CHAPTER VII.

"YOU KNOW THIS IS A GREAT SECRET."

"'And had he friends?' 'One friend perhaps,' said he, 'And for the rest, I pray you let it be.'"--_Jean Ingelow._

Queenie was terribly restless during the next few days. While the important negotiation was impending she held aloof as much as possible from her friends at Church-Stile House. She could scarcely look Garth in the face when she met him in the village, so heavily did her secret weigh upon her. She had been once to see Langley, and had sat with her some time; but their talk had languished, and at last degenerated into silence. Langley had been too sad and heavy-hearted to make any pretence of cheerfulness, and Queenie had been so oppressed with secret consciousness that she had failed in outward manifestations of sympathy.

"If talk would only mend matters you would have no reason to complain of my silence," Langley said, by way of excuse for her downheartedness, when Queenie rose to take leave.

"One cannot always talk; I wish I were only as patient as you," had been Queenie's reply. But she breathed more freely when she had crossed the little bridge and was walking down the lane in the grey, waning light.

But Cathy came to the cottage, and was so low-spirited, and drew such dismal pictures of the future, that Emmie, who was weakly and tender-hearted, burst out crying, and for a long time refused to be comforted.

"Oh, Queen, if we were but rich!" sobbed the poor child, "how nice it would be to help them. I can't bear to think of Langley and Cathy working as you used to work at Granite Lodge, and being hungry and cold and miserable. Cathy might come and live here, there is plenty of room."

"Yes, yes, my sweet," returned Cathy, drying her eyes and kissing her hurriedly, "I will promise to come to you if I am starving; but I am going to nurse the sick people in the great London Hospital, you know, and nurses are sure to get plenty to eat," and the warm-hearted girl changed the subject, and began a ludicrous narration of Ted's sayings and doings during the last few days.

But Emmie could not forget her friends' troubles; she brooded over them silently, and at last made a little pilgrimage on her own account.

Garth, sitting moody and listless in his study, was surprised by a feeble tap, and then by the entrance of the child in her little scarlet hood.

"Why, Emmie, my dear," he said kindly, "has your sister brought you over to see us? surely you have not come alone this cold evening."

"Queenie and Cathy are talking so busily that they will not miss me; they think I am with Patience. I did not mind the cold a bit; I came all by myself, because I wanted to see you, Mr. Garth."

"To see me!" in a surprised tone, for, in spite of their friendship, Emmie had never before distinguished him in this way; her visits had always been to Langley. "Well, I am highly honored, and must make much of my visitor. Will this thing untie?" touching the red hood. But Emmie took no notice of his question; she stood beside him with her large blue eyes fixed gravely on his face, and then she put up her hand and stroked his cheek, but very gently and timidly.

"Poor Mr. Garth, I am so sorry for you."

"Why, my dear?" But he was touched in spite of himself, the little thin hand spoke so eloquently.

"Because you have lost all your money, and are so dreadfully unhappy. Was there a great deal, Mr. Garth?"

"Well, it was a tolerably large sum, at least for me," he replied gravely.

"And God has taken it away from you; that is very sad, is it not? I don't like to think of you being poor, it makes me feel bad all over."

"Why, Emmie, I never expected you to feel it like this! You must not trouble your dear little head about my affairs."

"I am sorry, but not half so sorry as Queenie is, I know, though she says so little about it. She never talks now, at least hardly at all, and she has not told me stories for ever so long; but she sits and looks at the fire, and sometimes her eyes are full of tears, though she thinks I do not see them."

He flushed at this, and a look of pain crossed his face.

"She may have troubles of her own; she will not like you to tell me this," he began in an embarrassed tone; but Emmie was too much engrossed with her subject to heed him.

"Shall you be very poor?" she persisted; "shall you be obliged to leave this old house, where you and Langley were born, and go and live in a poky little place in Warstdale, as Cathy says?"

"Cathy knows nothing about it; she ought not to tell you such things," rather quickly. "Of course we must leave this house, and of course we shall have to work; but we are young, and that will not hurt us. Come, come, things are not as bad as you and Cathy make them out; put all these sad thoughts out of your head. How could they have talked so before the child?" he muttered to himself.

But Emmie was not so easily comforted. She stood silently by Garth a minute, and then her eyes filled, and two large tears coursed slowly down her cheeks.

"Now, Emmie, don't be silly; I can't have you crying over this!" but his tone was kind; and as he spoke he drew the child gently to him.

"I can't help it," she whispered. "Cathy says you eat nothing, and that you are getting so thin and ill; and that frightens Queenie, and makes her look grave."

