made warm 
 by love ; and I longed to congratulate them 
 both, and tell them how sincerely I gladdened 
 in their love and their happiness. And yet the 
 sight brought with it too a keen sense of isolation 
 and loneliness. I had felt for Lilla just that 
 warm and tender friendship which is to love 
 "as the moonlight to the sunlight." She had 
 been a friend to me when friends were most 
 precious and most rare. She had cared for 
 me when I was sick, confided in me always ; 
 begged for me, unasked and almost unthanked, 
 of one who probably despised her and me only 
 all the more for it. And now I was about to 
 lose her ; the only woman from whom I could 
 expect a greeting that was more than formal, a 
 glance that was at once friendly and sincere. 
 I don't say that this made me sad. I know I 
 was sincerely glad that things were to be so; 
 but it made me thoughtful. I was moody 
 enough to wish to be alone for a little : and un- 
 gallant enough to get gradually rid of my fair 
 and joyous companion^ I felt a twinge of re- 
 morse at the recollection when I came the oth- 
 er day upon the stone which bore the record of 
 her name, her birth, her marriage, her death, 
 and the inconsolable grief of her afflicted hus- 
 band who is now alive and merry with his 
 third wife. 
 
 I was glad to be alone. I stretched myself 
 on the grass. The evening was glowingly, glo- 
 riously hot. I heard the voices of singers not 
 far away, and the notes of a piano. I saw no- 
 thing but the unflecked sky of blue above my 
 head, and the slender spiral vapor of my cigar. 
 Was I happy ? Was I miserable ? Happy or 
 miserable, those moments were ecstatic. Are 
 not the sensations produced by extreme heat 
 and extreme cold so much alike that the African 
 brought for the first time into contact with snow 
 fancies it has burned him ? I think there are 
 pangs of delight and of pain where the soul is 
 the medium, not the nerves which are not eas- 
 ily to be distinguished from each other. 
 
 I started at an approaching step. Lilla was 
 close beside me ; she looked pale and much dis- 
 tressed. I jumped to my feet. 
 
 "I have been looking for you every where," 
 she said ; " I want you to take me home." 
 
 "Home so soon? Are you going home al- 
 ready?" 
 
80 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " Yes. I should like to, very much ; if yo 
 don't mind leaving so early. Or I will wa 
 longer, as long as you like, if you will promis 
 to leave a little before the rest, and to com 
 with me." 
 
 "Certainly, Lilla, when you please. Bu 
 where is Lambert ?" 
 
 " Mr. Lambert ? I don't know ; at least, 
 saw him n6t long since." 
 
 " Will Lambert not wish to see you home ? 
 
 " If yoif can't or won't come with me, Eman 
 
 uel," she said, petulantly, "if you must wait o 
 
 somebody else, of course I must not worry yo 
 
 about me." 
 
 "Why, Lilla, my dear girl, you know verj 
 well I will go with you when you please. Bu 
 I only thought " 
 
 "Dear Emanuel, please don't think an} 
 thing; at least, at present. Only do oblige 
 me this once ; I am so tired, and I want to ge 
 away." 
 
 "We will go this instant." 
 " Thank you ; that is kind. And I should 
 like to get quietly out, quite unnoticed, if yo 
 please." 
 
 "This way, then." 
 
 I gave her my arm, and I felt her arm trem- 
 ble on mine ; and could feel that her bosom 
 beat heavily as she leaned on me. Violet cir- 
 cles were round her eyes ; and every time she 
 spoke it seemed as if she must break into tears 
 There were several hansoms at the door, in 
 which some of our company had come. I meant 
 to take one of them, and convey Lilla home in 
 it. Young ladies don't usually go in hansoms, 
 I believe, with young men ; that is, where Re- 
 spectability reigns. We had no such etiquette 
 in our free and gladsome* world. One of Lilla's 
 special delights was, or used to be, a hansom. 
 But the gardens were full of company. 
 There were many parties there as well as ours. 
 Lilla and I, threading our way outward, were 
 always coming, on some brilliant group. It 
 was significant of my poor young friend's state 
 of mind, that she did not even cast a scrutiniz- 
 ing glance at the dresses of the ladies. We 
 hardly spoke at all. 
 
 I brought her into a narrow side-path be- 
 tween flowers and plants. We were nearly 
 out now. Toward us there came a group of 
 four or five ladies and gentlemen, straggling 
 along as the width of the path allowed them. 
 One voice struck on my ear, and I knew its 
 sharp and strident tone. I knew it to be the 
 voice of Lilla's uncle. Eminently disagreeable 
 I thought such a meeting would be in a place 
 so narrow that recognition could not be avoid- 
 ed. It was now too late to go back, so we 
 drew up to let the group stream by. 
 
 Lilla saw her uncle. She colored, and was 
 a little confused. He did not seem particu- 
 larly delighted at the meeting. 
 
 "Why, Lilla, you here?" He gave her his 
 hand rather coldly. 
 
 I had been standing silent and stiffly, looking 
 at nothing and feeling highly uncomfortable. 
 
 " Yes, uncle ; but I am going away now. I 
 
 have asked this gentleman don't you know 
 Mr.. Temple, uncle? to take me home." 
 
 " Indeed ! Yes. How do you do, Mr. Tern- 
 pie?" 
 
 I made a formal acknowledgment of his en- 
 forced salutation, and in doing so I became 
 conscious that the light of two deep, dark, soft 
 eyes was turned full on me. I became con- 
 scious of it I can use no other phrase for up 
 to this moment I had positively seen none of 
 the group but . Mr. Lyndon alone, and had 
 never looked at the lady who was by his side, 
 and who stopped when he did. But I felt that 
 the light of those eyes was on me, and an elec- 
 trical thrill ran through me, with which the 
 blood rushed heavily and fiercely to my head, 
 and the pulses of my heart seemed to stand 
 still, and the grass for a moment flickered with 
 changing colors, and the sinking sun appeared 
 to reel in the sky. 
 
 And looking up, I saw that Christina Reich- 
 stein stood before me. 
 
 Not my Lisette ! Not my Christina ! Beau- 
 tiful, stately, in the full glow of developed love- 
 liness no longer a girl; nay, now that the 
 westering sunbeams fell upon her face, I saw 
 that there was something even of the melan- 
 choly beauty of a sunset in her own features 
 and expression. Far more beautiful, far more 
 stately, far more attractive, than 'when I knew 
 her, but not with the fresh and passionate 
 youth which was her exquisite charm long 
 ago. Long ago ! A whole life seemed to lie 
 between that time and this. I thought there 
 was something sad, something even of a pre- 
 maturely wasted look about those glorious 
 eyes. Youth, and early love, and early strug- 
 le lay buried in those lustrous hollows. They 
 vere as mirrors to me, in which I saw my own 
 dead youth and disappointed love. I turned 
 oward her, and our eyes met and rested upon 
 jach other in an instant of unspeakable emo- 
 ion never to be forgotten in this world. 
 
 Christina recovered her composure in a mo- 
 ment.. 
 
 "We are fortunate, Mr. Lyndon," she said, 
 n her clear musical voice, with the old dash 
 'f foreign accent still perceptible in it "we 
 re fortunate in not having left so soon as I 
 ,'ished ; for we meet at least, I do two un- 
 xpected friends. Your niece I know already, 
 bough she seems to have quite forgotten me ; 
 nd in this gentleman I meet a very old friend." 
 
 She gave her hand first to Lilla and then to 
 tie. Not the lightest, faintest pressure of her 
 love indicated to me that I was any thing to 
 er but an old acquaintance. 
 
 Indeed!" said Mr. Lyndon, dryly. "I did 
 ot know that you were acquainted with this 
 h, this gentleman, Mr. Temple, before." 
 
 "Did you not? Oh yes; we were old ac- 
 uaintances ever so many years ago. How long 
 go, Mr. Temple ?" 
 
 "Several centuries ago at least, Madame 
 eichstein." 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER, 
 
 81 
 
 WE MEET AGAIN. 
 
 " Yes ; it must be many, many centuries ago," 
 she said, slightly shrugging her shoulders. 
 
 " A good way of evading any confession of 
 the number of years," remarked Mr. Lyndon, 
 with a short dry laugh. " If you are going 
 home, Lilla, I think you had better come with 
 us." 
 
 " Thank you, uncle. If you can take me, I 
 
 shall be very glad ; and then Mr. Temple need 
 not be dragged away to take care of me." 
 
 "No; we need not trouble Mr. Temple to 
 leave so early. Come, Lilla." 
 
 "Good-night, Emanuel," said Lilla, holding 
 out her hand to me. "I am so much obliged 
 to you for offering to come with me ; and so 
 glad that I have not to take you away." 
 
82 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "Then I think I shall not go just yet," said 
 Madame Eeichstein. " I will go in Mrs. Lev- 
 ison's carriage; she is not leaving for a few 
 minutes. I have not had the pleasure of see- 
 ing Mr. Temple for so many years that I can 
 not leave him now, at least until I have ex- 
 changed a few words with him, and told him 
 how and when he may see me again. Wil 
 you give me your arm, Mr. Temple ?" 
 
 I offered her my arm without a word. Lilla 
 looked at us both with wondering eyes. This 
 was a'll the wildest of mystery to her. She for- 
 got for a moment apparently even the trouble 
 that was oppressing her, in the surprise of see- 
 ing this unexpected acquaintanceship reveal 
 itself. 
 
 "Remember you promised to accept a seat 
 in my carriage," said Lyndon. "We are in 
 no haste ; we can wait as long as you please!" 
 " But I don't like the idea of any body wait- 
 ing for me. No, Mr. Lyndon ; pray excuse 
 me this once. Your niece, too, looks quite 
 tired and ill, and I think the sooner you take 
 her out of this the better." 
 
 Lyndon scowled and contracted his brow, 
 and looked at Lilla as if he could have found 
 it in his heart to say something rather sharp of 
 her illness, and her presence, and her existence 
 altogether. 
 
 "Oh, Lilla's very well," he snarled. "Are 
 you not ?" 
 
 "Quite well, uncle. I am quite well, in- 
 deed, dear Madame Reichstein. 
 
 " You don't look so, child. No, you must 
 go home, dear ; you will come and see me, will 
 you not? I have scolded your uncle before 
 now for not bringing you to me. Good-night, 
 dear." She kissed Lilla quite affectionatelv. 
 
 self driven into confusion, embarrassment, 
 constraint, and awkward silence. 
 
 My throat was dry, my lips were parched ; 
 the trail of her rustling dress along the walk 
 was the only sound that seemed to reach my 
 ears ; the fragrance of perfumes came faintly 
 from around her ; her hand rested on my arm. 
 I did not venture to look at her lest I should 
 meet her eyes, and, stricken by them, give out 
 my soul in some wild outbreak of love or an- 
 ger. 
 
 "Emanuel!" 
 
 The word came up low, sweet, and thrilling 
 to my ears. It pierced my heart. It seemed 
 as if between that word and the "Ade!" I had 
 heard her call from the window years and years 
 ago there was only an utter void. 
 Emanuel!" 
 
 Madame Madame Reichstein." 
 No ; not that name, Emanuel. Call me 
 )y the name you always gave me long ago. 
 
 "Good -night, Mr. Lyndon, and thafik you 
 very much." 
 
 "Good -night. But you will be at Mrs. 
 Levison's to-night, will you not ?" 
 
 "Really, I had quite forgotten. Oh yes, 
 certainly at least, I think so. Au revoir, 
 then." 
 
 Mr. Lyndon saluted me very slightly and 
 formally, and I saw him cast an appealing, dis- 
 appointed, impatient glance at Christina. It 
 was vain, however. She bowed graciously, 
 smiled sweetly, and then turned and led me 
 away. 
 
 All this time I was like one paralyzed of 
 speech. Not even that fiercest stimulus a 
 man's power of self-control can receive, the 
 consciousness that he is making himself ridicu- 
 lous, could spur me to the mastery of my feel- 
 ings and the faculty of unmeaning talk. * Late- 
 ly, when it had become apparently certain that 
 I must some time, and that soon, meet Chris- 
 tina, I had rehearsed over and over again the 
 manner in which I should demean myself. 
 Sometimes it was to be a dignified and haughty 
 coldness, sometimes an air of polite, genial, 
 easy indifference. But the one way in which I 
 was never on any account to greet her for the 
 first time was just that which I now found mv- 
 
 That at least is mine still." 
 "Christina!" 
 
 " Yes. I am still Christina. You must not 
 hink harshly of me, Emanuel." 
 "I do not. Heaven knows I do not. " 
 "You can not judge me,. and you must not 
 attempt to do so. I know by your manner now 
 that you think I have injured you." 
 
 "Think you have injured me! Think! I 
 look back on so many years of a life worse ten 
 times than any death, and you wonder whether 
 I think you have injured me !" 
 
 "Emanuel, if we begin reproaching, I too 
 have something to reproach. If we begin talk- 
 ing of years of suffering, do you think life has 
 been all a pleasure and a joy to me? If you 
 were disappointed, was not I? If you were 
 deceived, was not I ?" 
 
 "By me, Christina? Never. I I loved 
 you, you only, and with all my soul " 
 
 "Hush, hush, my friend, no more of that. 
 No, not one word. All that is dead and gone 
 long ago. Let it sleep. Why should we be- 
 gin raking up the past, and reproaching each 
 other, and making each other miserable? I 
 did not wish or mean to do so. I wished that 
 we should meet like old friends long separated, 
 who are friends in heart still. I have heard of 
 your success, Emanuel, and I congratulate you. 
 [ heard of it but now in Italy, where, look you, 
 you have friends. Greater success too you will 
 have yet. I was not surprised ; I always knew 
 it. And me look at me. Well, I have not 
 failed." 
 
 "No. You have indeed succeeded. You, 
 Christina, ^have realized your highest dreams ; 
 you have all you ever longed or prayed for." 
 
 " And you envy me, perhaps ? And look 
 coldly at me ? And wonder why I have suc- 
 ceeded so much better than others ? And will 
 join with my enemies in finding defects, and 
 blaming the prejudiced public which overrates? 
 No; I do not think you would do that. That 
 would not be like you." 
 
 "Christina, that you could even suggest it 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 shows that you do not know me. But, indeed, 
 you never did." 
 
 " Did I not ? But we will not talk of that. 
 Well, then, I have succeeded ; and you are just 
 on the verge of full success. They tell me we 
 are to sing together soon." 
 
 " So they tell me." 
 
 "Yes, I believe so; I suppose it will be. 
 In fact, I will have it so, although Mr. Lyndon 
 does not seem much to like it." 
 
 "What right of judgment has he?" 
 
 "Well, you know the right he has" and 
 she shrugged her shoulders "the right of the 
 man with the money who stands quietly in the 
 shadow behind the manager whose name is on 
 the bill. That right he has. But to me it 
 matters little ; I have my own way, or " 
 
 " Mr. Lyndon is a close friend of yours ?" 
 
 "I suppose so. I have a great many close 
 friends, and I hope I value them all exactly as 
 they deserve. You look coldly and strangely 
 at me, Emanuel," she said, suddenly changing 
 her tone of flippancy and cynicism, for the old 
 friendly pathetic voice, "and you seem as if 
 you too would judge me only by words, and 
 ways, and ^externals. If you will, I tell you 
 frankly beforehand that you will judge me 
 harshly as, perhaps, others do and you will 
 judge me wrongly, and I shall be disappointed. 
 Do not ; oh, do not ! We shall have to see 
 each other much in the future, and I should 
 like dearly to have one friend and brother." 
 
 Voices were close behind us ; and I heard 
 Madame Reichstein's name mentioned as if she 
 were sought for. 
 
 "This way, Emanuel, please; I see my 
 friends, and I must go with them. Is it not all 
 like a dream that we have met again ? Thank 
 you, Mr. Temple ; you will come and see me ? 
 Now, dear Mrs. Levison. Good -night, Mr. 
 Temple." 
 
 She gave me her hand, and said in a lower 
 tone, "Good-night, Emanuel;" and left me. 
 
 I sauntered vacuously back into the garden. 
 My brain was all in a whirl. I put between my 
 lips the cigar long since extinguished, and was 
 for a while unconscious that it did not burn. 
 A sense of disappointment mingled with all the 
 confused feelings that came up in my mind. 
 The Christina I had found was not like the 
 Christina I had lost. Something of sharpness, 
 of worldliness, of flippancy, seemed in her which 
 jarred and grated on me ; and yet now and 
 then some word or tone brought back all the 
 old memories, the ideal Christina, the strong 
 love. I tried to remember and dwell on only 
 the one delicious, pathetic sound which came 
 from her lips when she spoke my name, 'and to 
 put aside all association of her with the com- 
 
 *mon world with Lyndon's coarse and purse- 
 proud ways, with the kind of society in which 
 Lyndon strove to be a dictator, with the paltry 
 spites of cliques and the mean jealousies of 
 rivals. I tried to do this ; I did my best to suc- 
 ceed ; but the sense of disappointment outlived 
 my efforts. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 A BREAKING-UP. 
 
 I DID not want to meet Lambert or any of 
 my friends any more that night ; I had no mo- 
 tive for wishing to be home early ; I had no 
 motive, indeed, for wishing to do any thing, ex- 
 cept to get away from just the place where I 
 was : so I lighted a cigar and took to the road. 
 I walked from Richmond, choosing all the by- 
 ways and cii'cuitous complicated "short-cuts" 
 that could well be found, so that by the time I 
 arrived in town I was pretty well tired. I 
 looked into a theatre, and found it very dull ; 
 I dropped into a small and modest club of art- 
 ists and journalists and young authors, of which 
 I had lately become a member, and listened to 
 some of the ordinary gabble in the smoking- 
 room, about this man's piece and that man's 
 novel, and this other's overdone "business" in 
 the comic part, and somebody else's anger at 
 the malignity of the critics, who don't see the 
 merit of his wife's novel, and all the rest of the 
 kind of thing which one hears in such a place. 
 It was weary, or I was weary, and I hardly 
 talked to any body. 
 
 At last it grew late, and I went home. I had 
 resolved to stay out long enough to be certain 
 that I should find nobody stirring ; I was dis- 
 appointed, however. There were lights in the 
 little parlor ; I let myself in with my latch-key, 
 and would have gone up stairs, if I could, Avith- 
 out seeing any body. As I passed the parlor- 
 door, however, Lilla's voice called me ; I went 
 in, and found her looking very pale and weary 
 and sad. She was still in the dress she had 
 worn that day at Richmond. 
 
 "Not in bed yet, Lilla?" 
 
 "Not yet; I have been waiting up partly to 
 see you. Mamma is up too. I am going away 
 to-morrow, Emanuel." 
 
 " Going away ! Going where ?" 
 
 "I am going to Paris. I am going to have 
 a hand in a school there in a kind of partner- 
 ship with a person I know, a very clever sort of 
 woman, a Miss Whitelocke, who took quite a 
 liking to me, and has a very good opinion of 
 my capacity no great proof of her cleverness 
 is that, certainly." 
 
 " But this is very sudden ; you never spoke a 
 word to me of this before." 
 
 "No. Because nothing was certain, and I 
 hadn't made up my mind ; and we both have 
 our secrets, Mr. Temple, have we not? You 
 always spoke of me as your sister, Emanuel ; 
 but you seem to have kept something from me 
 which you would not have kept from your sis- 
 ter, and you allowed me once to exhibit myself 
 in a very ridiculous light. " 
 
 "Lilla, my dear girl, indeed there was no- 
 thing to tell. I did not know myself who she 
 was ; who Madame " 
 
 "I don't want to know your secrets, Eman- 
 uel, and don't look put out about it, for I am 
 not at all angry, and I think you showed 
 only your good sense in not trusting so silly 
 
84 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 a creature as I have always proved myself to 
 
 be. 
 
 "Indeed, indeed, Lilla, you don't understand 
 me ; you can't understand why I could not be 
 as frank with you as I could have wished to 
 be." 
 
 " Please let us not talk any more of that just 
 now. I am going away, Emanuel ; I must go 
 from this place. I must try to do something 
 for my mother, and make a home for her. Oh, 
 she has need of every help, and she has no one 
 but me no one. Every one despises her and 
 us both and I don't wonder." 
 
 "Your uncle, Lilla; does he know?" 
 "My uncle? Yes, he does. He scolded me 
 to-day, and and told me we were a disgrace 
 to him ; and so we are. And do you know 
 what he offered, Emanuel ? He offered to take 
 me into his house and keep me like a lady 
 like one of his own daughters, he said if I 
 would leave my mother, and promise not to see 
 her any more, except once a month, or some- 
 thing of that kind. My poor dear, loving, fool- 
 ish old mother ! She has made a slave of her- 
 self all her life for me ; and little return I ever 
 gave her." 
 
 "What did you tell him?" 
 " Well, I told him what he will remember. 
 I flashed out upon him, and told him just what 
 I felt ; not a word did I spare. I told him I 
 scorned his money and his kindness, and that, 
 please God, I would stand by my mother while 
 she lived ; and I am afraid I added that per- 
 haps some day one of his own daughters might 
 be invited to leave him, and might give a differ- 
 ent answer from mine. He was quite white 
 with anger. I didn't care I don't care. I 
 am glad I spoke out ; it did me good ; perhaps 
 it will do him good." 
 
 " Lilla, I always thought you had a fine, no- 
 ble nature ; now I know it." 
 
 " Noble nature ! nonsense. I am not going 
 to desert my poor mother now especially 
 that's all. But I waited up to tell you all this ; 
 and I want you not to say any thing to her 
 about the condition my uncle offered, for I 
 haven't told her that ; she would worry me to 
 death, poor soul, about sacrificing myself, and 
 stuff. And I want you to back me up ; to say 
 that every thing I do is right and wise, and for 
 the best, and all that. You will do this, Eman- 
 uel, like a kind, dear fellow, will you not? 
 And don't speak of any thing else, any thing 
 you may know or guess, or that Oh, you must 
 understand me ; but just tell her you think I am 
 doing the most sensible thing possible in going 
 to Paris." ' , 
 
 "But, Lilla, tell me do let me ask you 
 why are you doing this ? Do confide in me. 
 You may do so; I know all." 
 " All ?" she said, flushing up. 
 " Yes, my dear, all. I know, for instance, 
 what happened to-day. I knew it was coming. 
 Now, why can you not stay and make Ned Lam- 
 bert that true-hearted, manly, clever fellow 
 as happy as he asks to be ?" 
 
 "Emanuel, you have said you know all. 
 If so, you know my reason. I can not bring 
 disgraceful vexation on Edward Lambert ; and 
 to marry me just now would bring disgrace on 
 any man. Oh, I am so unhappy, so wretched ; 
 and I have been crying all the evening. I have 
 been silly and deceived all my life through, and 
 filled up with foolish and false notions and ex- 
 pectations ; and at last I know the whole truth. 
 It is enough to crush any one." And the poor 
 girl burst into tears. 
 
 "Have you told Lambert your reason," I 
 asked; "the reason of your leaving Lon- 
 don ?" 
 
 " I have not, I have not ; and I am ashamed 
 to say that I have still idle pride enough left in 
 me to conceal the truth from him." 
 
 "But really, Lilla, I must ask you is the 
 thing so bad as all this ? Are you not far too 
 sensitive? You can't suppose Ned Lambert 
 could be affected for a moment in his feelings 
 toward you by the fact that " I stopped, 
 rather embarrassed. What was I to say of her 
 father? This, of course, was the obstacle and 
 the disgrace of which she had spoken. 
 
 "No, Emanuel, I don't. Ah, L,know him 
 too well ; and for that very reason I will not 
 allow him to be victimized." 
 
 "But would you not allow him to judge for 
 himself?" 
 
 "No, Emanuel, no, no. Don't speak of it 
 to me ; pray don't. And, oh, I beseech of you, 
 I implore of you, don't tell him ! Don't let us 
 seem disgraceful in his eyes. Listen : I have 
 not been brought up well, Emanuel ; I need not 
 tell you that. I have not been made to care 
 much for truth and religion, and any thing oft 
 that sort ; and I am not religious, or particu- 
 larly good ; but somehow I never did see this 
 so plainly as of late, when I came to contrast 
 myself with others and with him. I don't think 
 I should have been fit for Edward Lambert at 
 my very best. I don't think poor mother and 
 myself are much the sort of people to make a 
 very delightful home for so good and noble a 
 man. But this last thing I have come to know 
 has decided me. Emanuel, have you seen my 
 father?" 
 
 " I have. I have known him for some time." 
 " And known who he was ?" 
 "Yes, Lilla." 
 
 " Yes. And you kept it to yourself, because 
 you did not wish to shame me ?" 
 
 " No, Lilla ; because I did not -wish to pain 
 you when there seemed no need of it, or no good 
 likely to come of your knowing it. It does not 
 shame you; it can not." ' 
 
 " Not in your eyes, perhaps, for 3^0 u know us ; 
 and you know it is no fault of ours- 5 at least, of 
 mine. Not in your eyes." 
 "Nor, surely, in his." 
 
 "Oh no, no; I know that. But it would 
 bring on him endless vexation and humiliation ; 
 and I should be a scandal to him, even though 
 he did not say it, or think it ; and I can not 
 bring him or myself to such a pass. I could 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 85 
 
 bring him nothing but disgrace, and that I won't I 
 bring him ; I think too highly of him. I feel 
 that I am doing right ; and I think it is the first 
 time in my life I ever resolved upon doing any 
 thing just because it was right. I have been 
 silly and frivolous enough ; but I have my feel- 
 ings, Emanuel, and my sense of honor, and my 
 pride, like other people." 
 
 "Lilla, my own," called her mother's voice 
 from below, "it is late, my dear, and you ought 
 to be in bed." 
 
 "Yes, mother, I dare say I ought; and ac- 
 cordingly I am not." 
 
 Lilla was going to make nay, had actually 
 made, and in very spirited fashion, too a great 
 sacrifice for her mother ; but she could not keep 
 from occasionally snubbing her. Good Mrs. 
 Lyndon was sometimes a trying dispensation to 
 a quick, impatient young woman ; indeed, she 
 was one of those good people who seem made 
 to be snubbed. 
 
 She came up herself presently, looking very 
 shaky and flustered. 
 
 " We're going away ; we're all breaking-up, 
 Emanuel," she said, looking inquiringly at me. 
 "Lilla's going in the morning." 
 
 "I know, Mrs. Lyndon." 
 
 "It seems sudden, don't it? And we were 
 just getting all to rights here,*after such trou- 
 ble and difficulty and work. But Lilla thinks 
 it's for the best." 
 
 "Yes, mamma; we've argued the point al- 
 ready quite enough, I think." 
 
 " She won't give in to her uncle, Emanuel ; 
 although you know that he's been so good to 
 her." 
 
 "Stuff, mamma! Now do stop, there's a 
 good woman." 
 
 "And you've heard something else, Emanu- 
 el? Have you told him, Lilly?" 
 
 "Oh yes, mamma yes." 
 
 "She's refused him, although he is so good 
 and kind, and so fond of her. Of course he is 
 not what I should have liked, and what I should 
 once have thought only right and proper for Lilla 
 to have. She ought to be a lady, and of course 
 Mr. Lambert isn't the sort of a person one had a 
 right to expect. Oh dear, there was a time when, 
 if any one had told me that a person in his posi- 
 tion would have thought of asking my Lilla to 
 marry him, I shouldn't have thought he could 
 be in his senses I shouldn't indeed! But you 
 know, after all, people must yield to their cir- 
 cumstances ; and what I say is, I never knew a 
 better or more worthy young man and doing 
 so well, too. I do think it's a pity ; but Lilla's 
 so willful." 
 
 "I suppose I was always willful, mamma, 
 wasn't I ?" 
 
 "Yes, my own, that you were; and such a 
 troublesome girl, many a time." 
 
 "Yet you were always fond of me, you dear 
 old woman." 
 
 " Fond of you, my love ? Ah, fond is no 
 name for it!" 
 
 "Well, then, you will continue to be fond of 
 
 me still, though I am much more willful now 
 than ever. Besides, if I was always so, it isn't 
 much use trying to be any thing else now. 
 ' What's bred in the bone,' mother ; and all the 
 rest of it." 
 
 Lilla was doing her best to carry it lightly, 
 saucily off. The effort was not very success- 
 ful. 
 
 ' ' Have you advised at all with Mr. Temple, 
 Lilla?" And the mother threw an appealing 
 glance at me. 
 
 " I have, mamma." And the daughter threw 
 an appealing glance at me. 
 
 "Yes, Mrs. Lyndon, I have talked with Lil- 
 la. I did at first speak to her as you have 
 done ; that is, to something like the same ef- 
 fect. I did think she might have married poor 
 Ned Lambert at once, instead of postponing it. 
 But I must say that she has spoken to me in a way 
 which shows me that she has clear and strong 
 reasons, and a feeling that we must not try to 
 counteract. You must let her have her way, 
 Mrs. Lyndon. I think we may trust her that 
 she is guided right ; and I hope and believe I 
 shall see her and you, and Ned Lambert too, 
 happy, quite happy, before long." 
 
 "If it please God," said Mrs. Lyndon, with 
 a half querulous sigh, which seemed to say that 
 one couldn't always rely upon Providence to do 
 exactly the sort of thing one wanted. 
 
 "You don't mean to see him again, Lilla?" I 
 said, turning back as I was about to leave them 
 for the night ; " not in the morning, before you 
 go?" 
 
 " Oh no, Emanuel ; it would do no good. I 
 don't want him to know until after I am gone. 
 You will give him this little packet, please, from 
 me ; it's only a poor little keepsake ; and you 
 may tell him, if you like, how sorry I was for 
 going ; and you will put it in the best light you 
 can, and make him see that it can't be helped. 
 And you may tell him, if you like, of my grat- 
 itude to him, and and of my unchanging 
 love." 
 
 She fairly broke down at last into sobs, and 
 signed for me to leave her. 
 
 I left her with deep regret, and sympathy, 
 and pity. I confess it seemed to me that she 
 was making a needless and Quixotic sacrifice ; 
 but from her point of view what she was doing 
 was clearly right, and I could not but admire 
 the quiet, resolute spirit with which she had 
 chosen her way and walked whither it led her. 
 I felt in this regard a thorough admiration for 
 her. A sort of pariah myself, I always feel a 
 special and natural pride in any brave good 
 deed done by one of my caste. It is the 'busi- 
 ness and the inheritance of the Brahmins to be 
 brave and good, and to think no little of their 
 own bravery and goodness ; and they do Hot 
 want the admiration of such as I am. But 
 when the courage and virtue are shown by one 
 of those from whom we do not expect any thing 
 of the kind, then I am inclined to wave my cap 
 and cheer. We hear of all sorts of self-sacrifice 
 in books, and even in real life ; some of it of a 
 
86 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 very stony, implacable, and self-tormenting kind, 
 which I at least can not find it in my heart ei- 
 ther to love or pity, but only shudder at, and pray 
 to be kept forever out of the presence of its si- 
 lent icy rebuke and self-assertion. Self-sacri- 
 fice is indeed the model and pet virtue of the 
 age ; and some of us are always inclined to re- 
 bel against models and pets. Moreover, it is al- 
 most always exhibited by somebody from whom 
 it is naturally to be expected the noblesse of 
 whose virtue, personal and inherited, obliges 
 its owner to such deeds of devotion ; it is. done 
 under the impulse of lofty religious inspii'ings, 
 it is preached up by good and authorized preach- 
 ers, it is sanctified with holy texts, it is illu- 
 mined and encouraged by hopes of everlasting 
 reward, and the eternal society of harps and 
 seraphs. My poor little London pagan had no 
 such stimulants and encouragements. Her sac- 
 rifice was not made as a slave performs a duty, 
 or as a courtier denies himself now that he may 
 have the greater thanks hereafter. It was al- 
 together the impulse of native honor and noble- 
 ness and love above all, love. It thought of 
 no reward, here or beyond ; it was all sacrifice. 
 It was foolish, perhaps, in one sense ; but there 
 are some of us in whose eyes even Virtue looks 
 most attractive when she is a little irregular 
 and unorthodox in her ways. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 "THOU HAST IT, ALL!" 
 
 So our dreams had come true at last ; our 
 wildest hopes had been realized. We had both 
 succeeded. Christina and I sang together dur- 
 ing the remainder of that season at the best 
 house. She was the great success and idol of 
 the hour ; I was, in my own way, a success too 
 greater than I had ever expected. Just think 
 of the changes time had worked for me with 
 unthought-of liberality. Only a little while ago 
 I was poor horribly, bitterly poor ; a man to 
 whom the fare of a hansom was an expense to 
 be avoided and fought against. Now I had, 
 for a bachelor, plenty of money, and spent sov- 
 ereigns heedlessly where even two years ago I 
 dared not lay out shillings. Now I had a name 
 that was known pretty well every where that 
 is, where people talk about singing. Now I 
 was once more restored to the society of Chris- 
 tina. We sang together ; our names were con- 
 stantly and of necessity coupled. I saw her al- 
 most every night. We were applauded togeth- 
 er ; I led her before the curtain at every recall ; 
 I gathered up her bouquets for her. On the 
 stage I was always associated with her ; off the 
 st^ge I could see her when I pleased. We 
 were now in very reality swimming together, 
 and side by side the success we used to dream 
 of and rave about years ago. 
 
 Was ever mortal so blessed of the gods as I ? 
 
 Let me answer in a sentence. My life was 
 unhappy, and I was sinking every day in my 
 
 own estimation deeper and deeper. I was be- 
 coming demoralized. 
 
 I have already said that during my long sep- 
 aration from Christina her memory was my 
 preservation from any thing mean or low or de- 
 grading. How did it happen that association 
 with her now seemed to produce just the op- 
 posite effect ? 
 
 To begin with, I could not any longer under- 
 stand either her or myself. She was no longer 
 "my Lisette. All the freshness of her nature 
 appeared to have been washed away. Her soul 
 seemed somehow to have contracted ; the brand 
 of the world was on her. The bloom was off 
 her cheek, and, as I believed, off her heart. 
 Yet she fascinated me as she did others ; and I 
 clung to her, and walked in her shadow, and 
 was unhappy without her, and unhappy and dis- 
 appointed with her. 
 
 Except when on the stage. There, and only 
 there, I saw my Christina. I have avoided, 
 and shall avoid, a cold and lengthened descrip- 
 tion of her as a singer and an actress. But she 
 delighted me, and, I could have almost said, 
 she surprised me. Her voice was as it had al- 
 ways been, more remarkable perhaps for its 
 clear, bright, vibrating strength than for the 
 softer and sweeter tones ; but the great charm 
 about her was Ahe perfect unity and harmony 
 of her acting and her singing. She did not 
 quite belong to that grand and classical line of 
 singers which seems for the present to have 
 closed with Grisi ; neither had she any thing in 
 common with the school of the pretty musical 
 humming-top, the warbling butterfly, which is 
 just now our pet ideal. Her voice and her 
 style expressed romantic, not classic, passion 
 and love and tragedy. She was always a wo- 
 man; never a goddess. But her whole soul 
 was infused into what she sung. She was to 
 the grand classic singers what Victor Hugo is 
 to Racine. Into mere piquancy and prettiness 
 she never degenerated. 
 
 I admired her greatly, wholly. In every 
 thing she did there was the unmistakable pres- 
 ence of genius. But when I strove to criticise 
 her calmly, putting myself into the position, as 
 well as I could, of the average public, and 
 asked myself, "Will her fame last?" I was 
 forced to reply, "I do not think so." 
 
 In the first place, she was not careful of her 
 voice. She exerted its powers with a gener- 
 ous carelessness, a splendid indiscretion. Each 
 time she appeared on the stage she seemed 
 to have said to herself, " This night I will do 
 my very best, no matter what my state of 
 health or strength : let to-morrow care for it- 
 self." 
 
 But, again, I doubted for the permanence of 
 her noble, natural, thrilling style in its hold on 
 public favor. It was not the lofty, the god- 
 dess-like, the terrible, which made other great 
 singers irresistible in their power; and it had 
 nothing to do with the saucy fascinations and 
 joyous little nightingale trillings which set vul- 
 gar audiences, no matter how high their social 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 87 
 
 rank, into ecstasies. There was neither terror 
 nor trick about it. 
 
 It was difficult for me to criticise even thus 
 far, for I hung upon her voice and her success 
 es like the most devoted lover. The first time 
 we sang together I was almost indifferent abou 
 my own success, so completely was I wrappec 
 up in hers. 
 
 On the stage, then, she was all I could have 
 expected, the very danger which I feared for 
 her coming only from the truth and integrity 
 of her artistic genius. But the moment she 
 ceased to be a lyric queen and became Chris- 
 tina Reichstein I could hardly now call her, 
 even to myself, Christina Braun she disap- 
 pointed me while she most fascinated me. 
 had to go away from her in order to bring the 
 true Christina back into my mind. 
 
 She coquetted with any body every body 
 who paid her homage with, for a long time, 
 one exception, myself. Of course I hung on to 
 her like an idiot ; I did indeed still passionate- 
 ly love her ; but it was a long time before one 
 glance of encouragement invited me on. Un- 
 derstand that this in itself was often to me a 
 flattering and a maddening incitement. She 
 seemed, I sometimes thought, to hold me apart 
 from all the rest seemed to say, " I may flirt 
 with others and play with them, but not with 
 you. We stand on different ground. We must 
 be lovers or nothing." I now believe Chris- 
 tina acted in this from a high deliberate motive ; 
 I do believe she thought the memory of our 
 past too sacred to be profaned by any contact 
 with the commonplace and frivolous flirtations 
 in which it was sometimes her humor to in- 
 dulge. Then I thought, according to my mood, 
 that she was resolved to repel me utterly, or re- 
 solved to make me her slave ; and I sometimes 
 adored and sometimes hated her. 
 
 Perhaps I might have taken heart of grace 
 and broken loose altogether from her, and stood 
 up and been free, but for the expression with 
 which I sometimes only sometimes caught 
 her eye resting on mine. Old, sweet, sad mem- 
 ories seemed to shine in it, and to bring our 
 hearts together for the moment once again. 
 This happened more often when we were on the 
 stage than at any other time. Always the mo- 
 ment my eye thus met hers she turned away, 
 and her expression and manner changed ; and 
 when next I met her she was sure to be colder 
 than ever to me, and perhaps to be more osten- 
 tatiously friendly than ever to somebody else 
 whom I especially disliked. There were many 
 whom I disliked on her account, believing one 
 week that she surely cared about them, and 
 finding out the week after that she held them 
 in the most absolute and supreme indifference. 
 Thus, then, the season mooned away. Thus 
 it came about that, though I had succeeded, 
 was the tenor of the season, and at the best 
 house ; sang with Christina Reichstein, helped 
 toward her success, and shared it ; saw her fre- 
 quently off the stage she received her friends 
 at her lodgings in Jermyn Street on Sunday 
 
 evenings, and one or two off afternoons in the 
 week was a constant visitor, and perhaps 
 ought to be very happy I was distracted, dis- 
 appointed, and miserable. 
 
 What on earth was the reason why I so 
 hated to see Christina acting and singing with 
 any body but myself? What was it to me? 
 Nevertheless I always felt keenly annoyed when 
 the chances of the situation flung her literally 
 into the arms of some stout basso, who proba- 
 bly felt no emotion whatever except anxiety 
 about his own part, and its effect on the au- 
 dience. She acted with such genuine and art- 
 istic effect that I sometimes became ridiculous- 
 ly annoyed. She clasped her operatic fathers 
 and lovers with a clasp apparently as fervent 
 and impassioned as if they were genuine fathers 
 or lovers, or only lay and feeling] ess figures. 
 She never thought of them at the moment, as I 
 knew well who had to embrace her publicly a 
 dozen times a week perhaps, and knew how ut- 
 terly absorbed in her lyrical art, and how ab- 
 solutely indifferent to me, she was all the time. 
 It would be idle to deny that stories of her 
 past life were whispered about which it was tor- 
 ture to hear, even though I knew that there was 
 no word of truth in them. I was got into a 
 silly row with a fellow who named the very year 
 in which he knew, he said, that she was living, 
 au cinquieme in a house in the Quartier Latin, 
 with a young artist whom she afterward threw 
 over, and who accordingly took to absinthe, and 
 finally to the Montmartre Cemetery. The 
 story-teller fixed upon the very year before 
 Christina's father died, and when she was living 
 peaceably and working hard, for a girl, in our 
 quiet old town by the sea before ever she had 
 set foot on Paris pavement. I hardly ever, in- 
 deed, heard any story, good or bad, told about 
 her which my own personal and certain knowl- 
 edge did not enable me to contradict. One 
 reason for this was, that so far as her recent 
 years her years of growing celebrity were 
 concerned, nobody had a word to say against 
 tier. Her life had left no opening for suspi- 
 cion, or even for calumny. But a beautiful and 
 attractive woman in that line of life, who has 
 cruelly sinned by her sudden and signal suc- 
 cess, must have done wrong some time or other, 
 you know ; and as there is nothing to be said 
 against her during the years which were passed 
 ander our own observation and those of our as- 
 sociates, the inference is obvious the error 
 must have been committed in the obscurer 
 ears before we came to know any thing about 
 ner. Therefore three out of every four of the 
 stories whispered about her referred to those 
 'Id dear early days when her life surely was one 
 >f the calmest and purest that even a German 
 girl could live. 
 
 There was apparently some mystery about 
 her marriage. That she was married appeared 
 o be certain ; most people said she was a wid- 
 >w. Ned Lambert did not know ; he said he 
 always took it for granted that she had married 
 he Italian who had her educated and brought 
 
88 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 out, and that he had died, or they had separa- 
 ted somehow. This was the only scrap of mys- 
 teryif it was mystery about her ; and she 
 lived an open, frank, and fearless life, absolute- 
 ly like one who had nothing to conceal. A 
 steady, elderly German woman always lived 
 with her ; a woman of some intelligence and 
 education, with a great eye for artistic make- 
 up, and a good business memory a sort of 
 compound of poor relation, paid companion, 
 and lady's-maid. 
 
 Christina never talked to any body of her 
 past life, or indeed much of herself 'at all. She 
 had a great many friends, and was free, friend- 
 ly, and joyous with most of them. 
 
 I made slight allusions several times' to the 
 old town of her early life and mine ; but she 
 did not seem inclined to go back to any such 
 memories, although she showed not the slight- 
 est embarrassment on the subject. Once, at 
 last, when I had again made allusion to it, she 
 seated herself at the piano and sang, as her 
 only answer I believe to an air of her own 
 composition a little ill-humored ballad by a 
 German poetess, whose name I now forget, ex- 
 pressing entire disregard and contempt for all 
 the associations of the poetess's native town and 
 early days, except for the memory of an old 
 tree which pleasantly shaded her childhood. 
 I ceased after that to say any word which might 
 remind her of that past from, which she had 
 evidently made up her mind to be wholly sev- 
 ered. 
 
 What I detested most was to see her haunt- 
 ed by the presence of Mr. Lyndon, M.P. He 
 was always in attendance on her ; and I hated 
 him. He ignored my existence when he could ; 
 I avoided meeting him when I could. There 
 was something about his manner to me which 
 was always strangely ii'ritating ; all the more 
 so because there was nothing in it on which a 
 man could reasonably found any cause of of- 
 fense. His manner ever seemed to say, "You 
 are not a person to be received by me as an 
 equal. I know what you were, and that is what 
 I always choose to think you. Others may re- 
 gard you as a successful artist, and so, being 
 like myself professed patrons of art, may admit 
 you to their intimacy. I don't choose to see 
 your success, or to care about it. You may be 
 tolerated by Madame Eeichstein ; that is no 
 reason why you should be tolerated by me. I 
 may make myself a slave to her openly and 
 ostentatiously ; that is no reason why I should 
 be so condescending to you" I am afraid there 
 was something mean in my dislike of him ; my 
 detestation of his cold arrogance, his insolent 
 money-pride, his bearing even among those of 
 our artist's circle whom he specially favored. 
 His very homage to Christina I thought had 
 something offensive in its ostentation. It al- 
 ways seemed to say, "Behold what so great 
 and grand a personage as I can do for beauty 
 and art ! I can come down from my serene re- 
 spectability and be the cavalier in service of a 
 singing- woman." 
 
 Christina, however, did not seem to regard 
 his attentions in that light. She encouraged 
 him, flattered him, trifled with him, coquetted 
 with him; sometimes had long and serious talks 
 with him in the corners of crowded rooms. He 
 took her to the Ladies' Gallery to hear the de- 
 bates on nights when there was no opera. He 
 hardly ever spoke himself, or intended to do so ; 
 but he was a steadfast Whig party-man ; and 
 people said ministers thought a great deal of 
 him, and that he might have been in office if 
 he liked. He was often on the platform^- 
 sometimes in the chair at Bible-society meet- 
 ings and missionary meetings ; and he was dead 
 against opening places of amusement or even 
 the British Museum on Sundays. He had his 
 vices, but they were very quiet and decorous. 
 His looks and his ways with women the women 
 I usually saw him with had a cold, consuming 
 sensuousness about them which I thought -de- 
 testable. He had been married twice, and now 
 had long been a widower; and he had the re- 
 pute of being the very best of fathers, especial- 
 ly devoted to his younger daughter, who never 
 thwarted him, as her rigidly religious sisters 
 did, on the score of his operas and his singers 
 and his liking for the ballet. I never could 
 quite understand how a man could be greatly 
 devoted to his daughter, and wholly unscrupu- 
 lous as regarded her sex in general. But it 
 seemed Mr. Lyndon was so. People admired 
 him for the former peculiarity, and thought 
 none the worse of him for the latter. He was 
 commonly set down as an excellent man, of 
 great ability and influence ; and most persons 
 paid court to him accordingly. 
 
 He was, I discovered, a great patron of rev- 
 olution. Refugees from disturbed continental 
 countries were constantly seeking him out and 
 being taken up and patronized by him. Chris- 
 tina, too, seemed always interested in that sort 
 of thing ; and they evidently used to have semi- 
 official conferences about it. Observing this, I 
 of course began to detest and despise all conti- 
 nental refugees ; to regard them as humbugs, 
 like Mr. Lyndon, and to think oppressed na- 
 tionalities nuisances and shams. I could not 
 believe that Christina really cared much about 
 such business ; and for Mr. Lyndon I set it 
 down at once that he had no other interest in 
 it but that it ministered to his own consequence 
 and importance. In fact, he was a patron, and 
 only kind or even civil to those who approached 
 him as such except, of course, women, who, 
 when they were good-looking, carried claims 
 of their own about with them which commend- 
 ed them to Mr. Lyndon's attention. More- 
 over, he seemed to take a sort of pleasure in 
 watching the smallness of human nature even 
 in those he paid court to ; and he laughed a 
 short and sharp little laugh over any small hu- 
 miliation to which his closest favorite might 
 happen to be put. 
 
 Thus .the man presented himself to my ob- 
 servation. I never knew any thing worse of 
 him than just what I have told or indicated ; 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 89 
 
 but I strongly disliked him ; and as, thank 
 Heaven, I never approached him as one ap- 
 proaches a patron, or recognized his right of 
 patronage, he never was any thing better than 
 coldly civil to me and not even that when he 
 could with decency avoid it. If afterward I 
 may have pained or injured the man, not quite 
 without malice, I may at least explain why it 
 was that from the first and to the last I detest- 
 ed and despised him. 
 
 Christina sometimes gave suppers at her 
 rooms (please to remember that I am describ- 
 ing the ways of ten or a dozen years ago), and 
 I used to meet some of her sister-singers there, 
 and one or two military men, and a few of the 
 leading critics, whom no actor or singer is ever 
 indifferent about conciliating. I was generally 
 found at these gatherings, chiefly because, al- 
 though I hated to be there, I could not help 
 myself, and had not the spirit to stay away. 
 They seemed to me entirely frivolous, hollow, 
 heartless. Christina herself appeared to have 
 sunk quite down to the level of her surround- 
 ings. The conversation was for the most part 
 mere gabble and gossip and satire. Every one 
 paid court to the ruling artists who happened 
 to be present by sneering at their absent rivals. 
 Hostile critics were denounced and no doubt 
 calumniated. Stories were told of the presents 
 made by such a tenor to such a critic to ex- 
 plain the tremendous puffs with which this or 
 that journal, defying all audiences and musical 
 science and common-sense, flamed in the fore- 
 head of the morning sky. Counter-insinuations 
 were made about the diamond rings, and other 
 temptations yet more bewitching, with which 
 this or that soprano or contralto had vainly 
 sought to corrupt the impregnable honor of 
 another critic who happened to be one of the 
 company. 
 
 The literary gentlemen did not appear to 
 have much more esprit de corps than the sing- 
 ers. If the latter babbled all manner of hissing 
 stories against their rivals, the former listened 
 complacently and even assentingly to the keen- 
 est insinuations against the honor and the 
 trust- worthiness of brother critics. The critics 
 seemed to have an enormous estimate of their 
 own power ; and not an unreasonable estimate, 
 judging from the court paid to them by those 
 who ought to be best able to appreciate their 
 influence. No one seemed to think much about 
 the public at all. It was quite a matter be- 
 tween the artists and the critics. If these ap- 
 proved of and wrote np those, the thing seemed 
 to be done. 
 
 From my own point of view it did not thus 
 appear to me. I had always relied on the au- 
 dience rather than on the critics, and indeed 
 had been somewhat ignored by the latter. I 
 owe them no ill-will on that account. Frank- 
 ly, they were right. Even then I had arrived 
 at a very fair estimate of my own merits. I 
 knew even then that I had a voice and nothing 
 else. My soul was not in the art ; and I felt 
 satisfied that some time or other this must be 
 
 found out by the public. I was quite aware 
 that I had not one reiy of the inspiration which 
 lighted the soul and the eyes of Christina 
 Reichstein in some of her great parts. I knew 
 that I was little better than a musical automa- 
 ton ; but I was a success with the audiences for 
 all that. The opera-house and the concert- 
 room filled for me ; and had my voice only en- 
 dured I must have made a fortune. The critics 
 could not do much to serve me ; and they seemed 
 rather too puzzled by my success to go boldly in 
 for attacking me. 
 
 One evening I remember in particular. Some 
 dozen or so supped at Christina's rooms. It so 
 happened that this night she took hardly any 
 notice of me certainly distinguished me in no 
 way from the most commonplace of her ordina- 
 ry visitors. Mr. Lyndon sat at her right hand, 
 and paid her devoted and undisguised attention, 
 which she took with a quiet assent that half- 
 maddened me. On her left sat a distinguished 
 critic and litterateur, who had written successful 
 plays and successful novels, published capital 
 translations of various foreign works, edited 
 scientific volumes, compiled biographies, and 
 even varied the more laborious occupations of 
 his life by appearing occasionally as an amateur 
 actor. He had an astonishing power of con- 
 versation ; he could talk with marvelous fluency 
 and vivacity on all subjects, and almost in all 
 European languages. To this gentleman Chris- 
 tina always intimated that she owed a great deal. 
 He had been, it would appear, one of the first 
 to note and to welcome her success. He was, 
 too, as I afterward heard from her many a time, 
 one of the few who understood that she was 
 something more than a mere singer. Indeed, 
 the criticisms he had published about her did 
 show a deep and genuine appreciation of all 
 those qualities of her voice, her lyric style, her 
 dramatic power, which were most truly great 
 and peculiar. There was nothing in him which 
 was not apparently sincere and manly. It did 
 not ven then surprise me that he had mani- 
 fested no particular admiration for my genius 
 and merits. He had taken my success, such 
 as it was, quietly, and as one whom nothing on 
 the part of the public could astonish ; and he 
 had said nothing ill-natured, or satirical, or even 
 distinctly depreciatory of me, only said just as 
 little of me as might be habitually recorded 
 the fact that I won applause, and so let me go 
 on my way. 
 
 Ordinarily I should have felt little of anger to- 
 ward any body who, like myself, did not think me 
 a great sinjfbr. But this particular night I felt 
 altogether out of humor with myself, and natu- 
 rally therefore inclined to be put easily out of 
 humor with every body else. I was beginning 
 of late (for reasons to be more fully explained 
 presently) to doubt myself, to suspect that I 
 was capable of playing a mean and ignoble part, 
 to look on myself as capable of servile love and 
 low-minded rancor. I was beginning to be 
 ashamed of my slavish hanging after Christina's 
 skirts, and to feel abashed and perplexed by 
 
90 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 other weaknesses too. I thought I saw myse 
 sinking, and that others to/> must see it. So 
 came prepared, despising myself, to resent an 
 slight from another. 
 
 I soon became exasperated when I saw tha 
 to the critic I have spoken of Madame Keich 
 stein ostentatiously paid special attention th 
 night. She flirted with him in the most feai 
 less and determined manner; it appeared t 
 me, with some definite purpose : whether fo 
 the discomfiture of myself or Mr. Lyndon 
 could not determine. The critic, who had flirt 
 ed doubtless with all the prima donnas of th 
 previous tsn years, entered very vivaciousl 
 into the game, and of course took it in precise 
 ly the spirit in which it was started. But 
 chose to be deeply offended ; and the mor 
 deeply I drank for comfort and desperation, 
 paid extravagant attention to a little French 
 woman (a new singer) beside me, who was her 
 self drinking Champagne with amazing zest. '. 
 either saw, or thought I saw, some smiles pass 
 ing around at both of us, and especially i 
 seemed to me that a look of surprise and con 
 tempt came up on the face of Christina's pel 
 critic. Impelled by Heaven knows what idiotic 
 impulse, I jumped on my feet and proceeded to 
 address the astonished little company. I com- 
 plained that I had been insulted ; I poured ou 
 some frantic nonsense, especially composed of 
 denunciations of critics and literary men. ] 
 saw Mr. Lyndon raise his double eye-glass, sur- 
 vey me coolly for a moment, and then drop his 
 glass and resume his conversation with his 
 neighbor, as if nothing I could do ought to be 
 surprising or worth any particular notice. 
 Looks of anger, contempt, pity, or disgust were 
 on every face, and one I could see even then 
 wore an expression of such surprise and shame 
 and sorrow, that it might almost have brought 
 me back to my senses. 
 
