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    THE BLACK POODLE
    &c.

[Illustration: 'IT'S MY BINGO, FOR ALL THAT!']

    THE BLACK POODLE

    _AND OTHER TALES_

    BY

    F. ANSTEY

    AUTHOR OF 'VICE VERSÂ' ETC.

    NEW YORK:
    D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,

    72 FIFTH AVENUE.
    1896.

PREFACE.

The Author begs to state that the stories which are collected in this
volume made their first appearance in 'Belgravia,' the 'Cornhill
Magazine,' the 'Graphic,' 'Longman's Magazine,' 'Mirth,' and 'Temple
Bar,' respectively, and he takes this opportunity of expressing his
thanks to those Editors to whose courtesy he is indebted for permission
to reprint them.

CONTENTS.

                                   PAGE
    THE BLACK POODLE                 1

    THE STORY OF A SUGAR PRINCE      46

    THE RETURN OF AGAMEMNON          69

    THE WRAITH OF BARNJUM            93

    A TOY TRAGEDY                    115

    AN UNDERGRADUATE'S AUNT          149

    THE SIREN                        168

    THE CURSE OF THE CATAFALQUES     182

    A FAREWELL APPEARANCE            232

    ACCOMPANIED ON THE FLUTE         256

_THE BLACK POODLE._

[Illustration: I]

I have set myself the task of relating in the course of this story,
without suppressing or altering a single detail, the most painful and
humiliating episode in my life.

I do this, not because it will give me the least pleasure, but simply
because it affords me an opportunity of extenuating myself which has
hitherto been wholly denied to me.

As a general rule I am quite aware that to publish a lengthy explanation
of one's conduct in any questionable transaction is not the best means
of recovering a lost reputation; but in my own case there is one to whom
I shall never more be permitted to justify myself by word of mouth--even
if I found myself able to attempt it. And as she could not possibly
think worse of me than she does at present, I write this, knowing it can
do me no harm, and faintly hoping that it may come to her notice and
suggest a doubt whether I am quite so unscrupulous a villain, so
consummate a hypocrite, as I have been forced to appear in her eyes.

The bare chance of such a result makes me perfectly indifferent to all
else: I cheerfully expose to the derision of the whole reading world the
story of my weakness and my shame, since by doing so I may possibly
rehabilitate myself somewhat in the good opinion of one person.

Having said so much, I will begin my confession without further delay:--

My name is Algernon Weatherhead, and I may add that I am in one of the
Government departments; that I am an only son, and live at home with my
mother.

We had had a house at Hammersmith until just before the period covered
by this history, when, our lease expiring, my mother decided that my
health required country air at the close of the day, and so we took a
'desirable villa residence' on one of the many new building estates
which have lately sprung up in such profusion in the home counties.

We have called it 'Wistaria Villa.' It is a pretty little place, the
last of a row of detached villas, each with its tiny rustic carriage
gate and gravel sweep in front, and lawn enough for a tennis court
behind, which lines the road leading over the hill to the railway
station.

I could certainly have wished that our landlord, shortly after giving us
the agreement, could have found some other place to hang himself in than
one of our attics, for the consequence was that a housemaid left us in
violent hysterics about every two months, having learnt the tragedy from
the tradespeople, and naturally 'seen a somethink' immediately
afterwards.

Still it is a pleasant house, and I can now almost forgive the landlord
for what I shall always consider an act of gross selfishness on his
part.

In the country, even so near town, a next-door neighbour is something
more than a mere numeral; he is a possible acquaintance, who will at
least consider a new-comer as worth the experiment of a call. I soon
knew that 'Shuturgarden,' the next house to our own, was occupied by a
Colonel Currie, a retired Indian officer; and often, as across the low
boundary wall I caught a glimpse of a graceful girlish figure flitting
about amongst the rose-bushes in the neighbouring garden, I would lose
myself in pleasant anticipations of a time not far distant when the
wall which separated us would be (metaphorically) levelled.

I remember--ah, how vividly!--the thrill of excitement with which I
heard from my mother on returning from town one evening that the Curries
had called, and seemed disposed to be all that was neighbourly and kind.

I remember, too, the Sunday afternoon on which I returned their
call--alone, as my mother had already done so during the week. I was
standing on the steps of the Colonel's villa waiting for the door to
open when I was startled by a furious snarling and yapping behind, and,
looking round, discovered a large poodle in the act of making for my
legs.

He was a coal-black poodle, with half of his right ear gone, and absurd
little thick moustaches at the end of his nose; he was shaved in the
sham-lion fashion, which is considered, for some mysterious reason, to
improve a poodle, but the barber had left sundry little tufts of hair
which studded his haunches capriciously.

I could not help being reminded, as I looked at him, of another black
poodle which Faust entertained for a short time, with unhappy results,
and I thought that a very moderate degree of incantation would be enough
to bring the fiend out of this brute.

He made me intensely uncomfortable, for I am of a slightly nervous
temperament, with a constitutional horror of dogs and a liability to
attacks of diffidence on performing the ordinary social rites under the
most favourable conditions, and certainly the consciousness that a
strange and apparently savage dog was engaged in worrying the heels of
my boots was the reverse of reassuring.

The Currie family received me with all possible kindness: 'So charmed to
make your acquaintance, Mr. Weatherhead,' said Mrs. Currie, as I shook
hands. 'I see,' she added pleasantly, 'you've brought the doggie in with
you.' As a matter of fact, I had brought the doggie in at the ends of my
coat-tails, but it was evidently no unusual occurrence for visitors to
appear in this undignified manner, for she detached him quite as a
matter of course, and, as soon as I was sufficiently collected, we fell
into conversation.

I discovered that the Colonel and his wife were childless, and the
slender willowy figure I had seen across the garden wall was that of
Lilian Roseblade, their niece and adopted daughter. She came into the
room shortly afterwards, and I felt, as I went through the form of an
introduction, that her sweet fresh face, shaded by soft masses of dusky
brown hair, more than justified all the dreamy hopes and fancies with
which I had looked forward to that moment.

She talked to me in a pretty, confidential, appealing way, which I have
heard her dearest friends censure as childish and affected, but I
thought then that her manner had an indescribable charm and fascination
about it, and the memory of it makes my heart ache now with a pang that
is not all pain.

Even before the Colonel made his appearance I had begun to see that my
enemy, the poodle, occupied an exceptional position in that household.
It was abundantly clear by the time I took my leave.

He seemed to be the centre of their domestic system, and even lovely
Lilian revolved contentedly around him as a kind of satellite; he could
do no wrong in his owner's eyes, his prejudices (and he was a
narrow-minded animal) were rigorously respected, and all domestic
arrangements were made with a primary view to his convenience.

I may be wrong, but I cannot think that it is wise to put any poodle
upon such a pedestal as that. How this one in particular, as ordinary a
quadruped as ever breathed, had contrived to impose thus upon his
infatuated proprietors, I never could understand, but so it was--he even
engrossed the chief part of the conversation, which after any lull
seemed to veer round to him by a sort of natural law.

I had to endure a long biographical sketch of him--what a Society paper
would call an 'anecdotal photo'--and each fresh anecdote seemed to me to
exhibit the depraved malignity of the beast in a more glaring light, and
render the doting admiration of the family more astounding than ever.

'Did you tell Mr. Weatherhead, Lily, about Bingo' (Bingo was the
poodle's preposterous name) 'and Tacks? No? Oh, I _must_ tell him
that--it'll make him laugh. Tacks is our gardener down in the village
(d'ye know Tacks?). Well, Tacks was up here the other day, nailing up
some trellis-work at the top of a ladder, and all the time there was
Master Bingo sitting quietly at the foot of it looking on, wouldn't
leave it on any account. Tacks said he was quite company for him. Well,
at last, when Tacks had finished and was coming down, what do you think
that rascal there did? Just sneaked quietly up behind and nipped him in
both calves and ran off. Been looking out for that the whole time! Ha,
ha!--deep that, eh?'

I agreed with an inward shudder that it was very deep, thinking
privately that, if this was a specimen of Bingo's usual treatment of the
natives, it would be odd if he did not find himself deeper still
before--probably _just_ before--he died.

'Poor faithful old doggie!' murmured Mrs. Currie; 'he thought Tacks was
a nasty burglar, didn't he? he wasn't going to see Master robbed, was
he?'

'Capital house-dog, sir,' struck in the Colonel. 'Gad, I shall never
forget how he made poor Heavisides run for it the other day! Ever met
Heavisides of the Bombay Fusiliers? Well, Heavisides was staying here,
and the dog met him one morning as he was coming down from the
bath-room. Didn't recognise him in "pyjamas" and a dressing-gown, of
course, and made at him. He kept poor old Heavisides outside the landing
window on the top of the cistern for a quarter of an hour, till I had to
come and raise the siege!'

Such were the stories of that abandoned dog's blunderheaded ferocity to
which I was forced to listen, while all the time the brute sat opposite
me on the hearthrug, blinking at me from under his shaggy mane with his
evil bleared eyes, and deliberating where he would have me when I rose
to go.

This was the beginning of an intimacy which soon displaced all ceremony.
It was very pleasant to go in there after dinner, even to sit with the
Colonel over his claret and hear more stories about Bingo, for
afterwards I could go into the pretty drawing-room and take my tea from
Lilian's hands, and listen while she played Schubert to us in the summer
twilight.

The poodle was always in the way, to be sure, but even his ugly black
head seemed to lose some of its ugliness and ferocity when Lilian laid
her pretty hand on it.

On the whole I think that the Currie family were well disposed towards
me; the Colonel considering me as a harmless specimen of the average
eligible young man--which I certainly was--and Mrs. Currie showing me
favour for my mother's sake, for whom she had taken a strong liking.

As for Lilian, I believed I saw that she soon suspected the state of my
feelings towards her and was not displeased by it. I looked forward with
some hopefulness to a day when I could declare myself with no fear of a
repulse.

But it was a serious obstacle in my path that I could not secure Bingo's
good opinion on any terms. The family would often lament this
pathetically themselves. 'You see,' Mrs. Currie would observe in
apology, 'Bingo is a dog that does not attach himself easily to
strangers'--though for that matter I thought he was unpleasantly ready
to attach himself to _me_.

I did try hard to conciliate him. I brought him propitiatory buns--which
was weak and ineffectual, as he ate them with avidity, and hated me as
bitterly as ever, for he had conceived from the first a profound
contempt for me and a distrust which no blandishments of mine could
remove. Looking back now, I am inclined to think it was a prophetic
instinct that warned him of what was to come upon him through my
instrumentality.

Only his approbation was wanting to establish for me a firm footing with
the Curries, and perhaps determine Lilian's wavering heart in my
direction; but, though I wooed that inflexible poodle with an assiduity
I blush to remember, he remained obstinately firm.

Still, day by day, Lilian's treatment of me was more encouraging; day by
day I gained in the esteem of her uncle and aunt; I began to hope that
soon I should be able to disregard canine influence altogether.

Now there was one inconvenience about our villa (besides its flavour of
suicide) which it is necessary to mention here. By common consent all
the cats of the neighbourhood had selected our garden for their evening
reunions. I fancy that a tortoiseshell kitchen cat of ours must have
been a sort of leader of local feline society--I know she was 'at home,'
with music and recitations, on most evenings.

My poor mother found this interfered with her after-dinner nap, and no
wonder, for if a cohort of ghosts had been 'shrieking and squealing,' as
Calpurnia puts it, in our back garden, or it had been fitted up as a
_crèche_ for a nursery of goblin infants in the agonies of teething, the
noise could not possibly have been more unearthly.

We sought for some means of getting rid of the nuisance: there was
poison of course, but we thought it would have an invidious appearance,
and even lead to legal difficulties, if each dawn were to discover an
assortment of cats expiring in hideous convulsions in various parts of
the same garden.

Firearms, too, were open to objection, and would scarcely assist my
mother's slumbers, so for some time we were at a loss for a remedy. At
last, one day, walking down the Strand, I chanced to see (in an evil
hour) what struck me as the very thing--it was an air-gun of superior
construction displayed in a gunsmith's window. I went in at once,
purchased it, and took it home in triumph; it would be noiseless, and
would reduce the local average of cats without scandal--one or two
examples, and feline fashion would soon migrate to a more secluded spot.

I lost no time in putting this to the proof. That same evening I lay in
wait after dusk at the study window, protecting my mother's repose. As
soon as I heard the long-drawn wail, the preliminary sputter, and the
wild stampede that followed, I let fly in the direction of the sound. I
suppose I must have something of the national sporting instinct in me,
for my blood was tingling with excitement; but the feline constitution
assimilates lead without serious inconvenience, and I began to fear that
no trophy would remain to bear witness to my marksmanship.

But all at once I made out a dark indistinct form slinking in from
behind the bushes. I waited till it crossed a belt of light which
streamed from the back kitchen below me, and then I took careful aim and
pulled the trigger.

This time at least I had not failed--there was a smothered yell, a
rustle--and then silence again. I ran out with the calm pride of a
successful revenge to bring in the body of my victim, and I found
underneath a laurel, no predatory tom-cat, but (as the discerning reader
will no doubt have foreseen long since) the quivering carcase of the
Colonel's black poodle!

