"My dearie, no, no mistake to come to Catherine. Oh, my lamb. Oh! my lady, no, no, it's all safe here. Catherine is all alone there's no one else. Come to the fire-you won't mind the kitchen, Miss Helen, and here's tea, for you're cold and shivering."

"Are you sure you're alone, Catherine? I couldn't come in if you weren't. I only got your address to-day, and I thought you were in your own home. Whose house is it? I wanted to rest quietly for a little, and I've brought a handbag so that I might stay with you."

And Catherine told her whose house it was. "But you've come to see me, Miss Helen, nobody but me. I know that. And when you've had your tea and are warm, we will talk it all over and settle what you are going to do. Now don't cry, my dearie, it's only stupid old Catherine fussing about you and you're cold. Catherine is going to take your shoes off and warm those poor chilled feet. You must have come by train," and the poor woman talked on to hide her horror and distress, and to give herself time to think and plan for her dear little girl as she ever called her in her heart. She was the Catherine from whom Helen had parted years ago in my mother's house.

"No, now, Miss Helen, you must trust me. I'll never tell any one. We must get you warm and strong before the seven o'clock train and then we will go together. No one will come in till then; the stablemen have their tea in their own room and don't come in till supper-time, and then you and I will be gone. Now, rest in that chair," and Catherine turned down the gas and made the warm kitchen dim in the firelight to hide those tears that wrung her very soul to see.

And the poor tired girl rested for an hour in my house, tended by the

woman who loved her best in the world.

"But he must never know, Catherine. Oh, if I had only known you lived here I should have missed this happy hour you've given me, for I shouldn't have come! Now, I must go, and must go back to London."

"I am coming with you, Miss Helen. No, I will come. I couldn't let you go alone."

So the two women left the house. Mrs. Smith turned back after they had gone a hundred yards or so and went to the stables. There she gave my groom the house key, charging him to wait till she came back, and an hour and a half later her dear Helen was back in her "home" in London, lying dry-eyed in her bed waiting for the dawn.

I came home the next day. Life went on in its usual channels, and Christmas was approaching. It was unusually cold and wet, rain and snow alternating, till the river was in flood and the country almost too deep to ride over. The river runs past the back of my house, at the bottom of a steep hill, on which, sloping to the sun, is my kitchen-garden. There is a rough road that was formerly a tow-path between my garden wall and the river, and there is a door in the wall leading on to it by four or five downward steps. The poorer part of the town lies a little way up-stream; and, down-stream, the road leads to some brickfields and the railway embankment.

Late in December I was dining at the barracks one night, and was to dress there, to save myself the trouble of going home and turning out again. Clarke had taken on my things, and Mrs. Smith was alone in the house. There was a knock at the door, and in a moment she knew what had happened, and in another moment her dear Helen was in her arms again. She was very pale and very calm.

"Yes, Catherine, I knew this time whose house it was. I have to see him. Some one must protect me now, and I know nobody but him and you."

"Oh my dearie, come in and let us think what's best," and, supporting her, Mrs. Smith led this poor child into the kitchen again, and darkened it and fussed round her, searching and craving for some guidance in this hopeless trouble.

They had been there less than an hour when Helen started up as a man's footsteps passed the window on the gravel-walk and the dog rose growling and moved towards the front hall. "Oh! Catherine, some one is coming. You mustn't let him in. What shall I do?"

Silent and absolutely calm, Mrs. Smith took her to the back stairs and pointed to the door of a room at the top. It was her own bedroom.

"Go in there."

Swiftly she went herself to the front door and opened it. Through the wet fog she saw the figure of a man she recognized. He asked if I was at home.

"No, sir, he is not. He is dining out and will not be home till late. Would you please to leave any message?" she asked, as the man hesitated and had no card to hand her.

He was silent a moment, and then, with an oath, said-yes, he had a message. "There is some one in this house I want to see. I don't believe he is dining out," and he strode into the hall. Mrs. Smith could see he had been drinking, and was livid with passion as well, but she kept very still.

"You must be making some mistake, sir. There is no one here. My master is dining at the barracks, and his servant has taken his things there. You will find him there if you like to call; it is not far. Or would you like to come in and write a note?"

He hesitated. Yes, he would come

in; and he passed into my sitting-room and looked round. Mrs. Smith had taken in a lamp from the hall, and then she opened the door that led into my dining-room; that, too, was dark and empty.