 I believe I displaced the mirth, broke the 
 good meeting. But I really am not quite cer= 
 tain how the matter ended, except that I was 
 assisted to a cab by a brother artist and the 
 very critic I had been so absurdly denouncing. 
 And I have a pretty clear idea, as shame flashed 
 a gleam of consciousness over me, that I heard 
 the former say to the latter: "Never saw him 
 like this before, I'm sure; can't think what 
 came over him. He is a very good fellow gen- 
 erally, I can assure you." 
 
 And the critic replied: "Yes; I have no 
 doubt he is a good fellow, and he has an un- 
 commonly fine voice ; but what a confounded 
 fool he must be!" 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 % SWEARING ETERNAL FRIENDSHIP. 
 
 BITTERLY and severely did I echo next morn- 
 ing the opinion of my friend the critic. What 
 a confounded fool I had made of myself! was 
 the first thought present to my mind. How she 
 
 must have despised me ! How steadily I had 
 been sinking of late ! This proof, the most 
 grotesque and ridiculous humiliation I had 
 ever been put to, was perhaps not the sharpest 
 proof of a lowered nature which pricked my 
 conscience. 
 
 For I had yet a conscience and a sense of 
 honor. I have read somewhere a story of a 
 prince to whom a loving fairy gave a magical 
 ring, which was to be his guide and guard 
 through life. Whenever he did wrong, the ring 
 was to prick his finger sharply, in propor- 
 tion to the magnitude of his fault. He erred 
 and erred ; was pricked and pricked. At last 
 he could not stand the thing any longer ; and 
 so he angrily plucked the ring off his finger 
 and flung it away. For a while he was per- 
 fectly happy, and could do as he liked un- 
 pricked of conscience. But of course I need 
 not say that he went to the bad utterly un- 
 less, perhaps, the fairy came in and somehow 
 redeemed him in the end. Now I had not 
 thrown away my ring, and I felt its sharp press- 
 ure very keenly even if I had not conscience 
 and spirit enough to do right, and thus avoid 
 ts censure. 
 
 Two things, at all events, I must do. I must 
 make an humble apology to Christina, and an- 
 other to Mr. Levison, the critic. The latter 
 gave me no troubling thought ; I knew he would 
 receive it like a gentleman, and, indeed, that he 
 was not likely in any case to feel much about 
 he matter. But to meet Madame Reichstein 
 ind talk of my shame to her was something 
 [uite different something I dreaded. Per- 
 aps I dreaded it none the less because I saw 
 low altered were our relations now ; and I ex- 
 acted from her none of that tender, forgiving 
 nterest with which women who care for us as 
 overs, or brothers, or friends, are only too hap- 
 >y to anticipate our penitence and cover our 
 umiliation. 
 
 It had to be done, however ; and with an 
 ching head and dogged heart I set about do- 
 ng it. I lived now, since the Lyndons had 
 eft London, in the same house with Edward 
 -ambert. We had taken lodgings together ^n 
 rompton ; and though our hours and ways 
 iffered so much that I sometimes did not meet 
 im for whole days together, we were still 
 riendly as ever, with only one or two subjects 
 n which we suspended, rather than withheld, 
 eciprocal confidence. All this I shall present- 
 T come to ; for the moment I pass it by. 
 
 This particular morning I was glad not to 
 ee him ; I did not want to talk to any body, 
 dressed myself as carefully and well as I could ; 
 ut it seemed, as I nervously and often scruti- 
 zed my appearance, that I could not get a cer- 
 ,in dissipated and rowdy look out of my eyes 
 nd hair. All that tubbing, and sponging, and 
 rushes, and pomade, and perfumery could do 
 as done energetically ; but I still thought the 
 >wdy look remained, like the blood-spots on 
 ady Macbeth 's hands or Bluebeard's key. My 
 ul sickened at the thought of breakfast. I 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 91 
 
 rejected eggs and toast and kidneys, and would 
 not look at the Times. When something like a 
 reasonable hour had approached, I started on 
 my errand, and walked to Jermyn Street. 
 
 When I stood at the door, this soft and sun- 
 ny noon, I could not but think of the drear and 
 dripping night when, prouder of soul and purer 
 of heart than now, I stood at this same door and 
 sought Christina in vain. Since then I had 
 many times crossed the threshold, but never 
 sought to speak with her alone and face to face. 
 If we were to speak together now, in a room 
 alone, it would be for the first time since the 
 night when she called a farewell to me, and the 
 rose dropped from her bosom. 
 
 I sent up my card, was invited to come up, 
 and I found her alone. 
 
 The room was small, elegant, with nothing 
 even in the graceful carelessness of its appear- 
 ance to remind one of the profession. Every 
 thing was^quiet, unpretentious, and even home- 
 ly-looking. Christina had been playing on the 
 piano and singing in a low tone as I came ; 
 and when I entered the room she had just 
 turned round and was rising to meet me. She 
 was dressed in a morning-robe of purple cash- 
 mere, or some such material, with a white rose 
 in her bosom. The color of the dress made 
 her bright complexion, luxuriant fair hair, and 
 deep dark eyes look even more striking and 
 dazzling than they were wont to do, and her 
 hair now fell around her as unconfined and 
 careless as when it used to rouse the spinster- 
 like anger of good Miss Griffin in the choir 
 long ago. Rising from the piano, she threw 
 back her hair with one hand and with an im- 
 patient toss of the head, and then held out her 
 other hand to me. She scarcely looked up, 
 and our eyes did not meet. 
 
 " You see," she said, with a smile, "how en- 
 tirely without ceremony I receive you. My hair 
 is in terrible disarray ; but if you will make such 
 early morning calls what can one do ?" 
 
 " I ought to apologize to you for coming, and 
 I would do so if I had not so much more serious 
 an apology to make. I am ashamed of myself, 
 Madame Reichstein, and of the world ; and, 
 most of all, of you." 
 
 "What an alarming preface! What have 
 you done ?" 
 
 " It is useless kindness, Madame Reichstein, 
 to profess ignorance. You know only too well 
 what I have done to shame myself, and what I 
 have come to apologize for. Don't, Christina, 
 don't force me to think you have really lost all 
 interest in me by telling me that you were not 
 angry with me, or ashamed of me, for what 
 happened last night." 
 
 I had till now been standing, and Christina 
 had not left her music-stool. While I was 
 speaking she rose and came toward me. 
 
 "Emanuel," she said, gravely, "I am glad 
 to hear you speak in this way. I am glad in- 
 deed ; and I will not go on in the tone I tried 
 to take. I was angry with you for for what 
 happened last nighj;. I was angry, and deeply 
 
 pained, and ashamed on your account. I 
 could not recognize you last night ; but I am 
 glad to believe you could not recognize your- 
 self, and mv mind is much relieved. I have 
 thought of it ever since ; but now, if you bid 
 me, I will think of it no more. You are not 
 changed, Emanuel? Not really changed, I 
 mean? You have not allowed the world to 
 corrupt you ? There was a word or two which 
 used to be favorite with you once about keep- 
 ing the whiteness of the soul. You have kept 
 the whiteness of your soul, nicht wahrf" 
 
 She spoke with a friendly, confiding tender- 
 ness and frankness, as unlike her ordinary man- 
 ner now as my drunken display of the previous 
 night could be to my penitent sadness of this 
 morning. 
 
 "I hope I have not changed wholly, Christi- 
 na. I hope so. But times have changed, and 
 most people round me ; and I sometimes think 
 and fear that I have been allowing myself to 
 sink into something of which once I should have 
 been ashamed." 
 
 She laid her hand gently on mine. 
 
 "Emanuel, I too fear it. I have watched 
 you closely from friendship, believe me ; and 
 I do fear that you are allowing yourself to 
 well, not to improve." 
 
 " Can you wonder at it ?" I interrupted her, 
 in bitter tone. "What have I to care for? 
 Why should I care for myself? If I have 
 changed, have not you changed ? Are you the 
 same that you were ? Do I not see that you can 
 fling yourself into a frivolous and foolish life?" 
 
 "Do you want answers to all these ques- 
 tions, Emanuel ?" 
 
 " No, I don't ; I have no right to ask them. 
 I have nothing to do with your way of living, or 
 your friends, or the people you allow to hang 
 after you, or the reports that other people spread 
 about I want no answer, Christina ; but when 
 you reproach me with having changed, and 
 sunk, and all that, I can only " 
 
 "Tell me to look at myself, Emanuel, and 
 bring my moral lessons to bear there, you were 
 going to say." 
 
 " No. I was not going to say that, although 
 But I was not going to say it, indeed. I was 
 only going to say that I never set up for any 
 thing for great moral purpose, or nobleness, or 
 virtue, or any of that sort of thing. I take my 
 color most men do -from the hues of those 
 around them. You, Christina, were my dream 
 for long, long years ; and you know it. Well, 
 I am awake ; and I can't pretend to be dream- 
 ing any more. We are all poor creatures, I 
 suppose ; and I accept the situation, and don't 
 set up to be any better than my neighbors. I 
 am heartily ashamed of what I said and did last 
 night, and I apologize profoundly for it. I of- 
 fended you, and insulted your guests, and made 
 a beast and a brute of myself; and it is very 
 kind of you to receive me at all after such a 
 scandal. But for the rest I have not much to 
 say. I have not improved of late ; and that's 
 all." 
 
92 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I could not keep back the bitterness of my 
 soul; it found relief, and I was not sorry 
 Christina did not wince, however; no, not in 
 the least. 
 
 " Emanuel, zwischen uns sei Wahrlie.it. Yot 
 remember the old scene v& Iphigenlaf- Between 
 us be the truth'! You think I have greatlj 
 changed, and for the worse?" 
 I made no answer. 
 
 "Come, speak out!" she said, impatiently 
 " You think I have become worldly, and friv- 
 olous, and cunning, don't you ?" 
 "Sometimes I do, Christina." 
 " I asked you when we met for the first time 
 I mean the first time since long ago not to 
 judge me merely from the outside. I don't 
 show to advantage, and I don't always want 
 to ; but I don't wish to lose your good opinion 
 wholly, Emanuel; the more as you seem to 
 make my falling off a sort of excuse for your 
 own. Come," she said, and she sat in a chair 
 and pointed me to another "come and tell 
 me my faults. Be a friend, and speak out. I 
 have spoken frankly to you." 
 
 "To-day, just for this moment, you have." 
 "To-morrow, perhaps, I shall be cold and 
 careless and frivolous ; very likely I shall seem 
 so. You, I might have thought, could judge a 
 little better than by mere seemings. Well, 
 will you tell me my faults ?" 
 
 "No; and I have not been speaking of 
 faults ; only of the change that seems to have 
 
 come over you. 
 
 "Then I will speak for you. You think I 
 have no heart and no memory, and no care for 
 any thing but flattery and excitement ?" 
 
 "I have lately thought so." 
 
 "Then you are wrong, Emanuel; indeed, 
 indeed you are. I have a sort of part to play, 
 and I must play it. I do not deny that I love 
 praise and excitement ; but I could have loved 
 other things better ; and I still am no more in 
 heart what you commonly see me than I am 
 Amina or Leonora." 
 
 "Why do you keep that old man hanging 
 after you ?" 
 
 "I might reply by another question, and say, 
 What right have you to ask ? I might evade 
 the question for a moment, as most women 
 
 "Then you know nothing of my life for the 
 past few years ?" 
 
 " Nothing. Except, of course, what all the 
 world knows.'' 
 
 She sighed audibly. 
 
 " I am glad of it," she said ; "you shall know 
 it all some time before long, perhaps, but not 
 now. For a while, Emanuel, take me on trust ; 
 I am better than I seem. Listen, and I will 
 speak to you as I never meant to speak to you 
 again. Your good opinion is dear to me. Your 
 friendship I would have if I could. Once, 
 Emanuel, I loved you better than all things on 
 
 sxcept 
 
 earth, except see how frank I 
 success." 
 
 I could not repress a groan ; and I rose from 
 my chair and turned partly away. 
 
 " But I always dreamed of that success with 
 you. And you loved me; but not so deeply 
 and wholly no, don't speak ; if I am stayed 
 now I shall never be able to continue not so 
 deeply as I would have had. We went our 
 ways, hoping to meet again before it should be 
 too late. We did not so meet ; it was too late. 
 When I wrote to you in London, Emanuel, it 
 was too late." 
 
 " No, no, Christina no, by Heaven ! It was 
 the idlest chance, the purest delusion, the error 
 of a kindly, well-meaning friend that made you 
 * " 
 
 All that I have since learned or guessed. 
 But I did not and could not know it then ; and 
 rou kept yourself hidden away until I hated 
 ron. and myself for the unwomanly advance I 
 had made, and the silence that followed it." 
 
 I never knew, I never dreamed, that Mile. 
 Reichstein was Christina Braun ; and I was poor 
 ind obscure and hopeless, a beggar without a 
 lame." 
 
 "Well, it is vain talking ; let all that be laid 
 side. It is now too late, and Providence has 
 indly ordered it for the best. I have only 
 rought back all this that I may say one thing 
 or myself. I have chosen another part in life, 
 nd I mean to play it faithfully and loyally to 
 the end. Therefore, Emanuel, I have kept 
 back from you, and received you not even as a 
 friend. If we were friends, you might come to 
 know in time why I do things which appear to 
 
 would, I think, and innocently ask, What old you now strange. I can not have you think 
 man ? But I suppose of course you mean Mr. ' 
 Lyndon. Well, Mr. Lyndon has long been an 
 intimate friend of mine, and " 
 
 "And is likely soon to be more, people say." 
 
 Do they? 
 do thev say ?" 
 
 How kind people are ! What 
 
 'Well, five out of every six say you will mar- 
 
 ry him.' 
 She smiled. 
 "Indeed! And the sixth who I 
 
 suppose 
 
 has reason to know better what does he say on 
 the subject?" 
 
 " Even he, I think, knows no particular rea- 
 son to the contrary." 
 
 "Do you know no reason to the contrary?" 
 
 "None whatever." 
 
 badly of me. Your word, Emanuel ; can we be 
 friends ?" 
 
 She held her hand out frankly, and her eyes 
 met mine. 
 
 "You do not speak. Will you be my 
 friend ? Your word, and I shall expect that, 
 once pledged, it shall -be as your oath. Will 
 you be my friend ?" 
 
 I could not answer for a moment; I could 
 not answer unconditionally at all. For half a 
 life I had loved her ; lately I had almost hated 
 her. How could I in a moment promise to sub- 
 side into pure and enduring friendship ? I saw 
 that in her eyes there came a look of anxiety 
 and pity and pathos. She leaned now on the 
 chimney-piece, and looked. steadfastly at me. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 03 
 
 I was about to speak, but she raised her hand 
 to enjoin silence. I remained silent, and with- 
 out moving. The street outside was singular- 
 ly quiet. It seemed as if sleeping in the hot 
 glare of the sun. From where I stood I could 
 see through the window only a part of the far 
 side of the street. There was no life stirring 
 there; not even a hurdy-gurdy was heard. For 
 the few seconds we remained silent not a cab 
 rattled down the street. In the room nothing 
 was heard but the ticking of the little gilt clock 
 on the chimney-piece. When, as we stood and 
 looked at each other, a piano-string suddenly 
 snapped, the clang came so loud and sharp on 
 the ear that Christina positively started. 
 
 Then, in the silence which followed, I heard 
 just what I had heard before, in fact, as 
 Christina broke off our conversation three bars 
 of what seemed to be an operatic air, but which 
 was certainly unfamiliar to me, whistled in the 
 street below. The whistle was of a somewhat 
 peculiar kind, shrill and sibilating; and the 
 whistler stopped suddenly short at one particu- 
 lar note each time ; almost as a bird does which 
 is trying to learn some air from its master, and 
 can not get over some difficult turn, and so 
 stops and begins again. I marked all this now 
 because my ears and senses were on the stretch 
 for something ; otherwise I should never have 
 paid any attention to it, or perhaps even been 
 aware of the sound at all. It was, however, 
 the only sound to be heard ; and it was clear 
 that Christina was listening to it with all her 
 ears. 
 
 Her face, from paleness, had grown to a deep 
 flush of excitement, and her lips quivered visi- 
 bly. When the whistling had the second time 
 reached the same note she sighed audibly, as 
 with profound resignation or profound relief, 
 one could not tell which. 
 
 " Has any thing happened ?" I asked. 
 
 " Oh yes ; something has happened. Some- 
 thing very unexpected. I must ask you to leave 
 me, Emanuel." 
 
 " Two words only. Nothing bad?" 
 
 "No; something good very good. I did 
 not expect it yet. I ought to be deeply thank- 
 ful ; I am thankful. Good-morning, Emanuel. 
 Please don't ask me any more ; and don't 
 stay." 
 
 She was all trembling, and quite eager and 
 excited. I obeyed her and put no further ques- 
 tions, but hurried from the room. Just as I 
 was leaving, her German companion or follow- 
 er came in, looking excited too, but seemingly 
 in a wholly joyous sense. She came like one 
 who brings good news. 
 
 When I reached the street I could see nobody 
 on either side of it who seemed likely to have 
 been the mysterious whistler. A man was 
 wheeling a barrowful of fruit, wrapped in blue 
 papers, along toward the St. James's Street end. 
 A policeman was tramping the other way. A 
 girl, with a roll of music in her hand, and petti- 
 coats high kilted, passed close to me. Other 
 human beings near at hand I could not see. It 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 did not seem likely that any one of those I had 
 seen could have had the faculty of startling 
 Christina by whistling the fag-end of a tune, 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 AN EXPLANATION. 
 
 THE conversation I had just had with Chris- 
 tina will help still further to explain a little of 
 my past life. It was certain that I had degen- 
 erated since the renewal of our acquaintance- 
 ship. Life has to be got through somehow aft- 
 er the heaviest disappointment ; and not often 
 in real existence can we raise a Rolandseck 
 over the wasted scene of frustrated love and 
 ruined hope, and go and be pious and patient 
 there. It was only after I had met Christina 
 again that the full bitterness of the thought 
 came to me that I had no longer any thing to 
 live for. While we were separated there was 
 always an object, if not a hope. Now there 
 seemed neither. I confess that I sank a little 
 way into a sort of unmeaning joyless dissipa- 
 tion, for which I had naturally no taste, and 
 into which I could not by any possibility throw 
 my soul. The Champagne of the night and the 
 headache of the morning just a little distractec 
 me, and no more. Ned Lambert sometime 
 shook his honest head and tried a gentle lacon 
 ic remonstrance ; with the usual effect. I have 
 no doubt he spoke to Christina on the subject 
 and urged her to bring her influence to bear 
 Perhaps to this I owed the pledge of friendship 
 we had just made. 
 
 Any how, the pledge of friendship did no 
 procure me much more of Christina's society 
 or apparently of her confidence. There was 
 perhaps a warmer pressure of the hand when 
 we met ; and there was occasionally a deeper 
 shade of interest and anxiety in her eyes as 
 they rested on me for a moment. Sometimes 
 I fear I only set this down to her dread on the 
 score of my degenerating habits; and I felt 
 rather inclined to resent than to feel grateful 
 for it. 
 
 No explanation had come or suggested itself 
 regarding her sudden emotion on the day when 
 our ceremonial of friendship -vowing was so 
 strangely interrupted. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon of course often came to the 
 Opera. One night, just about this time, I ob- 
 served him enter the stalls rather late. He 
 came in along with a tall, thin, dark-bearded, 
 remarkable-looking man a man with a high 
 forehead, sloping rather back and seamed with 
 premature wrinkles ; a man with a face which 
 would have been stern and sharp in its expres- 
 sion but for a certain soft and melancholy sweet- 
 ness in his liquid, luminous eyes. There was 
 something about this man's appearance which 
 attracted me in an instant; and I could not 
 help thinking it attracted Christina too, for I 
 observed that from time to time she glanced 
 under her eyes in the direction where he and 
 
 Lyndon sat ; and she was too much of a true 
 artist ever to think under ordinary conditions 
 of sending her eyes roaming about the house in 
 search of admiration. If you could have got a 
 boxful of emperors, Christina Reichstein would 
 have scorned to sing at them. So I had some 
 reason for silent surprise when I observed that 
 she did now and then glance quietly in the di- 
 rection where this man was sitting with his 
 friend. He was, I perceived, usually very 
 marked and emphatic in his applause. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon and this man escorted Christina 
 to her little brougham after the Opera. Need- 
 less to say that I did not feel much inclined to 
 obtrude myself on such company. Christina 
 saw me, and called a friendly good - night, 
 with two or three words added in German, 
 which bade me see her as early as possible 
 next day. Mr. Lyndon and I exchanged, as 
 usual, a very cold salute. 
 
 As I turned away I met a brother artist, 
 whom I saw exchanging a salute a little more 
 friendly with the dark and pale-faced stranger. 
 " Who's our friend ?" I asked, nodding in the 
 direction of the stranger, who had gone with 
 Mr. Lyndon to the carriage of the latter. I 
 threw an immense amount of scorn into my 
 voice; why, I don't know. He to whom I 
 spoke was a Frenchman. 
 
 J' But I have forgot his name. He is an Italian 
 indeed, that goes without saying and he is 
 going to be a lion of your salons here for a season, 
 I am told. He is a patriot ; he is an escaped " 
 "Convict?" 
 
 " Convict yes ; that is, Austrian convict, or 
 at least Austrian prisoner." 
 
 "I thought he had a look of Toulon about 
 him." 
 
 "Nothing of the sort. You are not sympa- 
 thique; nor I, indeed, no more. He has es- 
 caped somehow from Spielberg, or death, or 
 something, and he is going to agitate your 
 country to take up arms for the independence 
 of Italy. And she will ! Oh yes ; England 
 will spend all her moneys, and her powders and 
 shots, and her cottons, just for a dream." 
 "But this person?" 
 
 "Well, that is all I know. He is a very dis- 
 tinguished man quite celebrated." 
 "Whose name you have forgotten." 
 Yes, and of whom I never heard before." 
 How did you come to know him ?" 
 Madame Reichstein did me the honor to 
 present me." 
 
 How does she know him ?" 
 Oh, for that, my dear, you must not ask 
 me. Perhaps your Lyndon has taken him in 
 charge." 
 
 Ah, very likely; he patronizes illustrious 
 breigners a good deal." 
 
 "But rather when they are injupons than in 
 jantaloons, is it not ? Where are you going ?" 
 "Home, I think." 
 
 Ridiculous at this hour ! Come and have 
 a game of billiards." 
 
 Thanks not to-night." 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 95 
 
 "Come at least and smoke a pipe." 
 "No; I can't to-night." 
 Indeed my pipe was quite put out for tha 
 evening. I can not tell how it was that I cam< 
 to associate the man I had seen in the stalls 
 with the scene in Christina's room the other 
 day ; but I did so associate him in my mind a 
 once. When, as she was leaving the theatre 
 she asked me to come and see her next day 
 asked me in pressing tones, and in German (we 
 hardly ever spoke German to each other now 
 I felt in some strange way that my conjecture 
 was confirmed. I went home moodily, expect- 
 ing something painful, I hardly knew what. 
 
 Christina received me very graciously when 
 I visited her next morning very graciously and 
 sweetly. There was a pathetic, anxious sort of 
 kindness about her manner which was not usual 
 with her of late. She was embarrassed, too ; 
 and her thoughts seemed dwelling on any thing 
 rather than the subject we first talked of. For 
 a few minutes there was indeed an awkward 
 pause every now and then in the conversation 
 we carried on, as if each was expecting the 
 other to put some question or begin some ex- 
 planation. 
 
 We spoke a few words about Ned Lambert 
 and his love, and his separation from Lilla Lyn- 
 don, of which Christina appeared to know a 
 good deal. I made some allusion to the one 
 great cause of Lilla's resolution to leave Lon- 
 don, and found that Christina seemed to under- 
 stand or have guessed it. 
 
 " That, too, I know," she said. "You speak 
 Df the wretched man, Stephen Lyndon ?" 
 
 "I do." 
 
 " I did not know his real name or his real na- 
 :ure until lately." (Here she paused.) "But 
 [ don't want to speak of him just now. I have 
 sent for you for another purpose, Emanuel." 
 Another pause and then she said : " I am go- 
 ing to introduce you to-day to a man whose 
 'riend I want you to be ; for my sake first, and 
 ;hen for his own. I wish you and him to be 
 riends, and I wish that you should know our 
 secrets. You saw me speak to a tall and dark- 
 laired Italian last night ?" 
 
 "I did." 
 
 * ' He will come here to-day. He is my hus- 
 jand." 
 
 Carlo Farini Salaris. He had a title and or- 
 ders and honors ; but he dropped them all be- 
 cause he was disappointed in Charles Albert, 
 and in others too. He had two passions in his 
 life music and his country. Chance brought 
 him to know me when I was a poor girl an ad- 
 venturess, many people would have called me 
 a beggar almost. He liked my voice ; he 
 had faith in me; he had me educated; he 
 brought me out. All that I am he made me. 
 All that I could do for him in return I have 
 done, I am doing." 
 
 "I knew that that you had been married, 
 Christina. I did not know that your husband 
 was living." 
 
 "Nor must you know it now. Understand 
 me, it is a secret only known to you, and per- 
 haps one or two others. He has only lately es- 
 caped from an Austrian prison, where he was 
 sent for the part he took in Lombard plots and 
 revolutions. He has escaped only, I fear, to 
 take part in other plots. Think how happy the 
 life of his wife must be ! I can help him, how- 
 ever, in many ways while I am not known to be 
 his wife. I have carried the fiery cross for him 
 from the Alps to the Straits of Messina, when 
 not even Austrian or Neapolitan police suspect- 
 ed the German soprano of being an emissary of 
 the revolution. Ah, it would be a long and 
 weary tale to tell ; it is a sad memory ! In this 
 way I hold my life at his disposal, and my hap- 
 piness. I will plot for him, scheme for him ; 
 smile while I know that he is in danger, flirt 
 when every moment I think to hear news of his 
 death. This is the only way in which I can re- 
 pay him : I owe him all. " 
 
 " Surely you have given him something that 
 might repay any thing he has done for you?" 
 
 "I have given him all I could, Emanuel; 
 and he was generous eri'ough to have confidence 
 in me, and to believe that I would have given 
 "lim more if I could. Listen, and I will speak 
 to you with a frankness which others might 
 misunderstand, but you will not. I will speak 
 to you as if I were a ghost come back from the 
 rave, to whom the world could no longer have 
 reality, and who had nothing more to do with 
 mman hopes, and loves, and misunderstand- 
 ngs, and all the rest of it. Even before I had 
 made a success of any kind, he would have mar- 
 ried me, and I would not. You know the rea- 
 on why. I succeeded through him altogether. 
 3e pressed me again and again tenderly, del- 
 cately, like a man with a noble nature. I was 
 Doming to England. For the first time since I 
 ad left it, you understand. He guessed why 
 I was coming, and I told him all." 
 " All ? All of the past, or" 
 " I spoke to him as freely as some of his own 
 :ountrywomen do to their confessor. I told 
 lim that I loved you yes, I am not ashamed to 
 ay it now, and I was not then and that my 
 learest hope was to find you. And he said", 
 with his melancholy smile, ' Go to England ; 
 >ut if you do not find him, or have any cause to 
 hange your purpose, then promise me that you 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 will come back to me.' I went to England, 
 and you know the rest Fate was against us." 
 
 "Fate was cruelly against me!" I said, start- 
 ing up ; " Fate was against me! And you too, 
 Christina! You threw me away at a word; 
 you had done so before. Don't tell me of love 
 you never loved me ; you were too glad to 
 escape from me ; you had your ambition and 
 your career, and you followed your destiny.. 
 Well, I don't blame you, and I am not sur- 
 prised. Peace be between us for the future, 
 and let us be friends if you will ; only do not 
 torture me to no purpose by trying to persuade 
 me that that might have been which never could 
 have been. Well, forgive me for interrupting 
 you " 
 
 "You have not interrupted me; the story is 
 all over. It was not very long to tell." 
 
 "Oh no; let me finish it. You saw me; 
 and I was poor and obscure ; and you found no 
 difficulty in taking the chance word of a good- 
 natured, thoughtless girl as decisive of my fate ; 
 and you hurried back, and married your friend 
 and patron, who had influence and power. You 
 were grateful to him quite right ; and he ex- 
 acted his recompense for what he had done, and 
 you gave him yourself as his reward. Well, I 
 offer you my congratulations, and to him too. 
 I am late in the expression of my good wishes, 
 but you must remember how well you kept the 
 secret of your happiness, and that I thought you 
 were a widow, not a wife." 
 
 I saw Christina's cheek flush, and her eyes 
 first sparkle and then fill with tears; but I was 
 not in a mood to be stayed. Every thing seemed 
 to have conspired to make me savage, and some 
 infernal spirit within appeared to drive me on, 
 adding word to word. 
 
 "Emanuel!" 
 
 " Yes ; I thought you were a widow. So, I 
 suppose, did your other friend and patron, Mr. 
 Lyndon. He surely is not in your secrets ? Or 
 is he supposed to be your husband's friend, ap- 
 pointed to console you, and give you courage in 
 his absence and his dangers ?" 
 
 " I have at least had no reason, as yet, to re- 
 pent of any confidence I may have placed in 
 him, as I have now to repent of the confidence 
 I placed in you. Emanuel, I know you will be 
 ashamed of your bitterness and your cruelty, 
 and I forgive you beforehand. I know you 
 have reason to complain. I owe you some- 
 thing, too ; let me pay a part of my obligation 
 by bearing patiently any insult you may choose 
 to offer. You do not know how cruel you are. 
 I have striven to be a devoted and loyal wife to 
 my husband, as a brave German woman ought 
 to be ; and I have suffered much ; and if I have 
 had my ambition, it has not been fed for no- 
 thing, or bought without heavy penalty; and 
 of the old days nothing remains ; and now you 
 insult and scorn me. It is much ; but I bear 
 it for the sake of old memories." 
 
 She had been seated on a sofa. She now 
 stood up and leaned against the chimney-piece, 
 and tossed her bright mass of hair buck over 
 
 her shoulders with the old familiar impatient 
 action of one whom the weight of it oppressed 
 in a moment of excitement. She looked so 
 like the Christina of old' that my anger melted 
 away, and I bitterly repented my hasty words. 
 
 "I am always asking you to forgive me, 
 Christina ; I must ask you now again, sincere- 
 ly and humbly, for pardon. I was very bitter, 
 and rude, and brutal, and I knew how unjust 
 I was even at the time. But I only ask you to 
 make some allowance for me. You know how 
 I loved you. Oh, I am speaking now only of 
 the past, and I might say it if your husband 
 stood there ! I loved you deeply. No woman 
 can be loved so twice in a life." 
 
 " I know it, Emanuel, and I do forgive you, 
 freely and fully, your harsh words. You too 
 must make allowance for me. My life is an 
 anxious one in many ways. So far it has been 
 a failure ; and yet the best has passed. When 
 I look at you, Emanuel, and make you my own 
 mirror, I see that I too am no longer young. 
 What a handsome, fair -haired boy you were 
 when I first saw you ! How many years ago ?" 
 
 "Twelve years ago." 
 
 " How old are you now ? You may tell me ; 
 I shall not betray confidence." 
 
 "I don't know thirty-two or three." 
 
 "Ach Gott! so old! And I am but that 
 does not concern you to know. Yes, youth is 
 gone for both of us. I am talking wildly to- 
 day, am I not ? Yes, I can't help it ; but I 
 don't often get into these moods. Youth is 
 gone." 
 
 She turned to the mirror over the chimney- 
 piece, and still keeping back her hair, gazed 
 intently into her own face. Truth to speak, 
 with all its lustrous beauty, there were faint, 
 faint marks under the eyes, which hinted mourn- 
 fully of Time's premature footprints. 
 
 "I Avas handsome, Emanuel, when a girl 
 was I not ?" 
 
 She spoke without turning to me. 
 
 "You were beautiful ; but surely you must 
 know that you are still" I was going to say, 
 "that you are still beautiful;" but the expres- 
 sion of her face was so entirely abstracted and 
 distraite that the compliment, if it could be 
 called one, died tipo'n my lips. 
 
 " Yes," she went on, almost as one who talks 
 in a dream, "I was very handsome, and very, 
 very ambitious. I thought I was born for 
 something great born, perhaps, to conquer 
 the world. You could not know how ambi- 
 tious I was, and how my heart was set on suc- 
 cess ; and nothing has come of it, after ail." 
 
 "Nothing! and you the most successful of 
 the day ?" 
 
 "Yes, the most successful of the day, but 
 who will be the most successful of to-morrow ? 
 I shall sing, perhaps, another season or two, 
 and then be forgotten. I know well enough 
 that I am not like Giulia Grisi. There is a 
 singer to be remembered. I shall be extin- 
 guished when I cease to sing. My success 
 will die with the echo of my voice. I have 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 97 
 
 HOW MANY YEARS AGO?" 
 
 often thought that I am like the man in my 
 much-loved Schiller's play, who says he staked 
 his happiness and his heaven on being a hero, 
 and in the end no hero was there, only a fail- 
 
 ure.' 
 
 G 
 
 She leaned now on the chimney-piece, and 
 still contemplated her own face. I dare say an 
 ordinary looker-on would have thought there 
 was something theatric and self-conscious in 
 her attitudes and her ways. I did not think 
 
98 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 there was. From her childhood almost she 
 was little more than a child when first I knew 
 her there was that rare and striking harmony 
 of mind and body in her which made every 
 word find unconsciously its natural expression 
 in some gesture or attitude. This was not sure- 
 ly, one would have thought, a German attri- 
 bute. Still less was it a faculty any one can get 
 up, or even cultivate. It came by nature. It 
 made her a successful actress ; it made her 
 seem natural on the stage, because every ac- 
 tion expressed so easily and gracefully the emo- 
 tion which suggested it ; it made her seem the- 
 atric oif the stage, because so few people either 
 will or can allow their moods to find any out- 
 ward expression beyond that of voice and com- 
 plexion. 
 
 She suddenly turned to me, and going back 
 to the earlier part of our conversation, she said : 
 
 " You think I kept all this purposely a secret 
 from you?" 
 
 I knew, of course, she meant her marriage 
 and its story. 
 
 "I did think so, Christina." 
 
 "Well, perhaps it was partly a secret at 
 least, until I could learn what sort of person 
 time and change had made you. Perhaps you 
 did not at first show yourself in a manner which 
 greatly invited confidence. Perhaps I fancied 
 that you already knew nearly all the truth. 
 Perhaps I may have thought " and she stopped 
 and sighed, and then smiled a strange, nervous, 
 painful smile I did not like to see. Then she 
 made a quick gesture with both hands as if she 
 flung the subject from her, and came back to 
 her seat. Looking at her watch, she said : 
 
 " My husband will be here soon. You know 
 now why I was so much confused and embar- 
 rassed the last day you were here ?" 
 
 " Yes ; that was his signal I heard ?" 
 
 " It was. He always whistles those few bars 
 first once, then again with the slight varia- 
 tion ; and I know he is coming. That is, you 
 understand, when I have not seen him for some 
 time when his coming is unexpected ; and it 
 may be necessary to make some preparation to 
 get rid of inconvenient visitors " 
 
 " Like me ?" 
 
 "Like you that last day, before he knew you 
 or had given me leave to trust you. Oh, I am 
 thoroughly disciplined and obedient to him, be- 
 lieve me. I have heard that whistle in many 
 places in places where I knew that a mistake 
 or a delay, or a precipitate motion on my part, 
 might involve his discovery and his death. I 
 did not expect to hear it so soon, although I 
 knew that the plan for his escape out of the 
 Lombard prison was in good hands and pro- 
 gressing well. I have not a genius for conspir- 
 acy, Emanuel, and they don't trust me much 
 with details ; even lie does not. I wait and 
 watch and keep the secrets, and do faithfully 
 as I am told. And I have denationalized my- 
 self for his sake, and forgotten my country ; 
 indeed, had I not forgotten it long ago ? and I 
 have learned to hope that the German soldiers 
 
 may one day be chased across the Alps. My 
 husband is a man to inspire any one with his 
 own hopes and his own will, as you are sure to 
 discover before long." 
 
 A card was put into Christina's hand, and 
 she directed that the visitor should be shown 
 up. 
 
 " It is he" she whispered to me when the 
 servant had left the room. "Here, just now, 
 he is only on my ordinary visiting-list. He is 
 to me an Italian patriot who honors me with 
 his acquaintance no more." 
 
 In a moment Signor Salaris entered. 
 
 I do not know whether he had expected to 
 find her alone, but in the mere flash of time 
 from his announcement to his reaching Chris- 
 tina, I saw three distinct changes of expression 
 in his face. His wife stood at%ne side of the 
 chimney-piece, nearly opposite the door ; I had 
 fallen back to one of the windows looking into 
 Jermyn Street. As he came in I could see 
 him, but he, naturally looking directly before 
 him, did not see me. He crossed the threshold, 
 therefore, with the formal bow of an ordinary 
 visitor, and the corresponding expression. Ap- 
 parently then, as he only saw his wife, he as- 
 sumed that she was alone, and his pale face 
 lighted up with a warm and bright expression, 
 and he seemed for the instant, the second, like 
 one rejoicing to throw off a weary disguise. 
 And then he saw me ; and with a change quick 
 as the motion of light itself, his countenance 
 subsided into the genial, courteous expression 
 of one who presents himself to a friend. Prob- 
 ably no unprepared eye could have noted these 
 changes. I saw them clearly, and they were 
 significant of a character and a life. 
 
 Christina reassured him with a smile and a 
 few words. 
 
 "My dear Carlo, here we are all friends, 
 and 3*ou are my husband, not my visitor." 
 
 "Then this gentleman," he said, turning to 
 me and speaking in excellent English, though 
 a little slow and with a deep Italian accent, 
 " this is Mr. Temple ? I might have known 
 him, indeed. I have seen and heard you more 
 than oncte, Mr. Temple, but I did not at first 
 recognize you. I offer you my hand ; I am, if 
 you will allow me, your friend." 
 
 I gave him my hand, and we exchanged a 
 cordial grasp. I think both our faces flushed. 
 I felt mine grow hot. I know that across his 
 pale cheek something faintly approaching to a 
 crimson tinge came flashing, and a strange sud- 
 den spasm passed over it. Can we be friends ? 
 Here is the man who has robbed me of Chris- 
 tina; can I be his friend, sincerely, truly? 
 
 I think so ; at least I will try. I like the 
 expression of his face ; I like his soft dark li- 
 quid eyes, with an expression at once wild and 
 gentle and beseeching in them, like the eyes of 
 a gazelle ; I like the contrast they present to 
 the rigid, deep-thinking, inflexible expression 
 of the brow and the lips and the chin. I feel 
 sure this man has an unconquerable will, and a 
 pure tender heart. He is artist and conspirator 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 99 
 
 in one. He ought to have lived centuries ago, 
 and been a minstrel and a patriot at once. Or 
 he ought to have lived half a century back or 
 thereabouts, and been a Girondist and led the 
 chorus of the Marseillaise on the day when he 
 and his brothers went out to die. 
 
 Yes, I liked the man at once ; and as I looked 
 from his face to Christina's and noted her ex- 
 pression, I liked him all the better, for I felt an 
 indescribable pang of sympathy and pity o for 
 him. His liquid loving eye looked melancholy 
 when it turned on her, and hers sank beneath 
 his glance. 
 
 We talked like friends. He told me of his 
 escape from prison in a pleasant simple kind of 
 way, very agreeable, and even fascinating, to 
 hear. There was a quiet modesty about all he 
 said relating to himself that won upon one im- 
 mensely. We talked of music and art, on 
 which he was almost eloquent. When for a 
 moment the conversation lapsed into what may 
 be called generalities and^onventional talk, he 
 subsided into silence, and his mind evidently 
 withdrew itself altogether into its own habitual 
 thoughts. 
 
 I noted that Christina's eye always quietly 
 followed his expressions of feature ; I noted 
 that the moment he lapsed into silence she 
 changed the conversation, appealed directly to 
 him with some question or gther, and drew 
 him forward again. I think I read their story. 
 " She has given herself to him," I thought, 
 " and she esteems him, -and fears for him ; and 
 she would love him if she could. But she can 
 not, and she knows it ; and neither is happy. I 
 read in his face high aim, and courage, and ab- 
 solute self-devotion, and brooding perseverance 
 and failure. Whatever his hopes, they are 
 doomed to fail." 
 
 Heavy and blank was the first feeling of dis- 
 appointment with which I left Christina's house 
 that day, knowing as a certainty and for the 
 first time that she had a living, loving husband. 
 But was I only disappointed was the disap- 
 pointment utter and without shade? Was 
 there not some vague perception of a sense of 
 relief? Month after month, year after year, I 
 had worn myself out with almost unendurable 
 agony of longing and disappointment, hopes and 
 sickening pangs of despair ; and now at last the 
 doubt and the conflict of feeling were over, and 
 I was released from the struggle. Now the 
 torment of hope was quelled ; now the worst 
 was known; now thej|kterness of death was 
 past. Many a man fBlps, says the jailer in 
 Scott's romance, the night before he is exe- 
 cuted, but no man the night before he is tried. 
 Yes, I felt a sense of Belief. I should tor- 
 ftture myself with doubt wd hope no more. I 
 should Avalk up and down my room of nights 
 trying to^ squeeze hope out of every word she 
 had uttered, every glance I had caught as 
 shipwrecked sailors becalmed on a burning 
 southern sea stmve to squeeze moisture out of 
 rags no more. I should rehearse what I could 
 say when next we met, or lament that I had 
 
 not said this and that when last we met no 
 more. I should now be able to drudge through 
 my life unvexcd because hopeless. A resolve, 
 too, came up at once with a great new pang of 
 relief. I had become a singer and taken to the 
 lyric stage to please her, to Avin her, to prove 
 to her that I could succeed ; now I would give 
 it up. I would cease to sham an artist's part, 
 for which I really had no true taste or soul. I 
 would go to some other country, to America, 
 and see my brother. How fraternal we all 
 grow, how we think of far-off brothers and sis- 
 ters and mothers, when some woman has thrown 
 us over ! We are all like the gamester in the 
 famous classic comedy of France, who only re- 
 members her to whom, he owes his duty when 
 the luck of the night has gone against him. 
 I might have lived long enough content with 
 very rare and passing scraps of news from my 
 brother, but now a sudden and surprising ten- 
 derness had sprang up in my heart, and I won- 
 dered how I had existed so long without seeing 
 him; and I quite resolved to go out to the 
 States, and perhaps, with strch money as I could 
 get together, join him in some new Western 
 settlement, and be a farmer. I thought of my 
 own stout and sinewy arms and rather athletic 
 frame, and came to the conclusion that, after 
 all, digging, or felling trees, or hunting, was 
 the sort of thing for which Nature had clearly 
 intended me. 
 
 In a word, I was used up, and wanted a new 
 and freshening life. I envied my Italian friend 
 his schemes and his aspirations, and thought I 
 should dearly like to have an oppressed nation- 
 ality to plot for. and if needs were, die for; 
 and I really wished I could, even through his 
 nfluence, get up within myself a sort of bas- 
 tard philo-Italianism, and fling myself into the 
 cause of Italy as so many Englishmen were be- 
 ginning to do even then, and as Byron and 
 Stanhope, and Hastings and Finlay, and so 
 many others, had done for Greece. But I was 
 never much of a politician ; and I was so sick 
 of the stage that I recoiled from the notion of 
 converting my individual life into a new piece 
 of acting. I had long come to think, and I do 
 still think it seriously and profoundly, that no- 
 
 thing in life no, nothing whaflver is so envi- 
 able as the capacity to merge one's individu- 
 ality and very existence wholly in some great 
 cause, and to heed no personal sacrifice which 
 is offered in its name. I don't much care 
 whether the cause be political, or artistic, or 
 scientific, or what not ; let there but be a cause 
 to which the individual is subjected, in which* 
 he freely loses himself, and I hold that man 
 happy, if man can ever be happy at all. Nev- 
 er had it been my fortunate fate to have found 
 such an object. My own profession never gave 
 it to me. Therefore I accounted existence so 
 far a failure. I had tried many modes of activ- 
 ity and amusement, and distraction and enjoy- 
 ment, and they had done nothing for me, be- 
 cause' I had never gone deeply enough into any 
 path of life, or thought, or work ; I had never 
 
100 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 had a cause to live for, and I might as well n 
 have lived at all. If I have any faith left 
 me, it is that faith in a cause, as the soul, th 
 grace, the beauty, the purpose of life. 
 
 I will seek then, I said to myself, a new a 
 tivity. I will steep life in freshness, and r 
 color it in the dyes of new sensations. Ich wi 
 mein Gliick probiren marschiren ! 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 EXILE AND OUTCAST. 
 
 YES ; I began to think seriously of going t 
 the United States, making my way out West 
 ward, buying land, and turning farmer. Vagu 
 and delightful visions of the forest scenery o 
 the New World filled me ; visions of wood 
 where tints, which in our European region w 
 know of only in manufactured colors, mingl 
 and contrast in the living glory of the autum 
 nal foliage. Dreams of the rolling prairie, anc 
 the deep wine-coloffed brooklet, and the rushing 
 river, were in my mind and before my senses 
 It seemed to me that nothing but the fresl 
 bosom of the young mother-Nature of the Wes 
 could revive my exhausted and flagging tern 
 perament. I was fast growing more and more 
 weary of life as I found it, and as I made it 
 Heat and crowd, and midnight suppers, or lone 
 ly midnight grumblings and reflections, per- 
 petual excitement, fatigue, overwork, too mucl 
 wine, and the almost incessant cigar these be- 
 gan to take effect just as I might reasonably 
 have expected. I found that my voice already 
 was beginning to show signs of suffering. No- 
 body else noticed it yet ; but I could not be de- 
 ceived. I consulted a medical man, who rec- 
 ommended rest and country air ; and I thought 
 of acting on his advice soon some time, per- 
 haps, when the season was over, or next year, 
 or whenever convenient. 
 
 Meanwhile I went on as before ; I mixed a 
 great deal with joyous company of all kinds. 
 A positive necessity for distraction of some sort 
 seemed to have seized hold of me, and it even 
 appeared as if distraction relieved my mind and 
 improved my p%sical condition. The resolve 
 to give up the stage and go to America supplied 
 a delightful excuse and temptation. It would 
 be clearly a waste of power, an unnecessary vex- 
 ation, to put myself under heavy restraint just 
 now, when so short a time was to bring about a 
 total change of life and habits. The fregh man- 
 ; ly life of the New World would soon restore me 
 to that physical strength and brightness of tem- 
 perament which I used to enjoy. No use, then, 
 in beginning any reform before I undertake the 
 enterprise which shall change scene and habits 
 and life altogether. 
 
 I sometimes even thought of the expediency 
 of marrying and ranging myself, taking a com- 
 panion with me to America to be a backwoods- 
 man's wife. But I always ended by dismissing 
 the idea as one that brought up a sensation of 
 
 repulsiveness with it. To begin with, I knew 
 nobody whom I would or could marry. Most 
 of the women I knew were singers or actresses 
 and I saw most of them too closely to be likelv 
 to fall in love with any, even- if a deeper and 
 earlier feeling did not absorb my heart. There 
 was one to whom at times I did feel myself 
 slightly attracted ; she was the little French- 
 woman with whom I had had a sort of flirta- 
 tion on the evening when I otherwise made a 
 
 ol of myself at Christina's apartments. She 
 did not discourage my attentions whenever they 
 wera offered, and I did sometimes pay court to 
 her. She was young and very pretty. She was 
 not witty or intellectual, or gifted with any con- 
 versational power beyond what mere animal vi- 
 vacity or flow of talk may give. I do not know 
 why on earth I cared for her company, except 
 that she was easy of access and full of life, and 
 her society served to distract me, just as smok- 
 ing or drinking might. 
 
 My new friend, wfo called herself Mile. Fi- 
 nola, and was the daughter, I came to know, 
 of a fat couple who sold slippers in one of the 
 passages of the Palais Royal, was a girl with 
 a very agreeable light French sort of soprano 
 voice, and pleasing vivacious ways, and an in- 
 ordinate amount of self-conceit. She was not 
 by any means a bad little person, and would 
 ather, all things being equal, do a kindly thing 
 han not. She was, I have no doubt, practical- 
 y, or as Heine would say, anatomically, virtu- 
 ous ; but she had no particular prejudice in fa- 
 vor of virtue, and probably never troubled her- 
 elf much by thinking on the subject. Her 
 deas of life consisted of flattery, singing, lyr- 
 cal successes, complimentary critiques in news- 
 papers, jewels, crinoline (crinoline was rather a 
 new fashion then), pleasant little dinners and 
 uppers, carriages, and a fair prospect of a brill- 
 ant match. She had no more true lyrical 
 enius than an Italian boy's monkey ; but she 
 ometimes captivated audiences, and set them 
 pplauding with a genuine enthusiasm which 
 Pasta might have failed to arouse. She had 
 quick arch way of glinting with her eyes, 
 -hich conveyed to some people an idea of im- 
 mense latent humor and espieglerie, that, I can 
 nswer for it, had no existence in my little 
 riend's mental constitution. She turned her 
 right beaming orbs in flashing rapidity from 
 alls to boxes in a manner which irresistibly 
 cept attention alive. Who could Avithdraw his 
 nterest for a momenj^pm the stage when he 
 JRh 
 
 ould not tell but thi^Rie very next moment 
 hose glittering laughing brown eyes might 
 oguishly seek out his own ? She had appar- 
 ntly the faculty of ejje-flirting with every man 
 
 a whole theatre inllrn. Then ghe shrugged 
 er very full, white, and bare shoulders with 
 
 ch a piquancy, and had such quick graceful 
 estures, and so fluttered her pretty 'plumage, 
 mt it was quite a pleasant sight to see. Of 
 ourse all this told with muqh more decided 
 ffect in the Italiens, or some such house, than 
 
 one of our great temples of opera ; but even 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 101 
 
 in our vast house it had its effect upon the lim- 
 ited section from whom the rest of* the audi- 
 ence, and the town generally, took their time. 
 
 Not, however, to be merely piquante and vi- 
 vacious, Mile. Finola had a way of throwing a 
 momentary gleam of tender softness into her 
 eyes, and looking pensively before her, as if 
 consciousness had withdrawn itself wholly from 
 the audience, and buried itself in the depths of 
 some sweet inner sadness ; and she so thrilled 
 out a prolonged, plaintive, and dreamy note, 
 that people sometimes declared her pathetic 
 power quite equal to her humor and vivacity. 
 When ordinary observers note any little effect 
 produced with ease they are apt to believe that 
 the performer has a capacity for doing some- 
 thing infinitely greater, if he or she would only 
 try, and did but care to succeed. A sad mis- 
 take generally ; for on the stage and in real 
 life we almost invariably do all we can and the 
 best we can ; and that which you see is the 
 display of our whole stock of capability. But 
 audiences could not readily believe that the 
 one little bit of effective show had exhaust- 
 ed Mile. Finola's whole resources. The result | 
 was that in her own parts, Rosinas, Figlias del 
 Reggimento, and so on, she was greatly ad- 
 mired, and her little tricks of instinctive co- 
 quetry and vivacity were accepted by many as 
 the deliberate and triumphant efforts of grace- 
 ful art, if not indeed the stray sparks which 
 indicated the existence of a latent fire of true 
 lyrical genius. 
 
 Now this little personage was beginning to 
 be very popular about the time when Christina's 
 husband came to London. She had not, in- 
 deed, come as yet into any sort of antagonism 
 or rivalry with Madame Reichstein, and they 
 never sang together ; but Finola's nights were 
 usually very successful, and she was even rally- 
 ing a sort of party round her both in audiences 
 and critics. Perhaps Christina's passionate, en- 
 thusiastic style had begun to be too much for 
 some of her hearers. True art is a sad strain 
 upon the intellects of many of us ; and little 1 
 Finola was a great relief. She was Offenbach 
 after Meyerbeer ; and a good many occupants 
 of opera-stalls to-day know what that means, 
 and can appreciate the charming relaxation to 
 wearied inanity which it implies. And though 
 not as yet any thing of a rival to Christina, 
 Finola was beginning to be talked about a good 
 deal. I don't think Christina at this time cared 
 in the least, or grudged the little thing any 
 sprays of laurel that might fall to her. But she 
 always affected to think me an admirer of Fi- 
 nola, one of Finola's party, and indeed, more 
 than that, one of FinDla's lovers ; and at last, 
 out of pure spleen at being so set down, I acted 
 intentionally as if I were one of that silly throng ; 
 and as Mile. Finola liked flirting with any one, 
 she showed herself willing enough to flirt with 
 me. .* 
 
 I have spoken of all this for the purpose of 
 showing how matters stood as regarded Chris- 
 tina and myself just about the time when her 
 
 husband made his appearance so unexpectedly 
 in London. We Christina and I were on 
 strange, cold, almost unfriendly terms, so far 
 as all outer appearances went. Mv soul was 
 still filled with love for her, wildly dashed some- 
 times with a bitterness not much unlike hate. 
 She, on her side, seemed to me to be leading 
 the life almost of a frivolous, careless, heartless 
 coquette ; I was drifting away from all my old 
 moorings of steadfastness and perseverance and 
 I patience, and becoming an idler with the idle ; 
 j I drank midnight, and thought midnight, as 
 the phrase has it. With the sudden appear- 
 ance of the Italian exile came a change in all 
 our relationships; chance, utter chance, con- 
 spired with his own character and purpose, and 
 the place he held in Christina's life, to make 
 his presence the source of change and event to 
 all of us. 
 