I intend to set down here the exact unvarnished truth, and I confess
that at first, when I knew what I had done, I was _not_ sorry. I was
quite innocent of any intention of doing it, but I felt no regret. I
even laughed--madman that I was--at the thought that there was the end
of Bingo at all events; that impediment was removed, my weary task of
conciliation was over for ever!

But soon the reaction came; I realised the tremendous nature of my deed,
and shuddered. I had done that which might banish me from Lilian's side
for ever! All unwittingly I had slaughtered a kind of sacred beast, the
animal around which the Currie household had wreathed their choicest
affections! How was I to break it to them? Should I send Bingo in with a
card tied to his neck and my regrets and compliments? That was too much
like a present of game. Ought I not to carry him in myself? I would
wreathe him in the best crape, I would put on black for him--the Curries
would hardly consider a taper and a white sheet, or sackcloth and ashes,
an excessive form of atonement--but I could not grovel to quite such an
abject extent.

I wondered what the Colonel would say. Simple and hearty as a general
rule, he had a hot temper on occasions, and it made me ill as I thought,
would he and, worse still, would _Lilian_ believe it was really an
accident? They knew what an interest I had in silencing the deceased
poodle--would they believe the simple truth?

I vowed that they _should_ believe me. My genuine remorse and the
absence of all concealment on my part would speak powerfully for me. I
would choose a favourable time for my confession; that very evening I
would tell all.

Still I shrank from the duty before me, and as I knelt down sorrowfully
by the dead form and respectfully composed his stiffening limbs, I
thought that it was unjust of Fate to place a well-meaning man, whose
nerves were not of iron, in such a position.

Then, to my horror, I heard a well-known ringing tramp on the road
outside, and smelt the peculiar fragrance of a Burmese cheroot. It was
the Colonel himself, who had been taking out the doomed Bingo for his
usual evening run.

I don't know how it was exactly, but a sudden panic came over me. I held
my breath, and tried to crouch down unseen behind the laurels; but he
had seen me, and came over at once to speak to me across the hedge.

He stood there, not two yards from his favourite's body! Fortunately it
was unusually dark that evening.

'Ha, there you are, eh?' he began heartily; 'don't rise, my boy, don't
rise.' I was trying to put myself in front of the poodle, and did not
rise--at least, only my hair did.

'You're out late, ain't you?' he went on; 'laying out your garden, hey?'

I could not tell him that I was laying out his poodle! My voice shook
as, with a guilty confusion that was veiled by the dusk, I said it was a
fine evening--which it was not.

'Cloudy, sir,' said the Colonel, 'cloudy--rain before morning, I think.
By the way, have you seen anything of my Bingo in here?'

This was the turning point. What I _ought_ to have done was to say
mournfully, 'Yes, I'm sorry to say I've had a most unfortunate accident
with him--here he is--the fact is, I'm afraid I've _shot_ him!'

But I couldn't. I could have told him at my own time, in a prepared form
of words--but not then. I felt I must use all my wits to gain time and
fence with the questions.

'Why,' I said with a leaden airiness, 'he hasn't given you the slip, has
he?'

'Never did such a thing in his life!' said the Colonel, warmly; 'he
rushed off after a rat or a frog or something a few minutes ago, and as
I stopped to light another cheroot I lost sight of him. I thought I saw
him slip in under your gate, but I've been calling him from the front
there and he won't come out.'

No, and he never _would_ come out any more. But the Colonel must not be
told that just yet. I temporised again: 'If,' I said unsteadily, 'if he
had slipped in under the gate, I should have seen him. Perhaps he took
it into his head to run home?'

'Oh, I shall find him on the doorstep, I expect, the knowing old scamp!
Why, what d'ye think was the last thing he did, now?'

I could have given him the very latest intelligence; but I dared not.
However, it was altogether too ghastly to kneel there and laugh at
anecdotes of Bingo told across Bingo's dead body; I could not stand
that! 'Listen,' I said suddenly, 'wasn't that his bark? There again; it
seems to come from the front of your house, don't you think?'

'Well,' said the Colonel, 'I'll go and fasten him up before he's off
again. How your teeth are chattering--you've caught a chill, man--go
indoors at once and, if you feel equal to it, look in half an hour later
about grog time, and I'll tell you all about it. Compliments to your
mother. Don't forget--about grog time!' I had got rid of him at last,
and I wiped my forehead, gasping with relief. I would go round in half
an hour, and then I should be prepared to make my melancholy
announcement. For, even then, I never thought of any other course, until
suddenly it flashed upon me with terrible clearness that my miserable
shuffling by the hedge had made it impossible to tell the truth! I had
not told a direct lie, to be sure, but then I had given the Colonel the
impression that I had denied having seen the dog. Many people can
appease their consciences by reflecting that, whatever may be the
effect their words produce, they did contrive to steer clear of a
downright lie. I never quite knew where the distinction lay, morally,
but there _is_ that feeling--I have it myself.

Unfortunately, prevarication has this drawback, that, if ever the truth
comes to light, the prevaricator is in just the same case as if he had
lied to the most shameless extent, and for a man to point out that the
words he used contained no absolute falsehood will seldom restore
confidence.

I might of course still tell the Colonel of my misfortune, and leave him
to infer that it had happened after our interview, but the poodle was
fast becoming cold and stiff, and they would most probably suspect the
real time of the occurrence.

And then Lilian would hear that I had told a string of falsehoods to her
uncle over the dead body of their idolised Bingo--an act, no doubt, of
abominable desecration, of unspeakable profanity in her eyes!

If it would have been difficult before to prevail on her to accept a
bloodstained hand, it would be impossible after that. No, I had burnt my
ships, I was cut off for ever from the straightforward course; that one
moment of indecision had decided my conduct in spite of me--I must go on
with it now and keep up the deception at all hazards.

It was bitter. I had always tried to preserve as many of the moral
principles which had been instilled into me as can be conveniently
retained in this grasping world, and it had been my pride that, roughly
speaking, I had never been guilty of an unmistakable falsehood.

But henceforth, if I meant to win Lilian, that boast must be
relinquished for ever! I should have to lie now with all my might,
without limit or scruple, to dissemble incessantly, and 'wear a mask,'
as the poet Bunn beautifully expressed it long ago, 'over my hollow
heart.' I felt all this keenly--I did not think it was right--but what
was I to do?

After thinking all this out very carefully, I decided that my only
course was to bury the poor animal where he fell and say nothing about
it. With some vague idea of precaution I first took off the silver
collar he wore, and then hastily interred him with a garden-trowel and
succeeded in removing all traces of the disaster.

I fancy I felt a certain relief in the knowledge that there would now be
no necessity to tell my pitiful story and risk the loss of my
neighbours' esteem.

By-and-by, I thought, I would plant a rose-tree over his remains, and
some day, as Lilian and I, in the noontide of our domestic bliss, stood
before it admiring its creamy luxuriance, I might (perhaps) find courage
to confess that the tree owed some of that luxuriance to the long-lost
Bingo.

There was a touch of poetry in this idea that lightened my gloom for the
moment.

I need scarcely say that I did not go round to Shuturgarden that
evening. I was not hardened enough for that yet--my manner might betray
me, and so I very prudently stayed at home.

But that night my sleep was broken by frightful dreams. I was
perpetually trying to bury a great gaunt poodle, which would persist in
rising up through the damp mould as fast as I covered him up.... Lilian
and I were engaged, and we were in church together on Sunday, and the
poodle, resisting all attempts to eject him, forbade our banns with
sepulchral barks.... It was our wedding-day, and at the critical moment
the poodle leaped between us and swallowed the ring.... Or we were at
the wedding-breakfast, and Bingo, a grizzly black skeleton with flaming
eyes, sat on the cake and would not allow Lilian to cut it. Even the
rose-tree fancy was reproduced in a distorted form--the tree grew, and
every blossom contained a miniature Bingo, which barked; and as I woke I
was desperately trying to persuade the Colonel that they were ordinary
dog-roses.

I went up to the office next day with my gloomy secret gnawing my bosom,
and, whatever I did, the spectre of the murdered poodle rose before me.
For two days after that I dared not go near the Curries, until at last
one evening after dinner I forced myself to call, feeling that it was
really not safe to keep away any longer.

My conscience smote me as I went in. I put on an unconscious easy
manner, which was such a dismal failure that it was lucky for me that
they were too much engrossed to notice it.

I never before saw a family so stricken down by a domestic misfortune as
the group I found in the drawing-room, making a dejected pretence of
reading or working. We talked at first--and hollow talk it was--on
indifferent subjects, till I could bear it no longer, and plunged boldly
into danger.

'I don't see the dog,' I began. 'I suppose you--you found him all right
the other evening, Colonel?' I wondered as I spoke whether they would
not notice the break in my voice, but they did not.

'Why, the fact is,' said the Colonel, heavily, gnawing his grey
moustache, 'we've not heard anything of him since: he's--he's run off!'

'Gone, Mr. Weatherhead; gone without a word!' said Mrs. Currie,
plaintively, as if she thought the dog might at least have left an
address.

'I wouldn't have believed it of him,' said the Colonel; 'it has
completely knocked me over. Haven't been so cut up for years--the
ungrateful rascal!'

'Oh, Uncle!' pleaded Lilian, 'don't talk like that; perhaps Bingo
couldn't help it--perhaps some one has s-s-shot him!'

'Shot!' cried the Colonel, angrily. 'By heaven! if I thought there was a
villain on earth capable of shooting that poor inoffensive dog,
I'd----Why _should_ they shoot him, Lilian? Tell me that! I--I hope you
won't let me hear you talk like that again. _You_ don't think he's shot,
eh, Weatherhead?'

I said--Heaven forgive me!--that I thought it highly improbable.

'He's not dead!' cried Mrs. Currie. 'If he were dead I should know it
somehow--I'm sure I should! But I'm certain he's alive. Only last night
I had such a beautiful dream about him. I thought he came back to us,
Mr. Weatherhead, driving up in a hansom cab, and he was just the same as
ever--only he wore blue spectacles, and the shaved part of him was
painted a bright red. And I woke up with the joy--so, you know, it's
sure to come true!'

It will be easily understood what torture conversations like these were
to me, and how I hated myself as I sympathised and spoke encouraging
words concerning the dog's recovery, when I knew all the time he was
lying hid under my garden mould. But I took it as a part of my
punishment, and bore it all uncomplainingly; practice even made me an
adept in the art of consolation--I believe I really was a great comfort
to them.

I had hoped that they would soon get over the first bitterness of their
loss, and that Bingo would be first replaced and then forgotten in the
usual way; but there seemed no signs of this coming to pass.

The poor Colonel was too plainly fretting himself ill about it; he went
pottering about forlornly--advertising, searching, and seeing people,
but all of course to no purpose, and it told upon him. He was more like
a man whose only son and heir had been stolen, than an Anglo-Indian
officer who had lost a poodle. I had to affect the liveliest interest in
all his inquiries and expeditions, and to listen to, and echo, the most
extravagant eulogies of the departed, and the wear and tear of so much
duplicity made me at last almost as ill as the Colonel himself.

I could not help seeing that Lilian was not nearly so much impressed by
my elaborate concern as her relatives; and sometimes I detected an
incredulous look in her frank brown eyes that made me very uneasy.
Little by little, a rift widened between us, until at last in despair I
determined to know the worst before the time came when it would be
hopeless to speak at all. I chose a Sunday evening as we were walking
across the green from church in the golden dusk, and then I ventured to
speak to her of my love. She heard me to the end, and was evidently very
much agitated. At last she murmured that it could not be, unless--no, it
never could be now.

'Unless what?' I asked. 'Lilian--Miss Roseblade, something has come
between us lately: you will tell me what that something is, won't you?'

'Do you want to know _really_?' she said, looking up at me through her
tears. 'Then I'll tell you: it--it's Bingo!'

I started back overwhelmed. Did she know all? If not, how much did she
suspect? I must find out that at once! 'What about Bingo?' I managed to
pronounce, with a dry tongue.

'You never l-loved him when he was here,' she sobbed; 'you know you
didn't!'

I was relieved to find it was no worse than this.

'No,' I said candidly; 'I did not love Bingo. Bingo didn't love _me_,
Lilian; he was always looking out for a chance of nipping me somewhere.
Surely you won't quarrel with me for that!'

'Not for that,' she said; 'only, why do you pretend to be so fond of him
now, and so anxious to get him back again? Uncle John believes you, but
_I_ don't. I can see quite well that you wouldn't be glad to find him.
You could find him easily if you wanted to!'

'What do you mean, Lilian?' I said hoarsely. '_How_ could I find him?'
Again I feared the worst.

'You're in a Government office,' cried Lilian and if you only chose, you
could easily g-get G-Government to find Bingo! What's the use of
Government if it can't do that? Mr. Travers would have found him long
ago if I'd asked him!'

