CHAPTER IX.

KIT’S HOME.

Amid the city— The great humanity that beats Its life along the stony streets, Like a strong, unsunnéd river, In a self-made course is ever Rolling on, rolling on! She sits and hears it as it rolls— That flow of souls, Made up of many tones that rise Each to each as contraries. E. B. BROWNING.

While Valdimir Desparde is approaching the shores of England as swiftly as steam can bring him, we must return and look up our “Missing Link.”

In Church street, Chelsea, London, there is a clean and unpretentious house kept by a retired butler and cook, who had made money in service, then married, and invested their funds in “furnished lodgings to let.”

On a dreary, drizzling day early in December, when the London fog and mist made twilight at noon, a neatly fitted up front parlor in this house was occupied by one person, a handsome blonde woman, tastefully attired in a blue silk dress with white lace fichu and cuffs, and with her wealth of splendid golden ringlets looped up at the back of her head with knots of blue ribbons and lace. Sapphires set in pearl and gold blazed on her bosom and on her arms; but the sapphires were not bluer nor brighter than her eyes, the pearls no fairer than her skin, nor the gold more shining than her hair. She wore a heavy gold wedding ring.

A regal princess she would seem until she should open her mouth, when she would instantly betray herself to be really a very illiterate and silly peasant woman.

She was seated in a large easy-chair upholstered in pale buff satin, her well-shaped, black velvet slippered foot rested on a hassock, and her elbow on the sill of the front window, from which she gazed out upon the lowering sky, drizzling mist, and the wet tops of umbrellas continually passing along the sidewalks.

She was idle, lonely, sullen and miserable. She was utterly weary and disgusted with being a lady. She had no culture, no accomplishments, and no companions. She could not occupy herself with music, drawing, fine needle-work, reading, or even with gossip. She would gladly have gone down into the kitchen, tucked up her finery, borrowed an apron, and helped Mossop, the hard-working maid-of-all-work, to wash the dishes or pare the potatoes; but as such a proceeding might have lowered her in the eyes of her landlady, the prim Mrs. Perkins, she refrained, and sat in wretched solitude and idleness.

Now, how came our poor Missing Link to this miserable pass, exchanging her lovely cottage home in the beautiful lake and mountain country for this dreary lodging-house

“In the crowded city’s horrible street?”

To explain this we must go back a few weeks to the night of Kit’s sudden disappearance from “The Birds’ Nest.”

It may be remembered that Kit had been moody, sullen, and intractable from the time she had spelt out the meaning of that paragraph in the _Fashionable Intelligence_ which had announced the marriage engagement of the Lady Arielle Montjoie and Mr. Brandon Coyle.

She was not at all convinced by “Mistress Net’s” earnest and indignant denial of the truth of the statement, and even the bare possibility of the event it pretended to announce.

The matter troubled her. She brooded over it. Then she secretly wrote that strange, ill-spelled letter to the Lady Arielle Montjoie, warning her ladyship against contracting marriage with Mr. Brandon Coyle, and declaring her own prior and exclusive claim as the wife of the gentleman in question. This letter she put in her pocket and took to church with her on the following Sunday morning, and, after the service, she secretly gave it to her youngest brother, with a half-crown to secure his fidelity, and with instructions to take it to Castle Montjoie and deliver it with his own hands to the Lady Arielle. But it was a week before the boy could get a half-holiday from his place in the stables of the Dolphin Inn to convey the letter to its destination, and even then he was not allowed access to the presence of Lady Arielle, but was necessitated to send the letter up by the hands of her ladyship’s maid. However, the epistolary bombshell reached her in safety, and caused the explosion elsewhere recorded.

But before that fatal or fortunate explosion the Missing Link was lost.

It will be recollected that on the evening of her disappearance the unfortunate girl had seemed unusually depressed; that she had begged to be allowed to put the babies to bed, for that night; she had stayed with them until they went to sleep, and had then come into the parlor and seated herself on a low foot stool in the chimney-corner and had asked to be permitted to sit there until her mistress should retire; how Net had kindly endeavored to win from her the cause of her depression, but could get no satisfaction from Kit beyond the senseless repetition of the nursery refrain:

“‘Heavy, heavy hangs over my poor head!’”