 In a very short time after his coming, Signer 
 Salads became the recognized lion of the Lon- 
 don, season. He had, in the impresario's sense 
 of the word, quite a wonderful success. He 
 delivered lectures on his imprisonment and his 
 escape, which crowded Willis's Rooms, and 
 filled King Street with coroneted carriages. 
 He pleaded the cause of his country ; he called 
 upon England to regard the independence of 
 Italy as Europe's mot pressing and vital ques- 
 tion ; and countesses clapped their kid-gloved 
 hands and waved their perfumed handkerchiefs. 
 He dined now with a Cabinet minister, and now 
 with the leader of the Opposition. He spent 
 great part of his time at Mr. Lyndon's. He 
 was intrigued for and battled for as the attrac- 
 tion of evening parties. He bore it all patient- 
 ly, as one who does a work of drudgery with a 
 good object ; but he smiled sadly and shook his 
 head when one congratulated him privately on 
 his success. I once told him he ought to be a 
 proud man. He said he felt profoundly dis- 
 couraged. A great illusion, he calmly said, 
 was gone. England, he now knew, would do 
 nothing for his country. He had come to plead 
 for protection and help. He found himself the 
 hero of a carnival scene, pelted with flowers and 
 sugar-plums. 
 
 I am not a politician, and this is not a polit- 
 ical story. I introduce the subject of Salaris 
 and his success, because at this time in one 
 way, as later in another, it affected my own 
 life. 
 
 I went one evening to hear my new friend 
 tell his story and make his appeal in Willis's 
 Rooms. I went alone ; the room was crowded ; 
 Mr. Lyndon, M.P. , presided. There were pres- 
 ent what Ned Lambert would have called "no 
 end of swells." Salaris was speaking when I 
 got in. He was really not, in the rhetorical 
 sense, an eloquent man. He had nothing of 
 Kossuth about him, nor had his style any thing 
 of the poetic grandiloquence of Mazzini. He 
 talked in a simple, severe, unpretending sort of 
 way, with hardly any gesticulation. The sin- 
 cerity of his purpose, the clear straightforward- 
 ness of his language, the sweetness of his ex- 
 
102 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 pression, made the great charm which, added, 
 of course, to the romantic nature of his recent 
 escape, delighted the West End. He was a 
 novelty in the way of exiles. He positively 
 seemed, I heard a lady near me remark, quite 
 like an English gentleman. In fact, the Thad- 
 deus of Warsaw personage was played out ; and 
 the West End now thrilled with a new sensa- 
 tion, to see an escaped and exiled patriot who 
 looked like an ordinary gentleman, and spoke 
 as composedly as a financial member of Par- 
 liament. 
 
 I looked round the room, expecting to see 
 Christina there. I was not disappointed. She 
 was seated two or three rows of seats away from 
 me, and she looked very handsome, but melan- 
 choly, and a little fatigued. She was apparent- 
 ly not listening much more attentively than I 
 was. She saw me, and nodded a salutation, 
 and whispered something to a lady at her side. 
 The lady, who seemed to have been listening 
 very closely to the speaker, looked up, and 
 glanced toward me. She was very youngT 
 about nineteen, perhaps with a delicate, clear- 
 ly-shaped, youthful Madonna face, and eyes that 
 had a tender violet light in them. They were 
 eyes that did not flash or glitter or sparkle. 
 They rested on you with a quiet luminous depth, 
 like the light a planet seenjs to give. Her face 
 had a thoughtful, sweet, almost sad expression 
 until the violet light arising in the eyes suffused 
 the whole countenance with its genial radiancy. 
 It was a face not to be forgotten, once you had 
 seen it ; and I had not forgotten it, for I had 
 seen it before, and'had many a time wished to 
 see it again. It was the face of- Mr. Lyndon's 
 youngest daughter; the girl to whom I had 
 spoken in Palace Yard when wild Stephen Lyn- 
 don made his absurd mistake. 
 
 Did you ever on an evening of reckless revel- 
 ry, .amidst an atmosphere steaming with heat 
 and lights and the fumes of wine, in a room 
 ringing with laughter and frivolity, suddenly 
 open a window, and looking out catch a glimpse 
 of the blue summer heaven and the pure light 
 of the stars ? If so, you will understand how I 
 felt when I looked up from the increasing de- 
 generacy of my life, with its foolish excitements 
 and its ban-en spasmodic passion, and saw the 
 face of Lilla Lyndon. 
 
 I glanced many times to Avhere she sat, and I 
 forgot the cause of Italy's independence. Once, 
 only once, she looked toward me. 
 
 There was a slight movement on the platform ; 
 a letter was handed to Mr. Lyndon. That gen- 
 tleman said a word to the lecturer, who at once 
 stopped, bowed, and drew back ; and Mr. Lyn- 
 don rising came to the front and apologized for' 
 having to leave the chair. He was obliged to 
 O down to the House immediately. His dis- 
 tinguished friend, the Dean of some place or 
 other, whose remarkable work recently pub- 
 lished had proved how well he understood the 
 Italian question and how thoroughly he sympa- 
 thized with the cause of Italy, had kindly con- 
 sented to take the chair. There was a murmur , 
 
 i of genteel applause for Mr. Lyndon, another for 
 
 ' the Dean, as the latter gracefully threw himself 
 into the vacated chair ; and then Mr. Lyndon 
 disappeared from the platform, t*he lecture went 
 
 } on, and the audience settled itself to listen as 
 before. 
 
 Once, and only once, did Salaris make any 
 attempt at eloquence ; and even that was but 
 
 I the eloquence of passionate conviction. It was 
 at the close, where he proclaimed, rather than 
 merely predicted, to his hearers that, let who 
 would be friend or foe, the day of Italy's inde- 
 pendence was sure and near. "Only yester- 
 day, "he said, " an English lady I see' her now 
 in this room gave me as an omen of good a 
 translation of a noble poem by a great living 
 poet, a German, which bids my country be of 
 good cheer and expect her deliverance. Wilr 
 you listen to a few lines ? The German poet 
 reminds my country of the story of Penelope : 
 how she was fair, and persecuted for her beau- 
 ty, and how the reckless strangers reveled in 
 her hall : 
 
 ' Twenty years the purple tissue span she weeping on 
 
 her throne; 
 Twenty years iu bitter sorrow nurtured her beloved 
 
 son; 
 Twenty years remained she faithful to her husband 
 
 and her name 
 Weeping, hoping, sending seekers lo, ,and her 
 
 Ulysses came ! 
 
 'Woe to the audacious wooers when they heard the 
 
 avenger's tread, 
 And the bitter death - charged arrows from his 
 
 clanging bow were sped; 
 With the red blood of the strangers hall and pavement 
 
 dripping lay, 
 And a fearful feast of vengeance then was held at 
 
 Ithaca. 
 
 'Knowest thou that song, Italia? Listen, and in 
 
 patience wait, 
 Even although the'swarm of strangers throng through 
 
 thy ancestral gate ; 
 Rear thy sons to fearless manhood, though with 
 
 many a burning tear ; 
 Wait and hope ; thy hour is coming : thy Ulysses too 
 
 is near.' " 
 
 fTo the closing lines he gave all the dignity, the 
 thrilling force, the strength of pathos and of 
 hope, which the words deserved, and which his 
 penetrating voice, his noble earnestness, his ex- 
 pression, now animated, could lend. "It is," 
 he added, slowly, "the poetry, the hope, the 
 encouragement of a German! Quod minime 
 reris! The sympathy and the hope are the 
 more welcome, the more delightful. I accept 
 the omen for my country, and I say to her : 
 
 1 Wait and hqpe ; thy hour is coming ; thy Ulysses too 
 is near.' " 
 
 He remained for a moment motionless and 
 silent, and the audience did not know whether 
 he had finished or not ; then his hand dropped 
 upon the desk near him, and he bowed to the 
 assemblage, and drew back from the front of 
 the platform. 
 
 There was quite a cordial and enthusiastic 
 demonstration of applause ; and then began the 
 rustling of silks, and calling of carriages, and 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 103 
 
 the babble of talk with acquaintances, and the 
 crowding .on the stairs. 
 
 The moment the movement of departure be- 
 gan Madame Keichstein invited me by a look to 
 come to her. She and Miss Lyndon had with- 
 drawn into a corner a little out of the stream of 
 the departing crowd. I made my way through 
 groups of people and over trailing skirts to where 
 they stood. 
 
 " How did you like it ?" were Christina's first 
 words ; and then, without waiting for an an- 
 swer, she said, "I wish to introduce you to Miss 
 Lyndon Miss Lilla Lyndon." 
 
 Before the ceremony of introduction was well 
 through two or three acquaintances closed round 
 Madame Reichstein, and Miss Lyndon and I 
 were left for the moment together. 
 
 "Am I wrong, Mr. Temple," she said, "in 
 thinking that we have met and spoken together 
 before ?" 
 
 "No, Miss Lyndon, you are quite right." 
 
 " That day in Palace Yard, when that poor 
 man came up and stopped the carriage and called 
 me by my name?" 
 
 " That was the day. You have a good mem- 
 ory." 
 
 "It made a painful impression on me, that 
 scene and that poor man. I thought I could 
 not have been mistaken, Mr. Temple, in you, 
 when I saw you a few nights ago for the first 
 time since that day. May I congratulate you 
 now on your success on the name you have 
 won since I first saw you ? It always gave me 
 pleasure* to believe that it was you with whom I 
 had spoken that day, for you were kind to that 
 strange poor creature." 
 
 This was a subject that somewhat embar- 
 rassed me ; I turned to something else. 
 
 "The lines that Signer Salaris recited were 
 translated by you, Miss Lyndon, I venture to 
 think ?" 
 
 " They were. Did you like them ?" 
 
 " I thought them noble in spirit, and I hope 
 prophetic ; and they sounded to me I have not 
 seen the original like a pure and exquisite 
 translation." 
 
 "I am very glad ; they are Geibel's. They 
 seemed to me prophetic, and so I showed them 
 to Signer Salaris. He is a noble creatui-e, and I 
 hope whatever he engages in may succeed ; but 
 I don't understand much of Italian affairs." 
 
 "Nor I, indeed, Miss Lyndon." 
 
 " Not you ? And yet you ought to be at 
 least a sort of step-son of Italy." 
 
 "I only know my step-mother's voice. Her 
 interests she keeps for her own children." 
 
 "We are going, Emanuel," said Christina, 
 who was leaning on the arm of some gentle- 
 man. 
 
 I offered Miss Lyndon my arm, and she lean- 
 ed on it : 1 felt the pressure of her light touch, 
 and I was thrilled by it. 
 
 "Do you know, Mr. Temple," she said, as 
 we descended the stairs, "I have never ceased 
 to think that there was some mystery about that 
 man in Palace Yard which I ought to know, and 
 
 that you could explain it. How did he come 
 to know my name, and why did his face seem 
 so strange, and yet so familiar to me? Will 
 you tell me?'' 
 
 "Pray, Miss Lyndon, don't ask me; I can 
 not tell you any thing about him at least not 
 now ; not without thinking over it. The secret, 
 if it be one, may not be mine to tell." 
 
 "Then there is something?" 
 
 "There is." 
 
 "And he had some reason for knowing me 
 and calling me by my name?" 
 
 "Pray don't ask any more. He had." 
 
 "I knew it," she said; and an unconscious 
 vibration passed from her arm to mine. 
 
 " Some time, Miss Lyndon, you may know 
 all ; and it may be in your power to do good by 
 the knowledge to people who are unhappy, and 
 who don't deserve to be so." 
 
 She looked into my face, with surprise and 
 deep interest in her clear pensive eyes. 
 
 Christina was already at the door of her lit- 
 tle brougham waiting for us. I handed Miss 
 Lyndon in. Christina gave me her hand with- 
 out a word, and I saw a strange expression in 
 her face, as if something had both perplexed 
 and irritated her. I could not understand it. 
 
 Miss Lyndon held out her delicate little hand 
 with a frank and friendly expression. I touched 
 it, and the light pressure lingered long with me. 
 As I left the place I felt like one on whom the 
 first breath of some purifying and sacred in- 
 fluence has fallen. The presence of this girl 
 had strangely affected me when first I saw her, 
 and I had never forgotten the sensation. Now 
 it filled me almost wholly. It was indescriba- 
 ble ; at least, I can not describe it any better 
 than by saying that while the presence of 
 Christina seemed to allure me with the rich 
 incense of flowers, that of Lilla Lyndon made 
 me thoughtful and full of pure regret and hu- 
 mility, like the light of the stars. 
 
 In most stories of ghosts And demons and 
 warlocks is it riot sufficient to speak of the odi- 
 ous and supernatural ci'eature in order to evoke 
 his presence? Apparently some spell of the 
 same kind haunted me this night. Miss Lyn- 
 don and I had spoken of the Chan who accosted 
 her in Palace Yard ; I had never seen him since 
 my return from Italy. I had hardly got a dozen 
 paces from the door of Willis's Rooms when I 
 came straight on him. 
 
 Keeping the same side as you walk from 
 Willis's Rooms toward St. James's Square, you 
 may see as you look across the street a row of 
 white and stuccoed houses on the other side, 
 one of which has a fame attached to it. When 
 I nearly fell over Stephen Lyndon he was stand- 
 ing on the edge of the foot-path, looking up at 
 that particular house. He did not seem a day 
 older than when I saw him last. He wore 
 the black wig as before, and was rather better 
 dressed than I had seen him on some former 
 occasions, though not up to the mark of one 
 memorable occasion when he came out resplen- 
 dent. It seemed to me, too, that there was a 
 
104 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 little more of quietness and caution about him 
 than was his wont in earlier times. 
 
 I did not know then that he was there wait 
 ing for me. So I felt vexed when I nearly rai 
 up against him, and recognized him in the clea 
 moonlight of a beautiful night, and saw that fa 
 had recognized me, and there was no escapi 
 without at least a parley. 
 
 " Good -evening, Temple," he said, in the 
 coolest and easiest kind of way, as if we hac 
 met only the night before last ; and he quietly 
 laid his hand on my arm and stayed my go 
 ing farther. " I have been contemplating tha 
 house over there ; the first of the row. I hav< 
 been meditating, Temple. An exile lived there 
 once, my child of song an illustrious exile 
 Where is he now, Temple ? Only on a throne, 
 my swan. There are exiles and exiles, Temple 
 Our patriotic and banished friend Salaris wil 
 hardly, I think, come to so brilliant a place, 
 The throne for one conspirator, and the prison 
 or very likely the block, for another. Crowns 
 for the crowns that have brains under them 
 blocks for the blockheads. He is a gifted and 
 touching blockhead, that friend of ours, Mr. 
 Temple. I like him ; but I was always a child 
 of sentiment. I saw you in Willis's Rooms." 
 '^Were you there?" 
 
 " I was there ; oh yes. He and I, you know, 
 are old friends. I saw Goodboy on* the plat- 
 . form, and he saw me. I think he winced a lit- 
 tle, but it Avas a lost fear. I have given up my 
 notion of doing any thing with him in the way 
 of street-scenes." 
 
 "I am very glad to hear it. I do hope yon 
 have turned decent and honorable and manly. 
 Mr. Lyndon, there are many reasons why I wish 
 you well." 
 
 " Thanks ; I dare say. I really believe you, 
 Temple ; and I think you are a good sort 'of a 
 fellow in your way. Yes, I am quite a reformed 
 man. In fact, Temple, he was too much for 
 me in that Avay. " 
 "WhatAvay?" 
 "You never heard, then?" 
 " I have not heard any thing about you for a 
 long time." 
 
 "True; you -vtfcre away in Italian myrtle- 
 bowers, and that sort of delightful thing. Well, 
 I opened fire regularly on Goodboy; waylaid 
 him at his door; pursued him to the House, to 
 the Club, to the Opera. What do you think he 
 did? He coolly took the bull by the horns. 
 He gave me in charge to a policeman ; he fol- 
 lowed up the charge at the police-court ; he de- 
 livered his version of the business with a digni- 
 fied mock humility which quite touched and 
 charmed 'the worthy magistrate.' He re- 
 counted all the things he had done for me, 
 and all our venerable father had done; and 
 it was a magnificent scene, quite. And do 
 you know, Temple, while the whole thing was 
 a hideous lie from beginning to end, there was 
 not a word in it which was not literallv true? 
 It put me in an unpleasant Kght ; that I must 
 frankly confers. Well, there was nothing for 
 
 me but to find bail which of course I couldn't 
 do or be sent to prison, or pledge my honor to 
 molest him no more in that way. Temple, I 
 was defeated. I had fought Respectability, 
 and was overthrown! At least, I had the 
 sense to know that I was beaten, and I sur- 
 rendered and promised." 
 
 " I am very glad to hear it." 
 
 " Are you ? So I dare say is Goodboy. But 
 wait for the end. Do you ever read the Greek 
 dramatists, Temple? I suppose not. Well, 
 there is some good advice given by one of 
 them about counting no man successful until 
 you have seen the game all out. You just wait. 
 If I detested Goodboy before, do you think I 
 like him any better now ? Do you know, the 
 cunning old boy managed so well, that not -a 
 line of the business got into the papers ; so that 
 I had not even the satisfaction of bringing open 
 scandal on him. I wrote letter after letter to 
 the papers ; need I say that no editor did me ' 
 the favor of putting the tale of the wrongs I 
 had suffered into print ? Well, there's enough 
 of that. I have had rather a hard life of it 
 since. Give you my word, I don't think any 
 thing could have kept me up but my deep relig- 
 ious feeling and my determination to be revenged 
 upon my enemies. I thought it well to retire 
 from the metropolis for a little. I broke loose 
 from my base, and marched right into the heart 
 of the country Liverpool, Manchester, and that 
 sort of place. Coarse, cloddish, without soul, 
 without humor, and, let me tell you, by no means 
 green or awkward with the cards and the bill- 
 ards. Ah, mon Dieu! it was hard and dull. 
 S T o matter, I live! Providentially preserved, 
 [ still live ! I return to town at last, led doubt- 
 ess by my star. I find two of my old acquaint- 
 ances established as lions of the season. You 
 are one ; my Carbonaro of Willis's Rooms is 
 :he other. Good Heaven, it ought to teach the 
 ainest of us a lesson in modesty, when such 
 people can be successful." 
 
 We were now walking round St. James's 
 Square. We might have been mistaken for 
 wo dear and intimate friends. Lyndon was 
 eanihg affectionately on my arm, even when 
 le was propounding lessons of humility drawn 
 Vom the incomprehensible fact that such a per- 
 onage as I had succeeded. 
 
 I thought of him then as I had thought of 
 dm always since our first meeting as a hope- 
 ess old reprobate, whose inner nature no power 
 n earth could touch, and whose utterly selfish 
 nd heartless levity could only be explained or 
 xcused by the theory that something not un- 
 'ke insanity was mingled with his blood. Yet 
 now walked with him, listened to him, allowed 
 im to lean on me, felt even a positive interest 
 n his welfare. 
 
 Why ? Was it for the sake of Ned Lambert 
 nd his love, and my sincere friendship for them 
 oth? 
 
 In sad sober truth, it was not. 
 It was because the thoughtful violet eyes of 
 Lilla Lyndon the younger had looked into mine 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 105 
 
 with kindly interest while she spoke of this man. 
 The thought of her transfigured him in my mind. 
 Nay, this miserable wretch was a sort of link be- 
 tween us. His very misery might be the cause 
 of our meeting again. 
 
 And at this time I had no more thought of 
 loving Lilla Lyndon than I had of falling in 
 love with a saint or a star. I still believed 
 that my life was to be forever shadowed and 
 frustrated by hopeless unfading passion for 
 Christina Reichstein. 
 
 I listened, then, to Lyndon's talk, and even 
 encouraged him, and assured him I would save 
 him if I could. 
 
 "Now that," he said, "is the very thing I 
 am coming at. I really do think, Temple, that 
 you are a sincere sort of person ; and that you 
 mean what you say. My daughter has disap- 
 peared somewhere ; I can not find out where ; 
 Id I don't suppose, you know, that it much 
 iitters, because I dare say the girl is hard up, 
 and drudging and toiling, and that sort of thing, 
 and of course she couldn't do any thing for me. 
 I should think Goodboy turned her adrift ; he's 
 quite mean enough for it. Well, you see, it's 
 no use my looking her up. Do you know, I am 
 so sensitive, and epicurean, and chivalrous in 
 all my ways, that I can't bear to see women who 
 are drudging and poor and overworked. It isn't 
 the poetic idea of womanhood, is it? Women 
 don't look as if they ought to be seen then. 
 They get pale and washed-out-looking, and the 
 plump outlines go, and their hands look dirty 
 and^needle-marked, and all the rest of it. No ; 
 I really prefer, as a father, not to see my daugh- 
 ter just now. You follow me, Temple ?" 
 
 "I do," was my grim reply. Even the color 
 of those violet eyes was fading from my mind 
 as he talked in this way. 
 
 " You appreciate what I mean ?" 
 
 " Quite," I replied, more grimly. 
 
 "Now, on the other hand, look at my niece. 
 Aha, have I touched you ?" I suppose I start- 
 ed. "There is a lovely girl, charming to look 
 at ; a little pale, you will say ; but so very in- 
 teresting, and with such an expression of good- 
 ness. Now, Temple, don't you think she could 
 be brought to do something for me? Don't 
 you think, at least, she ought to be allowed to 
 know of my existence ? I know it's kept a se- 
 cret from her. I know she is ignorant of the 
 tender tie that binds her to me. Now, Tem- 
 ple, my boy, here is your opportunity ! You 
 know her; you are in your own way a kind of 
 success, and I dare say would pass off easily 
 upon her she's evidently very green and inno- 
 cent as quite a distinguished and delightful 
 sort of person. I saw you handing her to the 
 carriage to-day; you did the thing quite in good 
 style ; I dare say she wouldn't notice any differ- 
 ence. Now, your motive can not be suspected. 
 Mine, I confess, is open to misinterpretation ! 
 Temple, do a benevolent deed. Here is an 
 outcast uncle panting for love and redemption, 
 and very, very hard up. There is a lovely 
 niece, with her little bosom overflowing with 
 
 family affection and benevolence and romantic 
 nonsense of all kinds, and with unlimited in- 
 fluence over papa's purse. Temple, need I say 
 more ? You have a heart, and quite a present- 
 able appearance. Bring us together, and look 
 for your reward Above. " 
 
 I managed to escape at last, without making 
 a promise of any kind; but he squeezed my 
 hand warmly, accepted a trifling loan, and 
 went away humming a hopeful tune. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 RIVALRY. 
 
 OUR season was drawing fast to a close 
 the first season during which Christina and I 
 had sung together the season of fruition ! I 
 had some Continental engagements during the 
 winter ; she intended to take absolute rest, for 
 she had been apparently in uncertain and even 
 delicate health for some time' back, and her 
 voice had occasionally failed her. Just at the 
 close of the season she brought on herself, by 
 want of caution, rather a severe attack of chest 
 or throat complaint, as shall be presently told. 
 
 Her husband had left London, disappointed 
 but not dispirited. He was in Paris, striving to 
 teach diplomatists and statesmen there the ne- 
 cessity of doing just what was afterward done ; 
 that is to say, boldly and in the field taking up 
 the cause of Italy against Austria. As yet his 
 efforts did not promise much success, and of 
 England he had no longer any hope. 
 
 On the very day after the Willis's -Rooms 
 lecture at which I was present, Christina was 
 attacked by a sort of nervous weakness and 
 cold, and her place was vacant for a week. 
 Mile. Finola made her hay while the sun shone, 
 and came out prominently. Crowded houses 
 and animated audiences greeted her, and she 
 began to walk the stage Avith an air of conquer- 
 ing rivalry in the very rustle of her petticoats. 
 Critiques were written, proclaiming her the mis- 
 tress of a new style, the leader of a new lyrical 
 school. She took all the praises with a quiet 
 nonchalance, as if they were nothing but the 
 homage properly due to genius. To crown the 
 whole, she undertook some of Christina's own 
 favorite parts, and produced a curious half-pa- 
 thetic, half-comic melange, which it was not pos- 
 sible to think uninteresting, kept people's eyes 
 and ears quite open, puzzled many intelligent 
 and appreciative listeners, and was hailed with 
 positive enthusiasm by the general public. 
 
 I had to sing with Mile. Finola in most of 
 her parts ; and at first I put on a kind of high- 
 art indifference toward the whole affair. In- 
 deed, I did not care to sing with any woman 
 but Christina, and I looked upon little Finola 
 as a mere musical stop-gap. But her triumph 
 fairly startled me ; and the evident dissatisfac- 
 tion of some of the audience at my own careless 
 p'erformance, together with s*ome sharp repri- 
 mands from the fair singer herself, piqued and 
 
106 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 roused me at last into animation. I determ- 
 ined to enter into the spirit of the thing, and 
 play my part in the admirable fooling. I sang 
 and acted my very best, reproached my white- 
 robed Amina (whose stage night-dress was a 
 master-piece of elaborate millinery such as no 
 princess ever went to bed in) with all the tones 
 of despair and jealous madness ; clasped my 
 plump and tightly-laced Leonora, and sighed 
 out to the uttermost my passionate farewell, 
 was graciously permitted by my conquering her- 
 oine to share the honors of her triumph ; I led 
 her forth ; I seized as many of her bouquets as 
 two hands could grasp ; I held back the curtain 
 that she might squeeze her ample skirts through 
 she wore crinoline even when Ami'na in the 
 bedroom I attended her to her brougham, and 
 was admitted to a gracious degree of her pat- 
 ronage and favor. 
 
 "I don't think the world misses Madame 
 Reichstein so much," she remarked to me one 
 evening. 
 
 "I don't think it does," I added, with a bit- 
 ter conviction that it was only too true. 
 
 "You see," she went on, complacently, and 
 with a quite judicial calmness and self-satisfac- 
 tion, "it wearies soon, that grand lyricism of 
 the old school. The world will have vivacity 
 and esprit. One must suit the public ; but one 
 must have tact to do it. For me, I never ad- 
 mired Madame Eeichstein ; and I know she al- 
 ways detested me." 
 
 "Indeed you do her wrong; I have always 
 heard her speak very well of you." 
 
 " Possible ; but that was before she thought 
 I could be a rival. One does not like a rival, es- 
 pecially when one is not very young. She will 
 soon be quite passe'e, I think. How old is she ?" 
 " I really don't know," I replied, rather coldly. 
 "Truly? I thought you knew her whole 
 history. She can not be much less than forty." 
 "Oh yes, certainly, very much less than 
 forty; not more than thirty, perhaps." 
 
 " Then you do know something of her ? I 
 always heard that you did. Yes, I heard that 
 you were in love with her ever so long ago be- 
 fore I was born, perhaps and that she married 
 somebody else, who was killed, or died, or ran 
 away ; and lately I heard that you had arranged 
 your old quarrel, and were going to marry her; 
 but I did not believe that." 
 
 This was all hideously annoying; and no- 
 thing but the sense I had of the absurdity which 
 
 would attach to a dispute with such a girl, who, 
 after all, talked no worse than most women will 
 do of rivals, prevented me from giving some 
 sort of distinct expression to my feelings. 
 
 Mile. Finola read my face and laughed. 
 
 "Allans!" she said, "you are angry with 
 me because I mock myself of your old love. 
 I believe she is more jealous of me now than 
 ever." 
 
 "Come now, Mademoiselle, don't be foolish. 
 You are not ill-natured, I know, and you ought 
 not to talk spiteful nonsense of that sort." 
 
 "Perhaps. But when a woman has carried 
 
 a high head over one for a long time, it is a 
 grand provocation to be spiteful. Without 
 doubt, she has said as much or more of me 
 since these last few days ; but I will say not 
 one word more if you are hurt; and don't 
 quarrel with me, for I meant no harm ; and if 
 I had known it would touch you, I never would 
 have said a word against her du mains in vour 
 presence." 
 
 That night we were singing together in the 
 Trovatore, which used to be such a favorite 
 then ; and the audience were even more than 
 usually delighted with the astonishing little 
 Leonora. After one of her thrilling passages 
 (which reminded me of a canary-bird in love), 
 the beautiful Leonora passing me quickly, said', 
 with a beam of self-satisfaction twinkling* in her 
 bright eyes, "She is in the house." 
 
 I had no need to ask whom she meant. I 
 saw Christina in a box. She was very pal 
 and looked worse than I should have expecte 
 
 I called to see her next day, and ventured to 
 reproach her for coming out at night so soon ; 
 but she made no answer on that subject. 
 
 "You sang very well last night," she said; 
 with more soul than you generally throw into 
 your parts." 
 
 Did I really ? I was afraid I was getting 
 through in a blank and careless kind of way. 
 What Sid you think of Leonora ?" 
 
 I asked the question with some doubt, un- 
 willing to ask it, but not seeing how to avoid 
 t. I expected some sarcastic or contemptuous 
 answer, 'or some transparent affectation of ad- 
 miration. 
 
 "I was both surprised and pleased with her," 
 Christina answered, with perfect composure and 
 apparent earnestness. "There is something 
 quite new and fresh about her style, which 
 makes her very interesting. I never thought 
 she had so much originality. She quite in- 
 spired ?/o?/.." 
 
 " Did she ? I am glad to be inspired by any 
 body, or in any way." 
 
 "You don't sing so well with me. Why?" 
 "Perhaps because I strive to do my best too 
 anxiously. Besides, your genius rebukes me, 
 Christina ; that is the truth. You are too true 
 an artist for me ; I don't care about little Fi- 
 nola. " 
 
 "People say you do, in another sense." 
 
 "Do you believe them?" 
 
 "No, Emanuel, not I. What do vou think 
 
 of Mr. Lyndon's daughter ?" 
 
 She looked at me fixedly while she put this 
 utterly inappropriate question. 
 
 " She is a beautiful girl, and I should think 
 she must have a beautiful nature. How came 
 such a father to have such a daughter?" 
 
 " You dislike Mr. Lyndon, and can not judge 
 of him. Now I don't dislike Lilla." 
 
 " No ; why should you ?" 
 
 " Some women one could dislike, others one 
 could not. I could not dislike your little friend 
 Finola ; I should as soon think of disliking a 
 clever linnet. No matter ; let us pass all that. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 107 
 
 You must sing your very best with me on Mon- 
 day." 
 
 "Nex,t Monday? You surely don't mean to 
 sing next Monday?" 
 
 "Indeed I do." 
 
 "Is that not rashness?" 
 
 " Very likely. I mean to do it, though." 
 
 "Pray, Christina, don't attempt it. Do let 
 me advise you " 
 
 " My dear friend, I never take advice. My 
 voice is quite 1 restored, and I mean to sing on 
 Monday. Do you think I am going to allow 
 the season to close with your little friend in full 
 possession ?" 
 
 "You don't fear rivalry. Your place is al- 
 ways yours to resume when you will." 
 
 " Still, you don't know what woman's vanity 
 is, if you think I could be content to endure a 
 six months' exile from London with the knowl- 
 edge that I had left your fascinating friend in 
 possession of tne field. No ; I must win a bat- 
 tle before I go. Besides, I want to sing with 
 you again; I want to be certain whether you 
 can not sing as well with me as with her." 
 
 While we were speaking there was heard a 
 trampling of horses in the street below ; and 
 in a moment a card was brought to Christina. 
 When she looked at it she glanced at me sud- 
 denly, and with a sort of flush in her face, as 
 if I were somehow concerned in the matter. 
 
 "No, I can't see her," she said to her Ger- 
 man companion. " Yet, stay ; it's very kind of 
 her. Yes ; show her into the other room, Meta. " 
 
 I rose to go. 
 
 "One moment, Emanuel; oblige me by re- 
 maining one moment. I wish it particularly." 
 
 I remained ; standing up, however. 
 
 Presently I heard the rustle of skirts up the 
 stairs and in the next room. 
 
 "Now, Emanuel," said Christina, with an 
 odd and embarrassed kind of half-smile, "you 
 are free to go. No ; you need not advise or 
 remonstrate ; it would be useless. I mean to 
 resume my place on Monday, and dethrone 
 your little friend, or perish in the attempt." 
 
 She laughed a somewhat forced and flicker- 
 ing laugh, and I left. 
 
 Who was her mysterious visitor, whom I was 
 not to pass on the stairs even ; for that was 
 clearly the reason why Christina had detained 
 me? Well, there could not be much mystery 
 on the part of the visitor. As I came into 
 Jermyn Street I saw a mounted groom leading 
 a lady's horse up and down before the door. 
 I knew the man's face perfectly well ; he was 
 one of Mr. Lyndon's servants. The visitor was 
 evidently Lilla Lyndon. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 A DEFEAT. 
 
 CHRISTINA carried out her resolve, and sang 
 the following Monday night in one of the parts 
 to which Mademoiselle Finola had given a new 
 reading. When she came on the stage she 
 
 ooked weak, I thought, and nervous. I could 
 not see her without deep and genuine emotion. 
 [ could not but think of our early acquaintance 
 and our early love ; of the promises we had 
 made to each other of a happiness never given 
 us to enjoy ; of the bright assurance of success 
 which always sustained her, and of the success 
 she had won, and the slender joy it seemed to 
 have brought her. I felt the keenest sense of 
 delight when I heard the enthusiastic welcome 
 she received from the house, and saw her eyes 
 sparkle with triumph ; and yet I could not help 
 pitying her, because she loved so much a tri- 
 umph like that. 
 
 She sang exquisitely in the first act not, in- 
 deed, with all her. wonted strength, as my quick 
 and watchful ear soon discovered, but with all 
 the soul of feeling and the perfection of articu- 
 lation which belonged specially to her. Her 
 rival's performance must have seemed, in the 
 mind of any cultivated listener, a poor and 
 tricky piece of artificiality when compared with 
 her pure, noble, lyrical style. I saw her in the 
 interval after the first act, and she was full of 
 triumph. * 
 
 " Come," she said, " I have not been so rash, 
 after all ; I have not failed, you see. I know 
 you are glad of it, even though people do rank 
 you on the side of your pretty Mademoiselle 
 Finola." 
 
 "Nobody can sing as 3^011 can ; and for the 
 rest, you are only laughing at me." 
 
 "Perhaps so." Indeed, I feel in exuberant 
 spirits to - night ; partly, of course, because I 
 have got back my voice, and am about to re- 
 cover my place, but still more because I have 
 had good news." 
 
 "Indeed! when?" I knew by her expres- 
 sion that she was alluding to her husband. 
 
 " To-day. Every thing is going well. He 
 hopes to be able presently to take a little rest 
 at Vichy; and I am going there." 
 
 " But what is going well ? for I know no- 
 thing." 
 
 "Ach! nor I much more. But he has some 
 enterprise in preparation, and it is going well, 
 and he is hopeful. X^ne may rely upon him, 
 for he is not sanguine or extravagant ; he is 
 not a dreamer, though many people think him 
 so. It was quite miserable to me to have to 
 lie on a sofa all day long up there in Jermyn 
 Street, with nothing to do but torture my brains 
 and my heart thinking something had befallen 
 him. But things look brighter now. I am 
 very well now don't you think so ?" 
 
 "I would rather not see you here to-night. 
 I doubt whether you are strong enough even 
 yet." 
 
 "Strong enough! Quite. I could not be 
 better. You don't think my voice was weak ?" 
 
 " No ; but even now you seem nervous, and 
 look pale." 
 
 "Only because I am full of hope and tri- 
 umph." 
 
 Our conversation was cut short just then, and 
 I was a primo uorno once more. 
 
108 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I was glad when the opera was finished. It 
 was a weary and a painful business to me, and 
 to more than me. Christina's triumph was not 
 long-lived. A vague sense of languor and of 
 weakness began to diffuse itself through the 
 house during the second act. It became very 
 plain that Christina had tried her strength too 
 soon, and was not equal to the task she had so 
 rashly set herself. It was not that she decid- 
 edly failed, but that she did not keep up her 
 success. The music of the part became an 
 effort to her. She grew more and more dis- 
 pirited. In my anxiety that her wish for a tri- 
 umph should be gratified, I would have wel- 
 comed even some sudden expression of dis- 
 satisfaction from the house, because that would 
 probably have fired her into energy. Of course 
 nothing of the kind was heard." The house 
 was thoroughly sympathetic and respectful. I 
 knew how bitter to her would be even that 
 sympathetic respectfulness ; for it was the soft- 
 ened shadow of failure where she had expect- 
 ed to be illumined by the full blaze of success. 
 " She's not herself at all to-night," said some- 
 body to me during a momentary meetiftg. " She 
 ought not to have sung." 
 
 " She ought not, indeed," I said, very blank 
 
 I thought she was going to make a splen- 
 did thing of it at first ; but it is quite plain that 
 she is not equal to it. I am very sorry she 
 made the attempt, for it will be a sort of tri- 
 umph to little Finola and her clique. Have 
 you seen her to-night ? There she is, yonder 
 in that box, seemingly enjoying the whole af- 
 fair the little musical humbug." 
 
 I could not help smiling at the vigorous 
 truth fulness with which he analyzed the char 
 acter of Mademoiselle. 
 
 "People have been telling me," he went on, 
 " that you were going over to her party. No 
 truth in that, I should think ?" 
 
 "Not one solitary word of truth in it." 
 "No; I hardly thought you could mistake 
 that musical-snuff-box sort of thing for sing- 
 ing, and those winks and shrugs for acting. I 
 am very sorry for Reich^ein, but it's only just 
 a moment's disappointment. Let her keep 
 quiet and recover her strength, and she'll ex 
 tinguish little robin redbreast yonder." 
 _ The extinguishing, however, was not des- 
 tined to take place that night. Christina' 
 voice failed more and more. The perform- 
 ance dragged through lifelessly and sadly. She 
 could not sing. 
 
 When all was over, I found her far more calm 
 and self-controlled than I had expected. 
 
 "I have made a complete failure of it," she 
 said. 
 
 " It was too soon for you to attempt singing ; 
 that was all. There was no question of fail- 
 ure." 
 
 "I ought to have taken your advice from the 
 first ; but I was so confident of success. I sup- 
 pose every one perceived that I was not able to 
 get through with it ?" 
 
 Every one knew, of course, that you had 
 not been well, and no one expected to find that 
 you had fully recovered your voice so soon." 
 
 I saw your friend Mademoiselle Finola 
 
 doubt she thinks the victory is hers now 
 and indeed it is. Is it not, Emanuel ?" 
 
 You have only been defeated by yourself 
 because you would not do yourself justice." 
 
 "I ought to have taken your advice in the 
 matter, for it must have been disinterested. If 
 what people say be true, you ought to be' glad 
 that I persisted in singing, and failed accord- 
 ingly. ' 
 
 I bit my lips, and felt hurt and vexed by al- 
 lusions of which I could not affect to misunder- 
 stand the meaning. This was no time, how- 
 ever, to take offense at any word of Christina's. 
 "You .have not seen her since?" she pro- 
 ceeded, with determined ana vexing purpose. 
 Why don't you go to her and congratulate her 
 on her triumph ?" 
 
 ^ " I had better," I could not help answering, 
 go to her or to any one who will be less un- 
 generous and will understand me better than 
 you do, Christina." 
 
 " But don't go, please, just yet. I do wrong 
 to speak in that way, Emanuel, for I don't be- 
 lieve one word they say about your being leagued 
 against me with her I could not believe it. But 
 I can not help being vexed and spiteful after 
 such a failure, and under her very eyes. ' Are 
 you not sorry to see me so weak and vain ?" 
 
 "I am, Christina; I do think such ways un- 
 worthy of you. What rivalry can there be be- 
 tween you and that little creature? Let her 
 enjoy her triumph, if she thinks it one. You 
 know what it means, and what it is worth, and 
 how long it is likely to last. It's a shame, 
 Christina; you have other things to think of 
 besides her and her clique and their trumpery 
 gossip." 
 
 "I have, indeed; and I deserve to be re- 
 minded of it. You \vere always like an honest 
 doctor, Emanuel a doctor who does not mind 
 giving his patient a little extra pain if he can 
 do any good by it. But you must forgive a lit- 
 tle vexation to one who comes out for a great 
 victory and goes home defeated. You will come 
 and sup with us ? We were to have had a cel- 
 ebration of my triumph ; now it shall be a feast 
 of condolence. Come ; and I promise not to 
 say another word about Finola." 
 
 " Say any thing you like about her, meinet- 
 ivegen ; but don't sink yourself even for a mo- 
 ment to her level." 
 
 " Well, will you come ? I thought of dismiss- 
 ing my guests ; but I will not do so if you will 
 come." 
 
 Let me refuse. Do not have guests. You 
 are not fit for midnight, and talk, and excite- 
 ment. Send them away." 
 
 "Ah, but I am sadly in want of a flash of 
 excitement now. Do come, Emanuel; there 
 are only to be a few. Mr. Lyndon " 
 
 "No, Christina; forgive me, if I say point- 
 blank, I don't want to meet that man, and least 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 109 
 
 of all in your company. I dislike him, and I 
 wish I could get you to do the same." 
 
 " Thanks. Our feelings are not likely to run 
 quite in the same channel as regards the Lyn- 
 don family, I fancy. Meanwhile Mr. Lyrtdon 
 is my friend and my husband's. Then you will 
 not come ? Good-night. " 
 
 "You are offended with me?" 
 
 "A little, and justly; but I quite forgive 
 you ; only let us say no more about it. And so 
 good-night." 
 
 This conversation took place before we were 
 out of the opera-house. I left her, and went 
 my way alone. 
 
 Walking homeward an hour after I passed 
 through Jermyn Street. Coming near Chris- 
 tina's lodgings, I could not help thinking over 
 the strange mixture of levity and feeling, of 
 egotism and generosity, of ambition and frivol- 
 ity, which was in that singular nature ; ambi- 
 tion so great and jealousies so small ; success 
 discolored by such petty bitternesses ; great 
 hopes made mean by such little pleasures and 
 excitements. I wished she had sought solitude, 
 not society, that night. I could not bear to 
 think of her making one at a small revelry, and 
 accepting, and perhaps enjoying, the attentions 
 of Mr. Lyndon. Not my Lisette ! 
 
 I might have spared myself some of these re- 
 flections. When I came in sight of her win- 
 dows there were no signs of revelry of any sort ; 
 all was quiet-and dark. She had evidently got 
 rid of her guests and gone home to solitude. 
 
 "I don't understand this woman yet," I 
 thought. "For good or ill, I don't understand 
 her. I wonder if I ever shall. Are any wo- 
 men ever to be understood at all ?" 
 
 Christina sang no more that season, of which, 
 indeed, but few nights remained. She had at- 
 tempted too much and too soon, and had to 
 bear the penalty bitter to her of enforced 
 rest. 
 
 I did not see her any more that year. I called 
 many times, but she could not or would not see 
 me. After a few weeks she went to Vichy, and 
 thence to Nice. I had several provincial and 
 some German engagements, and our paths di- 
 vided altogether for many months. 
 
 So closed our first season for her in disap- 
 pointment; for me in disappointment of more 
 than one kind. One thing was clear : Christina 
 and I were far more widely separated now than 
 when she was struggling in Italy and I strug- 
 gling in London, and neither knew of the oth- 
 er's whereabouts. 
 
 Let me dispose, once for all, of Mademoiselle 
 Einola, who is of no further importance in this 
 story, and need not appear in it any more. She 
 had troops of admirers and many adorers ; and 
 among the latter she soon found an eligible hus- 
 band. He was a man of large property and with 
 a foreign title. She renounced the stage right 
 sly, and betook herself to an existence of 
 
 11s and receptions, in which her soul found 
 higher delight and more fitting sphere than it 
 could have discovered in any triumph of music- 
 
 al art. Her name has been forgotten among 
 singers long ago ; and sh is not sorry. She 
 carried off at the very outset the only prize she 
 cared about ; and she looked back ever after on 
 her artistic career as one remembers the weary 
 progress of a journey which has led him to the 
 warmth and light of a happy home. She lived 
 principally in London, not much caring to go 
 back to Paris while the shoe-shop still stood in 
 the Palais Royal arcade. I met her several 
 times after her marriage, and she was very 
 friendly and gracious for a while, until chance 
 and change gradually brought us less and less 
 within each other's sight, and at last extin- 
 guished even recognition. 
 
 The first season, then, in which Christina 
 and I sang together had come and gone ; and 
 this was what it brought. I knew no end of 
 people now, and I doubt if London held a loge- 
 lier man. I felt as if I were running to seed ; 
 and I longed for a new life a new start in life. 
 It came ; but not in the way I had planned or 
 expected. The unforeseen, as usual, came to 
 pass. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 CHRISTINA'S INTERVENTION. 
 
 ANOTHER season opens, finding every thing 
 with me much the same, to all outward ap- 
 pearance, as the season before. I have not yet 
 carried out my idea of going to America ; and 
 just at the present moment the idea is rathe'r 
 in the back-ground. I have been in London 
 since before Christmas, and the spring is jnow 
 well advanced. 1 am still lodging under the 
 same roof with Ned Lambert, though we some- 
 times don't meet for weeks together. I hear 
 rather promising accounts of the poor Lyndons 
 in Paris. I have not seen Christina, or heard 
 from her all the winter; but I know that she has 
 been to Nice, and that Mr. Lyndon, M.P., has 
 been there, without his daughters ; and I know 
 what the English colony there said and thought, 
 and, while I believe it to be false as hell, I am 
 maddened by such whispers. I know the com- 
 mon talk here is that Christina is to marry Lyn- 
 don; and I wish her husband would abandon 
 his conspiracies, and' own his wife, and live 
 with her in the face of day. I have heard 
 something from him too ; and news of him. 
 There has been an abortive insurrection in 
 Lombardv, and a few poor fellows have been 
 bayoneted and shot, and some people blame 
 Salaris for it, and say that he was there ; and 
 others condemn Mazzini, and say that he was 
 not there. 
 
 Christina's engagement here, beginning rath- 
 er late this year, is near at hand, and she must 
 soon be in town. I have heard that her voice 
 is quite restored, but that her general health 
 is still weak. 
 
 One morning I receive a letter addressed to 
 me in her handwriting. I see it with some- 
 thing like a start. The time has been my 
 
110 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 whole senses would have stirred at the sigh 
 of that writing ; anil even still I can not loo! 
 at it unmoved. I believe there are some earl 
 feelings one never gets ove^r never. I shai 
 never conquer my detestation of the smell o 
 certain medicines. The faintest breath of then 
 horrifies me, as if I were again a child about t< 
 have a dose forced down my throat. I shal 
 never lose a sense of delight called up by the 
 smell of tar ; because it brings back all the old 
 memories of the sea and the strand and th 
 boats. I shall never see a scrap of Christina 
 Braun's handwriting without emotion. There 
 are no particular mysteries to be treasured up to 
 the end of this story, and I may say at once tha 
 I love another woman now better then I evei 
 loved the idol of my boyhood. But I can look 
 at her writing in a letter without any thing of 
 thrill, while a line of Christina Braun's hand 
 would even still produce at the first glance a 
 sort of electric shock. 
 
 Christina's letter was short. 
 
 "JERMYN STREET. 
 
 "My DEAR EMANUEL, Greeting! I have 
 returned to town, as you will see, and I want to 
 sjieak to you frankly, earnestly, as a friend. Do 
 you believe me a true friend, above meanness, 
 and wishing you well ? If so, forget any little 
 coldness or ill-humor I may have shown last 
 year, when I was troubled so much mentally 
 and physically, and come to me at once ; if 
 you do not thus believe in me, then tear up this 
 letter, and don't come. CHRISTINA." 
 
 I went to Jermyn Street immediately. Chris- 
 tina's German companion received me at first; 
 and in a few minutes Christina herself entered. 
 She was looking rather pale, but very handsome, 
 and bright-eyed, and splendid. 
 
 "I am glad you have come," she said; "it 
 is friendly of you. I wished to speak to you a 
 little." And she glanced at the other woman, 
 who was still in the room. 
 
 " First of yourself, Madame Eeichstein. You 
 are recovered really recovered and strong, I 
 hope ?" 
 
 "Oh yes, I think so. I was not very well 
 all the winter ; and many things made me un- 
 easy and distressed." 
 
 She looked at me with such an expression 
 that I knew she referred to her husband. In- 
 deed, I believe her German companion was quite 
 in her confidence on this point. 
 
 "Bat I am better now much better; quite 
 restored, I think. And Finola is married, and 
 has a title, and is happy ! And Ned Lambert 
 is not married, and is not happy ! I saw poor 
 Ned the other day in Paris ; dear good Ned ! 
 He is not happy and he is uneasy about some 
 of his friends." 
 
 Here Christina lifted her eyes and let them 
 rest full on me, as if she would read my very 
 heart. I don't think I met the gaze quite 
 boldly. 
 
 " Did you meet many friends in Nice ?" I 
 asked, not knowing any thing else to say. 
 
 " Some ; not many. Mr. Lyndon was there 
 part of the time." 
 "So I heard." 
 
 I now looked fixedly at Christina in my turn. 
 She* did not wince. 
 
 ' I believe, " she said, quite carelesslv, " some 
 people say Mr. Lyndon and I are to be niarried. 
 What do you think of that story, Meta ?" 
 Meta smiled a dry smile. 
 " Herr Lyndon is ein bischen alt a little old," 
 was her only remark ; and in a moment or two, 
 to my great relief, she left the room, and I pre- 
 pared to hear what Christina had to say. 
 
 When Meta was present, Christina had been 
 sitting on a music-stool, while I sat quite away 
 on a chair near the window. When we were 
 left alone she rose and stood near the fire-place, 
 where, bright spring day though it was, there 
 were blazing embers, and she motioned to me 
 to come near. 
 
 I came and stood close beside her. 
 "I have asked you to come," she said, "to 
 speak of you, not of me." 
 
 I suppose that was a note of defiance in re- 
 Dly to my look when we spoke of Mr. Lyndon. 
 There was nothing indeed I wished to say or 
 ;o hear said on the subject of Mr. Lyndon and 
 his attentions, or the talk they created. I 
 merely bowed my head in token of assent. 
 
 Then Christina, throwing back her hair with 
 ne hand, and looking fixedly at jne for an in- 
 stant or two, said : 
 
 "Now, Emanuel, I have something earnest 
 o say to you. Just a word or two of question 
 ind of warning. You will take both question 
 and warning in a friendly spirit, will you not ?" 
 I think I now knew what was coming, al- 
 hough the reader does not. I fear I flushed 
 little ; but I answered calmly, 
 "Surely, Christina, I could not receive any 
 word from you but as a friend." 
 
 " I thank you for the confidence. Now for 
 he word, Emanuel. What about Lilla Lyn- 
 lon ?" 
 
 " About Lilla Lyndon ! Which Lilla Lyn- 
 on? There are two." 
 Christina shook her head. 
 " Not worthy of you, Emanuel. Evasion to 
 o purpose. Tell me to mind my own affairs 
 nd leave you to yours, and I will do so. But 
 F you allow me to be yqur friend, and admit 
 onfidence, don't evade. I have* always con- 
 ded in you." 
 
 "I don't think you have." 
 "So far as I could*just now. I have told 
 ou there are certain things I can not quite ex- 
 lain even yet, but that they shall be explained. 
 I have never evaded your questions. I once 
 rather anticipated them put them for you and 
 gave the answers, so far as any answer might be 
 given. Now, have you not been evading my 
 question? Did you not understand it? Did 
 I not see in your face that you underst^fc 
 it?" 
 
 " Well, Christina, I suppose I did. It is no 
 use trying to evade so keen a questioner ; and 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 Ill 
 
 I wish I had answered you directly at once, | 
 and riot given an appearance of mystery where 
 there is none, and no need of any. Come, put 
 any question you will only don't expect that 
 any thing mysterious or romantic or interesting 
 is likely to come in the way of answer." 
 
 "Well, then, again: what about Lilla Lyn- 
 'don ?" 
 
 "I can only say, so far as I know, nothing. 
 To Lilla Lyndon I am nothing. To me she is 
 a sweet, calm, pure-hearted creature, who seems 
 to come out of dreamland, or poetry, or some 
 old chronicle of saints and that is all." 
 
 "How long have you known her?" 
 
 " Comparatively speaking, a short time. The 
 first time I ever saw her, and spoke to her, was 
 before I went to Italy, and I then saw her hard- 
 ly five minutes. Last season I saw her with you, 
 as you will remember. Since I came back, I 
 I did meet her again." 
 
 "That is, you threw yourself in her way?" 
 
 "I did ; but not for any purpose of my own. 
 I threw myself in her way because I thought I 
 saw through her a means of helping and serv- 
 ing two dear friends you know them both 
 Ned Lambert and Lilla, the other Lilla, Lyn- 
 don. Most truly can I say I did not selfishly 
 do this ; but I did it, and this was how our ac- 
 quaintance began." 
 
 "All that I knew." 
 
 "Then that is all." 
 
 "No, not nearly all. You have met her 
 lately ?" 
 
 "I have." 
 
 "And often?'' 
 
 "Yes, often.'' 
 
 "In plain words, you have met this girl reg- 
 ularly, by appointment with her, in Kensington 
 Gardens ?" 
 