Lilian had never been so childishly unreasonable as this before, and yet
I loved her more madly than ever; but I did not like this allusion to
Travers, a rising barrister, who lived with his sister in a pretty
cottage near the station, and had shown symptoms of being attracted by
Lilian.

He was away on circuit just then, luckily, but at least even he would
have found it a hard task to find Bingo--there was comfort in that.

'You know that isn't just, Lilian,' I observed 'But only tell me what
you want me to do?'

'Bub--bub--bring back Bingo!' she said.

'Bring back Bingo!' I cried in horror. 'But suppose I _can't_--suppose
he's out of the country, or--dead, what then, Lilian?'

'I can't help it,' she said; 'but I don't believe he _is_ out of the
country or dead. And while I see you pretending to Uncle that you cared
awfully about him, and going on doing nothing at all, it makes me think
you're not quite--quite _sincere_! And I couldn't possibly marry any one
while I thought that of him. And I shall always have that feeling unless
you find Bingo!'

It was of no use to argue with her; I knew Lilian by that time. With her
pretty caressing manner she united a latent obstinacy which it was
hopeless to attempt to shake. I feared, too, that she was not quite
certain as yet whether she cared for me or not, and that this condition
of hers was an expedient to gain time.

I left her with a heavy heart. Unless I proved my worth by bringing back
Bingo within a very short time, Travers would probably have everything
his own way. And Bingo was dead!

However, I took heart. I thought that perhaps if I could succeed by my
earnest efforts in persuading Lilian that I really was doing all in my
power to recover the poodle, she might relent in time, and dispense with
his actual production.

So, partly with this object, and partly to appease the remorse which now
revived and stung me deeper than before, I undertook long and weary
pilgrimages after office hours. I spent many pounds in advertisements; I
interviewed dogs of every size, colour, and breed, and of course I took
care to keep Lilian informed of each successive failure. But still her
heart was not touched; she was firm. If I went on like that, she told
me, I was certain to find Bingo one day--then, but not before, would her
doubts be set at rest.

I was walking one day through the somewhat squalid district which lies
between Bow Street and High Holborn, when I saw, in a small theatrical
costumier's window, a handbill stating that a black poodle had 'followed
a gentleman' on a certain date, and if not claimed and the finder
remunerated before a stated time, would be sold to pay expenses.

I went in and got a copy of the bill to show Lilian, and although by
that time I scarcely dared to look a poodle in the face, I thought I
would go to the address given and see the animal, simply to be able to
tell Lilian I had done so.

The gentleman whom the dog had very unaccountably followed was a certain
Mr. William Blagg, who kept a little shop near Endell Street, and called
himself a bird-fancier, though I should scarcely have credited him with
the necessary imagination. He was an evil-browed ruffian in a fur cap,
with a broad broken nose and little shifty red eyes, and after I had
told him what I wanted, he took me through a horrible little den,
stacked with piles of wooden, wire, and wicker prisons, each quivering
with restless, twittering life, and then out into a back yard, in which
were two or three rotten old kennels and tubs. 'That there's him,' he
said, jerking his thumb to the farthest tub; 'follered me all the way
'ome from Kinsington Gardings, _he_ did. Kim out, will yer?'

And out of the tub there crawled slowly, with a snuffling whimper and a
rattling of its chain, the identical dog I had slain a few evenings
before!

At least, so I thought for a moment, and felt as if I had seen a
spectre; the resemblance was so exact--in size, in every detail, even to
the little clumps of hair about the hind parts, even to the lop of half
an ear, this dog might have been the 'doppel-gänger' of the deceased
Bingo. I suppose, after all, one black poodle is very like any other
black poodle of the same size, but the likeness startled me.

I think it was then that the idea occurred to me that here was a
miraculous chance of securing the sweetest girl in the whole world, and
at the same time atoning for my wrong by bringing back gladness with me
to Shuturgarden. It only needed a little boldness; one last deception,
and I could embrace truthfulness once more.

Almost unconsciously, when my guide turned round and asked,' Is that
there dawg yourn?' I said hurriedly, 'Yes, yes--that's the dog I want,
that--that's Bingo!'

'He don't seem to be a puttin' of 'isself out about seeing you again,'
observed Mr. Blagg, as the poodle studied me with a calm interest.

'Oh, he's not exactly _my_ dog, you see,' I said; 'he belongs to a
friend of mine!'

He gave me a quick furtive glance. 'Then maybe you're mistook about
him,' he said: 'and I can't run no risks. I was a goin' down in the
country this 'ere werry evenin' to see a party as lives at Wistaria
Willa,--he's been a hadwertisin' about a black poodle, _he_ has!'

'But look here,' I said, 'that's _me_.'

He gave me a curious leer. 'No offence, you know, guv'nor,' he said,
'but I should wish for some evidence as to that afore I part with a
vallyable dawg like this 'ere!'

'Well,' I said, 'here's one of my cards; will that do for you?'

He took it and spelt it out with a pretence of great caution, but I saw
well enough that the old scoundrel suspected that if I had lost a dog at
all, it was not this particular dog. 'Ah,' he said, as he put it in his
pocket, 'if I part with him to you, I must be cleared of all risks. I
can't afford to get into trouble about no mistakes. Unless you likes to
leave him for a day or two, you must pay accordin', you see.'

I wanted to get the hateful business over as soon as possible. I did not
care what I paid--Lilian was worth all the expense! I said I had no
doubt myself as to the real ownership of the animal, but I would give
him any sum in reason, and would remove the dog at once.

And so we settled it. I paid him an extortionate sum, and came away with
a duplicate poodle, a canine counterfeit which I hoped to pass off at
Shuturgarden as the long-lost Bingo.

I know it was wrong--it even came unpleasantly near dog-stealing--but I
was a desperate man. I saw Lilian gradually slipping away from me, I
knew that nothing short of this could ever recall her, I was sorely
tempted, I had gone far on the same road already, it was the old story
of being hung for a sheep. And so I fell.

Surely some who read this will be generous enough to consider the
peculiar state of the case, and mingle a little pity with their
contempt.

I was dining in town that evening and took my purchase home by a late
train; his demeanour was grave and intensely respectable; he was not the
animal to commit himself by any flagrant indiscretion--he was gentle and
tractable, too, and in all respects an agreeable contrast in character
to the original. Still, it may have been the after-dinner workings of
conscience, but I could not help fancying that I saw a certain look in
the creature's eyes, as if he were aware that he was required to
connive at a fraud, and rather resented it.

If he would only be good enough to back me up! Fortunately, however, he
was such a perfect facsimile of the outward Bingo, that the risk of
detection was really inconsiderable.

When I got him home, I put Bingo's silver collar round his
neck--congratulating myself on my forethought in preserving it, and took
him in to see my mother. She accepted him as what he seemed, without the
slightest misgiving; but this, though it encouraged me to go on, was not
decisive, the spurious poodle would have to encounter the scrutiny of
those who knew every tuft on the genuine animal's body!

Nothing would have induced me to undergo such an ordeal as that of
personally restoring him to the Curries. We gave him supper, and tied
him up on the lawn, where he howled dolefully all night, and buried
bones.

The next morning I wrote a note to Mrs. Currie, expressing my pleasure
at being able to restore the lost one, and another to Lilian, containing
only the words, 'Will you believe _now_ that I am sincere?' Then I tied
both round the poodle's neck and dropped him over the wall into the
Colonel's garden just before I started to catch my train to town.

I had an anxious walk home from the station that evening; I went round
by the longer way, trembling the whole time lest I should meet any of
the Currie household, to which I felt myself entirely unequal just then.
I could not rest until I knew whether my fraud had succeeded, or if the
poodle to which I had entrusted my fate had basely betrayed me; but my
suspense was happily ended as soon as I entered my mother's room. 'You
can't think how delighted those poor Curries were to see Bingo
again,'she said at once; 'and they said such charming things about you,
Algy--Lilian, particularly--quite affected she seemed, poor child! And
they wanted you to go round and dine there and be thanked to-night, but
at last I persuaded them to come to us instead. And they're going to
bring the dog to make friends. Oh, and I met Frank Travers; he's back
from circuit again now, so I asked him in too, to meet them!'

I drew a deep breath of relief. I had played a desperate game--but I had
won! I could have wished, to be sure, that my mother had not thought of
bringing in Travers on that of all evenings--but I hoped that I could
defy him after this.

The Colonel and his people were the first to arrive; he and his wife
being so effusively grateful that they made me very uncomfortable
indeed; Lilian met me with downcast eyes, and the faintest possible
blush, but she said nothing just then. Five minutes afterwards, when she
and I were alone together in the conservatory, where I had brought her
on pretence of showing a new begonia, she laid her hand on my sleeve
and whispered, almost shyly, 'Mr. Weatherhead--Algernon! Can you ever
forgive me for being so cruel and unjust to you?' And I replied that,
upon the whole, I could.

We were not in that conservatory long, but, before we left it, beautiful
Lilian Roseblade had consented to make my life happy. When we re-entered
the drawing-room, we found Frank Travers, who had been told the story of
the recovery, and I observed his jaw fall as he glanced at our faces,
and noted the triumphant smile which I have no doubt mine wore, and the
tender dreamy look in Lilian's soft eyes. Poor Travers, I was sorry for
him, although I was not fond of him. Travers was a good type of the
rising young Common Law barrister; tall, not bad-looking, with keen dark
eyes, black whiskers, and the mobile forensic mouth, which can express
every shade of feeling, from deferential assent to cynical incredulity;
possessed, too, of an endless flow of conversation that was decidedly
agreeable, if a trifle too laboriously so, he had been a dangerous
rival. But all that was over now--he saw it himself at once, and during
dinner sank into dismal silence, gazing pathetically at Lilian, and
sighing almost obtrusively between the courses. His stream of small talk
seemed to have been cut off at the main.

'You've done a kind thing, Weatherhead,' said the Colonel. 'I can't tell
you all that dog is to me, and how I missed the poor beast. I'd quite
given up all hope of ever seeing him again, and all the time there was
Weatherhead, Mr. Travers, quietly searching all London till he found
him! I shan't forget it. It shows a really kind feeling.'

I saw by Travers's face that he was telling himself he would have found
fifty Bingos in half the time--if he had only thought of it; he smiled a
melancholy assent to all the Colonel said, and then began to study me
with an obviously depreciatory air.

'You can't think,' I heard Mrs. Currie telling my mother, 'how really
_touching_ it was to see poor dear Bingo's emotion at seeing all the old
familiar objects again! He went up and sniffed at them all in turn,
quite plainly recognising everything. And he was quite put out to find
that we had moved his favourite ottoman out of the drawing-room. But he
_is_ so penitent, too, and so ashamed of having run away; he hardly
dares to come when John calls him, and he kept under a chair in the hall
all the morning--he wouldn't come in here either, so we had to leave him
in your garden.'

'He's been sadly out of spirits all day,' said Lilian; 'he hasn't bitten
one of the tradespeople.'

'Oh, _he's_ all right, the rascal!' said the Colonel, cheerily; 'he'll
be after the cats again as well as ever in a day or two.'

'Ah, those cats!' said my poor innocent mother. 'Algy, you haven't tried
the air-gun on them again lately, have you? They're worse than ever.'

I troubled the Colonel to pass the claret; Travers laughed for the first
time. 'That's a good idea,' he said, in that carrying 'bar-mess' voice
of his; 'an air-gun for cats, ha, ha! Make good bags, eh, Weatherhead?'
I said that I did, _very_ good bags, and felt I was getting painfully
red in the face.

'Oh, Algy is an excellent shot--quite a sportsman,' said my mother. 'I
remember, oh, long ago, when we lived at Hammersmith, he had a pistol,
and he used to strew crumbs in the garden for the sparrows, and shoot at
them out of the pantry window; he frequently hit one.'

'Well,' said the Colonel, not much impressed by these sporting
reminiscences, 'don't go rolling over our Bingo by mistake, you know,
Weatherhead, my boy. Not but what you've a sort of right after
this--only don't. I wouldn't go through it all twice for anything.'

'If you really won't take any more wine,' I said hurriedly, addressing
the Colonel and Travers, 'suppose we all go out and have our coffee on
the lawn? It--it will be cooler there.' For it was getting very hot
indoors, I thought.

I left Travers to amuse the ladies--he could do no more harm now; and
taking the Colonel aside, I seized the opportunity, as we strolled up
and down the garden path, to ask his consent to Lilian's engagement to
me. He gave it cordially. 'There's not a man in England,' he said, 'that
I'd sooner see her married to after to-day. You're a quiet steady young
fellow, and you've a good kind heart. As for the money, that's neither
here nor there; Lilian won't come to you without a penny, you know. But
really, my boy, you can hardly believe what it is to my poor wife and me
to see that dog. Why, bless my soul, look at him now! What's the matter
with him, eh?'

To my unutterable horror I saw that that miserable poodle, after begging
unnoticed at the tea-table for some time, had retired to an open space
before it, where he was now industriously standing on his head.

We gathered round and examined the animal curiously, as he continued to
balance himself gravely in his abnormal position. 'Good gracious, John,'
cried Mrs. Currie, 'I never saw Bingo do such a thing before in his
life!'

