judgment of the Lord against dirt, till she's frightened all the women so, that many's the man as has had to forbid her his house.—But you know that as well as I."
"I never heard a word of it before: but now I have, I'll give you my opinion on it. That she is a noble, sensible girl, and that you are all a set of fools who are not worthy of her; and that the greatest fool of the whole is you, Mr. Tardrew. And when the cholera comes, it will serve you exactly right if you are the first man carried off by it. Now, sir, you have given me your mind, and I have given you mine, and I do not wish to hear anything more of you. Good morning!"
"You hold your head mighty high, to be sure, since you've had the run of his lordship's yacht."
"If you are impertinent, sir, you will repent it. I shall take care to inform his lordship of this conversation."
"My dear Thurnall," said Headley, as Tardrew withdrew, muttering curses, "the old fellow is certainly right on one point."
"What then?"
"That you have wonderfully changed your tone. Who was to eat any amount of dirt, if he could but save his influence thereby?"
"I have altered my plans. I shan't stay here long: I shall just see this cholera over, and then vanish."
"No?"
"Yes. I cannot sit here quietly, listening to the war-news. It makes me mad to be up and doing. I must eastward-ho, and see if trumps will not turn up for me at last. Why, I know the whole country, half-a-dozen of the languages,—oh, if I could get some secret-service work! Go I must. At worst I can turn my hand to doctoring Bashi-bazouks."
"My dear Tom, when will you settle down like other men?" cries Claude.
"I would now, if there was an opening at Whitbury, and low as life would be, I'd face it for my father's sake. But here I cannot stay."
Both Claude and Headley saw that Tom had reasons which he did not choose to reveal. However, Claude was taken into his confidence that very afternoon.
"I shall make a fool of myself with that schoolmistress. I have been near enough to it a dozen times already; and this magnificent conduct of hers about the cholera has given the finishing stroke to my brains. If I stay on here, I shall marry her: I know I shall! and I won't—I'd go to-morrow, if it were not that I'm bound, for my own credit, to see the cholera safe into the town, and out again."
Tom did not hint a word of the lost money, or of the month's delay which Grace had asked of him. The month was drawing fast to a close now, however: but no sign of the belt. Still, Tom had honour enough in him to be silent on the point, even to Claude.
"By the by, have you heard from the wanderers this week?"
"I heard from Sabina this morning. Marie is very poorly, I fear. They have been at Kissingen, bathing; and are going to Bertrich: somebody has recommended the baths there."
"Bertrich! Where's Bertrich?"
"The most delicious little nest of a place, half way up the Moselle, among the volcano craters."
"Don't know it. Have they found that Yankee?"
"No."
"Why, I thought Sabina had a whole detective force of pets and protégés, from Boulogne to Rome."
"Well, she has at least heard of him at Baden; and then again at Stuttgard: but he has escaped them as yet."
"And poor Marie is breaking her heart all the while? I'll tell you what, Claude, it will be well for him if he escapes me as well as them."
"What do you mean?"
"I certainly shan't go to the East without shaking hands once more with Marie and Sabina; and if in so doing I pass that fellow, it's a pity if I don't have a snap shot at him."
"Tom! Tom! I had hoped your duelling days were over."
"They will be, over, when one can get the law to punish such puppies; but not till then. Hang the fellow! What business had he with her at all, if he didn't intend to marry her?"
"I tell you, as I told you before, it is she who will not marry him."
"And yet she's breaking her heart for him. I can see it all plain enough, Claude. She has found him out only too late. I know him— luxurious, selfish, blazé; would give a thousand dollars to-morrow, I believe, like the old Roman, for a new pleasure: and then amuses himself with her till he breaks her heart! Of course she won't many him: because she knows that if he found out her Quadroon blood—ah, that's it! I'll lay my life he has found it out already, and that is why he has bolted!"
Claude had no answer to give. That talk at the Exhibition made it only too probable.
"You think so yourself, I see! Very well. You know that whatever I have been to others, that girl has nothing against me."
"Nothing against you? Why, she owes you honour, life, everything."
"Never mind that. Only when I take a fancy to begin, I'll carry it through. I took to that girl, for poor Wyse's sake; and I'll behave by her to the last as he would wish; and he who insults her, insults me. I won't go out of my way to find Stangrave: but if I do, I'll have it out!"
"Then you will certainly fight. My dearest Tom, do look into your own heart, and see whether you have not a grain or two of spite against him left. I assure you you judge him too harshly."
"Hum—that must take its chance. At least, if we fight, we fight fairly and equally. He is a brave man—I will do him that justice—and a cool one; and used to be a sweet shot. So he has just as good a chance of shooting me, if I am in the wrong, as I have of shooting him, if he is."
"But your father?"
"I know. That is very disagreeable; and all the more so because I am going to insure my life—a pretty premium they will make me pay!—and if I'm killed in a duel, it will be forfeited. However, the only answer to that is, that either I shan't fight, or if I do, I shan't be killed. You know I don't believe in being killed, Claude."
"Tom! Tom! The same as ever!" said Claude sadly.
"Well, old man, and what else would you have me? Nobody could ever alter me, you know; and why should I alter myself? Here I am, after all, alive and jolly; and there is old daddy, as comfortable as he ever can be on earth: and so it will be to the end of the chapter. There! let's talk of something else."
CHAPTER XVI.
COME AT LAST
Now, as if in all things Tom Thurnall and John Briggs were fated to take opposite sides, Campbell lost ground with Elsley as fast as he gained it with Thurnall. Elsley had never forgiven himself for his passion that first morning. He had shown Campbell his weak side, and feared and disliked him accordingly. Beside, what might not Thurnall have told Campbell about him? And what use might not the Major make of his secret? Besides, Elsley's dread and suspicion increased rapidly when he discovered that Campbell was one of those men who live on terms of peculiar intimacy with many women; whether for his own good or not, still for the good of the women concerned. For only by honest purity, and moral courage superior to that of the many, is that dangerous post earned; and women will listen to the man who will tell them the truth, however sternly; and will bow, as before a guardian angel, to the strong insight of him whom they have once learned to trust. But it is a dangerous office, after all, for layman as well as for priest, that of father-confessor. The experience of centuries has shown that they must needs exist, wherever fathers neglect their daughters, husbands their wives; wherever the average of the women cannot respect the average of the men. But the experience of centuries should likewise have taught men, that the said father-confessors are no objects of envy; that their temptations to become spiritual coxcombs (the worst species of all coxcombs), if not intriguers, bullies, and worse, are so extreme, that the soul which is proof against them must be either very great, or very small indeed. Whether Campbell was altogether proof, will be seen hereafter. But one day Elsley found out that such was Campbell's influence, and did not love him the more for the discovery.
They were walking round the garden after dinner; Scoutbush was licking his foolish lips over some commonplace tale of scandal.
"I tell you, my dear fellow,