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"'Sir, I thank you, but I can answer at once. NEVER can I be yours.
That decision is irrevocable. I admire you, but cannot love you.'

"She parted from him abruptly, but no sooner had she left him than she
was confounded, and wondered who or what it was which gave that answer.
She wavered, and thought of going back, but she did not. Later on in
the day she heard that Charles had gone home, summoned by sudden
business. Two years afterwards his engagement with Evelina was
announced, and in three years they were married. It was not what I
should call a happy marriage, although they never quarrelled and had
five children. To the day of her death Phyllis was not sure whether she
had done right or wrong, nor am I."

THE GOVERNESS'S STORY

In the year 1850 I was living as governess in the small watering-place
S., on the south coast of England. Amongst my friends was a young
doctor, B., who had recently come to the town. He had not bought a
practice, but his family was known to one or two of the principal
inhabitants, and he had begun to do well. He deserved his success, for
he was skilful, frank, and gentle, and he did not affect that mystery
which in his elder colleagues was already suspected to be nothing but
ignorance. He was one of the early graduates of the University of
London, and representative of the new school of medical science, relying
not so much upon drugs as upon diet and regimen. I was one of his first
patients. I had a severe illness lasting for nearly three months; he
watched over me carefully and cured me. As I grew better he began to
talk on other matters than my health when he visited me. We found that
we were both interested in the same books: he lent me his and I lent
him mine. It is almost impossible, I should think, for a young man and
a young woman to be friends and nothing more, and I confess that my
sympathy with him in his admiration of the Elizabethan poets, and my
gratitude to him for my recovery passed into affection. I am sure also
that he felt affection for me. He became confidential, and told me all
his history and troubles. There was one peculiarity in his conversation
which was new to me: he never talked down to me, and he was not afraid
at times to discuss subjects that in the society to which I had been
accustomed were prohibited. Not a word that was improper ever escaped
his lips, but he treated me in a measure as if I were a man, and I was
flattered that he should put me on a level with himself. It is true
that sometimes I fancied he was so unreserved with me because he was
sure he was quite safe, for I was poor. and although I was not ugly I
was not handsome. However, on the whole, I was very happy in his
society, and there was more than a chance that I should become his wife.

After six months of our acquaintanceship had passed, M., an old
schoolfellow of mine, took lodgings near me for the summer. She was a
remarkable girl. If she was not beautiful, she was better-looking than
I was, and she possessed a something, I know not what, more powerful
than beauty to fascinate men. Perhaps it was her unconstrained
naturalness. In walking, sitting, standing--whatever she did--her
movements and attitudes were not impeded or unduly masked by artificial
restrictions. I should not have called her profound, but what she said
upon the commonest subjects was interesting, because it was so entirely
her own. If she disliked a neighbour, she almost always disliked her
for a reason which we saw, directly it was pointed out to us, to be
just, but it was generally one which had not been given before. Her
talk upon matters externally trivial was thus much more to me than many
discourses upon the most important topics. On moral questions she
expressed herself without any regard to prejudices. She did not
controvert the authenticity of the ordinary standards, but nevertheless
behaved as if she herself were her only law. The people in R., her
little native borough, considered her to be dangerous, and I myself was
once or twice weak enough to wonder that she held on a straight course
with so little help from authority, forgetting that its support, in so
far as it possesses any vital strength, is derived from the same
internal source which supplied strength to her.