"Why, this is too absurd!" he began, and then his tone changed. The child would make herself ill if she went on like this. "Do you think you could make me some tea and some hot buttered toast if I were to promise to eat it? Now I think about it I am rather faint, and hot buttered toast is a favorite luxury of mine. Langley will find you the toasting-fork and things if you go and ask her."

In a moment Emmie's tears were dried by magic, and the little red hood laid aside. When, half-an-hour afterwards, Queenie entered the house in some alarm to know what had become of Emmie, she found a little scene that surprised her.

Garth and Emmie were seated with a little round table between them; a choice pile of buttered toast, done to a nicety, lay on the young man's plate. Emmie's face was flushed with excitement and heat, her hands were slightly blackened.

"He has promised to eat all that!" she cried out, pointing with the teapot in the direction of Garth's plate; "and he says he feels better already. I have made the tea so strong, just as he likes it. Langley let me go to the caddy myself!"

Garth rose with a droll expression and shook hands with Queenie.

"Emmie has played truant, I am afraid. She has got it into her head that I am starving myself to death as the best way of escaping my difficulties. I have had to eat and drink before her to dissipate the unpleasant idea."

"Oh, Emmie! how could you think of running away like this?" exclaimed her sister, fondly pressing the child's fair head between her hands; but she said very little to either of them after that. In the months to come that little scene often recurred to her, and the strange, embarrassed look on Garth's face as she entered.

More than a week had elapsed since the two conspirators had met in the little parlor at Brierwood Cottage. Queenie was just beginning to feel that the suspense was becoming terrible, when one night, as she was sitting alone after Emmie had gone to bed, she heard Mr. Logan's voice in the entry, and in another moment he came in shaking the raindrops off him.

"Well," he said, beaming on her through his spectacles, "I have not kept you too long waiting, have I? Of course you have been very anxious, but a delicate matter like this required plenty of time and management."

"Oh, yes, I know," she replied hastily; "but, all the same, my suspense has been dreadful. Tell me quickly, Mr. Logan. Has he taken it?"

"He has."

"Oh, thank heaven!" she exclaimed, and turned away lest the relief and joy should be too legibly written on her face.

"It has been a difficult job," he went on, sitting down and spreading his white, finely-shaped hands over the blaze. "At one time I feared whether I could carry it through. He was so hard to manage; but I timed it well, and spoke before Miss Clayton. I knew I could count on her common-sense to help me."

"But how did you begin? Did you say the words I put into your mouth? Tell me all about it, please," and Queenie tried to compose her glowing face.

"I can hardly remember my words. I said very little at first. I told Garth that a sum of money had lately come into my possession, and was lying idle at the Carlisle Bank; that it was there, and that I intended to make no use of it; and I entreated him, for his sisters' sake, to lay aside his pride and accept the loan offered to him."

"Well?"

"Well, he was very difficult at first. He seemed cut up, poor fellow, and very low over the whole business. He would have it that it was dishonest to help himself to another man's money unless he could see his way clear to repay it in a fair time; that his embarrassment was such that, even with this help, it might be two or three years before he could perfectly right himself; that he had had other losses lately; and that perhaps the wisest course would be to throw up the Works and take a manager's place himself. 'We should not starve on a hundred and fifty a-year, and Ted would earn something,' he said more than once."

"Of course you did not give in to him?"

"No; I grew tremendously eloquent, and Langley helped me. I talked myself hoarse for nearly two hours before I could move him. I hurled all sorts of thunders at him. I anathematized the Clayton pride as an unholy thing. I told him that it was a grievous sin against charity to refuse the help of a friendly hand when it was stretched out to save him. What would have been thought of the conduct of the poor traveller if he had refused the assistance of the good Samaritan; if he had lain there in his obstinacy, declaring that no such bindings up of oil and wine should be his?"

"Ah, you had him there."

"Well, he did look a little uneasy at that; and then I plied him with arguments. Did he think it a manly thing to let his sisters go out into the world and work because he could not do as other men did under such circumstances, and bend that pride of his? I noticed he winced at that. And then I upbraided him with his want of friendship. What did Charlotte and I want with the money? we had sufficient for our simple needs. Buy books with it? for he actually suggested that in a feeble sort of way. Did he think we were such lukewarm Christians that we should lay it out in luxuries while our dearest friends were on the brink of ruin?"

"I can well imagine your eloquence."

"It was worse than preaching half-a-dozen sermons. I was just getting weary and out of breath when Langley came to my rescue, and begged him, with tears in her eyes, not to grieve me; and then between us we talked him into a better and more hopeful state of mind."

"And he consented to accept it at last?"

