so
CHANDOS.

ure and of more timorous breed. He sat there looking
out at the brown moors, warm with the golden gorse ;
and he moved in surprise as the door opened, with a
smile of pieasure lighting his eyes.
"You! Has an earthquake swallowed the town, that
we see you in the country, my dear Ernest?"
Even as the first word was spoken, even as his first
glance fell on Chandos, he knew vaguely but terribly
that some calamity, vaster than his thoughts could
compass, had fallen here, on the man whom he cared
for as he cared for no other of his race. Chandos was
1 the only one of his blood who had his own code, his
wn creedthe only one in whose companionship he
heard the echoes of a long-passed age; and he was
proud of him, and built mighty hopes on himproud
of his eminence, of his brilliance, of his success, proud
even of his personal grace and beauty.
Chandos drew near without a word. Those who loved
him as the old duke loved saw a change on him more
ghastly than though they had seen his face set in the
colorless calm of sudden death.
Castlemaine leaned towards him, and his long white
fingers closed with a convulsive pressure on the Mig-
nard snuff-box that he held.
"What is it!"
Chandos answered nothing; he sank down into a
seat, and his head fell forward on his arms. The reck-
lessness of desperation, the fever of utter hopelessness,
had given him strength to pass through the ordeal of
the night before; but here his strength broke down.
He knew how the pride of the gallant old man had
been centred in him; he suffered for the pain that he
must deal, not less than for the misery he bore.
The duke's mellow voice shook huskily:
" Tell me in a word.   I have never loved suspense."
Chandos did not lift his head ; his answer came slowly
dragged out, hoarse and faint from exhaustion, excita-
tion, and long want of food and sleep; for he had
tasted nothing from the hour that he had learned his
(fate, and his eyes had never closed.
" I can tell you in one wordruin!"
The duke's hand trembled, making the diamonds
flash and glitter on the enamel lid; It had never so
trembled when it had shaken the dice, though a fortune
hung on a throw, when it had lifted a pistol, though a
life hung on the shot, when it had pointed to a serried
square of Soult's picked troops, though an army hung
on the charge.
"Ruin!   A wide word.   And for whom?"
"For me."
" You!"
"Yes!" he answered, with a reckless laughsuch a
laugh m the gamester gives when his last coin is staked
and gone, and no resource is left except the suicide's
grave. " As Trevenna phrases it, ' Crsus has ceased
to reign in Sardis!' It will amuse the worldfor a
week, at least.- A long time for the absent to be re-
membered."
A deep oath sprang from the close-shut lips of the
old duke; his face grew white as the hoary silky hair
that shaded it, and the diamonds shook and glittered
in the tremor of his hand. But he loved the temper
that made a jest even of a death-blow; he had seen
much of it in his early day; he followed the lead with
gallant endurance.
"Ruin for you t It is very sudden, is it not. Tell me
Aiore; tell me more."
His voice was very faint, but it was steady; he loved
the man of whom he heard this thing with the generous
love of an age that kept all the warmth and all the fire
of his youth ; yet they were both of the same school
they both suppressed all signs of pain as shame. He
Heard ; his headthe head of an Agamemnonbowed ;
his hand closed convulsively on the Louis Quatorze
toy; his breathing was quick and loud. Once alone he
interrupted the recital; it was at Trevenna's name.
" That vile fellow ! I bade you beware of him. He
hates you, Ernest."
"It may be, "said Chandos, wearily. " I have almost
thought so sincesince this. And yet he owes me
muchmore than you know."
"Who hate us so remorselessly as those who owe us
anything!"
" Then are men devils?"
" Most of them. Who doubts it? Did he ever owe
you any grudge?"
" Noneonly benefits."
" They are the less easily forgiven of the two. Had
you any mistress whom this man loved?"
" Never, to my knowledge."
"But you may have had, unknown to you? 'Who
was IhewomanT may be asked wellnigh of every feud
and misery ! Whatever for, he hates you, haunts you,
envies you ruthlesslyhates you if only because his
hands are large and coarse and yours are long and
slender!"
"You make him knave and fool in one."
" The combination is not rare! But, pardon me, go
on.   I will hear more patiently."
He heard very patientlyheard to the end.
