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who, although he had of late years shunned | might be seen every morning upon her knees the prosperous prodigal, was most ready to scrubbing the steps before the door, (those assist the needy and repentant one. Nat, steps which no foot ever defiled!) were merely always quick, adroit, and neat-handed, had put in by the assignees to take care of the been in his youth a skilful engrosser; and premises. Influenced by these suspicions, Mr. Osborne, finding on trial that he could Mrs. Colby, who felt at once defrauded and depend upon him, not only employed him in affronted by not being able to answer the natuhis office when his failing health allowed him ral questions respecting her opposite neighto leave the house, but trusted him with deeds bour, and not even knowing whether she had to take home, in the completion and sometimes an opposite neighbour or not, took an opporthe entire execution of which Mrs. Kinlay, tunity one fine morning, when both the young applying herself to master the difficulties of and the old woman were at the door, the one the art, proved a most able and willing assist at her usual scrubbery, the other taking in ant. Hester, too, helped them and waited on some butcher's meat, to inquire if their masthem to the extent of her little power; and, ter were arrived. The poor lady took nothing once plunged into the healthful tide of virtu- by her motion; the Cinderella-looking maid ous industry and active exertion, the impover- was stupid, and cried Anan! the crone was ished family found their sufferings greatly surly, and banged the door in her face. No diminished. Even poor Nat, after a hard inquiry ever appeared more completely baffled; day's scrivening, felt his mind lightened and and yet Mrs. Colby had pretty nearly satisfied his conscience soothed. But this was a solace herself as to the ostensible object of her questhat become more and more rare; the attacks tion, (i. e. whether the purchaser were arrived,) of disease pressed on him with increasing fre- having caught a glimpse in the tray (our friend quency and added severity, and Mrs. Kinlay Stephen Lane used to say that Mrs. Colby and Hester were the chief bread-winners of could see through a deal board) of some prime the family. rump-steaks and a quarter of house-lamb, viands usually reserved for a master's table; and having also discerned, standing a little back in the passage, as if cogitating the question Shall I bark?' a beautiful Italian greyhound, so closely resembling the deceased Juliet, who had been of Mrs. Colby's acquaintance, that if such a thing as the ghost of a dog had been ever heard of, and that shrewd and unimaginative lady had been a believer in the unprofitable mysteries of the Gothic superstition, the light and graceful little animal might have passed for an apparition.

In the meanwhile, all their property at Belford had been disposed of,-plate, china, linen, the superb collection of greenhouse and hot-house plants, the trumpery pictures and the handsome furniture; and, persons not otherwise unfeeling, had committed the common but unfeeling act of crowding emulously to the sale, and talking quietly over the ruin of the acquaintance whom, not a month before, they had visited and liked,-for not to like Mrs. Kinlay, under all the disadvantage of low spirits, was impossible. Even the dairy-house, with its pretty garniture of old china and Dutch tiles, was dismantled and sold off; a dividend was paid on the debts, and every trace of poor Nat was swept away from Belford; the house where he had resided, which had hung longest on hand, as being almost too expensive a residence for a town, having at last found a purchaser, who, if outward indications might be trusted, was as different as possible from its late jovial but unthrifty proprietor.

The new occupant, who took possession in the dusk of the evening and retired immediately to the back drawing-room, which had been fitted up for his reception, kept himself so close within his citadel, the garden and the apartments looking into it, (the shutters of the front windows not being even opened,) that the inhabitants of Queen-street, especially our friend Mrs. Colby, who lodged in one of a row of small houses nearly opposite, and kept a pretty keen look-out on her neighbours, particularly on a fresh arrival, began to think that they had been misinformed as to the sale of the house, and that a cross-looking old woman, and a strong homely country-girl who seemed to officiate under her as a drudge, and

A week, nay a month passed away, and still Mrs. Colby, although keeping constant watch, had not been fortunate enough to see the stranger. It would almost seem that he had returned her compliment, and kept watch over her goings and comings likewise; for twice at least, as she had the mortification to hear, he had gone out during the short time that she had been off guard; once, as it ap peared, to visit the nursery-garden, fresh stock the hothouses and greenhouses, and hire suitable gardeners; the second time, to exchange his roomy and excellently situated pew in St. Stephen's church, (in the fitting up of which poor Nat had spent much money,) for a small niche in an obscure nook, which had no earthly recommendation but that of being close to a side-door at which the occupant might go out or come in without observation, and being so placed that it could be surmounted by a brass rod and a green curtain without causing annoyance or inconvenience to any one.