Nor was this any evasion on the part of the poor girl. Kit had really nothing to tell that her mistress did not already know.

She could not herself give any reason for her despair. Kit was suffering under a presentiment of evil and could not define her position better than by a repetition of the old nursery refrain.

She had refused to make her bed in her mistress’s room that night, as she had always refused before.

But when, at last, Net dismissed her maid and went to bed, Kit did not ascend to her own little room.

She fastened up the house and sat down over the kitchen fire, with her feet on the iron hearth, her elbows on her knees, and her head bowed upon the palms of her hands.

She was suffering under such fearful despondency that she dared not go to the solitude of her own room. Here, in the kitchen, she was at least within the call of Mistress Net and the children.

Kit sat there a long time. She heard the clock strike eleven—twelve—one; but still she dreaded to retire to bed.

It was only a few minutes after one, when she was startled by a low pecking at the window—no louder, indeed, than the sound that might have been made by the beak of some small bird; yet Kit started and stared with an impulse of flight, but was immediately arrested by the sound of a familiar voice.

“Don’t be frightened! It is I. Open the door!” whispered the voice through a crevice of the window.

Kit recognized the tones of Brandon Coyle, and impulsively, without a thought, she sprang up and obeyed.

“All abed and sound asleep, I suppose?” said the man, as he stepped into the kitchen and closed the door.

By this time the girl had recovered the possession of her senses, and so she answered:

“Yes, but yo hev no roight to kem here until to-morrow! Yo promised Mistress Net yo wadn’t kem agen until yo kem to-morrow to tek me away as yor woife, so yo did!”

“Hush! don’t speak so loud, girl! That woman may be lying awake and may hear you, and come out here, and I do not want to see her again.”

“Yo hed no business to kem, then! It’s _her_ house, and yo promised her not to kem until yo kem to-morrow to tek me away as yor woife and mek a leddy o’ me!”

“Well, but, Kit, suppose, my beauty, that I do better than my promise, and instead of waiting until to-morrow, I come to-night to take you away as my wife?” demanded Coyle, with a sly smile.

“Oh!” exclaimed the surprised and delighted idiot. “Is thet it? Then Oi’ll call Mistress Net.”

“Didn’t I tell you that I do not want to meet that woman? Just remember how she treated me the last time we met. Do you suppose it would be so pleasant for me to meet her? No, Kit. I come now to take you away and introduce you at once to my uncle and my sister as my wife, Mrs. Brandon Coyle. Come, now. You may take your wedding ring from the ribbon around your neck and put it on your finger, where it rightly belongs, and you never need to hide it again. Come, now. Get your bonnet and shawl and come along. You needn’t take any luggage. Your plain clothes would not do to wear at Caveland in the country, nor at Coyle House in town. Come, my girl. Hurry!”

“But—but—but—” stammered the perplexed and bewildered simpleton—mayn’t Oi tek leave o’ Mistress Net and the babies?”

“What? Wake them up this time of night? No. Besides, I tell you I won’t meet that woman to be insulted by her again. You _know_ she insulted me. You can write to her and explain. Come, come; get your things on.”

“But—but—she will be mazed! She will be frighted! And it will be breking my wurrud to her! Oi promised not to see yo till to-morrow, Friday, when yo wud tek me away as yor woife,” expostulated Kit.

“Nonsense! It is to-morrow _now_. It is Friday now—it is after one o’clock in the morning,” exclaimed Coyle.

“Oh, so it is!” acknowledged Kit.

“So you see I keep my promise to come and take you home to my family to-day,” said Coyle, triumphantly.

“So yo do,” admitted Kit; “but is it no an unco airly hour to tek me home? They’ll noo be oot o’ their beds for half a day yet!”

“Why, do you think they are at Caveland?”

“Ay! where else wud they be?”

