Evening Star Newspaper, July 31, 1897, Page 18

18 THE EVENING STAR. SATURDAY, JULY 31, 1897-24 PAGES. | = ETS the sea fs drowned by miles of chattering | §4 1) | of tat age—the acute eye can detect the | go up and tell them that if they would not | who, when be would have given another | good deal between this and that, Mr THE SAD SEA WAVES promenaders. W U R Y a exietbnce of an inner and outer ring of | have the mob pull the house down—”" toast, forced him away, scolding him j Pri Have a Treat as They Rollin at At- lantic City AND DASH UNDER THE BOARD WALK For the Summer Girl is There in All Her Glory. _—- A VISION OF REAL DELIGHT Special Correspondence of The Exening Star. ATLANTIC CITY, July 29, 1897. TLANTIC CITY'S A board walk contracts a continent and por- trays the smallness of the world almost 7 Naas surely and thor- \_———s=- oughly as does the = main deck of a mod- ern ocean steamsh'‘p. You are Hable to meet anybody on that board = walk whom you ever knew or heard of-just as you are like! row to sit down side by side at a cabin table of an Atl liner with the man who smoked a cigar h you a couple of weeks ago in the card reom of a Panama coffee freighter the st of Central off 1 is the perma- a perennial ase laved by a sea t and a surface trod- mori ksheesh generally well-groomed Coney Island is sleeves, or At- den as by h distrib in its shirt e with w. st fashion. from the rear—-and way the place can be a suggestion of Venice on its mere inged, as it practically is, by City wash brushes, Drawing clese to that is th carrie A Perennial World's Fair. the blue water of swamps, contrasting so brilliantly with’ the vivid green of sedge grass; but once inside the gates, the sug- gestion of Venice swirls away, and it is seen that Atlantic City is merely an enor- mous toy munity. American in its every villa gable, and palpably thrown together by Americans solely that therein they might have summer fun with the soupcon of sentimentality that the vicinage of the sea crea Visitors From the Capital. The crowds of Washingtonians who go jown there for greater of less periods find In Atlantie City some reproductions of na- tion@l capital manners and customs—which is not strange, ccnsidering that the sea- shore s flitting population 1s recrait- ed so larzely from practically the same classes of people who mak> Washfngton thelr permanent home. And when the fact is remembered that the Atlantic City girl has been pronounced by competent s to be the most absolutely bewitch- irl of the summer or winter species (but chiefly the former) to be found on the whole Atlantic cosst from Labrador to Key West, there should seem nothing un- flattering in a comparison from the feml- nine view-point of the girls of Washington and the girls of Atlantic City. There are, for instar only two sizable cities in the Unii where the young wo- men ea to the delightful, pic- turesque habit of strolling together bare- headed. They do that down en the board walk in ntic y, thousands of them, and W; onians, where the custom is s0 commonly engaged in, can understand how captivating the effect-is. Picture the young women of New York elty, for in- stance, walking in pairs and trios along the Battery sea wall, hours after night- fall, with absolute impunity, and no con- fousness whatever of the unusualness of Idleness a Business. The Atlantic City folks stick to the daily routine of summer lolling with an unhur- ried persistency that is appealing. For so dous an aggregation of people of temperaments so diverse, many of them, doubtless, naturally of the rushing, pitch- You Will Have It to Yourself. ing, headlong sort, the deliberate unanim- with which all hands seem to have agreed to make idleness a business and loafing a fine art for the time being 1s in- teresting. They all go down to the board walk at once; they all go into the water at once; they all eat their meals at the same time; all of them engage in their afternoon sleep of two or three hours at the same time, and the indulgence in the mild des- R ‘ation of flirtatiousness even seems to ave its especial hours. Go down to the board walk at any hour before 9 o'clock in the morning, and In nine cases in ten you will have it to yourself, save for the pres- ence of a few strollers who are not walk- ot that hour for their health and en- joyment, but because they have been on the beard walk all night, having no other place to go. The Atlantle City population is sitting on the great Atlantic City hotel or boarding house portico, reading the newspapers from Philadelphia, New York and Washington, or smoking or fanning, or doing all three at once. And all the kipg’s horses and king’s men can’t drag the Atlantic City population from the por- tico rocking chair until it gets ready to he dragged, no matter how aliuringly the sea murmurs {ts invitations. Then thé start is made all at once, and inside of ten min- utes the board walk has become magically @ mass of color, and the hoarse voice of Bathing by the Clock. Down at Atlantic City you go in bathing according to the clock, and not according to the tide. It is an exceedingly humorous scheme, but it has been adhered to for years. It makes no difference if the tide is out so far that you require a cable car to get to it, 11 o'clock is the bathing hour. You may point out that you should prefer to wait, say, until % o'clock in the after- noon, when the tide is to be in and the proper sort of surf shall be booming on the beach. Well, nobody is going to prevent you from going in at that hour, says the hotel proprietor or the bathing house man you are talking to, but was not the after- nocn made for sleep? The Atlantic City bath lasts for a solid two hours. At 1 o'clock, almost as if it were dene to the blast of siznal conchs fiom the depths of the sea, the heg:ra from the waters is on; and it is strange enough to Rides a Dinmond Frame. stand on the board walk and watch this sudden rush for the bath houses—on week days, that is, when excursionists are few. The excursionists are to be picked, the feminine excursionists, that is to say—ac- cording to the bathing house keepers—by the elaboration of their bathing dre: only the bathing: house men don't boration.”” say It §s the excursioning girl who wears the really stunning bathing suit at Atlantic City. She has usually taken it there on account of its splendor and the knowledge she possesses that she may wear it for one bath with impunity. Tht so the girl who, with her hair ilying to the zephyrs, rides a diamond frame wheel up and down the beach, clad in her bew!!