This last circumstance gave an insight into his character which every subsequent indication strengthened and confirmed. The man was evidently that plant of English growth

whether Mr. Carlton (if Carlton were indeed his name-if he were not rather some illustrious incognito,) amused his solitude by the perusal of the Times or the Chronicle, the

least have guessed at his politics, have learnt to think of him as Whig or Tory. Now he was worse than the Veiled Prophet-the most provoking puzzle in existence!

called an oddity. He neither received nor returned visits, made no acquaintance and seemed to have no associate in the world besides his cross housekeeper and his beautiful dog. Gradually he fell into the habit of go-Standard or the Courier. Then she could at ing into the streets, and entering the shops to which business called him; and then it was seen that he was a tall, erect, elderly gentleman, muscular and well proportioned, with a fine intellectual head, bald on the crown and forehead, and surrounded by short curly dark hair scarcely touched with grey, a firm intelligent countenance, and a general air of careless gentility-the air of one too sure of his station to take anything like trouble in its assertion.

After a time he began to haunt the booksellers' shops, and showed himself a man well acquainted not only with literature, but with bibliography, a hunter after choice editions, and a dear lover of that perhaps not very extensive class of scarce works which are valuable for other qualities besides their scarcity. In the old English drama particularly, and old ballads and romances in all languages, he was curious; and his library would have formed as good a subject for a grand incremation, in the hands of the Curate and Barber, as that of Don Quixote himself, whom he also emulated in the liberality of his orders and his total regardlessness of expense.

Another of his haunts was the shop of an intelligent printseller in the town, whom he employed in burnishing the frames and assisting him to hang a small but splendid collection of the finest Italian masters,-such pictures as it was sin and shame to shut up within doors more rigidly barred than those of a prison, inasmuch as none could find entrance; and such as collectors-who, even the most tasteful, often find the pleasure their pictures afford to their own eyes not a little enhanced by their value in the eyes of others are generally ready enough to display.

This feeling was shared in no small degree by our friend King Harwood; for if curiosity ever were a female monopoly, (which, by the by, I have not the slightest intention of admitting,) that time has long since passed away, and this identical personage, Mr. King Harwood, was in himself a bright example of a man possessing as much inquisitiveness and impertinent curiosity as all the sex put together. He it was who proposed to Mrs. Colby to storm Mr. Carlton's castle severally, and see whether their united powers or observation could not elicit some circumstance that might tend to elucidate the mystery; and, after some hesitation, Mrs. Colby consented; she being armed with the fair pretence of charity, as one of the lady collectors of a penny society; whilst King had provided himself with a letter from a young clergyman, who was standing for an evening lectureship at a public institution in London, and had requested Earl Harwood to canvass any of the governors with whom he chanced to be acquainted, enclosing a list in which appeared the name of Oliver Carlton.

Furnished with this document, our friend the beau approached, though with some caution, the grand object of his curiosity-the Bluebeard's chamber of Queen street. The point of admission had been regarded by both parties as a question of considerable difficulty,

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Not at home" being the regular answer to all visiters; and our adventurer had determined to watch Mr. Carlton home to dinner, and walk boldly after him into the house; a From the report made by the printseller of plan which was the more easily accomplished, these magnificent paintings, and of the rich-as the milkman, happening to stop at the door ness and tastefulness of the furniture, together with his large orders and punctual payments amongst the different tradespeople of the town, a strong and probably exaggerated notion of the recluse's great wealth began to prevail amongst the genteel-that is to say, the idle circles of Belford, to whom, in the absence of individual occupation, anything in the shape of mystery and news proved a welcome resource from the sameness and ennui of their general condition. During six months that he had been in the place, nothing more had been known of him than that his newspapers came addressed to Oliver Carlton, Esq. Beyond that, not a tittle of intelligence had Mrs. Colby been able to extract from the postman. He could not even tell her what the papers were; and she felt that it would somewhat have mitigated the fever of curiosity to know

at the same instant, favoured the manœuvre, by engaging the attention of the stupid maid, who answered her master's knock. What passed between them, we have no business to know. Mr. Harwood would not tell, and Mr. Carlton did not; (even Mrs. Colby's ingenuity could not extract more from the crest-fallen King, than that the interview had been short and decisive,) indeed having been watching him from her window with Dr. Fenwick's stop-watch in her hand, she knew that the time which elapsed between this stealthy entrance and his rapid exit was exactly four minutes and forty-three seconds, and that Mr. Carlton was a brute! Upon which encouragement, Mrs. Colby forthwith took up the Society's documents, and marched over the way herself-curious, perhaps, to know what sort of brute she might find him.

