to Rena?"
Rena, short for Irene: that was the baby's name.
"Kind to her? yes, of course. She is all that will be left me."
"Except riches. O Roland, do not care more for your money than for her."
"She will be a great heiress," said Bosworth.
"Riches do not always bring happiness. Love her, be kind to her!"
Those were the last words the dying lips uttered. She dropped asleep soon after this, her head resting against her husband's shoulder, and so out of that dim land of slumber passed silently into that deeper darkness which living eyes have never penetrated.
The Squire flung his bridle to a groom who had been hanging about the drive watching for his master's return, and stalked into the stately old hall, panelled with age-blackened oak, adorned with many trophies of the battle-field and the chase, and further embellished with the portraits of Mr. Bosworth's ancestors, which he valued less than the canvas upon which they were painted. He was as proud as Lucifer, but his was not that kind of pride which fattens itself, ghoul-like, upon the dead. The captains and learned judges looming from those dark walls were to him the most worthless of all shadows. The hall was spacious and gloomy, and opened into a still more spacious dining-room, where the Squire had never eaten a dinner since he came of age. A noble saloon or music-room, painted white, and furnished exactly as it had been in the days of Charles II., opened on the other side of the hall; but the only apartments which the Squire occupied on this ground floor were three small rooms at the end of a long passage, which served him as dining-room, study, and office. A steep narrow little staircase built in the wall, which stair had once been a secret means of communication between upper and lower stories, conducted to the Squire's bedchamber and dressing-room. His child and her nurse had their abode in the opposite wing; and thus all the state rooms, constituting the centre and main body of the house, were given over to emptiness.
The establishment was on the smallest scale. There were less than half a dozen servants where there had once been twenty.
No portly powdered footman came to Mr. Bosworth's summons, but a little old man in a very shabby livery shambled along the passage at the sound of his master's bell.
"Has there been a child brought here?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good. Send Mrs. Layburne here."
The man shambled out again. The Squire flung off hat and riding-gloves, and seated himself by his solitary hearth. There were some logs smouldering there, for the September mornings were cool, and the Squire was of a chilly temper. The table was laid for a frugal breakfast of tea and toast; not by any means the kind of meal which would have satisfied the average country gentleman of that era; a scrivener's or a garreteer's breakfast rather.
The Squire poured himself out a cup of tea, and sat sipping it with an absent stir, and his eye upon the door.
It was flung open abruptly, and a woman entered, tall, with noble neck and shoulders, and the carriage of Dido herself – a magnificent ruin. No one could doubt that the creature had once been eminently beautiful; there were traces still of those vanished charms: eyes of velvety brown, full, fiery, splendid, and the outline of fine features. But the skin was withered and yellow, the raven hair was grizzled, some of the teeth had gone, and nose and chin had both become too prominent. The queen had degenerated into the hag.
She was shabbily and carelessly dressed in a black stuff gown, with laced bodice and muslin kerchief. She wore no cap, and her coarse unkempt hair was gathered into a loose knot on the top of her head.
"An extinct volcano," thought the student of character, as he looked at that haggard countenance, with its premature wrinkles and unhealthy pallor. "A slumbering volcano, rather," he might say to himself upon closer scrutiny.
"Well," said the Squire, "I sent you home a child."
"You sent me some beggar's daughter, I should say, by her rags. I have washed her, and dressed her in some of Rena's clothes. What put it into your astute head to interfere with the people whose duty it may be to take charge of vagrants?"
"I don't usually act without a motive, as I think you know, Barbara. If the child is sound in wind and limb – a healthy child – I intend to adopt her. Rena wants a companion, I am told – "
"Nurse Bridget's fancy. I wonder you lend your ear to an ignorant country wench."
"The country wench is sustained by the doctor, and by facts. Rena has been drooping of late. Another baby's company may enliven her. Have you put them together?"
"Not I," protested Barbara; "it would have been more than my place is worth to act without orders. I never forget that I am a servant. You ought to know that."
"You tell me of it often enough," said the Squire, shrugging his shoulders. "The misfortune is that you never let me forget you were once something else."
"O, but the memory of it never ruffles your peace," sneered the woman, with a flashing glance at the stern, cold face. "It was so long ago, you see, Squire, and you have a knack of taking things coolly."
"Come and let us introduce the children to each other," said Bosworth, rising; and he followed Barbara Layburne to the further end of the house, where the sound of a crying baby indicated the neighbourhood of the nursery.
It was not the friendless waif who thus bewailed her inarticulate misery. The little stranger was asleep in Barbara's room on the upper story. It was the heiress who was lamenting her infantine woes. Buxom, apple-cheeked Bridget was marching up and down the room, trying to hush her to sleep.
"She's cutting another tooth, sir," she said apologetically.
"She seems to be everlastingly cutting teeth," muttered Bosworth, with a vexed air; "I never come to see her that she is not wailing. Fetch me the other child, Barbara; I want to see them together."
The other child was brought, newly awakened from the refreshing slumber that had been induced by her bath. Her large blue eyes explored the unknown room, full of a pleased wonder. There were bright-coloured chintz curtains, worsted-work shepherds and shepherdesses framed and glazed upon the flowered wall-papering. The nurseries were the brightest rooms in the rambling old house; had been brightened by the young mother before the coming of her baby.
The nameless child had a sweet placidity which appealed to the Squire.
"I suppose she has teeth to cut, too," he said, "but you see she doesn't cry."
"She cried loud enough while I was dressing her," retorted Barbara.
"Put them on the floor side by side," ordered the Squire.
The two infants were set down at his command. They were both at the crawling stage of existence, that early dawn in which humanity goes upon all fours. They seemed about the same size and age, as nearly as might be guessed. They had eyes and hair of the same colour, and had that resemblance common to pretty children. The heiress had a sicklier air than the waif, and was less beautiful in colouring.
"They would pass for twin sisters," said Bosworth; "come, now, Mistress Bridget, do you think you would know them apart?"
Bridget resented the suggestion as an insult to her affection and her intellect.
"I should know my own little darling anywheres," she said; "and this strange child ain't half so pretty."
"There's