- dering bathing costume. Whea she does this, it Is interesting to watch the expres- sions on the faces of the nearby watching women, especially those whose bathing skirts are of a dull and woolly black and ang around their ankle vearily. Women at the Show Hotels. But it is in the hoteis and on the board walk that the genuine iife of Atlantic City is led. In fact, a majority of the girls and women living at the more gorgeous of the hotels do not go into the water at all, more pafticularly if they are unfortunate enough to possess straight or stringy hair. Indeed, a strong and determined effort is being made to cast sea bathing ‘or women upon that already prodigiously big dump heap of “things out of form.” I: took only a moderate amount of observation down at Atlantic City to discover that the birth for this quiet passing of a new word was with the ladies who are stronger in cos- tumes than they are in natural advantages. The amount of daily Jressing that some of these ladies go through with at the show hotels of Atlantic City is almost unbe- lievable. And the ostentatious efforcs that some of them make not to let their rivals perceive their swift, furtive examinations of their (the rivals’) gowns are studies in the portrayal of acted indifference The dearth of men is one of the few things that have not outgrown the truthful art of the paragrapher. From Monday morning unt:1 Saturd: night it is a dearth that causes a vast deal of dancing between summer giris in hotel parlors and the for- mation of any number of summer girl friendships that somehow seem to tempo- rarily lose their enthusiasm when the trains begin to arrive on Saturday morning from New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Pitts- burg and Cincinnati—the cities which con- tribute the greatest number of Atlantic City visitors. The friendships are, of course, resumed when the Monday morning trains have begun to go; and the thing is quite well understood during the summer. Board Walk at Night. But the board walk is a blaze of light more thar it ever was. Gradually the va- shows, with their vinous-looking barkers waving the inevitable barkers’ have been forced down the line toward the darker end of the walk. Yet they have not been effaced by a good deal. The man with the humorous memory of the villainous continuous performances en- gaged in by people who look weary of life, and who are so herded cn their dingy stage The Hegira is On. by merciless managers that they must drink the ten-minutely glass of whisky that seems to be necessary to sustain their existences in the full view of the audiences—the man who, in brief, remembers his unspeakable Ceney Island, and firds a philosophical contentment in studying how far human imbecility may go, can still find all this at the farther end of the Atlantic City board walk. Bet he has to hunt it up. It is not obtruded upon his view. The very short- skirted young woman with the strange contrast of pallor and rouge on her leaden- heavy face may still be seen to walk out on her little stage in a barbarous atm phere of bac beer and cigar smoke, scatter her little cornucopia of sand in a half-cir- cle about the footlights, and amble through her dismal gyrations; so can the husky- voiced Hibernian policeman with the green Galways and the padded club; the girl who charms the fangless snakes; the decrepit bell ringer of our grandfathers’ day; the whole poor tribe. The Sailing Girl. The sailing girl is the genuine surhmer girl of high degree at Atlantic City this yea. Nor is her jaunty exterior over- pictured by the summer girl artist. She has it within her power (and knows it) to adopt the majestic toward the unnautical youth witn the nautical clothes who ac- companies her and suffers the frightful humiliation of being ill, while the nautical girl, quite comfortable herself, hands him the salts and takes the wheel. Here is a thing which should be men- tioned with reserve, but the wading sum- mer girl has also made her appearance in force at Atlantic City. She has possessed herself of wading stocxings and other gear, ordinarily dark in hue, especially devised for such work, and tn the early morning, when the sun first begins to make pris- Inatic the rushing crests of billows, the wading girl, sometimes with a small crab net in her hand, or a small bucket for clams, enjoys herself, with all the mirth of her little sisters, who wear no stockings for wading. The question is, why par- ticularly should not the wading summer girl exist? Yet, it is a fact that, somehow, she doesn’t look quite the same, or per- haps even @ little more the same, as the girl in the regular bathing dress. ——— A Rank Offense. From the Chicago Post. “May wo have the pleasure of your com- pany this evening, colonel?’ she asked. The colonel drew himself up haughtily and oe with every evidence of offended ignity: “Madam, I command a regiment.” —_—+o+—____ If you want anything, try an ad. in The Star. If anybody has. what you wish, you will get an answer, BY STANLEY J. WEYMAN. (Copyright, 1897, by Stanley J. Weyman.) Written for The Evening Star. Cont! ed From Last Saturday’s Star. “I understand, my lady, that you are say- ing things which are not fitting for me to hear,” the man answered in a tone of culd displeasure. “The King, thank God, is well. Wken he afls it will be time to talk of his succession.” “It will be a little late then,” she re- torted. “In the meantime, and to please arate = “Madam, anything else.” “You have not yet heard what I pro- Pose,” she cried shrilly. “To please me set your hand to a note which I will see safely delivered in the proper quarter, promising nothing in the king’s lifetime—there!—but only that in the event of his death you will support a restoration.” “I cannot do it,” he answered. “Why rot? You have done as much be- fore,” she rejoined with heat. “It may be; and been forgiven by the best master man ever had!” “Who feels nothing forgives easily, sneered. “But King. “Which king?” “The cnly king I acknowledge,” he an- swered unmoved. “He knows, believe me, far more than you give him credit for; and it were well if your friends bethought them of that before it be too late. He has wink- ed at much and forgiven more—no one knows it better than I—but he is not blind- ed, and there is a point, madam, beyond which he can be as steadfast to punish as your king. Amd if Sir John Fenwick, who I know well, is in England—” But at that she cut him short in a pas- sion which I doubt not she had curbed as long as it was in her impetuous nature to curb anything. “Odds my life!’ she cried, and at the sound of her voice uplifted in a shriek of anger, the woman listening be- side me raised her face to mine and smiled cruel triumph. “Odds my life, your king and my king! Kings indeed! Why, manti- kin, how many kings do you thing there are? By G—d, Master Charles, you will learn one cf these days that there is but one king, sent by God; one king, and no more, and that his yea and nay are life and death! You fool, you! I tell you you are trembling on the edge, you are tottering! A dav, a wek, a month, at most, and you fall, unless you clutch at the chance of safety I offer you! Sign the note! Sign the note, man. No one but the king and Middleton shall know of it, and when the day comes, as comes it will, it shall avail you.” ° ‘Never, madam; never,” was the cold an- swer. So much I heard and my lady’s oath and volley of abuse; but in the midst of these, and while she still raged, my com- panion, satisfied, I suppose, with what she had learned, ard assured that her lady would not get her way, twitched my sleeve, and softly taking up the lamp, signed to me to go before her. I obeyed, nothing loath, and, regaining the small ante room by which I had entered, found the man Smith awaiting us. When they had whispered together, “I'll see you home, Mr. Taylor,’’ said he, some- what grimly. ‘And tomorrow I will call and talk business. What we want you to do is a very simple matter.” “It is simply that my lady's son is a fool!” the woman cried snappishly. “Well,” he said, smilingly, “I should hardly call my Lord Shaftesbury that!” The woman screamed and clapped her hand to her mouth. “You babbling idiot!’ she cried. “You have let it out.” He stood gaping. ‘Good Lord!” he said. “You have let it out with a vengeance now!” she repeated furiously. He ked foolish; and at last, “He did not hear,” he said. “Hear? He heard, unless he is dea: she retorted. “You may lay your account with that. For me, I'll leave you. You have done the mischief and may mend it.” Chapter XVIII. But as the spoken word has sometimes the permanence which proverbs attach to the Littera scripta, and 1s only confirmed by bungling essays to erase it, so it was in this case, Mr. Smith's endeavors to. ex- plain away the fact which he had care- lessly blabbed only serving to impress it the more deeply on my memory. It would seem that he was partly aware of this, for not only did his lame attempts lack the dexterity which I should have ex- pected from one whose features seemed to avgur much experience of the world, but he quickly gave up the attempt as labor in vain, and gruffly bidding me go before to the coach, followed me and took his seat beside me. The night was overcast, the neighborhood seemed to be rural, and start- ing from an unknown point, I had less chance than before of tracing the devious lanes and streets through which we drove, so that when the coach stopped in a part of the town more frequented, I had not the least idea where we were or where we had been. “You can get home from here,” said he, still ruffled and scarcely able to speak to me civilly. Then I saw as I went to descend that we were near the end of Holborn, in the Ty- burn road, where it grows to country. “I will see you tomorrow,” he cried. “And mind you, in the meantime, the less you say to Ferguson the better, my man.” With which the coach drove away toward Kensington, leaving me standing against the wall of St. Giles’ pound. Released at last, alone and free to con- sider what had happened to me, I found a difficulty in tracing where I had been, but none at all in following the drift of the strange scene and stranger conversation at which I had been present. Even the plans of those who had conveyed me to that place were transparent. It needed no Sol- omon to discern that in the man Smith and the woman Montiret the young lord had two foes in his mother’s household as dan- gerous as foes could be; the woman moved, as I conjectured, by that spreta injuriae formae of which the great Roman poet speaks, and the man by I know not what old wrong or jealousy. It was plain that these two, to obtain their own ends, were urging on the mother a most perilous policy; that, I mean, of compromising the son with the Jacobite court, so that he might be cut off from St. James’; and that, as he could not be in- duced to such a treasonable step as would scrve their ends, advantage was to be tak- en of some likeness that