The lady was admitted without difficulty, and found herself, with a facility which she had not expected, and which, put her a good deal out of her play, in the presence of Mr. Carlton, and compelled by his manner to plunge at once into the affairs of the charity. "A penny society!" exclaimed her host, with an expression of sarcasm which only a long habit of scorn can give to any lips; "you come for a penny subscription! Madam, I have just had the honour of a visit from a gentleman, who is, he tells me, called KingKing, doubtless, of the Busybodies! Do not compel me to tell a lady that she is well fitted to be their Queen."

only by Hester, had taken a small lodging nearly opposite her own old house, and intended to support herself by needlework.

Why she chose for her place of abode a spot so well calculated to revive melancholy recollections, can be accounted for only on the principle which none can understand, but all have felt, that endears to us the scene of past sufferings. This was undoubtedly her chief reason; although she sometimes said to herself, with desperate calmness, "This is my parish, and I will not give the overseers the trouble of removing me in case I am compelled to apply to them." Another cause for her fixing in Belford might be found in its being the residence of a favourite old servant, now a respectable mantuamaker in the town, who was likely to be useful to her in procuring inac-employment, and to whom, in case of her own death, she could entrust the child of her pity and her love-her own dear Hester.

And Mrs. Colby found it convenient to take up her papers and march off, as her luckless predecessor had done before her.

-

Through this attached old servant,-why did I say that she had no friend in Belford ?— it was soon made known to the ladies of the place that Mrs. Kinlay declined all visiting and all assistance, but would be thankful for employment at her needle, at the customary rate of payment; and she and Hester (her zealous and most efficient assistant) were soon in full occupation; any interval in the supply of plain-work (always so precarious) being supplied by dresses or millinery, to begin or to finish, from the shop of their humble but faithful friend Mrs. Boyd.

From this time Mr. Carlton continued cessible and unmolested, holding intercourse with none but the poor of the place, whom he relieved with great munificence and some caprice. He was evidently a man of fortune and education; of retired and studious habits, of very good principles, and very bad temper (soured probably by some domestic calamity, for it is our English way to quarrel with the whole world if injured by one individual); and as the Belford people got used to his oddities, and ceased to watch his comings and goings, and he, in his turn, came to regard the persons amongst whom he lived no more than the passing and unobservant crowds of London or Paris- those mighty streams of human life, amongst which an isolated indi- Hester, for whom Mrs. Kinlay felt that she vidual is but as a drop of water in a great had sacrificed much, and whom she loved all fiver, his dislike to being seen insensibly the better for that sacrifice, was a most sweet wore away, and he walked in and out of his and gentle creature. Tall of her age-slender house as freely and quietly as his neighbours. and graceful, though rather with a bending It was now more than four years since the willowy grace-than the erect deportment of Kinlays had left Belford, and little had been the dancing-school-with a profusion of curlheard of them during their absence. Poor ing hair darkened into the soft colour of the Nat, who, at his height of popularity, had ripe hazel-nut, a skin fair and polished as that won only the undesirable distinction of being of the garden-lily, a high open forehead, a liked, but not esteemed even by the thought- mild grey eye, and a cheek pale until she less, whilst by the sober-minded he was uni- spoke or smiled, and then glowing with the! versally condemned, had been succeeded by very tint of the maiden-blush-rose: all thisanother "good fellow" amongst the parties and, above all this, that smile so full of tenwhich he frequented, whose newer songs and derness and sweetness, and that timid manner, fresher jokes had entirely effaced the memory and that low and pleading voice, were irresistof their old boon companion-such are the ibly charming. And her mind was as charmfriendships of men of pleasure!-whilst his ing as her person. Wholly unaccomplished, wife, though universally respected, had shrunk since for accomplishments she had had no so completely from every sort of intimacy, time, she had yet had the great and solid adthat, amongst her many acquaintances, there vantage of the society of a refined and cultiwas not one who lived with her upon more vated woman, who talked to her not as a child familiar terms than is implied by a polite in- to be instructed, but as a companion, to whom terchange of visits. Well-wishers she had she was pouring out the fulness of her own many, friends she had none; and almost the knowledge and information, and unlocking the first tidings that were heard of her in Belford stores of a memory rich, above all, in the during those three years were, that she had highest poetry of our language. Even the returned there a widow; that her husband had drudgery of the quill, had had its use in Hesdied after a tedious illness; and that she her- ter's education, first by forming her mind to self, in a state of failing health and utter po- habits of patient attention, and then by allowverty, had arrived in the town, accompanieding her, when the mystery was conquered and

the task of copying was become merely me- | him issue from his own door followed by the chanical, long intervals for silent thought. So beautiful Italian greyhound, and exclaimed at that, at little more than thirteen years of age, its resemblance to her own regretted pet, her her reflective and somewhat imaginative cha-faithful Juliet: "Never was such a likeness!" racter had the maturity of twenty; those cir- cried she; "look! dear mother! only look!" cumstances of her situation which would be. "It's Mr. Carlton and his dog-Romeo, I commonly called disadvantages having acted think they call him," observed the landlady, upon her mind as the wind and rain of March advancing to the window. upon the violet, strengthening the flower, and raising it into a richer tint and more exceeding fragrance.