His head sank, his breathing grew fast and labored,
the veins swelled on his still fair broad brow, his giant
limbs trembled. It was the heaviest blow life had it in
'its power to deal him, and, though still of the race of
Titans, the duke had lost something of the force of his
manhood; the strength which had risen from the
Regent's orgies unscathed, and borne unjaded the heat
and burden of Vittoria and Waterloo, was not now
what it had been.
' Great God! if Philip Chandos had forseen-----"
His voice faltered; his listener stretched out his hand
in an involuntary supplication.
"In mercy spare me that ! Do you think/ have not
remembered him?"
There was a piteous anguish in the few words, that
Eierced the duke's heart to the core; his own tones, as
e answered, were sorely enfeebled for the voice that
had used to roll its thunder through the Lords, and
peal down the ranks of " Castlemaine's Horse," in the
dauntless days of his manhood.
" I meant no reproach 1 You would have heard none
from your father's lips. He loved you well; and
though you have been improvident, you have not lost
all. You have been true to your house: you have
saved your honor. Pardon me, Ernest; your news has
left me scarcely myself. Butbutmust Clarencieux
go?"
Where Chandos sat, in the gloom of the mullioned
window, the shiver passed over him that had always
come there at the name of his idolized inheritance; he
could better have borne to part from wealth, and
repute, and fte love of the world, and the love of
woman, than he could bear to part from Clarencieux.
They say so," he answered, simply.
"My God! and we cannot help you. Warburne is
mortgaged to its pettiest farm. Weof the Plantagenet
blood !are beggars ! I would give my life to aid you,
and I have nothing."
The confession broke from him so low that it barely
was above his breath. It was very terrible to the great
noble to know that in the dire extremity of the man he
loved he could aid him no more than though he were
the poorest peasant on his lands.
Chandos looked up; the unnatural coldness and fixity
that had set upon the fairness of his face from the mo-
ment this calamity had fallen on him softened and
changed; his lips trembled; he rose with a sudden im-
Sulse, and stooped over the duke's chair, laying his
and tenderly on the old man's.
" Forgive me that I bring this shame and wretched-
ness upon you. I came here that you might learn it
from no other first; not the least bitter of my memories
has been the grief that I must entail on you."
The duke's fingers grasped his hand close, and wrung
it hard; no reproach, no rebuke, came from him; he
could not have raised his voice more than he could have
lifted his arm against Chandos in his suffering.
" Do not think of me; I shall live but little time to
suffer anything. One question more. She who is to be
your wife?"
Chandos moved from him into the shadow that was
thrown darkly across the casement by the great cedar-
boughs without.
" She is dead to me."
Another oath, loud and deep, rattled in his hearer's
throat ; the fire of his manhood's wrath gleamed in his
azure eyes. The haughty patrician could have borne
anything sooner than thisthat one of his blood should
be forsaken. Still, no recrimination escaped him ; he
never said, "/warned you!" The grand old pagan of
a colossal age, hardened by long combat, and used to
the proud supreme dominion of a great chieftainship
through such long years of war and of state power, was
more merciful to adversity than the young and delicate
Lily Queen.
Silence fell between them.
The duke sat with his white crest bowed, and an un-
usual dimness over the brightness of his Plantagenet
eyes; and every now and then the diamonds in the box
he held shook with a quick tremor in the sunlight.
"What will you do?" he asked, suddenly, shading
his glance with the enamelled box.
"Do!" echoed Chandos, wearily; it seemed to him
that his life was ended. "AVhat is'there to do? Noth-
ing; exceptto end like the last marquis. An axe on
Tower Hill was more dignified, but a dose of laudanum
will be as rapid. It would make the best ending for the
story for the clubs, and the sales will realize better if
their interest be heightened by a suicide!"
The duke looked hastily up, with that Jin sourire with
which throughout his career his Grace of Castlemaine
had veiled every deep agitation.
" Well, you would have precedent. You would but do
what Evelyn Chandos did after his master's death, you
remember? Doubtless it would finish the mlodrame
well for the world. Still, were I you, I would not. I am
an old soldier, and I confess I do not like surrenderto
fortune or anything else. Your father died in the
Commons like a gladiator; I should not like you to die
in a ditch like a dog. They would not be meet com-
panion-pictures. BesidesI do not wish to see your
grave; I have seen so many!"
