the calm had come after the storm; the great, hurrying, thundering waves had stilled into silence, and lay quiet over the shattered wreck of home, and happiness, and hope. the winter rain had beaten upon the pretty house, and the light snow had fallen and lain a while, and had then melted away upon the garden ground and the smooth green turf, within the walls which had made a prison to the restless spirit of margaret, even as the rain had beaten and the snow had fallen upon her grave in norwood cemetery. now the spring odours were abroad in the air, and the trees were breaking into leaf, and elm lodge was looking the very perfection of tranquillity, of well-ordered, tasteful comfort and domesticity; an appearance in which there was all the sadness of a great contrast, a terrible retrospect, and an irremediable loss. yet this appearance was not altogether deceptive; for within the house which had witnessed so much misery, peace and resignation now reigned. mrs. ludlow's unacknowledged desire was now realised; she was the mistress of her son's house, of all the modest splendour which had come with poor geoff's improved fortunes; she ruled now where she had been subordinate before, and in the nursery, where at best she had only enjoyed toleration, she found herself supreme. to be sure, the great element of enjoyment, her son's presence, was wanting; but she knew that geoffrey was doing the best thing in his power to do, was taking the most effectual means for the establishment of his health and the alleviation of his sorrow; and the old lady--on whom the supineness which comes with years, and which takes the edge off the sword of grief and the bitterness out of its cup, was beginning to steal--was satisfied. much that had occurred was only imperfectly known to her; and indeed she would have been unfitted, by the safe routine and happy inexperience of evil passions which had marked her own life, to understand the storm and conflict which had raged around her. that her son's beautiful wife had been utterly unworthy of him, and that she had deceived and left him, mrs. ludlow knew; but margaret's death had come so soon to terminate the terrible and mysterious dilemma in which her conduct had placed them all, that it had imposed upon them the silence of compassion, and filled them with the sense of merciful relief; so that by mutual consent her name had snot been mentioned in the house where she had been mistress for so long. her son's illness, and the danger of losing him, had impressed mrs. ludlow much more vividly than his domestic calamity; and she had settled down with surprising ease and readiness to the routine of life at elm lodge.

that routine included a good deal of the society of mr. charley potts; and as mrs. ludlow was almost as much attached to that warm-hearted and hot-headed gentleman as miss til herself, she acquiesced with perfect willingness in the state of affairs which brought him to elm lodge with regularity equalled only by that of the postman. the household was a quiet one; and the simple and unpretending women who walked along the shady paths at lowbar in their deep-mourning dresses, or played with the little child upon the lawn, furnished but scanty food for the curiosity of the neighbourhood. popular feeling was indeed somewhat excited on the subject of charley potts; but dr. brandram--a gallant gentleman in his way--set that matter at rest very quickly by announcing that charley and miss ludlow were engaged, and were shortly to be married--information which was graciously received; as indeed the most distant tidings of a prospective wedding always are received by small communities in which the female element predominates. dr. brandram had done geoffrey good service too, by his half-made, half-withheld communications respecting the beautiful mistress of elm lodge, whose disappearance had been so sudden. she had not recovered her confinement so well as he had hoped: the nervous system had been greatly shaken. he had ordered change: a temporary removal from home was frequently of great benefit. yes, there had been a terrible scene with mr. ludlow--that was quite true: the non-medical mind was hard to convince in these matters sometimes; and mr. ludlow had been hard to manage. but a quarrel between _them!_--o dear no: quite a mistake. mrs. ludlow left home by herself?--o dear no: by her own consent, certainly. she perfectly comprehended the necessity of the change, and was ready to submit; while ludlow could not be brought to see it--that was all. "i assure you, my dear madam," the doctor would say to each of his female catechists, "i never had a more interesting patient; and i never pitied a man more than ludlow when she sank so rapidly and unexpectedly. i really feared for _his_ reason then, and of course i sent _him_ away immediately. a little change, my dear madam,--a littlechange in these cases produces a wonderful effect--quite wonderful!"

"but, doctor," the anxious inquirer would probably say, "mr. ludlow never saw her again after she was removed, did he?"

"well, indeed, my dear madam,--you see i am telling professional secrets; but you are not like other women: you are so far above any vulgar curiosity, and i know i may rely so entirely on your discretion, that i make an exception in your case,--they never did meet. you see these cases are so uncertain; and cerebral disease developes itself so rapidly, that before any favourable change took place, the patient sunk."

"dear me, how very sad! it was at an asylum, i suppose?"

"well, my dear madam, it was under private care--under the very best circumstances, i assure you; but--you'll excuse me; this is entirely confidential. and now to return to your dear little boy."

so did kind-hearted dr. brandram lend his aid to the laying of the ghost of scandal at elm lodge; and gradually it became accepted that mrs. ludlow had died under the circumstances hinted at by dr. brandram.

"it is rather a disadvantage to the dear child, charley, i fear," sapiently remarked miss til to the docile mr. potts as he was attending her on a gardening expedition, holding a basket while she snipped and weeded, and looking as if pipes and beer had never crossed the path of his knowledge or the disc of his imagination; "people will talk about his mother having died in a lunatic-asylum."