'Very odd,' said the Colonel, putting up his glasses; 'never learnt that
from _me_.'

'I tell you what I fancy it is,' I suggested wildly. 'You see, he was
always a sensitive, excitable animal, and perhaps the--the sudden joy of
his return has gone to his head--_upset_ him, you know.'

They seemed disposed to accept this solution, and indeed I believe they
would have credited Bingo with every conceivable degree of sensibility;
but I felt myself that if this unhappy animal had many more of these
accomplishments I was undone, for the original Bingo had never been a
dog of parts.

'It's very odd,' said Travers, reflectively, as the dog recovered his
proper level, 'but I always thought that it was half the _right_ ear
that Bingo had lost?'

'So it is, isn't it?' said the Colonel. 'Left, eh? Well, I thought
myself it was the right.'

My heart almost stopped with terror--I had altogether forgotten that. I
hastened to set the point at rest. 'Oh, it _was_ the left,' I said
positively; 'I know it because I remember so particularly thinking how
odd it was that it _should_ be the left ear, and not the right!' I told
myself this should be positively my last lie.

'_Why_ odd?' asked Frank Travers, with his most offensive Socratic
manner.

'My dear fellow, I can't tell you,' I said impatiently; 'everything
seems odd when you come to think at all about it.'

'Algernon,' said Lilian later on, 'will you tell Aunt Mary and Mr.
Travers, and--and me, how it was you came to find Bingo? Mr. Travers is
quite anxious to hear all about it.'

I could not very well refuse; I sat down and told the story, all my own
way. I painted Blagg, perhaps, rather bigger and blacker than life, and
described an exciting scene, in which I recognised Bingo by his collar
in the streets, and claimed and bore him off then and there in spite of
all opposition.

I had the inexpressible pleasure of seeing Travers grinding his teeth
with envy as I went on, and feeling Lilian's soft, slender hand glide
silently into mine as I told my tale in the twilight.

All at once, just as I reached the climax, we heard the poodle barking
furiously at the hedge which separated my garden from the road. 'There's
a foreign-looking man staring over the hedge,' said Lilian; 'Bingo
always _did_ hate foreigners.'

There certainly was a swarthy man there, and, though I had no reason for
it then, somehow my heart died within me at the sight of him.

'Don't be alarmed, sir,' cried the Colonel, 'the dog won't bite
you--unless there's a hole in the hedge anywhere.'

The stranger took off his small straw hat with a sweep. 'Ah, I am not
afraid,' he said, and his accent proclaimed him a Frenchman, 'he is not
enrage at me. May I ask, is it pairmeet to speak wiz Misterre Vezzered?'

I felt I must deal with this person alone, for I feared the worst; and,
asking them to excuse me, I went to the hedge and faced the Frenchman
with the frightful calm of despair. He was a short, stout little man,
with blue cheeks, sparkling black eyes, and a vivacious walnut-coloured
countenance; he wore a short black alpaca coat, and a large white cravat
with an immense oval malachite brooch in the centre of it, which I
mention because I found myself staring mechanically at it during the
interview.

'My name is Weatherhead,' I began, with the bearing of a detected
pickpocket. 'Can I be of any service to you?'

'Of a great service,' he said emphatically; 'you can restore to me ze
poodle vich I see zere!'

Nemesis had called at last in the shape of a rival claimant. I staggered
for an instant; then I said, 'Oh, I think you are under a mistake--that
dog is not mine.'

'I know it,' he said; 'zere 'as been leetle mistake, so if ze dog is not
to you, you give him back to me, _hein_?'

'I tell you,' I said, 'that poodle belongs to the gentleman over there.'
And I pointed to the Colonel, seeing that it was best now to bring him
into the affair without delay.

'You are wrong,' he said doggedly; 'ze poodle is my poodle! And I was
direct to you--it is your name on ze carte!' And he presented me with
that fatal card which I had been foolish enough to give to Blagg as a
proof of my identity. I saw it all now; the old villain had betrayed me,
and to earn a double reward had put the real owner on my track.

I decided to call the Colonel at once, and attempt to brazen it out with
the help of his sincere belief in the dog.

'Eh, what's that; what's it all about?' said the Colonel, bustling up,
followed at intervals by the others.

The Frenchman raised his hat again. 'I do not vant to make a trouble,'
he began, 'but zere is leetle mistake. My word of honour, sare, I see my
own poodle in your garden. Ven I appeal to zis gentilman to restore 'im
he reffer me to you.'

'You must allow me to know my own dog, sir,' said the Colonel. 'Why,
I've had him from a pup. Bingo, old boy, you know your master, don't
you?'

But the brute ignored him altogether, and began to leap wildly at the
hedge, in frantic efforts to join the Frenchman. It needed no Solomon to
decide _his_ ownership!

'I tell you, you 'ave got ze wrong poodle--it is my own dog, my Azor! He
remember me well, you see? I lose him it is three, four days.... I see a
nottice zat he is found, and ven I go to ze address zey tell me, "Oh, he
is reclaim, he is gone wiz a strangaire who has advertise." Zey show me
ze placard, I follow 'ere, and ven I arrive, I see my poodle in ze
garden before me!'

'But look here,' said the Colonel, impatiently; 'it's all very well to
say that, but how can you prove it? I give you _my_ word that the dog
belongs to _me_! You must prove your claim, eh, Travers?'

'Yes,' said Travers, judicially, 'mere assertion is no proof: it's oath
against oath, at present.'

'Attend an instant--your poodle was he 'ighly train, had he some
talents--a dog viz tricks, eh?'

'No, he's not,' said the Colonel; 'I don't like to see dogs taught to
play the fool--there's none of that nonsense about _him_, sir!'

'Ah, remark him well, then. Azor, mon chou, danse donc un peu!'

And on the foreigner's whistling a lively air, that infernal poodle rose
on his hind legs and danced solemnly about half-way round the garden! We
inside followed his movements with dismay. 'Why, dash it all!' cried the
disgusted Colonel, 'he's dancing along like a d----d mountebank! But
it's my Bingo for all that!'

'You are not convince? You shall see more. Azor, ici! Pour Beesmarck,
Azor!' (the poodle barked ferociously). 'Pour Gambetta!' (he wagged his
tail and began to leap with joy). 'Meurs pour la Patrie!'--and the
too-accomplished animal rolled over as if killed in battle!

'Where could Bingo have picked up so much French!' cried Lilian,
incredulously.

'Or so much French history?' added that serpent Travers.

'Shall I command 'im to jomp, or reverse 'imself?' inquired the obliging
Frenchman.

'We've seen that, thank you,' said the Colonel, gloomily. 'Upon my word,
I don't know what to think. It can't be that that's not my Bingo after
all--I'll never believe it!'

I tried a last desperate stroke. 'Will you come round to the front?' I
said to the Frenchman; 'I'll let you in, and we can discuss the matter
quietly.' Then, as we walked back together, I asked him eagerly what he
would take to abandon his claims and let the Colonel think the poodle
was his after all.

He was furious--he considered himself insulted; with great emotion he
informed me that the dog was the pride of his life (it seems to be the
mission of black poodles to serve as domestic comforts of this priceless
kind!), that he would not part with him for twice his weight in gold.

'Figure,' he began, as we joined the others, 'zat zis gentilman 'ere 'as
offer me money for ze dog! He agrees zat it is to me, you see? Ver well
zen, zere is no more to be said!'

'Why, Weatherhead, have _you_ lost faith too, then?' said the Colonel.

I saw that it was no good--all I wanted now was to get out of it
creditably and get rid of the Frenchman. 'I'm sorry to say,' I replied,
'that I'm afraid I've been deceived by the extraordinary likeness. I
don't think, on reflection, that that _is_ Bingo!'

'What do you think, Travers?' asked the Colonel.

'Well, since you ask me,' said Travers, with quite unnecessary dryness,
'I never did think so.'

'Nor I,' said the Colonel; 'I thought from the first that was never my
Bingo. Why, Bingo would make two of that beast!'

And Lilian and her aunt both protested that they had had their doubts
from the first.

'Zen you pairmeet zat I remove 'im?' said the Frenchman.

'Certainly' said the Colonel; and after some apologies on our part for
the mistake, he went off in triumph, with the detestable poodle frisking
after him.

When he had gone the Colonel laid his hand kindly on my shoulder. 'Don't
look so cut up about it, my boy,' he said; 'you did your best--there was
a sort of likeness, to any one who didn't know Bingo as we did.'

Just then the Frenchman again appeared at the hedge. 'A thousand
pardons,' he said, 'but I find zis upon my dog--it is not to me. Suffer
me to restore it viz many compliments.'

It was Bingo's collar. Travers took it from his hand and brought it to
us.

'This was on the dog when you stopped that fellow, didn't you say?' he
asked me.

One more lie--and _I_ was so-weary of falsehood! 'Y-yes,' I said
reluctantly, that was so.'

'Very extraordinary,' said Travers; 'that's the wrong poodle beyond a
doubt, but when he's found, he's wearing the right dog's collar! Now how
do you account for that?'

'My good fellow,' I said impatiently, 'I'm not in the witness-box. I
_can't_ account for it. It--it's a mere coincidence!'

'But look here, my _dear_ Weatherhead,' argued Travers (whether in good
faith or not I never could quite make out), 'don't you see what a
tremendously important link it is? Here's a dog who (as I understand the
facts) had a silver collar, with his name engraved on it, round his neck
at the time he was lost. Here's that identical collar turning up soon
afterwards round the neck of a totally different dog! We must follow
this up; we must get at the bottom of it somehow! With a clue like this,
we're sure to find out, either the dog himself, or what's become of him!
Just try to recollect exactly what happened, there's a good fellow. This
is just the sort of thing I like!'

It was the sort of thing I did not enjoy at all. 'You must excuse me
to-night, Travers,' I said uncomfortably; 'you see, just now it's rather
a sore subject for me--and I'm not feeling very well!' I was grateful
just then for a reassuring glance of pity and confidence from Lilian's
sweet eyes which revived my drooping spirits for the moment.

'Yes, we'll go into it to-morrow, Travers,' said the Colonel; 'and
then--hullo, why, there's that confounded Frenchman _again_!'

It was indeed; he came prancing back delicately, with a malicious
enjoyment on his wrinkled face. 'Once more I return to apologise,' he
said. 'My poodle 'as permit 'imself ze grave indiscretion to make a very
big 'ole at ze bottom of ze garden!'

I assured him that it was of no consequence. 'Perhaps,' he replied,
looking steadily at me through his keen half-shut eyes, 'you vill not
say zat ven you regard ze 'ole. And you others, I spik to you: somtimes
von loses a somzing vich is qvite near all ze time. It is ver droll, eh?
my vord, ha, ha, ha!' And he ambled off, with an aggressively fiendish
laugh that chilled my blood.

'What the dooce did he mean by that, eh?' said the Colonel, blankly.

'Don't know,' said Travers; 'suppose we go and inspect the hole?'

But before that I had contrived to draw near it myself, in deadly fear
lest the Frenchman's last words had contained some innuendo which I had
not understood.

It was light enough still for me to see something, at the unexpected
horror of which I very nearly fainted.

That thrice accursed poodle which I had been insane enough to attempt to
foist upon the Colonel must, it seems, have buried his supper the night
before very near the spot in which I had laid Bingo, and in his attempts
to exhume his bone had brought the remains of my victim to the surface!

There the corpse lay, on the very top of the excavations. Time had not,
of course, improved its appearance, which was ghastly in the extreme,
but still plainly recognisable by the eye of affection.

'It's a very ordinary hole,' I gasped, putting myself before it and
trying to turn them back. 'Nothing in it--nothing at all!'

'Except one Algernon Weatherhead, Esq., eh?' whispered Travers jocosely
in my ear.

'No, but,' persisted the Colonel, advancing, 'look here! Has the dog
damaged any of your shrubs?'

'No, no!' I cried piteously, 'quite the reverse. Let's all go indoors
now; it's getting so cold!'

'See, there _is_ a shrub or something uprooted!' said the Colonel, still
coming nearer that fatal hole. 'Why, hullo, look there! What's that?'

Lilian, who was by his side, gave a slight scream. 'Uncle,' she cried,
'it looks like--like _Bingo_!'

The Colonel turned suddenly upon me. 'Do you hear?' he demanded, in a
choked voice. 'You hear what she says? Can't you speak out? Is that our
Bingo?'

I gave it up at last; I only longed to be allowed to crawl away under
something! 'Yes,' I said in a dull whisper, as I sat down heavily on a
garden seat, 'yes ... that's Bingo ... misfortune ... shoot him ...
quite an accident!'

There was a terrible explosion after that; they saw at last how I had
deceived them, and put the very worst construction upon everything. Even
now I writhe impotently at times, and my cheeks smart and tingle with
humiliation, as I recall that scene--the Colonel's very plain speaking,
Lilian's passionate reproaches and contempt, and her aunt's speechless
prostration of disappointment.

I made no attempt to defend myself; I was not perhaps the complete
villain they deemed me, but I felt dully that no doubt it all served me
perfectly right.