I bore to him (which Smith had observed the previous evening in Covent Garden) to personate she ot twice,” he said gravely. ‘Ihe “You Asked for the Room.” rim in some place or company where his presence would be conclusive both for and against him. I could believe that the mother contem- plated but vaguely the power over him which the incident would give her and dreamed of using it only in the last resort: rather amusing herself in the present with the thought that short of that and without bringing the deception to his notice, the since conspirators, whereof the latter are com- monly the dupes of the former; so I took it that here Smith and the woman meditat- ed gfher and more serious results than those which my lady foresaw; and thinking less of my lord’s safety in the event of a restoration than of punishing him or ob- tainifg a hold upon him, and more of pri- vate.revenge than of the good cause, had madam for their principal tool. Such a consieration,- while it increased my re- luctaince te be mixed up with a matter so two-faced: left me to think whether I shoujd not seek out the victim, and by early, information gain his favor and pro- tectién. I Stood° in the darkness of the street weighing the matter. Clearly if I had to do the thing, now was the time, before I saw Smith, or exposed myself to an ur- gency, which. in spite of his politeness, I fancied might: be of a kind difficult to re- t. If by going straight to Lord Shaftes- bury I could kill two birds with one stone, could at once free myself from the gang of plotters under whom I suffered, and secure for the future a valuable patron, here was @ chance in a hundred, and I should be foolish to hesitate. Nor did I do so long. True, it struck me a little that I knew nothing of my Lord Shaftesbury’s whereabouts in London, nor whether he lived in town or in the great house among the laneg and gardens which I had visited, but of ‘the road whereto I had no more knowledge than a blind: man. But the tumult above, waxing loud at that moment, drowned her words, and cer- tainly took from me what little good will to ascend I had. However, the host, hav- ing me there, a person who had inquired for the room, would take no denial, but de- lighted to have found a deputy, fairly set me on the stairs and pushed me up. “Go up and tell them! Go up and tell them!" he kept repeating. You asked for the Toom, and there it is. In a word, I had no choice, and with re- luctance went up. The noise was such I could not fail to find the room, even if they would have let me. I knocked and opened: the roar of voices poured out, and even be- fore I entered the room I knew what was afoot, and could swear to treason. Cries such as “Down with the whigs and d—n their king!’ “The 29th of May and a glo- rious restoration!” “Here's to the hunting party!" poured out in a eonfused medley; with half a dozen others as treasonable and as certain, were they overheard in the street, to bring down the mob and the mes- sengers on the speakers, True, as soon as the haif-muddled brains of the company took in the fact that the door was open and a stranger standing on the threshold—which was not easily dis- cerned on the instant, owing to the cloud ‘of tobacco smoke that filled the room— nine-tenths quavered off into silence and gaped at me, that proportion of the com- pany having still the sense to recognize the risk they were running, and to appre- “KILLED THE KING,” SHE SAID. This, however, I could learn at the nearest coffee house, and, impulse rather than cal- culation directing my ste F hurried hot foot toward Covent Garden, which lay con- veniently to my hand. It was not until I was in the square and close to the piazza that I bethought me how imprudent I was to revisit the scene of my last night's adventure; a_ place where it was common knowledge that the Jacobites held their assignations. To re- inforce this late-found discretion and blow up the spark of alarm already kindled, [ had not stood hesitating while a man coul: count ten before my eye fcll on the very same soldierly gentleman with the hand- kerchief hanging out of his pocket to whom I had been sent the evening before. He was alone, walking.under the dimly lighted piazza, but as I caught sight of him two others came up and joined him, and fn terror lest these should be the two I had met before, I retreated jastily into the shadow of St. Paul's Church, and so back the way I had come. Hewever, I was not to get off so easily. Though the hour was late, the market be- ing closed, and the pavements in front of the taverils deserted, or only blocked here and there by a chair waiting for a belated gamester,I really ran a greater risk of b irg recognized as I passed than I thought, and ‘had hot gone ten paces along King street before I heard a light foot following me, dnd 4 hand caught my arm. Turning in @ fright, I found it was only a girl, and at first stght was for wresting myself from her, ‘rlad‘tkat it was no worse, but she muttered'my name, and, looking down, I recognized to my astonishment Ferguson's niece. 