"suppose they do?" asked charley in reply. "that sort of thing does not harm a man; and"--here the honest fellow's face darkened and his voice fell--"it is better they should say that than the truth. i think that can always be hidden, til. the poor woman's death has saved us all much; but it has been the greatest boon to her child; for now no one need ever know, and least of all the child himself, that he has no right to bear his father's name."

"it is well geoff is not a rich man, with a great estate to leave to an eldest son," said til, pulling at an obstinate tuft of groundsel, and very anxious to prevent any suspicion that her lover's words had brought tears to her eyes.

"well," said charley, with rather a gloomy smile, "i'm not so certain of that, til: it's a matter of opinion; but i'm clear that it's a good thing he's not a great man--in the 'nob' sense of the word i mean--and that the world can afford to let him alone. here comes the young shaver--let's go and talk to him." and charley, secretly pining to get rid of the basket, laid down that obnoxious burden, and went across the grass-plat towards the nurse, just then making her appearance from the house.

"charley is always right," said til to herself as she eradicated the last obstinate weed in the flower-bed under inspection and rejoined mr. potts; from which observation it is to be hoped that the fitness of miss til for undertaking that most solemn of human engagements--matrimony--will be fully recognised. there are women who practically apply to their husbands the injunctions of the church catechism, in which duty to god is defined; who "believe in, fear, trust, and love" them "with all their hearts, with all their minds, with all their souls, and with all their strength;" and matilda ludlow, though a remarkably sensible girl, and likely enough to estimate other people at their precise value, was rapidly being reduced to this state of mind about charley, who was at all events much less unworthy than most male objects of female devoteeism.

mrs. ludlow and her daughter heard pretty regularly from geoff. of course his letters were unsatisfactory; men's letters always are, except they be love-letters when their meaning is tempered by their exclusiveness. he was eager for news of the child; but he never referred to the past in any other respect, and he said little in anticipation of the future. he described his travels, reported the state of his health, and expressed his anxiety for his mother's comfort; and that was about the sum-total of these literary productions, which no doubt were highly penitential performances to poor geoffrey.

spring was well advanced when charley and til began to discuss the propriety of naming a time for their marriage. the house at brompton was still "on their hands," as mrs. ludlow was fond of saying, while in her secret heart she would have deeply regretted the turning-up of an eligible tenant; for who could answer for the habits and manners of strangers, or tell what damage her sacred furniture might receive? charley proposed to til that they should become her mother's tenants, and urged that young lady to consent to a speedy marriage, from the most laudable economic principles, on the ground that under present circumstances he was idling dreadfully, but that he confidently expected that marriage would "settle his mind." the recent date of the family calamity charley could not be brought to regard as a reasonable obstacle to his wishes.

"look here, til," he said; "it isn't as if we were swells, you know, with our names, ages, and weights in the _morning post_, and our addresses in the _red book_. what need we care, if geoff don't mind?--and he won't, god bless him!--the happier we are, the sooner he'll cease to be miserable; and who's to know or to care whether it's so many months sooner or later after that poor woman's death? besides, consider this, til; if we wait until geoff comes home, a wedding and all that won't be pleasant for him: will it, now? painful associations you know, and all that. i really think, for geoff's sake, we had better get it over."

"do you indeed, master charley?" said til, with a smile full of pert drollery, which rendered her exasperatingly pretty. "how wonderfully considerate you are of geoff; and how marvellously polite to describe marrying me as 'getting it over' no, no, charley," she continued, seriously; "it cannot be. i could not leave mamma to the responsibility of the house and the child--at least not yet. don't ask me; it would not be right towards geoff, or fair to my mother. you must wait, sir."

and the crestfallen charley knew that he must wait, and acquiesced with a very bad grace; not but that miss til would have been horribly vexed had it been better.

an unexpected auxiliary was about this time being driven by fate towards charley potts in the person of annie maurice. she had been constant and regular in her visits to elm lodge, affectionate and respectful in her demeanour to mrs. ludlow, and sisterly in her confidence towards til. the hour that had united the two girls in a tie of common responsibility towards geoff and margaret had witnessed the formation of a strong and lasting friendship; and though annie's superior refinement and higher education raised her above the level of matilda ludlow, she was not more than her equal in true womanly worth. they passed many happy hours together in converse which had now become cheerful, and their companionship was strengthened by the bond of their common interest in til's absent brother. miss ludlow, perhaps, did an unfair proportion of the talking on these occasions; for she was of the gushing order of girls, though she did not border even remotely on silliness. by common consent they did not speak of margaret, and til had never known arthur; so that annie rarely talked of him, always sacredly loved and remembered in her faithful heart, preserved as her friend and monitor--dead, yet speaking. annie had been more silent than usual lately, and had looked sad and troubled; and it chanced that on the day following that which witnessed charley's luckless proposition, miss maurice arrived at elm lodge at an earlier hour than usual; and having gained a private audience of til, made to her a somewhat startling revelation.

the conference between the girls lasted long, and its object took til completely by surprise. annie maurice had resolved upon leaving lord beauport's house, and she had come to ask mrs. ludlow to receive her. she told til her reasons, simply, honestly, and plainly.