"Yes; he is to draw two hundred and fifty to-morrow to meet some bills that are pressing upon him, and next week he is to take three hundred more, that will put him straight; but he will require the remainder for current expenses. It appears there will be little or no profit coming in from the Works for the next six months. His great fear is that he may not be able to repay me for two or three years."

"What does that matter?" exclaimed the girl, joyfully. "Oh, Mr. Logan, how shall I thank you for doing what you have done to-night? How did he look? and what did Langley say to you?"

"Well, he looked very pale, poor fellow; but I think on the whole he is very grateful and relieved. I know he wrung my hand nearly off when I took my leave. I felt such a consummate hypocrite when Miss Clayton burst into tears, and thanked me for saving her brother. I wonder what they would say if they knew the truth!"

"Hush! we will not say anything about that. Have you come straight from Church-Stile House? does Miss Cosie know yet?"

"No; but I must tell her directly I get home. By-the-bye, where is Miss Catherine, I missed her to-night?"

"She is spending the evening with Mrs. Stewart. Dr. Stewart has gone over to Karldale for the night. Mrs. Chester is very ill, and there is to be a consultation."

"Her days are numbered, poor soul, at least I greatly fear so," he returned very gravely, and soon afterwards he took his leave.

Queenie could scarcely compose herself to sleep that night, her relief was so intense; but in the morning the old fear obtruded itself. Could they rely with any degree of safety on Miss Cosie?

"Solomon tells us, that in the multitude of counsellors there is wisdom," she thought to herself; "but I do not think it holds good in the case of a dear fussy little old maid like Miss Cosie." And then she groaned in spirit, and finally decided to go then and there to the vicarage, and threaten that harmless old maiden with all sorts of pains and penalties if she did not keep that busy tongue of hers in order.

She found her in an old wooden out-house, that went by the name of the dairy, busily skimming a great bowl of yellow cream, with the inevitable grey shawl pinned round her, and a little drawn grey hood tied over her curls.

When she caught sight of her visitor she dropped her spoon, and came clattering over the brick floor in her little clogs.

"Dear, dear, it is never you, Miss Marriott! and not a wink of sleep have I got all night with thinking of you and those poor creatures at Church-Stile House; but there, there, I must not upset you," went on the little woman breathlessly, reaching up on tiptoe to kiss her.

"Dear Miss Cosie, I knew how glad you would be."

"Glad! I couldn't coin the word that would express my feeling. I seem as though I were made of india-rubber, I feel so drawn out and expanded with sheer happiness. It is a mountain that is lifted off me and Christopher, that's what it is," continued the soft-hearted little creature, wiping her eyes, and dimpling all over her round bright face. "Dear, dear, to think that you are a rich woman, and all the rest of it."

"Now, Miss Cosie, remember this is a great secret," began Queenie solemnly.

"My dear, I wouldn't breathe a word to a soul not if it were to save my life. Didn't Christopher tell me all about it last night, sitting there in his big chair, looking so good and beautiful, more fit to be lifted straight up to heaven, as I always say, than to be down here in father's big elbow chair, and with the tears all but running down his cheeks, so that he had to take off his spectacles to wipe them."

"But, Miss Cosie--"

"And to begin in that joking way, too," went on Miss Cosie, too intent on her reminiscences to heed the interruption. "'Well, Charlotte, my dear,'--I hardly thought I should be deceived at my time of life in this bare-faced manner,--'what do you think this sly little puss of a schoolmistress has been doing?' that's how he began."

"I wish I had been behind the door."

"Why, it was as good as a play, and he enjoying my fright, for I was quite in a fuss and worry in a moment. 'Don't tell me that our Miss Marriott could do anything wrong, for I won't believe it, Kit,' I returned; 'for she is as good a girl as ever lived, and a better sister to that poor little sickly child never breathed, and you may take my word for it, as sure as my name is Charlotte Logan.'"

"Thank you for that, dear Miss Cosie."

"'Don't put yourself out, Charlotte, there is no reason for it,' he answers, quite calmly. 'I am not saying a word against Miss Marriott's goodness; but she is a sly little creature for all that, for she is hiding from us all that she is a rich woman, with a tidy little fortune of five thousand a-year.' Dear, dear, the maze I was in when he said that!"

"If only I had been there!" ejaculated Queenie feelingly.