2 At ‘that "I remember a dread of the man, and ‘ils power seized me and chilled my very heart. For was not this the third time this girl, whom I scarce ever saw at other seasons, had arisen, as it were, out of the ground to confront me and pluck me back when on the point of betriying him? I stared at her, thinking of this with I know not what effright and shrinking, and could scarcely command either voice or limbs. And yet, as'sh2 stood looking at me, with the dim lengt% of the street stretching to the market betind her, it must be confess- ed that there was little in he~ appearance tocause terror. The night being cold and a small rain beginning to fall, she had a shawl drawn tightly over her head, whence her face, small and pale as a caild’s, peered at me. I thought to read in it a-sly and elfish triumph, such as became Ferguson's minion. Instead I discerned only a wearl- ness that went ill with her years, and a Uttle flicker of contempt in eye and lip. The weariness was in her voice, too, when she spke. “Well met, Mr. Price,” she said. “I am in luck to light on you. I shivered in my shoes, but without seem- ing to notice. want this note taken to Mr. Watkins,” she continued, rapidly, pressing a scrap of paper into my hand. “He is in the tavern there, the Seven Stars. Ask for the Apollo room, and you will find him.” “But,” I protested, as in her eagerness she pushed me that way with her hand, id Mr. Ferguson—is it from him?” ‘Of course, fool,” sho answered: bluntly. “Do you think that I have been standing here for the last half hour, cold and wet, for my own pleasure?’ ‘But if he sent it,” I remonstrated fee- bly, “perhaps he may not like me to—” ‘Like me to!’ she retorted sharply, mocking my tone. “Who said he would? Cannot you understand that it is I who do not like to? That I don’t want to go into that place at this time of night, and half in the house drunken brutes. It is bad enough to be here loitering up and down, as it I were what I am not, and free to be spoken to by every impudent blood that passes. Go, man, and do it, and I will wait so Jong. What do you fear?” ‘The rope,” said I. To be plain with you.’” And I looked with abhorrence at the scrap of paper she had given me. “I have taken too many of these,” I said. ‘Well, you will take one more!” she an- swered, doggedly. “Or you are no man. Sce, there Is the door. Ask for the Apollo room, give it to him, and the thing is done!” And she set both hands to me and pushed me the way she would have m move—I mean toward the tavern. “Go! she sald. “Go!” Hate the thing as I might, and did, I could not resist persuasions addressed to me in such a tone, or fail to be moved by the girl’s shrinking from the task, which eat be done, it seemed, by one or other of us. After all, it was no more than I had done several times before; and my reluctance, having its real origin in the resolution, to which I had just come, to break off from that gang, yielded to the reflection that the desi lay as yet in my own breast, and might hescarried out as well tomorrow as In a word, I complied out of pity, o the tavern and went boldly in. Hawimg=ubeen in the house before, and knowing where I should find a waiter of whog I Znight inquire privately, I passed Hic room, and would have gone place I mean. I had scarcely ad- vaneed three paces beyond the threshold, however, before a great noise of voices and laughter and beating of feet overhead sa- luted_my_ears and surprised me, for it was so loud and boisterous as to be unusual evenin places of that kind. I had no more than taken this in and set it down to an orgy beyond the ordinary when I came on a faced group standing at the foot of the ) Where, among others, were the landjc (ae = three drawers, aoe as many wo! Was easy to see that they were spe fever about the noise above, for while thé host was openly wringing his hands and crying that those devils would ruin him, a woman who seemed to be his wife was urging first one and then another of the drawers to ascend and caution the . That something more than digor- deriiness or a visit from the constable was in question, I gathered from their pale and wes confirmed in the impression med they dispersed a little hend that judgment had taken them in the act. Two men in particular, older than the rest, the one a fat, infirm fellow with a pallid face and the air of a rich citizen, the other a peevish, red-eved atomy in a green fur-lined coat, were of this party. They had not, I think, been of the happiest be- fore. Seated in the midst of that crew, but now sinking back in their high-backed chairs, they stared at me as if I carried death in my face. A neighbor of theirs surpassed even them, for with a howl that the secretary was on them and the office: were below, he kicked over his chair and dashed for a window, pausing only when he had thrown it up. However, even then the recklessness of some of the party was evident, for while 1 stood, uncertain to whom to ‘speak, one of the more drunken staggered from his seat, and, giving a shrill-voiced helloa that might have been heard in Bedford House, rade toward me with a cup in his hand “Drink!” he cried, with a hiccough, as he forced it on me. “Drink! To the squeez- ing of the rotten orange. Drink, man, or you are no friend of ours, but a’sniveling, sneaking, white-faced son of a Dutchman. like your master! So drink, and no lea ings, or—eh, what is it? What is the mat- ter?” PART XL Chapter It was no small thing could enlighten that brain, clouded by the fumes of drink and conceit, but at length the silence, now perfect and clothing panic—a silence that had set in with his first word, and a panic that had grown with a whisper, which passed round the table—came home to him. “What is it? What is the matter?” he re- peated, with a silly, drunken laugh. And he turned to look. No one answered him, but he saw the strange sight which I had already seen— his fellows fallen away from him and hud- dling on the further side of the table, as sheep huddle away from the sheep do; some pale, cross-eyed, and with lips draw back, seeking softly in their cloaks for weapons, while others stood irresolute or leaned against the wall shaking and un- nerved. At that sight he turned to me again, more than half sobered. “Won't he drink the toast?” he maundered in an uncertain voice. ‘“‘Why—why not, I'd like to know? Eh? Why not?” he repeated and stag- gered. At that some one in the crowd laughed hysterically; and, this breaking the spell, a second found his voice. “God! It is not the man!” the latter cried with a rattling oath. “It is not! I swear it is not!” he continued harsh exultation. “Here, you, speak