Still I do not think I am under any obligation to put their remarks down
in black and white here.

Travers had vanished at the first opportunity--whether out of delicacy,
or the fear of breaking out into unseasonable mirth, I cannot say; and
shortly afterwards the others came to where I sat silent with bowed
head, and bade me a stern and final farewell.

And then, as the last gleam of Lilian's white dress vanished down the
garden path, I laid my head down on the table amongst the coffee-cups
and cried like a beaten child.

I got leave as soon as I could and went abroad. The morning after my
return I noticed, while shaving, that there was a small square marble
tablet placed against the wall of the Colonel's garden. I got my
opera-glass and read--and pleasant reading it was--the following
inscription:--

                   IN AFFECTIONATE MEMORY
                             OF
                         B I N G O,
              SECRETLY AND CRUELLY PUT TO DEATH,
                       IN COLD BLOOD;
                           BY A
                    NEIGHBOUR AND FRIEND.
                        JUNE, 1881

If this explanation of mine ever reaches my neighbours' eyes, I humbly
hope they will have the humanity either to take away or tone down that
tablet. They cannot conceive what I suffer, when curious visitors
insist, as they do every day, in spelling out the words from our
windows, and asking me countless questions about them!

Sometimes I meet the Curries about the village, and, as they pass me
with averted heads, I feel myself growing crimson. Travers is almost
always with Lilian now. He has given her a dog--a fox-terrier--and they
take ostentatiously elaborate precautions to keep it out of my garden.

I should like to assure them here that they need not be under any alarm.
I have shot one dog.

_THE STORY OF A SUGAR PRINCE._

A TALE FOR CHILDREN.

[Illustration: O]

Of course he may have been really a fairy prince, and I should be sorry
to contradict any one who chose to say so. For he was only about three
inches high, he had rose-pink cheeks and bright yellow curling locks, he
wore a doublet and hose which fitted him perfectly, and a little cap and
feather, all of delicately contrasted shades of blue--and this does seem
a fair description of a fairy prince.

But then he was painted--very cleverly--but still only painted, on a
slab of prepared sugar, and his back was a plain white blank; while the
regular fairies all have more than one side to them, and I am obliged to
say that I never before happened to come across a real fairy prince who
was nothing but paint and sugar.

For all that he may, as I said before, have been a fairy prince, and
whether he was or not does not matter in the least--for he at any rate
quite believed he was one.

As yet there had been very little romance or enchantment in his life,
which, as far as he could remember, had all been spent in a long shop,
full of sweet and subtle scents, where the walls were lined with
looking-glass and fitted with shelves on which stood rows of glass jars,
containing pastilles and jujubes of every colour, shape, and flavour in
the world--a shop where, in summer, a strange machine for making cooling
drinks gurgled and sputtered all day long, and in winter, the large
plate-glass windows were filled with boxes made of painted silk from
Paris, so charmingly expensive and useless that rich people bought them
eagerly to give to one another.

The prince generally lay on one of the counters between two beds of
sugar roses and violets in a glass case, on either side of which stood a
figure of highly coloured plaster.

One was a major of some unknown regiment; he had an immense head, with
goggling eyes and a very red complexion, and this head would unscrew so
that he could be filled with comfits, which, though it hurt him
fearfully every time this was done, he was proud of, because it always
astonished people.

The other figure was an old brown gipsy woman in a red cloak and a
striped petticoat, with a head which, although it wouldn't take off, was
always nodding and grinning mysteriously from morning to night.

It was to her that the prince (for we shall have to call him 'the
prince,' as I don't know his other name--if he ever had one) owed all
his notions of Fairyland and his high birth.

'You let the old gipsy alone for knowing a prince when she sees one,'
she would say, nodding at him with encouragement. 'They've kept you out
of your rights all this time; but wait a while, and see if one of these
clumsy giants that are always bustling in and out doesn't help you;
you'll be restored to your kingdom, never fear!'

But the major used to get angry at her prophecies: 'It's all nonsense,'
he used to say, 'the boy's no more a prince than I am, and he'll never
be noticed by anybody, unless he learns to unscrew his head and hold
comfits--like a soldier and a gentleman!'

However, the prince believed the gipsy, and every morning, as the
shutters were taken down, and grey mist, brilliant sunshine, or brown
fog stole into the close shop, he wondered whether the day had come
which would see his restoration to his kingdom.

And at last the day really came; some one who had been buying sugar
violets and roses noticed the prince in the middle of them and bought
him too, to his immense delight. 'What did the old gipsy tell you, eh?'
said the old woman, wagging her head wisely; 'you see, it has all come
true!'

Even the major was convinced now, for, before the prince had been packed
up, he whispered to him that if at any time he wanted a
commander-in-chief, why, he knew where to send for him. 'Yes, I will
remember,' said the prince; 'and you,' he added to the gipsy, 'you shall
be my prime minister!'--for he was so ignorant of politics that he
actually thought an old woman _could_ be prime minister.

And then, before he could finish saying good-bye and hearing their
congratulations, he was covered with several wrappers of white paper and
plunged into complete darkness, which he did not mind at all, he was so
happy.

After that he remembered no more until he was unwrapped and placed
upright on the top of a dazzling white dome which stood in the very
centre of a long plain, where a host of the strangest forms were
scattered about in bewildering confusion.

On each side of him tall twisted trunks of sparkling glass and silver
sprang high into the air, and from their tops the cool green branches
swayed gently down, while round their bases velvet-petalled flowers
bloomed in a bed of soft moss.

Farther away, an exquisite temple, made of a sort of delicate
gold-coloured crystal, rose out of the crowd of gorgeous things that
surrounded it, and this crowd, as the prince's eyes became accustomed to
the splendour, gradually separated itself into various forms of
loveliness.

He saw high curiously moulded masses of transparent amber, within which
ruby and emerald gems glowed dimly; mounds of rose-flushed snow, and
blocks of creamy marble; and in the space between these were huge
platforms of silver and porcelain, on which were piled heaps of
treasures that he knew must be priceless, though he could not guess what
they were all used for.

But amidst all these were certain grim shapes; some seemed to be the
carcases of fearful beasts, whose heads had all been struck off, but who
had evidently shown such courage in death that they had earned the
respect of the brave hunters who had vanquished them--for rosettes had
been pinned on their rough breasts, and their stiffened limbs were bound
together by bright-hued ribbons.

Then there was one monstrous head of some brute larger still, which
could not have been quite killed even then, for its tawny eyes were
still glaring with fury--the prince could easily have stood upright
between its grinning jaws if he had wanted to do so; but he had no
intention of doing any such thing, for though he was quite as brave as
most fairy princes he was not foolhardy.

And there were big enchanted castles with no doors nor windows in them,
and inhabited by restless monsters--dragons most likely--who had thrust
their scaly black claws through the roofs.

Perhaps he was a little frightened by some of the ugliest shapes at
first, but he soon grew used to them, and had no room for any other
feelings than pride and joy. For this was Fairyland at last, stranger
and more beautiful than anything he could have dreamed of--he had come
into his kingdom!

He was going to live in that lacework palace; those dragons would come
fawning out of their lairs presently, and do homage to him; these
formidable dead creatures had been slain to do him honour; and he was
the rightful owner of all these treasures of gold, and silk, and gems.

He must not forget, he thought, that he owed it all to the good-natured
giants who had brought him here: no, when they came in--as of course
they would--to pay their respects, he would thank them graciously and
reward them liberally out of his new wealth.

There was a silver giraffe, stiff and old-fashioned, under a palm-tree
hard by, which must have guessed from the prince's proud gay smile that
he was deceiving himself and had no idea of his real position.

But the giraffe did not make any attempt to warn him, either because it
had seen so many things all round it consumed in its day that the
selfish fear that it too would be cut up and handed round some evening
kept it preoccupied and silent, or else because, being only
electro-plated and hollow inside, it had no feelings of any kind.

By-and-by the doors opened, and delicious bursts of music floated into
the room, mingled with scraps of conversation and ripples of fresh
laughter; servants came noiselessly in and increased the glare of a kind
of sun that hung above the plain, and a host of smaller lights suddenly
started up and shone softly through shades of silk and paper.

The music stopped, the laughter and voices grew louder and came nearer,
there was the sound of approaching feet--and then a whole army of
mortals surrounded the prince's kingdom.

They were a far smaller and finer race than the giants he had seen
hitherto, with pretty fresh complexions, and wearing, some of them, soft
shimmering dresses that he thought only fairies ever wore. After a
little confusion, they ranged themselves in one long line completely
round the plain; the taller beings glided softly about behind, and the
prince prepared himself to receive their congratulations with proper
dignity and modesty.

But these giants certainly had very odd ways of showing their loyalty,
for they saluted him with a clinking and clattering so deafening that
they would have drowned the noise of a million gnomes forging fairy
armour, while every now and then came a loud report, after which a
golden sparkling cascade fell creaming and bubbling from somewhere above
into the crystal reservoirs prepared for it.

It was all very gratifying, no doubt--and yet, though they all pretended
to be honouring him, no one seemed to pay him any more particular
attention; he thought perhaps they might be feeling abashed in his
presence, and that he must manage to reassure them.

But while he was thinking how he could best do this, he began to be
aware that along the whole of that glittering plain things were being
done without his permission which were scandalous and insulting--he saw
the grisly carcases cut swiftly into pieces with flashing blades, or
torn limb from limb deliberately; all the dragons were attacked and
overpowered, and hauled out unresisting from their strongholds; even the
fierce head was gashed hideously behind the ears!

He tried to speak and ask them what they meant by such audacity, but he
could not make them hear as he could the major and the old gipsy; so he
was obliged to look on while one by one the trophies dedicated to his
glory were changed to shapeless heaps of ruin.

And, unless he was mistaken, the greater part of them were actually
disappearing from sight altogether! It seemed impossible, for where
could they all go to? and yet nothing now remained of the huge carcases
but a meagre framework of bone, hanging together by shreds of skin; the
strong castles were roofless walls with gaping breaches in them; and
could it be that the more attractive objects were beginning to melt away
in the same mysterious manner? Was it enchantment, or how--how on earth
did they manage to do it?

He was no happier when he found out--for though, of course, to _us_
eating is quite an ordinary everyday affair, only think what a shock the
first sight of it must have been to a delicate fairy prince, whose
mouth was simply a cherry-coloured curve, and not made to open on any
terms!

He saw all the treasures he had looked upon as his very own being lifted
to a long line of mouths of all sizes and shapes; the mouths opened to
various widths, and--the treasures vanished, he could not tell how or
where.

The mellow amber tottered and quivered for a while and was gone; even
the solid creamy marble was hacked in pieces and absorbed; nothing,
however beautiful or fantastic, escaped instant annihilation between
those terrible bars of scarlet and flashing ivory.

Could this be Fairyland, this plain where all things beautiful were
doomed--or had they brought him back to his kingdom only to make this
cruel fun of him, and destroy his riches one by one before his eyes?

But before he could find any answers to these sad questions he chanced
to look straight in front of him, and there he saw a face which made his
little sugar heart almost melt within him, with a curious feeling, half
pleasure, half pain, that was quite new to him.

It was a girl's face, of course, and the prince had not looked at her
very long before he forgot all about his kingdom.

He was relieved to see that she at least was too generous to join in the
work of destruction that was going on all around her--indeed, she seemed
to dislike it as much as he did himself, for only a little of the tinted
snow passed her soft lips.

Now and then she laughed a little silvery laugh, and shook out her
rippling gold-brown hair at something the being next to her said--a
great boy-mortal, with a red face, bold eyes, and grasping brown hands,
which were fatal to everything within their range.

How the prince did hate that boy!--he found to his joy that he could
understand what they said, and began to listen jealously to their
conversation.

'I say,' the boy (whose name, it seemed, was Bertie) was saying, as he
received a plateful of floating fragments of the lacework palace, 'you
aren't eating anything, Mabel. Don't you care about suppers? _I_ do.'

'I'm not hungry,' she said, evidently feeling this a distinction; 'I've
been out so much this fortnight.'

'How jolly!' he observed, 'I only wish _I_ had. But I say,' he added
confidentially, 'won't they make you take a grey powder soon? They would
_me_.'

'I'm never made to take anything at all nasty,' she said--and the prince
was indignant that any one should have dared to think otherwise.

'I suppose,' continued the boy, 'you didn't manage to get any of that
cake the conjurer made in Uncle John's hat, did you?'

'No, indeed,' she said, and made a little face; 'I don't think I should
like cake that came out of anybody's hat!'

'It was very decent cake,' he said; 'I got a lot of it. I was afraid it
might spoil my appetite for supper--but it hasn't.'

'What a very greedy boy you are, Bertie,' she remarked; 'I suppose you
could eat _anything_?'

'At home I think I could, pretty nearly,' he said, with a proud
confidence, 'but not at old Tokoe's, I can't. Tokoe's is where I go to
school, you know. I can't stand the resurrection-pie on Saturdays--all
the week they save up the bones and rags and things, and when it comes
up----'

'I don't want to hear,' she interrupted; 'you talk about nothing but
horrid things to eat, and it isn't a bit interesting.'