"i cannot live in the house with lionel brakespere," she said; "and i have no friends but you. geoffrey and i were always friends, and my dear arthur trusted him, and knew he would befriend me. i am sure if he were living now, he would counsel me to do what i am doing. i have often thought if he had had any idea that the end was so near, he would have told me, if any difficulty came in my way, to apply for aid to geoffrey, and i am clear that i am doing right now. i have no friends, til, though i am rich," annie repeated, with a more bitter smile than had ever flitted over her bright face in former days; "and i have no 'position' to keep up. i cannot go and live in a big house by myself, or in a small one either, for that matter, and i want your mother to let me come and live with her while geoffrey is away."

til hesitated before she replied. she saw difficulties in the way of such an arrangement which annie did not; difficulties arising from the difference in the social position of the friends annie wished to leave, and those she wished to come to.

"i am sure, as far as we are concerned, every thing might be as you wish," she said; "but--lady beauport might not think it quite the thing."

"lady beauport knows i will not remain in her house, til; and she will soon see as plainly as i do that it is well i should not. the choice is between me and her son, and the selection is not difficult. lionel brakespere (i cannot call him by arthur's familiar name) and i are not on speaking terms. he knows that i am acquainted with his crimes; not only those known to his family, but those which he thought death had assisted him to hide. i might have concealed my knowledge from him had he not dared to insult me by an odious pretence of admiration, which i resented with all my heart and soul. a few words made him understand that the safest course he could pursue was to abandon such a pretence, and the revelation filled him with such wrath and hatred as only such a nature could feel. why he has adopted a line of behaviour which can only be described as down-right savage rudeness--so evidently intended to drive me out of the house, that lord and lady beauport themselves see it in that light--i am unable to comprehend. i have sometimes fancied that he and his mother have quarrelled on the matter; but if so, he has had the best of it. however, there is no use in discussing it, til; my home is broken up and gone from me; and if your mother will not take me under her charge until geoffrey comes home, and advises me for the future, i must only set up somewhere with a companion and a cat."

annie smiled, but very sadly; then she continued:

"and now, til, i'll tell you how we will manage. first, we will get the mother's leave, and i will invite myself on a visit here, to act as your bridesmaid, you see, and--"

"charley has been talking to you, annie!" exclaimed miss til, starting up in mingled indignation and amusement: "i see it all now--you have been playing into each other's hands."

"no, indeed, charley never said a word to me about it," replied annie seriously; "though i am sure if he had, i should have done any thing he asked; but, til, do let us be earnest,--i am serious in this. i don't want to make a scandal and a misery of this business of my removal from lord beauport's; and if i can come here to be your bridesmaid, in a quiet way, and remain with your mother when you have left her, it will seem a natural sort of arrangement, and i shall very soon, heiress though i am, drop out of the memory of the set in which i have lately moved. i am sure geoffrey will be pleased; and you know that dear little arthur is quite fond of me already."

it is unnecessary to report the conversation between the two girls in fuller detail. mrs. maurice carried her point; the consent of mrs. ludlow to the proposed arrangement was easily gained; and one day the fine carriage with the fine coronets, which had excited the admiration of the neighbourhood when miss maurice paid her first visit to geoffrey ludlow's bride, deposited that young lady and her maid at elm lodge. a few days later a more modest equipage bore away mr. and mrs. potts on the first stage of their journey of life.

"and so, my dear annie," wrote geoffrey to his ex-pupil, "you are established in the quiet house in which i dreamed dreams once on a time. i continue the children's phrase, and say 'a long time ago.' i am glad to think of you there with my mother and my poor little child. if you were any one but annie maurice, i might fear that you would weary of the confined sphere to which you have gone; but, then, it is because you _are_ annie maurice that you are there. sometimes i wonder whether i shall ever see the place again which, if ever i do see it, i must look upon with such altered eyes. god knows: it will be long first--for i am wofully weak still. but enough of me. my picture goes on splendidly. when it is finished and sent home to stompff, i shall start for egypt. i suppose many a one before me has tried to find the waters of lethe between the banks of nile."

charley potts and til were comfortably settled in the house at brompton, where til guarded the household gods with pious care, and made charley uncommonly comfortable and abnormally orderly. mrs. ludlow and her young guest led a tranquil life at elm lodge. annie devoted herself to the old lady and the child with a skilful tenderness partly natural to her and partly acquired by the experiences of her life in her rural home, and within the scene of caterham's lengthened and patient suffering. the child loved her and throve under her charge; and the old lady seemed to find her "cross" considerably less troublesome within the influence of annie's tranquil cheerfulness, strong sense, and accommodating disposition. the neighbourhood had taken to calling vigorously and pertinaciously on mrs. ludlow and miss maurice. it approved highly of those ladies; for the younger was very pleasant, not alarmingly beautiful, reputed to be very rich, and acknowledged not to "give herself airs;" while the elder was intensely respectable--after the fashion dear to the heart of lowbar; and both went to church with scrupulous regularity. dr. brandram was even more cordial in his appreciation of annie than he had been in his admiration of margaret; and the star of elm lodge was quite in the ascendant. a few of the members of the great world whom she had met in the celestial sphere of st. barnabas square found annie out even at elm lodge, and the apparition of other coronets than that of the beauports was not unknown in the salubrious suburb. lady beauport visited miss maurice but rarely, and her advent seldom gave annie pleasure. the girl's affectionate and generous heart was pained by the alteration which she marked more and more distinctly each time that she saw the cold and haughty countess, on whose face care was fast making marks which time had failed to impress.