fool!” he went on to me. “What do you here “This for Mr. Wilkins,’ I answered, hold- ing out my note. 1 meant no jest, but the words suvplied the signal for such a roar of laughter as well-nigh lifted the roof. The men were still between drunk and sober, and in the rebound of their relief staggered and clung to one another, and bent this way and that in a very paroxysm of convulsive mirth. Vainly one or two, less heady than their fellows, essayed to stay a tumult that promised every moment to rouse t watchmen; it was not until after a con- siderable interval, nor until the more drunken had laughed their fill—and I had asked myself a hundred times if these were men to be trusted with secrets and others’ recks—that the man with the white hand- kerchief, who had just entered, gained at last silence and a heating. This done, how- ever, he rated his fellows with the utmost anger and contempt; the two elderly gen- tlemen whom I have mentioned adding their quavering, passionate remonstrances to his. But as in this kind of association there can be little discipline, and those are most forward who have least to lose, the hot- heads only looked silly for the moment, and the next were calling for more liquor. “Not a bottle!” said he of the white hand- Lerchief. “Nom de Dieu, not @ bottle. “Come, captain, we are not on service now.” one remonstrated, looking darkly at “Aren't you?” sald he, them. “No, not we!” cried the other, recklessly. “And, what ts more, we will have no Regi. ment du Rol regulations here. Is nota rt ‘oO have gentleman @ second bottle if he att? 22, o'clock,” replied irmly. “For the love of hea’ wait until this business is over and then drink until you burst, if you please. For me,,I 1am going to bed.” : “But who is this—lord! I don’t ks to call him!” the fellow retorted, turning ‘unken gesture t 5 sentleman dancing master?’ ™® “This “‘A messenger from the old Fox. Mr. Tay- Jor, [ think ‘he calls himself.” ‘the offinee answered, turning to me. kes.” sata 1. “Well, you may go. Tell the gehi who sent you that Wilkins got his sean and will bear the matter in mind.” . ‘I said I would; and was going with that, and never more glad than to be out of thes gompany. But the fellow who had asked who I was and who being thwarted of Mo drink was now out of temper, called rude- ly to know where I got my wig, and who rigged me cut like a lord, swearing that Fergusoi must be a d—d deal the drink on me, who, in his hand, thrust himself in forcing the liquor on me so he spilled some over my though all the Scotch colon barred the way, I should = Seraraseie en me. s ure 8 work! A st: a firm hand! he cried. aon ane drink! For g:hunting we will go, and a. ! And if we don’t flush nham Green, call me a groan st at Charing on! gone, so drunk that it was that the fool would Cross next, but. and the man being evident resistance would hut render more obstinate and imperil my skin, I the cup and drank and gaye it back to Bt ee te caret ott prudent any in that compan: called prudent—had risen and % soundly for a leaky chatterer, and a fool who would ruin all with the drink. Freed from his" importunities, I watted for no second permission, but got me out and down the stairs, at the foot of whi the landlord's scared face and the waiting, | watching eyes of the drawers and servants, | still gathered there in a listening group, put the last touch to the picture of mad- tess and recklessness I had witnessed | above. Here were informers and evideaces ready to hand, and more than enough. If the very beggars in the street and the or- ange girls and nightwalkers who prowled the market were not sufficient to bring home to its authors the rank (reason they bawled and shouted overhead. The thought that such rogues should en- danger my neck, and good, honest men’s necks, made my blood run cold and hot at once; hot when I thought of their folly, cold when I recalled Mr. Ashton executed in "9% for carrying treasonable letters, or Anderton, the printer, betrayed and done } to death for printing the like. I could un- | derstand Ferguson's methods; they had reason in them, and if I hated them and Icathed them, they were not so very dan- serous. For he had disguises and many names and lodgings, and lurked from one to another under cover of night, and if he sowed treason, he sowed it steaithily and in darkness, with all the adjuncts which prudence and tradition dictated; he boasted to those only whom he had in his power and used them like instruments. But ine outbreak of noisy, rampant, reck- less rebeilion which I had witnessed—and which, it seemed to me, must be known within twenty-four hours to all London— filled me with panic and put me beside my- self. So that, when the girl who had em- ployed me on that errand met me in the street, I cursed her and would have passed her, being unable to say another word, lest I should weep. But s with nm and, keeping pace with tinually what it was, anc swer, by and by caught my arm and for me to stand in the p ge beyond Bedford | house and close to thy Strand. Here she repeated her question so fiercel. king me | besides if 1 was mad and the like, and showed herself such a little termagant, that | 1 had no option but to answer hb “Mad?” I cried passionate! I am mad—to have anything to do with such as | you.” ate | “But what is it? What has happened?” | she persisted, peering at me, and so barring the way that I could not pass. I, could hear that they were drinking, answered. “I knew that, and therefore I thought that you should go to them. drun the risk?” I said you are a man,” she ve answered coolly. ‘At that I stood so spoke it with meaning and a n aback—for she ort of in her tone—that for a minute I dic answer her. Then “Is not a man’s life as much to him as a woman's to her?” I said | Beaten replied. “Ay, but not a mouse’s! I will tell you