The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1909-05-25

/ that mSIOuy III uGT ears, lSGlluS d
poignant sweetness in it, since at least
it was the most beautiful thing for
him to do, yet with every word feel
ing more and more the anguish of the
| failure, and the depth of the death
wound which was in her heart.
"There are boys who torture cats
and dogs and tear flies asunder, and
yet are not evil natures" Beaufort
said; "they have not the power of
realizing the pain they cause. They
want imagination. They know moth
ing of the animals they hurt, except
that they are there in their power to
be done what they please with. My
the dreadful cynicism that young men
seem to originate somehow among
| themselves. They think they are the
subjects of every kind of interested
vile, and that such thing as-this :"
Beaufort was not philosopher
enough to name Toms act more dis
tinctly-"is nothing more than sort
of balance on their side."
Lady Car opened her eyes, which
were clear with fever and weakness,
lucid like an evening sky, and looked
at her husband with piteous smile.
My dearest" he said hastily, II
am saying only how they represent
such things to themselves. They
don't take time to think--they rush
on to the widest conclusions. The
thing is done before they see or real
ize what it is. And then, as tell
you, they think themselves the prey,
and those-those others the hunters
and take their revenge-when they
can"
But it was hard to go on with that
argument with her eyes upon him.
When she closed them he could speak.
When they opened again in the midst
of his plea, those eyes so clear with
fever, SO liquid, as if every film had
been swept from them, and only an
all-seeing, unquenchable vision, yet
tender as the heavens, left behind
he stopped and faltered in his tale,
and then he took refuge in that last
resort of human feeling-what was to
be done? The expedients by which a
wrong can be made to appear as if it
were right, and trouble and misery
smoothed away, so that the world
should believe that all was well?
The conclusion, which was not ar
rived at for some time, was that
which old Lord Lindons took credit
to himself for having suggested be-
fore, "and which might have put a
stop to all this, " he said, with wave
of his hand. 1t was Africa and big
game for two or three years, during
which "the young woman the fam
lily spoke of her as if she had no name
should be put under careful train
ing. 1t had been ascertained, still by
Beaufort, who conducted himself to
everybodys admiration, that "the
young woman" had no bad antece-
dents, and that SO much hope as there
could be in such miserable business
might be theirs. Tom was so thor
oughly broken down by the discovery
which humbled his clownish pride to
the dust, and made him feel almost
as poor a creature as he was, that he
gave in with little resistance to the
dictates of the family council. No
unhappy university man, however,
was beguiled into accompanying this
unlikely pupil. He was given into
the hands of mighty sportsman,
who treated him like powder boy,
and brought Tom, the lord Of the
Towers, the wealthiest commoner in
the North, the experienced man of
Oxford. into complete and abject sub
jection-which was the best thing
that could have happened to him.
The young woman" was less easily
subdued. She wrote to her relations
that it had been all mistake. but
that family reasons had made it i'm
possible for her husband and herself
to disclose the true state of affairs
before. That, instead of being Mrs.
Francis Lindons, she was Mrs. Thomas
Francis Lindons Torrance, of the
Towers, her dear husband being the
son of Thomas Torrance, Esq, of the
Towers, and of Lady Caroline Lin
dons, the daughter of the Earl Of
Lindons, from whom dear Tom took
his second name, as they might see in
any peerage; that her mother-in-law
and all her new family were very nice
to her, and that she was going off
upon visit with Lady Edith Erskine,
who was her aunt, and dear grand
mamma the Countess. And she or
dered for herself at once new cards
with Mrs. f. F.. Lindons Torrance"
upon them, which she thought looked
far more distinguished looking than
the original name. But when Mrs.
Tom became aware that dear grand
mamma and her dear aunt meant to
conduct her to an educational estab-
lishment, where she was to pass at
least the next two years of her life,
the young woman rebelled at once
She had never heard, she declared,
of a married woman going to school;
that her place was with her husband |:
that she had passed all the standards,
and learnt to play the piano, and had
taken lessons in French; that no
woman. unless she were going to be
a governess, wanted more; and, final
ly, that she fatty refused to go. 1t
was more difficult, much more diff
cult, than with Tom, to convince the
| young woman by the logic of cir
cumstances. for she was still more ig-
norant than Tom, and thought his
giving in ridiculous, and did not see
why, with him or without him, she
should not go and take up her abode