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this luxurious and self-indulgent age. I will, therefore, revert to that hour of evening prayer which this chapter began by describing, as it will introduce us at once to the subject of this story.

Mr. Lacy had seated himself in his stall, and his eyes. were glancing over the small congregation that had gathered together, on a week-day, for divine worship, when his attention was attracted by a woman who was sitting on one of the benches generally occupied by the poorest inhabitants of the town. She was very simply dressed, in deep mourning; but there was something about her attitude and countenance which plainly indicated that she belonged to the higher classes of society. It was impossible to guess at her age; for although the slightness of her figure and the delicate beauty of her features gave her the appearance of youth, her face bore a wild and haggard expression that we seldom see in those who have not far advanced on their pilgrimage through life. Her arm was thrown against one of the adjoining pillars, and just before the beginning of the service she laid her head upon it, and neither stirred nor looked up during the time the prayers lasted. She neither knelt when others knelt, nor stood when they stood. Once only, when the organ sounded the first notes of one of the most beautiful anthems of our church, she rose from her seat almost mechanically, and an instant after resumed her former attitude. At the conclusion of the service, when the worshippers had all left the cathedral, Mr. Lacy passed near the place where the stranger still remained in a state of apparent abstraction; the sound of his approaching footsteps startled her; she hastily withdrew, and walked rapidly out of the church, and down one of the small streets that faced the entrance door. Two or three times during the succeeding fortnight Mr. Lacy noticed the same person occupying the same place, and conducting herself in the same

manner.

His interest was powerfully excited, but he neither ventured to address her, nor could he succeed in ascertaining from the vergers, or from one or two other persons whom he questioned on the subject, anything respecting her. Chance, however, as it often happens in such cases, threw the information he sought in his way.

He was sitting one evening in his room, busily engaged in preparing his sermon for the Feast of All Saints, which occurred on the ensuing day, and on which it was his turn to preach, when he was disturbed by a knock at the door, and the subsequent entrance of an elderly woman, whom he had known for many years, and who had been in the habit of consulting him whenever any little scruple of conscience disturbed her in the exercise of her line of business, which was no other than that of lodging-letting. Mr. Lacy was so well acquainted with the character of his old friend, and with the nature of the difficulties usually submitted to him, that, after begging her to sit down, and draw her chair close to the fire (for the last day of October was ushering in with suitable severity the first of November), he immediately began:

'Well, my good Mrs. Denley, any more drunken lodgers, whom you keep on for fear that no one but yourself would help them up to their rooms, and see that they did not spend the night in a less comfortable place than their beds? or are you still doubting as to the propriety of giving notice to quit to the gentleman who spoils your furniture, and never pays his rent, thereby keeping you from sending Johnny to school, as you had intended ?'

'No, no, sir; it has nothing to do with drunken lodgers, or with poor dear Johnny's going to school, or with not getting the rent paid, and all that, what's disturbing me now; but only just the contrary.'

As it was difficult to understand, without further explana

tion, how the contrary of these three things could be disturbing Mrs. Denley's mind, Mr. Lacy looked at her inquiringly, and she continued:

'You see, sir, it is not exactly, as one might say, any business of mine; and I mind well what is said in St. Paul's Epistle to Timothy, that women should not be tattlers and busy-bodies; but for all that, I hope it is no sin to wish a young creature that's under one's roof, and that's dying by inches of something-the Lord only knows what-for Dr. Reid doesn't. He saw her walking in, sir, the other day, and I made so bold as to ask her if she wouldn't speak to him, but she wouldn't; and he says as how he can't guess what's the matter with her; and if he can't—why, who should? Well, as I was saying, sir, I hope it isn't a sin to wish the poor young thing not to die without medicine for her body or means of grace for her soul.'

'Assuredly; you are quite right in forming such a wish, and in endeavouring to prevent so terrible an occurrence. But who is the person you are alluding to?'