sometimes she would be almost silent during her short visits, on which occasions mrs. ludlow was wont to disappear as soon as possible; sometimes she would find querulous fault with annie--with her appearance and her dress, and her "throwing herself away." sometimes annie felt that she was endeavouring to turn the conversation in the direction of lionel; but that she invariably resisted. it chanced one day, however, that she could not succeed in preventing lady beauport from talking of him. time had travelled on since annie had taken up her abode at elm lodge, and the summer was waning; the legislative labours of the houses had come to an end, and lord and lady beauport were about to leave town. this time the countess had come to say goodbye to annie, whom she found engaged in preparations for a general flitting of the elm-lodge household to the seaside for the autumn. annie was in blooming health, and her usual agreeable spirits--a strong contrast to the faded, jaded, cross-looking woman who said to her complainingly,

"really, annie, i think you might have come with us, and left your friends here to find their autumnal amusements for themselves; you know how much lord beauport and i wished it."

"yes," said annie gently, "i know you are both very kind; but it cannot be. you saw that yourself, dear lady beauport, and consented to my entering on so different a life. you see i could not combine the two; and i have new duties now--"

"nonsense, annie!" said lady beauport angrily. "you will not come because of lionel,--that is the truth. well, he is not to be at home at all; he is going away to a number of places: he likes any place better than home, i think. i cannot understand why you and he should disagree so much; but if it must be so, i suppose it must. however, you will not meet him now." and lady beauport actually condescended to reiterate her request; but she had no success. annie had resolutely broken with the old life, which had never suited her fresh, genial, simple tastes; and she was determined not to renew the tie. she knew that she was not in any true sense necessary to lady beauport's happiness; she was not ungrateful for such kindness as she had received; but she was a sensible girl, and she made no mistake about her own value, and the true direction in which her duty, her vocation lay. so she steadily declined; but so gently that no offence was taken; and made inquiry for lord beauport. the worried expression which had gradually marred the high-bred repose of lady beauport's face increased as she replied, and there was a kind of involuntary confidence in her manner which struck annie with a new and painful surprise. lord beauport was well, she said; but he was not in good spirits. things seemed to be wrong with them somehow and out of joint. then the elder lady, seeing in the face of her young listener such true sympathy, thawed suddenly from her habitual proud reserve, and poured out the bitterness of her disappointment and vain regret. there was a tone of reproach against annie mingled with her compliant, which the girl pityingly passed over. if annie had but liked lionel; if she would but have tried to attract him, and keep him at home, all might have been well: but annie had imbibed poor arthur's prejudices; and surely never were parents so unfortunate as she and the earl in the mutual dislike which existed between their children. lady beauport did not want to justify lionel entirely--of course not: but she thought he might have had a better chance given him in the first instance. now he had greatly deteriorated--she saw that: she could not deny it; and her "granted prayer" for his return had not brought her happiness.

annie listened to all this with a swelling heart. a vision floated before her tearful eyes of the lost son, who had been so little loved, so lightly prized; whose place the brother preferred before him had taken and disgraced; and a terrible sense of retribution came into her mind. too late the father and mother were learning how true his judgment had been, and how valuable his silent influence. time could only engrave that lesson more and more deeply on their hearts; experience could only embitter it--its sting was never to be withdrawn. they had chosen between the two, and their choice, like esau's, was "profane." lady beauport spoke more and more bitterly as she proceeded. the softening touch of grief was not upon her--only the rankling of disappointment and mortification; only the sting of a son's ingratitude, of discovering that in return for the sacrifice of principle, self-respect, and dignity to which she had consented for lionel's sake, she had not received even the poor return of a semblance of affection or consideration.

the hardness of lionel's nature was shown in every thing his mother said of him--the utter want of feeling, the deadness of soul. annie felt very sad as she listened to lady beauport's melancholy account of the life they had fallen into at the great house. she was oppressed by the sense of the strangeness of the events which had befallen, and in which the countess had, all unconsciously, so deep an interest. it was very sad and strange to remember that she was detailing the conduct of the man whose baseness had enabled margaret to lay geoffrey's life in ruins under geoffrey's own roof. it was terrible to annie to feel that in her knowledge there was a secret which might so easily have been divulged at any moment, and which would have afflicted the vexed and mortified woman before her more deeply than any thing that had occurred. lady beauport was not tender-hearted; but she was a high-minded gentlewoman, and would have been shamed and stricken to the soul had she discovered the baseness of her son in this particular instance. she had fondly flattered herself into a belief that the crime which had been so inadequately punished was only a folly; but there was no possibility of such a reading of this one, and annie was glad to think that at least the pang of this knowledge was spared to lady beauport. she could say nothing to comfort her. in her inmost heart she had an uneasy, unexplained sense that it was all the just retribution for the conduct of arthur's parents towards him, and hopelessness for the future of a family of which lionel formed a member took possession of her.

