Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 3).djvu/245

 wind, he rode slowly home, completely crestfallen. He bitterly upbraided himself for having spared Evelyn's feelings with a result infinitely more deplorable than any scene she could have created on the road. He had imagined the poor fellow to be incapable for hours to come. Leaving the horse with the groom, he was following round the picket-fence to the front gate, as the night was so dark, when a figure rose from the ground_at his very feet. Dr. Methuen had no time to draw back. Strong arms embraced him, a heart thumped thrice against his own, and the the Bishop was left standing alone, peering into the darkness and dust, and listening to the dying beat of footsteps he should never overtake.

And this was the last he saw of his old schoolfellow's son. Some few weeks later came the noted night when the wholesale jeweller was at length known to be on his way inland to caress the hand that exhibited his merely representative ring. On that night the Bishop read in The Grazier of the violent death of Samuel Follet, by drowning, many miles higher up the river. It appeared that the young man's condition had become such as to necessitate a constant supply of watchers; that from one of these he had broken away, jumping into the river and being drowned, as stated. This was all. The Bishop had been alone with it more than an hour when Evelyn came in to bid him good-night. The paper was clenched tightly in his two hands. The pipe between his teeth had long been cold,

Of late there had been little enough in common between Evelyn and her father; but to-night she desired to say more than the customary three words. She was in great spirits, naturally; she wanted to talk. She shut the door and sat down; she sat down in the chair in which Follet had sat night after night for nearly five months.

"Do not sit there, Evelyn."

Dr. Methuen had found his voice, but to Evelyn it seemed a new voice. It was harsh, yet it quavered. She rose hastily, and as she rose the diamonds on her finger lightened under the lamp.

"Why not?"

"Because—because I wish to be alone."

She stooped to kiss him.

"Do not kiss me!" he cried, pushing back his chair.

"Why—why ever not?"

"I am smoking strong tobacco."

"You are not; your pipe is out."

"I don't think so," said the Bishop, attempting in quite good faith to animate that corpse. "Good-night, Evelyn."

"You are vexed with me!" exclaimed the girl, indignantly. "I won't go until you tell me the reason. Pray, what have I done?"

Then the Bishop could contain it no longer—and he never forgave himself for what he did. He jumped up, holding out the paper, and answered with a trembling finger on the place:

"This!"