He cursed again as he took up a piece of paper from my writing-table and then threw it down. He got up and swung round to the door and out into the hall. There he listened a moment, and then Mrs. Smith's face paled. but she stood quite still. He cursed again, and asked the way to the barracks-no, to the railway station,-in that damned fog who could find his way?

"The station, sir? Oh, well, that's hot far at all, but the road is full of turns; and if you would like to go a straighter way, I can let you out by the garden-gate. If you had a train to catch, it might be better. Would you come this way?" And she moved to the door leading to the garden. He followed her, and she passed rapidly on, down the slope of the garden, to the river door.

"This way, sir; you come to the railway a little way down. You can see the lights now. If you follow the road it brings you to the station." This was true, but it was to Tatfield Station, our junction, and three miles

away.

She was holding the door open for him to pass on to the steps. He moved through it, looked down the stream, and, misliking the blackness of the road, he turned to repass into the garden, saying he would rather go by the way he came. In an instant the heavy door swung round with tremendous force, struck him on the outstretched hand and full on the face. He crashed down the steps, with an oath for every step, and as he collected himself and gained his feet, to find the door firm and blank, Mrs. Smith was coursing up the path swifter than one

can tell it and back into the house. "Miss Helen, come at once. We can catch the train, and we must get to London and then think what to do. This is no place for you to-night, Miss Helen."

Swiftly she dressed for the journey. In two minutes she was with Helen in the road, and then went back to warn my men in the stable that she should be away till late; would they tell me if I came in before she returned.

When I got home at midnight Mrs. Smith was there, and hot soup was ready for me by my fire, and the house was as ordered and comfortable as she always made it.

It was a Friday night that I dined at the barracks: on Sunday morning I had a letter from Lady Colesden:

"I think I ought to write and let you know what is happening to Helen, since you and I are perhaps the nearest approach, to real relations she has in the world. You know I have scarcely seen her for years. After my poor cousin died and that idiot of a father of hers let Helen make that deplorable marriage of course he didn't know what he was doing, but any one but an idiot would have known: I never had any patience with the manHelen has been more and more difficult to find, and for several years now she has kept away from us quite pointedly. She is a perfect dear and it broke my heart to think why it was.

"Well, last night, imagine my astonishment when I got home from dining out. There was a very untidy note scribbled in pencil, and Hicks said a street messenger brought it about ten o'clock. It wasn't signed, but asked me to go at once to Eaton Place to Helen's house, as some one should be with her.

"I didn't quite like it, so I thought I would take Robert with me in case

he could be useful-there are times, you know, when he really is a prop!

"When we got to the house the servant said Helen had come home about nine o'clock and gone straight to her room, saying she was tired and would not come down. She had been out since afternoon. He did not know where she had dined. She had left no message about me, and I was rather hesitating what to do, and Robert said, as she had gone to her room two hours before, she was probably sound asleep by then, and there must be some mistake about the note. That seemed reasonable, and just as we were leaving, a cab drove up to the door and there was a fuss and bother about getting something out of it. A policeman who had come in it was pulling and tugging, and presently there emerged the figure of Helen's husband.

"It was here that I began to be most sincerely thankful that I had had the foresight to bring Robert with me. We could see some of the trouble at once. The man had been drinking; he was drenched (you know what a night it was); he was covered with mud, and his face was dreadfully bruised on one side and his right hand damaged. Robert is capital when things get tangled, and he took charge of the situation at once. He found the policeman was a railway man-they had discovered the wretch in a first-class carriage of the train at Paddington, and he was just able to say he had come from Tatfield but could give no account of his injuries; but he gave his address.

"Robert and I both had misgivings while the policeman was speaking that the man was really ill as well as battered, and though I wouldn't have touched him with the tongs otherwise, that somehow did compel me to see what I could do for him when we had got him on to a sofa in the library. Robert simply enveloped that police

man in the necessity for letting nothing get into the papers, and talked about the chairman of the railway whom he meant to see about it all in the morning; then he sent the footman for a doctor, while I prevented any one going upstairs to Helen till we knew what was wrong.

"Well, my dear friend, it was a positive relief to me when the doctor came and said the man was very seriously ill. I felt so dreadfully afraid he was going to say I was wasting my sympathies and energies on the animal's disgusting habitual state.