 "No, Christina, that is not so. Whoever 
 told you that part of the story told you what 
 was not true, what was flatly false ; and if it 
 were a man, I should like to have a chance of 
 saying as much to him. One word of this 
 kind never passed between us. We never met 
 by appointment. I am not so mean as to think 
 of such a thing ; and if I had suggested it, I must 
 have been answered just as I deserved." 
 
 "Well, I hear all this with pleasure with 
 some pleasure, at least. But you have met 
 several times, quite by accident, as she walked 
 in Kensington Gardens. She has stopped and 
 spoken to you at the railings as she rode in the 
 Bow." 
 
 " She has ; and to many others too." 
 
 "Yes ; the recognized friends of her family ; 
 her father's friends." 
 
 I felt myself flushing with anger. I wish I 
 could have felt myself clear enough of con- 
 science to reply. 
 
 " Come, Emanuel, again let me quote Zwisch- 
 en uns sei Wahrheit. You have deliberately put 
 yourself in the way of meeting Miss Lyndon ?" 
 
 "I have." 
 
 " And you have met her so often and so reg- 
 ularly that you can nearly always count upon 
 
 meeting her on certain days in the same place. 
 This is true ?" 
 
 "It is true." 
 
 " And she is well, not to be hard upon your 
 years, which would seem painfully like being 
 hard on my own she is at least fourteen or fif- 
 teen years younger than you is, in fact, con- 
 siderably under age ?" 
 
 "She is." 
 
 " And you think you are acting honorably in 
 this?" 
 
 "I do not!" I exclaimed, so suddenly and 
 sharply that Christina drew back a little and 
 glanced uneasily at the door, as if fearful lest 
 we should have been overheard. " I do not, 
 Christina! I count it dishonorable frankly 
 dishonorable. I have been ashamed of myself 
 long enough for doing it. When a poor boy in 
 a small sea -port, I would not have done so. 
 But I have changed, and life has been dull and 
 lonely to me, and I did like to meet that sweet 
 pure girl, who seemed to me something so un- 
 like the common world that her very presence 
 brightened life to me. And I am afraid I liked 
 it none the less because I detested that cold- 
 blooded, sensuous, selfish old hypocrite, her fa- 
 ther." 
 
 " Hush, hush, Emanuel, you don't know Mr. 
 Lyndon you and he seem, I can't tell how, to 
 have a sort of instinctive aversion to each oth- 
 er." 
 
 " No ; I don't suppose he even honors me 
 with his aversion and I don't care." 
 
 " Then let him pass ; come to his daughter. 
 I think I am satisfied, Emanuel. I think, as 
 you look this thing so fearlessly "in the face and 
 don't spare yourself, you need no farther ap- 
 peal no appeal from me ; still, I meant to give 
 you a warning. Let me give it before you 
 leave ; we shall not often have such confiden- 
 tial conversations. Emanuel, do you love this 
 girl?" 
 
 I turned away, and walked to the window. 
 Christina came to me, and laid her hand upon 
 my shoulder. 
 
 "Speak frankly to me as to your friend or 
 your sister. Do you love her?" 
 
 " Can you ask such a question ?" 
 "Oh yes. Gone is gone, my friend, and 
 dead is dead. I don't expect that the past 
 could live forever in your heart, and I should 
 be sorry if it did. Let us remember nothing 
 but so much as may give us a right to trust in 
 each other. You do, then, love her?" 
 
 Christina's voice trembled a little as she spoke. 
 
 " Christina, I have not thought of loving her ; 
 not in that sense.- Not as I loved you not as 
 I" 
 
 "Then why do you meet her?" 
 
 " Because I was lonely, and at odds with ev- 
 ery thing, and her voice sounded sweetly in my 
 ears, and her eyes looked kindly on me : and 
 she was a mild delightful influence, and I was 
 selfish enough to think of nothing else." 
 
 " Then my warning may be of use. Listen, 
 Emanuel. If you loved the girl passionately, 
 
112 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER 
 
 and hoped to marry her, you might possibly ! 
 gain your wish ; for I believe there is nothing i 
 her father would not in the end consent to for ! 
 her sake. But I don't believe you could be | 
 happy with her, or she with you. She is a ' 
 sweet, loving child, with a child's feelings. She j 
 has, I think, no strength of character, no endur- 
 ing, absorbing affection. Either she must lead 
 a life with you to which she would be utterly 
 unused you know that she has never breathed 
 our atmosphere of Bohemia or you must live 
 a kind of pensioner on her father, maintained 
 as the husband whom his willful and fooli: 
 daughter would marry, and who therefore mu a 
 be taken into the family circle. You wince un 
 der this. Is it not true ?" 
 
 "But there never was the faintest idea o 
 any thing of the kind. Never. Good Heavens 
 
 one may speak to a young lady without " 
 
 "Yes, one may; but when one meets th 
 young lady very often clandestinely " 
 "Clandestinely!" 
 
 "What other word can you find for it 
 Clandestinely, and nothing else. When on 
 does this, he must contemplate something, o 
 he must have no brains and heart at all ; an 
 you have both. Emanuelj I would, at almos 
 any risk, save you from an entanglement tha 
 could only end, I am sure, in unhappiness. 
 speak to you, therefore, with an openness whic 
 perhaps wise people and good people woul 
 think does me little credit. Lilla Lyndon love 
 you!" 
 
 I am afraid the first emotion created in nu 
 by this declaration was a pang of fierce anc 
 wild delight. ' It was followed quickly, as by a 
 rush of cold air on a burning forehead, by a 
 chilling sense of hopelessness and pain and 
 shame. 
 
 "It can not be so, Christina ; it is not so." 
 " It is so ; I know it. Do you think I would 
 talk of the poor girl so if I did not know what 
 I was saying ? It is so. I have seen her late- 
 ly ; I know her well ; I have talked with her 
 many times ; she has come and seen me here 
 in this room ; and a thousand things, a thou- 
 sand words, have betrayed her poor little secret 
 to me. Perhaps she does not know it herself. 
 I don't suppose she has ever indulged much ifi 
 examination of her own heart. Wh'afof that ? 
 I have eyes, and can see. If she were sinking 
 into a consumption, she might not know it ; but 
 I should know it, or you. There is nothing 
 much to wonder at in the matter, Emanuel. 
 The poor girl has hardly ever met any men but 
 elderly members of Parliament, and heavy cap- 
 italists, and bishops. I know Mr. Lyndon too 
 well to suppose he would allow any poor and 
 handsome young curate ever to come near his 
 daughter. Wohlavf! Your whole life is to 
 her something interesting, strange, romantic. 
 What is there to wonder at ? I dare say if she 
 had met a dove-eyed young clergyman in good 
 time, the thing never would have happened. 
 Mr. Lyndon is like the man in ^Esop who shut 
 up his son in a tower lest he should be killed 
 
 by the lion ; and, behold, the picture of a lion 
 on the Avail brought his death." 
 
 Christina spoke with flashing eyes, and with 
 all the dramatic energy she always had shown 
 since her girlhood, whenever she felt any in- 
 terest in what she was saying. A stranger 
 might have thought she was acting even now 
 but I knew she was not. 
 
 "Why do you tell me this even if it be 
 true ?'' 
 
 "Because I think I am speaking to a man 
 of honor and spirit, and that the best appeal to 
 you I can make is by the full frank truth " 
 
 "What would you have me do-supposing 
 all this to be true ?" 
 
 "Give up this girl leave her never see her 
 again ! Leave her before it be too late. She 
 will forget you, Emanuel, believe me ; she will 
 forget you, if only you leave her in time ; and 
 she' will marry somebody her father likes, and 
 she will be a good obedient girl, and very hap- 
 py, and her days will be long in the land, as the 
 story-books put it, or the religious books, or 
 what you will. And you will forget her; you 
 say even now you do not actually love her. 
 She will cry a little, perhaps ; but all girls cry 
 for something, and I really don't think it much 
 matters for what." 
 
 ' Christina, I don't like your tone I don't 
 like your way of speaking." 
 
 She laughed a low, slight, scornful laugh. 
 
 "Not romantic and tender and sentimental 
 enough, perhaps ? But look what your romance 
 and tenderness come to. You are teaching this 
 girl to deceive her father yes, you are yet 
 you don't know that you love her, and you have 
 no object whatever in meeting her ! ' Turare ! 
 You are not a boy, Emanuel, to act so any 
 longer." 
 
 I bit my lips. I felt vexed and ashamed, 
 and only too conscious that I deserved all she 
 said or could say. 
 
 "Well, Christina, I must try to deserve your 
 better opinion, and to act with more judgment 
 md manliness. I make no promise, and I 
 must act for myself in my own way ; but I Hope 
 ^ou shall have no further cause to" feel ashamed 
 or me." 
 
 "That is like yourself your old self; I am 
 ure you will do right after all. I would not 
 alk to you in this way, if I thought you loved 
 his girl; I would rather say, Fling every 
 bought away but that of loving her and hold- 
 ng her against the world. But you do not, 
 nd I think she will be cured at last of her love 
 'or you." 
 
 I rose to close the conversation. 
 "I will do my best, Christina. Existence, 
 suppose, is always to be a bore and a wean- 
 ess and a renunciation to me. Well, I accept 
 le situation ; it will come to an end some 
 me." 
 
 Oh, pray, don't speak so." 
 
 Yes ; I am weary of every thing. I am 
 ck of this wretched profession or art, or 
 hatever you choose to call it for which I 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 113 
 
 have no heart and no genius, and in which I 
 know I can never come to any thing worth liv- 
 ing for. I am tired of the people one meets, 
 and the follies one commits, and the weary re- 
 straints one has to put on if he would not com- 
 mit follies, and worse. What is one's motive 
 in living ? I don't know." 
 
 "Still we live, my dear; and we can but 
 make the best of it. I at least will not see you 
 sink away, Emanuel, into any folly or fatality 
 without saying a word to interpose. Perhaps 
 you think I have no right to preach or to ad- 
 vise?" 
 
 I waved my hand to repudiate this idea. 
 
 " But we made a pledge of friendship, Eman- 
 uel, when we entered on that new chapter of 
 'our lives ; and I have kept it in my heart as 
 sacredly as I could, though we have not often 
 met. And I do not indeed, I do not think 
 this you have done could come to any happi- 
 ness for you or for her. Perhaps I don't un- 
 derstand the little girl quite, you will say," and 
 she smiled slightly; "but if I am wrong, the 
 thing will come to pass none the less because I 
 ask you to be open and manly, and yet careful. 
 You ask me what is the use of living, and how 
 one is to bear with life? My good friend, oth- 
 ers have bitter burdens too to bear, and bitter 
 bad temptations to resist ; and I could tell you 
 how they learn to do it, only I dare not yet ; 
 you would smile at me, or think me hypocritical, 
 and I could not bear either. But one time I 
 will tell you that, and other things too which 
 now perhaps you do not know or guess. No, 
 don't ask for explanation ; I have said enough, 
 and too much. Now, good-by !" 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 IN KENSINGTON GARDENS. 
 
 THE conversation with Christina, which left 
 me a little mystified in the end, has at least 
 cleared up something of my story since the 
 Lyndons, mother and daughter, left London. 
 Perhaps it has told so much that I might now 
 go straight on with the rest as it occurred, and 
 without turning back to review or explain any 
 thing. But it would possibly be well to give a 
 few lines to a candid recapitulation of what had 
 taken place, and to a chapter of my life which 
 I always look back on with a mixture of pride 
 and of shame. 
 
 When poor Ned Lambert was left by Lilla 
 Lyndon, he and I spoke but a very few words 
 over the matter : few, but enough. He was a 
 silent fellow by nature, and a man to crush down 
 what he felt. He knew how thoroughly I sym- 
 pathized with him ; and a grip of the hand from 
 such a man or to such a man is incomparably 
 more eloquent than words. His nature was 
 quiet, patient, confiding; he kneAV that Lilla 
 loved him, he knew that there was some reason 
 why he must at least submit to wait ; and he 
 submitted, and asked no questions. He did not 
 
 maunder, or mope, or idly repine at fate or any 
 thing else, but only seemed to throw a fiercer 
 energy into every thing he did, to the very 
 smoking of a cigar ; and he used to sit up half 
 the night devising new improvements in the 
 construction of organs. He told me he went to 
 see Christina sometimes, but never when any 
 body was likely to be there. He "dropped her 
 a line," he said, when he felt anxious to say a 
 word to her, and she always set apart a time to 
 suit him at the earliest moment. Like most 
 silent men, he was, I am sure, ready to be very 
 effusive and confidential with any *woman he 
 trusted in ; and I have no doubt that he told 
 Christina every word of his disappointment and 
 his love, and talked to her as he would not 
 indeed, as he could not have talked to any 
 man alive. 
 
 Meanwhile his occupations took him a good 
 deal out of town. I don't know whether Lilla 
 Lyndon wrote to him : she wrote to me some- 
 times, and gr.ve me good news of her prosper- 
 ous and promising occupation in Paris. Of 
 course I told her all about Ned Lambert, and 
 hardly any thing else, when I replied. After a 
 while she began to tell me that she had received 
 the sweetest, kindest letters from her cousin 
 Lilla, whom she had never seen, but who had 
 suddenly opened up a correspondence with her. 
 Lilla the elder Ned's Lilla was greatly amazed 
 and delighted at this, and could not understand 
 it at all. I felt like one who is conscious of 
 having done something delightfully good, and 
 is proud of having it known only to himself. 
 After a while I began to take a somewhat 
 modified and less flattering view of my own 
 position in the transaction. 
 
 For all had happened as I told Christina. I 
 had acted on the idea of making Lilla the 
 younger the angelic, celestial mediatrix in the 
 whole of the painful business. I felt sure that 
 her influence over her father would have power 
 enough to induce him, for the sake of the other 
 Lilla, to buy off or pension off in some way his 
 wretched brother send him to America or 
 Australia, or any where out of the way. Many 
 times I passed her door to no purpose. One 
 day at last I saw her as her groom was holding 
 her horse's head and she was about to mount. 
 Perhaps if she had not seen me then, and cord- 
 ially recognized, I might not have ventured to 
 speak to her ; but she did see me, and gave me 
 a frank and friendly recognition ; and then I 
 went up and presented myself to her, and told 
 her without hesitation that I came of my own 
 counsel, unasked by any body, unknown to any 
 body, to plead for her good offices on behalf of 
 her cousin, the other Lilla. Whatever of se- 
 crecy might afterward have grown up, this at 
 least was done openly, at her father's door, un- 
 der the eyes if not within the hearing of her 
 groom, in the face of day. She received me 
 with that innocent, genial, sympathetic trust- 
 ingness which nothing but purity and nobleness 
 of heart ever can give. 
 
 I confess that as I spoke to her that time, 
 
114 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and saw her pure, calm eyes turned to me, am 
 heard her sympathetic, tender, girlish voice, . 
 thought that between her and me lay a distanc 
 as broad as between two creatures of.differen 
 worlds. It no more occurred to me as possibl 
 that such a woman could turn one thought to 
 ward me than that one of the Madonnas of 
 marble in an Italian chapel could have com 
 down from her pedestal in the sacred stillnes 
 of the evening, and, like Diana, kissed some 
 mortal worshiper. 
 
 She had only known before that she had 
 cousin whom her father would not suffer her to 
 see ; of her uncle she had known nothing. Sh< 
 spoke to her father, and pleaded hard ; and al 
 she obtained was permission to write to the 
 other Lilla Lyndon. From Lilla the elder sh( 
 doubtless received encomiums of my honor anc 
 integrity and brotherly affection, and so forth 
 which led her to confide frankly in me. She 
 did not despair at all of winning over her father 
 and but for the too frequent presence of hei 
 hard and puritanical step-sisters she was the 
 daughter, the only child, of Mr. Lyndon's sec- 
 ond marriage she might much sooner have 
 prevailed. I learned from her that she had 
 actually found out and tried to redeem, and 
 petted and largely bribed, the wretched old 
 scoundrel, her uncle ; and that she really did 
 contrive, by her influence, and still more by hei 
 money, to keep him from making any more 
 scandal. How I sickened at the idea of her 
 meeting the odious old hypocrite! and yet I 
 did not dare to hint at what I thought of him. 
 She had, with all her sweetness, a sort of reso- 
 lute sanctified willfulness about her ; and no- 
 thing on earth, except perhaps her father's 
 absolute command, could have kept her from 
 trying to do good to her outcast uncle. Mean- 
 while the only good of keeping him temporarily 
 decent was that it made her father feel con- 
 vinced his brother would not dare to annoy 
 him any more, and therefore more than ever 
 determined not to yield to any entreaty on his 
 behalf. 
 
 What I confessed to Christina explains all 
 the rest. We met by chance frequently. I 
 found it was Lilla's habit to walk almost every 
 day in Kensington Gardens for half an hour or 
 so. It was only, so to speak, crossing the 
 street from her own house ; and her maid was 
 generally with her. We spoke together : she 
 had always something to say to me about the 
 progress of her endeavors on behalf of her 
 cousin. She did sometimes come alone. I 
 did observe the hour and day of her coming, 
 and I did always contrive to be there. To 
 speak to her did always seem to sweeten and 
 purify life for me. I did at last begin to think 
 I was acting a mean and shameful part, al- 
 though no word had ever passed between us 
 which her mother, were she living, might not 
 have heard. I did begin to feel ashamed of 
 thus meeting a girl whose father would not, if 
 he could, acknowledge my existence ; and, 
 what was worse still, I did feel conscious of a 
 
 hideous, degrading sens,e of gratified malignity 
 in the knowledge of the fact. This it was 
 which most distinctly told me of my own grow- 
 ing degradation. 
 
 All I had told Christina was true. I did 
 not venture to think with loveof Lilla Lyncloh. 
 My God, I never thought of loving her. She 
 seemed far too pure and good, too unworldly 
 and childlike in her goodness, to be loved by a 
 half-outworn Bohemian like me. She was not 
 of my ways at all. When I saw her I only 
 breathed a purer air for a moment, and then 
 went back to my smoke and gas-light and Bo- 
 hemia again. But Christina spoke unwisely : 
 she counted on a romantic heroism greater than 
 mine when she told me that such a girl was 
 capable of loving me. Truly, I resolved that 
 I must cease to see her ; but then I also made 
 up my mind that I must see her once more, 
 and that I must part from her in such a way 
 that at least she should not despise me. Sup- 
 pose what Christina said to be true and I hard- 
 ly yet believed . it the worst of the evil was 
 partly done, and it could do little more harm, 
 no more harm, to take leave of Lilla Lyndon in 
 such a way as should at least allow her to re- 
 tain a memory of me which should not be whol- 
 ly one of contempt. 
 
 I did not once think it possible that any thing 
 but separation could come of our strange ac- 
 quaintanceship. Let me do myself justice. So 
 much there was equivocal and weak, and un- 
 generous and mean, in this chapter of my his- 
 tory, that I must protect the reputation of what 
 little honorable feeling I always retained. Had 
 I loved Lilla with all the passion of a youth's 
 first love, I don't think I should have attempt- 
 ed to induce her to marry me : it would have 
 eemed cruelly unfair to her. There appeared 
 to be some truth in what Christina said. Lilla 
 probably did not and could not know her own 
 mind. Any feeling she might entertain for me 
 was doubtless but the strange, sudden, ephem- 
 eral sentiment of a girl the foolish romantic 
 tenderness a young woman just beyond the 
 school-girl's age sometimes feels toward her 
 music-master or her riding-master. It will die, 
 and be buried and forgotten in a season: to 
 reat it as a reality would be a treachery and a 
 cruelty. The more we hear from the women 
 f mature years who confide in us, the more do 
 ve know that almost every girl of quick fancy 
 and tenderness has had her budding bosom 
 filled for a while with some such whimsical af- 
 ection, which fades before the realities of life 
 and of love, and is only remembered, if at all, 
 with an easy, half-mirthful memory. To Lilla 
 jyridon, I thought to myself, I shall soon be 
 uch a memory, and no more. If I remain in 
 jondon, or return to it, I shall hear of her be- 
 ng married to some one who brings her a for- 
 une and a position; and I shall read of her 
 arties in the season, and perhaps some day see ; 
 n the papers that she has presented her claugh- 
 er at Court ; and we may meet sometimes, or 
 he will come to hear me sing, and she will be 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 115 
 
 friendly and kind, and not ashamed of the fad- 
 ing memory of these days. I am surely the 
 most unfortunate of beings where any word of 
 
 love is in question : I seem to be able only to 
 learn what the thing is, or may be, in order to 
 have it taken away from me. I must really 
 
116 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 make up my mind to be a stern old bachelor, 
 and have done with all thoughts of what is 
 clearly not for me. Yesterday I was a boy too 
 young. to marry; now I am getting rather eld- 
 erly for such ideas. Let me close the chapter 
 altogether ; let me see Lilla Lyndononce, only 
 once, and bid her a kind good-by, and relieve 
 my soul by confessing that I have done wrong, 
 and beg of her still to think of the other Lilla ; 
 and then I will go and tell Christina what I 
 have done, and she will at least approve ; and 
 so the drudgery of life will just go on as before. 
 
 I had walked, thus thinking, along Piccadil- 
 ly, which was glaring and garish in the sun, and 
 by Apsley House (where, when first I came to 
 London, one might yet see "the Duke" get- 
 ting into his queerly- shaped cab), into Hyde 
 Park, and so to Kensington Gardens. When 
 I reached the shade of the noble old trees of 
 Kensington I walked slowly, and lingered and 
 looked anxiously around. I came within sight 
 of the little round basin which lies, so pretty a 
 lakelet, in the bosom of the open, which the 
 trees fringe all round, and whence the glades 
 and vistas stretch out. London has nothing so 
 exquisite as just that spot. With the old red 
 palace near at hand, and no other building in 
 sight, one may ignore the great metropolis al- 
 together, and fancy himself in a park of Anne's 
 days, embedded deep in the heart of some se- 
 cluded country landscape. A slight breeze to- 
 day ruffled the surface of the little pond, over 
 which the water-fowl were skimming, and the 
 shadows of birds fell broken on it as they flew 
 overhead ; and a light cloud could now and 
 then be seen reflected in it. The whole scene 
 was gracious, gentle, tender, with a faint air 
 of melancholy about it, which was but a new 
 grace. 
 
 On one of the seats which look upon the lit- 
 tle basin I saw Lilla Lyndon sitting. She had 
 a book in her hand, but she was not reading. 
 She looked up from the water as I approached, 
 and greeted me with a frank, bright smile. 
 She was a very handsome girl, with her youth- 
 ful Madonna contour of face, her pale clear 
 complexion and violet eyes, and dark brown 
 hair parted smoothly, as was then the fashion, 
 on either brow. As her brilliant red lips part- 
 ed and showed her white small teeth, a gleam 
 of vivacity for the first time lighted the face, of 
 which the habitual expression was a tender 
 calmness, almost a melancholy beauty, like that 
 of the sunlight on the water beneath' her. 
 
 "I am glad you have come," she said, after 
 she had given me her hand, " for I came here 
 much earlier than usual to-day, and it is lone- 
 ly, and I have felt rather weary. I have just 
 been wondering perhaps you can help me to 
 understand it why inanimate nature is all so 
 melancholy, and why the least throb of life 
 seems to be joyous. I have been looking at 
 that pool, and the light and the leaves, and they 
 all seem sad ; and a water-fowl just plunges 
 into the pond, and floats and dives, and the 
 sadness seems to vanish in a moment." 
 
 "I fear I am not poet enough to understand 
 it." 
 
 "But you ought to be a poet in soul, at 
 least. A singer must be a poet, I think, or 
 how can he sing? You have made me feel 
 poetic many times." 
 
 "So I dare say has a harp or a violin. I 
 have as much music in my soul as the fiddle." 
 
 " Oh, but that is nonsense. There is some- 
 thing I read lately that reminds me of a word 
 or two I once heard from you about music. I 
 have been reading that novel of Richter's you 
 told me to get the Flegeljahre. Well, the 
 poet-brother praises the flutist-brother's exqui- 
 site performance ; but unfortunately he gives as 
 his reason for admiration that the music brought 
 up all the most tender and delightful associa- 
 tions to his memory. I should have thought 
 that the highest praise: should not you?" 
 
 I shook my head. 
 
 "No? Well, so too says Vult the flute- 
 player. He is quite disappointed, and shakes 
 his head, and says: 'I see, then, that you did 
 not understand or appreciate the music at all.' 
 So it is with me. When I most delight in 
 music, it is because it brings up something 
 which is not in the music itself." 
 
 "And I too, Miss Lyndon; and therefore I 
 know I am not a true musician." 
 
 "Then who is?" 
 
 "Well, Madame Reichstein is, and many 
 others." 
 
 " Yes ; papa always says Madame Reichstein 
 is. I delight in Madame Reichstein myself, 
 both on the stage and oft'; more even when off, 
 I think." 
 
 "You have met her lately ?" 
 
 "Yes, several times. I make papa take me 
 to see her. I never knew a great singer before 
 a woman, I mean. I think her very charm-, 
 ing. Is she what people call a lady ?" 
 
 "Not what Belgravia calls a lady, certainly. 
 Her father was a German toymaker." 
 
 "You are angry with me for my question," 
 said Lilla, opening her violet eyes widely, and 
 looking at me with quite a pathetic expression, 
 "and you think me a fool ; but do you know 
 the reason I asked the question ? I had a rea- 
 son." 
 
 " I don't know the reason, Miss Lyndon." 
 
 "Just this, then: somebody a woman to 
 whom I talked of Madame Reichstein chose 
 to speak rather contemptuously of her, and said 
 she was not a lady. I asked rather sharply, 
 why not ? and she answered that she was not a 
 [ady of rank oft" the stage, like Madame Sontag 
 and somebody else, I don't know whom ; and 
 that she is not received in society. So much 
 the worse for society, I thought." 
 
 "I suppose society has its laws every where. 
 [ don't suppose Madame Reichstein cares. I 
 am sure she is not ashamed of having been born 
 ooor, any more than I am, Miss Lyndon. My 
 ather was a boat-builder, my mother sewed 
 gloves ; my genealogy goes no farther back. I 
 don't suppose I ever had a grandfather." 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 117 
 
 You speak coldly, or angrily, as if yot 
 thought I cared about people's grandfathers, 
 said Lilla, gently; "I wish I had not said an 
 thing about Madame Keichstein, whom I think 
 I admire as highly as any body can. You can 
 ~ot suppose I really care whether her fathe: 
 v :- a poor man or a rich man ?" 
 
 "Frankly, Miss Lyndon, I doubt whethe: 
 people ever get quite over these feelings. Per 
 haps it is better not. I am always angry with 
 any of my own class who try to get out of it 
 and I think them rightly treated when they arc 
 reminded of their social inferiority." 
 
 I suppose I was speaking in a tone of some 
 bitterness. Lilla's remark, innocent as it was_ 
 had jarred sharply on me, and seemed to point 
 the painful moral of the course into which I hac 
 been drifting. Even this child had eyes to see 
 that she and I had c*me from a different class, 
 and belonged to a different world. I had been 
 standing beside the seat on which she sat. She 
 looked up quickly as I spoke ; then rose and 
 stood near me, and with the gentlest action in 
 the world, laid her small hand on my arm. 
 
 "I see that I have offended you," she said, 
 
 " by my thoughtless talk. But trust me, that 
 
 if I thought less highly of Madame Eeichstein, 
 
 and and of you, I should never have spoken in 
 
 such a way. I did not suppose it possible you 
 
 could have taken my words as you have done. 
 
 It humiliates me even more than you. Tray, 
 
 ' pray don't misunderstand me ; I have no friend 
 
 < I value like you." 
 
 Her voice was a little tremulous in its plaint- 
 iveness, and the kindliness of her expression 
 was irresistible. Even wounded pride could 
 not stand out against it. 
 
 "Your friendship, Miss Lyndon, is one of 
 the dearest things I have on earth almost, in- 
 deed, the only thing that is dear to me. Let 
 me preserve it. Were you going home ? and 
 may I walk just a little way with you ?" 
 
 "Yes, I was going home ; and I shall be glad 
 of your companionship yet a little." 
 
 With all our " clandestine" meetings, we had 
 never walked together before. Our sin against 
 propriety had been limited to just the occasional 
 meetings, the exchange of a few words, and the 
 partings. Now I did not offer her my arm ; we 
 walked side by side down one of the glades 
 wjiich stretches nearly parallel with the road. 
 A little girl, poorly dressed, darted across our 
 path, then suddenly stopped, and looking shyly 
 at me, dropped a courtesy to my companion, 
 and was going on, when Lilla, addressing her 
 as "Lizzy," brought her to a stand. She talked 
 to the child about her father, who had a sore 
 arm, and was out of work ; and her mother, 
 and her brother, and so on ; and I heard her 
 say she was going to see them that day ; and 
 she took out a little purse, and gave the girl 
 something. 
 
 " One of my children," she said in explana- 
 tion ; " I have a school ; a very little one. I 
 have asked Madame Reichstein to come and 
 see it, and she will sing for the girls. I owe a 
 
 great deal to these children. They give me 
 occupation ; I should not k.now what to do with 
 my existence but for them, our house is so very 
 dull. I suppose a home without a mother al- 
 ways is. Papa is so busy with Parliament and 
 politics, and so much out." 
 
 A moment's silence followed. Then I took 
 heart of grace and said, 
 
 "Just now, Miss Lyndon, you were kind 
 enough to say you thought of me as a friend ; 
 and I asked you to let me Reserve your friend- 
 ship " 
 
 " Have you not deserved it ? Did you not 
 teach me how I might perhaps serve and help 
 those who have claims on me? Have I not 
 heard how true and steady a friend you were 
 to my cousin and her mother, and her poor fa- 
 ther ? Have I not seen all this ? Mr. Temple, 
 I don't know why papa is so resolute in refus- 
 ing to meet or help my uncle. I suppose he 
 has good reason ; but I myself believe only in 
 mercy and kindness, and and love. I don't 
 think our religion teaches us any thing else; 
 and at least I don't believe in human justice 
 when it only punishes. I must try to bring my 
 people together; and I hope to succeed. If I 
 do, will not that be a great thing ? And how 
 could it have been done but for you ?" 
 
 "If it can be done, it would have been done 
 without me. But I am only too glad to hear 
 you speak so kindly and hopefully. I am a 
 believer in your religion of pity and mercy and 
 love or in none. But I have to deserve your 
 friendship otherwise than in this easy and pleas- 
 ant way. Miss Lyndon, I have no right to be 
 with you here to-day. I have no right to walk 
 your side. I have no right to come, as I 
 lave come, for the sole purpose of meeting you. 
 All this is wrong in me, and wrong toward you. 
 You are much younger than I am, and your 
 dndness and friendship make you only too 
 ;houghtful for others not for yourself. I must 
 not see you any more in this way and I could 
 not help telling you and good-by." 
 
 She looked up at me with a sudden startled, 
 pained expression, and then her eyes fell, and 
 jver her clear pale face there came a faint, 
 aint flush. 
 
 "Not to meet any more?" she said at last. 
 ' Then I have done wrong in being here ?" 
 
 " Not you oh, not you. But I, Miss Lyn- 
 lon, I have done wrong; I came here, day 
 fter day, to meet you." 
 
 " Yes ; I knew it I expected you ; I wished 
 ou to come." 
 
 "But I am not your father's friend he 
 would not approve of my meeting you." 
 
 'Who is to blame, Mr. Temple, but your- 
 elf ? Have I not many times asked you to let 
 ne bring papa and you to be friends? Have 
 not often told you I felt convinced that if he 
 nly knew you, he would appreciate you as I 
 
 "You have often said so; but you can not 
 now how men of the world think " 
 "But I do know papa; and I know that 
 
118 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 there are few things I could ask him which he 
 would not grant. One of the things I have de- 
 termined on is, that he shall know you, and ap- 
 preciate you, and like you. I will tell him this 
 very day. Why should you not come to our 
 house, and be of our friends, and brighten our 
 home a little for us, instead of some of the dull 
 and pompous and uncharitable and unloving 
 people who come to us ? Mr. Temple, if you 
 think there is any thing lowering to you in the 
 way our acquaintanceship has been carried on 
 so far, let me bear the blame of it, and there 
 shall be no more cause for blame. I will tell 
 papa this very day I will tell him all." 
 
 "That I have met you, and walked with 
 you ?" 
 
 "Yes, every word. Why not? I will tell 
 him the whole truth, and he will believe me. 
 I will tell him we met here because I wished 
 to meet you, and you were too proud to come 
 to our house. And I will tell him that you 
 must come often." 
 
 "And teach you to sing, perhaps?" I could 
 not help asking, with a rather melancholy smile. 
 
 " Yes ; why not ? that is, if you would ; only 
 I suppose you are again too proud, and will be 
 offended if I even mention such a thing. I 
 should think it delightful." 
 
 "Miss Lyndon, every word you say only 
 shows me, more and more, with what noble- 
 ness and innocence I must say it you have 
 acted, and how unworthy of such goodness and 
 such companionship I am. Do follow out your 
 right impulse; do speak to your father thus 
 frankly, and abide by what he says." 
 
 "I will; and I will tell him you told me to 
 do so. You will find you do not understand 
 him as well as I do. Only you must promise 
 you will come to our house when he asks you." 
 
 "I might safely promise on such a condition, 
 and the result be just the same, but I will not. 
 I must at last be open and frank with you, who 
 are so candid and sincere with me. No, Miss 
 Lyndon, I can never enter your house as a sort 
 of tolerated inferior, even if your father did be- 
 come as good-natured as you expect." 
 
 " Inferior ! You pain me and humiliate me. 
 Have I acted as if I thought you an inferior? 
 Am I, then, in your judgment, capable of giv- 
 ing my warm friendship and my confidence to 
 an inferior ? For shame, Mr. Temple ! Have 
 more faith in yourself and your art, and the 
 beautiful life it gives. Have more faith in me. " 
 
 "I have more faith in you than in any thing 
 under heaven. But I know what your father 
 would think of me. I know what he would 
 say, and with only too much appearance of jus- 
 tice. I can not, even for you, bear this, and 
 bear it too to no purpose. Speak to him, if 
 you will, but I could never meet you under his 
 roof except on conditions which I could never 
 bear, or with an object which is hopeless and 
 impossible. No, Lilla no, Miss Lyndon " 
 
 " You may call me Lilla ; I wish to be called 
 so." 
 
 "No, Lilla; I have come up from the low- 
 
 est life, but I have some sense of honor, and 
 some pride. I have done wrong thus far I 
 never saw it so clearly as now ; but it shall be 
 done no more. I have your interest and your 
 happiness now far too deeply at heart to think 
 in the least of any pain it may give me or even 
 you to do right. To meet any more would be 
 hopeless for me, and useless generosity on your 
 part." 
 
 "Then our friendship comes to an end? I 
 am sorry. I wished that we might be always 
 friends I felt life less weary." 
 
 "Our friendship surely shall not come to an 
 end. It shall live always, I hope." 
 
 "But I don't understand why this should be 
 so why you should haughtily refuse our friend- 
 ship." 
 
 "You don't understand it now, Lilla; but 
 you will one day, and you will feel glad " 
 
 " I am very unhappy." 
 
 There was a calm, clear sincerity in the 
 way she spoke these words which was infinitely 
 touching. Was it not likewise infinitely tempt- 
 ing ? Let those who, like me, yet young, have 
 been cast away prematurely from love, and have 
 long felt compelled to believe that supreme hu- 
 man joy cut off from them forever let them 
 suddenly be placed face to face with a beauti- 
 ful, pure, and tender girl, and see the expres- 
 sion I saw trembling on her lips and sparkling 
 in tears on her eyelids, and say if it was nothing 
 to stand firmly back, and leave her, as I did. 
 When for my sins I am arraigned hereafter, 
 as good people tell us we shall be, before some 
 high celestial bar, I hope I shall be able to 
 plead that one effort as a sacrifice in mitiga- 
 tion of the heavenly judgment. 
 
 "I am very unhappy," she said. "And now 
 that you have spoken thus, you have made me 
 think for the first time that I have been doing 
 wrong. I hoped to have brought all my people 
 together, and healed the quarrels and dislikes 
 which are so sad and sinful in a family ; and I 
 hoped to have made papa and you know each 
 other and love each other and he could appre- 
 ciate you and to have made much happiness ; 
 and now I only feel ashamed, as if I had been 
 doing something secret and wrong ; and you 
 tell me we must not be friends any more. I 
 have had no friends before ; the people we know 
 are formal and hard, and only care for politics 
 and money ; and I don't care for their society, 
 and I can not school my feelings into their way. 
 But what is right, Mr. Temple, we must do ; 
 and I think only the more of your goodness, 
 and am all the more sorry, because you have 
 told me what I ought to do. Good-by ! " 
 
 She spoke this in a tremulous voice that vi- 
 brated musically and sadly in my. ears, as in- 
 deed it vibrates there now. There was a look 
 of profound regret and profound resignation on 
 her face, which to my eyes, unaccustomed to 
 see men and women obey aught but their mere 
 impulses, good or bad, seemed saint-like, heav- 
 en-like. Even then, I think I only felt the more 
 leeply how little such a nature could in the end 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 119 
 
 have blended ijgith mine ; how imperative and 
 sacred was the duty which divided us in time. 
 I could have wished that death awaited me in 
 five minutes ; but I did not flinch. I did not 
 say one tender word, which might have reck- 
 lessly unsealed the fountains of emotion in that 
 sweet and loving nature. 
 
 " Good-by, Mr. Temple." She put her hand 
 in mine. I pressed it reverently, rather than 
 warmly. 
 
 "Good-by, Miss Lyndon." 
 
 There was a pause ; neither spoke ; and then 
 we separated. 
 
 I turned and gazed after her. Her tall, 
 light, slender figure looked exquisitely grace- 
 ful as she passed under the shadow of the trees, 
 and over the soft green turf. I see her still as 
 I look back in memory ; I see her figure pass- 
 ing under the trees. I see the whole scene ; 
 the grass, the foliage, the sunlight, the grace- 
 ful, tender, true-hearted girl, who would have 
 loved me. 
 
 Her handkerchief had fallen, and lay on the 
 grass. I took up the dainty little morsel of 
 snowy cambric, and saw her initials in the cor- 
 ner. I thrust it into my breast : I would keep 
 it forever ! To what purpose ? It is not mine ; 
 what have I to do with relics ad memorials of 
 Lilla Lyndon ? I ran after iiejfvvith it. She 
 turned round quickly when dK heard the foot- 
 steps behind her. 
 
 " Your handkerchief, Lilla you dropped it ; 
 that is all. Good-by." 
 
 She smiled a faint acknowledgment ; but, 
 though her veil was down, I could see that her 
 eyes were swimming in tears. She did not 
 speak a word ; and I turned and went my way, 
 not looking back any more, for I knew that the 
 angel who had perchance been a moment under 
 my tent had departed from it. 
 
 I went back to the side of the little basin, 
 and sat for a while in the chair where she had 
 sat ; and I leaned my chin upon my hand, and 
 looked vacuously at the rippling water. I have 
 obeyed you, Christina, I thought ; I have made 
 this sacrifice. Heaven knows how little of it 
 was made for Heaven ! Would you ever, un- 
 der any circumstances, have loved me as she 
 might have done ? And now all is at an end ; 
 I have lost her ! What remains ? 
 
 I believe old-fashioned theologians used to 
 say that man had always an angel on one side 
 of him and a devil on the other. My angel, as 
 I have said, had left me ; but I suddenly found 
 that I was favored with the other companion- 
 ship. 
 
 I heard footsteps near me. I did not look 
 up ; what did it matter to me who came or went 
 in Kensington Gardens now ? But a mellow 
 rolling chuckle, to which my ears had lately 
 been happily a stranger, made me start. 
 
 "Ill met by sunlight, proud Temple," said 
 the voice I knew only too well. And Stephen 
 Lyndon the outcast Lyndon of the wig came 
 stamping and rolling up. I think I have al- 
 ready said that his gait often reminded me of a 
 
 dwarf Samuel Johnson. He had a habit, too, 
 of rolling his jocular sayings about on his lips, 
 which made the odd resemblance still odder. 
 It was some time since I had seen him, although 
 I knew of late that he too used to walk in Ken- 
 sington Gardens. He was neatly and quietly 
 dressed now, and, in fact, looked rather as if 
 he were going in for calm respectability. His 
 wig was less curly, his hat was not set so jantily 
 on the side of his head, and he was not smoking 
 a cigar ; he wore black cotton or thread gloves ; 
 he had a bundle of seals pendent from his old- 
 fashioned fob. Virtuous mediocrity, clearly; 
 heavy uncle, -of limited means, reconciled with 
 Providence. 
 
 I looked at him thus curiously because I had 
 come to know that one must always study his 
 "get-up" a little in order to understand his 
 mood of mind or purpose. Taking all things 
 together, I came to the conclusion that he had 
 watched and waited for me deliberately, and 
 that he had something to say. I did not seek 
 to avoid him, or get rid of him. Why should 
 I? Lilla Lyndon held him good enough to 
 speak to her; how should I think myself low- 
 ered by his companionship ? I resolved even 
 to do my best to be courteous and civil to him. 
 
 "How do you do, Mr. Lyndon? We have 
 not met for some time." 
 
 "No, Temple a pity too; such congenial 
 spirits, and now, I may almost say, companions 
 in a common enterprise. We have not met 
 lately; but I have seen you I have seen you 
 when you didn't think it, wild youth. You're 
 looking well, Temple, as far as flesh and world- 
 ly evidences go ; you are growing stout, I think, 
 and your get-up is rather different from what it 
 was when I first had the honor of meeting you 
 let us say half a century ago. Ah, Fortune 
 has been kind to you. You are no longer the 
 wretched poor devil you used to be. I have 
 heard of your success, Temple, with a sort of 
 pride, not unmingled with surprise, let me say ; 
 for, between ourselves, I never thought there 
 was much in you except voice. I told Madame 
 Reichstein so the other day." 
 
 "Indeed! You have seen Madame Reich- 
 stein ?" 
 
 " I did myself the pleasure of calling on her ; 
 we are old friends. She does not forget old 
 friends, or turn up her nose at them, as certain 
 smaller people do, to whom we will not allude 
 more particularly. Now, she is a great suc- 
 cess : there is genius, if you want it, not mere 
 lungs. Yes, I disparaged you, Temple, to her ; 
 I said I thought there was nothing in you. 
 You are not offended ?" 
 
 "Not in the least." 
 
 "I thought you wouldn't. Between old 
 friends, you know ; and I never concealed from 
 you my honest opinion. You see, Temple, 7 
 am an artist in soul. I know real musical gen- 
 ius when I find it rather ! Yes, I told her so." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Well, she didn't seem to like it. She con- 
 veyed to me delicately, of course, for she is 
 
120 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 quite a lady in manner, that let me tell you 
 she conveyed to me that she thought me an im 
 pertinent old idiot. Of course I didn't mind 
 She is prejudiced in your favor ; any body can 
 see that with half an eye. May I sit beside 
 you a moment ?" 
 
 " Certainly ; but I am going immediately." 
 " I have a word or two to say first ; if you 
 like, I'll walk your way. Bather not ? Well 
 then, let us just sit here for a few moments 
 After all, Temple, what lovely spots there are 
 in London ! What could be a more charming 
 bit of woodland than this ? it might make a 
 painter of any body. To know London, Tem- 
 ple, is, if I may paraphrase a famous saying, 
 of which I dare say you never heard, a liberal 
 education. Where in the Bois de Boulogne, or 
 the Thiergarten, or the Prater, is there so de- 
 licious and so natural a glimpse as that?" 
 
 He pointed with his cane down the glade into 
 which Lilla Lyndon had just disappeared. 
 
 "I saw you studying that vista just now, 
 Temple. Evidently you have an artist's eye, 
 although I confess I never suspected you of any 
 thing of the kind before ; but you looked down 
 that vista as only an artist or a lover could." 
 
 * ' I like Kensington Gardens very much. But 
 you were saying, I think, that there was some- 
 thing particular you wished to speak of." 
 
 "To be sure, so I was; I approached you 
 for the purpose. But I am such a lover of nat- 
 ural beauty that it makes me forget every thing, 
 especially business. Do you know, Temple, I 
 don't believe a man can be really religious who 
 does not appreciate the beauty of that sunbeam 
 on the water, and that shadow on the grass. I 
 don't think such a man ought to expect to go 
 to heaven. Do you ?" 
 
 "I don't think some of us ought to expect 
 to go to heaven in any case. But you had 
 something special to say ?" 
 
 " Hard and practical as ever ! Ah, Temple, 
 I fear there is in you very little of the true art- 
 ist nature. Well, it makes my present business 
 the more easy ; I might perhaps find it hard to 
 open it gracefully to a poet. To the business, 
 then. The fact is, Temple" and here he sud- 
 denly abandoned the tone of rhodomontade 
 blended with banter which was so common 
 with him, and assumed a cool, dry, matter-of- 
 fact way " the fact is, I see the whole game ; 
 I have seen it all along." 
 
 "Indeed! May I ask what game whose 
 game ?" 
 
 "No nonsense, Temple; it won't do with 
 me ; I am quite up to the whole thing. We 
 have been rowing in the same boat this some 
 time, although, if you will pardon me for ap- 
 plying such a dreadful old joke, not perhaps 
 with the same sculls. She is a charming girl, 
 Temple, and we're both very fond of her, in a 
 different sort of way ; and she will have a good 
 fortune of her own, even in the lamentable 
 event of her displeasing her respectable and 
 virtuous father, and so causing him to leave all 
 his money to her step-sisters. Her mother took 
 
 good care of her in that way^ Ah, Temple, 
 ingenuous youth, what a sharp fellow you are !" 
 I got up to go away, disgusted beyond en- 
 durance. 
 
 "Look here, Mr. Temple ; I want to talk to 
 you fairly and like a man. Do drop your rant- 
 ipole high-tragedy airs for once. You have been 
 meeting my charming and innocent little niece 
 here day after day ; so have I. It goes to my 
 heart sometimes to take the good little girl's 
 money ; but I do take it. She doesn't want it, 
 you know and we do. Now your game is just 
 the same, only bigger and completer : you mean 
 to marry the girl, and have her fortune." 
 
 "It is utterly and ridiculously false; and 
 were not anger thrown away on such a creat- 
 ure as you " 
 
 "You would say something dreadful, no 
 d<3ubt. Don't ; anger is thrown away on me. 
 Glad you have the good sense to see that. 
 This is the point, then. I don't object to your 
 marrying my niece ; you have my consent on 
 conditions. I detest Goodboy so", that, only for 
 the sake of the dear creature herself, I would 
 fall on my knees and thank Heaven if she mar- 
 ried a pork-butcher's boy or a chimney-sweep, 
 just to spite him and wring his gutta-percha 
 leart : I would, by the Almighty ! Now, then, 
 Temple, to business. If you promise to make 
 t worth my while, I'll help you in this. You 
 shall have my help and countenance what you 
 
 "1. I want a modest income, made safe to 
 me and beyond any confounded creature's con- 
 :rol. Are you prepared to enter into terms ? 
 Look here, Temple. Beauty, virtue, and plen- 
 y of money, with a venerable uncle's blessing ! 
 all at your command. It is simply a question 
 >f how much you are disposed to stand for my 
 o-operation. If I am not for you, Temple, I 
 m against you. Make terms with me, or I 
 ;o over to the enemy ; and Goodboy shall know 
 ill." 
 
 "Now, Mr. Lyndon, I have listened to you, 
 ! think, with great patience and self-control. 
 Pray listen to me. It is not, I suppose, any 
 onger your fault that you can not understand 
 vhat good intentions and honor and honesty 
 mean ; so I shall not waste any words to that 
 urpose on you." 
 
 " That's a good fellow. I do detest virtu- 
 us indignation in men ; especially when com- 
 ined with eloquence." 
 
 "I shall only say, you don't understand me. 
 ro and do your best ; do any thing you please. 
 Say any thing you can to pain and grieve that 
 ne sweet and noble nature which has stooped 
 o you and done you kindness. Her you may 
 grieve, but you can not injure. Play the spy, 
 he liar, the calumniator, the swindler, as you 
 ike ; but don't talk of terms or rogue's baV- 
 gains with me. I would not buy your silence 
 ,t the cost of a sixpence. I Avould not accept 
 ny conditions of yours to save my life and 
 lers." 
 
 "That is your answer?" 
 
 "That is my answer." 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 121 
 
 "Now look here, Temple, my good fellow; 
 another man might be offended, but I don't 
 mind any of your nonsense. Just don't be in 
 a hurry don't be a fool. Really, Temple, I 
 want to settle down in life, and live quietly and 
 pleasantly. I begin to tire of racketing about, 
 and living on chance, and billiards, and soft- 
 headed spoons, and all that. I am getting, 
 you see, a little into years, though people tell 
 me I'm looking wonderfully well yet. Can't 
 we manage this thing nicely ? You want that 
 charming girl why not, old boy? and, of 
 course, her money. I want just a neat little 
 annual sum a little pension just to keep me 
 from being a trouble to my friends, and so 
 forth. I'll undertake, on very reasonable con- 
 ditions, not to trouble even Goodboy whom 
 may a truly righteous Providence confound ! 
 and, in fact, to take myself off to Nice, or some 
 pleasant, sunny place I love warm climates 
 and never come back any more. Now do, like 
 a good fellow, just think of that. Do you know 
 don't laugh at me ! I positively would rath- 
 er please that dear girl than not ; and if my 
 turning respectable on a decent pension, and 
 taking myself off, would do it, I really am open 
 to terms. I don't mean to say that I am pre- 
 pared to make any downright sacrifice for my 
 niece of course, between men of the world, 
 that sort of thing is nonsense; but I would 
 rather serve her than not. I should like to 
 live quietly at Nice ; and upon my word, if my 
 wife would only oblige me and show her con- 
 jugal devotion by departing to that world where 
 all virtuous persons ought to wish to go, I don't 
 know but that I should entertain the idea of 
 marrying some nice little girl myself. There 
 are, nice little girls, Sir, let me tell you, who 
 would not be entirely averse to such a notion. 
 Now think of all this, Temple. Think of me ! 
 Think of what a thing it is to do a good action, 
 and to play your own game and torment your 
 enemies at the same time." 
 
 He spoke, in quite a solemn and pathetic 
 tone. 
 
 "I have given you my answer. Let me 
 pass. I don't want to speak more harshly, or 
 to lose my temper." 
 
 "Confound it!" he exclaimed, with a puz- 
 zled air ; " I can't understand this at all. By 
 Jove ! the fellow must be privately married to 
 her already, or he never would talk in this 
 cock-a-hoop and lofty kind of way. There is 
 an alarming air of security and confidence about 
 him. Now, Temple, fair is fair, you know. I 
 always thought you too honorable for that sort 
 of thing. Do speak out like a man, and tell 
 me what is your game. Imitate my candor, 
 and speak out." 
 
 I pushed past him ; he caught me by both 
 arms, and looked earnestly, scrutinizingly into 
 my face. I could not get away from him' with- 
 out an exertion of positive violence. His grip 
 was wonderfully strong; and there were some 
 groups of people scattered here and there suffi- 
 ciently near to make me feel anxious to avoid 
 
 | any scene. I stood there and allowed him to 
 study my face. It was rather a ludicrous busi- 
 ness. With his twinkling beady black eyes he 
 peered up into my face, standing on his toes 
 meanwhile, and his head still hardly touching 
 my chin. His sensuous, expressive lips were 
 working unceasingly with eagerness and curi- 
 osity; and in his whole expression, attitude, 
 manner, eyes, there was a strange blending of 
 the cunning of a detective and the wildness of 
 a lunatic. Far back in the depths of* those 
 keen, twinkling eyes there was surely, one might 
 think, the reflection of a madman's cell. The 
 first impression, as I looked at him, was a mere 
 sense of the ridiculous, and I could hardly re- 
 press a laugh ; the next was a sense of the hor- 
 rible, and I found it not easy to keep down a 
 shudder. It would not be pleasant to wake 
 some night and find such a grip on one's arms, 
 and see such -eyes peering into one's face. 
 
 When he had scrutinized me apparently to 
 his satisfaction his countenance underwent a 
 sudden and complete change of expression. 
 Curiosity and eagerness had now given way to 
 mere contempt. He literally flung himself off 
 from me. 
 
 "Pah ! " he exclaimed ; " the idiot has done 
 nothing of the sort. His enemy's daughter is 
 safe enough so far as he is concerned. He 
 walks in Kensington Gardens pour des prunes." 
 
 He put his hat a little more jantily than be- 
 fore on the side of his head, nodded an ironical 
 farewell, and I saw him a moment after open- 
 ing up a conversation with a smart nurse-maid 
 who was in charge of two obstinate children. 
 
 I went my way, not rejoicing, Heaven knows, 
 but at least relieved. 
 
 . CHAPTER XXVI. . 
 
 LILLA GONE. 
 
 I HAVE never greatly troubled myself to 
 study human character. I have especially rath- 
 er avoided studying my own. I do not know 
 much about the springs of human action. I 
 am neither a moral philosopher nor a psychol- 
 ogist, therefore I can not pretend to explain the 
 manner in which the separation I have described 
 in the last chapter affected my character and 
 my ways. But I know how it did actually af- 
 fect me, and I record the fact. W T ith the part- 
 ing from Lilla Lyndon there fell away from me 
 all inclination for the kind of indolent distrac- 
 tion in which last year I had been seeking con- 
 solation only too often. I despised and detest- 
 ed it all ; I shook it completely off me in a mo- 
 ment. I knew myself redeemed from it, and I 
 knew that the whole change was made in me, a 
 man of maturing years, by the sad smile of a girl. 
 