"I wouldn't believe it for a long time, and then it seemed to come on me like a flash. 'Why of course, Kit, my dear,' I said, as well as I could speak for crying, for he had been telling me all about the Brierwood Cottage conspiracy as he called it, and a more blessed deed of charity never reached my ears; but it shall be restored four-fold, pressed out and running over, and all that, my dear, you may rest assured of that. 'Why it stands to reason, Kit, my dear,' I said, 'that a young lady like Miss Marriott, who has the carriage of a duchess, and puts on her clothes well, and always holds her head high, and looks you in the face, and moves about as though she knew there was a barouche and pair waiting for her round every corner; why it stands to reason that a noble young creature like that should turn out to be somebody.'"

"But, Miss Cosie," exclaimed Queenie, trying not to laugh in the little woman's face, "I am the same that I was before; it does not make any difference in me, really, because Emmie's uncle chose to leave me all his money."

"No, my dear, certainly not; and of course in church you will always call yourself a miserable sinner, and all that, and of course that will be right and proper; but if only you could have heard what Christopher said about you! but I must not make you vain."

"Ah, Mr. Logan has been so good in helping me; he has managed everything so cleverly," returned Queenie, thankful to turn Miss Cosie's thoughts into a less embarrassing channel.

"My dear, you have no conception of Christopher's cleverness; he ought to be the bishop of the diocese, or the prime minister, with that head of his. No one can hold a candle to him, that is what I always say; he is the wisest and the best and the cleverest man I ever knew, in spite of his never remembering to take a clean handkerchief out of his drawers unless I put it ready for him. Why he actually ran after the bishop in that old patched dressing-gown of his; but I have told you that story before," interrupting herself just in time, and stopping to take breath. Now was Queenie's opportunity.

"Miss Cosie," she began, still more solemnly than before, "you know this is a great secret, and that it must be only known to us three."

"Yes, yes; of course, my dear."

"If the truth were to leak out in any way the whole plan will be spoilt. Mr. Clayton would not touch the money if he knew it were mine and not Mr. Logan's, and then he and Langley and Cathy would be ruined."

"My dear, as though I would breathe a syllable!"

"No; you will not mean to say a word, but, all the same, a hint or a moment's forgetfulness would betray us. Ah, there is Langley coming up the garden; she has come, of course, to thank you as well as Mr. Logan. Dear, dear Miss Cosie, do promise to be careful!"

"There, there, you are quite agitated, and no wonder; but you may trust me; oh, you may trust me!" returned Miss Cosie with a soothing pat and nod.

But she had no time to add more, for Langley was approaching them with her pale face brightened with unwonted smiles.

"Dear Miss Cosie, I hardly know what I am to say to you and Mr. Logan," she exclaimed, clasping the little woman in her arms with unusual warmth, for Langley, in spite of her gentleness, was not a demonstrative woman.

"There, there, say nothing at all about it," returned Miss Cosie hurriedly and nervously; "that is by far the wisest plan, is it not, Miss Marriott?" appealing in some alarm to her young companion.

"Yes; Miss Cosie would rather not be thanked," returned Queenie in a low voice.

"Must I not tell you good dear people what I think of you both?" continued Langley in her soft, persuasive manner. "When one's heart is brimming over with gratitude one cannot refrain from speaking. I always knew what unselfish Christians you were, but now you have proved it without doubt."

"Oh, my dear, this is dreadful! pray, pray do not say any more, you make me quite unhappy," exclaimed Miss Cosie, putting up her plump hands in dismay. "Miss Marriott, if you love me, ask this dear soul not to say any more."

"I think it upsets her and Mr. Logan to be thanked," observed Queenie, turning her face a little aside, for Miss Cosie's helplessness and terror moved her to inward laughter. "I think I would let it be, Langley."

"Yes, do, there's a dear good creature," returned Miss Cosie, breathing a little more freely; "it cuts one like a knife to hear you, and then to know that one has nothing to do with the matter at all."

"Miss Cosie means that she and Mr. Logan have no present use for the money, that they did not intend to spend it," put in Queenie calmly; "but she is so flurried and upset by the whole business that it is kindest not to talk to her at all upon the subject. It only distresses her kind heart," went on the young girl with the utmost calmness, though her heart sank over Miss Cosie's first blunder.

And Langley, with her usual tact, quietly changed the subject.

But Queenie returned home ill-at-ease.

"I feel as though I were walking over a mine that might explode at any moment under my feet," she said to Mr. Logan when he came to her the next day to inform her that Garth had paid that visit to the Carlisle Bank. "I hardly dare trust Miss Cosie out of my sight."

"Oh, it will be all right," he answered soothingly; "in a few days the subject will have blown over, and she will have forgotten all about it. Don't trouble yourself. This little plot of yours is making you nervous."

"I think it is," she returned frankly; "my peace of mind is quite gone, and I do nothing but anticipate difficulties; but, all the same, I would not undo our work," smiling in her old bright manner.