Her pleasure in returning to Belford," to the country," as she fondly called it was excessive. Accustomed to fresh air and clear sunny light, the closeness and gloom of London had seemed to double the labour to which she had been condemned; and to inhabit again a street on the very outskirts of the town, in which three minutes' run would lead her through the by-lane she knew so well, into the beautiful meadows and pastures of the Dairy Farm, was a blessing for which she could never, she thought, be sufficiently grateful. A few "natural tears she shed" to the memory of her kind protector-her father, as she had been taught to call him; but for herself, and even for her dear mother (for "mother" was the fond name by which she had always been permitted to address Mrs. Kinlay), she was full of hope. “The air would restore that dear mother's health, and she should be able to support them both-she was sure she should. Half an hour's run in the fields and lanes in the early morning, or in the dusk of twilight, and a long, long ramble every Sunday afternoon, would make her strong enough for any exertion; she wished her dear mother would let her work only for one week without helping her-she was sure she could keep them both." And as she said this, her sweet face gladdened and glowed with her earnestness, the sad expression vanished, and she looked as happy and as hopeful as she really felt.

"Romeo! how strange! my dog's name was Juliet," replied Hester. "Do, dearest mother, come and see how like this little dog is to her in all her pretty ways. See how he frisks round his master and jumps almost into his arms! Pray look!"

And turning round to demand still more earnestly Mrs. Kinlay's attention, she saw her leaning back in her chair pale and motionless, the needlework on which she had been employed fallen from her hands, and her whole appearance and attitude bespeaking her inability to speak or move. She had not fainted, and yet she seemed scarcely conscious of the caresses of poor Hester, or of her efforts to revive and rouse her. Her first articulate words were a desire to see Mrs. Boyd; and by the time she arrived, Mrs. Kinlay was sufficiently collected to send the anxious girl for a walk, while she conversed in private with their humble but faithful friend.

The result of this consultation was a long letter written by Mrs. Kinlay and dispatched to the post-office by Mrs. Boyd; and, until the reply arrived on the second morning, an evident increase of illness and agitation on the part of the writer.

This reply consisted of a large packet, apparently, as Hester thought from a transient glance which she was too delicate to repeat, of her dear mother's own letter returned with two or three lines in the envelope. Whatever might be the contents, the effect was exquisitely painful! Inured as the unhappy lady had long been to suffering, this stroke seemed the most severe of any, and Hester could Neither she nor Mrs. Kinlay had made any scarcely repress the affectionate anxiety which inquiry respecting their opposite neighbour, prompted her twenty times a day to implore the occupier of the house where they had that this new grief might be confided to her. lived for so many years. Their landlady, a Someway or other she could not avoid connectwell-intentioned but very common person, was ing it in her own mind with Romeo and his not of a class to tempt them into any commu- master; she even thought that the name of nication on a subject so painful and so affect- Carlton came across her as a sound once ing; and Mrs. Boyd-who had lived with familiar; she could not recall when she had Mrs. Kinlay from childhood, had pressed her heard it, or where the trace on her memory coming to Belford, and had engaged for her was faint and indistinct as the recollection of her present lodging, with a vague intimation a dream-but assuredly the name was not new that she thought the situation would be bene- to her. Again and again she was on the point ficial, and hoped her dear mistress would not of making some inquiry either of Mrs. Kinlay object to its vicinity to her former dwelling- or of Mrs. Boyd; but respect in the one inhad never entered on the subject. Ten days stance and delicacy in the other-and, above had passed without their happening to see all, the early and salutary habit of self-restraint their misanthropic neighbour, when one bright-withheld her from touching on the subject. autumn morning, (for it was early in October that they arrived in Queen-street,) Hester sitting at work at the open window, her landlady and Mrs. Kinlay being both in the room, saw

The only approach to it that she ventured was a remark on the singular coincidence of the name in the two dogs: "Romeo and Julietsurely it was strange!"