 I knew a man once who told me, in one of 
 those rare bursts of confidence in which gener- 
 ous and reserved men sometimes indulge, how 
 he had lived for ten long years of the most try- 
 ing part of existence, defiant of temptation, on 
 
122 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 the memory of a kiss. He was not a senti 
 mental or a weakly man ; he did not pretend to 
 be what pious people call a good man. I never 
 knew whether he believed in any particular 
 theological dogmas. He was a man of strong, 
 passionate emotions ; a man to go widely astray 
 under certain circumstances ; a man who had 
 gone astray. A good, pure woman loved him 
 and trusted him ; he had no money, and he 
 went away to the United States to look for 
 some, that they might be married. When he 
 was going, she herself, spontaneously and for 
 the first time, put her arms round his neck and 
 kissed him. He did not make any formal re- 
 solve that his lips, like those of Coriolanus, 
 should virgin it till he should return and give 
 back that kiss again, for he was not one of your 
 deliberately good and Spartan men at all. But 
 he told me that he never knew temptation in 
 the mean time which could for a moment efface 
 the memory of that kiss. He lived on the mem- 
 ory, pure as a King Arthur, for ten years ; and 
 then he came back, and they were married. 
 
 Perhaps such things are not so uncommon 
 as we think ; only that few men will venture to 
 confess purity. At all events, I believe it to 
 have been true in this case. I could under- 
 stand it the better, knowing what impression 
 the parting from Lilla Lyndon made on me. I 
 think I could have carried a kiss from her un- 
 stained into the darkness of the grave. 
 
 I avoided Christina, and indeed every body, 
 as much as I could. I observed that Mr. Lyn- 
 don was growing more and more attentive to 
 her; and this fact alone, were there no other 
 reason, would have kept me from her. 
 
 Her husband suddenly reappeared in town. 
 During his stay of last season he and I had 
 taken a strong liking for each other; and now 
 that he returned he came to see me at once. I 
 happened to be out when he called ; and as his 
 card bore no address, I resolved to go to Jer- 
 myn Street, see Christina, if she should happen 
 to be alone, and learn where he was to be found. 
 When I got to her house, however, I heard that 
 she had visitors ; and knowing who one of them 
 was, for I saw his carriage at the door, I would 
 not be of the number. So I turned away. 
 
 This was only three or four days after the 
 meeting and parting described in the last chap- 
 ter. I left the door of Christina's lodgings to 
 avoid one Lyndon, in order to meet another. It 
 was with a sense of detestation that I suddenly 
 found myself confronted on the Jermyn Street 
 pavement by my odious Stephen Lyndon. What 
 on earth what out of the lower world brought 
 him there? As I turned my eyes away from 
 Christina's house I nearly run against him or 
 over him. 
 
 "I have been signaling you," he said, "from 
 across the street; but either you couldn't or 
 wouldn't see. Only a word or two now. I 
 sha'n't detain you. Our society now isn't pleas- 
 ant to each other. But I want to know whether 
 you have reconsidered what we spoke of the 
 * other day in Kensington Gardens ?" 
 
 " No, I haven't. There's nothing to recon- 
 sider let me pass !" 
 
 "Isn't there? Perhaps! I have news for 
 you. Goodboy is on the scent ; and he has or- 
 dered her off." 
 
 " What do you mean ?" 
 
 "Thought I could arouse your attention! 
 He has taken her or sent her away out of Lon- 
 don. Carried her away from me as well as 
 from you! I didn't count on that. Twas I 
 gave him the hint I told you I would ; but I 
 never expected that he would do what he has 
 done absolutely prohibit the poor little thing 
 from holding any communication with me with 
 me, her uncle, who loves her ! Yes, by Jupiter 
 Ammon, I do love her! Forty thousand Good- 
 boys could not, with all their quantity of love, 
 make up my sum ! It's all your fault, with 
 your confounded scruples and nonsense. If 
 you^had listened to reason, you and I could 
 have managed this splendidly. Now she is gone 
 from both of us." 
 
 "How do you know?" I inquired, ashamed 
 of myself for asking the question. 
 
 "" She wrote me a line, poor little innocent 
 the last, she says; and inclosed me a trifle. 
 It's the spirit of the gift one values, Temple, not 
 the paltry amount ; and she hopes all may yet 
 be reconciled ; and she will never fail to work 
 for that sacred end and that kind of thing, 
 you know. By Jove, Temple, what a little an- 
 gel in petticoats she is ! I have no doubt she'll 
 be a ministering angel, old boy, when you and 
 I lie howling ; though I, God knows, was made 
 for goodness and religion, and am a man more 
 sinned against than sinning." 
 
 "Well, what do you want of me?" 
 
 "Simply to ask, are you going to stand this?" 
 
 " Stand what ?" . 
 
 "That fellow packing away that sweet, lov- 
 ing girl to some abominable hole in the coun- 
 try." 
 
 "I suppose Mr. Lyndon has a right to the 
 care of his daughter. Some fathers do care 
 for their children. I have no claim on Miss 
 Lyndon." 
 
 "Then I'll tell you what, if y"ou're going to 
 stand it, I'm not. I'll spoil them all ; and that's 
 why I'm here. Temple, I wish you no harm 
 I don't indeed : in fact, I rather respect you ; 
 and I think in my anger yesterday I did you 
 njury to no purpose, and myself too. On the 
 whole, I like your chivalric nonsense ; there is 
 a far-off flavor of youth and poetry, and that 
 sort of rot about it, which refreshes me like a 
 scent of the distant sea. If I had a son, Tem- 
 ple, I think I shouldn't be very sorry if he act- 
 ed as you did ; for, by the good God, that girl 
 would run away with you to-morrow if you 
 asked her ! Well, then, I don't want to injure 
 you; but I'll crush them." 
 
 " Whom do you mean ?" 
 
 "My hated Eteocles Lyndon, or Polynices 
 iyndon, whichever you please ; and the woman 
 le is following, and my old friend and colleague, 
 he Carbonaro vonder. I'm on the track of 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 123 
 
 something, Temple; and trust me, I'll run it 
 down. They are making use of Goodboy : he 
 fancies he is making use of them. / know 
 what it's all about. Vive la Republique sociale 
 et democratique. Viva Mazzini ! Piff, paff !" 
 
 He nodded his head, jerked, and gesticulated 
 vehemently, like a Neapolitan going mad. 
 
 "I don't understand you at all." 
 
 " Dare say you don't ! Be innocent of the 
 knowledge, dearest chuck ; keep yourself out 
 of their schemes, Temple, and then I sha'n't 
 have to harm you. I am in the swim already, 
 I promise you. Good-by. You don't under- 
 stand how Goodboy came to be an Italian con- 
 spirator, then, don't you? Hum, ha! Did 
 you ever read Churchill ? 
 
 'By my life, 
 This Davies hath a mighty pretty wife!'" 
 
 He winked his beady old eyes, then again 
 indulged in a variety of gesticulations admira- 
 bly imitated from the Italian, made a panto- 
 mimic gesture expressive of the rapid and fre- 
 quent use of the stiletto, exploded into his old 
 familiar rolling chuckle, raised his hat to me, 
 and turned away. 
 
 Looking back a moment after I saw him 
 standing on the steps of Cox's hotel engaged in 
 conversation with a waiter, and smoking a ci- 
 gar with as lordly an air as if the whole house 
 and the street too belonged to him. 
 
 I thought little of his hints and threats : he 
 was always vowing and menacing, and nothing 
 ever came of it ; an unconquerable levity and 
 fickleness always seemed to interpose happily 
 between him and any serious deed of harm to 
 others; nor did I see what possible danger 
 could come on Christina and her husband 
 through his influence. So little belief had I in 
 any thing he said that I did not even place un- 
 reserved faith in his story about Lilla Lyndon, 
 although that, Heaven knows, looked likely 
 .enough; at least, I earnestly hoped it might 
 not prove true. If I had been the means of 
 creating a discord between that girl and her 
 father I had surely reason to blame and hate 
 myself. I will find out if it be true, and if it 
 be I will at least do practical penanc* in this 
 way : I will go to Mr. Lyndon, and humble my- 
 self before him him whom I detest and speak 
 to him as one man of honor speaks to another, 
 and pledge him my earnest, solemn word that 
 I will never see his daughter again ; and tell 
 him that I am resolved on leaving this country, 
 not to return. This must satisfy him : he shall 
 be satisfied, if any pledge, if any humiliation of 
 mine can do it. I will not be the cause of 
 estrangement between him and his daughter; 
 I will not have that great sin upon my soul. If 
 I have done wrong, I can at least endeavor to 
 undo it, and to do penance for it, 
 
 I will do it this moment. 
 
 I hailed a hansom, and drove to Connaught 
 Place. 
 
 "Is Miss Lilla Lyndon in town?" I asked 
 of the footman who opened the door. 
 
 " Miss Lilla have left town," was the answer. 
 
 "To-day?" 
 
 "To-day, Sir." 
 
 The man's expression was, I thought, con- 
 clusive. 
 
 "Is Mr. Lyndon at home?" 
 
 "Mr. Lyndon is at home, Sir; but he have 
 give instructions he is engaged particular." 
 
 " Will you give him that card, and say I have 
 the strongest reasons for wishing to speak to 
 him for five minutes ? Say I would not dis- 
 turb him, but that I have the strongest reasons." 
 
 The man asked me to step into the hall while 
 he took the card to his master. As the reader 
 will remember, I had been in this house once 
 before, and I knew that Mr. Lyndon's study 
 was only divided by the wall from where I stood. 
 
 In a moment I heard Mr. Lyndon say, in a 
 loud, strident tone, as of one who determines 
 that his words shall be heard by those whom 
 they concern : 
 
 " I decline to see Mr. Temple !" 
 
 The man came out and gave me the mes- 
 sage, looking rather reluctant and abashed, I 
 am bound to say in justice to him. 
 
 Still I was resolved that no mere humiliation 
 should deter me from acting as I felt my- 
 self bound in honor and conscience to do. I 
 clenched my fingers, bit my lips, crushed down 
 my emotions, and made a new attempt. 
 
 " Will you be good enough to say to Mr. 
 Lyndon that a very grave misunderstanding 
 may be wholly avoided if he will see me for 
 five minutes?" 
 
 The man went in, and I heard again, in the 
 same tone, the same words : 
 
 "I decline to see Mr. Temple!" 
 
 " I told you," said the servant when he came 
 ou t and he spoke in a half-remonstrating, half- 
 deprecating kind of way "I told you he was 
 particularly engaged. He always is particu- 
 larly engaged, and can't see no one at this hour, 
 just before he goes to the 'Ouse." 
 
 The man made this observation in the purest 
 good-nature. He wished to soften the snub to 
 me, and to put it on the mere ground of his 
 master's intense occupation. I caught at the 
 suggestion, however. I took out my purse and 
 slipped a sovereign into his hand, rather glad 
 of any way to testify my appreciation of his 
 good-nature while buying one more service of 
 him. 
 
 "I am sorry to have disturbed Mr. Lyndon," 
 I said ; "and I ought to have known that he is 
 busy just now. Will you, however, kindly go 
 back again, and say that if he will name any 
 time and place the House, or Brooks's" (of 
 which I knew he was a member), " or anywhere, 
 I shall be only too glad to wait on him, and say 
 half a dozen words which it is very important 
 he should hear." 
 
 I don't know whether the man could have 
 delivered this long message ; but I think he was 
 saved the trouble. The moment he opened 
 Mr. Lyndon's door I heard the words : 
 
 " I 'decline to see Mr. Temple now or at any 
 
124 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 other time, any where. I decline to hold any 
 kind of communication with him. I am busy ; 
 do not disturb me any more. Give that mes- 
 sage distinctly, and say there is none other." 
 
 And this was the end of my resolve to hum- 
 ble myself, and try to do good ! I came away 
 with a burning face and a raging heart. All 
 that anger and hate and sense of wounded pride 
 could stir up to embitter human nature was 
 working within me just then. No wonder men 
 sold their souls in the old days, when there were 
 powerful bidders for them from the infernal 
 world no wonder they sold their souls for re- 
 venge on some enemy. 
 
 I crossed into the Park, and was walking 
 slowly under the trees. Presently I heard a 
 quick step following mine, and the rustle of a 
 dress came near me, and an emphatic little 
 cough appealed to my attention. I might not 
 have heeded, but a woman's voice at last said, 
 and apparently very much out of breath too : 
 
 "Oh, if you please, Mr. Temple, Sir!" 
 ' I turned round, and saw a pretty, flushed lit- 
 tle face near me the face of a well-dressed 
 young woman, who had lady's-maid printed in 
 every lineament of her countenance and motion 
 of her limbs. I did not recognize her at first. 
 " Don't you remember me, Sir ? I am Miss 
 Lilla's maid. Which master was very angry, 
 Sir ; and Miss Lilla took on a great deal ; and 
 she has gone with Miss Lyndon (our eldest 
 daughter, Sir) to the country for a while ; and 
 master's going down soon. Miss Lilla cried a 
 deal, Sir; and master was very cross; and I 
 came in for my share of it too. I saw you in 
 the hall, Sir, and thought I'd just chance it, and 
 run across to tell you ; for I'm not allowed to 
 go with her, Sir. I wouldn't stand being talked 
 to by Miss Dora Jane, and I've give warning ; 
 and I've brought you her address, Sir, written 
 on paper, which I thought you'd like to 'ave." 
 
 She put a paper into my hand, and nodded 
 knowingly and hurried away. I was taking out 
 my purse to offer her something, but she would 
 not wait. I do believe she had run her risk out 
 of the uttermost good-nature and pure sympa- 
 thy with what she regarded as a touching love- 
 affair broken in upon by a cruel parent. 
 
 run this risk ; I will not thus tempt myself and 
 peril her happiness. I have resolved to save 
 her from the futile vexation my acquaintance 
 might bring on her ; and I will not allow my- 
 self even the chance of breaking my resolve. 
 In God's name, then " 
 
 Without reading what was written on the 
 paper, without even looking at the handwrit- 
 ing I did not dare to trust myself I tore the 
 thing into a hundred minute fragments, and 
 flung them on the face of the pool. The little 
 waves tossed them, the little breezes played 
 with them, some greedy wild-fowl gobbled up 
 a few of them. I left the scraps that still float- 
 ed to sink or decompose; no eye could read 
 their secret. 
 
 I carried the piece of paper mechanically in 
 my hand a long way until I had, in fact, got 
 into Kensington Gardens, and reached the mar- 
 gin of the pond. I did not open and look at it 
 then. What right had I to know any thing of 
 the movements of Mr. Lyndon's daughter ? I 
 was not even her lover, as the good-natured girl 
 who had left me evidently imagined. Why 
 should I expose myself to the temptation of 
 renewing an acquaintance which, for her sake 
 and for the sake of honor and honesty, ought 
 never to be reopened ? The very bitterness of 
 the anger and resentment I felt toward her fa- 
 ther gave but another reason why I should not 
 trust myself with any chance of revenging my 
 own wounded pride by meanly tampering with 
 his daughter's love. 
 
 "No," I said to myself, firmly, "I will not 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE CONSPIRATOR. 
 
 SALARIS and I gradually became close friends. 
 Habitually we were both silent men, and there 
 s no sociability like the free companionship of 
 silent men. We often sat for hours together 
 n my lodgings or in his, and smoked our ci- 
 gars, and hardly exchanged, perhaps, in the 
 course of the evening, a dozen sentences. Nei- 
 ther felt any need to talk unless when he had 
 something to say ; and therefore we much en- 
 joyed each other's society. Ned Lambert was 
 sometimes with us, and when with us, did not 
 add much to our loquacity ; for he had grown 
 silent and moody enough, poor fellow, of late, 
 his soul brooding over one purpose and one 
 love. 
 
 ; Thus, therefore, we sometimes sat of an idle 
 evening: three men smoking, and mostly si- 
 lent ; the Italian brooding over his new political 
 schemes ; Edward Lambert brooding over his 
 love-affair, which was so tormenting in its in- 
 complete, not hopeful, yet not quite hopeless, 
 condition; I looking on at both, and liking 
 both, and pitying them, and wishing I could 
 help them, and in my heart acting as their con- 
 fidant, but not speaking much aloud of the se- 
 crets of either. Ned Lambert and I had hard- 
 ly ever spoken of his love-affair since his Lilla's 
 departure. The promise she had exacted from 
 me not to speak to him of her father made me 
 anxious to avoid approaching the subject at all ; 
 and my own disastrous failure in attempting to 
 set things to rights made me feel ashamed of 
 the topic. Moreover, I had a clear conviction 
 that the thing must come right in the end, and 
 I looked on the separation of Ned and his love 
 only as a mere probation, during which he must 
 practice self-restraint and save money. So, if 
 sometimes pitied him, I often envied him as 
 well. 
 
 But the case of Salaris was quite different. 
 He was a man given up so at least I thought 
 to a hopeless object. I looked on him as one 
 destined to drag out a lingering life, hoping 
 against hope, feeding upon air, wasting so much 
 that might be noble and useful upon the empti- 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 125 
 
 est of all chimeras. His face was seamed with 
 the deep lines of failure ; you saw the ruin of 
 plans and plots written on it as clearly as men 
 crossing the desert can see the bones of dead 
 camels in the sand. His life, past and present, 
 seemed to lie before me openly as a panorama ; 
 the conspiracies discovered before they had been 
 half matured, the sworn confederates who dis- 
 patched their daily reports to the police, the 
 inane and empty projects, the hopeful and de- 
 spairing journeys to and from London and 
 Paris, with the eye of the Government quietly 
 fixed upon the supposed incognito all the while ; 
 the tacit encouragement and half-spoken prom- 
 ises of diplomatists, which would turn out to be 
 reeds to lean on, or spears to pierce, when the 
 moment came ; the over-impetuous friends, the 
 cold friends, the false friends ; the courage and 
 self-devotion and soldierly manly qualities all 
 flung away, the ruined life, the hollow cheeks, 
 the prematurely gray hair, the broken heart. 
 
 Sometimes I thought, this man possesses all 
 that I should once have asked to make me tran- 
 quil and happy. Had I been Christina's hus- 
 band, I think I could have lived for her, and 
 with her. He loves her only too deeply, he 
 trusts in her wholly; why can he not be hap- 
 py with her, and leave his feverish and idle 
 schemes ? Is it wholly because he has a lofty, 
 absorbing sense of duty ? or is it not, in part at 
 least, because she does not love him, and he 
 knows it, and can only make life endurable by 
 the presence of continual excitement ? I think 
 so. I think he thirsts for a love she can not 
 give, and he drinks political excitement as the 
 thirsty seaman on the raft, when he can get no 
 pure water, drinks from the salt waves, well 
 knowing what must come of it and goes mad. 
 
 I think Christina's ambition has gone far to 
 destroy at all events, to mar three lives : her 
 own, her husband's, and mine. Some day I 
 will surely tell her so. Now I systematically 
 avoided her, and she avoided me. The more I 
 saw of her husband, the less I saw of her. It 
 so happened that even on the stage just now we 
 did not so often meet, for I had had the evil 
 fortune about this time to contract a pretty se- 
 vere cold and hoarseness, and my medical man 
 bade me take rest and change of air. He 
 recommended me to go to the south Hastings 
 or Brighton, or some such place. I detested 
 these places ; and it so happened that my Italian 
 friend one night expressed a strong desire to 
 see the English Lake country. I too had never 
 seen it, and we agreed to go together. My 
 physician had told me some southern place was 
 the only spot I could go to under the circum- 
 stances ; I knew, however, that all my voice 
 and I wanted was rest, and rest was to be found 
 deliciously in the shadow of the mountains. 
 So we left town at a moment's notice, and 
 traveled to Bowness, Salaris and I ; and we had 
 some quiet days on the Lakes. 
 
 One glorious day we were at Grasmere. We 
 had been paddled across the lake to the mount- 
 ain, Loughrigg I think, on the shore opposite 
 
 the road from Ambleside. We had scrambled 
 our way to a path called the Terrace Walk 
 which runs winding like an order-ribbon around 
 the broad chest of the mountain. We flung 
 ourselves on the ground, and looked silently at 
 the scene below. The lake lay quite at our 
 feet, a sapphire bedded in the emerald of the 
 hills. The sun was already sinking, and his 
 beams shot across our path. It was a glowing 
 day : heat lay upon every thing. The water 
 "ept in the sun, and scarcely stirred a ripple ; 
 the grasses under our feet were motionless in 
 the light. Tiny insects, which even in June 
 were generally to be found nestling aAvay from 
 the cold air, crept out of their lurking-places 
 to-day, and basked in the sunbeams. Two or 
 three girls were sitting far below us, with their 
 white feet plashing in the stream which ran into 
 the lake. A boat, with a solitary oarsman, 
 moved slowly across the surface of the pool, the 
 rower merely keeping on his motion by a stroke 
 of his paddles at intervals. Distant peaks and 
 ranges of hills revealed themselves for the first 
 time in the lucent sky ; far-off waters gleamed 
 among the mountains like sword-blades shining 
 in the sun ; the white pebbles on the strand 
 seemed to suck in with delight the ripples which 
 softly plashed upon them. A white cottage, 
 .with the sunlight on it, blazed like a pale me- 
 teor across the valley. Except the occasional 
 voice of distant sheep, or the faint lapping of 
 the water on the beach, or the twitter of the 
 birds, or the laughter of the girls below, no 
 sound disturbed the quiet of the scene. 
 
 We had been some moments without speak- 
 ing. A bird suddenly rose above our heads 
 with a shrill cry, and sailed away over Helm 
 Crag. The sharp cry broke the spell of silence 
 which had held us. 
 
 "This reminds me of Northern Italy," said 
 Salaris, in his low, musical voice, with some- 
 thing always of a thrill in it. "I have been 
 thinking of it this some time. The skies are 
 as clear as over Como or Garda : it makes me 
 melancholy. Nature is always melancholy, I 
 think." 
 
 - "I suppose it is ; except to a painter, whose 
 study it is, or to somebody who never thinks 
 about it at all. I think sunlight is, on the 
 whole, rather a sad thing to look at." 
 
 "So it is. So is music, to hear; so is any 
 music at least that is worth hearing." 
 
 " Music is a passion of yours, Salaris, is it 
 not?" 
 
 " It is not ; it used to be. It only betrayed 
 me, and I have cast it off." 
 
 "Betrayed you?" 
 
 "Disappointed me deceived me. It is all 
 illusion ; you can not reach it. It is to the 
 soul, in life, what the mirage is to the unfortu- 
 nate wretch in the desert. I wish I had never 
 known one note of music from another." 
 
 "And you an Italian!" 
 
 " The more reason. The arts have been the 
 Circes of Italy. There is no music where there 
 is political freedom, and where manly energy 
 
126 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 finds room. What music has England ? what 
 music has America? No; it is Italy, Ger- 
 many these are the places where people lie 
 down and make songs. Italy is a slave tinkling 
 her guitar to make merry her master's friends. 
 No ; I love not music any more ; it has betrayed 
 me as well as my country." ' 
 
 There was a profound bitterness, as well as 
 pathos, in the tones of his voice as he spoke 
 thus. No one follows a mere abstraction, an 
 impersonal idea, with such emphasis. I glanced 
 at Salaris, and I thought I could read his heart. 
 
 I was anxious to lead him away to other 
 thoughts; so I said: 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 127 
 
 "But you have still hopes for Italy's inde- 
 pendence ?" 
 
 "Hopes? have I hopes of another world? 
 I believe in the future of Italy just as I believe 
 in God : when I despair of the one I shall dis- 
 believe in the other." 
 
 " Well, I don't pretend to understand the 
 question as an Italian might, or to look at it 
 from an Italian point of view; but the pros- 
 pect does not seem to me a hopeful one. Your 
 Italians are not agreed upon any 'thing among 
 themselves ; they don't know what they would 
 have ; they have made up their minds to no- 
 thing." 
 
 " My good friend, when did a people on the 
 eve of revolution know what they would have ? 
 Did all your English people know what they 
 would have when they rose against Charles I. ? 
 Did the Americans all agree beforehand upon 
 the object of their revolt against England ? Did 
 the Dutch make up their minds about wnqf 
 was to come before they attempted to expel the 
 Spaniards ? It is only the very few who lead 
 the rest by whom any plan of action can be 
 arranged ; and even they, if they are wise, do 
 not always try to know much beforehand. You 
 are never master of the situation and the cir- 
 cumstances if you have planned all rigidly in 
 advance. Revolutions are not to be set out 
 beforehand, like pieces at the theatre. Let the 
 thing once be set going, and leave the issue to 
 Providence." 
 
 "Providence, they say, always sides with the 
 strong." 
 
 " And we are strong, if we only would use 
 our strength. Italians are kept down in great 
 part by what you in England call a sham. Just 
 now she has indeed one solid obstacle in her 
 path ; but that once removed her course ought 
 to be clear." 
 
 "Well, I wish you every success, and I only 
 wish I could bear a hand in your struggle. I 
 might well do so ; I have nothing to lose." 
 
 He looked at me intently. 
 
 "Nothing to lose in life?" he asked. 
 
 "Nothing." 
 
 " Not hope not success not love ?" 
 
 " I have no hope ; and and I have got into 
 a wrong groove." 
 
 "No way out of it?" 
 
 "No way except over the precipice and 
 down." 
 
 "I should like to enlist you in our cause, 
 and I should have no scruple ; but I have prom- 
 ised not to bring you with me in this." 
 
 " Promised whom ?" 
 
 He set his teeth hard upon his cigar, and 
 sent out two or three puffs so fierce and sharp 
 that the smoke went straight from his lips hor- 
 izontal as the path of a bullet, until the little 
 breeze got power and dispersed it. 
 
 "I have promised my wife, "he said. 
 
 He fell into a moment's silence. Then I re- 
 sumed : 
 
 " You have some allies in England, though ?" 
 
 The reader will remember that this was a 
 
 year or two before Solferino, and when italy 
 had as yet few earnest British believers. To 
 most of us honest Englishmen, despite Venice 
 and Manin, Home and Garibaldi, "Italian" 
 still meant cowardly, treacherous, dagger- using, 
 lazy, dirty, fawning, begging, lying, vacillating, 
 popish, and slavish. 
 
 "Yes, we have some friends; not many." 
 
 " Mr. Lyndon is one ?" 
 
 My companion smiled. 
 
 " Yes, he is one ; and a generous friend." 
 
 " Does he know of any of your plans ?" 
 
 "Some, if not all. There is something now 
 in prospect of which he does not know." 
 
 " One question more let me ask you. Do 
 you know his brother?" 
 
 "I know the man you mean, and I know 
 now that he is Lyndon's brother. I only knew 
 it lately ; but the man himself is well known to 
 me. We were friends long ago, and served 
 each other." 
 
 "You don't trust Umf 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Because he is a treacherous, selfish scoun- 
 drel." 
 
 "What words of energy! No; I don't 
 think he is. He is unfortunate and heedless, 
 and has had a stormy youth ; but treacherous 
 I do not think he is." 
 
 "But you do not meet him; you have not 
 trusted him with any thing lately, I mean ?" 
 
 " I have lately employed his services a little ; 
 but ^ou may rely that in no case should he 
 have much of my confidence. He can be 
 made useful, but he has not a head to be trust- 
 ed. He can talk to Frenchmen like a French- 
 rrifin ; to Italians, like an Italian ; to English- 
 men, like an Englishman. He can be made 
 useful in a way, and in that way I use him, not 
 farther. He is now in Paris. He came to me 
 a few days ago, and showed me that he knew 
 something not much of some projects. He 
 offered his services, and told me he was poor. 
 I once did like the man ; and I have some old 
 memories that are strong, that are supersti- 
 tions with me. I accepted his services." 
 
 " Salaris, beware of that man ! He will be- 
 tray you." 
 
 "The Englishman suspects," said my com- 
 panion, faintly smiling, "and the Italian does 
 not ! What a reverse of conditions ! But 
 have no fear ; we trust our agents with knowl- 
 edge only in their capacity of keeping it. He 
 can do nothing. If I were to intrust you, I 
 should put something in your power." 
 
 "Then do so. Let me be in the business, 
 whatever it is. I have good nerves, and a 
 pretty strong frame. I can use either rifle or 
 sword. I can speak Italian ; and I think I 
 know, without teaching, how to die." 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 "It would not do yet. There are things 
 only an Italian may do, even for Italy things 
 an Englishman must not share or even know 
 of. I told you there is an obstacle to be re- 
 moved first ; that out of the way, the drama 
 
128 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 will begin. Then, if you will play a part, 
 grasp your hand. After all, you are at lea 
 Italy's foster-son. You 1 are an artist an 
 singer. You have sucked at Italy's bosom 
 You should give out a little blood* in retur 
 for so much milk." 
 
 "Only try me, when the time comes. Bu 
 the obstacle you spoke of is it one that can b 
 removed ?" 
 
 "Ay, it can be, and it shall be." 
 "Before long?" 
 
 "Before many days, perhaps; before man 
 weeks, so surely as I fling this stone into th 
 lake below." 
 
 He flung a shining pebble far from the hill 
 side. No breath of air stirred as I lookec 
 somewhat languidly to see the stone shoot int< 
 the lake. But the brightness of the atmos 
 phere had deceived him, and he thought the 
 task easier than it was. The stone fell fa 
 short, and rattled into a cleft of the hill. Some 
 wild birds rose screaming from their nests, an( 
 swept across the sky. 
 
 Salaris looked surprised, and even discon 
 certed, at the issue of the test he had offered. 
 "Come," I said, "were I a believer in au 
 guries, I should endeavor to persuade you no 
 to go on with your present undertaking, what- 
 ever it may be. The Powers are clearly agains 
 you. " The stone did not reach the lake. Did 
 you observe 'at which side the birds rose?" 
 
 " Absit omen!" replied my companion, with 
 restored cheerfulness, and his usual smilfe of 
 mingled melancholy and sweetness. 
 
 We sat still longer on the grass, thinking 
 and smoking. My friend seldom indeed ceased 
 to smoke under any circumstances ; and the 
 cigar had long been my nepenthe, my balm of 
 hurt mind, my sovereign grace. Disappoint- 
 ments, vexations, humiliations, reverses, setem- 
 ed to float away for the moment on the vapor : 
 to go up like the players of the pious on the 
 steam of the sacrifice. 
 
 The sun meanwhile was near, very near his 
 setting; the place seemed more lovely than 
 ever. More lonely and more lovely ; the soli- 
 tary boat had long since been moored under 
 the shadow of Helm Crag ; and the girls had 
 plashed in the water until they were tired, and 
 then dried their feet and put on their stockings 
 and shoes, and went their merry way, wholly 
 unconscious that far above their heads two pair 
 of eyes watched, or might have watched, their 
 doings. They too had gone away long since, 
 and left my friend and myself apparently quite 
 alone. Salaris lay fiat on the turf, after a 
 while, and seemed to have fallen asleep. 
 
 The skies were already purpling ; and shad- 
 ows were falling over the lake. It seemed to 
 me vaguely as if the sound of the distant wa- 
 terfalls grew louder and deeper in the evening 
 air. In the growing twilight the scene began 
 to lose its realities in my eyes, and to become 
 transfigured into something more familiar, long 
 unseen. I seemed to see again beneath me the 
 bright bay of my childhood, with the headlands 
 
 clasping like arms around it, and the gentle 
 hills on whose sides I so often lay of evenings 
 like this, and looked idly, as now, on the noble 
 waters beneath. It was easy enough and pleas- 
 ant enough to fancy, with half-shut eyes, that 
 the scene I looked on was still the same. Yon- 
 der was the wood sloping down to the sea the 
 paths of it, as I well knew, thick with fallen 
 leaves at all seasons, thick at some seasons 
 with pine-cones and chestnuts; and there is 
 the church-yard where my mother lies; and 
 there is the path where Christina and I used 
 to walk together. The sun goes down : he is 
 gone; and the sunset-gun will be fired from 
 the frigate in the bay. 
 
 And just at that moment a sharp, thrilling, 
 peculiar whistle, seeming at first like the long 
 scream of some mountain bird, rang through 
 the evening air, and broke up my reverie. 
 
 My companion started to his feet, wide awake, 
 qfid looked wildly around him. Far off, on the 
 side of another hill, we saw the figure of a man. 
 He was coming toward us, and he whistled again 
 as before. 
 
 Salaris put one finger between his lips, and 
 sent back a whistle so like that we had heard, 
 that, but for its nearness and loudness, it might 
 'iave seemed an echo. 
 
 "It is some one you know?" I asked, not a 
 ittle bewildered. 
 
 "Yes," he replied, "some one I know; but 
 I had not expected him now and here." 
 
 He hurried to meet the figure, which was now 
 n the hollow just beneath. I followed at some 
 ittle distance, allowing my friend to come well 
 jp with his visitor, and exchange words with 
 aim unheard. The man, as well as I could see 
 rim in the growing twilight, was an Italian, 
 ut of a different mould from Salaris. He was 
 ow, stout, with a thick black beard cut close 
 ound his face, so that his chin and jaws looked 
 as if they were set in it ; and he had a roving, 
 estless, hungry, red -black eye, which rested 
 uspiciously on me while I approached, like the 
 ye of a fierce dog when, as he is devouring his 
 aod, he sees a stranger coming, and is not quite 
 asy as to the stranger's intentions. 
 
 He had given Salaris a letter : and the lat- 
 er, having read it carefully, spoke a little in a 
 ow tone with the messenger. Then Salaris 
 ailed to me in a loud and cheerful voice : 
 
 "Our friend has had a rare search for me," 
 e said. " He left London this morning, and 
 5 here now ! He brings me some news which 
 bliges me to return at once to town. There is 
 o train to-night, unluckily, from here ; but, by 
 aveling on in a carriage all to-night, we shall 
 et to Lancaster in time for the first train in 
 ic morning. I am sorry to break up our 
 larming little sojourn ; but there is reason." 
 "No unpleasant news, I hope?" 
 " Unpleasant?" He paused a moment, and 
 eemed to weigh the word, and sighed. "No, 
 ot unpleasant; untimely, perhaps." 
 
 " Nothing rash ; no madness, Salaris ! Don't 
 sk your life in idle attempts." 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 129 
 
 " My life has no value to me except for thes 
 things ; and an Italian exile's life is always 
 conspiracy. ,But don't be alarmed; cautio: 
 shall be used in every thing : we have to econ 
 omize life, I can tell you." 
 "Can I lend a hand?" 
 " No, no ; it is not time," he said, with i 
 smile, "to fight for Italy in the open field jus 
 yet. When it is, we enroll you. One thing yo 
 can do for me. I can only rush through Lon 
 don. " Here he put his arm in mine, and drew 
 me a little away, out of hearing of his compan 
 ion. "When you return to town, see my wifi 
 alone, and tell her I have had to leave Englam 
 hurriedly, and that she will not have tidings of 
 me for some days. You need not cut shor 
 your stay here : she will not expect to hear from 
 me for the time we were to be here. Needless 
 to say, I never write to her through the post, 
 Do you not write, but see her see her alone." 
 
 He pressed my hand. 
 
 His companion had a carriage waiting on the 
 road at the nearest point of access to the mount- 
 ain. Salaris got in, and lit a fresh cigar, 
 did not accompany them ; their way was not 
 mine, and my companionship would doubtless 
 have been embarrassing. I intruded no more 
 inquiries or advice ; indeed, I had no basis on 
 which to rest inquiry or advice. I knew that 
 Italian plots of various kinds -had been going on 
 for years ; that emissaries were constantly trav- 
 eling backward and forward between London 
 and the Continent, with, so far as public observa- 
 tion was concerned, no apparent result whatev- 
 er. I was therefore not much alarmed for Sala- 
 ris. I felt rather, indeed, an unspeakable sense 
 of pity for the enthusiast who was leaving me, 
 and whom, as I did not then know, I was never 
 to see again. He looked calm enough now, 
 and cheerful ; not at all like a conspirator, at 
 least of the theatrical kind, with whom I was 
 most familiar. 
 
 "Adieu," I called. "Beware of bringing 
 on your head the anathema of Pio Nono." 
 
 He smiled cheerily, waved me a friendly fare- 
 well, and the carriage bore him away. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 "AH, BEAR IN MIND THAT GARDEN WAS 
 ENCHANTED." 
 
 DESPITE Salaris's hint that I need not cut 
 short my stay among the Lakes, I determined 
 to return to town at once. Somehow I felt 
 that I could not remain mooning among these 
 mountains to no purpose and alone. Of course 
 I pretended to myself to be very sorry to have 
 to leave Nature so soon, and insisted that an 
 immediate return to town was simply a hard 
 necessity not to be avoided ; but in my soul I 
 was glad to escape from a tete-a-tete with Na- 
 ture. I dreaded her twilights and her long 
 lonely shadows, as children dread the hour of 
 dusk, when ghosts are supposed to lurk in all 
 T 
 
 dim closets and dark corners. To some of us, 
 too, Nature is not a quick consoler. She wants 
 sympathy terribly. She is so beautiful and 
 calm and good that we poor sinners can not 
 hope to touch her heart at all. The exquisite 
 beauty of the scenes around me just now, the 
 purple shadows, the pure outlines, all seemed to 
 form a sort of angelic society into which I had 
 no business to enter where, at all events, I had 
 no right to remain. So, instead of lounging 
 late among the mountains, I resolved to go 
 straightway back to Bowness and the hotel, 
 and to leave for London in the morning. 
 
 This was apparently a new instinct, an un- 
 reasoning, foolish, utterly unpoetic impulse ; 
 yet I have good cause to be thankful for my 
 prosaic and timorous desertion of Nature ; for 
 the whole current of my life from that day might - 
 have been changed, an existence the most blank 
 and hopeless might have been allotted to me, 
 but for the sudden impulse which bade me leave 
 the mountains and the tarns at once. 
 
 I turned, then, and set out to walk home. 
 I even endeavored not to look much or often at 
 the beauty of the scenes which -surrounded me 
 and which I was leaving. Sometimes, indeed, 
 at a bend or sudden elevation of the path I was 
 following, the resistless glory of lake and wood 
 and mountain, steeped all in the rising purple 
 of evening, would arrest my attention for a mo- 
 ment, like a sudden burst of light flashing on 
 the eyes of one who has been groping and plod- 
 ding a steady way in the darkness. But I was 
 out of sympathy somehow with the scene. It 
 was not like the sight of my rough and pas- 
 sionate old play-fellow the Sea, which, even 
 n its softest, calmest moods, has nothing of 
 the angelic and the heavenly about it, but is 
 tossed, and fitful, and reckless, and ready for 
 rude evil work, like any of ourselves, and never 
 abashes or rebukes us by a cold, pure, change- 
 ess beauty. See, after all our raptures about 
 her, how few of us can long endure the society 
 of Nature ! When any thing has gone wrong 
 with us we are ready enough to run back to 
 ler ; very much indeed as a young debauchee 
 f prematurely broken health is seized with a 
 onging to be once more nursed and watched 
 y the tenderness of the mother whom he has 
 sft behind so long, and hardly thought of in 
 he midnight hour of his revelry. Yes, when 
 me is sick at heart ; when his splendid soap- 
 iubble has burst ; when he has been rejected 
 iy the girl he would marry ; when his play has 
 >een damned, his great part been hissed by the 
 udience, and gibed at by the critics ; when he 
 elieves he has ruined his constitution, and 
 hinks himself under sentence of death then 
 e begins to find out that Nature never did be- 
 ray the heart that loved her, and he crawls to 
 er knees perhaps, and fancies himself becom- 
 ig very pure and devoted in her refined com- 
 anionship, and he admires himself and her 
 nth a mournful complacency. But he soon 
 rows tired of her silent beauty and her unde- 
 lonstrative sympathy ; her face of loveliness 
 
130 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 and her heart of stone. He wearies very soon 
 in any case, and goes away ; while, only let the 
 world, the flesh, or the devil, or all three com- 
 bined, give him another chance, and then see 
 what follows ! open to him any new and prom- 
 ising project in place of that which has col- 
 lapsed ; give him reason to believe that in his 
 case, too, the nineteen nay-says of the maiden 
 make one grant ; let him feel returning strength 
 and energy once again ; tempt him with an 
 opening for a new play or a new part and ob- 
 serve how soon he renounces the charms of Na- 
 ture, and rushes to the vehement interests and 
 excitements of life once more. Delicious was 
 the retreat which Gil Bias made for himself at 
 Lirias, and calmly philosophical was the fare- 
 well to Spes et Fortuna which he inscribed over 
 its portals. But the story does not end there. 
 Yet another cha'pter, and we learn how prompt- 
 ly he quitted it for the treacherous court, and 
 ran into the embraces of Spes et Fortuna once 
 more. 
 
 Indeed, after a thorough drenching in the 
 life of cities people do not seem to me fit for 
 Nature's placid and pure companionship. We 
 ought to be like the animal of which people 
 say that once its fur has been soiled by contact 
 with common clay, it goes back to its home no 
 more. Nature avenges herself somehow, and 
 will no longer put up with us. We have grown 
 so that we can not do Avithout the city life ; we 
 miss its very discomforts, as Albrecht Diirer, in 
 the pathetic German story, missed even the ill- 
 humors of his wife, and was glad to get home 
 to her again. 
 
 So I resolved to quit Nature, and get back to 
 Art. 
 
 It is but a short walk from Grasmere to 
 Ambleside, and thence I meant to go in one of 
 the steamers to Bowness, where our head-quar- 
 ters were at one of the two or three big hotels 
 which then looked out upon Windermere. I 
 walked rather fast, and got over a good deal 
 of the ground without stopping even to look 
 round. As I drew near to Ambleside the road 
 became studded with handsome villas and 
 charming cottages. The gates of one villa 
 stood invitingly open ; the back of the house, 
 which was seated in the midst of a considerable 
 patch of lawn and shrubbery, was turned to 
 me, its front looked on the lake. I could not 
 see the water as I glanced in, but only the 
 hills which I knew were lying on the other 
 side. The hills were now of a deep dark pur- 
 ple, their outlines cut out sharp as steel against 
 the violet of the sky, and over the shoulder of 
 one of them rose in soft and melancholy beauty 
 the silver disc of the Shepherd's Star. 
 
 I stopped before the gate and looked in, struck 
 beyond resistance by the quiet witchery of the 
 evening and the scene ; and seized with a curi- 
 ous longing to get a glimpse of the lake, which 
 if brought to view would complete the charm 
 of the whole picture. So, as the gate stood 
 hospitably open, and I knew that people are 
 not very rigid toward strangers in the Lake- 
 
 land, I ventured in a few paces, and took the 
 path which led to the left of the house, assum- 
 ing that that would in a moment bring me to 
 see the water. All at once I was aware of a 
 figure a few yards in front of me. 
 
 It was that of a slender young woman, who 
 stood with her back to me, leaning one arm on 
 the bough of a little tree, and holding a straw 
 hat in her hand. From the position of her 
 head I saw that she was looking at the sky ; 
 and the e\ening light, the scene, the grace of 
 her figure, the sort of pensiveness expressed in 
 her attitude, threw a poetic and melancholy 
 charm around her. I felt as if I could almost 
 see 
 
 "The looks commercing with the skies, 
 The rapt soul sitting in the eyes." 
 
 I could not help gazing for a moment ; but I 
 would have gone back, if possible, unobserved, 
 as I had entered, only that, just at that instant, 
 somebody came out of the house somebody 
 whom I could not see and I heard a wo- 
 man's voice call, 
 
 "MissLilla!" 
 
 I started at the name. 
 
 The girl who stood before me neither looked 
 round nor answered ; but a quiver of impa- 
 tience went through her figure, and her shoul- 
 ders moved with a slight shrug of vexation. 
 Looking now more closely at her, I could not 
 doubt her identity. Chance, or fate, or provi- 
 dence, or what you will, had brought me, ut- 
 terly ignorant and blind as I was, to the very 
 spot where Lilla Lyndon stood, and which I 
 had deliberately refused to know of, when the 
 chance was placed within my power. 
 
 Even then I would have gone away unseen 
 if I could, if I had had time. But the voice 
 again called this time in a sort of supplica- 
 ting tone, such as one employs toward a way- 
 ward child, 
 
 "MissLilla." 
 
 This time Lilla looked round ; she did not 
 see me at the first glance. The light, such as 
 it was, just between the death of day and the 
 birth of night, fell on her face. With its pale 
 light against the growing shadow, that face 
 looked like the etening-star itself, which shone 
 above it ; the face was now more than ever 
 that of a young Madonna. Delicately form- 
 ed, with clear outlines, a smooth, straight, 
 white forehead, small straight nose, cheeks 
 tha^fc now looked quite uncolored, dark eye- 
 brows, and beneath them sad, clear, violet 
 eyes. Lilla Lyndon's face was turned to me ; 
 and I could not move, even if I would. 
 
 Still she had not seen me ; and she turned 
 to where the person who called her must have 
 been standing, and whom she evidently could 
 see, although I could not; and I heard her 
 say, 
 
 " I am here, Anne ! What is it ?" 
 
 " Miss Dora Jane, Miss Lilla, hopes you will 
 come in now. It gets cold, she says ; and she : 
 hopes you have your hat on." 
 
 " I am coming, Anne, in a few minutes ; aad j 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 131 
 
 it is not cold. I am coming, quite soon, tell 
 Miss Dora Jane." 
 
 Miss Dora Jane's messenger vanished, I sup- 
 pose ; and then Lilla turning round, as if to re- 
 sume her old position, looked directly where I 
 was standing, and saw me. 
 
 First she seemed only startled and surprised, 
 and she made a step forward as if to see who 
 was the intruder. Then a sudden change came 
 over her face and lighted in her eyes ; and she 
 put one hand to her breast, and held the other 
 toward me ; and then I sprang forward, only 
 just in time to catch her as she was falling 
 for she fainted and I caught her in my arms. 
 
 She was a light burden, although rather a 
 tall girl. I could have carried her, if need 
 were, like a child ; but I only held her in my 
 arms, and drew her to a garden seat which 
 stood near, and placed her there reclining ; 
 and was bewildered, not knowing whether to 
 go to the house and ask for help, or carry her 
 there in my arms, or stay with her and let no 
 one know. 
 
 Lilla remained only a moment unconscious. 
 She opened her eyes and looked at me, first 
 with an expression of wonder and alarm, and 
 then with a glowing smile of childlike confi- 
 dence and gladness. She passed her hand 
 across her forehead and said : 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Temple, how much ashamed of 
 myself I feel ! Does any one know ?" 
 
 "No one." 
 
 "Thank Heaven for that! I should hear 
 such remonstrances and advice. I do not 
 know why I became so weak in a moment. 
 Was I long so?" 
 
 "Only an instant." 
 
 "Ah! What can have made me so? I 
 think you frightened me. First I did not 
 know who it was; then, I think, for a mo- 
 ment I thought it must be a ghost this is a 
 land of ghosts, you know. Why did you not 
 speak? Why did you come in so strange a 
 way? You quite alarmed me." 
 
 " You are better now, Miss Lyndon, are you 
 not? -You look quite pale still." 
 
 ' ' Oh, I am quite well now quite well. See, 
 I can walk quite strongly. That was only the 
 nonsense of a moment." 
 
 She stood up, and walked a few paces firmly 
 enough, although she still was evidently a good 
 deal agitated. 
 
 "Shall I go to the house and send some 
 one ?" I asked. 
 
 " Oh, please no ; I don't want any one ; they 
 would only bore me. But now tell me, why did 
 you come in that strange way, and alarm me ?" 
 
 " I came in only by chance, Miss Lyndon ; I 
 did not even know that you were here. I walk- 
 ed in a few paces I don't know why and then 
 I saw you, and had not time to go away." 
 
 "You did not come here, then, to see me?" 
 
 "No, Miss Lyndon; I did not even know 
 that you were in this part of the country." 
 
 " I was here, and you did not know it ; and 
 your coming to this part of the country, and 
 
 into this very place, was the effect of chance 
 pure chance?" 
 
 "Chance pure chance." 
 
 "How strange!" she said, meditatively. 
 " Such things would seem impossible. And 
 yet I must believe you." 
 
 " You may believe me." 
 
 "If I had gone into the house five minutes 
 before, you would not have seen me?"" 
 
 "No, Lilla." 
 
 " I have never heard of any thing so strange 
 as that," she said again, rather as if speaking to 
 herself than to me ; " they would never believe 
 it never." 
 
 "They who?" 
 
 "My step-sister and the rest. They never 
 will believe it ; but I can not help them, and I 
 don't care. Let them say what they will." 
 
 "There is nothing to say, Lilla. I have 
 seen you merely by chance, and for a moment. 
 I am going away again. I leave this place by 
 the first train to-morrow." 
 
 " That, too, they will not believe. I do not 
 like unbelieving people; they suspect deceit, 
 and. so they create it every where. Deceit be- 
 comes encouraged where nothing else would 
 be regarded as possible. This chance meeting, 
 Mr. Temple, will be a reproach and a suspicion 
 for long enough." 
 
 " I am very, very sorry, Miss Lyndon, and I 
 wish I had not come." 
 
 "So do I. But it is done. Will you go 
 now ?" 
 
 "Yes, Lilla." 
 
 She gave me her hand ; it trembled in mine ; 
 and I thought there were tears in her eyes. In 
 answer to a sort of plaintive inquiry which spoke 
 in them, I said, 
 
 "You wish me to go, Lilla do you not?" 
 
 "I do oh yes. I must wish you to go; 
 but not in a cold and angry way ; not as if you 
 were offended with me. Not as if you thought 
 that I, of my own accord, wanted you to go 
 away." 
 
 " Oh no, Miss Lyndon." 
 
 "Why do you sometimes call me Lilla, and 
 sometimes Miss Lyndon ?" 
 
 "I don't know. I will call you Lilla al- 
 ways, if you wish." 
 
 "I do wish it. I wish that we should be 
 friends, and speak to each other so." 
 
 " I never thought, Lilla, that you wished 
 me away; I know you are always too kind 
 and friendly. But I know too I should have 
 known even if you had not told me that this 
 chance meeting might expose you to reproach- 
 es which you don't deserve, nor I ; and so I un- 
 derstand that you wish me away for that reason, 
 and that you are in the right." 
 
 "Tell me, Mr. Temple, frankly and for- 
 give me beforehand for any pain it may cause, 
 but tell me truly, and all, whether it causes 
 pain or not to you or to me why does papa 
 not like you ?" 
 
 "Indeed, Lilla, I can not tell you; I do not 
 know." 
 
132 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTEK. 
 
 " But you must have some kind of idea ; you 
 must guess." 
 
 "I think it is because he knows that only 
 the other day I was poor and humble. Not 
 romantically poor, Lilla, but downright and 
 wretchedly poor. Now he knows that I come 
 from the poor, that all my friends were poor ; 
 I myself am not a man he cares to know ; and 
 I am by far the richest and the grandest per- 
 sonage of my whole race. I think he disliked 
 me always for that reason. Is that frank ?" 
 
 "It is. But I must go in. Now pray for- 
 give me, and don't, oh don't, speak as if you 
 were speaking to one who had herself any such 
 ignoble feelings. You have told me that Ma- 
 dame Reichstein too was once poor, that her 
 family and her people were poor ?" 
 
 "Yes. Poor and humble as my own. No 
 words could be stronger." 
 
 "Yet papa always admires her, and delights 
 in her company ?" 
 
 " She is a woman ; and beautiful and attract- 
 ive ; and I think " 
 
 "Yes, yes. Now go on, pray; don't stop." 
 
 "I think your father admires her." 
 
 "And I too," she said, looking at me with a 
 flash of fire which I had not expected to see in 
 her Madonna eyes ; " I think so too, and Dora 
 Jane is a fool not to see it. I know it. He 
 admires her, he adores her ; he would give her 
 mamma's place if he could, and I must have no 
 friend unless such as he pleases to give me! 
 But I have a little of his own spirit, and I can 
 not so be schooled any longer. I will not stay 
 here any more. I hate the place at least, not 
 the place, but the way in which I am kept here. 
 Mr. Temple, I am a prisoner here, and I can 
 bear it no longer." 
 
 "Lilla, your father means it all for your 
 welfare ; even I, whom he does not like, must 
 admit that. He has a right to guard you. You 
 are young, and don't be angry with me beau- 
 tiful and sweet and trustful, and you have no 
 mother." 
 
 " Oh, I feel that bitterly, more and more ev- 
 ery day. If I had a mother I could lay my 
 head upon her breast and tell her all ; and she 
 would understand me, and forgive me when 
 there was any thing to be forgiven, and not 
 scold me in hard biting words. Mr. Temple, 
 I have never until lately known what distrust 
 was. I have believed every one. Lately I 
 have been distrusted, and it has taught me to 
 look at others with eyes of doubt : and I begin 
 to find some of my idols are of clay. Look, 
 they are broken, some of them ! I understand 
 now why girls in other countries go into con- 
 vents, and live there and die there." 
 
 "You will outlive all this, Lilla, and be hap- 
 py, and wonder that you ever could have had 
 these sad and gloomy thoughts." 
 
 " Never, never ! Nothing can give back the 
 faith and confidence which are gone." 
 
 "New faith and confidence will grow up, and 
 Other ties will draw around you. Listen, Lilla, 
 dear Lilla ! I am so much older than you that 
 
 I may talk to you as wisely and boldly as I 
 think right. Do you trust me ?" 
 
 "Indeed I do." 
 
 Her eyes looked a trustingness into mine 
 which to win was worth having lived for. 
 