what, Mr. Taylot or Mr. Price, , your name is— tali me i said. “Only | let_me go!” : : “Then 1 wil you Mr. Craven!” she j retcrte 1 Or Mr. Da in R cocks’ feather: And let you Go, €o, | you coware . you crave Though it was not the most gracious per- and stung me enough, 1 took it | and getting away from her, went down th age toward the Strand, leav- pas ing her there. But not giacly, although to go had been all I had asked a moment be- fore. No man, indeed, could have had it in | his mind more firmly made up to wrench | himself from the grasp of the gang whose tool this little s = nor to @ man | Lred to peaceful purs and flung inta such an wherein to dance on nothing seemed to be th® alterna: er way I looked. was it so much a matter of consequence be called a coward by a child that I must hesitate fer that. Moreover, the place and time, a dingy passage on a dark night, with rain falling and a chill wind blowing, and none abroad but such as honest men would avoid if they could, were not incen- tives to rashness or adventure. And yet when it came to going nullis ve: tigiis ‘retrorsum, as the Latins say, I proved to be either too much or too little of a man—these arguments notwithstand- ing; too litile of a man, I mean, to weigh reason justly against pride, or too much of a man to hear with philosophy a girl's taunt; 20 when I had gone fifty yards I halted, and then in a ‘moment went back. Not slowly, however, but in a gust of in tation: so that for a very little I could have struck the girl for the puling face and help- 1 ness that gave her an advantage over me. { found her in the same place, and asked her roughly what she wanted. “A man,” she said. “Well,” I answered, sullenly, it?” “Have I found one? That is the ques- tion,” she retorted. And at that again I could have had it in my heart to strike her | across her scornful child's face. “My un- cle is a man, 2 “He is a bad one, curse him,” I cried, in 2 fury. She looked at me coolly. “That is bet- ter,” she said. “If your deeds were of a piece with your words, you should be no man’s slave. His least of all, Mr. Price. “You talk finely,” I said, my passion cooling, as I began to read a covert mean- ing in her tone and words, and that she would be at something. “It comes well from you, who do his errands day and night.” “Or find some one to do them,” she an- swered, with derision, “Well, after this you will have to find some one else,” I cried, warming again. “Ah, if you would but keep your word!” she cried, clapping her hands softly and peering at me. “If you would keep your word.” Seeing more clearly that she would be at something, and wishing to know what it was, “Try me,” I sald. “What do you mean?” “It is plain,” she answered, “what I mean. Carry no more messages! Be sneak and spy no longer! Cease to put your head ina noose, to serve rogues’ ends! Have done. man, with cringing and fawning and trembling at big words. Break off with these villains that hold you, put a hun- dred miles between you and them, and be yourself! Be a mai “Why, you mean your uncle!” I cried, vastly surprised. “Why not?" she said. “But if you feel that way, why do his bidding yourself?” I answered, doubting all this might be a trap of that cunning devil. ‘If I sneak and spy, who spies on me, miss?” “I do,” she said, leaning against the wal of Bedford Garden, where one of Heming’s lights, set up at the next corner, shone full on her face. “And I am weary of it.” “But then if you are tired of tt—’ “If I am tired of it, why don’t I free my- self instead of preaching to you?” she an- swered, wearily. “First, because I am a woman, Mr. Wiseman. ‘I don’t see what that has to do with it,” I retorted. “Don't you?’. she answered, bitterly. “Then I will tell you. My uncle feeds me, clothes me, gives me a roof, and sometimes beats me. If I run away, gs I bid you run away, where shall I find board and lodging. or anything but the beating? A man comes and goes; a woman, if she has not some one to answer for her, must to the justice and thence to the round house, and be set to beating hemp, her shoulders smarting to boot. Can I get service without a char- “what is — travel without money?” 0. a alone, except to Whetstone Park?” “No.” “Well, It Is fine to be a man, then,” she answered, leaning her little shawled head further back against the wall and slowly moving it to and fro, while she looked at me from under her eyelashes. “For he can do all. And take a woman with him.” I started at that, and stared at her, and saw a little color come into her pale face. But her eyes, far from falling under my gaze, met my eyes with a bold, mischievous look, that gradually, and as she st{!l moved her head to and fro, melted into a smile. It was impossible ‘to mistake per mean- ing, and I felt a thrill run thro me such as I had not known for ten years. “Oh, said at last, and awkwardly, “I see now.” “You would have seen long ago if you had not been a fool.” she answered. And then, as if to excuse herself, added—but this I did not understand—‘not that fine feathers make fine birds—I am not such a fool myself as to think that—but——” “But what?” I said, my face warm. “I am a fool all the same.’ Her eyes falling with that and her pale face fast growing scarlet, though I could not follow her precise drift, of the main thing there was no doubt. And I take it there are few men that, upon such an in- vitation, however veiled, would not re- spond. Accordingly I took a step toward the girl and went, though clumsily, to put amy arm round her. But she angen ose off with pe sek that ‘surprised me, and mocked me with a face between mischief and triumph, a face that like a mutinous -boy’s than a “Oh, no,” she said. “There is a | settled? From the Flilegende Blatter. low?” I said shamefacediy. 