"Then we had him carried up to his room, and I sent for Helen's maid to tell Helen I was downstairs. There I sat wondering whether she had a servant in the house who was any sort of comfort to her, and grudging you old Mrs. Smith, who used to be with her, as I daresay you know, when she was a child, till Alice died and that senseless father of Helen's broke up the household and sent her back to Lark's Lacey and I took her as housemaid.

"Helen came down at last, but, of course, she had heard them moving in his room and had been in there to see. So she knew before I saw her, and it was evidently a fearful shock. I have never seen any one look so worn and broken, and she was so dear and nice to me.

"I came over to her this morning after I had been home for breakfast and a change of raiment, and here I am. Helen has been with him nearly all day. The doctor says he must have been in a bad state of health for a long time, and the chill he has had will be very hard to recover from. The shock of the injuries is severe, and that is what prevents him being clear enough to tell how he came by them and what he was doing at Tatfield-if by chance he wanted to enlighten us: perhaps he doesn't.

"Helen is well; that is to say, she

isn't ill, and you needn't be anxious about her at present. She is nursing the man as if he had been a model of all the virtues all the time.

"I will tell you if there is any change. I have written folios, and must stop and try to get the dear thing to rest a little. And you are not to come now, Helen says. She would rather see you later on. Also, I would rather not share her with anybody at present, so you see I am not loth to pass you on her order. I don't seem to have any time to attend even to Robert and the children at present.

"But who in creation was it that sent me that note telling me to come here???"

Mrs. Smith did not come for orders next morning, and, as there was some household thing I had to tell her about, I sent for her. Then I told her I had bad news from Lady Colesden of Helen's husband, and that I had heard for the first time that she had been Helen's maid long ago.

"Yes, sir, and I was very fond of the young lady, sir-very fond. And I am very sorry, sir, if she is in any trouble. I would be pleased if you would tell me if you hear again. And what would you like done with the woodcock, sir? Shall I cook them tonight, or keep them till next week?" Mrs. Smith had changed the subject. Three days later came another letter from Lady Colesden.

1

was fading into early sunsets and frosty mornings, and I was wondering whether I really took any interest in the General Election that was shaking the country, or not. Looking back, I know that I took none. But one day, having waded through the mass of election news in the paper, I came on a paragraph in the personal column saying that Helen had gone to Alderholt.

In ten minutes I had forgotten the meeting that evening at which I was to speak in support of our ardent Jingo candidate, and was on my way to -shire.

I found Helen, and told her I could wait no longer.

When we had settled one or two interesting matters, she told me the whole story of Mrs. Smith's-Catherine's action of those fatal days. At the end her husband had recounted it all to her his awful purpose in following her to my house, after he knew he had driven her by his cruelty to go; the servant-woman's treatment of the problem that faced her. He begged Helen's forgiveness, and she gave it. She had told him all that she did on that unhappy day, and how the loyal woman had shielded her from danger and from every breath of ill as far as lay in her resolute soul to do it.

And then-what could we do, we two together, to recompense such devoted service?

Just before we were married we made her come and see us, and told her we knew all she had done that we owed her more than we could ever reBlackwood's Magazine.

pay for her devotion and strength of purpose and loving care.

"You're not sending me away, Miss Helen?" (She never would call Helen by her first married name, or any version of it, if she could help it.) "Oh, don't send me away! I only came to you, sir, because I knew you were Miss Helen's friend. And if I may stay, don't, please, Miss Helen, ever talk about all that. You see, sir, I am just your servant, and hers, and if you were to make any difference with me I couldn't be still her servant. All I want is to stay and work for her. I've had trouble myself in my time. knew, sir, that when a person's trouble is at its worst, there is something coming to help. It was like that with me. It was nothing I did nothing. And please, Miss Helen, never speak of it again-oh, never, never!"

I

And the strong woman broke down, and we were fain to let her have her way.

So she stayed till she died; and I know that if Helen had a devoted husband-and I hope she had-she had an old servant-woman who loved her no less. And while that old servant lived, the story she would never bear to have told was heard by none.

Now it is written only that those three children of her beloved mistress -she nursed them all through childhood; and I can think of no one else to whom their mother would have entrusted them-may know how much they owe to Mrs. Smith.

C. H. B.

LIVING AGE. VOL. LI. 2668