 " Then be advised by me. Be reconciled to 
 your father. He may seem harsh now, and 
 harshness is strange to you, and comes with 
 the greater pain. But he thinks only of your 
 good ; it is his way of showing his love. Don't 
 think of the fear you had that about Madame 
 Reichstein, I mean. Mr. Lyndon admires her 
 all lovers of music and genius do : but the 
 rest is nothing; and what you feared is, I 
 know, an impossibility. Be reconciled to your 
 father ; write to him frankly and lovingly, and 
 tell him so. Tell him that you accept his con- 
 ditions." 
 
 She hung her head a moment, and without 
 looking up asked, 
 
 "Do you know the conditions ?" 
 
 " I do ; I think I do ; at least, I guess them, 
 dear. I may speak out openly to you, may I 
 not, though you are only a girl, and I am a man 
 not over-young ? His conditions are, that you 
 promise never to see me any more ?" 
 
 In the faintest syllables she assented. 
 
 "Be advised by him, my dear. I would 
 promise and pledge for you if I could." 
 
 " Do you advise me so ?" 
 
 "I do, Lilla; I do indeed. For your own 
 sake, my dear, I advise it. Do not become es- 
 tranged from your father for my sake I mean 
 on my account ; I am not worthy of such sacri- 
 fice ; I am not worthy, Lilla dear, of you. " 
 
 O God, if I were ! If I could now but feel 
 myself worthy of that child's pure and generous 
 heart ! If I could offer her a fresh, pure affec- 
 tion like her own ! If I could but believe it in 
 my power to make her happy! Never, never 
 again will such a gift be within my reach ! No 
 man can hope for such a moment twice in his 
 lifetime. 
 
 " You see I speak to you with a freedom and 
 frankness which might offend you, if you were 
 not so sweet and trusting and noble as you are. 
 I will not affect to misunderstand you, Lilla ; 
 and you will understand me. I am not worthy 
 of you, my dear ; you would be thrown away 
 on me and on my life." 
 
 "Your life has always seemed to me beauti- 
 ful and poetical, and free from all the meanness 
 and roughness of the common world." 
 
 " From the outside it seems so, Lilla. It is 
 very hard and commonplace and mean and bit- 
 ter within. I do not like it ; and I am leaving 
 it. I am leaving it to steep myself in the fresh 
 life of the New World, and to lose myself there. 
 You will become reconciled with your father, 
 who loves you dearly, and you will forget all 
 this, and be married some day, and be happy." 
 
 " Oh, how can you say such things ! Oh, 
 how can you ! You are very, very cruel ! " 
 
 She sat down on the gnarled oaken seat that 
 stood near by, and covered her pale face with 
 her white slender hands. Her whole figure 
 

 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 133 
 
 shook and heaved with emotion, and tears came 
 trickling through her fingers. 
 
 Must I own that, up to this moment, I had 
 always thought there was probably some truth 
 in what Christina Eeichstein had said, and that 
 any feeling Lilla Lyndon might have had to- 
 ward me was in part only a child's romantic 
 sentiment toward a man who lived in a world 
 strange to her, and which doubtless showed it- 
 self in her unskilled innocent eyes all poetry, 
 wonder, and beauty ? I was not prepared for 
 the deep vehement burst of emotion and grief 
 I now beheld. I was not even prepared to find 
 that the sentiment, whatever it might be, had 
 survived a short separation and silence. I was 
 not prepared for love. 
 
 Could I doubt that I saw it now offered to 
 me ? Could I refuse it ? I who had wasted 
 half a life in vain! 
 
 I could not ; I would not. I sat by Lilla's 
 side, and put my arm round her slender waist, 
 and drew her to me. I would have done the 
 same though her father stood by. She en- 
 deavored to draw herself away, but I held her 
 while I spoke, and her hands yet covered her 
 face. 
 
 "Since this is so, dearest Lilla, why should 
 I try, even for your sake, to be wise and self- 
 denying in vain ? Since this is so, I do believe 
 that Heaven has sent me he1"e to see you, and 
 to save you from a life which is too cold and 
 hard for you. If I can make you happy I will, 
 and I will at least give my life to the attempt. 
 I accept humbly and thankfully what Heaven 
 gives me. Will you love me, Lilla, and have 
 me for your husband ? I will love you always. " 
 
 I heard no answer, and wanted to hear none. 
 But she allowed me to draw her closely to me 
 now, though her tears still fell as before. And 
 then I raised her face from her hands and kissed 
 her. 
 
 "Miss Lilla!" 
 
 The woman's voice again was heard at a lit- 
 tle distance. She was evidently seeking for 
 Lilla near where Lilla had been before. We 
 had gradually straggled to a distance from that 
 place, to quite a different part of the shrub- 
 bery. 
 
 " I must go," said Lilla ; " they are looking 
 for me again." 
 
 She now looked up for the first time for some 
 moments, and her eyes met mine. They were 
 full of tears, through which at last a smile 
 struggled. 
 
 "You must go, dearest. Your eyes, I fear, 
 are tell-tales." 
 
 "They will tell nothing more," she said, 
 with a brighter gleam, "than they have often 
 told lately." 
 
 "And I did not know of it !" 
 
 "Miss Lilla! Miss Lilla!" 
 
 "Good-by, dearest," I again said. "Se- 
 crecy for this once ; only this once. We will 
 act in the open face of day soon. I will write 
 to your father to-morrow." 
 
 " To mv father?" 
 
 She spoke tremulously, and looked affrighted 
 almost. 
 
 " Yes, Lilla. To whom else ?" 
 
 "But if " 
 
 "We will talk of the <ifs' hereafter. Just 
 now, I think of no doubts. You shall hear 
 from me, Lilla, soon, very soon. Good-by." 
 
 Again I kissed her. There was a flower in 
 her bosom, and she took it silently out and gave 
 it to me. Then she went quickly toward the 
 house. She looked back a moment, and I saw 
 her pale face once more a star in the dark- 
 ness. It set she was gone. 
 
 I came into the road, and paced up and 
 down there for a long time, trying to think, to 
 arrange my ideas, to plan for our future. It 
 looked difficult and complicated enough, but 
 assuredly my heart did not misgive me ; even 
 on her account I could fear nothing. I could 
 only think, "She loves me. I am sent to de- 
 vote my life to her. " 
 
 The flower she took from her bosom was a 
 rose. Something like a shudder went through 
 me as I looked upon it. An evil omen ! When 
 last a rose taken from a woman's breast was 
 my possession, what was the story it predicted ? 
 Separation, disappointment, two, three lives 
 thwarted and frustrated. An5 now again the 
 symbol! Childish unmeaning folly to think 
 of such things. But I could have wished that 
 Lilla's flower were not a rose. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 LILLA'S FLIGHT. 
 
 I DO not know how long I remained on the 
 road outside Lilla's gate that night. I only 
 know that it was dark, like midnight, before I 
 thought of returning to Bowness. I have no 
 way of expressing how I felt. My happiness 
 was an unspeakable, an almost unbelievable 
 ecstasy. I felt happy and humbled, deeply 
 humbled. To know that that pure, noble heart 
 had given itself up to me was indeed something 
 to fill me with a sense of my own miserable 
 demerits. I could have knelt on the bare road- 
 side, and prostrated myself, and prayed of Heav- 
 en to help me that I might be less unworthy. 
 
 Yesterday I should have wished to do some 
 good or great thing which might win me a place 
 of regard in her memory, and redeem my barren 
 life, and then die. To-day my veins are filled 
 with the ecstasy and glory of living for her. 
 
 I was resolved even more than ever to go to 
 town at once. I would not make any effort to 
 see Lilla again. I should be wholly unworthy 
 of her if I did so. There shall be nothing more 
 that has the least appearance of secrecy. I will 
 ask her openly of her father; and should he 
 refuse, as I know he will, we will marry in de- 
 fiance o'f him. Come the worst, it is not long 
 before she will be of age to decide for herself. 
 And he even he shall learn that I have not 
 been influenced by any hope or wish to get his 
 
134 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 accursed money. No coin of his shall benefi 
 me or mine. 
 
 After a sleepless, restless, happy night, '. 
 started by the first train from Windermere. '. 
 strained and twisted out of the window of the 
 carriage until we had quite lost sight of th< 
 lake, in the futile hope of getting a glimpse 
 somehow of the villa and the little demesne where 
 I had found Lilla. I could not see the place 
 or, indeed, any thing near it. At last, I am 
 ashamed to say, yielding to utter fatigue, I fel 
 fast asleep, and slept in the carriage for hours. 
 
 It is a long journey from Lake-land to Lon- 
 don. It was far into evening when I got to 
 town, and I went almost at once to Jermyn 
 Street to see Christina. I was disappointed, 
 however, in my desire to see her alone, for she 
 had several visitors with her when I called. 
 
 She looked surprised and even startled when 
 I presented myself; but she compelled herself 
 to receive me with external composure. 
 
 "I never expected to see you so soon," she 
 said. "You must have grown tired of Nature 
 even more quickly than I predicted." 
 
 "No," I replied, "I did not get tired of Na- 
 ture ; or, at least, that was not my reason for 
 returning to town. But my companion" (I did 
 not mention his tame) "had to desert me, and I 
 didn't care to stay among the mountains alone. 
 
 And I looked significantly at Christina. 
 
 "Afraid of being left to bleat alone, like 
 Wordsworth's lamb on the mountain-side, the 
 plaintive spirit of the solitude," interjected a 
 young literary man present, who doubtless 
 wanted to seem clever. 
 
 "Indeed? You were left alone? Then 
 your fellow-traveler got tired of Nature first 
 and left you ?" asked Madame Keichstein, look- 
 ing with anxious eyes. 
 
 "No, not that either ; but some sudden call 
 found him out even there among the mountains 
 he is such a dreadful fellow for sudden en- 
 gagements and he had to hurry away. He 
 could not fix any time for his return, and so I 
 followed his flight." 
 
 All this was said on both sides in the coolest 
 and easiest tone in that tone of semi-badinage 
 which people generally adopt on nearly all sub- 
 jects when indifferent ears are open to hear. 
 But I knew that Christina was anxious and un- 
 easy, and I only waited to get an opportunity 
 of exchanging a quiet word or two with her to 
 tell her all. 
 
 The opportunity was soon made. She drew 
 herself away to a little table covered with books 
 that stood in a corner, as if she were looking 
 for something. I came to her side. She had 
 just said, in an eager under-tone, "What is it, 
 Emanuel?" and glanced up under her eye- 
 lashes to see that no one was too near, when I 
 saw a change come over her face ; and Mr. Lyn- 
 don, M.P., who had just then entered the room, 
 approached her. 
 
 His eyebrows contracted when he saw me. 
 She instantly left me, and hurried to meet him. 
 He led her to a sofa with an air of lordly def- 
 
 erence, which had something of a sultan's pat- 
 ronage about it ; and they presently began to 
 converse so earnestly that they seemed to for- 
 get all around them. 
 
 I was resolved to wait no longer. If Chris- 
 tina had already forgotten all about her hus- 
 band, and her anxiety regarding his disap- 
 pearance, any thing that I had to tell her could, 
 well afford to remain untold until some more 
 convenient opportunity. I was quietly with- 
 drawing, when, just as I passed near the sofa 
 where Christina sat, an artist I knew, who hap- 
 pened to be one of the company, asked, 
 
 " Did you leave Windermere only this morn- 
 ing, Temple?" 
 
 Fire flashed under Mr. Lyndon's heavy eye- 
 brows, and he almost started he almost seem- 
 ed as if about to break in upon our conversa- 
 tion. I noted the expression and manner, and 
 I understood the meaning. The whilom pau- 
 per at Dives's gate was the dreaded lover of 
 Dives's daughter. 
 
 I confess that I felt some respect for the 
 self-constraint which enabled Mr. Lyndon to 
 command his feelings in an instant, and to be- 
 have as if he had never heard my friend's in- 
 nocent question. In a moment Lyndon and 
 Christina were conversing as before ; and I left 
 them to converse. I had always hated to see 
 this man near Christina, and I was pained not 
 less than ever to see him there now. So I left 
 the place, where he seemed determined to stay. 
 
 But I could not hate the man any more. 
 There was a time, and that not long ago, when 
 I thought it would have given me pleasure to 
 humiliate and mortify him. I had no such 
 feeling now. I made every allowance and ex- 
 cuse for him : I desired sincerely to be as con- 
 iderate as possible toward him. I would have 
 given much to be able to convince him of the 
 ntegrity and the disinterestedness of my love 
 for his daughter. I almost think I could have 
 jeen induced, under proper encouragement, to 
 his paternal blessing. In truth, my love 
 br Lilla and my happiness in her love swal- 
 owed up all mean hates, and spites, and ig- 
 noble feelings of whatever kind within me. I 
 vas in fact almost in love with the world. The 
 nearest approach to anger I felt toward any 
 mman creature was toward Christina Braun. 
 3er reception of Lyndon, her eager welcome 
 f him, her absorbed attention to his talk, 
 eemed to me to bespeak a lamentable levity at 
 a time when some crisis, which she appeared to 
 hink serious, was impending over her husband. 
 I walked home thinking over these things, 
 angry with Christina, and sorry for her ; and 
 ometimes, indeed, full of deep, deep pity for 
 er. It was ten. o'clock when I reached home ; 
 and I opened one of my windows upon the blue 
 wilight of early summer, and sat without a 
 amp and smoked a cigar, and began to see my 
 ray. I must write at once, this night, this 
 moment, to Mr. Lyndon. I must anticipate 
 ny inquiry or discovery by him. He must 
 now at once that no secrecy of any kind is in- 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 135 
 
 tended. From this moment it is certain that 
 no power of man shall prevent me from mak- 
 ing Lilla Lyndon my wife ; and he shall know 
 the full truth. No idle feeling of pride or mor- 
 tified self-love shall restrain me from making 
 every effort to avert discord and disunion. 
 Nothing shall prevent my acting toward Lilla 
 Lyndon's father as her love Reserves that I 
 should act. He could no longer offend me. I 
 had lost the right to complain. 
 
 I lighted my lamp and wrote a letter. It 
 was to him, and ran thus : 
 
 " SIR, Not long since I endeavored to see 
 you, and I was not successful. My object then 
 was to pledge you my word as a man of honor 
 that I would never place myself again in the 
 way of meeting Miss Lilla Lyndon, or willing- 
 ly be the cause of any disunion, however slight 
 and passing, between her and you. I was not 
 favored with an interview. You believed me 
 guilty of conduct you had reason to resent. I 
 do not deny it, or defend myself. The prom- 
 ise, however, which I could not make to you I 
 made to myself, and I would have kept it. 
 
 "Chance I am superstitious enough to 
 think it Providence ordered otherwise. I 
 have just seen Miss Lyndon in Westmoreland. 
 I declare that I had not the slightest idea that 
 she was in that part of England. I declare 
 too that I deliberately refused to know where 
 she was, when I might (without knowledge or 
 consent of hers) have learned it. Our meeting 
 was as much a surprise to her as to me. This, 
 however, I need not tell you. You know that 
 she is incapable of deceit. 
 
 "I write now to ask you, as Lilla Lyndon's 
 father, for your permission to me to become a 
 suitor for her hand. I will not affect to doubt 
 that this proposal will displease you. I say 
 sincerely I am not surprised that you should 
 have wished another husband for your daugh- 
 ter. But I say too that I am worthy of her 
 thus far that she has honored me frankly 
 with her affection. For myself, I have but 
 lately learned to the full how deep and devoted 
 is my love for her. I stand amazed, and in- 
 deed humbled, by the thought of her affection 
 for me humbled because I have nothing to 
 give in return. 
 
 "You are doubtless a rich man; your fa- 
 vorite daughter would in the ordinary course 
 bring a fortune to her husband. Not so in 
 my case. If Lilla Lyndon honors me with 
 her love, and you give your consent, I receive 
 her, and her alone. I will not consent to re- 
 ceive one penny's-worth of pecuniary advant- 
 age. Even you shall at least have no reason 
 to suspect me of a mercenary motive. I can 
 myself maintain my wife at least in comfort, 
 though not in splendor ; and I think Lilla Lyn- 
 don does not care for splendor. 
 
 "I wait your reply, and add nothing else. 
 Nothing that I could say could honestly put 
 my appeal in any better light to you. It 
 should never have been made, did it only con- 
 
 cern my own happiness. I make it believing 
 that it also concerns the happiness of her 
 whom I am sure you love. 
 
 " I have the honor to be 
 
 "Your obedient servant, 
 
 "EMANUEL TEMPLE. 
 "GKOBGE STAMFORD LYNDON, Esq., M.P." 
 
 I had hardly finished this letter when I 
 heard the rattle of wheels in the street, and 
 presently my landlady herself came up and 
 told me, with rather a significant twinkle in 
 her eye, that a lady wished to speak to me 
 very particular. 
 
 "Where is she?" 
 
 "I have shown her into the drawing-room. 
 She said it didn't matter about her name, but 
 she must see you." 
 
 I hastened to the drawing-room, and found 
 Christina Reichstein standing there. Her veil 
 was down, but I could see through it that her 
 face was very pale, and that her eyes sparkled. 
 
 "Where is my husband, Emanuel?" she 
 said, without any introductory word. 
 
 "I can not tell you, Christina. I have told 
 you nearly all that I know. He left me, and 
 bade me tell you that you should hear from 
 him soon." 
 
 " Where did he leave you ? Where was he 
 going? Who came for him? When did he 
 say he would return ?" 
 
 "Christina, I am not deeply in his confi- 
 dence. He did not tell me where he was go- 
 ing, nor did I ask any such question. He did 
 say there was nothing to be alarmed at imme- 
 diately." 
 
 "Who came for him Benoni?" 
 
 I described the emissary. 
 
 " Yes ; Benoni. I thought so I feared so ; 
 I hate that man." 
 
 "Is he not true?" 
 
 "True? Oh yes, too true. True to his 
 wretched plots and plans. But there can be 
 nothing to alarm me," she went on, reassuring 
 herself. "I have not heard a syllable of any 
 thing. Is it not very hot ?" 
 
 I opened the window near her. She threw 
 back her veil. She looked pale as a ghost. 
 
 " No ; there can be nothing of any moment," 
 she said, looking at me anxiously for confirma- 
 tion of her hopes. "I believe is still in 
 
 town, and has not heard of any thing ?" 
 
 And she named an Italian name known of 
 all men ; a name identified with revolutionary 
 movement for more than a quarter of a cen- 
 tury. 
 
 "I can satisfy you as to his being in town, 
 Christina. I passed him at Knightsbridge- as 
 I came along, not an hour ago. He was walk- 
 ing very quietly and slowly quite unconcern- 
 edly, to all appearance." 
 
 "Then there can be nothing. It must be 
 only some one of those ordinary journeyings." 
 
 "But don't people say," I asked, malig- 
 nantly, " that the Chief prefers stirring up 
 rebellions with the long arm of the lever that 
 
136 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 he generally directs an Italian insurrection 
 from a safe stand-point here in London ?" 
 
 "People do say it, I believe," she replied, 
 coldly, " who know nothing of him, and have 
 no sympathy with his cause, or perhaps with 
 any thing that is noble and high. You ought 
 not to say it." 
 
 I felt a little ashamed and penitent. 
 
 "I am sure," I said, after a short pause, 
 "that I heard Berioni, if it was he, speak to 
 Salaris about the necessity of being in Paris at 
 once." 
 
 "In Paris? Oh, come, this is the only im- 
 portant word you have let fall yet. In Paris ? 
 If you had only mentioned that before, I should 
 have felt greatly relieved. It is nothing defin- 
 ite, then? It is only some organizing affair: 
 to seek for .aid, or advice, or friends, or some- 
 thing." 
 
 " Yes. I don't see how they can well fight 
 for Italian liberty in Paris. Indeed, Madame 
 Reichstein, I don't believe there is much cause 
 for alarm. Perhaps the battle won't come off 
 just yet : threatened governments live long." 
 
 "You are in a sneering humor, Emanuel, 
 and I don't like to meet people in such humor ; 
 but I am a good deal relieved by what you tell 
 me. And now, before I go, let me scold you 
 for having left me this evening so hastily. Why 
 did you not wait, and tell me all you knew?" 
 
 "In fact, I had nothing to tell ; and you had 
 other people with you." 
 
 " They all left very soon. You might have 
 waited a little ; I have no one to confide in but 
 you." 
 
 "No one?" 
 
 " No one, now that my husband is away. I 
 don't know why you look at me with such an 
 expression ; I think you ought to explain what 
 you mean." 
 
 " Christina, I don't ask explanations, or offer 
 any. /have nothing to explain." 
 
 " Yes, you have something," she replied, with 
 energy. " You have to explain your manner to 
 me your suspicious manner, and your looks, 
 which seem to insinuate something that I do 
 not understand that I will not understand." 
 
 " Ay, will not understand !" I said, with em- 
 phasis. 
 
 "Will not understand, then, if you like to 
 have it so. What have I done that you, my old- 
 est friend, look on me so coldly? Have I not 
 now enough to distract and torment me without 
 that? There is nothing I am ashamed of, al- 
 though there is much I am sorry for. You are 
 changed toward me ; why why ?" 
 
 " Christina, I don't like your way of life ; I 
 tell you that frankly indeed, you know it al- 
 ready. I don't like to see that man Lyndon 
 hanging about you in the way he does now 
 too, when, for aught you and I can tell, your 
 husband may be in some serious danger. I 
 don't like to hear your name coupled with his 
 in a way that well, in the way that people do 
 couple it." 
 
 Christina blushed, or flushed rather. 
 
 "My husband knows of Mr. Lyndon's visits. 
 What right has any one else to " 
 
 "No right, Christina. / claim no right. 
 You insisted on knowing why I seemed sur- 
 prised, or cold, or something of that kind ; I 
 have told you the reason." 
 
 " I didn't mean you, Emanuel ; I meant the 
 idle people whose babble and malignant trash 
 you repeat people who babble malignant trash 
 about yourself, let me tell you, as well as about 
 me. How do you know what things are being 
 said of you and of me ? How do you know 
 what vile gossip may have reached my hus- 
 band's ear which he scorns to believe ? Who 
 can tell what people might say, if they knew, 
 for example, that I have come in this way to 
 visit you at night alone ?" 
 
 There was much of her old winning way 
 about this, which, coming as it did now, brought 
 a vague, subtle sense of deceit to my mind. 
 
 " Come, Emanuel, dear old friend, have faith 
 in me. Let there be one at least who thinks 
 well of me one here I mean for my husband 
 thinks well of me, better, far better than I could 
 ever deserve of him. If you knew him well, 
 and knew how he trusts me, you would not, and 
 could not, believe me capable of* deceiving him. 
 He knows that Mr. Lyndon visits me ; and he 
 knows why. It is his doing altogether ; that is 
 all I can tell you now ; but you shall know more 
 before long. He is all confidence and trust. 
 My dear friend, you and I are very good people 
 in our way, but we are not like him." 
 
 She spoke now with a dash of sarcasm in her 
 tone, and with a quivering lip. 
 
 "Christina, I do believe I have done you 
 wrong." 
 
 She sprang up and caught my hand in a wild 
 way. 
 
 "Yes, I do fully believe I have -been sus- 
 pecting you wrongfully. I don't pretend to 
 account for what I have certainly observed " 
 
 She smiled half maliciously. 
 
 "Although perhaps even now a conjecture 
 does start up in my mind which seems to ex- 
 plain it but I will not ask you for any explana- 
 tion " 
 
 "No, Emanuel. Believe me without ask- 
 ing for any explanation now." 
 
 "And I do. I am sorry for having wronged 
 you ; and I am more sorry still for the circum- 
 stances that have entangled you in what I can 
 not help thinking a sort of humiliation ; and 
 which will end, I fear, in the wreck of your 
 happiness." 
 
 "My happiness is wrecked, Emanuel! It 
 went down long, long ago. I would give all to 
 be young again, to begin again. The old im- 
 memorial vain regret! To be young again, 
 Emanuel to have the chance of beginning 
 again, and doing something better ! I sold my 
 soul, and I have got a heap of fairy gold in ex- 
 change ; and it has turned into withered old 
 leaves." 
 
 My heart was deeply moved by the state of 
 almost abject despair into which she had worked 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 137 
 
 herself. I endeavored to say something in the 
 way of commonplace reassurance ; but she cut 
 me short impetuously, petulantly. 
 
 "Don't," Emanuel; I want no condolence. 
 I dare say every thing is for the best, and all 
 right, and all that : that sort of stuff never made 
 any one feel any the happier. If I were to ask 
 you, Don't I look pale, and wretched, and ugly, 
 at this very moment ? you would say something 
 complimentary, I dare say. It would not re- 
 assure me. I have had compliments enough in 
 my day, and they have done me much good ! 
 I have cried my eyes quite red, and my cheeks 
 quite pale : mock tears on the stage, and real 
 tears at home, make sad work of one's beauty, 
 Emanuel. You find the world well enough, no 
 doubt ; you were always a patient, contented 
 kind of being, and did not trouble yourself 
 about any thing, as women do. Besides, you 
 have special reason for happiness now. You 
 have seen Lilla Lyndon." 
 
 "How do you know?" 
 
 " I heard, only an hour since, that she was in 
 the Lake country ; and I knew by your air of 
 brightness and triumph, and oh, something 
 wholly unspeakable that you had seen the lit- 
 tle girl." 
 
 "Yes, I have seen her." 
 
 " And you will persevere, then ; and you will 
 not be warned ; and you will take this child 
 away from her father and her family? Oh, 
 don't protest and look angry ; she will go if you 
 ask her ; and you think you can break all the 
 bonds of association thus, and yet find the wo- 
 man you tear away from friends and family and 
 habits happy in the end ? You know nothing 
 of women, Emanuel ; you never did. She will 
 plunge into any gulf with you now ; she will 
 awake with a shiver some day, and turn a pale 
 face of silent reproach on you. I don't think 
 the poor girl would scold. " 
 
 "You are a prophet of evil omen, Christina." 
 
 " A screech-owl, am I not ?" 
 
 "But I am not dismayed." 
 
 " You believe in this girl's firmness and con- 
 stancy, and knowledge of her own mind ?" 
 
 "I do, as fully as I believe in Heaven; far 
 more fully, very likely. I know Lilla Lyndon ; 
 I don't know Heaven." 
 
 "You think the bonds of love will prove 
 stronger with her than the bonds of habit ?" 
 
 "I do." 
 
 Christina shrugged her shoulders ; but re- 
 turned to the charge. 
 
 " She lives now in Connaught Place ?" 
 
 "She does." 
 
 "And you propose to live ?" 
 
 " In a small house in Brompton or Kensing- 
 ton, say." 
 
 " She has carriages and horses, grooms and 
 maids without stint ?" 
 
 "Yes; and it will try my resources, proba- 
 bly, to keep a miniature brougham, a couple of 
 maids, and a boy in buttons. Connu, Christina. 
 All that I know, and have thought of." 
 
 "And she will sit at home of nights and do 
 
 crochet, while you sing at the Opera with some 
 Finola?" 
 
 "No, Christina. I mean to give up the Op- 
 era I am sick of it. Any thing I can do is bet- 
 ter done in the concert-room. I will at all events 
 try to make her happy, if she will have me." 
 
 "Happy after she has quarreled with her 
 father, and been discarded by him ?" 
 
 "She will not quarrel with her father." 
 
 "Emanuel, you are out of your senses." 
 
 "No, Christina. I am coming to my senses 
 at last!" 
 
 I do not know why I made this reply. I 
 suppose I was merely carried away by antago- 
 nism and her last words. She flushed as if she 
 had been smitten on the cheek, and her bosom 
 heaved up and down like little waves, and she 
 indulged in her familiar action of throwing back 
 that hair from her brow and shoulder. She 
 turned away for a moment ; and then laying 
 her hand gently on my arm, she said in a soft- 
 ened tone : 
 
 " You do not think I wish you not to be hap- 
 
 py?" 
 
 "Oh no, Christina!" 
 
 " Oh, do not, do not ! I wish you to be hap- 
 py, most sincerely. I only feared and doubted ; 
 but all that is nonsense. Indeed, I long to see 
 you happy. I shall feel when I see it that my 
 expiation is out, and my penance removed. I 
 only feared that perhaps you did not know her, 
 or she you. I suppose a woman always feels 
 jealous of another who I don't know really 
 what I am saying ! Emanuel, remember I was 
 the first who told you Lilla Lyndon loved you ! 
 My dear, I read it in the child's eyes before 
 she knew it herself. But you you do love her 
 now?" 
 
 " Yes, Christina, I do. I know her now, and 
 I love her." 
 
 " Then I hope and pray that you may be hap- 
 py, and that the future may recompense for any 
 waste of the past. I will pray for you, Eman- 
 uel, and for her. Do you know I am a Catho- 
 lic now ?" 
 
 "A Roman Catholic?" 
 
 "A Roman Catholic, if you will," she said, 
 with a faint smile. " Yes, I have been so for 
 some time. What would my brother and his 
 pious Lutheran wife in Konigsberg you re- 
 member them, Emanuel ? say, if they knew ? 
 Yes, I sought peace ; and I trust I have found 
 it. You do not know no man could know 
 how empty and blank my life has been. I have 
 none of the true joys of life, and I shall never 
 have. Other women, whatever their disap- 
 pointments, have some comfort to cheer them, 
 to look forward to, when they cease to be young ; 
 but I ! Ah ! a man can't know." 
 
 Yet I did know. I knew what she thought 
 of, at least. What woman will not mourn over 
 the quiver that is empty of arrows ? 
 
 "Come," she said, "I must go. It is al- 
 most midnight ; and this is a mad escapade. 
 I am wasting my own time and yours." 
 
 As she rose to go her eyes glanced at the 
 
138 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 looking-glass, which, in the true style of a 
 Brompton lodging, adorned my chimney-piece. 
 "Emanuel," she asked, quite seriously, "have 
 I not greatly changed for the worse ? But you 
 won't tell me. And then don't say any thing 
 so changed since I used to watch for you 
 in the window every evening, long ago ! Ah, 
 those were pleasant days ! I too shall soon 
 leave the stage. I must in any case. I am 
 resolved to go in my full prime of voice. We 
 will go and live somewhere quietly in Switzer- 
 land, I think, if my poor Salaris can he per- 
 suaded to give up his dreams, and if he comes 
 safely out of this present business. I don't 
 well know what I shall do without the excite- 
 ment of applause. It is a fearful thing for a 
 woman who has nothing but excitement to live 
 on. But I made my bed, and must lie on it." 
 "Christina, my dearest, earliest friend, it 
 grieves my heart to see you so unhappy. Is 
 there nothing that can be done ? Do confide 
 in me. Is there nothing ?" 
 
 "Nothing, oh, nothing," she answered, with 
 
 a sad wan smile. "I have now, oh, thank 
 
 Heaven, a true and warm religion to fill my 
 
 heart. Then, Emanuel, you forgive me all ?" 
 
 "Dear Christina, what is there to forgive?" 
 
 " Yes, yes, there is. I left you for the sake 
 
 of my own career and my own ambition. I 
 
 went forth on my fool's errand and left you, 
 
 and it was long before you recovered wholly, 
 
 and and ceased to think about me." 
 
 "It was indeed." 
 
 "But you are now free again, and happy, 
 and hopeful ; and all the past is sponged out, 
 and I am forgiven ?" 
 
 " Oh, surely, surely ; if you will have it that 
 I have any cause or right " 
 
 " There, that will do. And we are friends ?" 
 "Friends, Christina, forever." 
 She leaned toward me, and kissed me on the 
 forehead. 
 
 "We may not meet again," she said, "ex- 
 cept before many eyes ; and besides," she added, 
 with a wild, sweet smile, "it is no wrong now." 
 With that kiss of peace she left me ; that 
 was the funeral ceremony of a long, long, vain 
 love now dead. 
 
 I went down with her to her brougham. Her 
 German "familiar" was waiting for her, and 
 they drove away. 
 
 She was, then, a Roman Catholic. I after- 
 ward learned that she had been formally so only 
 a few months. I was not sorry for it. I was 
 of no particular creed, and could never ani- 
 mate my mind, though in my blank and lonely 
 years I often tried, into any warm interest in 
 the differences of denominations, and the nar- 
 row theological questions on the solution of 
 which so many good people are content to rest 
 their hopes of heaven. I could never believe 
 in the power of any faith to monopolize the 
 right of granting passports into heaven. Many 
 people, I often thought, seem to liken heaven 
 practically to that famous cave in the "Arabian 
 Nights," the doors of which opened at the ut- 
 
 terance of a few cabalistic words, equally power- 
 ful in their operation whether he who pronounced 
 them understood what he was saying, or com- 
 prehended no syllable of its meaning. But I 
 was glad, somehow, to think of Christina kneel- 
 ing at a Roman Catholic altar. She seemed 
 the kind of being destined specially to be a 
 Roman Catholic. Born to be sustained after 
 every spring of impulse, passionate, warm- 
 hearted, and yet in some sense egotistical 
 and subjective; strong and bold in impulse, 
 yet feeble in purpose, and especially lacking 
 that steadfast, stony patience, which, indeed, 
 is almost exclusively a man's quality that 
 proud, inexorable patience which, even in 
 great natures, as Macaulay truly says, is often 
 mistaken for the patience of stupidity; hers 
 was a nature thoroughly suited to lean for 
 support on the arm of a faith rich in conso- 
 lations for every mood, in appliances to soothe 
 every impatience and strengthen every weak- 
 ness. I could easily understand how that 
 heart, so passionate and loving, yet so fitful 
 and ambitious, warmed toward a faith among 
 the very ceremonials of whose ministry are 
 sympathy and confidence and ready pardon. 
 She, the disappointed wife, the childless mo- 
 ther, the ambitious artist who had won success 
 and found it barren, what was left for her but 
 such ready and sensuous consolations as are 
 found in the religion of Rome ? 
 
 At last I had begun to understand Christina 
 Braun. I have written to little purpose if the 
 reader does not already understand her. She 
 was not the kind of being I had once imagined. 
 Hers was not the clear, strong, self-reliant, self- 
 contained soul I had once believed it. How, 
 indeed, I now asked myself, could I ever have 
 thought so ? Did not a word, a mood, a chance 
 decide almost every successive chapter of her 
 life? Was not strength of sudden impulse 
 shining in those dark and glittering eyes ? 
 was not instability of purpose shown in those 
 fair, soft, tremulous outlines? Vivacity of 
 emotion was indicated in the sensitive lips, 
 weakness of purpose in that rounded cheek 
 and chin. All those years she had been 
 looking for happiness in many paths, and had 
 not found it, because she gave up too soon each 
 place of search and sought anew. She had al- 
 ways been seeking an object in our darkling 
 life, but . had never gazed long or steadfastly 
 enough through the darkness in order that the 
 way and the end might become clear to her. It 
 was natural that she should take to the stage-life 
 and to music music, that most bewitching of 
 delusions, that intoxication of the soul, in which 
 a nature like hers would find all that the Ori- 
 ental finds in his haschez. She had sold her soul 
 to the unreal : they who do so soon find them- 
 selves but shadowless ghosts among the real. 
 
 Easy to understand how Christina Braun 
 could believe herself accomplishing a high des- 
 tiny when first enraptured by the success of a 
 career where the honors follow so quickly on 
 the victory that they are in fact its very echo. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 139 
 
 No success in life is so intoxicating as that of 
 a great prima donna. Think of the patient 
 author laboring for years at some work on 
 which he stakes his fame and his happiness, 
 and the fame never perhaps in his lifetime 
 spreads beyond the appreciation of a few re- 
 views and the admiration of one or two coteries. 
 Think of the inventor wasting away his brains 
 to make perfect some great scheme, which an- 
 other man at the other end of the country may 
 be all the while forestalling, or which may in 
 the end only bring money to' the capitalist who 
 buys it, and whose name it is destined to bear. 
 Think of the gray old soldier, whose terribly- 
 earned honors only come in time to decorate 
 his corpse. And then think of the successful 
 singer adorned with the gifts of emperors, and 
 greeted in turn with the plaudits of eVery civil- 
 ized capital. Who in St. Petersburg cares for 
 the great English savant ? What London aud- 
 ience thrills at the entrance of the Italian poet ? 
 But the great singer goes from state to state, 
 and is the idol and delight of every people she 
 visits, and the fame which precedes and follows 
 her is like the language of the music she inter- 
 prets cosmopolitan and universal. 
 
 But when all this has been tasted, and the 
 delight exhales, what remains for the sated and 
 sickened heart? The joy of the Art itself? 
 Yes, if one has loved the art only, and for the 
 art's sake ; but what remains for one whose joy 
 was only in the intoxication of the false emo- 
 tions and the meretricious successes which the 
 art can be made the instrument to procure ? 
 What earthly reality can sustain and nourish 
 the nature which has lived in the delusion of 
 music and the delusion of fame ? I know of 
 nothing. I thought it but natural that, awak- 
 ened from those delusions, Christina should 
 seek repose in that most fascinating and sublime 
 of all delusions which exhales from the perfumed 
 incense of the Church of Eome. 
 
 Thus I remained for some time, thinking 
 over Christina and the change that had come 
 upon her. For a long time, even before I knew 
 it, the witchery of her influence over me had 
 been fading. Her nature seemed to have been 
 lowered somehow, and unidealized. Some- 
 times, indeed, the old influence awoke again, 
 and her fascination, her ardor, her generous im- 
 pulses quite conquered me ; but if I had been 
 given to self-analysis, I might have found that 
 her influence over me was most powerful when 
 I was not near her. When lately I still be- 
 lieved that I loved her, it was the memory of 
 my own youth and hers that I truly loved. I 
 believe that a man who has been badly wound- 
 ed in a limb, and suffers great agony, and at 
 last has the limb amputated, is long haunted by 
 the echo of the pain, which he now can not real- 
 ly feel any more. And so it was with my feel- 
 ings toward Christina Braun of late. They were 
 the echo of a passionate love and a bitter agony. 
 
 I thought of her so sadly that, for the time, 
 I almost forgot myself and what I had to do, 
 and the letter that lay written on my desk. 
 
 I sealed my letter, and went with it myself to 
 the post. Next evening I received the follow- 
 ing answer : 
 
 " CONNATTGHT PLACE. 
 
 g IR> i do n ot stop to express any surprise 
 at the nature of the proposal contained in your 
 letter. I give it the reply which you appear to 
 anticipate. I utterly decline to give my con- 
 sent to your becoming a suitor to Miss Lilla 
 Lyndon. I do not believe that such a course 
 could possibly conduce to my daughter's happi- 
 ness, of which I still consider myself the most 
 competent judge, and of which, at all events, I 
 am the natural and legal guardian. 
 
 " You are good enough to say that you would 
 accept my daughter without any fortune. This 
 offer probably seems to you magnanimous and 
 romantic. It might possibly impress my daugh- 
 ter in the same way. She is still, as you know, 
 very young. You will allow me, however, as a 
 man of the world, to remark that such an offer, 
 while very easily made, could in no case be fol- 
 lowed by any result. Were I willing to accept 
 your proposal to marry Miss Lilla Lyndon, you 
 will, of course, perceive that common regard 
 for her interest and her happiness would com- 
 pel me to take care that she was provided with 
 such means as I could contribute toward main- 
 taining her in the station to which she has been 
 accustomed. 
 
 "You will perhaps, for the future, see the 
 propriety of withholding attentions which are 
 in every way unwelcome, and of refraining from 
 making proposals which can only meet with 
 emphatic rejection. 
 
 "I have the honor to remain, Sir, your obe- 
 dient servant, 
 
 "GEORGE STAMFORD LYNDON. 
 
 "EMANCEL TEMPLE, Esq." 
 
 I had expected nothing better. I was not 
 surprised. I could not be angry. Having 
 Lilla's love, I could afford to bear the cold re- 
 buffs of Lilla's father. I was not discouraged. 
 It would not in any case be long until Lilla 
 came of age and could do as she pleased ; and 
 if her love for me could stand the test of that 
 delay as I now fully believed it could no 
 power on earth should prevent me from making 
 her my wife. 
 
 I wrote to Lilla, telling her what I had done, 
 and the purport of her father's answer, but soft- 
 ening as far as I could the tone and temper of 
 it. I wrote full of love and confidence ; bade 
 her wait but a little, and all would be well; 
 pledged her my earnest, unalterable affection, 
 and my full faith in hers. In the conviction of 
 her love I seemed to myself to move in an at- 
 mosphere of purple and rose-color. 
 
 Days and days passed away, and I received 
 no answer. I grew restless, but hardly uneasy. 
 She doubtless found it difficult to write ; per- 
 haps she was not willing even to pen a few clan- 
 destine lines, but preferred nobly and patiently 
 to wait. I did not for a moment doubt of her 
 love, or fear lest she might have repented, or 
 
140 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 drawn back, or been talked into acquiescence 
 with her father's wishes. 
 
 Suddenly I heard a rumor which startled me, 
 and which gradually deepened into certainty. 
 
 Lilla Lyndon had been brought by her fa- 
 ther from Westmoreland to his country seat in 
 Leicestershire. The very first day of her re- 
 moval there she left his house ; she came to 
 London by the train, and thence disappeared, 
 no one could tell whither. 
 
 I had a stormy interview with Mr. Lyndon, 
 who came, excited and furious, to my lodgings. 
 I could tell him nothing ; and I am bound to 
 say he came rather to denounce me as the orig- 
 inal cause of the disunion in his family than 
 out of any suspicion that Lilla's flight had been 
 concerted between her and me. He knew his 
 .daughter too well to suspect any thing of the 
 kind. He could only suppose that she had fled 
 to take refuge in the bosom of some wild and 
 romantic school-friend, who would regard the 
 whole thing as a delightful chapter of romance 
 in real life. He had gone or written or sent to 
 every one he could think of, and he was wait- 
 ing in agony of expectancy to hear of her ar- 
 rival somewhere. 
 
 Characteristically, he never thought of yield- 
 ing to her love. 
 
 , "I can not be civil to you, Sir," he said, as 
 he left me. ' * There was happiness in my house 
 until, in a cursed hour, you saw my foolish 
 daughter. I will take good care when she 
 comes back that you never see her again until 
 she has recovered her senses." 
 
 "You have driven your daughter from your 
 house," I answered, " and you know it in your 
 heart. You can never change my feelings or 
 hers." 
 
 "Then you still mean to pursue this foolish, 
 romantic girl this this child, Sir ?" he asked, 
 with a scowl. 
 
 "Until Lilla Lyndon herself asks me to re- 
 lease her from such engagement as we have 
 made," I said, "I shall never change." 
 
 Characteristically, too, he never thought of 
 his poor relations in Paris. He had ransacked 
 his brain not to omit one of the families and 
 friends Lilla might have sought refuge with; 
 but they were all West End people with coun- 
 try houses. His suspicions principally turned 
 to two old school-fellows of Lilla's lately mar- 
 ried ; one in Scotland, one in Florence. Nay, 
 he even thought of the maid who had lost her 
 place for being too faithful to Lilla, and he had 
 had her hunted up to no purpose. It was quite 
 possible, he thought, that a romantic and head- 
 strong young lady might take refuge in the fam- 
 ily of a favorite servant. That would be like 
 something in a novel, and, after all, would not 
 be quite unladylike ; the lady and the servant 
 would still hold their relative places. It never 
 occurred to him as possible that his daughter 
 could condescend to fly for shelter and expose 
 her family quarrels to a pair of poor relations 
 who now taught a school and had lately let 
 lodgings. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 A YEAR'S TRIAL. 
 
 I HAD thought of the poor relations very soon. 
 Nothing seemed to me more probable than that 
 Lilla, having resolved to leave her father's 
 house, would go to the lately-found relatives to 
 whom she had been kind, and who had known 
 me, rather than to any of the friends of her fa- 
 ther. 
 
 I \vas hardly surprised when, the very day 
 after I had seen Mr. Lyndon, I received a let- 
 ter addressed in a woman's hand which I knew 
 the hand of Lilla, the elder Lilla, Lyndon. 
 This was what it contained : 
 
 "My DEAR OLD EMANTJEL, Do you know 
 whom we have got with us, sheltered here a 
 little dear white pigeon not at all trembling 
 or weak though, but full of pluck ? My cousin 
 Lilla. She is the sweetest girl I ever knew, and 
 so fresh arid green that I feel like her mother. 
 
 "Now you know why she is here. My uncle 
 worried her to death with his pompous old non- 
 sense. But you know that, after all, she must 
 go back to him or come to some terms ; and 
 perhaps her plucky conduct this time may con- 
 vince him that she is not a silly little child. I 
 can tell you she has a spirit which rather amazed 
 me. 
 
 "Well, I have written to her father; of 
 course I must, you know. Mamma would have 
 it so, and, indeed, I knew it must be done. But 
 this goes to you by the same post. I made up 
 my mind not to give the flinty-hearted parent 
 any advantage that he is not entitled to ; and 
 if I were you, and you are really the true and 
 firm Emanuel I knew, then I think you had 
 better I have confused this sentence, but no 
 matter come over here and have it out with 
 him. She is worth making a fight for ; and if 
 I were a man, and such a girl were good enough 
 to bestow a thought on me, I should like to see 
 the father, mother, or grandmother that could 
 get her away from me. 
 
 " I have written this in nonsensical style, but 
 you won't mind. I am heart and soul with her 
 and you. 
 
 " Always your friend, dear Emanuel, 
 
 " LILLA LYNDON." 
 
 Of course I crossed the Channel at once. 
 There was, I found, a steamer for Dieppe from 
 Newhaven leaving rather earlier than the Do- 
 ver mail-boat. I chose it for two reasons: 
 first, there was the less delay, and it was some- 
 thing to be on the move ; next, there was the 
 less chance of my finding myself a fellow-passen- 
 ger of Mr. Lyndon. 
 
 When I got into Paris it was not yet seven 
 o'clock in the morning. I went to one of the 
 hotels in the Rue de Rivoli, bathed and dressed, 
 and went through some attempt at breakfast, 
 and 1 then started to walk through the Champs 
 Elysees and by the Elysee Palace to that part 
 of the Faubourg St. Honore where the Lyndons 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 141 
 
 lived. I calculated that I should reach it by 
 nine o'clock, which seemed as early as I could 
 possibly venture to present myself. 
 
 It was Sunday morning, and already the 
 place was flooded with holiday-makers. 
 
 Somewhere by one of the great ministerial 
 offices near the Kue Eoyale I felt a hand laid 
 firmly on my arm, and looking round I saw the 
 black, peering eyes of my hated acquaintance, 
 Stephen Lyndon, fixed on me. He was dressed 
 quite in French fashion, and looked thoroughly 
 like a Frenchman. 
 
 What an interruption ! What a delay ! 
 
 At first I began to think that he really had 
 gone mad ; for he talked loudly in French to 
 me, rejoiced to see me in town, asked when I 
 had come back from Russia, and other such 
 nonsense, meanwhile keeping his arm firmly in 
 mine, and walking by my side with his head as 
 high in air as he could manage to raise it. At 
 last, when we got to a quiet spot in the Champs 
 Elysees under 'a clump of trees, where by some 
 chance there then was a deserted space around 
 us, he dropped his jabber and began : 
 
 " So you are in this business too, you most 
 deluded Temple ! Go back again, if you have 
 an ounce of brains in your head ! Look here, 
 Temple ; I told you lately I had come rather to 
 like you, that is, not absolutely to detest you. 
 Now I give you the greatest possible proof of 
 my friendship. I doubt if Damon would have 
 done as much for Pythias I do, on my soul ! 
 Leave Paris by the next train ; and laugh at 
 the fools who brought you here.' They won't 
 echo the laugh, I promise you." 
 
 " I don't know what you mean ; and I am in 
 no humor for foolery." 
 
 " Are you not ? To see you here one would 
 not think so. But the affectation of innocence 
 is lost on me, Temple. Man, I know all about 
 it ; I know who are here ; I know Goodboy is 
 coming ; I know they are duping him too, and 
 not giving the old idiot the faintest notion of 
 what they are at ! But here he is, thank God ! 
 The dies irce has come, Temple ; and I shall 
 give a few of my enemies something. But of 
 all men else, I had avoided thee, Temple ! 
 How on earth they got you into this, or what 
 possible use they thought they coujd make of 
 you, I can't for the life of me imagine. But 
 get back. Vade retro! Take my advice. I 
 had always a genius for advising others. Leave 
 Paris. Don't be found here to-night. A nod 
 is as good as a wink, you know ! Adieu ; and 
 remember, if you are concerned hereafter in 
 writing my biography, that once in my life I 
 did a good turn when I had positively nothing 
 to gain by it!" 
 
 He withdrew his hand from my arm, became 
 a Frenchman again, saluted me in Parisian 
 style, and turned back in the direction whence 
 he had come. 
 
 Another time I dare say I should have dis- 
 cerned quickly enough a gleam of meaning in 
 his words. But now I was so glad to find I 
 had really got rid of him without loss of time, 
 
 and that he evidently knew nothing of what 
 had brought me to Paris, that no other impres- 
 sion whatever was left upon my mind. 
 
 Not far from the Palace of the Elyse'e, in a 
 little avenue running at right angles with the 
 street of the Faubourg St. Honore, was the old- 
 fashioned house, with a small court, in which 
 the lady who had entered into a sort of combi- 
 nation with Lilla Lyndon the elder kept her 
 modest school for the education of French and 
 English demoiselles. A carriage was at the 
 door when I came up, and I assumed that Mr. 
 Lyndon had forestalled me. 
 
 Yes, Mademoiselle Lyndon was at home, the 
 concierge told me ; and the bell for mademoi- 
 selle's apartment was rung. 
 
 In a moment my old friend came running 
 down, looking very plump and healthy, her 
 dark eyes sparkling with excitement. 
 
 " Oh, you dear old Emanuel!" exclaimed 
 this impetuous young lady, and she kissed me 
 twice before I had time to speak. "You are 
 just in time! Haven't you been creating a 
 pretty disturbance in a well-regulated family! 
 Come on ; no time to be lost." 
 
 She led me up stairs ; then into a small dark 
 room with floor gleaming in wax ; then opened 
 a pair of folding-doors which divided us from a 
 larger room ; led me into this, and announced, 
 "Mr. Temple." 
 
 This room was brighter than the other, and 
 had windows opening upon a little garden where 
 there were vines. A sofa was near the win- 
 dow, and there Lilla Lyndon my Lilla was 
 seated, looking pale and distressed, but very 
 beautiful, and calm, and resolute. 
 
 She was dressed in some dark color, very 
 plainly ; she always dressed plainly, and looked 
 for that very reason all the more remarkable in 
 her beauty. The most careless glance must 
 have seen that her face was of exquisite shape ; 
 that her complexion was singularly pure, trans- 
 parent, colorless. H.er habitual expression of 
 something akin to melancholy gave the greater 
 charm to the sudden flashes of bright happiness 
 which were called up with ease by any glad- 
 some thought or word,. and which lighted her 
 face like that of a joyous child. This moment, 
 as I saw her first, she looked wholly sad. One 
 of her hands held a vine leaf, which she had 
 plucked from the stems that trailed in through 
 the open window. 
 
 I saw in an instant her face pass through its 
 most sudden and beautiful change. When I 
 looked on her first her eyes were downcast, and 
 she was, as I have said, all melancholy and 
 pale. Her eyes flashed light on me when my 
 name was spoken, and something like a color 
 came into her cheek. 
 
 On a chair close to the sofa sat her father. 
 He had had her other hand in his ; he dropped 
 it suddenly and sharply when I came in, and 
 wheeled round to confront me, and his face 
 flushed a deeper tint, and his teeth clicked to- 
 gether at the sight of me. 
 
 Standing at a little distance, and looking 
 
142 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 wretchedly alarmed and uncomfortable, was my 
 old landlady, Mrs. Lyndon. I am bound to 
 say that her expression of countenance seemed 
 to ask me if I didn't think things were bad 
 enough already, without thus coming to com- 
 plicate them. 
 
 A mirror was over the chimney-piece straight 
 before me, and in it I could see the face of the 
 elder Lilla, who had introduced me. She 
 looked quite delighted and triumphant. Her 
 very curls spoke saucy triumph. 
 
 "Lilla," said her uncle, in his harsh, cold 
 voice, "this is not fair; I did not expect 
 this." 
 
 "Oh, Lilla, my dear! Good gracious!" 
 murmured Mrs. Lyndon. 
 
 Meanwhile I crossed the room and approach- 
 ed my Lilla. Her father made a gesture as 
 if he would interpose, but controlled himself. 
 Lilla gave me her hand without speaking. I 
 kissed it. Her eyes met mine fearlessly, and 
 they told me of a generous confiding love, for 
 one glance of which a man might be glad to 
 die. When she gave her hand to me she 
 dropped the vine leaf she had plucked. I took 
 up the leaf and kept it. 
 
 All this, of course, occupied not an instant 
 of time, 
 i Then Mr. Lyndon addressed me. 
 
 "Mr. Temple, I certainly did not expect to 
 see you here to-day. I do not see what right 
 you had to come no, pray excuse me for one 
 moment. A man in my position might natu- 
 rally and properly decline to see you, or permit 
 your interference in any way, where you cer- 
 tainly have in fact no well, no ah locus 
 standi. But I have a great objection to scenes 
 of all sorts in private life, and we are not now 
 rehearsing Lucia di Lammermoor; therefore, to 
 save argument and scenes, and all that, I con- 
 sent to admit you for the time to this agreeable 
 family conference. Well, then, Mr. Temple, I 
 have come to take home my daughter. I sup- 
 pose I have a right to do so ? Have you, who 
 honor me by showing such an interest in my 
 affairs, any objection to urge ?" 
 