0 you £0?" she asked sharply That first of all, if you ple: As to the going—somewhere—1 had “Ist nade up my mind long ago; before I met her, or went into the Seven Stars, or knew that a dozen raad topers were ‘roaring treason about the town, and bidding fair to hang us all. But being of a cautious temper. and seeing conaitions I had not pleted, added, and having besides idea that I could not withdraw I hesita It is dangerous!” 1 “I will tell you what ts dangerous,” she answered, showing her little white teeth as she flashed her eyes at me. nd that is to be where we ure. Do you know what they arc doing there?” and she pointed toward the market whence we had come. No,” 1 said reluctantly, wishing she would say no more. Killing the king,” she answered in low voice. “It is for Saturday or Saturday week. He is to be stopped in his has he comes from hunting—in the lane be tween Tul m green and the river You can ccunt their cha They are merry s. And now-—now,” she continued, u know where you stand, Mr. Price he it ix danger 5 4, trembling at that ty ign, which no whit surprised me rything I had heard corroborate know what I have to do.” “What?” she said “Go straight to the secr i, “and tell him pu won't do it, ‘on’t.”* he answered I asked, a-tremble with exctte And 1 bright, I 1, mo. king m only were her ey but her lips red. “Why, firstly, Mr. Pric because I want to have done with plots and live honestly, and that is not to on blood money secondly, it is Gangerous, as you call it want to be in ce, Set point at, end six months af coyed to Wapping. drop; hold, and carried over to France? “God forbid,” I said, aghast « | of things. “Then have done with infec answere little spurt o let it. be rate, until we ourselves and snug in the coun if you cl and you do not my uncle—for I will not have him tow —We moy talk of it. But not for money ‘safe and snv that moment most desirable iy on my « 1 felt will gc you will?” I answered. telling seemed of a ot that the she “And?” “And what?” 1 said, wondering. hesitated a moment and then: “That is for you to say, replied, lowering her eyes. It is possible that I might not have derstood her even then, if I had not mark ed her face, and seen that her bps we quivering with a sudden bashtulness whi vords manner in vain b» She was not, not all boldness, she nehed at last lowering her eyes. w forward t that covered her ad, the str urchin gone out of her. And [, seeing and understanding, had other and new thought of her which remained with me. “If yo mean that,” I said, “I will make you m. wife if you will let me.” “Well, we'll nwe get t Romford.” she nervou aside, and_pluckin, Inge of th shawl. “We have to escape fi And now liste che continued rapidly and in her ordinary voice. “My uncle is removing t norrow to another hiding place, and I go first with some clothes. He will not iit himself until it is dark. Do you put your trunk outside your door and I will take it and send it the Chelmsford wagon. At neon meet me at Clerkenwell gate, and we will walk to Romford and hide there until we_ know how things are going.” "1 “Why Romford?” I asked. . “Why anywhere?” she answered, impa- tient! That was true enough, and seeing In what mood she was, and that out of sheer cor trariness she was inclined, because she had melted to me a moment before, to be the more shrewish now, I refrained from ing further questions, listening inste her minute directions, which were given with as much clearne: 1 perspiculty as if she had dwelt on this escape for a twelvemonth past. It was plain, indeed, that she had not fetched and carried for the famous fuson for nothing, nor ods to little purpose. > Was this Mingled with this display of precociou skill there constantly appeared a touch of malice and mischievousness, mc natural in a boy than in a girl, and seldom found even in boys where the gutter served for a school. And throw again, as through the folds of a not this, eh shifting gauze. appeared now and then that which gradually, as I listened, took more and mvre a hold on me—the woman. Yet I suppose that there never w stranger love-making in the world, if making that could be called, wh at le of fear and death for one love, and a pu attuned slow and dreary drip of the eav bout us—and the monotoneus yelp of a cur chained among the stalls—than to the flut- ter of desire. And yet when, our plan agr the details settled, we turned homeward and went together through the stre eculd not refrain from glancing at companicn from time to time in doubt almost in incredulity. When th refused to melt, when I found h ing at my elbow, her small sh on a level with my shoulder—when I sav I found her so, not love, but a s of companionship, and a feeling of gratulas tion that I was no longer alone, stole for the first time into my mind and ‘comforted me. IT had gone many thre these streets solus et coelebs th: my ears and pinched myself in ishment at finding another beside other feet keeping time with mine knew whether to be more confound relieved to think that of all persons’ in- terests, her tnterests marched with min {To be continued.) st of us had in his mind ten th: of happiness or to rather the d upon and Take heart of grace, Today’s to ww Of early morning still doth play. Take heart of grace, and gather up This dewy sweetness of the morn, FUl up with this your emptied enp, And pledge the fair hours newly born, Take heart of grac 1 be Instend of backward on the w Wash out the old regretful seare, ‘The sorrowing sins of yesterday; And let the old mistakes and pain Be cleansed with this refreshing dew, And make beginning once again, With hope and courage bright and m For what's the world and ull its days, But ours to try and try again? Not ours to falter on its ways; ‘Not ours to fling aside for pain, Take heart of grace, then, day by day: ce heart of grace, ani sing each morn “Today's today, not yesterdays . And all the world is newly hefore, ——_+e- A Practical Havelock,