Calmly, dispassionately, the old soldier spoke, toying
with his Bourbon box. None could have guessed the
intense anxiety hidden under that courtly manner, the
yearning emotion concealed under that serene snile.
Once only his voice shook: he had seen the graves of
so many !of the friends of his youth of his brothers
in council, of the comrades who had fought and fallen
beside him, of the women who had lain in his bosom
and smiled in his eyes.   He had seen so many !
Chandos knew his meaningknew all that was veiled
under the gracious courtesy, the gentle smile; those
brief and tranquil words to him bore an unspeakable
eloquencean eloquence which moved him as no in-
sult, no indignity, no adversity, had power to move
him.
Where he stood, he bowed low; very low, till his
head was stooped and his lips touehed the aged noble's
hand.
"You are right, and I thank you. Have no fear;
your words shall be remembered. Whatever my fate
is, I will accept it and endure it."
The duke looked upward at him.
"lam glad," he said, almost faintly. " Contre for-
tune bon camr. Pardon me if I intrude my counsels:
it is the privilege of Nestors to prose! You go now?
I shall see you again?"
"Surely." Chandos'voice sank very low as he stood
before the grand old man. " Before I goforgive me. "
The duke's eyes, so blue, so fiery still, dwelt on him
with a great unuttered tenderness; and the tones that
had used to ring like a clarion down the battle-fields
were gentle as a woman's.
"I have nothing to forgive.    Had you loved and
served yourself as you have loved and served others, it
would not be thus with you how."
Then they parted, never to meet again.
The duke sat listening to the last echo of his foot-
steps, then, with a slight sigh, he leaned back in his
arm-chair, his hand relaxed its clasp upon the jewelled
box, a weariness came over him new to his nerve of
steel, a mist stole before his eyes, shutting from his
sight the flickering leaves and the purple moorlands 
and all the light and movement of the forest-world.
The summer light quivered through innumerable
boughs, young fawns played in the warmth, white
clouds drifted over sunny skies, and a nest-bird above
in the cedar's branches sang low and softly, as though ,
not to break the rest of the sleeper within. And the
duke still leaned back in his ebony chair, with the I
slight smile about his lips, and the diamonds flashing
m the box that was lying at his feet.
The golden day stole onward, the shadows length-
ened, the birds sought their roost, and the young ;
fawns their couches; the peace of evening brooded on
the earth, all things were at rest, and so was he; for he
still sat there, motionless, and with the jewels gleam-
ing at his feet.
The sunset faded, and the twilight came, the purple
haze upon the moorlands deepening to night. Still he
sat there, while the shadows stole the brilliance from
the diamonds and softly veiled his face as though in
reverence. And when some of his wide household,
who were so nigh, yet whom he could not lift his hand
to summon, dared to venture at length unbidden to hts
iresence, they found him thus; and a great awe fell on
them, and the hush of a breathless dread; for they
knew they were standing in the presence of Death.
The last of a race of Titans had died, as well became
him, in silence and alone, without a sign, and with a
smile upon his lips.
CHAPTER VI.
It was night at Clarencieux.
In the Greuze cabinet where a few weeks before
Chandos had stood lightly glancing through the French
novel, with the warmth of its fire shed mellow and
ruddy about him, he stood now. The twilight of the
summer evening had but just fallen; the pale moon
streamed in through the oriels ; even the fair, rich hues
of the French painter's women looked ashen and
weary in the misty half-light that was alone in the
chamber. Chandos leaned against the high carved
marble of the mantel-piece; his chest was bowed as
with the weight of age; he breathed heavily, and with
each breath pain ; his face was white as the sculpture
he rested on, and set into that deadly calm which had
never left him when in others' sight. The tidings of
the duke's death had reached him some days, and had
filled up the measure of his anguish, adding to it the
torture of a passionate regret, of an eternal remorse.
He had loved the grand old man from whose fearless,
fiery eyes no glance but one of kindness and of gentle-
ness had looked on him from his earliest childhood ;
and he knew that the shock of his own ruin had slain
the mighty strength of the old noble, if ever grief
killed age.
