CHAPTER IV.

4 Towards the end of the week we receivel a card from the town ladies.” Viear of Wakefield.
THE curate was gone, and the lessons suspended ; otherwi —as like each to each as sunshine or cloud permitted—-day followed day in the calm retreat of Brook-Green ; when, o morning, Mrs. Leslie, with a letter in her hand, sought La Vargrave, who was busied in tending the flowers of a sma conservatory which she had added to the cottage, when, from various motives, and one in especial powerful and mysterious she exchanged for so sequestered “a home the luxurious vill bequeathed to her by her husband.
To flowers—those charming children of Nature; 4 in which ou age can take the same tranquil pleasure as our youth—Lad Vargrave devoted much of her monotonous and unchequeres time. She seemed to love them almost as living things; an her memory associated them with hours as bright and fleeting as themselves. be
“My dear friend,” said Mrs. Leslie, “I have news for you. My daughter, Mrs. Merton, who has been in Cornwall on a visit her husband’s mother, writes me word that she will visit us her road home to the Rectory in B——shire. She will not put you much out of the way,” added Mrs. Leslie, smiling, “ for Merton will not accompany her; she only brings her daught Caroline, a lively, handsome, intelligent girl, who will b enchanted with Evelyn. All you will regret is, that she comes to terminate my visit, and take me away with her,
If you can forgive that offence, you will have pou to pardon.”
Vargrave replied with fer usual simple kindness, but. vas evidently nervous at the visit of a stranger (for she d never yet seen Mrs. Merton), and still more distressed at > thought of losing Mrs. Leslie a week or two sooner than been anticipated. However, Mrs. Leslie hastened to reas- her. Mrs. Merton was so quiet and good-natured, the wife a country clergyman with simple tastes; and, after all, Mrs. slie’s visit might last as long, if Lady. Vargrave would be yntented to esd her hospitality to Mrs. Merton and roline. ; When the visit was announced to Evelyn, her young heart s susceptible only of pleasure and curiosity.. She had no end of her own age; she was sure she should like the ndchild of her dear Mrs. Leslie. _ Evelyn, who had learned betimes, from the affectionate solicitude of her nature, to relieve her mother of sich few mestic cares as a home so quiet, with an establishrient so Tegular, could afford, gaily busied herself in a thousand little “preparations. She filled the rooms of the visitors with flowers not dreaming that any one could fancy them unwholesome), d spread the tables with her own favourite books, and had little cottage piano in her own dressing-room removed into aroline’s — Caroline must be fond of music: she had some ubts of transferring a cage with two canaries into Carmline’s m also, but when she approached the cage with that ention, the birds chirped so merrily, and seemed so glad see her, and so expectant of sugar, that her heart smote her her meditated desertion and ingratitude. No, she could not re up the canaries; but the glass bowl with the gold fish—oh, hat would look so pretty on its stand just by the casemept; nd the fish—dull things !—would not miss her. The morning—the noon—the probable hour of the important trival came at last; and after having three times within the st half-hour visited the rooms, and settled and unsettled, and tled again everything before arranged, Evelyn retired to her n room to consult her wardrobe, and Margaret — once her e, now her Abigail. Alas! the wardrobe of the destined py Vergrave—the betrothed of a rising statesman, a new and : B 2
now an ostentatious peer—the heiress of the w ealthy Templet: on —was one that many a tradesman daughter would ha
disdained. Evelyn visited so little; the clergyman of the © place, and two old maids who lived most respectably on a — hundred and eighty pounds a year, in a cottage, with one — maidservant, two cats, and a footboy, bounded the circle of —
her acquaintance. Her mother was so indifferent to dress; she herself had found so many other ways of spending money !—_
but Evelyn was not now more philosophical than others of her — age. She turned from muslin to muslin—from the coloured to — the white, from the white to the coloured—with pretty anxiety and sorrowful suspense. At last she decided on the newest, — and when it was on, and the single rose set in the lustrous and
beautiful hair, Carson herself could not have added a charm. — Happy age! Who wants the arts of the milliner at seventeen? —
.“ And here, miss; here’s the fine necklace Lord Vargrave
brought down when my lord came last ; it will look so grand!”
The emeralds glittered in their case—Evelyn looked at them irresolutely ; then, as she looked, a shade came over her forehead,
and she sighed, and closed the lid. “No, Margaret, I do not want it; take it away.”
“O dear, miss! what would my lord say if he were down? — And they are so beautiful! they will look so fine! Deary me, — how they sparkle! But you will wear much finer when you are ~
my lady.” “T hear mamma’s bell; go, Margaret, she wants you.” Left alone, the young beauty sank down abstractedly, and
though the looking-glass was opposite, it did not arrest her eye; she forgot her wardrobe, her muslin dress, her fears, and her
guests.
“Ah,” she thought, “ what a weight of dread I feel here when >. I think of Lord Vargrave and this fatal engagement ; and every | day I feel it more and more. To leave my dear, dear mother—~ the dear cottage—oh! I never can. I used to like him when I was a child; now I shudder at his name. Why is this? He
is kind—he condescends to seek to please. It was the wish
of my poor father—for father he really was to me; and yet ;
oh that he had left me poor and free!”
Pee ate, oe Le
cat Moe BUR Byte \ 5 cis Spier a ae Se ye te ELST cw stows abate ichg
els was Testd on te eee ‘she started Hitt eat from her eyes—and hurried down to welcome the