"he is so disagreeable, so selfish, annie," continued lady beauport, "and o so slangy; and you know how his father hates that sort of thing."

"it is better that he should be away, then, for a little," said annie, trying to be soothing, and failing lamentably.

"well, perhaps it is," said lady beauport; "and yet that seems hard too, when i longed so much for his return, and when now he has every thing he wants. of course, when he was only a second son, he had excuses for discontent; but now he has none, and yet he is never satisfied. i sometimes think he is ill at ease, and fancies people are thinking about the past, who don't even know any thing about it, and would not trouble themselves to resent it if they did. but his father does not agree with me, annie: he will not give lionel credit for any thing good. i cannot make out lord beauport: he is much more cold and stern towards lionel than he need be, for he is not so careless and inconsiderate towards his father as he is towards me. he seems to have taken up poor arthur's notions now, and to judge lionel as severely as he did. he does not say much; but things are uncomfortable between them, and lord beauport is altered in every way. he is silent and dispirited; and do you know, annie, i think he grieves for arthur more than he did at first?"

distress and perplexity were in lady beauport's face and voice, and they went to annie's gentle heart.

"try not to think so much of it," she said; "circumstances may alter considerably when lionel gets more settled at home, and lord beauport has had time to get over the irritation which his return occasioned him."

"he resents your having left us more bitterly than any thing, annie. he constantly speaks of you in the highest terms of praise, and wishes you back with us. and so do i, my dear, so do i."

annie was amazed. tears were in lady beauport's eyes, and a tremble in her voice. during all the period of annie's residence in her house, the countess had never shown so much feeling towards her, had never suffered her to feel herself of so much importance. the sterling merit of the girl, her self-denial, her companionable qualities, had never before met with so much recognition; and a thrill of gratification passed through her as she felt that she was missed and valued in the home whence lionel's conduct had driven her.

"i am very glad," she said, "that lord beauport thinks and speaks so kindly of me--indeed, he was always kind to me, and i am very grateful to him and you."

"then why will you not come to us, annie? why do you prefer these new friends to us?"

"i do not," she answered; "but as things have been, as they are, it is better i should not be in a position possibly to estrange the father and son still more. if i were in the house, it would only furnish him with an excuse to remain away, and cause lord beauport additional anxiety."

annie knew that she must appear strangely obstinate to lady beauport; but it could not be helped; it was impossible that she could explain. the visit of the countess was a long one; and annie gathered from her further confidences that her dissatisfaction with lionel was not her only trouble. the future was not bright before lady beauport. the charms of the world were fading in her estimation; society was losing its allurements, not under the chastening of a wholesome grief; but under the corroding, disenchanting influence of bitterness and disappointment. she looked aged and wearied; and before she and annie parted that day, she had acknowledged to the girl that she dreaded the prospect before her, and had no confidence in her only son, or in his line of conduct towards her in the event of lord beauport's death. the earl's words to his wife had been prophetic,--in caterham's death there had been but the beginning of sorrow.

annie stood sadly at the house-door, and watched the carriage as it rolled away and bore lady beauport out of her sight, as it bears her out of this history.

"this is the man," she thought, "whom she would have remorselessly made me marry, and been insensible to the cruel wrong she would have done to me. what a wonderful thing is that boundless, blind egotism of mothers! in one breath she confesses that he makes her miserable, and admits his contemptible, wretched nature, though she knows little of its real evil; in the next she complains that i did not tie myself to the miserable destiny of being his wife!"

then annie turned into the drawing-room, and went over to the window, through whose panes margaret's wistful, weary gaze had been so often and so long directed. she leaned one round fair arm against the glass, and laid her sleek brown head upon it, musingly:

"i wonder when _home_ will really come for me," she thought. "i wonder where i shall go to, and what i shall do, when i must leave this. i wonder if little arthur will miss me very much when i go away, after geoffrey comes back."

geoffrey ludlow's letters to his mother and sister were neither numerous nor voluminous, but they were explicit; and the anxious hearts at home gradually began to feel more at rest about the absent one so dear to them all. he had written with much kindness and sympathy on the occasion of til's marriage, and they had all felt what a testimony to his unselfish nature and his generous heart his letter was. with what pangs of memory,--what keen revivals of vain longing love and cruel grief for the beautiful woman who had gone down into her grave with the full ardour of his passionate devotion still clinging around her,--what desperate struggles against the weariness of spirit which made every thing a burden to him,--geoffrey had written the warm frank letter over which til had cried, and charley had glowed with pleasure, the recipients never knew. there was one who guessed them,--one who seemed to herself intuitively to realise them all, to weigh and measure every movement of the strong heart which had so much ado to keep itself from breaking, far away in the distant countries, until time should have had sufficient space in which to work its inevitable cure. mrs. potts showed her brother's letter to annie maurice with infinite delight, on that memorable day when she made her first visit, as a married woman, to elm lodge. the flutter and excitement of so special an occasion makes itself felt amid all the other flutters and excitements of that period which is the great epoch in a woman's life. the delights of "a home of one's own" are never so truly realised as when the bride returns, as a guest, to the home she has left for ever as an inmate. it may be much more luxurious, much more important, much more wealthy; but it is not hers, and, above all, it is not "his;" and the little sense of strangeness is felt to be an exquisite and a new pleasure. til was just the sort of girl to feel this to the fullest, though her "own" house was actually her "old" home, and she had never been a resident at elm lodge: but the house at brompton had a thousand charms now which til had never found in it before, and on which she expatiated eagerly to mrs. ludlow, while annie maurice was reading geoffrey's letter. she was very pale when she handed it back to til, and there were large tears standing in her full brown eyes.

