Page:Once a Week Jun to Dec 1864.pdf/35

20 known, that he had a refuge just then to hide himself in.

“It’s new lines to them yet, Eliza,” he called out as he went, for the benefit of his rebellious daughters. “To Jane especially. They haven’t got their sea-legs on at present; but it will be all right in a day or two. Or you shall ask them the reason why.”

An exceedingly smart lady’s maid brushed past the earl, brushed past Jane, and addressed her mistress, with whom she had arrived.

“Your chamber is in order now, my lady, and what you’ll want to-night unpacked. I thought your ladyship might like a fire, so I have had one lighted.”

The countess passed out of the room, glad as the earl, perhaps, to make her escape. Jane grasped a chair in her heart-sickness.

Oh, reader! surely you can feel for her! She was hurled without warning from the post of authority in her father’s home, in which she had been mistress for years; she was hurled from the chief place in her father’s heart. One whom she regarded as in every way beneath her, whom she disliked and despised, over whom she had held control, was exalted into her place; raised over her. She might have borne that bitterness: not patiently, but still she might have borne it: but what she could not bear was that another should become more to her father than she was. He whom she had so revered and loved, he in whom her very life had been bound up, had now taken to himself an idol—and Jane henceforth was nothing.

She dragged her aching limbs back to her dressing-room and cowered down before the fire with a low moan. Judith found her there. The girl had a letter in her hand.

“My lady, Pompey’s nearly out of his mind with alarm. He says he’d rather run away back to Africa than that his fault should become known to his master. My lord gave him a letter to post for you yesterday, and he forgot it, and has just found it in his pocket.”

Jane mechanically stretched out her hand for the letter; mechanically opened it. It was short and pithy.

“Dear Jane:—I married Miss Lethwait this morning, and we shall be home to tea to-morrow: have things ship-shape. You behaved ill to her when she was with us, and she felt it keenly, but you’ll take care to steer clear of that quicksand for the future; for remember she’s my wife now, and will be the mistress of my home. “Your affectionate father, “.”

Jane crushed the letter in her hand and let her head fall, a convulsive sob that arose in her throat from time to time alone betraying her anguish. If ever the iron entered into the soul of woman, it had surely entered into that of Jane Chesney.

stood together in the library—the earl and his daughter Jane. The morning sun streamed in at the window, playing on the fair smooth hair of Jane, showing all too conspicuously the paleness of her cheek, the utter misery of her countenance. The earl, looking bluff and uncomfortable, paced the carpet restlessly, his stick, for a wonder, lying unheeded in a corner.

It was their first meeting since the of his return the previous night. Ah, what a night it had been for Jane! Never for an instant had she closed her eyes. As she went to bed, so she rose; not having once lost consciousness of the blow that had been dealt out to her.

She had heard the earl go into the library, after his breakfast. He had taken it with the countess and Lucy. And Jane, drinking at a gulp the cup of tea brought to her, and which had stood neglected until it was cold, went down stairs and followed him in.

Not to reproach him; not to cast a word of indignation on the usurping countess; simply to speak of herself, and what her future course must be.

“This is no longer a home for me, papa,” she quietly began, striving to subdue all outward token of emotion, of the bitter pain that was struggling within her. “I think you must see that it is not. Will you help me to another?”

“Don’t talk nonsense, Jane,” said the earl, testily, wishing he was breasting the waves in a hurricane off the Cape, rather than in this dilemma. “It will all smooth down in a few days, if you’ll only let it.”

Jane lifted her eyes to him, a whole world of anguish in their depths. “I could not stop here,” she said, in a low tone, quite painful from its earnestness. “Papa, it would kill me.”

And it seemed as if it really would kill her. Lord Oakburn grunted something unintelligible, and looked uncommonly ill-at-ease.

“You must let me go away, papa. Perhaps you will help me to another home?”

“What home? Where d’ye want to go?” he crossly asked.

“I have been thinking that I could go to South Wennock,” she said. “I cannot remain in London. The house at South Wennock