Bertie allowed himself a brief interval for refreshment unalloyed by
conversation, after which he began again: 'Mabel, if they have dancing
after supper, dance with me.'

'Are you sure you know _how_ to dance?' she inquired rather
fastidiously.

'Oh, I can get through all right,' he replied. 'I've learnt. It's not
harder than drilling. I can dance the Highland Schottische and the
Swedish dance, any-way.'

'Any one can dance those. I don't call that dancing,' she said.

'Well, but try me once, Mabel; say you will,' said he.

'I don't believe they will have dancing,' she said; 'there are so many
very young children here and they get in the way so. But I hope there
won't be any more games--games are stupid.'

'Only to girls,' said Bertie; 'girls never care about any fun.'

'Not _your_ kind of fun,' she said, a little vaguely. 'I don't mind
hide-and-seek in a nice old house with long passages and dark corners
and secret panels--and ghosts even--that's jolly; but I don't care much
about running round and round a row of silly chairs, trying to sit down
when the music stops and keep other people out--I call it rude.'

'You didn't seem to think it so rude just now,' he retorted; 'you were
laughing quite as much as any one; and I saw you push young Bobby Meekin
off the last chair of all, and sit on it yourself, anyhow.'

'Bertie, you didn't,' she cried, flushing angrily.

'I did though.'

'But I tell you I _didn't_!

'And _I_ say you _did_!'

'If you will go on saying I did, when I'm quite sure I never did
anything of the sort,' she said, 'please don't speak to me again; I
shan't answer if you do. And I think you're a particularly ill-bred
boy--not polite, like my brothers.'

'Your brothers are every bit as rude as I am. If they aren't, they're
milksops--I should be sorry to be a milksop.'

'My brothers are not milksops--they could fight _you_!' she cried, with
a little defiant ring in her voice that the prince thought perfectly
charming.

'As if a girl knew anything about fighting,' said Bertie; 'why, I could
fight your brothers all stuck in a row!'

'_That_ you couldn't,' from Mabel, and 'I could then, so _now_!' from
Bertie, until at last Mabel refused to answer any more of Bertie's
taunts, as they grew decidedly offensive; and, finding that she took
refuge in disdainful silence, he consumed tart after tart with gloomy
determination.

And then all at once, Mabel, having nothing to do, chanced to look
across to the white dome on which the prince was standing, and she
opened her beautiful grey eyes with a pleased surprise as she saw him.

All this time the prince had been falling deeper and deeper in love with
her; at first he had felt almost certain that she was a princess and his
destined bride; he was rather small for her, certainly, though he did
not know how _very_ much smaller he was; but Fairyland, he had always
been told, was full of resources--he could easily be filled out to her
size, or, better still, she might be brought down to _his_.

But he had begun to give up these wild fancies already, and even to fear
that she would go away without having once noticed him; and now she was
looking at him as if she found him pleasant to look at, as if she would
like to know him.

At last, evidently after some struggle, she turned to the offending
Bertie, and spoke his name softly; but Bertie could not give up the
luxury of sulking with her all at once, and so he looked another way.

'Is it _Pax_, Bertie?' she asked. (She had not had brothers for
nothing.)

'No, it isn't,' said Bertie.

'Oh, you want to sulk? I thought only girls sulked,' she said; 'but it
doesn't matter, I only wanted to tell you something.'

His curiosity was too much for his dignity. 'Well--what?' he asked,
gruffly enough.

'Only,' she said, 'that I've been thinking over things, and I dare say
you _could_ fight my brothers--only not all together and I'm not sure
that Charlie wouldn't beat you.'

'Charlie! I could settle him in five minutes,' muttered Bertie, only
half appeased.

'Oh, not in _five_, Bertie,' cried Mabel, 'ten, perhaps; but you'd never
want to, would you, when he's _my_ brother? And now,' she added, 'we're
friends again, aren't we, Bertie?'

He was a cynic in his way--'I see,' he said, 'you want something out of
me; you should have thought of that before you quarrelled, you know!'

Mabel contracted her eyebrows and bit her lip for a moment, then she
said meekly--

'I know I should, Bertie; but I thought perhaps you wouldn't mind doing
this for me. I can ask the boy on my other side--he's a stupid-looking
boy, and I don't care about knowing him--still, if _you_ won't do
it----'

'Oh, well, _I_ don't mind,' he said, softened at once. 'What is it you
want?'

'Bertie,' she whispered breathlessly, 'you'll be quite a nice boy if
you'll only get me that dear little sugar prince off the cake there; you
can reach him better than I can, and--and I don't quite like to--only,
be quick, or some one else will get him first.'

And in another second the enraptured prince found himself lying on her
plate!

'Isn't he lovely?' she cried.

'Not bad,' said Bertie; 'give us a bit--_I_ got him for you, you know.'

'_Give you a bit!_' she cried, with the keenest horror and disgust.
'Bertie! you don't really think I wanted him to--to eat.'

'Oh, the paint doesn't matter,' he said; 'I've eaten lots of them.'

'You really are too horrid,' she said; 'all you think about is eating
things. I can't bear greedy boys. I won't have anything to do with you
any more; after this we'll be perfect strangers.'

He stared helplessly at her; he had made friends and done all she asked
of him, and, just because he begged for a share in the spoil, she had
treated him like this! It was too bad of her--it served him right for
bothering about a girl.

He would have told her what he thought about it, only just then there
was a general rising. The prince was carried tenderly upstairs,
entrusted with many cautions to a trim maid, and laid to rest wrapped in
a soft lace handkerchief upon a dressing-table, to dream of the new life
in store for him to the accompaniment of faintly heard music and
laughter from below.

He had given up all his old ideas of recovering his kingdom and marrying
a princess--very likely he might not be a fairy prince after all, and he
felt now that he did not very much care if he wasn't.

He was going to be Mabel's for evermore, and that was worth all
Fairyland to him. How bewitching her anger had been when Bertie
suspected her of wanting the prince for her own eating. (The prince had
already found out that eating meant the way in which these ruthless
mortals made everything beautiful pass away between their sharp teeth.)

She had pitied and protected him; might she not some day come to _love_
him? If he had only known what a little sugar fool he was making of
himself, I think he would certainly have dissolved into syrup for very
shame.

Mabel came up to fetch him at last; they had fastened something white
and fleecy round her head and shoulders, and her face was flushed and
her eyes seemed a darker grey as she took him out of the handkerchief,
with a cry of delight at finding him quite safe, and hurried downstairs
with him.

While she was waiting in the hall for her carriage, the prince heard the
last of Bertie; he came up to her and whispered spitefully, 'Well,
you've kept your word, you've not looked at me since supper, all because
I thought you meant to eat that sugar thing off the cake! Now I just
tell you this--you needn't pretend you don't like sweets--I wouldn't
give much for that figure's lasting a week, _now_!'

She only glanced at him with calm disdain, and passed on under the
awning to her carriage, where her brothers were waiting for her, and
Bertie was left with a recollection that would make his first fortnight
under old Tokoe's roof even bitterer than usual to him.

What a deliciously dreamy drive home that was for the prince; he lay
couched on Mabel's soft palm, thinking how cool and satiny it was, and
how different from the hot coarse hands which had touched him hitherto.

She said nothing to her brothers, who were curled up, grey indistinct
forms, opposite; she sat quietly at the side of the servant who had come
to fetch them, and now and then in the faint light the prince could see
her smiling with half-shut sleepy eyes at some pleasant recollection.

If that drive could only have gone on for ever! but it came to an end
soon, very soon.

A little later his tired little protectress placed him where she could
see him when first she awoke the next day, and all that night the prince
stood on guard upon the high mantelpiece in the night nursery, thinking
of the kiss, half-childish and half-playful, she had given him just
before she left him at his post.

The next morning Mabel woke up tired, and, if it must be confessed, a
little cross; but the prince thought she looked lovelier than even on
the night before, in her plain dark dress and fresh white pinafore and
crossbands.

She took him down with her to breakfast, and stationed him near her
plate--and then he made a discovery.

_She_, too, could make the solid things around her vanish in the very
way of which he thought she disapproved so strongly!

It was done, as she seemed to do everything, very daintily and
prettily--but still the things _did_ disappear, somehow, and it was a
shock.

She called the attention of her governess--who was a pale lady, with a
very prominent forehead and round spectacles--to the prince's good
looks, and the governess admitted that he was pretty, but cautioned
Mabel not to eat him, as these highly-coloured confections invariably
contained deleterious matter, and were therefore unwholesome.

'Oh,' said Mabel, defending her favourite with great animation, 'but not
this one, Miss Pringle. Because I heard Mrs. Goodchild tell somebody
last night that she was always so careful to get only sweets painted
with "pure vegetable colours," she called it. But that wouldn't
matter--for of course I shall never want to _eat_ this little man!'

'Oh, of course not,' said the governess, with a smile that struck the
prince as being unpleasant--though he did not know exactly why, and he
was glad to forget it in watching the play of Mabel's pretty restless
fingers on the table-cloth.

By-and-by the nurse came in, carrying something which he had never seen
anything at all like before, and which frightened him very much. It was
called as he soon found, a 'Baby,' and it goggled round it with glassy,
meaningless eyes, and clucked fearfully somewhere deep down in its
throat, while it stretched out feeble little wrinkled hands, exactly
like yellow starfish.

'There, _there_, then!' said the nurse (which seems to be the right
thing to say to a baby). 'See, Miss Mabel, he's asking for that to play
with.'

Now _that_ happened to be the sugar prince.

Mabel seemed completely in the power of this monster, for she dared not
refuse it anything; she crossed almost timidly to it now, and laid the
prince in one of its starfish, only entreating that nurse would not
allow it to put him in its mouth.

But the baby did not try to do this; its vacant countenance only creased
into an idiotic grin, as it began to take a great deal of notice of him;
and its way of taking notice was to shake the prince violently up and
down, till he was quite giddy.

After doing this several times, it ducked him quite suddenly down,
head-foremost, into the nearest cup of tea.

The poor prince felt as if he were all softening and crumbling away into
nothing, but it was only some of the paint coming off; and before he
could be ducked a second time, Mabel, with a cry of dismay, rescued him
from the indignant baby, which howled in a dreadful manner.

She dried him tenderly on her handkerchief, and then, as she saw the
result, suddenly began to weep inconsolably herself. 'Oh, see what
Baby's done!' she gasped between her sobs; 'all his lovely complexion
ruined, spoilt ... I wish somebody would just spoil Baby's face for him,
and see how _he_ likes it.... If he isn't slapped _at once_--I'll never
love him again!'

But nobody slapped the baby--it was soothed; and, besides, all the slaps
hand could bestow would not bring back the prince's lost beauty.

His face was all the colours of the rainbow now; the yellow of his curls
had run into his forehead, his brown eyes were smudged across his nose,
and his cherry lips smeared upon his cheeks, while all the blue of his
doublet had spread up to his chin.

He knew from what they were all saying that this had happened to him,
but he did not mind it much, except at first; he had never been vain of
his beauty, and it was delightful to hear Mabel's little tender laments
over his misfortune; so long as she cared for him as he was--what did
anything else matter?

In the schoolroom that morning he leaned against her writing-desk, and
watched her turning fat books lazily over and inking her fair little
hands, until she shut them all up with an impatient bang and yawned.

Why was it that at that precise moment the prince began to feel
uncomfortable?

'Is it near dinner-time, Miss Pringle?' she asked. 'I'm so awfully
hungry!'

The governess's watch showed an hour more to wait.

'I wonder if Comfitt would give me some cake if I ran down and asked
her!' said Mabel next.

The governess thought Mabel had much better wait patiently till
dinner-time without spoiling her appetite.

'Oh, very well,' said Mabel; 'what a bore it is to be hungry too soon,
isn't it?'

Then she took the faded prince up and looked at him mournfully. 'What a
shame of Baby!' she said; 'I wanted to keep him always to look at--but I
don't see how I can very well now, do you, Miss Pringle? Do they make
these things only for ornament, should you think?'

'I think it is time you finished that exercise,' was all the governess
replied.

'Oh, I've almost done it,' said Mabel, 'and I want just to ask this
question (it comes under "general information," you know)--aren't
vegetable colours "dilly-whatever-it-is" colours I mean--harmless? And
Dr. Harley said vegetables were so very good for me. I wonder if I might
just _taste_ him.'

Here the prince's dream ended: he saw it all at last--how she had petted
and praised him only while he was pleasant to look at; and now that was
over--he was nothing more to her than something to eat.

Presently he was lifted gently between her slim finger and thumb to her
lips, and touched caressingly by something red and moist and warm behind
them. It was not unpleasant exactly, so far, but he knew that worse was
coming, and longed for her to make haste and get it over.

'Vanilla!' reported Mabel, 'that _must_ be all right, Miss Pringle. Cook
flavours corn-flour with it!'

Miss Pringle shrugged her sharp shoulders: 'You must use your own
judgment, my dear,' was all she said.