"isn't it a delightful letter, annie?" asked mrs. potts; "so kind and genial; so exactly like dear old geoff."

"yes," annie replied, very softly; "it is indeed, til; it is very like geoffrey."

then annie went to look after little arthur, and left the mother and daughter to their delightful confidential talk.

when the party from elm lodge were at the seaside, after til's marriage, annie began to write pretty regularly to geoffrey, who was then in egypt. she was always thinking of him, and of how his mind was to be roused from its grief; and once more interested in life. she felt that he was labouring at his art for money, and because he desired to secure the future of those dear to him, in the sense of duty, but that for him the fame which he was rapidly winning was very little worth, and the glory was quite gone out of life,--gone down, with the golden hair and the violet eyes, into the dust which was lying upon them. annie, who had never known a similar grief; understood his in all its intricacies of suffering, with the intuitive comprehension of the heart, which happily stands many a woman instead of intellectual gifts and the learning of experience; and knowing this, the girl, whose unselfish spirit read the heart of her early friend, but never questioned her own, sought with all her simple and earnest zeal how to "cure him of his cruel wound." his picture had been one of the gems of the academy, one of the great successes of the year, and annie had written to him enthusiastically about it, as his mother had also done; but she counted nothing upon this. geoffrey was wearily pleased that they were pleased and gratified, but that was all. his hand did its work, but the soul was not there; and as he was now working amid the ruins of a dead world, and a nation passed away in the early youth of time, his mood was congenial to it, and he grew to like the select lapse of the sultry desert life, and to rebel less and less against his fate, in the distant land where every thing was strange, and there was no fear of a touch upon the torturing nerves of association. all this annie maurice divined, and turned constantly in her mind; and amidst the numerous duties to which she devoted herself with the quiet steadiness which was one of her strongest characteristics, she thought incessantly of geoffrey, and of how the cloud was to be lifted from him. her life was a busy one, for all the real cares of the household rested upon her. mrs. ludlow had been an admirable manager of her own house, and in her own sphere, but she did not understand the scale on which elm lodge had been maintained even in margaret's time, and that which miss maurice established was altogether beyond her reach. the old lady was very happy; that was quite evident. she and annie agreed admirably. the younger lady studied her peculiarities with the utmost care and forbearance, and the "cross" sat lightly now. she was growing old; and what she did not see she had lost the faculty of grieving for; and geoffrey was well, and winning fame and money. it seemed a long time ago now since she had regarded her daughter-in-law's furniture and dress with envy, and speculated upon the remote possibility of some day driving in her son's carriage.

mrs. ludlow had a carriage always at her service now, and the most cheerful of companions in her daily drive; for she, annie, and the child made country excursions every afternoon, and the only time the girl kept for her exclusive enjoyment was that devoted to her early-morning rides. some of the earliest among the loungers by the sad sea-waves grew accustomed to observe, with a sense of admiration and pleasure, the fresh fair face of annie maurice, as, flushed with exercise and blooming like a rose in the morning air, she would dismount at the door of her "marine villa," where a wee toddling child always awaited her coming, who was immediately lifted to her saddle, and indulged with a few gentle pacings up and down before the windows, whence an old lady would watch the group with grave delight. mrs. ludlow wrote all these and many more particulars of her happy life to her absent son; and sometimes annie wondered whether those cheerful garrulous letters, in which the unconscious mother showed geoffrey so plainly how little she realised his state of mind, increased his sense of loneliness. then she bethought her of writing to geoffrey constantly about the child. she knew how he had loved the baby in happier times, and she never wronged the heart she knew so well by a suspicion that the disgrace and calamity which had befallen him had changed this deep-dwelling sentiment, or included the motherless child in its fatal gloom. she had not spoken of little arthur in her earlier letters more than cursorily, assuring his father that the child was well and thriving; but now that time was going over, and the little boy's intellect was unfolding, she caught at the legitimate source of interest for geoffrey, and consulted him eagerly and continuously about her little _protégé_ and pupil.

the autumn passed and the winter came; and mrs. ludlow, her grandchild, and annie maurice were settled at elm lodge. annie had taken anew to her painting, and geoffrey's deserted studio had again an inmate. hither would come charley potts--a genial gentleman still, but with much added steadiness and scrupulously-neat attire. the wholesome subjugation of a happy marriage was agreeing wonderfully with charley, and his faith in til was perfectly unbounded. he was a model of punctuality now; and when he "did a turn" for annie in the painting-room, he brushed his coat before encountering the unartistic world outside with a careful scrupulousness, at which, in the days of caroline and the beer-signals, he would have derisively mocked. another visitor was not infrequent there, though he had needed much coaxing to induce him to come, and had winced from the sight of geoff's ghostly easel on his first visit with keen and perceptible pain.

