The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1909-02-10
p VI.

period which she had previously dis
liked to do; but there was n thing
which she did not for a long time
consent to, and that was to open the
house in the North which was called
the Towers, which Tom had been
used to speak of as my place." and
which Beaufort thought it foolish OF
her not to inhabit. He did not know
the ghosts that dwelt there. He did
not consider that it was the house
of her first husband, the house she
was taken to as a most wretched bride
after the marriage into which she
had been forced, and that the dread
full time of that bridehood, and the
years she had lived with Torrance,
and the moment of awful agony when
she had heard Of his death. all lin
gered there waiting for her. MIR.
Beaufort only thought it was foolish,
when she had a handsome house in
Scotland at her command, that the
family did not go there in the au-
tumn, when it was natural that fam
lilies should go. But he was not a
man to bore her by any repetition of
this counsel. He had been a little
surprised, and even it must be al
lowed a little disconnected, to find
himself so much more at his OWL dis
posal than of old, and now that Garry
was not always at his side his habits,
too, changed imperceptibly. His
beautiful library was still his chief
haunt, but he read the papers there
and all kinds of profane things. And
he went a great deal to Cordelton,
where the county club was, and spent
q part almost of every day there. 1t
was not that he had any great liking
for the gentlemen who found it such
a resource. He kept the position
among them of a man who was not
as they were-a person superior in
many ways, a writer (though he never
wrote anything), a philosopher. No
doubt he was entitled to that last
character. He was very civil to them
all, but regarded them from an alti-
tude, making notes Of what he called
the "humors," and making them the
subject of many satirical descriptions
when he went home. Sometimes he
went up to London for the day, at
first to consult books, but. latterly
without alleging any such reason,
and went to many places where were
no books to consult. But it was very
rarely that he did not return home
in the evening. He had nc desire
for designations of any kind. He was
far too much a philosopher, not to
say a gentleman. Tom, perhaps, de-
scribed it best in his schoolboy Ian
guage when he said that Beau liked
to loaf. So he I'd. He had no twist
in his character. Had Lady Car fol-
lowed him in all his excursions she
would have found nothing to object
to, and indeed he would have enjoyed
them much more if she had. But he
had, as a matter Of fact, no mission
such as she had credited him with;
he had no gospel to preach. nothing
at all to say. If there had been any
thing more than youthful excitement
and ambition in his plans it had all
evaporated in his listless life. He
might have pushed on-many young
men do-and insisted upon marrying
his love, and saved her from Tom
Torrance and the dreadful episode of
her first marriage. He might have
realized at least some of his early
promises and anticipations. He
might at least have reused himself
from his sloth, and written That book
upon which her heart was so set. But,
indeed, that last was doubtful, for he
might only have proved that he could
not write a book, which would have
been harder on Lady Car than to
think he would not. The end of all
things was, however, that he was i'm
mensely relieved, and yet vaguely in
sensible, by the change that had now
come over his life. There was a
change. The secret and constant, if
sometimes a little eXacting, compan-
ionship of those early years was one
which gave him a vague ache as of
desertion, especially at first. And
Garry vas changed. Her questions,
her arguments, her constant persua-
sions and inducements to go on with
that book depressing always a
boundless trust in his powers which
it panied him to part with, were all
over. On the other hand, he had re-
gained his liberty, was now free to do
as he pleased-an indescribable
boon. What he planned to do was
always quite gentlemaLlike, CONNIE il
faut. There was no reason why he
should be restrained in doing it. He
liked to read, and alsc to think, with
out 1t being supposed to be necessary
that anything should "ome of his
reading and thinking. He liked to
go to his London club now and then
and have the stimulus of a little con-
versation; he liked when there was
nothing else, to so into Cordelton and
talk a little to the country gentlemen
and the smaller fry about, who were
sufficiently important to belong to the
county club, and to come in OCCASION
ally to sit with his wife in her draw
ing room, to read to her, to tempt her
to talk, even to give Janet a little lee
ture upon literature, which she cared
nothing about. He "a on those &C.
casions a delightful companion. so
easy in his superior knowledge, so
unpretending. In their rich and easy