When she came to S. she was unwell, and consulted my friend B. He did
not at first quite like attending her, and she reported to me with great
laughter how she had been told that he had made some inquiries about her
from one of her neighbours at home with whom he happened to be
acquainted, and how he had manoeuvred in his visits to get the servants
or the landlady into the room. I met him soon afterwards, and he
informed me that he had a new patient. When he heard that I knew her--I
did not say how much I knew--he became inquisitive, and at last, after
much beating about the bush, knitting his eyebrows and lowering his
voice, he asked me whether I was aware that she was not quite--quite
ABOVE SUSPICION! My goodness, how I flamed up! I defended her with
vehemence: I exaggerated her prudence and her modesty; I declared, what
was the simple truth, that she was the last person in the world against
whom such a scandalous insinuation should be directed, and that she was
singularly inaccessible to vulgar temptation. I added that
notwithstanding her seeming lawlessness she was not only remarkably
sensitive to any accusation of bad manners, but that upon certain
matters she could not endure even a joke. The only quarrel I remember
to have had with her was when I lapsed into some commonplace jest about
her intimacy with a music-master who gave her lessons. The way in which
she took that jest I shall never forget. If I had made it to any other
woman, I should have passed on, unconscious of anything inconsistent
with myself, but she in an instant made me aware with hardly half a
dozen words that I had disgraced myself. I was ashamed, not so much
because I had done what was in the abstract wrong, but because it was
something which was not in keeping with my real character. I hope it
will not be thought that I am prosing if I take this opportunity of
saying that the laws peculiar to each of us are those which we are at
the least pains to discover and those which we are most prone to
neglect. We think we have done our duty when we have kept the
commandments common to all of us, but we may perhaps have disgracefully
neglected it.

Oh, how that afternoon with B. burnt itself into my memory for ever! I
was sitting on my little sofa with books piled round me. He removed a
few of the books, and I removed the others. He sat down beside me, and,
taking my hand, said he hoped I had forgiven him, and that I would
remember that in such a little place he was obliged to be very careful,
and to be quite sure of his patients, if they were women. He trusted I
should believe that there was no other person IN THE WORLD (the emphasis
on that word!) to whom he would have ventured to impart such a secret.
I was appeased, especially when, after a few minutes' silence, he took
my hand and kissed it, the first and last kiss. He said nothing
further, and departed. The next time I saw him he was more than usually
deferential, more than ever desirous to come closer to me, and I thought
the final word must soon be spoken.

M. remained in S. till far into the autumn, but I did not see much of
her. My work had begun again. B. continued to call on me as my health
was not quite re-established. We had agreed to read the same author at
the same time, in order that we might discuss him together whilst our
impressions were still fresh. Somehow his interest in these readings
began to flag; he informed me presently that I had now almost, entirely
recovered, and weeks often passed without meeting him. One afternoon I
was surprised to find M. in my room when I returned from a walk with my
pupils. She had been waiting for me nearly half an hour, and I could
not at first conjecture the reason. Gradually she drew the conversation
towards B. and at last asked me what I thought of him. Instantly I saw
what had happened. What I imagined was once mine had been stolen,
stolen perhaps unconsciously, but nevertheless stolen, my sole treasure.
She was rich, she had a father and mother, she had many friends and
would certainly have been married had she never seen B. I, as I have
said, was almost penniless; I was an orphan, with few friends; he was my
first love, and I knew he would be my last.

I was condemned, I foresaw, henceforth to solitude, and that most
terrible of all calamities, heart-starvation. What B. had said about M.
came into my mind and rose to my lips. I knew, or thought I knew, that
if I revealed it to her she would be so angry that she would cast him
off. Probably I was mistaken, but in my despair the impulse to disclose
it was almost irresistible. I struggled against it, however, and when
she pressed me, I praised him and strove in my praise to be sincere.
Whether it was something in my tone, quite unintentional, I know not,
but she stopped me almost in the middle of a sentence and said she
believed I had kept something back which I did not wish her to hear;
that she was certain he had talked to me about her, and that she wished
to know what he had said. I protested he had never uttered a word which
could be interpreted as disparaging her, and she seemed to be content.
She kissed me a little more vehemently than usual, and went away. We
ought always, I suppose, to be glad when other people are happy, but God
knows that sometimes it is very difficult to be so, and that their
happiness is hard to bear.

The Elizabethan studies had now altogether come to an end. In about a
couple of months I heard that M. and B. were engaged. M. went home, and
B. moved into a larger town. In a twelvemonth the marriage took place,
and M. wrote to me after her wedding trip. I replied, but she never
wrote again. I heard that she had said that I had laid myself out to
catch B. and that she was afraid that in so doing I had hinted there was
something against her. I heard also that B. had discouraged his wife's
correspondence with me, no other reason being given than that he would
rather the acquaintanceship should be dropped. The interpretation of
this reason by those to whom it was given can be guessed. Did he fear
lest I should boast of what I had been to him or should repeat his
calumny? Ah, he little knew me if he dreamed that such treachery was
possible to me!