And then--I am sorry to have to tell what happened next, but this is a
true story and I must go on--then the prince saw Mabel's grey eyes
looking at him from under their long lashes with interest for the last
time, he saw two gleaming pearly rows closing upon him, he felt a sharp
pang, of grief as well as pain, as they crunched him up into small
pieces, and he slowly melted away and there was an end of him.

There is a beautiful moral belonging to this story, but it is of no use
to print it here, because it only applies to sugar princes--until Mabel
is quite grown up.

_THE RETURN OF AGAMEMNON._

[Illustration: It]

It was ten years since Agamemnon, the mighty Argive monarch, had left
his kingdom (somewhat suddenly, and after a stormy interview with the
Queen, as those said who had the best opportunities of knowing), with
the avowed intention of going to assist at the siege of Troy.

He had never written once since, but so many reports of his personal
daring and his terrible wounds had reached the palace that Clytemnestra
would often observe, with a touch of annoyance, that, if not actually
dead by that time, he must be nearly as full of holes as a fishing-net.

So that she was scarcely surprised when they broke the intelligence to
her one day that he really had gone at last, having fallen, fighting
desperately, against the most fearful odds, upon the Trojan plain; and
when, a little later, she formally announced to her faithful subjects
her betrothal to Ægisthus, her youngest and favourite courtier, _they_
were not surprised in their turn.

They told one another, with ribald facetiousness, that they had rather
expected something of the kind.

They were celebrating their Queen's betrothal day with the wildest
enthusiasm, for they were a simple affectionate people, and foresaw an
impetus to local trade. It had been but a dull time for Argos during
those weary ten years, and the city had become well-nigh deserted, as,
one by one, all her bravest and her best had left her, to seek, as they
poetically put it, 'a soldier's tomb.'

Several married men, in whom no such patriotic enthusiasm had ever been
previously suspected, found out that their country required their
services, left their wives and their little ones, and started for the
field of battle. There were many pushing Argive tradesmen, too, who
abandoned their business and sought--not ostentatiously, but with the
self-effacement of true heroism--the seat of war upon which their
sovereign had been sitting so long; while the real extent of their
devotion was seldom appreciated until long after their departure, when
it was generally discovered that, in their eagerness, they had left
their affairs in the greatest confusion.

And very soon almost the only young men left were mild, unwarlike
youths, who were respectable and wore spectacles, while the rest of the
male population was composed of equal parts of prattling infants and
doddering octogenarians.

This was a melancholy state of things--but then the absent ones wrote
such capital letters home, containing such graphic descriptions of camp
life and the fiercer excitements of night attacks and forlorn hopes,
that the recipients ought to have been amply consoled.

They were not; they only remarked that it seemed rather odd that the
writers should so persistently forget to give their addresses, and that
it was a singular circumstance that while each letter purported to come
direct from the Grecian lines, every envelope somehow bore a different
postmark. And often would the older married women (and their mothers
too) wish with infinite pathos that they could only just get the missing
ones home and talk to them a little--that was all!

But all anxiety was forgotten in the celebration of the betrothal, for
the Argives were determined to do the thing really well. So in the
principal streets they had erected triumphal arches, typifying the
chief local manufactures, which were (as it is scarcely necessary to
inform the scholar) soda-water and cane-bottomed chairs; and from these
arches chairs and bottles were constantly dropping, like a gentle dew,
upon the happy crowd which passed beneath. All the public fountains
spouted a cheap dinner sherry like water--'_very_ like water,' said some
disaffected persons; householders were graciously invited to exhibit
flags and illuminations at their own expense, and in the market-place a
fowl was being roasted whole for the populace.

All was gaiety, therefore, at sunset, when the citizens assembled in
groups about the square in front of the palace, prepared to cheer the
royal pair with enthusiasm when they deigned to show themselves upon the
balcony.

The well-meaning old gentlemen who formed the Chorus (for in those days
every house of any position in society maintained a chorus, and even
shabby-genteel families kept a semi-chorus in buttons) were twittering
in a corner, prepared to come forth by-and-by with the ill-timed
allusions, melancholy and depressing forebodings, and unnecessary
advice, which were all that was expected of them, and the Mayor and
Corporation were fussing about distractedly with a brass band and the
inevitable address.

All at once there was a stir in the crowd, and the eyes of everyone
were strained towards a tall and swaying scaffold on the royal
house-top, where a small black figure, outlined sharply against the
saffron sky, could be seen gesticulating wildly?

'Look at the watchman!' they whispered excitedly; 'what _can_ be the
matter with him?'

Now before Agamemnon left he had had fires laid upon all the mountain
tops in a straight line between Argos and Troy, arranging to light the
pile at the Troy end of the chain when it should become necessary to let
them know at home that they might expect him back shortly.

The watchman had been put up on a scaffold to look out for the beacon,
and had been there for years day and night, without being once allowed
to quit his post--even on his birthday. It was expected that
Clytemnestra would have let him come down for good when she was informed
of Agamemnon's death on such excellent authority, but she would not hear
of such a thing. She knew people would think it very foolish and
sentimental of her, she said, but to take the watchman down would seem
so like giving up all hope! So she kept him up, a proof of her conjugal
devotion which touched everyone--except perhaps the watchman himself.

Clytemnestra and Ægisthus, who had happened to come out while all this
excitement was at its height, found themselves absolutely ignored. 'Not
a single cap off--not one solitary hurray,' cried the Queen with
majestic anger. '_What_ have you been doing to make yourself so
unpopular with my loyal Argives?' she demanded suspiciously.

'I don't think it's anything to do with _me_, really,' protested
Ægisthus, feebly. 'They're only looking the other way just now,
and--can't you see why?' he added suddenly, '_they've lit the beacon on
the top of Arachnæus_!'

Clytemnestra looked, and started violently, as on the mountain-top in
question a red tongue of flame shot up through the gathering dusk: 'What
does it mean?' she whispered, clutching him convulsively by the arm.

'Well,' said Ægisthus, 'it looks to me, do you know, rather as if your
late lamented husband has changed his mind about dying, and is on his
way to your arms.'

'Then he is not dead!' exclaimed Clytemnestra. 'He is coming home. I
shall look upon that face, hear that voice, press that hand once again!
How excessively annoying!'

'Confounded nuisance!' he agreed heartily, but his irritation sounded
slightly overdone, somehow. 'Well, it's all over with the betrothal
after this; don't you think it would be as well to get all the arches,
and fireworks, and things out of the way? We shan't want them _now_, you
know.'

'Why not?' said the Queen; 'they will all do for him; _he_ won't know.
Ye gods!' she cried, stretching out her arms with a tragic groan. 'Must
_I_, too, do for him?'

'Any way,' said Ægisthus, with an attempted ease, 'you won't want _me_
any longer, and so, if you will kindly excuse me, I--I think I'll retire
to some quiet spot whither I can drag myself with my broken heart and
bleed to death, like a wounded deer, don't you know!'

'You can do all that just as well here,' she replied. 'I wish you to
stay. Who knows what may happen?'--she added, with a sinister smile, 'We
may be happy yet!'

Clytemnestra's sinister smiles always made Ægisthus feel exactly as if
something was disagreeing with him--so he stayed.

By this time the populace had also realised the turn affairs had taken,
but they very sensibly determined that it was their plain duty to
persevere with the merriment. They were, as has been mentioned before, a
simple and affectionate people, and fond of their king; so, as his
return would be even more beneficial to trade than the betrothal, they
rejoiced on, and there was nothing in the least strained or hollow in
their revelry.

And presently there was a fresh stir in the crowd, and then a rumbling
of wheels as the covered chariot from the station rolled, amidst faint
cheering, up to the palace gates, and was saluted by the one aged
sentinel who stood on guard.

'It _is_ Agamemnon,' gasped the Queen; 'he has come already--he must not
find me unprepared. I will go within.'

She had just time to retire hastily, followed by Ægisthus, before a
short stout man in faded regimentals and a cocked hat with a moulting
plume descended from the vehicle.

The Chorus, finding it left to them to do the honours, advanced in a
row, singing the ode of welcome, which they had had in rehearsal ever
since the first year of the war.

'O King,' they chanted in their cracked old trebles, 'offspring of
Atreus, and sacker of Troy!'

'Will you kindly count the boxes?' interrupted the monarch, who hated
sentiment; 'there should be four--a tin cocked-hat box, two camel-hair
trunks, and a carpet bag.'

But a Greek chorus was not easily suppressed, and they broke out again
all together, 'Nay, but with bursting hearts would we bid thee thrice
hail!'

'Once is ample, thank you,' said the King, with regal politeness; 'and I
should be really distressed if any of you were to burst on my account.
Has anybody such a thing as half a drachma about him?'

He heard no more of the ode, and the Mayor thought it advisable to roll
up his address and take his Corporation home.

Agamemnon had succeeded in borrowing the drachma, and had just turned
his back to pay the driver as Clytemnestra glided down the broad steps
to the court-yard, and, striking an attitude, addressed nobody in
particular in tones of rapturous joy.

'O happy day!' she cried very loudly, 'on which my hero husband returns
to me after a long absence, quite unexpectedly. Henceforth shall his
helmet rust upon the hat-stand, and his spear repose innocuous amongst
the umbrellas, and his breastplate shall he replace by a
chest-protector; for a shield he shall have a sunshade, and instead of
his sword he shall carry a spud. But now let me, as an exceptionally
faithful wife, greet him before ye all with----Agamemnon, _will_ you
have the goodness to tell me who that young person is in the chariot?'
was her abrupt and somewhat lame conclusion.

'Oh, there you are, eh?' said Agamemnon, turning round and presenting a
forefinger. 'How de do, my love; how de do?' ('I shan't give you another
obol!' he said to the driver, who seemed still unsatisfied.) 'So, you're
quite well, eh?' he resumed to his wife; 'plenty to say for yourself as
usual. Gad, I feel as if I hadn't been away a week--till I look at
you.... Well, we can't expect to be always young, can we? So you want to
know my little friend here? Allow me to present her to you. One moment.'

And bustling up to the chariot, he assisted from it a maiden with a pale
face, great, wild, roving eyes, and hair of tawny gold, and led her back
to his wife.

'The Princess Cassandra of Troy--my wife, Queen Clytemnestra. They tell
me this young lady can prophesy very prettily, my dear,' he remarked.

Clytemnestra bowed coldly, and said she was sure it would be vastly
amusing. Did the Princess intend giving any public entertainments?

'She is our visitor,' Agamemnon put in warningly; while Cassandra smiled
satirically, and said nothing at all.

Clytemnestra hoped she might be able to induce her to stay longer, a
week was such a _very_ short time.

'She has kindly consented to stay on a little longer, my love,' said
Agamemnon--'all her life,' in fact.'

The Queen was charmed to hear it; it was so very nice and kind of her,
particularly as strangers were apt to find the neighbourhood an
unhealthy one.

And as Ægisthus joined them just then, she presented him to the King,
with the remark that he had been the most faithful and devoted of
courtiers during the whole period of the King's absence; to which
Agamemnon replied, with the slightest of scowls, that he was delighted
to make the acquaintance of Mr. Ægisthus; and after that no one seemed
to know exactly what to say for a minute or two.

At last Ægisthus hazarded a supposition that the royal warrior had found
it warm over at Troy.

'It varied, sir,' said the monarch, uncomfortably; 'the climate varied.
I used to get very warm fighting sometimes.'

Ægisthus agreed that a battle must be hot work, and Clytemnestra
suddenly exclaimed that her husband was wearing the very same dear
shabby old uniform he had on when he went away.

'The very same,' said Agamemnon, smiling. 'I wore it all through the
campaign. Your true warrior is no dandy!'

'We were given to understand you were wounded,' remarked Ægisthus.

'Oh,' said the King, 'yes; I was considerably wounded--all over the
chest and arms. But what cared I?'

'Exactly,' said Ægisthus; 'and, curiously enough, the weapons don't seem
to have pierced your coat at all. I observe there are no patches.'

'No,' the King replied; 'so you noticed that, eh? Well, the reason of
that is that those fellows out there have a peculiar sort of way of
cutting and slashing, so as to----'

And he explained this by some elaborate illustrations with his sheathed
sword, until Ægisthus said that he thought he understood how it was
done.

But Clytemnestra suddenly, with a kitten-like girlishness that sat but
ill upon her, pounced playfully upon the weapon. 'I want to see it
drawn,' she cried; 'I want to look upon the keen flashing blade which
has penetrated the inmost recesses of so many of our country's foes. Oh,
it won't come out,' she added, as she attempted to pull it out of the
scabbard; '_do_ make it come out!'

The King tried, but the blade stuck half way, and what was visible of it
seemed thickly coated with rust; but Agamemnon said it was gore, and his
orderly must have forgotten to clean his accoutrements after the fall of
Troy. He added that it was the effect of the sea air.

'Troy really has fallen then?' asked Ægisthus. 'I suppose you stayed to
see the thing out?'

'I did, sir,' answered the monarch proudly; 'I sacked the
most fashionable quarters myself. I expect my booty will be
forwarded--shortly. Didn't you _know_ Troy was taken?' he asked
suspiciously. 'Couldn't you see the beacon I lighted just before I
started?'