“They are at Coyle House, Westbourne Terrace, London—a splendid place, Kit. And we shall go up to town by the two o’clock express, and arrive about eight, in time to reach Coyle House and dress to meet the family at breakfast. But you must hurry, I say, or we shall miss the train.”

“Oh! if Oi could—if you wud let me—just say ged-bye to Mistress Net and the childer!”

“I cannot! I will not! And look here, Kit. Take your choice. Come along with me _now_, or _never_. If I go away alone this morning, I will never come back again to ask you a second time. Now, or never!” exclaimed Coyle, sternly.

“Ou, then, if thet’s the case it’s _noo_!” replied the unlucky girl; who then hurried up to her room, put on her hat and shawl, and came down to join her worst enemy.

“Here, wrap this closely around your face and head,” said Coyle, drawing from his pocket a thick gray vail.

“Oi never wore a kivering over moy face in all moy loife,” objected Kit.

“I know it, but you will have to wear this,” persisted Coyle, clumsily tying the vail over the girl’s hat so as to conceal her features.

Then they left the cottage together by the back door, that fastened itself after them with a spring.

“Ou, Gude forgie me, ef Oi had only bid ged-bye to Mistress Net and the bairns!” sighed Kit, when she found herself walking briskly down the lane by the side of Brandon Coyle.

“You can write from London and explain,” replied the latter.

“And a fist Oi mek o’ writing!” exclaimed the girl.

At the entrance of the lane they found a post-chaise and a pair of horses waiting.

Brandon Coyle put his companion in this and took a seat by her side.

“Back to Keighly!” he ordered the driver, as the latter closed the door.

The man mounted to his seat and drove off.

“Keighly? Where’s Keighly? Annot yo going to Miston Station to tek the train?” inquired Kit.

“No! the two o’clock London express does not stop at Miston. We must go on to Keighly,” said Brandon Coyle.

But in fact his true motive in going on to the next station and taking this special train was to cover up his tracks in this course.

He himself, and even Kit, were too well known in Miston for them to venture to get on the train at that station, unless his intentions towards the unfortunate girl had been perfectly honest.

For this reason, early in that afternoon he had gone by train to Keighly and hired this post-chaise from the White Bear Tavern, and had come over to Miston Church Lane to take Kit away. He had no sort of doubt that his personal influence and power over the poor simpleton would induce her to go with him. He had only to catch her when she was alone. He had, therefore, timed himself so well that it was after midnight when he arrived at Church Lane.

He had left the post-chaise at the entrance of the lane and had walked down to the cottage.

He had expected to find that Kit, as well as all the rest of the family, had retired, and that he would have to awaken her, as he had been once accustomed to do by throwing up pebbles at her window panes.

But he found to his surprise that there was a light in the kitchen.

Going around by the back way and peering through a crevice in the window shutter, he had seen Kit sitting moodily, as we have described her, over the kitchen fire. He had succeeded in attracting her attention without disturbing the rest of the little household, as we have seen.

His plan had been perfectly successful, and now he had the wretched girl in his power to carry her whither he should please.

Fifty minutes’ rapid drive brought them to the Keighly Station, where Brandon Coyle had just time to pay and discharge the post-chaise and purchase tickets for himself and his companion when the train for London thundered into the station.

He secured a coupé for himself and his companion, placed her in it, and seated himself by her side just as the train started. It was the express, and had only stopped thirty seconds.

Kit was terribly flurried and frightened. She had never been on a train before in all her life, and the rapid speed of the flying express seemed to whirl away her breath and her senses. It was sometime before she could get accustomed to the motion, or be made to believe that if she let go the straps on the side of the carriage she should not be shaken to death.

But there came a reaction, and the next effect of the speed upon the nerves of the Missing Link was to swing her into a profound sleep that lasted many hours, giving her companion an opportunity to smoke and doze until the train reached Peterborough, where it stopped for breakfast.

Brandon Coyle awoke his slumbering and stupefied companion and took her out to breakfast in the refreshment-room of the station.

There he was half amused, half shocked at the enormous meal of pork steaks, eggs, muffins, marmalade, coffee and milk consumed by the handsome animal.

After breakfast they returned to their coupé, and the train started.