"No; he rests at last. I am glad to say I was able to make his last days on earth the happiest days of his life."
"I wonder," Sydney confessed, "how you met with him."
"There was nothing at all romantic in my first discovery of him. I was reading the police reports in a newspaper. The poor wretch was brought before a magistrate, charged with breaking a window. His one last chance of escaping starvation in the streets was to get sent to prison. The magistrate questioned him, and brought to light a really heart-breaking account of misfortune, imbittered by neglect on the part of people in authority who were bound to help him. He was remanded, so that inquiries might be made. I attended the court on the day when he appeared there again, and heard his statement confirmed. I paid his fine, and contrived to put him in a way of earning a little money. He was very grateful, and came now and then to thank me. In that way I heard how his troubles had begun. He had asked for a small advance on the wretched wages that he received. Can you guess how the schoolmistress answered him?"
"I know but too well how she answered him," Sydney said; "I was turned out of the house, too."
"And I heard of it," the Captain replied, "from the woman herself.
Everything that could distress me she was ready to mention. She told me of your mother"s second marriage, of her miserable death, of the poor boy, your brother, missing, and never heard of since. But when I asked where you had gone she had nothing more to say. She knew nothing, and cared nothing, about you. If I had not become acquainted with Mr. Randal Linley, I might never have heard of you again. We will say no more of that, and no more of anything that has happened in the past time. From to-day, my dear, we begin a new life, and (please G.o.d) a happier life.
Have you any plans of your own for the future?"
"Perhaps, if I could find help," Sydney said resignedly, "I might emigrate. Pride wouldn"t stand in my way; no honest employment would be beneath my notice. Besides, if I went to America, I might meet with my brother."
"My dear child, after the time that has pa.s.sed, there is no imaginable chance of your meeting with your brother--and you wouldn"t know each other again if you did meet. Give up that vain hope and stay here with me. Be useful and be happy in your own country."
"Useful?" Sydney repeated sadly. "Your own kind heart, Captain Bennydeck, is deceiving you. To be useful means, I suppose, to help others. Who will accept help from me?"
"I will, for one," the Captain answered.
"You!"
"Yes. You can be of the greatest use to me--you shall hear how."
He told her of the founding of his Home and of the good it had done.
"You are the very person," he resumed, "to be the good sister-friend that I want for my poor girls: _you_ can say for them what they cannot always say to me for themselves."
The tears rose in Sydney"s eyes. "It is hard to see such a prospect as that," she said, "and to give it up as soon as it is seen."
"Why give it up?"
"Because I am not fit for it. You are as good as a father to those lost daughters of yours. If you give them a sister-friend she ought to have set them a good example. Have I done that? Will they listen to a girl who is no better than themselves?"
"Gladly! _Your_ sympathy will find its way to their hearts, because it is animated by something that they can all feel in common--something nearer and dearer to them than a sense of duty. You won"t consent, Sydney, for their sakes? Will you do what I ask of you, for my sake?"
She looked at him, hardly able to understand--or, as it might have been, perhaps afraid to understand him. He spoke to her more plainly.
"I have kept it concealed from you," he continued--"for why should I lay my load of suffering on a friend so young as you are, so cruelly tried already? Let me only say that I am in great distress. If you were with me, my child, I might be better able to bear it."
He held out his hand. Even a happy woman could hardly have found it in her heart to resist him. In silent sympathy and respect, Sydney kissed the hand that he had offered to her. It was the one way in which she could trust herself to answer him.
Still encouraging her to see new hopes and new interests in the future, the good Captain spoke of the share which she might take in the management of the Home, if she would like to be his secretary. With this view he showed her some written reports, relating to the inst.i.tution, which had been sent to him during the time of his residence at Sydenham.
She read them with an interest and attention which amply justified his confidence in her capacity.
"These reports," he explained to her, "are kept for reference; but as a means of saving time, the substance of them is entered in the daily journal of our proceedings. Come, Sydney! venture on a first experiment in your new character. I see pen, ink, and paper on the table; try if you can shorten one of the reports, without leaving out anything which it is important to know. For instance, the writer gives reasons for making his statement. Very well expressed, no doubt, but we don"t want reasons. Then, again, he offers his own opinion on the right course to take. Very creditable to him, but I don"t want his opinion--I want his facts. Take the pen, my secretary, and set down his facts. Never mind his reflections."
Proud and pleased, Sydney obeyed him. She had made her little abstract, and was reading it to him at his request, while he compared it with the report, when they were interrupted by a visitor. Randal Linley came in, and noticed the papers on the table with surprise. "Is it possible that I am interrupting business?" he asked.