 All this was said, of course, in a tone of cold 
 grating sarcasm, intended to offend, and yet to 
 stop short of being directly offensive. I was 
 certainly not in the least likely to heed his tone 
 or manner. Why should I ? Had not Lilla's 
 silent face told me enough ? 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Lyndon, I have an objection to 
 urge." 
 
 "Ha, indeed! I propose to take home my 
 daughter, who is a minor ; and you, who are 
 an entire stranger, have an objection to urge. 
 Hum, the objection?" 
 
 "That I am not certain whether Miss Lyn- 
 don is satisfied to go." 
 
 "I am not satisfied to go," Lilla said. 
 
 These were the first words she had spoken. 
 They were pronounced in a low, sweet, melan- 
 choly tone. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon frowned and bit his lip. An 
 explosion would evidently have relieved him 
 
 immensely ; but he seemed to have .made up 
 his mind not to explode. 
 
 "Why not, Lilla?" he asked. "You used 
 to love your home." 
 
 " I never loved my home much, papa ; but I 
 loved you very much, and I do still, and I al- 
 ways will, if you will let me. But I have been 
 very miserable lately, and I do not wish to go 
 back on the conditions you have spoken of. I 
 don't think we could be happy together. I 
 know I could not be happy." 
 
 "What childish folly! Why can we not 
 live as happily as before ?" 
 
 " Oh, papa," she said, with a faint crimson 
 now even on her forehead, and tears in her 
 eyes, "I have told you already; I have told 
 you many times ; and here to-day, even before 
 my aunt and my cousin, I will tell you again, 
 if you like. I am not ashamed, no, not in the 
 least ; but you might spare me. You know the 
 reason." 
 
 "In other words, Mr. Temple, my daughter 
 admits that you have enticed her into a clan- 
 destine engagement." 
 
 "I do not, papa; I could not admit any 
 thing of the kind, for it would not be true. 
 There is no clandestine engagement. Mr. Tem- 
 ple has never enticed me into any thing. He 
 has held back from me, he has avoided me, like 
 a man of honor, like a gentleman. But you 
 ask me to promise never to see him again. 
 I will not promise that; I can not promise 
 it." 
 
 "He offered to promise as much the other 
 day," Mr. Lyndon said. "Be offered it, for his 
 part." 
 
 "I did, Mr. Lyndon, because I was willing 
 to make any sacrifice whatever of my own feel- 
 ings for Miss Lyndon's sake. I would have 
 done any thing, promised any thing, and kept 
 my promise, that you and she might not be 
 brought into disunion through me. But I did 
 not then know Oh, forgive me, Lilla, if I speak 
 too plainly I did not then feel sure that your 
 daughter's feelings toward me were as deep and 
 lasting as I now believe they are. Providence 
 threw us together, and I learned my own hap- 
 piness. I will not give it up for any considera- 
 tion upon earth. Miss Lyndon honors me with 
 her affection ; that gives me a claim and a right 
 beyond any thing any other living being can 
 have. No power under heaven shall induce 
 me to resign it." 
 
 Mr. Lyndon's eyes flashed fire. I must say 
 that all this time he was a marvel of self-con- 
 trol and of good-breeding good-breeding cov- 
 ering a bitter anger. 
 
 "Mr. Temple, I believe you consider that 
 you owe me some ill-will for having slighted 
 you once or twice. If that is so, even you must 
 admit that you see me in a position of sufficient 
 humiliation, brought about by your means, to 
 atone for all wrongs. Now let me speak plainly 
 to you, and let this extraordinary conference, 
 which I certainly never invited, have some 
 practical conclusion. You come here, I as- 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 143 
 
 sume, to offer yourself as a husband for my 
 daughter ?" 
 
 I bowed my head. 
 
 " Then, so far as I am concerned, I absolute- 
 ly, and for the second I hope the last time, 
 refuse my consent'. If my daughter chooses 
 you, she- loses me." 
 
 "Oh, uncle, for shame!" broke in the elder 
 Lilla. 
 
 "Lilla, my dear! Lilla, my own child!" re- 
 monstrated her mother. 
 
 " Stuff, mamma ! it is a shame." 
 
 Mr. Lyndon looked at her silently for a mo- 
 ment. I am compelled to say that his niece in 
 no way flinched. He turned away, giving her 
 up apparently as hopeless, and went on : 
 
 " Now that is my decision ; and I distinctly 
 say it is not to be altered. Of course I can not 
 control my daughter's actions after she comes 
 of age ; and in real life the days of coercing 
 young women and locking them up in towers 
 have passed away. My daughter must choose. 
 I don't know whether Mr. Temple considers it 
 the best way of proving his chivalrous affection 
 for my daughter to induce her to separate her- 
 self from her family, and give up her father and 
 her place in society." 
 
 "Papa, I have told you that Mr. Temple 
 never did endeavor to induce me. I endeav- 
 ored to induce him. He kept back because he 
 was only too considerate for me. Please don't 
 pain me uselessly by speaking in such a manner 
 of him : it pains me ; and indeed, indeed it is 
 useless; it can not change me." 
 
 "My daughter thinks more of Mr. Temple's 
 feelings than she does of her father's." 
 
 "No, papa. Mr. Temple has never said a 
 word of you which was unkind. It is ungen- 
 erous of you to speak so of him. You know he 
 will not resent it, or defend himself." 
 
 Lyndon looked at his daughter with eyes of 
 positive wonder. Such demonstrations on her 
 part were perfectly new to him. I thought 
 there was, with all his anger, a certain expres- 
 sion of admiration in his face. He leaned his 
 chin upon his hands, and his hands upon the 
 head of his cane, and looked at her quietly, 
 contemplatively. 
 
 "Lilla, my dear," he said, after a moment's 
 pause, " you are a generous child. Before you 
 decide, you ought at least to know all. You 
 are not, I believe, the first of our family whom 
 Mr. Temple has honored with his affection : 
 you are not even the first Lilla Lyndon." 
 
 Lilla turned h#r eyes on me with an expres- 
 sion which only seemed to say, " This is a mis- 
 take, is it not?" I think my looks replied. 
 
 "I believe Mr. Temple was once engaged to 
 my niece yonder?" 
 
 "Never, uncle; never in his life," calmly 
 replied Lilla the elder. "Mr. Temple never 
 spoke a word of love to me, nor I to him. He 
 was no more engaged to me than to mamma." 
 
 "Oh, Lilly dear!" interposed her mother, 
 shocked at the apparent levity of the compari- 
 
 " But you gave me to understand you did 
 yourself " said Lyndon, wheeling round and 
 sternly confronting his niece. 
 
 "A pious fraud, uncle," replied the young 
 lady y quite unabashed. "And not so much of 
 a fraud either, for it was rather implied than 
 expressed." 
 
 "A deceit, then, was practiced on me for 
 what purpose ?" 
 
 " A sort of deceit ; but Mr. Temple had no- 
 thing to do with it ; never heard of it until it 
 was done, and then was horribly ashamed and 
 amazed. I had no reason to be flattered, I 
 can tell you ; and I was very sorry for it, be- 
 cause the purpose a stupid idea of mine, uncle, 
 to get your interest and influence wholly failed. 
 I had my shame for my pains, that's all." 
 
 "Perhaps it was also by some delusion or 
 deception of the kind that I have been led to 
 believe Mr. Temple was engaged to another 
 lady at one time a lady whom I know a lady, 
 in fact, who belongs to his own profession/' 
 Mr. Lyndon was now growing very intense in 
 his manner, and he kept his lips closely to- 
 gether. "I don't care to mention the lady's 
 name ; but Mr. Temple will hardly say he does 
 not know whom I mean." 
 
 "I know perfectly well, Mr. Lyndon." 
 
 "I believe I am not wrong in saying that 
 you endeavored to induce that lady to marry 
 you?" 
 
 "You are not wrong." 
 
 A flush of triumph came into Mr. Lyndon's 
 face, and he looked eagerly round at his daugh- 
 ter. She had been listening with an expression 
 of quiet, confident, half-smiling contempt to all 
 this cross-examination, and when the final ques- 
 tion cameshe glanced up toward me as before. 
 When I gave my answer the color rushed to 
 her* cheeks, and a hurt and startled expression 
 came over her. She half rose from the sofa, 
 and an exclamation of surprise and pain broke 
 from her. 
 
 "Habet!" observed Mr. Lyndon, in a quiet 
 under-tone. 
 
 Lilla the elder raised her eyebrows in won- 
 der. 
 
 "You are not wrong, Mr. Lyndon," I said 
 quite calmly ; and then I turned to his daugh- 
 ter. "Listen, Lilla ; you have a right to a full 
 explanation, and there is nothing for me to be 
 ashamed of, or for you to condemn. If there 
 was, I should not now be here. Lilla, some 
 dozen years ago, when I was hardly more than 
 a boy, I loved the woman your father speaks 
 of. She was then a poor girl ; I loved her dear- 
 ly ; we thought to have been married ; but we 
 were both poor, and she looked for some bright- 
 er career than I could give her; and I don't 
 blame her. She left me, and for ten years I 
 never even saw her. I loved her passionately 
 all that time ; I wasted the remainder of my 
 youth and much of my manhood in fruitless 
 love for her. When at last we met again she 
 was married. I think, or I then thought, that 
 I loved her still at least I loved her memory. 
 
144 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 I saw you, Lilla and I came to know, not all I "Lilla my dearest Lilla my love " I sai( 
 
 at once, but gradually and surely, that I loved "you have heard your father's decision- he 
 
 her no more. I loved you. That is the whole says he will not change." 
 
 story, as true as light. Twelve years ago, when She looked up with a faint sad smile and 
 
 you were a little child, I loved that woman, said in a low firm voice : 
 
 She is still my dear friend, and always, please "Nor I, unless you bid me.' 
 
 God, shall be. I love you now better than all " That I never, never wili ; but I will not 
 
 the world better than memory, or youth, or allow you to sacrifice yourself for me for it 
 
 hope, or, I believe, than Heaven !" will be a sacrifice, Lilla without full and long 
 
 Tears were in Lilla's eyes. She made no consideration. You are very young dearest 
 answer, but quietly, confidently put her small you are only twenty years old to me almost a 
 white tender hand in mine, and with the light- child you do not perhaps even yet know what 
 est, faintest, dearest pressure of faith and affec- you are doing. Your father loves you even 
 tion told me I was believed and loved. now when he seems most angry with' you 
 
 Mr. Lyndon's shot had wholly missed ; in Let us think of him too ; go back with your 
 fact his piece had burst, and wounded him with ' fa****** i. " 
 the splinters. He soon recovered himself, how- 
 
 ever, and he never failed to remember that he 
 was a gentleman. 
 
 father, my love. 
 
 She started, and so did he. 
 "Oh, don't think I ask you to give me up- 
 I am not capable of such a sacrifice. But I do 
 
 "Well," he said, " I am sure there is nothing ask you, Lilla, to wait ; to go home with your 
 to Mr. Temple's discredit in what he has told father, to be his daughter again until you are 
 us. He has no reason apparently to complain of age and can rightfully decide for yourself, 
 of my having brought out this explanation. Live with him, and do not even see me in the 
 He will of course understand my natural anx- mean time, if he exacts that condition. Dear 
 iety to see that, if my daughter chooses to make Lilla, it will be a bitter condition to me to ful- 
 what I consider an utterly unsuitable marriage, fill, if he demands it ; but I will fulfill it, and 
 it is at least with somebody whose protestations you will be guided by me, and fulfill it too. 
 of affection are likely to be sincere. I think, And then when that time is out, I will come to 
 however, we have had quite enough of discus- you openly, and under your father's eyes, if he 
 sion now, and had better bring this very singu- will, and ask you to be my wife ; and if you 
 lar conference to an end. I have made up. are still of the same mind as now, I will accept 
 my mind, and have mentioned my decision, your sacrifice without scruple, and recognize 
 From that I shall not depart. If my daughter no right under heaven to interpose between 
 chooses you, Mr. Temple, she has done with you and me. Let us do this, my dearest, and 
 me. That being so, I ask you, Sir, what you I shall then have no fear that I have taken ad- 
 propose to do ?" vantage of the tenderness of a young heart, and 
 
 "First, to speak for a few minutes with beguiled you into a sacrifice." 
 Miss Lyndon alone." Lilla's hand clung to mine all the closer. 
 
 "That you shall not, by God!" exclaimed Her father said : 
 Mr. Lyndon, losing for the first time his self- " Mr. Temple, I can not help saying that 
 control and the hard iciness of his manner, your proposal seems that of a man of honor. 
 " Never, while she is under any control of and and, in fact, of a of a gentleman. I 
 mine. Too much of that already ; but for do not attempt to induce my daughter to ac- 
 that, we never should have been brought to cept it ; I fear my influence now would be of 
 this outrageous state of things. No, Sir, if little avail. It is only fair to you to say that 
 you have any thing to say to my daughter, it there is not the slightest chance of my views 
 must be said in her father's presence, or not at with regard to your proposal undergoing anv 
 all. She is still my daughter." change in the mean time. But I promise you 
 
 Then in your presence, Mr. Lyndon, if you that no pressure shall be brought to bear upon 
 please. I desire to take no advantage even of Lilla, either by me or my other daughters, to 
 you ; you shall hear every word." distress her in any way. The subject shall, if 
 
 He frowned and assented. she wishes, never be alluded to. I would ask 
 
 Lilla the elder and her mother quietly left you, perhaps, in the interval, occasionally to 
 the room and closed the folding-doors behind honor me with your company at my house ; 
 them. Mr. Lyndon stood up ; his daughter yet, all things considered" , 
 remained seated on the sofa, pale still, with) " Spare yourself any such consideration, Mr. 
 
 say 
 
 tears in her eyes, but undismayed. 
 
 " Now, Sir," Mr. Lyndon said, harshly, 
 what you will ; and to the point, please." 
 
 He took out his watch and glanced at it. 
 
 I sat beside Lilla and took her hand. He 
 chafed, and looked for an instant as if he 
 would have interfered ; but he again con- 
 
 Lyndon; I could not accept your invitation." 
 
 Then I turned to Lilla and pleaded my ar- 
 guments against myself, against my own heart, 
 once more. Heaven knows what it cost me to 
 plead for that year of separation and silence. 
 Heaven knows the agony of the pang that oc- 
 casionally shot through me as I thought of the 
 
 trolled himself, and shrugged his shoulders as possibility that a year of severance might 
 one who would say, " Better let this fooling change the heart of even a girl so loving and 
 have its way; it must finish soon." I noble as Lilla, who, after all, was yet in the 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 145 
 
 light sunshine of her twentieth summer. 'But 
 I ordered my soul and hers to bear it. Be- 
 lieving that for her sake for her, who was so 
 young and trustful and innocent it was but 
 right and just, I stamped my selfish emotions 
 under my feet, and pleaded for my own sen- 
 tence of banishment. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon meanwhile looked on with a 
 queer, puzzled, half-humorous expression. I 
 believe in his heart he thought for a while that 
 I was trying a mere coup de theatre, making a 
 grand display of self-sacrifice, in the hope that 
 he might start up, as the father in a well-con- 
 structed domestic drama would naturally be 
 expected to do, declare that he was not to be 
 conquered in generosity, and place his daugh- 
 ter's hand in mine. He was, as I have already 
 mentioned, a quiet, interested, admiring student 
 of the selfishnesses and frauds of human nature. 
 He studied them and delighted in them as a 
 naturalist does in watching the habits of some 
 kind of insect ; and he believed he had dis- 
 covered the secret spring of all the impulses 
 of man and woman. I had reason to know 
 that the very women at whose skirts he ostent- 
 atiously hung, and on whom he spent his money, 
 he thus studied as if they were rabbits or bees, 
 and smiled to himself whenever he found, or 
 thought he found, some new little meanness. 
 He therefore listened with an expression of 
 whimsical interest while I pleaded with Lilla, 
 and the corner of his mouth played with a quiet 
 humor, as if he smiled in anticipation over the 
 certain failure of this my melodramatic artifice. 
 I saw the look, I understood it, and I despised 
 him. 
 
 ".Now then, Lilla," he said at last, "your 
 decision, my dear?" 
 
 "/know it already," I said. 
 
 " I will go with papa," Lilla murmured. 
 
 Mr. Lyndon smiled a triumphant smile. 
 
 "And I will do as you tell me, Emanuel, 
 because I believe in you, and because you ask 
 me in the name of your own feelings and your 
 own sense of honor. You shall be satisfied 
 that I have not acted like a child. Let us 
 wait ; it will not be very long, and then we 
 can have nothing to repent. You will not 
 change, Emanuel." 
 
 "No, by Heaven not I r 
 
 "And for me if you doubt me oh, wait 
 and see. You have talked of a sacrifice. 
 This is the sacrifice, and I agree to it for your 
 sake. Papa, you have not understood Mr. 
 Temple. If he were to ask me this moment 
 yes, this moment I would leave all on earth 
 to go to him and be his wife, and be happy, or 
 suffer, or die with him. He asks me to wait ; 
 and I do so for his sake, and because he asks 
 me, and I too wish to show and prove to all the 
 world that he is what / know him to be. For 
 a year, then, Emanuel, good-by. Let us not 
 see each other any more until that time, that 
 long time, is out. Then come to me. You 
 will find me unchanged or dead. Papa, you 
 lose your daughter either way." 
 K 
 
 She was rising with a proud, firm air. But 
 her soul was stronger than her frame, and she 
 pressed her hand to her forehead, gave a deep- 
 drawn sigh, and fainted. 
 
 I caught her and held her in my arms. Her 
 father made a step forward ; but I peremptorily 
 signed to him to keep back. I would, if needs 
 were, at that moment have held him back with 
 one arm, while I sustained her with the other. 
 Then, after one long, sad, delightful, madden- 
 ing moment, during which I kissed her lips, 
 her cheek, her forehead, her eyes, I laid her 
 softly on the pillow of the sofa, whereon she 
 had been about to fall when I caught her ; and 
 I said to Mr. Lyndon : 
 
 "She will revive in a moment : and she will 
 go with you, Sir. Be kind to her." 
 
 "Damn it, Sir !" he said, angrily ; "I know 
 how to take care of my own daughter. She 
 always loved me and obeyed me until now." 
 
 So I left the father and the daughter. 
 
 I glanced back as I passed through the fold- 
 ing-doors, and saw that he was bending ten- 
 derly over her, and touching her hair with 
 hands that trembled and looked hot ; and I 
 do believe that I saw a tear fall from his eyes. 
 The cynical student of human nature had found 
 out a new weakness in himself! Make him 
 laugh at that ! 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 DANGER-SIGNALS. 
 
 AN hour after, I was walking alone through 
 one of the alleys of the Champs Elysees. 
 
 I had waited but a few moments with Mrs. 
 Lyndon and her daughter, long enough to hear 
 that things were going rather prosperously with 
 them ; that Mrs. Lyndon hated Paris, and the 
 Parisian way of cutting steaks and chops and 
 joints ; that they had sometimes seen Ned 
 Lambert, "as a friend," Lilla said; and that 
 he was still constant, patient, hopeful. I was 
 glad to learn that Lilla knew nothing of her 
 father's whereabouts her father, whom I had 
 seen that morning within a quarter of a mile 
 of her house ! and I put in many words for 
 Ned Lambert, and against her resolution of 
 delay. She shook her head sadly, but deci- 
 sively. 
 
 " You have to wait," she said; "why not 
 we ? If a woman is worth having, Emanuel, 
 she is worth waiting for. I will never marry, 
 never, while that wretched man lives, or until 
 I know that he is reclaimed., and decent enough, 
 at all events, not to bring open shame on my 
 husband. If Edward Lambert is like me, he 
 will wait. If not, Emanuel, then would it not 
 be better we never became any thing more to 
 each other?" 
 
 "Ned will wait, never fear." 
 
 " Oh yes, Ned will wait" and a tear flashed 
 up in her bright eye. "There never was a 
 heart more true and tender than his dear old 
 Ned, dear old Ned !" 
 
146 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 My poor friend's own heart had greatly ex 
 panded since I first saw her. She was a sad 
 der and a more loving woman now than I ha 
 ever known her. My pretty pagan was be 
 coming thoroughly Christianized. The sou 
 was entering the body of the hardly-entreated 
 world-seared Undine of the Thames. 
 
 Thinking over this, even amidst the bewil 
 tiering pressure of my own thoughts, I walkec 
 slowly through the Champs Elysees. I was t( 
 leave Paris that night ; to travel again by Dieppe 
 lest I should obtrude myself on Mr. Lyndon 
 and I had yet some weary hours to while away 
 Despite my parting from Lilla despite tin 
 year of probation, fraught with such various 
 possibilities, that lay before me the pervad 
 ing sensation of my soul was made up of pride 
 and happiness. I had something to love, I hac 
 something to live for I was loved. Out of the 
 dullness and arid darkness of my commonplace 
 purposeless existence a light of heaven hac 
 come down to me. I had no longer any doubt 
 of the depth of Lilla Lyndon's affection. I be- 
 lieved without shadow of distrust in the im- 
 mortal strength of her love, and I seemed as 
 if henceforth I walked with a pillar of light to 
 guide my way. Wait for a year ! why, I had 
 waited for ten years and more, in vain, and I 
 would have accounted it no sacrifice, if the 
 time had but accomplished the object. If the 
 younger love for Christina had been more fe- 
 verish and burning, it had never had the deep 
 sweet abiding faith I felt in the soul and the 
 nffection of Lilla Lyndon. The first glance 
 she ever turned on me was like a ray of sacred 
 moonlight to one who has lain down wearied 
 in a sandy desert. In her I found the woman 
 who is all truth and simplicity ; who has char- 
 acter, but no self. How such a being ever 
 came to love me, I never could understand I 
 can not now understand ; but it always seemed 
 to me that her love was a consecration which 
 pledged me to all good and generous impulses, 
 and bade selfishness, and evil passion, and dis- 
 trust, be gone forever. A year only a year ! 
 and the deep faith and sanctity and heavenly 
 guardianship of her love the while. A year 
 and, after all, I am yet young ! it shall be a 
 year of earnest work and improvement, and 
 preparation for the future, which now at last 
 looks so clear and bright. 
 
 Prose in life always mingles with our poetry. 
 I was already turning over practical plans for 
 our future ; plans into which questions of in- 
 come largely entered. I had a year to work 
 in, and during that interval I hoped to make 
 a little money, and then to give up the stage. 
 In every way the concert-room suited me bet- 
 ter and pleased me better; and I thought I 
 could thus lead a far quieter and happier life 
 with Lilla. 
 
 Thinking over these things, I sauntered 
 through the Camps Elysees, where now it be- 
 came hardly possible to find a quiet spot. The 
 Sunday-enjoying people were all out; the men 
 with their wives, and mothers, and little chil- 
 
 dren', the husbands generally attending more 
 to the children than the wives did ; the ouvrier 
 and his amie,- the voitures de remise full of pleas- 
 ant parties going off to the Bois although the 
 Bois of the year I speak of was very different 
 indeed from that of 1869 ; the soldiers loung- 
 ing and smoking ; the queer riders looking so 
 very much as if they had hired their horses for 
 the first time that very day, and did not well 
 know what to do with them. 
 
 I sat at a table of one of the open cafe's and 
 looked at the scene. I was thirsty, and ordered 
 some wine ; drank it, and smoked a cigar, and 
 fell thinking. 
 
 A man passed by once or twice, and surveyed 
 me curiously. At last he came and took a seat 
 at a table near me, and still eyed me attentively. 
 I knew he was looking at me, even when I did 
 not see him ; so I looked up at last, and stud- 
 ied his features. Yes, I must know him ; I 
 had certainly seen him before somewhere. 
 
 But where ? 
 
 He was evidently an Italian or Spaniard 
 an Italian more likely. He was low and stout, 
 with a thick black beard cut closely round his 
 ? ace, and he had a strange restless, suspicious, 
 turning, wolf-like eye, unpleasant to see, al- 
 though the general expression of his face was 
 otherwise honest and manly enough. 
 
 Yes, I know that man ; at least I have seen 
 lim before ; that is not a man to quarrel with ; 
 that is a man to do any thing. For a certain 
 class of conspirator, now 
 
 Ah ! there it is ! that is the man ! The en- 
 <oy who found Salaris in Westmoreland, and 
 ook him away ! 
 
 Then there came a very rush of half-forgot- 
 
 en things to my mind. My own concerns had 
 
 made me forget them. The words which Ste- 
 
 hen Lyndon had spoken to me this morning : 
 
 lis wild vague talk of something going on 
 
 which he meant to disclose; his advice to me 
 
 o leave Paris this very night ! And Salaris is 
 
 n Paris ; and this man, who brought him, hap- 
 
 )ens to be at my very elbow. And Lyndon 
 
 lad been intrusted with some of their secrets ! 
 
 In a moment the reality of. the whole situa- 
 ion seemed to reveal itself to me. Whatever 
 he plot Salaris had now in hand, Stephen Lyn- 
 on had betrayed it to the French Government, 
 nd its eyes were on the conspirators ! 
 
 Even in that moment I was much puzzled 
 o think what the mysterious plan for the re- 
 emption of Italian liberty could be which was 
 o open its first scene in Paris. Every body 
 new, however even I did, who took but lit- 
 e interest in politics, home or foreign that 
 le French Government, or at least its chief, 
 r as willing enough just then to play into the 
 ands of the legitimate and despotic Italian 
 ilers the Bourbons, and Parmas, and Mode- 
 as, and the Pope ; and the arrest of Salaris 
 nd the discovery of any thing like a genuine 
 lot might probably mean his instant surrender 
 o Pope or Austrian or Austria's vassal. Sen- 
 ence of death had been recorded against him 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 147 
 
 in some of the Italian States ; and he had but 
 lately effected a desperate and romantic escape 
 from a Lombard prison. The surrender of such 
 a man now to any of his old enemies would 
 probably mean a short shrift and a sharp axe. 
 
 This man near me is trust-worthy ? He must 
 be. He seemed to be fully in the confidence 
 of Salaris, and Christina spoke of him as a man 
 of undoubted truth. 
 
 He was still eying me curiously. I ad- 
 dressed him in Italian, and in a low tone. 
 
 "I think I have had the honor of meeting 
 you before, signor ?" 
 
 He nodded his head, and smiled. 
 
 " In England a few days ago ? ;> 
 
 " Up among the mountains ; yes." 
 
 " You know I am a friend of Signor Sala- 
 ris?" 
 
 "Yes, signor." 
 
 "He has told you so?" 
 
 "Often." 
 
 A more laconic person one could not easily 
 meet ; and he indulged in not the slightest 
 gesticulation. 
 
 "You will trust me." 
 
 He nodded, and glanced round to see that 
 the garyon was not too near. 4 
 
 " Does any one here speak Italian ?" I asked, 
 thinking that he dreaded being overheard and 
 understood. 
 
 " I think not, signor. But they may know 
 that we are speaking Italian and even that " 
 he finished the sentence with another glance 
 round and a slight shrug. 
 
 "Perhaps English would do better. Do 
 you speak English ?" 
 
 "Oh yes, some." 
 
 "You understand it?" 
 
 "Much well." 
 
 "Then," I said, speaking slowly that he 
 might follow my meaning, "I have reason to 
 fear that you and our friend the signor are be- 
 trayed." 
 
 He started and frowned ; then, after a mo- 
 ment of silence, said, 
 
 " Impossible." 
 
 "It is possible ; it is true. I have seen and 
 spoken to the man who'betrayed you. He told 
 me he had done it, or meant to do it. Take 
 care ! I do not know what your plans are, or 
 what you are doing in Paris ; but I tell you 
 that I fully believe every thing either is now 
 known to the police here, or will be known be- 
 fore night." 
 
 He looked grim and set his teeth, and a low 
 red fire burned in his eye. I began to tell him 
 exactly what I knew ; but I had so often to 
 repeat what I said, and he had such difficulty 
 in following me, despite his professed mastery 
 of English, that I discarded his objection to 
 Italian, and told him my story in his own lan- 
 guage. I told him that a man whom I knew 
 to be partly in Salaris's confidence, and who 
 was now in Paris, had warned me to leave the 
 city before night, and hinted, or more than 
 hinted, that he had given information to the 
 
 government which would lead to arrests. And 
 I give him my own view of the character of 
 the man who had told me this, and my belief 
 that in this at least he was quite capable of 
 keeping his word. 
 
 "This man's name, signor?" 
 
 I hesitated. Ought I to betray even the 
 wretch who was betraying others ? There was 
 a savage gleam in my companion's eyes which 
 boded ill to a traditore. After all, the wretched 
 Stephen Lyndon had had some thrill of good- 
 nature in him toward me, and had endeavored 
 to save me from what he supposed to be a great 
 danger. No, I could not give up his name; 
 and I told the Italian so. 
 
 "I ask you," he said, quietly, "because all 
 would depend upon that. He may tell all he 
 knows, and yet tell nothing." 
 
 "But he clearly told me that he would be- 
 tray Salaris." 
 
 "Possible. The signor does not quite un- 
 derstand. It may be that he is set on to be- 
 tray something that is truly nothing, in order to 
 turn away attention from the real business. I 
 do not know." 
 
 "Do you know where Salaris is?" 
 
 " Not where he is now. I hope to see him 
 in Paris to-night." 
 
 " Can you not find him out and tell him ?" 
 
 "Yes, I can do that ; it is my duty to do it 
 at once. He will know what to do. Could the 
 signor remember the exact words told to him 
 by this person who warned him ? That would 
 be of great importance to know." 
 
 I tried to repeat, as well as I could, the exact 
 words Lyndon had used. But the attempt was 
 a failure ; I had only a vague recollection. 
 
 "Perhaps the person did not quite under- 
 stand all he was saying ? Perhaps he conveyed 
 more than he meant or less? The signor 
 speaks Italian well oh, very well indeed ; but 
 I can discover that sometimes he uses a word 
 with not quite the meaning, or more than the 
 meaning he would express. Now this is of 
 great moment. The person who spoke to you 
 may have impressed on you too much or too 
 little." 
 
 " No, no ; there was nothing of the kind. He 
 was not talking Italian, but English his own 
 tongue and mine." 
 
 The Italian's eyes flamed again. He had 
 laid a trap for me, and I had blundered right 
 into it. 
 
 "Thanks, signor," he said, rising from his 
 chair. " I have now what I would know. I 
 thought so ! I know who is the man who spoke 
 in his own tongue, English, to the signor. The 
 signor evidently always suspected him ? So did 
 I always. Adieu, signor! The news is ill 
 news that the signor brings ; but it is not per- 
 haps yet too late." 
 
 He saluted me gravely, and walked quickly 
 down the Champs Elysees toward the Place de 
 la Concord, leaving me much bewildered with 
 doubt as to whether I had done Salaris any 
 good after all ; whether Lyndon was not a vain 
 
148 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 old madman, who bragged of a capacity to c 
 harm which he did not possess ; and whether 
 had not handed the wretch over to a venge 
 ance which it was not in his power to deserve 
 If I could only see Salaris and speak with him 
 I sprang up, and ran as fast as I could after th 
 Italian, in the hope of overtaking him and in 
 ducing him to confide to me something of m 
 friend's whereabouts ; but before I could mak 
 much way through groups of holiday-maker 
 and children he had quite disappeared. I sper 
 a horrible hour or two in the odious >osition o 
 one who just knows that something evil or dan 
 gerous is going forward, and fancies he onl 
 wants a little light, a little opening, to be abl 
 to prevent it, and is groping here and there t 
 no effect, while he feels that every moment los 
 brings the dreaded thing nearer. I could d< 
 literally nothing, and yet I was so near to be 
 ing able to do something ! 
 
 I had engaged to sing the following night in 
 London with Christina; otherwise I would 
 gladly have remained in Paris, in the faint 
 futile ghost of a hope of meeting Salaris, anc 
 being perhaps able to prevail on him to leave 
 France at once and draw out of whatever enter 
 prise he had engaged in. Time ran on while I 
 thought and debated with myself, and fretted 
 and fumed in this idle way ; and at last it came 
 .to this, that I must either go at once, or make 
 up my mind to break my engagement, telegraph 
 that I could not leave Paris, and stay. 
 
 I adopted the resource of many a puzzled 
 and idle man, and invited the Fates and Chances 
 to settle the question for me. 
 
 A bird was swaying on the branch of a chest- 
 nut just in front of me. He was about to take 
 flight. 
 
 "Come," I said to myself, "if the bird flies 
 to the right, I will leave Paris ; if he flies to the 
 left, I will remain." 
 
 He shot from the swinging bough, and flew 
 in the direction of the Arch of Triumph, on my 
 right. 
 
 I got up instantly, walked to the Place de la 
 Concord, hailed a voiture, and was presently on 
 my way to the terminus of the railway to Rouen 
 and Dieppe. I crossed the Channel that night, 
 not without a feeling that I was like a man run- 
 ning away from the camp the night before a 
 battle. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 CHRISTINA'S LAST TRIUMPH. 
 
 THIS had not been, on the whole, a brilliant 
 season with Christina. She opened magnifi- 
 cently : her voice perfect, her physical powers 
 apparently quite restored. A week had hardly 
 passed when a change came, and she was at- 
 tacked at once by hoarseness and nervous weak- 
 ness. Then she took a few nights' rest, and 
 apparently recovered ; then she sang for a night 
 or two more, and fell back again. More than I 
 once, when she was announced for some one of ' 
 
 her great parts, she had to give up at the last 
 moment, and little printed notifications laid in 
 every box and stall told disappointed audiences 
 that this singer or that had undertaken to act 
 as substitute for Madame Reichstein. The 
 West End public is at once undemonstrative and 
 exacting, and Madame Reichstein was openly 
 and generally accused of being willful, capri- 
 cious, and ill-tempered. Stories were repeated 
 of the manner in which she had taken offense 
 at this or that imaginary slight, and peremp- 
 torily told the manager, at the last moment, 
 that she positively would not sing. She began 
 to be quietly regarded as one on whom reliance 
 could not be placed ; whom success had spoiled ; 
 who was ungrateful to her best patrons and ad- 
 mirers. This sort of thing even found its way 
 into newspapers ; and a comic journal had some 
 pleasantries about the amazement of an aud- 
 ience when Madame Reichstein, who had been 
 announced, did actually sing and such like 
 stuff. 
 
 All this pained and vexed Christina, and of 
 course only helped to make her more nervous, 
 and less able to command her physical resources. 
 he was simply the most conscientious artist I 
 <re ever known. She was absolutely without 
 the petty caprices and whims which spoil so 
 many singers, men as well as women. But she 
 was not only too conscientious as an artist to 
 evade her duties ; she delighted in them ; they 
 were her happiness lately perhaps her only 
 happiness. To me my operatic parts were 
 mere drudgery ; mechanical, mercenary toil, to 
 vhich I went reluctantly, from which I escaped 
 with a sense of relief. To her they were ex- 
 itement, exhilaration, delight. She breathed 
 reely on the stage, as in some congenial and 
 elicious atmosphere. Her inability to sing 
 lever disappointed even the most sympathetic 
 udience so much as it disappointed herself. 
 >he told me often that she had passed many 
 f those evenings of disappointment in unceasing, 
 ncontrollable tears. It was therefore a bitter 
 ddition to her trouble to be suspected of petu- 
 ant and unworthy caprice, because of a phys- 
 cal weakness which grieved her to the heart. 
 
 Thus far, then, the season had been fitful 
 nd disappointing. At last Christina was per- 
 uaded to take a few weeks of absolute rest ; to 
 urse her voice, and give it a fair chance to re- 
 over its power. She felt convinced, at the 
 nd of the interval, that her strength was quite 
 estored, for the time at least, and she made up 
 er mind to regain her place before the glory 
 ? the season waned. A new opera had for 
 time been heralded from Vienna and 
 aris, as full of splendid music and grand dra- 
 iatic effects. The bringing out of this opera 
 London had been delayed hitherto only in 
 der that Christina might have the first part in 
 : and the press and the public were beginning 
 to grumble a little over the delay. It was now 
 announced at last, with Christina for its heroine 
 it had been rehearsed and postponed again 
 and again and it was waited for with an al- 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 149 
 
 most unparalleled expectation and excitement. 
 I had the tenor part, which I too had rehearsed 
 ever so many times ; and the first performance 
 was fixed for the night after that on which I 
 left Paris. My non-appearance would there- 
 fore have been a deplorable disturbance ; but, 
 as I have said, I appealed to the oracle ; and I 
 reached London in good time, none the worse 
 for my hasty flight to Paris. 
 
 The great hour came, and with it came 
 Christina, resolved to reconquer her place at 
 any risk or sacrifice. 
 
 You would not have thought Christina Reich- 
 stein had been recently sunk in nervous debility, 
 had you seen her as she came on the stage that 
 memorable evening. She had, in one sense, 
 her position to retrieve, and she felt it. I knew 
 the moment I saw her that she came to con- 
 quer ; and she did conquer. Hers was in every 
 way that sympathetic sensitive nature to which 
 any excitement lends momentary strength and 
 the capacity for the time to prevail. The con- 
 sciousness that she had to succeed was to her 
 success itself. Not in her brightest days the 
 days of her too brief prime did she ever, I be- 
 lieve, sing as she sang that night. If in earlier 
 years her voice \vanted any thing, it wanted oc- 
 casionally a certain shading away and tender- 
 ness of tone. Perhaps her condition of mind, 
 perhaps even her recent illness, helped now to 
 supply this want. I know that the want exist- 
 ed no longer. She looked queenly in form as 
 she moved across the stage ; and beautiful in 
 the face which recent illness had softened into 
 a paler tenderness than commonly belonged to 
 it. What is there in the superstition of aris- 
 tocracy which even still lurks, like the belief in 
 ghosts, in the instincts of most people ? Why, 
 this daughter of a German toy-maker looked 
 every inch a queen. A queen ? I have seen 
 many queens, and not one of them ever looked 
 so queenly as she did that night. Her voice 
 thrilled the theatre ; and her noble lyrical style, 
 inspired of the soul, free from every trick and 
 artifice of the stage, uplifted, one might think, 
 every heart to its own regions on its own soar- 
 ing melody. 
 
 I felt a thorough pride in her triumph : all 
 the more so because I hoped I had in some way 
 helped toward it. Lately, too, my heart was 
 beginning to be filled with affection and pity 
 for her, and sorrow for her. Love that had 
 died had sent its pale ghost of pure and pitying 
 friendship to haunt her and watch over her. 
 
 I clasped her hand in delight and congratu- 
 lation at the close of the first act, and she re- 
 turned the pressure with no less warmth. 
 
 " See," said she, "how exuberant I am in 
 my delight ; I have cut my hand !" She drew 
 off her glove and held up one hand, and I saw 
 tiny drops of blood trickling down her white 
 fingers. 
 
 " It was my ring that did it : it cut through 
 glove and all. Salaris's ring look at his min- 
 iature." She touched a spring, and a tiny 
 iocket, set among brilliants in the ring, flew 
 
 open, and showed me a little miniature of the 
 grave, melancholy, manly face of her hus- 
 band. 
 
 "Salaris reproves me," she continued, faint- 
 ly smiling, " for forgetting him in a poor stage- 
 triumph. But he would not blame me, if he 
 knew all, Emanuel. I have made up my mind 
 to .devote myself to him for the rest of my life. 
 The curtain falls for me with this season. I 
 will sing no more. I have vowed a vow, Eman- 
 uel, and I will keep it. If Heaven brings him 
 safe out of his present enterprise I will devote 
 myself to him, and be for the rest of my life 
 what I have not yet truly been his wife." 
 
 Her face flushed as she spoke, and her eyes 
 fell. 
 
 "You have not received any message from 
 him ?" I asked, not caring to encourage her to 
 dwell upon this proffered one-sided bargain with 
 the powers above. 
 
 " Not yet ; but I think I may rely upon re- 
 ceiving rews from him in some way to-night. 
 You shall know what I hear as soon as it reaches 
 me." 
 
 She did not know how lately I had been to 
 Paris : I had no motive or heart to tell her. 
 
 We separated just then. I need not speak 
 of the progress of the second act. Enough to 
 say, that Christina made it a promenade of tri- 
 umph, a conqueror's procession for her. 
 
 And then the news of Salaris came at last. 
 I had hardly quitted her when many mouths 
 told me of it. It had been made publicly 
 known in the House of Commons, and had 
 been flashed to the Opera, the theatres, and 
 the clubs. It had throbbed along the tele- 
 graph wires only too quickly; and it was, for 
 all its haste, but too true. Yes, we heard not 
 from Christina's husband, but of him, that fatal 
 night. The new grand project for the liberty 
 of Italy had exploded in the bombs of an as- 
 sassin ; and the great obstacle which was to be 
 removed from the way of the young liberty was 
 standing in the way still ! In a word, an insane 
 and monstrous attempt had been made that very 
 night in Paris an attempt at what was believed 
 to be the slaying of a despot ; and it had only 
 ended in the slaughter of some half-dozen people, 
 the very worst of whom, in patriotic eyes, were 
 but poor police officials, the humble menials of 
 despotism, who would have served liberty just 
 as faithfully as they served tyranny if they had 
 but the chance. And Salaris's name was named 
 as that of the soul and leader of the conspir- 
 acy. 
 
 The curtain was already up for the last act ? 
 and I had no time to find out whether the news 
 had reached Christina, or to endeavor to pre- 
 vent it from reaching her. Indeed, my time 
 was come. I was already expected on the 
 j stage, and I was almost out of breath and out 
 of capacity for my part when I came on. She 
 i was there before me. She had yet heard no- 
 ' thing. Her eyes only expressed surprise and 
 good-humored rebuke at the awkwardness of 
 the position in which my momentary delay had 
 
150 
 
 endeavoring to sing. She looked more sur- 
 prised, and even a little petulant. I endeav- 
 ored to do better, and succeeded tolerably. 
 The scene got through somehow ; but I fear 
 that if I helped the prima donna in the other 
 scenes, I was rather a damaging influence in 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 gasped and choked in r the words, and the manner and tone which ac- 
 
 this. 
 
 She did not appear in the next scene ; I did. 
 Then came the last. 
 
 She returned ; and I saw at the first glance 
 that all was known. What a gaze that was 
 which met mine! Her face was rigid and 
 livid ; her eyes were lit with a low pale fire, 
 such as one might imagine gleaming from the 
 eyes of the dead restored for a moment to life. 
 I scarcely understood how any one could look 
 at her and not shudder ; I can not still under- 
 stand how any one could look at her and fail 
 to see that some terrible agony burned in thos 
 glittering eyes. I had to take her hand 
 was cold as death ; it gave back not the faint 
 est return to the pressure with which I endeav 
 ored to assure her of sympathy, and to offe 
 some poor encouragement. 
 
 The house applauded her all the more fo 
 the deep and genuine tragedy that was writte 
 in her face. 
 
 "How devilish well Reichstein makes up! 
 I distinctly heard a swell say in one of the 
 stage-boxes. "How does she make hersell 
 look so ghastly all in a moment ?" 
 
 It was some piece of lyric agony, some ca 
 tastrophe of separation and broken hearts and 
 love and death ; no matter what. Those whc 
 saw her, all but myself, accepted her pallic 
 cheeks and spectral gleaming eyes as the verj 
 triumph of theatrical art. At first her voice 
 choked and trembled; then sounded hollow, 
 ghostly, heart-rending. Oh, but it suited the 
 part she had to play, and the house first listened 
 in a deep awe-stricken silence, and then broke 
 into a murmur of awakening applause. 
 
 She had determined to go through with the 
 task. Whether her husband was dead or liv- 
 ing, escaped or a prisoner, really guilty or not 
 guilty, she could not know; but a feeling of 
 desperate loyalty to him and his secrets and 
 their secret relationship constrained her to give, 
 if possible, no sign which might reveal any thing 
 that perhaps he, if living still, would have con- 
 cealed. She told me afterward that in all the 
 agony of horror and doubt, one thought came 
 up clearly in her mind that if her husband 
 were yet alive, it might perhaps be somehow 
 in her power to help him to escape, if only she 
 could still keep their relationship a secret. She 
 told me, too, that from the first moment she felt 
 convinced that he had been drawn innocently 
 and as an instrument into that plot ; and what- 
 ever might be his illusions or his plans, he had 
 never been knowingly a party to an assassina- 
 tion. 
 
 I confess I did not think so. The words he 
 had let. fall about the obstacle to be removed 
 now came back to my mind with fearful force ; 
 
 companied them. I remembered, too, that he 
 told me there were things no man bat an Ital- 
 ian might be asked to do for Italy. 
 
 What I did wonder at was the nature of the 
 projected tyrannicide ; the reckless, indiscrim- 
 inate, cowardly slaughter of the innocent, in 
 the wild hope of including the guilty among 
 them. ^ I could, after what I had heard, be- 
 lieve in Salaris planning and trying to exe- 
 cute a deed of tyrannicide in the high Ro- 
 man fashion ; I could think of him as a Bru- 
 tus ; I found it hard indeed to believe in him 
 as a Fieschi. 
 
 Christina went on with her task. Many, 
 many have indeed come forward to the foot- 
 lights as she did, and bending down with hands 
 clasped upon a bursting heart, have warbled 
 their notes of lyric joy, or love, or grief, while 
 agony of true human sorrow was helping to 
 produce the convulsive throbs which the audi- 
 ence wondered and delighted to hear. Men 
 and women have acted their parts through, 
 desperately, to the end ; have stifled physical 
 agony, and struggled with the convulsions which 
 they knew to be the beatings of death at their 
 door, and made life triumph, at least until the 
 fall of the curtain. All this, one might say, 
 is but commonplace and elementary in the story 
 of the stage. But how few have ever had a 
 torture such as hers to conceal ! To hear such 
 tidings but by half, and to crush down anxiety 
 and the passion of fear, and to make them serve 
 to work along the mechanical passion and pain 
 of the drama, like agonized captives compelled 
 to row the galley of the conqueror, or to chant 
 the celebration of his triumph ! Was she sing- 
 ing, or only crying aloud in the anguish which 
 could not be repressed ? I hardly knew : but 
 I know that such a rapturous audience I never 
 beheld; such a triumph I never assisted in. 
 Even then a sense came strangely over my mind 
 of the marvelous grotesquerie, the farouche hu- 
 mor of the whole scene, as I glanced around, 
 and saw that vast house filled with people who 
 applauded to the repeating echo what they be- 
 lieved to be the triumph of stage simulation, 
 what I believed to be the very death-cry of the 
 )roken heart. At one moment it belonged 
 o the situation her head dropped upon my 
 ihoulder, and tears, the most genuine that ever 
 ell on a stage, trickled on my tragedy trap- 
 )ings. And I yelled, as best I might, my lyric 
 arewell ; and the audience applauded, as en- 
 husiastically as a fashionable audience ever 
 ould applaud ; and she clung around me with 
 ucli passionate force that I could hardly tear 
 tiyself away, while her voice soared and shook 
 nd trembled in the air as if music itself were 
 ttering its farewell to life. I did just for one 
 noment release myself, that the need of the 
 cene might be satisfied, and I stood for an 
 nstant out of the sight of the spectators until 
 curtain came down amidst new bursts of 
 pplause, and I sprang forward just in time to 
 atch her in my arms as she fell in a faint. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 151 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 THE OLD SONG. 
 
 IN a day or two it became known about town, 
 and was mentioned in most of the papers, that 
 Madame Reichstein hid exerted herself too 
 much after her recent illness, had overtasked 
 her strength and fallen ill again, and was or- 
 dered by her medical men to take absolute re- 
 pose for some time. 
 
 Indeed, she was for many days very, very 
 unwell. She was brought down to almost ut- 
 ter prostration, with frequent faintings and 
 blood-spitting; and lay sometimes in a coma- 
 tose condition for hours and hours, during 
 which absolutely nothing could be done for 
 her. I did not see her during all this time, 
 but I called many times each day ; and I saw 
 her medical men, and they told me frankly 
 that her life trembled on a mere chance that 
 the probabilities seemed to be that she would 
 die. I did not know then, but I came to know 
 after, that she had long suffered from a serious 
 chronic complaint, which over-exertion or ex- 
 citement of any kind was sure to aggravate and 
 might render fatal. 
 
 Yet she did not die. She grew better. Dar- 
 ing the worst two or three days she had been 
 almost wholly unconscious happily uncon- 
 scious, perhaps. Before she had gained men- 
 tal and bodily strength enough to understand 
 all that had passed, there was news which it 
 was good for her to hear. 
 
 Gradually the full story of what had hap- 
 pened in Paris came in upon us. First as 
 concerned us was the fact that Christina's hus- 
 band had not been taken ; had not been actu- 
 ally seen at all on the spot when the conspiracy 
 exploded, of which he was named as the fore- 
 most leader. Those who had been arrested 
 were to be immediately tried, and it was known 
 that rewards, were held out for the capture of 
 several others highest reward of all for the 
 capture of Salaris. 
 
 I was glad to believe that my warning had, 
 after all, been the means probably of saving my 
 friend's life. I was glad to find that most peo- 
 ple in London who had known any thing of the 
 Italian cordially and at once acquitted him of 
 any complicity whatever in the attempt at as- 
 sassination. Some were indignant at the bare 
 idea of such a thing ; declared Salaris a man 
 of honor wholly above such a suspicion ; and 
 asserted that the dragging of his name into 
 the business was a paltry scheme of the French 
 Government to discredit and defame an honor- 
 able and gallant enemy. Many went so far as 
 to say that the whole thing was a "plant" from 
 beginning to end ; that the alleged conspirators 
 were the hirelings of mouchards; that the deaths 
 which had taken place were mere accident, the 
 result of an unforeseen bungle ; that nobody 
 would be executed ; that Cayenne or Toulon 
 and forced labor would mean in the case of the 
 convicted persons a quiet well-pensioned retire- 
 ment into obscurity ; and that the plot had been 
 
 got up only to bring discredit on the Revolu- 
 ion, and to justify the French Government in 
 he eyes of Europe for any severity of repres- 
 sion it might afterward find it convenient to 
 idopt. Salaris had been a favorite in Lon- 
 don ; he had been admired by the West End, 
 and had always demeaned himself like a brave 
 nan and a modest gentleman ; the account of 
 lis former escape from prison had been the 
 sensation of a season, disconcerting even the 
 African travelers and the new poetsj_there was 
 lothing whatever about him of the melodramat- 
 c conspirator or the Leicester Square refugee ; 
 and in some quite unusual way patriotism and 
 respectability seemed to blend in his person. 
 So that London generally curled the lip of quiet 
 contempt at the story of my friend's complicity 
 in the great assassination. 
 
 One incident connected with the whole busi- 
 icss seemed to have come miraculously to con- 
 firm this view. Had the French police really 
 desired to convince England that there was 
 sham in the affair, they could not have done 
 any thing better than just what they did. For 
 the very night of the catastrophe, and before 
 the dead and wounded had yet been well re- 
 moved from the scene, they hastened to the 
 Hotel Bristol in the Place Vendome, and ar- 
 ested Mr. George Stamford Lyndon, English 
 deputy of Parliament, as an accomplice in a 
 plot to assassinate the chief of the French Gov- 
 irnment. 
 
 London received the news first with a cry of 
 ndignation, next with a burst of laughter, and 
 then again with a cry of indignation. Before 
 many days had elapsed Mr. Lyndon himself 
 appeared in person on the floor of the House 
 of Commons, and told his own story : the sto- 
 ry of his arrest, and of his release. I read his 
 speech ; and I must say it was moderate, 
 straightforward, and gentlemanlike. He told 
 the House that he scorned even to pledge his 
 word as an English ^gentleman that he had 
 never had any part in, or known any thing of 
 any plot to murder. And the House applaud- 
 ed the manful scorn and energy of his tone. 
 When he said, "I pass by that now and for- 
 ever," the House cheered again. But he frank- 
 ly owned that he had been a sympathizer with 
 Italian schemes for independence ; that he had 
 given somewhat largely to the cause ; and that 
 he had done his best to assist men who here in 
 England were endeavoring to promote a rising 
 against the Austrians in Lombardy and Vene- 
 tia. He had endeavored to do, he said, for 
 Italian independence, what members of her 
 Majesty's present Government had done not 
 so many years back for Greek independence ; 
 and this he was not ashamed of doing, and 
 would always continue to do. Naturally, there- 
 fore, he had been in correspondence with many 
 Italian exiles, among the rest with some who 
 were now accused of being accomplices in the 
 assassination plot. This doubtless explained 
 his arrest. He had no complaint to make of 
 the French authorities. He had given them 
 
152 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 precisely the same explanation he now gave 
 the House ; and had only added that he was 
 ready at any time whatever to take his trial in 
 Paris, if the French Government thought prop- 
 er to make any charge against him of conspira- 
 cy with murderers. His explanation had been 
 courteously received, and he was at .once de- 
 clared at liberty. He had no complaint to 
 make. He had, on the contrary, every allow- 
 ance to make for the excitement of the French 
 authorities at such a time ; and, so far as he 
 was concerned, he thought the whole subject 
 deserved no further discussion. 
 
 Many people expected that something else 
 was coming. Every body knew of the close 
 intimacy between Lyndon and Salaris. Every 
 one, therefore, expected to hear from Lyndon an 
 emphatic declaration of his confidence in his 
 friend's innocence, and an indignant repudia- 
 tion of the charge made against him. Every 
 one was disappointed : Mr. Lyndon never men- 
 tioned Salaris's name ; and only repudiated the 
 charge of conspiracy to assassinate when it ap- 
 plied to himself. 
 