I remained at the vicarage for three years. The children grew up and I
was obliged to leave, but I continued to teach in different families
till I was about five-and-forty. After five-and-forty I could not
obtain another situation, and I had to support myself by letting
apartments at Brighton. My strength is now failing; I cannot look after
my servant properly, nor wait upon my lodgers myself. Those who have to
get their living by a lodging-house know what this means and what the
end will be. I have occasionally again wished I could have seen my way
partially to explain myself to M., and have thought it hard to die
misrepresented, but I am glad I have not spoken. I should have
disturbed her peace, and I care nothing about justification or
misrepresentation now. With eternity so near, what does it matter?

INSCRIPTION ON THE ENVELOPE.

"TO MY NIECE JUDITH,--You have been so kind to your aunt, the only human
being, at last, who was left to love her, that she could not refrain
from telling you the one passage in her history which is of any
importance or interest."

JAMES FORBES

"It is all a lie, and it is hard to believe that people who preach it do
not know it to be a lie."

So said James Forbes to Elizabeth Castleton, the young woman to whom he
was engaged. She was the daughter of a clergyman, and James, who had
been brought up at Rugby and Oxford, was now in his last year at a
London hospital, and was going to be a doctor.

"I am sure my father does not know it to be a lie, and I do not myself
know it to be a lie."

"I was not thinking of your father, but of the clergy generally, and you
DO know it to be a lie."

"It is not true of my brother, and, excepting my father and brother, you
have not been in company with parsons, as you call them, for half an
hour in your life."

"Do you mean to tell me you have any doubts about this discredited
rubbish?"

"If I have I would rather not speak about them now. Jim, dear Jim, let
us drop the subject and talk of something else."

He was walking by her side, with his hands in his coat pockets. She
drew out one of his hands; he did not return the pressure, and presently
released himself.

"I thought you were to be my intellectual companion. I have heard you
say yourself that a marriage which is not a marriage of mind is no
marriage."

"But, Jim, is there nothing in the world to think about but this?"

"There is nothing so important. Are we to be dumb all our lives about
what you say is religion?"

They separated and soon afterwards the engagement was broken off. Jim
had really loved Elizabeth, but at that time he was furious against what
he called "creeds." He waited for three or four years till he had
secured a fair practice, and then married a clever and handsome young
woman who wrote poems, and had captivated him by telling him a witty
story from Heine. Elizabeth never married.

Thirty years passed, and Jim, now a famous physician, had to go a long
distance down the Great Western Railway to attend a consultation. At
Bath an elderly lady entered the carriage carrying a handbag with the
initials "E. C." upon it. She sat in the seat farthest away from him on
the opposite side, and looked at him steadfastly. He also looked at
her, but no word was spoken for a minute. He then crossed over, fell on
his knees, and buried his head with passionate sobbing on her knees.
She put her hands on him and her tears fell.

"Five years," at last he said; "I may live five years with care. She
has left me. I will give up everything and go abroad with you. Five
years; it is not much, but it will be something, everything. I shall
die with your face over me."

The train was slackening speed for Bristol; she bent down and kissed
him.

"Dearest Jim," she whispered, "I have waited a long time, but I was sure
we should come together again at last. It is enough."

"You will go with me, then?"

Again she kissed him. "It must not be."

Before he could reply the train was stopping at the platform, and a
gentleman with a lady appeared at the door. Miss Castleton stepped out
and was at once driven away in a carriage with her companions.

He lived three years and then died almost suddenly of the disease which
he had foreseen would kill him. He had no children, but few relatives,
and his attendant was a hospital nurse. But the day before his death a
lady appeared who announced herself as a family friend, and the nurse
was superseded. It was Elizabeth: she came to his bedside, and he
recognised her.

"Not till this morning," she said, "did I hear you were ill."

"Happy," he cried, "though I die to-night."