"Both are common names for Italian greyhounds," was Mrs. Kinlay's quiet reply; and nothing more passed between them.

In the mean while Christmas approached, and the invalid's health became more and more precarious; and their united labours (although liberally paid) became more and more inadequate to the additional expenses of winter and of sickness. Mrs. Kinlay, whose hoard of jewels and trinkets had been nearly exhausted by the long illness and the burial of her husband, now disposed even of her laces and linens, reserving nothing but mere necessaries for herself and Hester, and a small but beautiful and valuable repeater-the last gift, as she said, of a dear friend.

This resource and Hester's incessant labours kept them through the dark months; for the poor child found that November, and December, and January could be dark even out of London: and the winter passed away unmarked by any occurrence, except the formation of a warm and lasting friendship between herself and Romeo. One day, by some strange accident, the graceful little creature, shy and timid as a fawn, had lost his master, missed him in some of the booksellers' and printsellers' shops that he frequented; and when, after a fruitless search, he addressed himself in distress and perplexity to the task of finding his way home, he encountered a tribe of noisy urchins, the pest of the streets, ripe for mischief, who seeing the poor little animal panting and breathless for fear, surrounded it shouting and hooting, halloed their own curs upon it, chased it as if it had been a wild beast, and finally followed it up the street with the cry of "A mad dog!"

to the door before he had been even missed; but from that moment an attachment of the warmest kind was established between them. Romeo loved Hester as the most grateful of all animals loves those who have served him ;* and Hester loved Romeo with that still stronger and more delightful affection which a young and generous girl feels for one whom she has served.

Under the guidance of this sentiment, it was quite extraordinary, considering how little either party went out, that they should so of ten contrive to meet each other. Romeo watched for Hester, and Hester watched for Romeo. It was an innocent romance, a rare instance of a clandestine intercourse without guilt or shame. Whether Mr. Carlton knew of their meetings, never appeared. Mrs. Kinlay did, and felt a pleasure which few things now could give her when Romeo bounded up stairs with Hester to pay her a visit. Frugal as they were, denying themselves all but necessaries, they could not resist the temptation of keeping a supply of the delicate biscuits which that choice and fragile race of dogs are known to prefer to any other food; and Romeo, however difficult to coax into eating at his own home, never refused the cates prepared for him by the fair hands of his new friends. It was a very singular and very genuine attachment.

The winter, although gloomy, had been mild; and even in the Christmas week Hester, who knew every dell where the starry primrose grew, and every hedge-row where the violet blossomed, had cheered the sickroom of Mrs. Kinlay by a nosegay of primroses; whilst during the whole of February In this plight, Hester, going to the chemist's she had contrived to find on southern banks, for medicine, met the worried and bewildered and in nooks sheltered from almost every little creature, who, on her calling" Romeo!" wind, covered by withered grass or couching came to her at once, and sprang into her arms; amongst short mossy turf, a few, and a very and little as the slight gentle girl seemed cal- few, early violets;-for those sweet flowers culated to encounter the small mob of mis- know and obey their season, and although an chievous boys already emulating the hero of occasional straggler, tempted by the mildness Hogarth's Progress of Cruelty, and promising of the weather, may steal into day, yet the candidates for a similar catastrophe, yet, strong countless multitude, the mass of fragrant blosin womanly scorn and righteous indignation, soms (unlike the primrose, which, provided she succeeded in rescuing her trembling pro- not checked by frost, will cover the ground in tegé and kept his pursuers at bay until, still mid-winter,) reserves its simple beauty and carrying him in her arms, she took refuge with its exquisite perfume for its own month of her frightened charge in a respectable shop. March. And now March had arrived — a There she sat down with him in her lap, and March soft and genial as April; and Mrs. soothed and caressed him until his fear seemed Kinlay appearing much revived by the beauty lost in love and gratitude to his fair preserver. of the weather and the fresh impulse given to Dogs are great physiognomists,-that is ad- all nature by the breath of spring, Hester was mitted on all hands; they are also voice-most anxious to win her into walking with her fanciers; and Romeo showed his discrimination in both these points, by being never weary of looking at his new friend's sweet face, or of listening to her melodious tones. They were obliged to part, for Hester felt it a point of duty to return him as speedily as might be to the master who seemed to love nothing else in the world, and accordingly she took him

one fine Sunday as far as the pastures of the Dairy Farm, now let to an old milkman, who, churlish to all the world, but courteous to Hester, had extended to her, and to her alone, the privilege of gathering violets in his hedgeThe first day that she had attempted

rows.

* Vide note at the end of the story.

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