 "Cautious old humbug, that Lyndon is, "a 
 journalist of some note remarked to me that 
 night at a club which I frequented. "I've 
 just been to the House, and heard his explana- 
 tion. Of course it was all right; and the 
 House cheered him immensely. But would 
 you believe it, he never said one syllable on be- 
 half of poor Salaris. He knows perfectly well 
 that Salaris is as incapable of any share in that 
 rascally business as he himself, or as you or I ; 
 and yet he never said a word on his behalf! 
 The fact is, he thinks this business makes Ital- 
 ian patriotism of all kinds seem rather disrep- 
 utable in our British eyes, and he would not 
 utter a word which might appear to make him 
 responsible for the character of any individual 
 Italian." 
 
 My friend expressed, I think, the common 
 feeling. I did not blame Lyndon ; and though 
 of course I never openly dissented from the gen- 
 eral belief in Salaris's innocence, I could not in 
 my heart acquit him. The whole thing was a 
 wonder and mystery to me. First, that Salaris 
 could for any purpose become a party to such a 
 plot; next, that having promoted it, and in 
 some inconceivable way reconciled his own soul 
 and conscience, and sense of honor and human- 
 ity, to it, he should have held back from taking 
 a personal part in it ; lastly, that having direct- 
 ed the playing of the game, he should have 
 shrunk from the paying of the forfeit. 
 
 But this, 4oo, came to be explained at last 
 By safe means a letter came to Christina',, 
 hand, on which no eyes but hers and mine ever 
 glanced, and which contained much that, for 
 the present at least, perhaps forever, must re 
 main a secret. What especially concerned us 
 Avas that it explained Salaris's own part in the 
 transaction. He had left Paris not after, but 
 before, the deed ; he had gone in despair and 
 disgust ; he had planned and urged, and volun- 
 teered for. a deed of what he called and be- 
 
 lieved to be national vengeance and personal 
 sacrifice, quite, as indeed I had believed, after 
 the high Roman fashion. He offered himself, 
 or himself and the man Benoni, to lead the way, 
 to attempt the deed personally ; others, if he 
 failed, to follow the example. To do or die 
 was not his purpose, but to do and die. But 
 he could not animate those who were his asso- 
 ciates with this high, desperate resolve. They 
 were for taking into consideration the element 
 of personal safety; to do the deed, and if pos- 
 sible escape. Therefore they planned a wild, 
 indiscriminate slaughter, in which the one ene- 
 my might perish, and the murderers might escape. 
 All this seemed to Salaris as frivolous as it was 
 hideous. It made a murder what he thought a 
 sacrifice. To him the one essential condition 
 distinguishing the tyrannicide from the- assassin 
 was that the former must devote his own life to 
 secure the death of the tyrant, and of the tyrant 
 alone. He did his best to persuade them to 
 abandon their project, over which indeed he 
 sickened, and he still thought to carry out his 
 own. But my warning reached him, and he 
 opened his eyes and saw that he was watched. 
 He left Paris in time, postponing, not abandon- 
 ing, his design; and the night after he had left 
 the city came the catastrophe, as much of a sur- 
 prise and a horror to him as to Europe in gen- 
 eral. He would have been a Brutus, a Scasvola ; 
 and behold, he saw his name branded as that 
 of a Faux. 
 
 He was, then, guilty of the intent to kill a 
 crowned and sceptred man. Would such a 
 deed have been wholly, utterly guilty and base ? 
 I do not stop to inquire into that moral ques- 
 tion ; I never was much of a moral philosopher ; 
 I know Salaris was not a base and evil man, 
 and I know what we are all taught at school to 
 think of Brutus. But there are anachronisms 
 of deed which it is, ipso facto, something like a 
 crime to commit ; and just such a crime had 
 Salaris planned. I know from his letter that 
 he was glad now he had not done the deed ; I 
 feel sure his intended victim would have been 
 safe, alone and unarmed, in his presence for- 
 ever after. There are things which we never 
 fully understand till we see them caricatured ; 
 I think Salaris understood at last the true na- 
 ture of his projected piece of antique devotion 
 when he saw it caricatured in outlines of blood. 
 But he declared his firm conviction, a con- 
 viction never to be shaken, that the catastrophe 
 itself had been encouraged, fostered, and actu- 
 ally brought to a head by the agents of the 
 French Government. They had done it, he 
 said, to bring disgrace and odium on the Ital- 
 ian patriots, and to prevent other attempts more 
 direct and desperate from being made. This 
 he insisted on, and he supported his belief by 
 evidences which I can not report. He added 
 his conviction that one man, an Englishman, 
 had been a prime mover in the plot on behalf 
 of the agents of the police. To all this I at- 
 tached not too much importance. It looked 
 wildly improbable ; yet what could be more im- 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 153 
 
 probable than those passages of the story which 
 had actually happened ? I neither believed 
 nor disbelieved ; I wa glad he had escaped 
 and had no part in the bloody business, and 
 had at the very worst only planned and dreamed 
 to be a tyrannicide, not an indiscriminate slayer. 
 
 At one time, he said, his feelings of horror 
 at the deed were such that he determined to 
 give himself up to the French Government, and, 
 proclaiming boldly what he had really planned 
 to do, insist upon being tried, that it might 
 be made clear he had no part in what was 
 actually done. But his friends he had some 
 knot of friends every where reasoned him out 
 of this scheme of foolish chivalry. They con- 
 vinced him that if he surrendered himself, the 
 French Government would most assuredly con- 
 trive to convict him of the very crime he de- 
 tested, all the more because he detested it ; 
 and then came to his hand the evidences, such 
 as they were, which satisfied . him and those 
 around him that the most hideous part of the 
 business was the outcome of a police plot. He 
 had resolved then at last to leave the scenes of 
 so many unavailing and abortive struggles for- 
 ever, or, if not forever, until some auspicious 
 hour should arrive when a brave, true-hearted 
 man could make a sacrifice for his country with 
 hope and without shame. 
 
 I visited Christina every day while she was 
 recovering, and sometimes sat with her alone 
 for a few minutes. She recovered slowly, but 
 very steadily, from the influence of overexcite- 
 ment, mental and physical, and began to resume 
 her brightness both of look and manner. She 
 lay upon a sofa, still weak indeed ; but with 
 something of the reaction which follows natu- 
 rally any better modification of evil news stim- 
 ulating her, she was cheerful and almost joyous. 
 Her manner, too, had lost much of the constraint 
 which used to disfigure it, and cause it to seem 
 affected of late. She looked now to me more 
 like the old Christina than she had been since 
 we both were much younger. 
 
 One of the days when I came to see her, I 
 found her reading a letter, and looking flushed 
 and excited over it. 
 
 "Look at this letter, Emanuel," she said; 
 "and tell me whether I ought to laugh or cry. 
 Stay, you could not understand it without some 
 explanation. It is from our dear friend, Mr. 
 Lyndon. Now listen, and then you shall read 
 it. When I heard that dreadful story from 
 Paris, one of my first thoughts was, that I had 
 unconsciously entangled him in the business ; 
 and that he would believe I had purposely de- 
 ceived him. This rested heavily on my mind ; 
 and as soon as I could hold a pen, I wrote him 
 a letter, assuring him that I was as innocent and 
 ignorant an agent in the matter as himself; 
 and I asked him to come and see me. He 
 might have come, might he not, for the kind- 
 ness of old recollections ? To-day, at last, he 
 sends me his reply. There it is ; read it. No 
 don't hesitate ; I want you to read it I ask 
 vou to read it." 
 
 I took the letter in my hand. There was 
 not much to read ; it was this : 
 
 "CONNATTGHT PLACE. 
 
 "DEAR MADAME, I regret that I am unable 
 to do myself the honor of visiting you. I can 
 not think, however, that much good could come 
 of an interview, or that any very satisfactory 
 explanations could be exchanged. It is clear 
 that I was grossly deceived, and that my own 
 credulity was much to blame. I do not much 
 care to inquire into the relative share which we 
 all had in the delusion. You are, no doubt, 
 innocent of any knowledge of the detestable 
 plot which I was made the means of helping 
 and promoting ; but there were deceptions prac- 
 ticed on ine of another kind, and of which I pre- 
 sume you do not feel ashamed. I am, howev- 
 er, ashamed of having been so deceived. I am 
 conscious of having rendered myself ridiculous, 
 and I deserve to be laughed at. But I prefer 
 being laughed at behind my back rather than to 
 my face ; and therefore I take with a good grace 
 the lesson I have received, and have the honor 
 to remain 
 
 "Your obedient servant, 
 
 "GEORGE STAMFORD LYNDON." 
 
 I read the letter through, then turned back to 
 the first sentence, and read it again. 
 
 " Your judgment, Emanuel ? Am I to laugh 
 or cry ?" 
 
 "It is an insult, that is certain; and it is 
 characteristic ; but I can not help asking, is it 
 quite undeserved ?" 
 
 "No, not undeserved; and therefore all the 
 harder to be borne. I suppose I did allow this 
 vain and selfish old man to flirt with me, or to 
 think he was flirting with me. I did not dis- 
 like him ; indeed, his companionship sometimes 
 pleased me. I was embittered with life in many 
 ways, and I found his sharp cynicism congeni- 
 al. I flattered him and paid court to him, and 
 I allowed him to flatter me and pay court to 
 me. I did it to win the man over to our cause 
 at least, to my husband's cause and to make 
 him useful to projects about which, Heaven 
 knows, I knew little, and cared just as little. 
 I did not see through him at the first. He even 
 paid me attentions which, if my husband had 
 but known well, I am ashamed of the whole 
 thing now, and I was many times ashamed and 
 annoyed when I saw your eyes fixed on me ; 
 and I often feared that you would think far, 
 far worse of me than I deserved, and despise 
 me. Yet you might have trusted me, even 
 without explanation." 
 
 " Beati sunt," I could not help murmuring, 
 in some bitterness, " qui non videi'unt." 
 
 " Still you think harshly of me ?" 
 
 " I am sorry you ever descended to any de- 
 ceit, Christina. I am sorry you ever stooped 
 for any purpose to flatter the vanity of that self- 
 ish and sensuous old man. It was a degrada- 
 tion ; it lowered you ; and I could forgive no- 
 thing that made you seem unworthy." 
 
154 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "It was meant, at least," she said, in an ap 
 pealing, plaintive tone, "as a sort of expiation 
 to my husband. I thought I might in some 
 way help him in his plans, and by a little harm- 
 less deception bring him a useful ally. I an 
 ashamed of it now ; but I hardly thought of ii 
 then; and, indeed, I thought he saw through 
 me at last, as I did through him, and that nei- 
 ther took the other au serieux. Yet you, Eman- 
 uel," she added, suddenly and bitterly, "have 
 no reason to be sorry ; if I deceived him, I think 
 I undeceived you." 
 
 I made no answer. What she said was true. 
 It was when I watched her manner with Mr. 
 Lyndon that I first began to doubt the strength 
 of my love for her. The very day I first sav 
 her with him at Bichmond something told me 
 that she was as I wyote it then not my Li- 
 sette any more. 
 
 Her eyes were fixed on mine, and I did not 
 look up to meet them. She knew what thoughts 
 were passing through my mind. She took Lyn- 
 don's letter and tore it in pieces. 
 
 "That is gone, and with it go the memo- 
 ries," she said. "You must forget this, Eman- 
 uel ; and you must remember me only as I was 
 before I had ever learned to practice any deceit. 
 There was such a time ! Think of me only as 
 I was then ; and tell Lilla Lyndon of what I 
 was then. Thank Heaven, my deceits never 
 went far. Do you know how I think of myself 
 often ? As one of the people we read of in the 
 old stories of my country, who sold their souls 
 to the demon, but contrived by the help of some 
 saint or pious monk to cheat him in the end. 
 Well, I sold my soul to ambition and vanity; 
 but by the help of penitence and faith, I hope I 
 have redeemed it at the last. Stay ; don't say 
 any thing more ; I am going to sing something 
 for you. Yes, I am quite well and strong, and 
 I mean to sing for you something that shall be 
 a memory." 
 
 It was growing to evening, the twilight was 
 deepening. 
 
 "No melancholy song," she said. "We 
 must not be melancholy to-night, for we have 
 reason to be happy. You surely have, and I 
 too ; for my dear, noble-hearted Salaris has es- 
 caped from a great danger and a great wrong ; 
 and he is not the only one," I heard her mur- 
 mur to herself as she sat down to the piano ; 
 " not the only one not the only one." 
 
 She took out a faded old piece of music, rat- 
 tled some lively notes, and broke into a viva- 
 cious song. What was the song the great prima 
 donna chose to sing for me? What but the 
 very song I had heard her sing in the old sea- 
 port concert-room long ago, when she sang me 
 into the poetic madness of first love ! I listen- 
 ed with feelings no words could speak. The 
 whole scene was around me ; and I saw through 
 the haze and smoke of years, and confused 
 memories, and bewildering associations, clearlv 
 as then through a more material and vulgar 
 smoke-film, the bright-eyed young singer again. 
 
 " Do you remember it ?" she asked. " Yes, 
 
 I know you do ; and I give it to you now, to 
 bear with you as a lasting memory of me. I 
 sang it to you in the oJd concert-room, oh, so 
 long ago ! Yes, I sang it to you for I saw 
 you, Emanuel, from the first. I knew well you 
 were there. I saw your fair hair and boyish 
 face clearly among all the coarse stupid faces I 
 so hated to see. And I saw, too, how enrap- 
 tured you were ; and I was proud and delight- 
 ed. There ! I close the book. I will never 
 sing that song again!" 
 
 And she shut the book with a clang, and 
 stood up. 
 
 This was, I may say, our last parting. I 
 have always endeavored to remember her only 
 as she bade me. I think of her as she was 
 when first I knew her. The long-extinguished 
 fire of love has left no blackened waste behind 
 it. I remember her always with tender friend- 
 ship. I remember her as one remembers some 
 early scene of youth, which, however it may 
 change in reality, remains in the mind unalter- 
 ably beautiful, quite immortal, through age and 
 sorrow and the changes of all things else, and 
 time and decay, and up to the very threshold 
 of death. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 A STROKE OF RETRIBUTION. 
 
 A FEW days or weeks passed away. Chris- 
 tina had gone; faded, so to speak, out of 
 our lives. She was living for the present in 
 Lugano with her husband. The excitement of 
 :he Paris crime had been almost forgotten in 
 London. The season was over, the opera- 
 louses were closed, every thing looked dead. 
 Edward Lambert and I Avere in town to- 
 gether, two moody, silent, sympathetic friends ; 
 each, as before, knowing something more of 
 he other than he cared to talk of even to that 
 other. 
 
 We were going home one night together, and 
 our way lay through the Haymarket. We turned 
 'nto a cigar-shop to get a cigar, and Lambert 
 >vas talking of a game of billiards. As we stood 
 upon the threshold, doubtful, a man passed slow- 
 y down the street toward the Pall Mall end. I 
 caught a glimpse of his face under the flash of 
 
 lamp, and I knew him at once for the Italian 
 Benoni. He did not, or would not, recognize 
 me, although I could not help thinking I had 
 done him a good turn once ; so I came to the 
 conclusion that, under the circumstances, he 
 did not want to be recognized. Although 
 [ was just on the point of calling Lambert's 
 attention to him, I checked myself, and re- 
 'rained. 
 
 We did have a game of billiards, and then 
 vere leaving. As we passed through the cigar- 
 hop a voice hailed me : 
 
 " Doth not a meeting like this make amends ! 
 ! say, Temple ! Hallo there !" 
 
 And briskly leaping off a chair, up rushed old 
 Stephen Lyndon, 'and held out both his hands. 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 155 
 
 He was handsomely dressed, and wore elegant 
 lavender gloves, and I think, a new wig. But 
 his face looked puckered and seamed and care- 
 worn. I did not take his hand, and indeed I 
 would have walked away and left him but that 
 Lambert stopped, somewhat bewildered. 
 
 "Introduce me, Temple," proceeded the un- 
 abashed Lyndon. "I do think I must have 
 had the pleasure of meeting your friend before ; 
 the very remarkable contour of his face is fa- 
 miliar to me. Introduce me, Temple ; but 
 don't mind names. Call me for the moment 
 Mr. Badboy ; you understand the allusion. I 
 don't care for much naming of names here just 
 now pour des raisons." 
 
 " I think your name and yourself ought to be 
 alike detestable," I began. 
 
 "Dear boy, wherefore? I have done the 
 state some service not this state, but the oth- 
 er yonder ; and they know it. I have defeated 
 the machinations of conspirators and murder- 
 ers. I feel proud of it. Temple, I swear to 
 you that on a certain day I saved France ! Let 
 us repair to yonder fane, and give thanks over 
 Champagne. Some states know how to reward 
 their benefactors, Temple. I have gold, Sir, 
 red gold. Come, I long to know your friend ; 
 present me." 
 
 Ned Lambert was puzzled. Politeness, 
 good-nature, distrust, surprise, were battling 
 within him. He had almost begun, "Happy 
 to have the honor, I'm sure," when I stopped 
 him with a vehement gesture. 
 
 Then Ned said : 
 
 "I know I have seen this gentleman this 
 person before. Yes, I remember ! He's a mad- 
 man, Temple ! 'Twas he that attacked me and 
 and Lilla, you recollect, one night at the 
 theatre. Yes ; he's mad!" 
 
 "No, Lambert, not mad ; I am sorry to say 
 not mad not quite mad, at least. Look at 
 him, Ned ; he asks me to introduce him. I 
 do so. That man, that disgrace to the name 
 of Englishman, is a scoundrel and a profligate ; 
 a wretch who left his wife and daughter to 
 starve, if they would ; he has lately made him- 
 self a rascally spy for the French Government, 
 and tried to sell, and, according to his own 
 boast, did sell with profit, the lives of brave 
 and foolish men. Look at him, Lambert, and 
 know him if you will." 
 
 "Yes, look at me, Lambert," broke in Lyn- 
 don, "and know me for I know you now as 
 all that our polite friend has said ; and one 
 thing more : I am Lilla Lyndon's father, Lam- 
 bert ; and I presume I am one day to have the 
 honor of being your father-in-law. Let us em- 
 brace." 
 
 "Is this true ?" asked Lambert, turning with 
 pale face to me. 
 
 "It is true, Ned; that wretched creature is 
 Lilla's father. Now you know all." . 
 
 " Poor, poor Lilla ! She knew of this : and 
 therefore she doomed herself to live alone ?" 
 "She did." 
 "Now, look here, fellows!" said Lyndon, 
 
 cocking his hat more fiercely than before on 
 the side of his head, and trying to look tall ; 
 " there is no use in talking over family affairs 
 thus publicly. But I tell you this : / don't 
 care I'm not going to be kept out of the fam- 
 ily councils any longer. I know all about my 
 daughter now, and my wife too ; and I'm open 
 either to hate them or to love them. Whoever 
 marries my daughter has to deal with me. I 
 am not hard to deal with ; but I must be con- 
 ciliated, courted, paid off, if necessary. In 
 one word, Lambert, are you prepared to treat ? 
 Are you ready to go into council ?" 
 
 "No," I said, answering for him. "No, 
 Ned, not a word with him. Better Lilla bore 
 any persecution, or waited any time." 
 
 "This from you, Temple ! I thought I had 
 won your gratitude, at least." 
 
 " Yes ; I believe you did really try to do me 
 a good turn ; and though I had no need of it, 
 and was not in the danger you supposed, I am 
 not ungratsful for it, and I will try to serve you 
 yet. If you want money " 
 
 "My good Temple! If I want money? 
 All my life has been a perpetual want of mon- 
 ey. Just now I do happen to be pretty flush ; 
 but, good God ! I know myself I ought to 
 and I shall be as hard up as ever in a few 
 weeks. Besides, I begin to feel at last the 
 want of a peaceful domestic life. I think I 
 have pretty well exhausted all the stormy joys, 
 and I am now very anxious to retire into the 
 placid bosom of family comfort. I think I may 
 venture to say to my future son-in-law, if he 
 will allow me the honor so to call him, that in 
 me he sees a reclaimed man ; at least he sees 
 in me a man who wants to be reclaimed. The 
 one grand emotion at the bottom of my nature, 
 Lambert, is religion. Our friend Temple will 
 quite bear me out in that. Religion, Sir ! I 
 confess that my life of late years, and the per- 
 sistent ill-treatment I have experienced from 
 the world and my nearest relatives, has rather 
 disturbed the religious element. But there it 
 is still. Now I know that family affection can 
 purify and restore it ; therefore let us go in for 
 family affection. I am to be reclaimed. Eh, 
 lien, reclaim me!" 
 
 He then threw back his coat from his breast, 
 and stood with displayed shirt-front, as if moral 
 reclamation were to be effected by the agency 
 of a stethoscope. 
 
 Lambert looked at me inquiringly, as if to 
 ask, "Is this genuine?" 
 
 I looked at him with an expression which 
 said, "Decidedly not." 
 
 "Come, Mr. Lyndon," I said, "my friend 
 does not know you as well as I do ; you want 
 something; put it into plain words what is 
 it?" 
 
 The little man smote his breast theatrically, 
 and said, 
 
 "A home." 
 
 "Any thing else?" 
 
 "A daughter." 
 
 "Mr. Lyndon," I said, rather seriously, 
 
156 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 "there is such a thing in the world as bein 
 too late. I am afraid you are too late." 
 
 "But look here, Temple; I want to be re 
 claimed; I do, by Cod! And I think Go 
 wants me to be reclaimed too. I don't thin 
 He hates me wholly, for I have always love 
 the beauty of His house, and I have loved t 
 sing to Him. I think He could have loved m 
 if things had just gone a little better with me 
 Do try me, Temple and Lambert. 1 know 
 well, come, at least I think I am sincere now 
 I do really. I've always been repenting, o 
 coarse ; and I don't wonder that you are a lit 
 tie suspicious ; but, by the Lord, I think I'n 
 sincere this time ! Don't turn away from me 
 lads ; now don't ! Come to my daughter 
 Lambert, and take me with you ; I'll fall a 
 her knees, I'm d d if I don't ! Look here 
 these are tears. " 
 
 So they were ; there were tears nnmistakablj 
 running down his wrinkled old face, out of his 
 blinking black eyes. I had so long been ac- 
 customed to his private theatrical displays and 
 his easy gusts of emotion, that I was not per- 
 haps much moved. Lambert was touched 
 quite touched. He held out his hand to the 
 wretched old creature, who seized it, pressed it 
 to his lips, and blubbered over it. 
 
 My God ! if in that supreme moment a touch 
 of true compunction did visit the heart of that 
 unfortunate man, may it not have been too 
 late ! may it not have been too late ! 
 
 Lyndon lifted up his head, and exclaimed, 
 
 " Then I am saved ? I shall see my daughter ?" 
 
 "You shall," said poor Ned Lambert, and 
 
 wrung again the old man's hand. 
 
 Now I had been anxious to bring this scene 
 to a close. Perhaps my distrust of Lyndon 
 was such that I disliked to see Ned Lambert 
 touched by him. Besides, it was hardly the 
 place for a scene. We had moved a few paces 
 up the Haymarket, and now stood just one 
 pace down Jermyn Street, and in the shadow : 
 I had, by working our group gently along, got 
 thus far at least out of the glitter and glare of 
 the Haymarket. Still, there were people con- 
 stantly passing us, and looking with some sur- 
 prise at us and our gestures. Just now some- 
 body who had been standing in a doorway 
 came out, and, apparently attracted by curios"- 
 ity, drew nearer and nearer to us. The person 
 approached somewhat behind me, and I could 
 only see that somebody was drawing near and 
 listening. Now nothing can exceed the easy 
 vacuous impudence with which street-idlers in 
 London coolly walk up close to a group of peo- 
 ple, and there stand, and stare, and listen. I 
 am myself peculiarly nervous and sensitive 
 about this sort of thing ; and the vicinity of 
 this vulgar and curious eaves-dropper made me 
 specially uncomfortable. I was just about to 
 turn and ask the fellow rather angrily what he 
 wanted there, when Lyndon called to me, in a 
 tone half triumphant, half tearful : " Not too 
 late, Temple ! recall your words, my friend I 
 No, not too late, after all ! " 
 
 At that moment the listener, whose shadow 
 was just behind me, pushed or lurched forward, 
 and dashed against Lyndon. So far as there 
 was time for thought, I thought it was the 
 lurch of a drunken man. But at the same in- 
 stant I heard two sudden peculiar sounds fol- 
 lowing each other instantaneously ; two sounds 
 in each of which there was something like a 
 thump, and something like a rattle, and Lyn- 
 don gave a wild shriek, flung up his arms, then 
 collapsed like a man stricken with cholera, and 
 rolled on his legs for a second, and then fell all 
 in a heap on the pavement. And in the same 
 instant of time the man who had rushed on Lyn- 
 don cried out the word " Traditore /" flashed 
 round on me the fierce wolf-like eyes of Benoni 
 the Italian, and then fled fast as a wild-cat 
 down the silent darknesses of Jermyn Street. . 
 "Look to him, Temple," shouted Lambert; 
 
 I'll be after that fellow." And he rushed 
 away, his long legs making tremendous play 
 along the pavement. 
 
 In a moment a group of people, chiefly wo- 
 men from the Haymarket, had gathered round ; 
 ;hen a couple of policemen came up, and one 
 vent off like mad down Jermyn Street after 
 Ned and the assassin. We lifted up Lyndon, 
 and brought him into a public house which 
 stands, or stood, at the Haymarket corner of 
 he street. There we laid him on a bench. 
 He was bleeding fearfully from two wounds, 
 one in the breast, one just under the ear. A 
 urgeon was sent for from across the street, 
 ind came up in a moment. While he was 
 pening Lyndon's clothes Lyndon recovered a 
 ittle from the swoon into which he had fall- 
 n, and looked up. His eyes fell on me at 
 nee. 
 
 ^ " You are a prophet, Temple," he murmured. 
 ' It is too late, you see. No use, doctor ! Not 
 o deep as a well, nor so wide as a church- 
 Soor; but 'tis enough, 'twill serve. Temple, 
 our friends of the revolution have done for 
 me. Tell my daughter I'm sorry, and my wife, 
 ndyour little Lilla." 
 
 Ned Lambert had by this time quietly re- 
 oined the group, and stood with flushed Vace 
 ilently looking on. Lyndon saw him, and 
 miled. 
 
 "Good fellow, Lambert," he said; "kind 
 ad I like you. I ought to say, ' Bless you, 
 jambert ! ' in the regular old style ; but I can't 
 et up to do it with the proper action. I am 
 ying, Egypt, dying! I hope God will forgive 
 ie. I think He might forgive me if He for- 
 ives Goodboy ; and Goodboy is so respectable 
 lere can't be any doubt about him." 
 
 I asked the surgeon in a low tone whether 
 oor Lyndon had not better be kept quiet ; he 
 as talking away all this time incessantly, ex- 
 ept when an occasional pang or gasp stopped 
 is utterance for a moment. The surgeon only 
 look his head, and signified with a gesture 
 lat it did not matter now. I asked whether 
 e had not better be removed to some hospital, 
 r somewhere of the kind. The reply was a 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 But where there's so much valuable raw mate- 
 rial, I don't believe God means it always to lie 
 idle. No, no ; He doesn't make blunders, or 
 waste good stuff in that sort of way. He'll find 
 use for me, though I couldn't find any use for 
 myself. Confound it all ! I'm better than a rat 
 or a black beetle. I know that my Redeemer 
 liveth ! I am sorry you seem rather wanting 
 in the religious element, Temple ; but I dare 
 
 say something can be done, even for you. 
 
 Ah, not fair, George Lyndon ; not fair, brother 
 George ; 'twas you did it, not I ; always making 
 me your scape-goat. Well, I did one right 
 thing in life, d n me! O God, forgive me, I 
 mean. Not too late, Temple, after all ! O 
 God!" 
 
 Lyndon gasped heavily. His head fell for- 
 ward plump on his breast. 
 
 "Oh, he's dead !" said one of the bar-maids, 
 with a little scream. 
 
 So he was. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 THE OLD PLACE AGAIN. 
 
 THERE is very little of a story in all this. 
 
 reat heroic events and sufferings, which would 
 naturally consolidate themselves into five acts 
 with a grand denouement, are the lot of the fa- 
 vored very few. My ordinary life kept on much 
 the same after the departure of Christina, the 
 murder of Lyndon, and the marriage, which 
 ;ook place within a few months, of my dear 
 friends -Ned Lambert and his Lilla Lyndon. 
 They live in a pretty little house in Brompton. 
 I left that neighborhood, and took lodgings 
 near Bedford Square. It was there that I be- 
 gan the writing of this story, in the Bloomsbury 
 region which the opening chapter describes, on 
 he wet and wild evening, when, lonely, I sat 
 down to tell my tale to him and her who would 
 isten. 
 
 Nothing came of Lyndon's murder. The 
 ssassin was not found, nor was any trace of 
 im discovered. What I knew I kept to 
 myself. 
 
 I gave up the stage at once, and not too 
 oon. 1 have often hinted that my voice be- 
 an to give distinct signs of failure; and of 
 ate it was quite clear to me that it would not 
 luch longer bear the heroic strain of opera. So 
 anticipated defeat, and surrendered. "Hap- 
 y the man," says the author of " Penden- 
 is," "who quits the field in time, and yields 
 is broken sword to Fate the Conqueror with a 
 esigned and cheerful heart." My heart was 
 esigned and cheerful, indeed, but not from 
 ny heroic or magnanimous qualities, to which 
 have not pretended, but because it never had 
 een in the battle at all, and it was now ab- 
 rbed in quite other and far better hopes than 
 lose which at the outset led me to the fight, 
 retired, had a farewell benefit, was banquet- 
 1 by some of my friends, made a speech, was 
 ndly and even tenderly noticed by the news- 
 
158 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 papers, and then subsided into music-teaching 
 and concert-singing. I quitted wild Bohemia, 
 and became thoroughly respectable and com- 
 monplace. Nothing could be more quiet, mo- 
 notonous, humdrum, lonely, than the kind of 
 existence into which I gradually sank. Many 
 a man makes a desperate run up the hill, full 
 of energy and resolve, but suddenly meeting 
 midway with some check, struggles a moment 
 or two, grumbles a while, and then very quietly 
 turns round and saunters down again. So it 
 was with me ; but neither the early run up, nor 
 the later descent, was wholly merit or wholly 
 fault of mine. I mounted in the hope of over- 
 taking Christina Reichstein ; I paused and came 
 down because I believed that thereby I should 
 make myself worthier at least less unworthy 
 to be the husband of Lilla Lyndon. 
 
 I had to wait our self-appointed period of 
 probation for her; and I waited, silent, pa- 
 tient, absorbed in the thought of her. We 
 never interchanged letter, or word, or missive, 
 or greeting of any kind. During the whole 
 time I never saw her ; for a long time I never 
 heard of her, except once, Avhen, taking up the 
 Morning Post, I saw that Mr. Lyndon, M.P., 
 and the Misses Lyndon, had arrived at the 
 Hotel Bristol, Paris, on their way home from 
 Italy. I make no doubt that Mr. Lyndon 
 took his daughter every where he could, and 
 into all manner of distractions, in the hope of 
 inducing her to love some one else and to for 
 get me. I did not fear. Lilla Lyndon had 
 contrived, unconsciously I am sure/to impress 
 me with a sense of pure unalterable constancy 
 which I could not doubt. She had her father's 
 qualities, in fact, turned from bad into good, 
 and sanctified by her purity of soul, and glori- 
 fied by her noble warmth of heart. No, I 
 could not doubt her. 
 
 Other doubts, indeed, I had ; and they gave 
 me many a pang. They were doubts of my 
 own worthiness not merely of my moral worth, 
 for I do believe that the presence and the in- 
 iluence of such a woman must have stirred Ba- 
 rabbas to some love of goodness ; but doubts 
 of my fitness in what I may call the esthetic 
 or artistic way to sustain Lilla Lyndon's ideal. 
 I could not and did not disguise from myself 
 that her love for me had its source in pure ro- 
 mance the passion of a generous girl-nature, 
 weary of monotonous and colorless formality 
 and respectability, for some nature on which 
 the rays of a more romantic and highly-tinted 
 existence fell ever so lightly. I knew that 
 what with our secret love and my late attempt 
 not to steal her from her sphere, Lilla had be- 
 gun to look upon me as an exalted heroic kind 
 of being. I looked into myself, and turned 
 away with a pang of shame to think how unlike 
 to all this was the reality of dread lest she 
 too should some time discover it and be disap- 
 pointed. Would it be better, I sometimes 
 gloomily thought, that the passages in our lives, 
 now interrupted, should end thus simple, sad, 
 memorable, not to be renewed, not to be for- 
 
 gotten ? Often, as I found myself giving way 
 to ill humor and pettishness and littleness of 
 any kind ; as I felt tempted to snarl at friends 
 who had passed high up the beanstalk of suc- 
 cess and got to the castle and fairy regions at 
 the top, while I remained idly on the dull 
 ground below ; as I recognized in myself the 
 prickings of envy and the pangs of disappoint- 
 ed ambition ; as I detected myself in being too 
 lazy to change a lodging, too cowardly to give 
 a landlady warning, too procrastinating to suc- 
 ceed in doing some solid service to a friend I 
 could not help thinking that perhaps it would be 
 a happy thing, after all, for her, if Lilla Lyndon 
 and I were never to meet again. 
 
 This was my pain and punishment some- 
 times ; but for this I should have had, even in 
 waiting for her thus in silence and separation, 
 the light of an unchanging hope and happiness 
 around me. 
 
 Once I went back and revisited my old birth- 
 place town. Very little was changed there. 
 It is exasperating, when you think you have 
 lived through at least half a dozen lives, to come 
 back to the place you left so long ago, and find 
 every thing precisely as it was when you, un- 
 heeded, turned your boyish back upon it. I 
 spent the better part of a whole day loitering 
 on the strand where I did battle with Ned 
 Lambert, and watching the roll of the surf, 
 and flinging lazy pebbles in. I climbed the hill- 
 side and looked long upon the glorious scene 
 below. Once I made an excursion in a fisher- 
 man's boat round the bay ; and from the light 
 summer-day clouds and soft blue hazy sky came 
 suddenly heavy mist and gale (I knew them 
 well of old) ; and quickly a squall arose, and a 
 storm thundered in our ears and tattered our 
 sails before we could reef them, and drove us 
 off shore, blinding and baffling us with its spray. 
 I declare that I felt a rush of life and energy 
 such as I had not known for long, and which 
 was positive delight. I showed a proficiency, 
 too, in the management of the sheet which was 
 intrusted to me, and a familiarity with the char- 
 acter of the sea there, which quite amazed the 
 fisherman and his boy. I was enraptured with 
 the storm. I was a boy again, and I roared 
 some frantic improvisation of exulting energy to 
 answer the defiance of the roaring waves. Our 
 aoom was torn away, and we had literally no- 
 thing for it but to run before the wind, whither 
 the wind would. I lighted a cigar, and strove 
 to keep it burning. I could sometimes, when 
 the wind lifted the mist, and the spray was less 
 blinding, catch glimpses of a distant shore, and 
 \ steep hill, and white houses scattered over 
 t ; and I thought I could find no more ap- 
 propriate place to die " where I did begin, 
 here now I end!" and that were I to go 
 down there, I should always live a pure and 
 glorified life in the sacred memory of Lilla 
 jyndon. But I was preserved I trust to 
 make her happy ; and I was landed at night, 
 he storm having abated, near a lonely public 
 louse on a little peninsula far down the coast, 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 159 
 
 wet and draggled, cold and dispirited, the en- 
 ergy and excitement quite washed out of me, 
 and with the prospect of at least a fortnight's 
 enforced relief from singing, owing to the mag- 
 nificent hoarseness I felt setting in. 
 
 And I went to see poor old Miss Griffin, the 
 organist under whose sway Christina and I 
 used to sing, and whom I hope the reader has 
 not quite forgotten. Miss Griffin did not look 
 very much older, or neater, or primmer, than 
 she used to do twenty years syne. She still 
 played upon the very same organ Ned Lam- 
 bert's improvements had made no way here 
 and she had loud-voiced, demure girls singing 
 round her on the Sunday, and practicing under 
 her direction in the evenings of the week, and 
 taking a quiet tea with her now and then ; 
 sometimes being scolded by her, and no doubt 
 sometimes paying her off with smart feminine 
 gibes when her neat, well-made-up back was 
 turned. Every thing around Miss Griffin seem- 
 ed so much the same as before, so little affect- 
 ed by years, that I positively looked round for 
 Miss Griffin's mamma and the parrot, and I 
 should not have been surprised if both had ap- 
 peared in their familiar places. But Time is 
 not to be quite disarmed and the mamma and 
 the parrot were gone. 
 
 Miss Griffin was very friendly, quaint, and 
 affectionate. 
 
 "And so you became a great singer," she 
 said, "after all? To say the truth, I never 
 expected it of you. I always thought you were 
 too idle and careless. Of course you often met 
 Christina Braun?" 
 
 "Yes, Miss Griffin ; very often." 
 
 " She was a pupil of mine once, and sang in 
 my choir. Oh, but I forgot of course you 
 recollect her here.' ; 
 
 " Perfectly well, indeed." 
 
 "Yes, yes; to be sure. Many a time you 
 sang with her in this very room. No, though 
 not this room ; the old lodgings. You see, I 
 have been migratory since you were here." 
 
 She had changed her lodgings once in twen- 
 ty years. 
 
 "Did Christina ever speak of me, Mr. 
 Banks ?" Miss Griffin took up my name, of 
 course, in the old and original way. 
 
 "Very often, Miss Griffin; and very kind- 
 
 iy." 
 
 "Yes, I am sure she would. She was a 
 good-hearted creature, only I used to fear that 
 she was too fond of display, and that she w r ould 
 come to no good. And she became a great 
 singer too ?" 
 
 " She became a great singer indeed. That 
 is quite certain, Miss Griffin." 
 
 ' ' Yes, a gentleman here, son of Mr. Thirl- 
 wall, our clergyman you recollect ? was up 
 in London once, and he told me he heard 
 Christina at the Opera, and that the house was 
 crowded, and the Queen was there. He did 
 not speak of you ; but this was before you came 
 out, I suppose. And she has made a great 
 fortune, and retired from the stage?" 
 
 "I believe so, Miss Griffin ; at least she has 
 retired from the stage." 
 
 "Already! Dear, dear! Only the other 
 day she was a little girl here oh, quite a little 
 girl. And you were a boy ; and now " 
 
 "And now I am a 'grizzled, grim old fogy,' 
 you were going to say, Miss Griffin ?" 
 
 "Nonsense ! Indeed I was going to say no- 
 thing of the kind ; for if you were to be thought 
 old, I don't know what could be said of me. 
 And you are not married yet ? I wonder you 
 didn't marry Christina. I remember now that 
 I thought at one time you were sweet upon her ; 
 but certainly you were too young then." 
 
 After a while I asked Miss Griffin to play 
 something in memory of old acquaintance. She 
 did so, very kindly and readily, playing, in- 
 deed, with some skill ; and even, on a little 
 pressure, sang a quaint old song, with Avhich, 
 some twenty years back, I used to be perhaps 
 rather more familiar than I much cared to be. 
 It sounded in my ear now enriched by such 
 kindly, softening, saddening associations, that 
 it seemed almost like an evening hymn. 
 
 Then she insisted on my singing something 
 for her out of one of the operas in which, as 
 she Avas pleased to put it, I had made my great- 
 est success. I asked her to choose for herself, 
 and she selected, of all others, something from 
 the very opera in which I sang with Christina 
 for the last time. I sang it as well as I could 
 with the hoarseness of my boating -excursion 
 growing on me ; and a dark-eyed, pale-cheeked 
 girl, too timid to open her lips, accompanied 
 me. What a dreary business it was to me ! It 
 was the very ghost of a song. 
 
 This done, I prepared to leave. 
 
 " I suppose I shall never see you again," said 
 Miss Griffin. " Though I think, whenever you 
 get married, you ought to bring your wife to 
 see me. You ought to be married now. Don't 
 let it get too late. Well, well, how odd it is ! 
 The other day only, it seems to me, I thought 
 you quite too young to marry ; and now I am 
 urging you not to let it grow too late." 
 
 "Just the way in life, Miss Griffin. One day 
 we are too young, and we resolve to wait a lit- 
 tle and think the matter over ; and we think ;i 
 little too long, and behold we wake up and we 
 are too old." 
 
 ' ' Ah, that is just the way with me. I thought 
 of going to live in London once, when I heard 
 that every body from this place was doing so 
 well there even poor Edward Lambert, who 
 wasn't clever or brilliant at all, you know, quite 
 making a fortune, I'm told but I put off go- 
 ing from time to time, and now I am too 
 old." 
 
 "You must be very lonely here, Miss Grif- 
 fin." 
 
 " I used to be very lonely at first, after my 
 dear m&mma died ; but I have grown used to 
 it now. I have the church to attend to, and 
 my choir, and the pupils. I suppose every body- 
 is lonely in one way or another, more or les?, 
 except, of course, great people who mix in the 
 
160 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 fashionable world of London, like Christin 
 Braun and vou." 
 
 Yes ; except such as Christina and I. Othe 
 people are lonely ; but we who have free souls 
 it touches us not ! 
 
 I took a friendly leave of good old Miss Gri: 
 fin ; never, in all probability, to see her again 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 "BRIGHT AS THE BREAKING EAST." 
 
 THE year was over; that strange, dreamy 
 solitary, silent year of my life was gone at last 
 I was free to seek out Lilla Lyndon and ask he 
 to be my wife. I had been filled with hope an< 
 confidence all through the time, and only long 
 ing that the day should come when I coul( 
 realize my hopes. Now that the time ha( 
 come, I was tormented with doubts, distrusts 
 despondency. I had not, indeed, to agonize 
 me the sudden fear of Wordsworth's lover les 
 the beloved should be dead. People of Mr, 
 Lyndon's wealth and position live in a glass 
 house in London : any body with the slightes 
 interest in the matter can follow them in al 
 their movements in their going from town to 
 country, from London to the Continent, in theii 
 dinner-parties and balls. Nothing remarkable 
 could have happened to Lilla without my hear- 
 ing of it through half a dozen channels. Of 
 late I hardly ever visited Ned Lambert and his 
 wife without hearing that the latter had just re- 
 ceived some kind letter, or message, or perhaps 
 even a visit from Lilla. I had several times 
 heard rumors that Lilla was to be married to 
 this or that desirable and aristocratic or wealthy 
 personage, and these rumors did not alarm me. 
 Nothing, in fact, had occurred to give me fear, 
 and Lilla had impressed me gradually, inde- 
 scribably, with a faith in her constancy which 
 was the nearest approach to religious devotion 
 I had ever had. Yet the time had come to 
 prove her, and I was filled with distrust and 
 despondency. 
 
 So far as I could analyze the feeling, it arose 
 from the old deep sense of my own unworthi- 
 ness. What had I to give her for her love ? 
 What had I done that I should be called living 
 into heaven ? I who had always been buffeted 
 through life, without time or chance to develop 
 whatever elements of good might be in me ; I 
 who had never troubled myself about religion 
 or morals in any high and spiritual sense, but 
 merely gone my way whither Fate and the hour 
 would what had I done to deserve the love 
 of such a woman ? What could I give her for 
 it ? What warrant had I that I should always 
 be able to hold it ? 
 
 I think, to be happy, a man ought to be su- 
 premely selfish or sublimely good. He ought 
 to have either a dominating will or a domina- 
 ting conscience. I envy people who look out 
 for the right, and, seeing it, go straight along 
 that path, without hesitation or after-thought, 
 
 whether it lead to happiness or torment, to 
 
 shame or splendor, because it is the right. I 
 have sometimes, in lower moods, envied those 
 who follow, unthinking and reckless, their dom- 
 inant will who do the thing that pleases them, 
 who are unjust and fear not. But those who 
 are not selfish enough to think only of self, who 
 are not sublime enough to ignore self altogeth- 
 er, they have often a trying time ; and I am 
 one of them. If I could now have thought only 
 of myself, I should have been happy. Perhaps 
 if I could have thought only of Lilla, I should 
 have been happy too, and with a far purer hap- 
 piness. But I could not forget my own life, 
 my own follies, faults, weaknesses, roughnesses' 
 sins ; and I thought if, since I saw her last, she 
 has reconsidered her resolve, if she has seen 
 some one who is in every way more worthy of 
 her than I, and has found that she could love 
 him better every friend she has on earth must 
 approve her change of mood, and I even I 
 could not condemn her. And though I did not 
 fear that this would be the end, my very faith 
 in her but deepened and embittered my sense 
 of hopeless inferiority. 
 
 One resolve I made; the Christian reader 
 will, of course, condemn it, and regard me as 
 abhorred because of it ; the practical, cynical 
 reader will smile at the idea, and think I never 
 meant what I said. It is the truth, however. 
 [ f f any thing whatever should have occurred to 
 Dreak the engagement between Lilla Lyndon 
 and me, I was determined not to live anV lon- 
 ger. I would not confront any more of' a fu- 
 tile, good-for-nothing, ignoble existence with- 
 out love and without hope. If this glorious, 
 delicious prospect which Heaven had so sud- 
 denly and strangely held out to me of a regen- 
 erated and exalted life, with love in it and a 
 purpose in it if that prospect should be as sud- 
 denly and as strangely withdrawn, I would ac- 
 cept the decree as a sentence of dismissal ; I 
 vould take it as a declaration that* I had no 
 arther hope or business in life, and I would get 
 ^ut of life accordingly. On this I declare it 
 low in all calmness, and looking back from a 
 listance of years I was resolved ; and the re- 
 olve sustained me. Come the worst, there 
 vas something to fall back upon there was a 
 means of escape. I believed that Heaven would 
 ot judge my decision too sternly, and at least 
 was resolved to trust my soul rather to heaven 
 lan to earth. Any thing in preference to any 
 more of the meaningless, barren, good-for-no- 
 ling, loveless, homeless, hopeless life I had been 
 eading for now some .fifteen years. One way 
 r another, let that at least end. 
 
 Grim resolve for a lover going to meet his 
 3ve ; but, grim as it was, it strengthened, con- 
 oled, and animated me. 
 
 Lilla is of age to-day. She is her own mis- 
 ress. She can accept me or reject me of her 
 wn free-will, and no one can say her nay. I 
 ill go to-day this very day and know all. 
 will not write to her, I will not go to her house, 
 ut though I have never seen her since our 
 
MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 161 
 
 parting in Paris, and never heard from her; 
 though we have never interchanged the brief- 
 est message or greeting, I know that, if she is 
 still of the same resolve as she was, she will 
 walk in Kensington Gardens this day. I know 
 that if she does not come there, all is over. 
 The same impulse which brings me there would 
 bring her, if her object were the same as mine. 
 
 I dressed with immense and exhausting care 
 that day, and looked in the glass nearly as often 
 as if I were a girl going to her first ball. But 
 the result did not strike me as satisfactory; 
 and at last I gave up the attempt at self-adorn- 
 ment and improvement in a kind of despair. 
 
 The day was not bright. For summer-time 
 it was singularly dark and gray. No sun shone, 
 the air was dense, the sky all hung with heavy 
 clouds, the leaves rustling and blowing as if 
 autumn had already set in. If one were to 
 take his omen from the heavens and the at- 
 mosphere, this were a day to look for disaster. 
 This is just the gray sombre sky under which I 
 should expect to hear some heavy news. 
 
 Kensington Gardens looked strange and 
 gloomy to me. The trees moaned slightly in 
 the light wind that seemed to anticipate Octo- 
 ber. The birds flew low ; the round pond, or 
 pool, when I came near it, had a leaden-hued 
 surface, which even the ripples fanned by the 
 wind did not brighten. Leaves detached un- 
 timely from the neighboring trees and plants 
 came rustling and rushing down .the glades. 
 There rose up and lingered in my mind a verse 
 from a strange, sweet, melancholy song of Uh- 
 land's : 
 
 "Ich reit' am fin stern Garten bin, 
 Die diirren. Biiume sausen drin, 
 Die welkeii Blatter fallen. 
 Hier pflegt' ich in der Rosen zeit, 
 Wann alles sich der Liebe weiht, 
 Mit meinem Lieb zu wallen." 
 
 No one was near the pond when I reached it, 
 with the mournful cadence of this ballad in my 
 ears and in my soul. As I stood by the mar- 
 gin of the pool there was literally no human 
 being in sight. Not a nursery-maid, not a 
 child even, could be seen. Down this glade 
 or that, wherever I looked, was no form mov- 
 ing. One might have been far away in the 
 country, in the heart of some lonely old park 
 of Queen Anne's time, when the last owner was 
 dead, and the young heir was abroad, and the 
 mansion-house was deserted. 
 
 I stood for a while pursuing this sort of 
 thought, and vaguely trifling with my own 
 emotions, as if I were half occupied in turning 
 over the leaves of a book, endeavoring to while 
 away time and to keep down anxiety. It 
 seemed to me at last as if I stood in utter isola- 
 tion, quite alone. A sort of sea seemed to 
 have risen up and swallowed all my old friends 
 and old associations, and left me planted there. 
 In this moment all the past seemed to wear an 
 aspect of unreality to me. Did I read it all, or 
 find it in the music of some of the operas in 
 which I sang, or dream it out as a poem or a 
 L 
 
 story to be written by me some time ? Did a 
 real living Lilla Lyndon ever tell me of a real 
 living love or is she but the phantom of a wo- 
 man who would have loved me had she been a 
 creature of life ? 
 
 In one moment, in one flash, my melancholy 
 meditations were gene my question was an- 
 swered. Life came into the silent glade at my 
 left. I saw a woman's figure at the far end of 
 the glade, and though no eye could distinguish 
 features at such a distance, I knew who came 
 with light and rapid step toward me. I knew 
 the figure, the walk of Lilla Lyndon. I did 
 not rush to meet her no, not yet. I stood 
 and abandoned myself to the unspeakable de- 
 light of seeing her come to me. I think I broke 
 into a deep sigh of profound relief and passion- 
 ate joy. She came nearer and nearer. Thank 
 Heaven for the rare chance that has made these 
 gardens so solitary to-day ! She came so near 
 that now I could see every feature of her face, 
 so near that now she saw me ; and then I 
 sprang to meet her. A light blush, or flush, 
 came over her face, tinting it all with a deli- 
 cate momentary rose-color, which deepened al- 
 most to the hue of the damask-rose, to the hue 
 of her own lips as I kissed them. I can not 
 describe her as I saw her, and I have no faith 
 in word-descriptions. The light of her face was 
 to me as the light of a star. Other description 
 I have none to give. 
 
 "I knew you would come !" she said. 
 
 "My love! Lilla!" were the only words I 
 could find in answer. 
 
 Then we walked, silent, to the edge of the 
 pond, and sat on one of the seats there ; and I 
 took her hand in mine. 
 
 "I have sad news," said Lilla, looking up to 
 me with eyes that now floated in tears. 
 
 I started. In the selfishness of my love I 
 only thought of some sad news that threatened 
 it. 
 
 " Poor papa is very, very ill. He has had 
 some cruel attacks of gout lately ; and and 
 he's very bad now indeed. I have only stolen 
 out a moment to see you, because I knew you 
 would be here. I must not stay with you ; but 
 he knows I came to see you ; and he only said 
 he hoped I would not leave him for long just 
 now. Oh, he spoke so kindly ! Under all his 
 manner he has a noble heart. I told you that 
 some day he would appreciate you, and you 
 him ; and I only hope and pray it is not too 
 late." 
 
 I loved her but the more for her tender, gen- 
 erous illusion. To me it seemed, even in that 
 hour, an illusion. I had outlived faith in the 
 miraculous redemption of selfishness. I could 
 not believe in Mr. Lyndon's noble heart ; but I 
 believed all the more in my enemy's daugh- 
 ter. 
 
 "You must return, my love," I said. "I 
 will not keep you now though I hope your af- 
 fection magnifies the seriousness of the danger. 
 But I will not keep you here enough that I 
 have seen you to-day." 
 
1G2 
 
 MY ENEMY'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 " I came because I knew you would be here. 
 I came to tell you" She hesitated. 
 
 "You came to tell me that you have not 
 changed that I may love you that you will 
 be my wife ?" 
 
 "I came to tell you all that," she said, with 
 a bright gleam of light shining for a moment in 
 her eyes and on her face, "if you came to ask 
 me." 
 
 Some months after this I received one day 
 a letter from Switzerland. It was dated from 
 Lugano, and this was what it contained : 
 
 " MY DEAR EMANUEL, I have just seen Ned 
 Lambert and his wife, and they have brought 
 me news, not unexpected, from England the 
 news of your approaching marriage. I hear 
 of it with gladness, and with tears that are glad 
 too, but still tears. Oh, how I wish you happi- 
 ness, and to her who loves you and whom you 
 
 love ! I shall tell her some day that it was I 
 who first discovered her secret, before you did, 
 and told you of it. I have sent her a little gift,' 
 a necklace, which she will wear for my sake' 
 and a gift from my husband. 
 
 "I was shocked and startled indeed to read 
 of Mr. Lyndon's death. He had many quali- 
 ties that were good ; and I, for one, think of 
 him now only with kindness, and pray for 
 him. 
 
 "My husband sends his greetings and con- 
 gratulations.' He hopes for great things in the 
 spring, and bids me tell you the opening of 1859 
 will be an era. He is, you see, as full of hope 
 and faith as ever. 
 
 "And now, dear old friend, friend from 
 youth, almost from childhood, adieu ! I shall 
 hold you and your wife always in my heart and 
 in my love, and I am to both the true soul-sis- 
 ter CHRISTINA." 
 
 THE END. 
 
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