He stood alone; his heart seemed numb and dead
with misery; he gave no sign of emotion; no tears had
ever come irto his eyes since the hour in which his
fate fell on him. The nights had passed pacing sleep-
less to and fro his chamber, or heavily drugged to rest
with opium; the days had passed almost fasting, and
in an apathy that awed those about him with a vague
terror lest his end should be in the vacant gloom of
madness. He was self-possessed, self-controlled; he
answered tranquilly, he heard patiently: but there was
that in this mechanical action, this unnatural serenity,
that had a more horrible dread for those who saw him
than all the ravings of delirium, all the passion of
grief, could ever have had.
The door unclosed: John Trevenna entered.
"They are all here," he said, more softly than he
had ever spoken.
Chandos bent his head and followed him out of the
chamber.   They who waited were his creditors.
In a day, with the rush of hell-hounds let out of leash,
and as though at a given unanimous signal, his Claim-
ants had poured and pressed in on him, baying with
one tongue for their own quarrymoney. He had
bidden them all meet here, and they had come without
one missinga strange gathering for the halls of
Clarencieux, where kings had used to find their surest
shelter, and courts had been entertained through
Plantagenet and Elizabethan and Stuart days.
They were collected in the great banqueting-hall; a
mob of more than a hundred menmen who had
come down on the same errand, in the same temper,
sullen yet eager, defiant yet suspicious, savage yet
audaciousmen who had no mercy on a dethroned
royalty, and who had no sight save for the deficit they
pushed to claim. Still even on them the solemn and
venerable beauty of Clarencieux had a quieting spell.
As they had entered, their voices unconsciously had
sunk lower, their gait involuntarily had grown less
swaggering ; and as they stood now, counting with
greedy eyes the worth and magnificence of the ban-
queting-room, a silence had fallen on them.
"Feels a'most like a church," whispered one, a
picture-dealer, as he looked down the vista of the
double porphyry columns.
As he spoke, Chandos entered.
He bowed to them with a grave and courteous grace;
all had their hats on, even those better bred, from the
sense of scorn in which they held a debtor, and for the
sake of vaunting and claiming their own superiority.
Involuntarily, as they saw him, they uncovered in re-
spectful silence, the Jew Ignatius Mathias, who repre-
sented the bill-discounting firm, alone remaining the
exception. Trevenna's eye had glanced at him as his
hand went to his velvet cap, and his arm had dropped
as though paralyzed.
In the stillness Chandos advanced up the hall, Ms
eyes restiug unmoved on the strange and motley group
that filled with their uncomely forms, and with almost
every type of European nationality, the porphyry
chamber where king and prince and peer had used to
sit, his guests and his boon friends. His perfect calm-
ness was unchanged ; his bearing was grave and proud ;
his face looked white as the marble of a statue against
which he paused, death-white beside the black velvet
of the morning-dress he wore, but it -as composed,
haughty, thoughtfulstrangely like the face of the
last marquis. There was not a murmur, not a whisper,
raised; there was that in his look which held the
coarsest, the greediest, the most pitiless, silent.
He stood beside the statue (it was that of his father)
and turned towards them He was at the upper end of
the porphyry hall, and the multitude faced him in the
glow of the lights that were illumined here.
" Gentlemen," he said calmly, with a tremor in his
voice, though it was faint as after a long illness, "I
have but a few words w say to you. You are here to
enforce your claims. Of any one of those claims I
was in ignorance a few days since; but I dispute none
of them: the improvidence of my life has left me no
title to do so. You will doubt me, perhaps, when I
say I never knew I owed a single debt ; yet such is the
truth."
There was a stir among the crowd, restless, pained,
yet curious; they could not tell the meaning of this, ye*
they were stirred with a singular awe and wonder.
One voice, the picture-dealer's, rough yet cordial, broke
the silence:
"We believe you! damned if we don't! You ha'n't
got a face what lies!"
Chandos bent his head in silent achnowledgment.
"For the rest," he continued, still with that un-
changed tranquility, " I have but little to add. The
amount of your claims on me is, in the aggregate, suf-
ficient to wreck fortunes ten times larger than mine
has been; yet, as I understand, you can be paid in full
by my entire surrender of all that I possess. This sur-
render I make ; my lawyers will explain its value bet-
ter than I can do. I resign everything unconditionally
to you; it has become no longer mine, but yours. I be-
lievo there will be enough to satisfy you to the utter-
most farthing."
The murmur rose deeper and louder in the hall ; the
mass of men swayed together as though stirred by a
universal impulse.   They had come prepared to bully,.