a strong mutual liking existed between william bowker and annie maurice. each had recognised the sterling value of the other on the memorable occasion of their first meeting; and the rough exterior of bowker being less perceptible then than under ordinary circumstances, it had never jarred with annie's taste or offended against her sensibilities. so it came to pass that these two incongruous persons became great friends; and william bowker--always a gentleman in the presence of any woman in whom he recognised the soul of a lady--passed many hours such as he had never thought life could again give him in his dear old friend's deserted home. miss maurice had no inadequate idea of the social duties which her wealth imposed upon her, and she discharged them with the conscientiousness which lent her character its combined firmness and sweetness. but all her delight was in her adopted home, and in the child, for whom she thought and planned with almost maternal foresight and quite maternal affection. william bowker also delighted in the boy, and would have expended an altogether unreasonable portion of his slender substance upon indigestible eatables and curiously-ingenious and destructible toys but for annie's prohibition, to which he yielded loyal obedience. many a talk had the strangely-assorted pair of friends as they watched the child's play; and they generally ran on geoffrey or if they rambled off from him for a while, returned to him through strange and tortuous ways. not one of geoff's friends forgot him, or ceased to miss him, and to wish him back among them. not one of "the boys" but had grieved in his simple uncultivated way over the only half-understood domestic calamity which had fallen upon "old geoff;" but time has passed, and they had begun to talk more of his pictures and less of himself. it was otherwise with bowker, whose actual associates were few, though his spirit of _camaraderie_ was unbounded. he had always loved geoffrey ludlow with a peculiar affection, in which there had been an unexplained foreboding; and its full and terrible realisation had been a great epoch in the life of william bowker. it had broken up the sealed fountains of feeling; it had driven him away from the grave of the past; it had brought his strong sympathies and strong sense into action, and had effected a moral revolution in the lonely man, who had been soured by trouble only in appearance, but in whom the pure sweet springs of the life of the heart still existed. now he began to weary for geoffrey. he dreaded to see his friend sinking into the listlessness and dreariness which had wasted his own life; and geoffrey's material prosperity, strongly as it contrasted with the poverty and neglect which had been his own lot, did not enter into bowker's calculations with any reassuring effect.

"does geoffrey never fix any time for his return?" asked william bowker of miss maurice one summer evening when they were slowly pacing about the lawn at elm lodge, after the important ceremonial of little arthur's _coucher_ had been performed.

"no," said annie, with a quick and painful blush.

"i wish he would, then," said bowker. "he has been away quite long enough now; and he ought to come home and face his duties like a man, and thank god that he has a home, and duties which don't all centre in himself. if they did, the less he observed them the better." this with a touch of the old bitterness, rarely apparent now. annie did not answer, and bowker went on:

"his mother wants him, his child wants him, and for that matter mrs. potts's child wants him too. charley talks some nonsense about waiting to baptize the little girl until geoff comes home 'with water from the jordan,' said master charley, being uncertain in his geography, and having some confused notion about some sacred river. however, if we could only get him home, he might bottle a little of the nile for us instead. i really wish he'd come. i want to know how far he has really lived down his trouble; i can't bear to think that it may conquer and spoil him."

"it has not done that; it won't do that--no fear of it," said annie eagerly; "i can tell from his letters that geoffrey is a strong man again,--stronger than he has ever been before."

"he needs to be, miss maurice," said william, with a short, kind, sounding laugh, "for geoffrey's nature is not strong. i don't think i ever knew a weaker man but one--"

he paused, but annie made no remark. presently he fell to talking of the child and his likeness to geoffrey, which was very strong and very striking.

"there is not a trace of the poor mother in him," said bowker; "i am glad of it. the less there is before geoffrey's eyes when he returns to remind him of the past the better."

"and yet," said annie in a low voice, and with something troubled in her manner, "i have often thought if he returned, and i saw his meeting with the child, how dreadful it would be to watch him looking for a trace of the dead in little arthur's face, and not finding it, to know that he felt the world doubly empty."

her face was half averted from bowker as she spoke, and he looked at her curiously and long. he marked the sudden flush and pallor of her cheek, and the hurry in her words; and a bright unusual light came into william bowker's eyes. he only said,

"ay--that would indeed be a pang the more." and a few minutes later he took his leave.

"charley," said mr. bowker to mr. potts, three or four gays afterwards, as he stood before that gentleman's easel, criticising the performance upon it with his accustomed science and freedom, "why don't you get your wife to write to geoffrey, and make him come home? he ought to come, you know, and it's not for you or me to remonstrate with him. women do these things better than men; they can handle sores without hurting them, and pull at heartstrings without making them crack. there's his mother, growing old, you know, and wanting to see him; and the child's a fine young shaver now, and his father ought to know something of him, eh, charley, what do you think?"

"you're about right, old fellow, that's what i think. til often talks about it, particularly since the baby was born, and wonders how geoffrey can stay away; but i suppose if his own child won't bring him home, ours can't be expected to do it; eh, william? til doesn't think of that, you see."