Soon afterwards--it was about sundown--he became unconscious; she sat
there alone with him till the morning broke, and then he passed away,
and she closed his eyes.

ATONEMENT

"You ask me how I lost my foot? You I see that dog?"--an unattractive
beast lying before the fire--"well, when I tell you how I came by him
you will know how I lost it;" and he then related the following story:-

I was in Westmoreland with my wife and children for a holiday and we had
brought our dog with us, for we knew he would be unhappy with the
strangers to whom we had let our house. The weather was very wet and
our lodgings were not comfortable; we were kept indoors for days
together, and my temper, always irritable, became worse. My wife never
resisted me when I was in these moods and the absence of opposition
provoked me all the more. Had she stood up against me and told me I
ought to be ashamed of myself it would have been better for me. One
afternoon everything seemed to go wrong. A score of petty vexations,
not one of which was of any moment, worked me up to desperation. I
threw my book across the room, to the astonishment of my children, and
determined to go out, although it was raining hard. My dog, a brown
retriever, was lying on the mat just outside the door, and I nearly fell
over him. "God damn you!" said I, and kicked him. He howled with pain,
but, although he was the best of house-dogs and would have brought down
any thief who came near him, he did not growl at me, and quietly
followed me. I am not squeamish, but I was frightened directly the oath
had escaped my lips. I felt as if I had created something horrible
which I could not annihilate, and that it would wait for me and do me
some mischief. The dog kept closely to my heels for about a mile and I
could not make him go on in front. Usually the least word of
encouragement or even the mere mention of his name would send him
scampering with delight in advance. I began to think of something else,
but in about a quarter of an hour I looked round and found he was not
behind me. I whistled and called, but he did not come. In a renewed
rage, which increased with every step I took, I turned back to seek him.
Suddenly I came upon him lying dead by the roadside. Never shall I
forget that shock--the reproach, the appeal of that poor lifeless
animal! I stroked him, I kissed him, I whispered his name in his ear,
but it was all in vain. I lifted up his beautiful broad paw which he
was wont to lay on my knee, I held it between my hands, and when I let
it go it fell heavily to the ground. I could not carry him home, and
with bitter tears and a kind of dread I drew him aside a little way up
the hill behind a rock. I went to my lodgings, returned towards dusk
with a spade, dug his grave in a lonely spot near the bottom of a
waterfall where he would never be disturbed, and there I buried him,
reverently smoothing the turf over him. What a night that was for me!
I was haunted incessantly by the vivid image of the dead body and by the
terror which accompanies a great crime. I had repaid all his devotion
with horrible cruelty. I had repented, but he would never know it. It
was not the dog only which I had slain; I had slain Divine faithfulness
and love. That GOD DAMN YOU sounded perpetually in my ears. The
Almighty had registered and executed the curse, but it had fallen upon
the murderer and not on the victim. When I rose in the morning I
distinctly felt the blow of the kick in my foot, and the sensation
lasted all day. For weeks I was in a miserable condition. A separate
consciousness seemed to establish itself in this foot; there was nothing
to be seen and no pain, but there was a dull sort of pressure of which I
could not rid myself. If I slept I dreamed of the dog, and generally
dreamed I was caressing him, waking up to the dreadful truth of the
corpse on the path in the rain. I got it into my head--for I was half-
crazy--that only by some expiation I should be restored to health and
peace; but how to make any expiation I could not tell. Unhappy is the
wretch who longs to atone for a sin and no atonement is prescribed to
him!

One night I was coming home late and heard the cry of "Fire!" I ran
down the street and found a house in flames. The fire-escape was at the
window, and had rescued a man, his wife and child. Every living
creature was safe, I was told, save a dog in the front room on the
ground-floor. I pushed the people aside, rushed in, half-blinded with
smoke, and found him. I could not escape by the passage, and dropped
out of the window into the area with him in my arms. I fell heavily on
THAT foot, and when I was helped up the steps I could not put it to the
ground. "You may have him for your pains," said his owner to me; "he is
a useless cur. I wouldn't have ventured the singeing of a hair for
him." "May I?" I replied, with an eagerness which must have seemed very
strange. He was indeed not worth half a crown, but I drew him closely
to me and took him into the cab. I was in great agony, and when the
surgeon came it was discovered that my ankle was badly fractured. An
attempt was made to set it, but in the end it was decided that the foot
must be amputated. I rejoiced when I heard the news, and on the day on
which the operation was performed I was calm and even cheerful. Our own
doctor who came with the surgeon told him I had "a highly nervous
temperament," and both of them were amazed at my fortitude. The dog is
a mongrel, as you see, but he loves me, and if you were to offer me ten
thousand golden guineas I would not part with him.

