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not those which Wenna would have expected to find there as the result of the exercise of charity.

The small girl came back, and gave him the newspapers. He began to read; she sate down before him and stared up into his face. Then a brother of hers came in, and he, too, sate down, and proceeded to stare. Mr. Roscorla inwardly began to draw pictures of the astonishment of certain of his old acquaintances if they had suddenly opened that small door, and found him, in the parlour of an ale-house, reading stale political articles to an apparently uninterested invalid and a couple of cottage children.

He was thankful that the light was rapidly declining; and long before he had reached his half-hour he made that his excuse for going.

"The next time I come, Mr. Keam," said he, cheerfully, as he rose and took his hat, "I shall come earlier."

"I did expect vor to zee Miss Rosewarne this evenin'," said Nicholas Keam, ungratefully paying no heed to the hypocritical offer; "vor she were here yesterday marnin', and she told me that Mr. Trelyon had zeen my brother in London streets, and I want vor to know mower about 'n, I dü."

"She told you?" Mr. Roscorla said, with a sudden and wild suspicion filling his mind. "How did she know that Mr. Trelyon was in London ? " "How did she knaw?" repeated the siek man, indolently. "Why, he zaid zo in the letter."

So Mr. Trelyon, whose whereabouts were not even known to his own family, was in correspondence with Miss Rosewarne, and she had carefully concealed the fact from the man she was going to marry. Mr. Roscorla rather absently took his leave. When he went outside a clear twilight was shining over Eglosilyan, and the first of the yellow stars were palely visible in the grey. He walked slowly down towards the inn.

If Mr. Roscorla had any conviction on any subject whatever, it was this-that no human being ever thoroughly and without reserve revealed himself or herself to any other human being. Of course, he did not bring that as a charge against the human race, or against that member of it from whose individual experience he had derived his theory-himself; he merely accepted this thing as one of the facts of life. People, he considered, might be fairly honest, well-intentioned, and moral; but inside the circle of their actions and sentiments that were openly declared there was another circle only known to themselves; and to this region the foul bird of suspicion, as soon as it was born, immediately fled on silent wings. Not that, after a minute's consideration, he suspected anything very terrible in the present case. He was more vexed than alarmed. And yet at times, as he slowly walked down the steep street, he grew a little angry, and wondered how this apparently ingenuous creature should have concealed from him her correspondence with Harry Trelyon, and resolved that he would have a speedy explanation of the whole matter. He was too shrewd a man of the world to be tricked by a girl, or trifled with by an impertinent lad.

He was

of the way.

overtaken by the two girls, and they walked together the rest Wenna was in excellent spirits, and was very kind and grateful to him. Somehow, when he heard her low and sweet laughter, and saw the frank kindness of her dark eyes, he abandoned the gloomy suspicions that had crossed his mind; but he still considered that he had been injured, and that the injury was all the greater in that he had just been persuaded into making a fool of himself for Wenna Rosewarne's sake.

He said nothing to her then, of course; and, as the evening passed cheerfully enough in Mrs. Rosewarne's parlour, he resolved he would postpone enquiry into this matter. He had never seen Wenna so pleased herself, and so determinately bent on pleasing others. She petted her mother, and said slyly sarcastic things of her father, until George Rosewarne roared with laughter; she listened with respectful eyes and attentive ears when Mr. Roscorla pronounced an opinion on the affairs of the day; and she dexterously cut rolls of paper and dressed up her sister Mabyn to represent a lady of the time of Elizabeth, to the admiration of everybody. Mr. Roscorla had inwardly to confess that he had secured for himself a most charming and delightful wife, who would make a wonderful difference in those dull evenings up at Bassett Cottage.

He only half guessed the origin of Miss Wenna's great and obvious satisfaction. It was really this-that she had that evening reaped the first welcome fruits of her new relations in finding Mr. Roscorla ready to go and perform acts of charity. But for her engagement, that would certainly not have happened; and this, she believed, was but the auspicious beginning. Of course Mr. Roscorla would have laughed if she had informed him of her belief that the regeneration of the whole little world of Eglosilyan-something like the Millennium, indeed-was to come about merely because an innkeeper's daughter was about to be made a married woman. Wenna Rosewarne, however, did not formulate any such belief; but she was none the less proud of the great results that had already been secured by by what? By her sacrifice of herself? She did not pursue the subject so far.

Her delight was infectious. Mr. Roscorla, as he walked home that night-under the throbbing starlight, with the sound of the Atlantic murmuring through the darkness-was, on the whole, rather pleased that he had been vexed on hearing of that letter from Harry Trelyon. He would continue to be vexed. He would endeavour to be jealous without measure; for how can jealousy exist if an anxious love is not also present? and, in fact, should not a man who is really fond of a woman be quick to resent the approach of anyone who seems to interfere with his right of property in her affections? By the time he reached Bassett Cottage, Mr. Roscorla had very nearly persuaded himself into the belief that he was really in love with Wenna Rosewarne.

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THE

CORNHILL MAGAZINE.

OCTOBER, 1874.

Three Feathers.

CHAPTER IX.

THE RING OF EVIL OMEN.

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NE of Wenna's many friends outside the village in which she lived was a strange misshapen creature who earned his living by carrying sand from one of the bays on the coast to the farmers on the uplands above. This he did by means of a troop of donkeys-small, rough, light-haired, and large-eyed animals-that struggled up the rude and steep path on the face of the cliff, with the bags on their backs that he had laboriously filled below. It was a sufficiently cheerless occupation for this unfortunate hunchback, and not a very profitable one. The money he got from the farmers did not much more than cover the keep of the donkeys. He seldom spoke to any human being; for who was going to descend that rough and narrow path down to the shore-where he and his donkeys appeared to be no bigger than mice-with the knowledge that there was no path round the precipitous coast, and that nothing would remain but the long climb up again?

Wenna Rosewarne had some pity for this solitary wretch, who toiled at his task with the melancholy Atlantic

VOL. XXX, No. 178.

19.

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