"i see," said mr. bowker, with a smile. "but, charley, do you just get til to write to geoffrey, and tell him his mother is not as strong as she used to be, and that the care of her and the child is rather too much of a responsibility to rest upon miss maurice's shoulders, and i think geoffrey will see the matter in the true light, and come home at once."

charley promised to obey mr. bowker's injunction, premising that he must first "talk it over with til." william made no objection to this perfectly proper arrangement, and felt no uneasiness respecting the result of the conjugal discussion. he walked away smiling, congratulating himself on having done "rather a deep thing," and full of visions in which geoffrey played a part which would have considerably astonished him, had its nature been revealed to him.

six weeks after the conversation between mr. bowker and mr. potts, a foreign letter in geoffrey's hand reached mrs. ludlow. she hardly gave herself time to read it through, before she sought to impart its tidings to annie. the young 114 was not in the painting-room, not in the drawing-room, not in the house. the footman thought he had seen her on the lawn with the child, going towards the swing. thither mrs. ludlow proceeded, and there she found annie; her hat flung off; her brown hair falling about her shoulders, and her graceful arms extended to their full length as she swung the delighted child, who shouted "higher, higher!" after the fashion of children.

"geoffrey's coming home, annie!" said mrs. ludlow, as soon as she reached the side of the almost breathless girl. "he's coming home immediately,--by the next mail. is not that good news?"

the rope had dropped from annie's hand at the first sentence. now she stooped, picked up her hat, and put it on; and turning to lift the child from his seat, she said,

"yes, indeed, mrs. ludlow, it is; but very sudden. has any thing happened?"

"nothing whatever, my dear. geoffrey only says--stay, here's his letter; read for yourself. he merely says he feels it is time to come home; he has got all the good out of his captivity in egypt in every way that he is likely to get--though why he should call it captivit when he went there of his own accord, and could have come away at any moment he liked, is more than i can understand. well, well, geoffrey always had queer sayings; but what matter, now that he is coming home!--papa is coming home, arty;--we shall see him soon."

"shall we?" said the child. "let me go, annie; you are making my hand cold with yours;" and he slipped his little hand from her grasp, and ran on to the house, where he imparted the news to the household with an air of vast importance.

"annie," said geoffrey ludlow one day when he had been about three weeks at home, and after he had passed some time in examining miss maurice's art-performances, "what has become of the drawing i once made of you, long ago, when you were a little girl? don't you remember you laughed at it, and said, 'grandmamma, grandmamma, what big eyes you've got!' to it? and the dear old rector was so dreadfully frightened lest i should be offended."

"yes, i remember," answered annie; "and i have the picture. why?"

"because i want it, annie. if you will let me have it, i will paint a full-length portrait of you for the next academy, in which every one shall recognise a striking likeness of the beautiful and accomplished miss maurice."

"don't, geoffrey," said annie gravely. "i am not in the least more beautiful now than i was when you took my likeness long ago; but you shall have the drawing, and you shall paint the picture, and it shall belong to arthur, to remind him of me when i am gone abroad."

"gone abroad!" said geoffrey, starting up from his chair and approaching her. "you--gone abroad!"

"yes," she said, with a very faint smile. "is no one to see men and cities, and sand and sphinxes, and mummies and nile boatmen, except yourself? don't you remember how caterham always wished me to travel and improve my mind?"

"i remember," said geoff moodily; "but i don't think your mind wants improving, annie. how selfish i am! i really had a kind of fancy that this was your home; different as it is from such as you might, as you may command, it was your own choice once. you see what creatures we men are. a woman like you sacrifices herself for one of us, to do him good in his adversity, and he takes it as a matter of course that the sacrifice is to continue--" geoffrey turned to the window, and looked wearily out. from the dim corner in which she sat, annie looked timidly at his tall figure--a true image of manliness and vigour. she could see the bronzed cheek, the full rich brown eye, the bushy beard with its mingled lines of brown and gray. there was far more strength in the face than in former days, and far more refinement, a deeper tenderness, and a loftier meaning. she thought so as she looked at him, and her heart beat hard and fast.

"it was no sacrifice to me, geoffrey," she said in a very low tone. "you know i could not bear the life i was leading. i have been very happy here. every one has been very good to me, and i have been very happy; but--"

geoffrey turned abruptly, and looked at her--looked at the graceful head, the blushing cheek, the faltering lips--and went straight up to her. she shrunk just a little at his approach; but when he laid his hand upon her shoulder, and bent his head down towards hers, she raised her sweet candid face and looked at him.

"annie," he said eagerly, with the quick earnestness of a man whose soul is in his words, "will you forgive all my mistakes,--i have found them out now,--and take the truest love that ever a man offered to the most perfect of women? annie, can you love me?--will you stay with me? my darling, say yes!"

his strong arms were round her now, and her sleek brown head lay upon his breast. she raised it to look at him; then folded her hands and laid them upon his shoulder, and with her crystal-clear eyes uplifted, said, "i will stay with you, geoffrey. i have always loved you."

the storm had blown itself out now--its last mutterings had died away; and through all its fury and despair, through all its rude buffets and threatening of doom, geoffrey ludlow had reached land at last!