The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1889-02-06

persuade her to take it; but she is young
and in youth and in pain the feelings are
/ treacherous counsellors. What more
is there to be said? 1t is
to your brother that you must
90. 1t is useless to come to me. l am
/ not the guardian of Lady Guilderoy, nor
am my cousins keeper. | have no more
/ whatsoever to do with this sad letter than
4 my dog Hubert yonder. 1t is mistake on
/ her side; an error, and a grave one; but
| he has brought it about by a much darker
/ fault on his own, and he cannot complain.
/ Neither you nor l can possibly interfere.
/ We have no title to do so. If your brother
/ acquiesce, all his relatives must acquiesce
/ also. OF that no reasonable doubt can be
/ urged for one moment.
! The great dog, hearing his name spoken,
rose and approached, and laid his head
upon Aubreys knee; his master stroked
I him with a sigh.
Passionate and injurious words rose to
Lady Sunbury's lips, bUt she repressed
! them unuttered; she was pale with rage
and offense, but she had strength not to
insult man whom the nation respected.
"You cannot altogether disclaim re-
! sponslbility for her actions" she said
{ with unkind and insOlent meaning.
You have guided them for a long time.
I
! that this letter and the resolutions con-
tanned in it are altogether so unfamiliar
/ to you as they assume to be. You were
| the last person who saw Lady Guilderoy
I In England, and everyone is aware that
! YOU have been for a long time her most
! cherished and trusted friend.
/ Aubrey rose to the full highs of his
/ great stature, and stood at the end OF the
I great library liable as he had often stood at
1 the table of the house of commons.
1ou are a woman and nv cousin" he
said slowly. "Both persons are privileged
! in you. But be so good as to remember
/ that | do not allow even lady to a cast
/ doubt on what have said is a fact; and
you will kindly take care not to hint the
insult which you have just hinted outside
/ the walls of Balfrons."
She was impetuOus, courageous, and
/ full of dark and insolent suspicion, but
bold though her temper was and uncon-
/ trolled. she did not dare to affront or
offend him farther, and she was silent.
1t is late, said Aubrey. ALLOW me
/ to accompany you to your rooms. You
will see Ermyntrude in the morning. She
retired very early, for she was fatigued
with watching my father. Tonight he is
+ quieter and asleep"
Then with all courtesy and ceremony
he waited on her across the halls and cor
ridors and galleries of the great CASTLE and
! only bade her good night at the entrance
OF that suite OF rooms in the tapestried
wing which were always set aside as hers,
and which were warmed and illuminated
| for her now as though she had been ex-
pected there since MONDAY. He was not
conscious that he had kept the letter from
/ Gladys in his hand, and she had been too
enraged and mortified to ask him for it,
1 He walked slowly backward to the Ii
/ brary in the midnight stiffness everything
was hushed into greater quiet than usual
| that the rest of the old marquis might not
| be disturbed. The lamps burned white
/ between the armored figures, the droop-
/ ing banners, the trophies of arms, the
! massive and fantastic carvings OF the oak
! paneled walls; his own steps sank sound
I less on the thick carpeting. Hubert
/ followed him with noiseless velvet feet.
He paused before one of the great un-
/ shuttered easements, with their iron graf
! ings, which had been there in the Wars of
/ the Roses, with the bazonries OF the
house OF BalfrOns stained upon their
/ glass. The night without was frosty and
moonlit. There was snow on the ground,
/ and snow law on the roof, the turrets, the
cOrbels, the battlements OF the mighty
Border castle. The keep, round, massive,
/ terrible-lOoking, like fortress for giants
in the starry night, lowered up in front
/ OF him upon the other side of the quad
! rangle.
He had a deep and filial love for Bal
! irons, and if public life had not called on
! him for absence, he would seldom have
! left its treasure-house of books and its
! great forests filled with wild cattle and
red deer and all water-birds and moor
/ birds which ever haunt the reedy meres
/ of the old romantic border lands.
! He sat down in the embrasure OF the
/ window and read her letter over again,
! word for word, by the light of the lamp
| hanging over his head There was not a
/ sound in the house. The clouds swept
past the easement in great, mOonlit, hur-
/ rying armies. The deep bell of the clock
/ tower toled midnight.
! Every word of the letter sank into his
heart like a knife. Every work thrilled
! with the violence, the misery, the despair
] OF great love which was writhing under
! abandonment, outrage and misconception.
! The step she had taken was unwise; it
| had a child's rashness. a woman's OBJ
| stinacv, and forsaken woman's reckless
ness; but there were a self-negatioD and
an austerity in it which were in their
error very noble, and touched chords in
/ his own nature which responded TO them.
81 think she would have been happy
with me-" he thought: and he sighed as
! he looked out at the cold and luminous
night and the great keep towering to the
skies.
But now, though he would have laid
| down his life to save her, he could not give
her one hour OF peace. A furious longing
! came over the calm, grave temper of
] Aubrey to east all other considerations,
public and private, to the winds, and
avenge her wrongs upon his cousin with
! the rude, frank championship of another
age and country than their own. But re-
Election told him that such an act could do
her only harm; could only give her name
more completely to the worlds tongues,
and could only possibly awaken in her
| husbands mind doubts which wonld dis
honor her, and give him, in his own eyes,
palliative for his own offense against
her.
81 have no title to interfere" he thought
sadly. IL am not her lover. Scarcely
even did she at last accept me as her
| friend"
A thrill of what was to him degrading
and criminal, because a selfish pleasure.
| passed through him at the memory of the
utter loneliness to which she had con-
! demned herself, the dangers, the barren
ness of the future which she had shaped