LETTERS FROM MY AUNT ELEANOR {180} TO HER DAUGHTER SOPHIA, AND A
FRAGMENT FROM MY AUNT'S DIARY.

January 31, 1837.

My Dearest Child,--It is now a month since your father died. It was a
sore trial to me that you should have broken down, and that you could
not be here when he was laid in his grave, but I would not for worlds
have allowed you to make the journey. I am glad I forced you away. The
doctor said he would not answer for the consequences unless you were
removed. But I must not talk, not even to you. I will write again
soon.

Your most affectionate mother,

ELEANOR CHARTERIS.

February 5, 1837.

I have been alone in the library from morning to night every day. How
foolish all the books look! There is nothing in them which can do me
any good. He is NOT: what is there which can alter that fact? Had he
died later I could have borne it better. I am only fifty years old, and
may have long to wait. I always knew I loved him devotedly; now I see
how much I depended on him. I had become so knit up with him that I
imagined his strength to be mine. His support was so continuous and so
soft that I was unconscious of it. How clear-headed and resolute he was
in difficulty and danger! You do not remember the great fire? We were
waked up out of our sleep; the flames spread rapidly; a mob filled the
street, shouting and breaking open doors. The man in charge of the
engines lost his head, but your father was perfectly cool. He got on
horseback, directed two or three friends to do the same; they galloped
into the town and drove the crowd away. He controlled all the
operations and saved many lives and many thousands of pounds. Is there
any happiness in the world like that of the woman who hangs on such a
husband?

February 10, 1837.

I feel as if my heart would break if I do not see you, but I cannot come
to your Aunt's house just now. She is very kind, but she would be
unbearable to me. Have patience: the sea air is doing you good; you
will soon be able to walk, and then you can return. O, to feel your
head upon my neck! I have many friends, but I have always needed a
human being to whom I was everything. To your father I believe I was
everything, and that thought was perpetual heaven to me. My love for
him did not make me neglect other people. On the contrary, it gave them
their proper value. Without it I should have put them by. When a man
is dying for want of water he cares for nothing around him. Satisfy his
thirst, and he can then enjoy other pleasures. I was his first love, he
was my first, and we were lovers to the end. I know the world would be
dark to you also were I to leave it. Perhaps it is wicked of me to
rejoice that you would suffer so keenly. I cannot tell how much of me
is pure love and how much of me is selfishness. I remember my uncle's
death. For ten days or so afterwards everybody in the house looked
solemn, and occasionally there was a tear, but at the end of a fortnight
there was smiling and at the end of a month there was laughter. I was
but a child then, but I thought much about the ease and speed with which
the gap left by death was closed.

February 20, 1837.

In a fortnight you will be here? The doctor really believes you will be
able to travel? I am glad you can get out and taste the sea air. I
count the hours which must pass till I see you. A short week, and then-
-"the day after to-morrow, and the day after to-morrow of that day," and
so I shall be able to reach forward to the Monday. It is strange that
the nearer Monday comes the more impatient I am.

March 3, 1837.

With what sickening fear I opened your letter! I was sure it contained
some dreadful news. You have decided not to come till Wednesday,
because your cousin Tom can accompany you on that day. I KNOW you are
quite right. It is so much better, as you are not strong, that Tom
should look after you, and it would be absurd that you should make the
journey two days before him. I should have reproved you seriously if
you had done anything so foolish. But those two days are hard to bear.
I shall not meet you at the coach, nor shall I be downstairs. Go
straight to the library; I shall be there by myself.

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