Bennydeck answered with the a.s.sumed air of importance which was in itself a compliment to Sydney: "You find me engaged on the business of the Home with my new secretary."
Randal at once understood what had happened. He took his friend"s arm, and led him to the other end of the room.
"You good fellow!" he said. "Add to your kindness by excusing me if I ask for a word with you in private."
Sydney rose to retire. After having encouraged her by a word of praise, the Captain proposed that she should get ready to go out, and should accompany him on a visit to the Home. He opened the door for her as respectfully as if the poor girl had been one of the highest ladies in the land.
"I have seen my friend Sarrazin," Randal began, "and I have persuaded him to trust me with Catherine"s present address. I can send Herbert there immediately, if you will only help me."
"How can I help you?"
"Will you allow me to tell my brother that your engagement is broken off?"
Bennydeck shrank from the painful allusion, and showed it.
Randal explained. "I am grieved," he said, "to distress you by referring to this subject again. But if my brother is left under the false impression that your engagement will be followed by your marriage, he will refuse to intrude himself on the lady who was once his wife."
The Captain understood. "Say what you please about me," he replied.
"Unite the father and child--and you may reconcile the husband and wife."
"Have you forgotten," Randal asked, "that the marriage has been dissolved?"
Bennydeck"s answer ignored the law. "I remember," he said, "that the marriage has been profaned."
Chapter LV. Leave It to the Child.
The front windows of Bright.w.a.ter Cottage look out on a quiet green lane in Middles.e.x, which joins the highroad within a few miles of the market town of Uxbridge. Through the pretty garden at the back runs a little brook, winding its merry way to a distant river. The few rooms in this pleasant place of residence are well (too well) furnished, having regard to the limits of a building which is a cottage in the strictest sense of the word. Water-color drawings by the old English masters of the art ornament the dining-room. The parlor has been transformed into a library. From floor to ceiling all four of its walls are covered with books. Their old and well-chosen bindings, seen in the ma.s.s, present nothing less than a feast of color to the eye. The library and the works of art are described as heirlooms, which have pa.s.sed into the possession of the present proprietor--one more among the hundreds of Englishmen who are ruined every year by betting on the Turf.
So sorely in need of a little ready money was this victim of gambling--tacitly permitted or conveniently ignored by the audacious hypocrisy of a country which rejoiced in the extinction of Baden, and which still shudders at the name of Monaco--that he was ready to let his pretty cottage for no longer a term than one month certain; and he even allowed the elderly lady, who drove the hardest of hard bargains with him, to lessen by one guinea the house-rent paid for each week. He took his revenge by means of an ironical compliment, addressed to Mrs.
Presty. "What a saving it would be to the country, ma"am, if you were Chancellor of the Exchequer!" With perfect gravity Mrs. Presty accepted that well-earned tribute of praise. "You are quite right, sir; I should be the first official person known to the history of England who took proper care of the public money."
Within two days of the time when they had left the hotel at Sydenham, Catherine and her little family circle had taken possession of the cottage.
The two ladies were sitting in the library each occupied with a book chosen from the well-stocked shelves. Catherine"s reading appeared to be more than once interrupted by Catherine"s thoughts. Noticing this circ.u.mstance, Mrs. Presty asked if some remarkable event had happened, and if it was weighing heavily on her daughter"s mind.
Catherine answered that she was thinking of Kitty, and that anxiety connected with the child did weigh heavily on her mind.
Some days had pa.s.sed (she reminded Mrs. Presty) since the interview at which Herbert Linley had bidden her farewell. On that occasion he had referred to her proposed marriage (never to be a marriage now!) in terms of forbearance and generosity which claimed her sincerest admiration.
It might be possible for her to show a grateful appreciation of his conduct. Devotedly fond of his little daughter, he must have felt acutely his long separation from her; and it was quite likely that he might ask to see Kitty. But there was an obstacle in the way of her willing compliance with that request, which it was impossible to think of without remorse, and which it was imperatively necessary to remove.
Mrs. Presty would understand that she alluded to the shameful falsehood which had led the child to suppose that her father was dead.
Strongly disapproving of the language in which her daughter had done justice to the conduct of the divorced husband, Mrs. Presty merely replied: "You are Kitty"s mother; I leave it to you"--and returned to her reading.
Catherine could not feel that she had deserved such an answer as this.
"Did I plan the deception?" she asked. "Did I tell the lie?"
Mrs. Presty was not in the least offended. "You are comparatively innocent, my dear," she admitted, with an air of satirical indulgence.