Mary Marston

ood many of his neighbors and of the townsfolk of Testbridge, whom he could not well ask to dinner: there happened to be a political expediency for so

ine the questionable honor-which fact carried in it the best justification of which the meanness and insult were capable. Mrs. Wardour accepted for herself and Letty; but in their case

d Wardour been an ordinary farmer, of whose presuming on the acquaintance there could have been no danger, Mortimer would doubtless have behaved differently; but as Wardour had some pretensions-namely, old family, a small, though indeed very small, property of his own, a university education, good horses, and the habits and manners of a gentleman-the men scarcely even saluted when they met. The Mortimer ladies, indeed, had more than once remarked-but it was in solemn silence, each to herself only-how well the man sat, and how easily he handled

ther, by a continuity of judicious cares, and a succession of partial resurrections, it had been restored to something like its original modest dignity. Durnmelling, too, had in part sunk into ruin, and had been but partially recovered from it; still, it swelled important beside its antecedent Thornwick. Nothing but a deep ha-ha separated the two houses, of which the older and smaller occupied the higher ground. Between it and the ha-ha was nothing but grass-in front of the house fine enough

resent owner could not have bought it at half its worth. He had of late been losing money heavily-wh

, was devoted to addition and ornamentation, nowise to preservation or restoration. They had enlarged both dining-room and drawing-rooms to twice their former size, when half the expense, with a few trees from a certain outlying oak-plantation of their own, would have given them a room fit for a regal assembly. For, constituting a portion of the same front in which they lived, lay roofless, open to every wind that blew, its paved floor now and then in winter covered with snow-an ancient hall, whose massy south wall was pierced by three lovely windows, narrow and

he sweeping winds had made its smooth hearthstone clean as if fire had never been there. Its floor was covered with large flags, a little broken: these, in prospec

nkets, with carpets, with a few pieces of old tapestry, and a quantity of old curtains, mostly of chintz, excellent in hues and design, all cunningly arranged for as much of harmony a

sited the stables and the home-farm, with its cow-houses and dairy and piggeries; some the neglected greenhouses, and some the equally neglected old-fashioned alleys, with their clipped yews and their moss-grown statues. No one belonging to the house was anywhere visible to receive t

have the honor of joining the company afterward. They were at the time-but this he did not say-giving an

some few of the farmers, capable only of drinking, grumbled at having their potations interrupted for

But she allowed Letty to go without her, which she would not have done had she not been so anxious to have news of what she could not lift her head

h everybody in his vicinity. When the tables were removed, and the rest of the company began to come in, he went about searching anxiously for Letty

the window-sills and wherever they could stand, gave a light the more pleasing that it was not brilliant. Overhead, the night-sky was spangled with clear pulsing stars, afloat in a limpid blue, vast even to awfulness in the eyes of such-were any such there

own. Was he doomed never to come near his idol?-Ah, there she was! Yes; it was she-all but lost in a humble group near the door! His foolish heart-not foolish in that-gave a great bound, as if it would leap to her where she stood. She was dressed in white muslin, from which her white throat rose warm and soft. Her head was bent forward, and a gentle dissolved smile was over all her face, as with loveliest eyes she watched eagerly the motions of the danc

new better than injure his chance by precipitation: he would wait until the dancing was more general, and the impulse to movement stronger, and then offer himself. He stood therefore near Letty for some little time, talking to eve

ormer meeting with him, had heard his name spoken by not a few who eviden

he had said something: were his companion capable of discovering the illusion, there was no time; Tom was instantly away, carrying him or her with him to something else. But there was better than this-there was poetry, more than one element of it, in Tom. In the presence of a girl that pleased him, th

ty was aware of no repellent atmosphere about him, and did not shrink from his advances. He pleased her, and why should she not be pleased with him? Was it a fault to be easily pleased? The truer and sweeter any human self, the readier is it to be pleased wit

hung dark and thick over the still, warm night. Even the farmers were unobservant of the change: their crops were all in, they had

ed hail-stones. In a moment or two scarce a light was left burning, except those in the holes and recesses of the walls. The merrymakers scattered like flies-into the house, int

e enough to have retained; the younger merrier than ever, notwithstanding the cold gusts that now poked their spirit-arms higher and thither through the openings of the half-ruinous building: to them even the destruction of their finery was but added cause of laughter. But a few minutes before, its freshness had been a keen pleasure to them, brightening their consciousness with a rare feeling of perfection; now crushed and rumpled, soile

lmer," said Letty. "There

wered Tom. "You need not be frighte

" said Letty, and mad

of which was a faint glimmer of light from an oval aperture in the sid

is was the little window, high in its gable, through which, in far-away times

ing lost in the hurry of the scattering. It was a waste and dismal show. Neither of them had read Dante; but Letty may have thought of the hall of Belshazzar, the night

must be, with nothing but that thin musli

he wind a bit; it's rather pleasant. It's only that the look of the place makes m

at a fine place it would be if only it had a roof to it! I can

loser to a worse ruin, and

hivered

fully. "I can't think why I should feel like this-just as if s

ndeed caught cold," replied Tom, rejoiced at the chance of

etty. "I have an old servant of my aunt's with me-somewhere about

er down the dark stair, hoping, how

ed the bottom of the stairs, found herself on the rocks of the seashore, with the waves dashing up against them, she would only have said to herself, "I knew I was in a dream!" But the wind having blown away the hail-cloud, the stars were again shining down into the hall. One or two forlorn-looking searchers were still there; the rest had scattered like

the possibility. Letty found her cloak, which she had left in the hall, soaked with rain, and thought it prudent to go

ght came to Letty: the moon suddenly appeari

h gloomed in the moonlight by the sunk fence parting the grounds. In the slow strength of its growth, by the rounding of its bole, and the spreading of its roots, it had so rent and crumbled the wall as to make through it a little ravine, leadi

y you always co

nmelling land befor

hen?" he asked. "It certainly does

lling and Thornwick now. It was all ours once, though, Cousin Godfrey say

es

o learn my lesson, and can't rest in the house;

e innocence, but Tom l

still?" he said. "Ha

of amusement. "But Cousin Go

aid, when they reached the gate of the yard behind t