'She is my lodger, sir, and has been for the last six weeks.'

'What is her name ?' inquired Mr. Lacy.

'Mrs. Rodney, sir.'

'Has she no friends that you know of?

to hear of your lodgings?'

How came she

'Why, she stopped (on a Monday, I think it was) at the "Rose," and she asked Mr. Chapman if he could tell her of a quiet kind of respectable lodging in the town; now, Mr. Chapman is always willing to do one a good turn. It was him, sir, that sent Johnny back to Ashby on Tuesday last in a return post-chaise, after he had sprained his ankle. A very good man, and a neighbourly, is Mr. Chapman, and, as I was saying, he likes to do one a good turn; so that when the lady asked for decent respectable lodgings, he said

he knew of the very thing as would suit her. And sure enough, the next morning she came to see the rooms, and took them at once, and nothing would serve her but to pay down at once the rent for six months; and when I made so free as to say she had better not, for fear of changing her mind about them, she grew quite savage like, for all that she is a gentle-looking creature, and said, as violent as could be, "It must be so-take the money." Well, thought I to myself, maybe she fancies I don't like her for a lodger, so I just said, in an easy kind of manner, "Well, maʼam; and I hope, when the six months are past, that you may take them on for another half year." But "No," says she, “six months will do," which, to be sure, was a natural thing enough for her to say; but I take it, that if you had been there, sir, and had heard her say it, you would not have thought it quite natural either.'

'Is this lady whom you are speaking of in deep mourning? and does she occasionally attend the cathedral service ?'

'She does, sir; and is always dressed in black. She sits near the pillar where Mrs. Jones used to sit, poor soul, when she was alive.'

'I have remarked her; she does indeed look both ill and unhappy. Do you know anything of her history?'

'Not a word, sir; she wears a wedding-ring, but her clothes are marked with an E. and an M.; for all that she calls herself Mrs. Rodney.'

'Does she ever enter into conversation with you?'

'Sometimes, a little. Last week, Joe Irving, the undergardener at Clomley Lodge, brought me, as a present, a large nosegay of dahlias and china-asters. I carried them upstairs, and while Mrs. Rodney was in church I put them into jars on the table and on the chimney-piece, and very bright and pretty they looked. So when she came in she

noticed them and thanked me, and spoke quite cheerful. As she was standing a-talking to me about them, an insect ran out from between the leaves, and I tried to kill it, but she caught my hand and stopped me; and her hand, sir !— why it was more like one of those bits of hot coal there than the little white soft thing it looked like; and when I looked at her face there was a bright fever-spot on each cheek, and her lips were as white as could be. "You are very ill, ma'am," says I to her; "your hand is burning hot." She put it to her forehead, and "It does not feel hot to me," says she, and walks away to the window and opens it, for all that it was almost as cold and raw as to-night. But now-and that's what I'm come about, sir-she has taken to her bed, and is in a very bad way indeed, I take it.'

'What! and has not she seen the doctor?'

'No, indeed, Mr. Lacy; she won't as much as let him come into the house. When she found herself so ill that she could not do for herself, she sent me to get one of the hospital nurses; and as Mary Evans was to be had the girl that you was so good to last year when she broke her armI got her to come, and she has been with her these two days.' 'Has she never spoken of seeing a clergyman?'

'Why, to say the truth, sir, I made so bold as to ask her on it; it was yesterday when Mary Evans and I had been a-begging of her to let us fetch the doctor. "No, no," says she, "he can do me no good ;" and she fell to crying, which I had not seen her do before. "Well, ma'am," says I, "if he can do you no good, I know some one that would." "And who is that?" says she, sitting up in her bed and looking hard at me. "Mr. Lacy, ma'am," I said; "the clergyman that read prayers last Sunday afternoon." She laid down again, disappointed like; and I went on to say. how you was quite a saint and a martyr, and a luminary of the church, as Johnny's schoolmaster says———————'

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