The courtier murmured that it was wonderful to find so long and tedious
a journey accomplished in such capital time.

'What do you mean by that? How do you know how long it took?' demanded
Agamemnon.

'Don't you see?' said Clytemnestra. 'Why, you say you had the fire
lighted at Ida when you started; then, of course, they would see it
directly over at Lemnos, and light theirs; and then at Athos, and
then----'

'You are not a time-table, my love,' interrupted the monarch, coldly.
'I won't trouble you for all these details. Come to the point.'

'The point is,' she explained sweetly, 'that we have only just seen the
beacon flame arrive here at Arachnæus, after leaping from height to
height across lake and plain; so that you, my dearest, must have made
the distance with almost equal celerity!'

'I came _with_ the beacon,' said Agamemnon, coughing; 'perhaps that
disposes of the difficulty?'

'Perhaps,' said the Queen; 'I mean _quite_. And now,' she continued,
after a rapid exchange of glances with Ægisthus, 'you will come indoors,
and have a nice cup of coffee and a warm bath before you do anything
else, won't you?'

He almost thought he would, he said; fighting for ten long years without
intermission was a dusty, tiring occupation, and he was accordingly
about to enter, when his eye fell on the awnings and flags and the red
stair carpet, which had been prepared for the betrothal festivities, and
he frowned.

'Now, my dear, this sort of thing is all very well, no doubt; but I
don't care about it. I'm a plain, honest ruler of men, and I hate
flummery and flattery--particularly when it all comes out of _my_
pocket! Why, you've laid down the drugget from the Throne-Room over all
this gravel. Take it up directly; I decline to walk over it. Do you
hear? This wasteful extravagance is positively sinful. Take it up!'

Clytemnestra assured him earnestly that they had had no intention of
annoying him with it--which was literally true; and suggested meekly
that for the King to stay out in the court-yard until all the
decorations were removed might be a tedious and even a ridiculous
proceeding. 'If,' she added, 'he was merely unwilling to spoil the
drugget, he might easily remove his boots, which were extremely
muddy--for a monarch's.'

'Well, well, my dear, be it so,' said the King; 'I did not intend to
chide you. It is only that I have grown so accustomed to the frugal,
hardy life of a camp, that I have imbibed a soldier's contempt for
luxury.'

And, removing his boots, he followed the Queen into the Palace, as she
led the way with a baleful expression upon her dark and inscrutable
face.

As the pair passed up the steps and between the lofty pillars, the
hounds howled from the royal kennels at the back of the Palace, and--a
stranger portent still--a meteor shot suddenly through the growing gloom
and burst in a rain of coloured stars above the house-top, while,
shortly after, a staff fell from above upon the head of one of the
Chorus--and was shivered to fragments!

Ægisthus had strolled away under the colonnade, and Cassandra was left
alone with the Chorus. She stood apart, mystic, moody, and impenetrable,
letting down her flowing back hair.

'You prophesy, do you not?' said the kind old men at length, wishing to
make her feel at home; 'might we beg you to favour us with a
prediction--just a little one?'

Cassandra made excuses at first, as was proper; she had a cold, and was
feeling the effects of the journey. She was really not inspired just
then, she protested, and besides, she had not touched a tripod for ages.

But, upon being pressed, she gave way at last, after declaring with a
little giggle that she was perfectly certain nobody would believe a
single word she said.

'I see before me,' she began, in a weird, sepulchral tone which she
found it impossible to keep up for many sentences, 'a proud and stately
pile--but enter not. See ye yon ghoul among the chimney-pots, yon
amphisboena in the back garden? And the scent of gore pervades it!'

'It is no happy home that is thus described!' the Chorus threw in
profesionally.

'But the Finger of Fate is slowly unwound, and the Hand of Destiny steps
in to pace the marble halls with heavy tramp. And know, old men, that
the Inevitable is not wholly unconnected with the Probable!'

At this even their politeness could not restrain a gesture of
incredulity, but she heeded it not, and continued:

'Who is this that I see next--this regal warrior bounding over the
blazing battlements in brazen panoply?'

('That must be Agamemnon,' cried the Chorus; 'the despatches mentioned
him bounding like that. Wonderful!')

'I see him,' she resumed, 'pale and prostrate--a prey to the pangs
within him, scanning the billows from his storm-tossed ship. Now he has
reached his native city. Hark! how they greet him! And, behold, a
stately matron meets him with a honeyed smile, inviting him to enter. He
yields. And then----'

Here Cassandra stopped, with the remark that that was all--as there were
limits even to the marvellous faculty of second-sight.

The Chorus were not unimpressed, for they had never seen a prediction
and its literal fulfilment in quite such close conjunction before, and
their own attempts always came wrong; but although they were agreed that
the prophecy was charming as far as it went, they began to feel slightly
afraid of the prophetess, and were secretly relieved when Ægisthus
happened to come up shortly afterwards with an offer to show her such
places of interest as Argos boasted.

But they were great authorities upon all points of etiquette and
morality, and they all remarked (when she had gone) that she displayed
an unbecoming readiness in accepting the escort of a courtier who had
not been formally introduced to her. 'That may be the custom in _Troy_,'
they said, wagging their beards, 'but if she means to behave like that
here--_well_!'

And now the last gleam of the sunset had faded, and the stars straggled
out in the pale green sky, whilst the Chorus walked up and down to keep
warm, for the evening was growing chilly.

Suddenly a loud cry broke the silence--a scream as of a strong man in
mortal agony! It struck all of them that the voice was uncommonly like
Agamemnon's, but none liked to say so, and they only observed with a
forced composure that really the cats were becoming quite a nuisance.

The cry came again, louder this time, and more distinct; it seemed to
come from the direction of the royal bath-room. 'Hi, here,
somebody--help! _They've turned on the hot water, and I can't turn it
off again!_'

After this there could be no possible doubt that there was something the
matter far more serious than cats. Agamemnon, the king of men, was
apparently in difficulties, and it was only too probable that this was
Clytemnestra's fell work.

They all ran about and fell over one another in the general flurry and
confusion, and then as they recovered their presence of mind they began
to consult upon the best course to pursue under the circumstances. Some
were of opinion that it would not be a quite unpardonable breach of
court etiquette if they were to rush into the bath-room and pull the
royal sufferer out; others, more cautious, asked for precedents in a
case of such delicacy, and they almost quarrelled, until the wisest of
them all reminded his fellows that, at all events, it was too late to
interfere then, as the monarch must certainly be hard-boiled by that
time--which relieved them from all responsibility in the happiest
manner.

At this point the Queen appeared at the head of the marble steps, down
which she glided cautiously and came towards them, evidently in a
condition of suppressed excitement.

'What a beautiful evening!' said the Chorus in unison, for they
considered it better taste not to appear to have noticed anything at all
unusual.

'Agamemnon is with his ancestors,' she replied in a fierce whisper; 'I
sewed up the sleeves of his bathing-gown and I drugged his coffee, and
then from afar I turned on the hot water. And he is boiled, and it
serves him right, and I'm glad of it--so now! But tell me, ye aged
ones,' she added with one of her quick transitions, 'have I done well?'

Now the Chorus were distinctly disgusted at her want of tact and
reserve, and would have greatly preferred not to be admitted into
confidences of so purely domestic a description, but they were not the
men to flinch from their duty.

'In our opinion, O Queen,' they replied coldly, 'the deed was a hasty
one, and accomplished without sufficient consideration.'

'Ha!' she exclaimed angrily, 'so ye would rate me like a girl! Am I not
your sovereign mistress? Guard, seize these insolents!'

And the superannuated old sentinel left his box and tottered up to seize
as many of them as he could lay hold of at once, telling the remainder
to consider themselves under arrest, which they did directly.

'Summon the populace,' Clytemnestra next commanded, and the Argives left
the fireworks obediently and assembled before the steps.

'Citizens! Argives!' she cried in a loud clear voice, 'I am sure you
will all be very sorry and disappointed to hear that your beloved
sovereign, so lately restored to us' (here she broke down with the
naturalness of a great artist)--'that our beloved sovereign is--by a
most deplorable and unaccountable lack of precaution----'

'_Alive!_' interrupted a voice from behind the Queen, and someone pushed
aside the hangings before the door of the Palace, and began to descend
the steps. It was Agamemnon himself.

Clytemnestra shrieked as she turned slowly, and confronted him in
silence for some moments; the situation was intensely dramatic, and the
Argives, a simple and affectionate people, fully appreciated this, and
never once regretted the fireworks they had abandoned.

The Queen was the first to speak: 'So,' she said, pale and panting,
'you--you've--had your bath?'

'Well--no,' said Agamemnon mildly; 'I happened to observe that someone
had thoughtfully sewn up the armholes of my dressing-gown, and that the
coffee had a particularly nasty smell in it, and so, somehow, I thought
I would rather wait. And then the boiling water came rushing in, and I
saw there had been a little mistake somewhere. So it occurred to me that
I too would dissemble and see what came of it, and I shouted for help. I
think I see it all now.'

And then he took a higher moral tone; his manner was no longer cynical;
he was not angry even--only deeply wounded, and there was something fine
and striking in the stern sadness of his brow.

'So this,' he said, 'was to have been my fate? I was to return, a
war-worn warrior, to the hearth and home from which I had been absent so
long--so long--to be ruthlessly parboiled the very moment after my
arrival, by the partner of my throne! Was this kind--was this wifely,
Clytemnestra?'

'That comes so well from you, does it not?' she retorted.

'Why--why--what do you mean?' he stammered.

'You know very well what I mean,' she said. 'Bah! why play the hypocrite
with me?'

'Is it possible,' he cried, 'that you can suspect me of not having been
near Troy all this time--tell me, Clytemnestra--is this monstrous
thing possible?'

'Quite,' she replied; 'I _know_ you haven't!'

'What--when I tell you that there is a poet, a fellow called Homer or
something, who has got a sort of reputation already by putting the
campaign into verses, rather long, but quite readable (you must order
them); well, there's a lot about _me_ in them.'

'Did Homer _see_ you there?'

'Now that's a most ridiculous question,' he protested, with a feeling
that she was coming round, and that he should convince her directly;
'the poet's blind, Clytemnestra, quite blind. But I will not argue--you
must be content with a warrior's assurance.'

She laughed. 'I'm afraid,' she said, 'that even a warrior's assurance
will find it difficult to account satisfactorily for this--and this--and
these!' And as she spoke, she handed him a variety of articles: a
folding hat, a guide to Corinth, a conversation manual, several unused
tourist tickets, one or two theatre programmes, a green veil, some
supper bills, a correct card for the Olympian races, with the names of
probable starters, and three little jointed wooden dolls.

Agamemnon took them all helplessly; all his virtuous indignation had
evaporated, and he looked very red and foolish as he said with a kind of
nervous laugh, 'You've been looking in my pockets!'

'I have,' she said, 'and now what have you to say for yourself? I don't
believe there is any such place as Troy.'

'There is indeed,' he pleaded; 'I can show it to you on the map!'

'Well,' she said, 'if there is, _you_ never went near it!'

'Send those people away,' he said, 'and I will tell you all!'

And when they had gone, he confessed everything, explaining that he
really had meant to go to Troy at first, and how, as he got nearer, he
found himself less and less inclined for fighting--until at last he
determined to travel about and see life instead, and, as he expressed
it, 'pick up a little character.'

'Well,' said Clytemnestra, 'I will have no little characters in _my_
palace, Agamemnon.'

But he protested that she had not understood him. 'And if I have erred,
my love,' he suggested humbly, 'excuse me, but I cannot help thinking
that the means devised for my correction were unnecessarily severe!'

'They were nothing of the sort,' she said; 'you deserved it all--and
worse!'

Upon this Agamemnon made haste to assure her that she had shown a very
proper spirit, and he respected her the more for it. 'And now,' he put
it to her, 'why not let bygones _be_ bygones?' But Clytemnestra's reply
was that she would be quite willing to permit this when they _were_
bygones, which, at present, she added, they were very far from being.

The King was in despair, until beneficent nature came to his assistance;
a faint chirrup was heard from a neighbouring bush, a circumstance which
he turned to admirable account.

'You hear it?' he asked tenderly, 'the dulcet strain? Know ye the note?
Ah, Clytemnestra, 'tis the owl--the blithe and tuneful owl! Owls sang on
our bridal night--can you hear their melody now and be unmoved? No, I
did but wrong ye ... a tear trembles on that eyelash, a smile flickers
upon that lip! I am pardoned. Clytemnestra--wife, embrace me ... we both
have much to forgive!'

This speech (which was not unlike some he had heard in thrilling dramas
at the 'Hæmabronteion,' Corinth, where the prophetess Cassandra had been
greatly admired in her impersonations of persecuted and distracted
heroines) touched Clytemnestra's heart, in which, hard as it was, there
was a strain of sentiment--and she fell sobbing into her husband's arms.

And so all was forgotten and forgiven in the most satisfactory manner,
the Chorus (who had been considering themselves arrested until the
intellectual strain had proved almost too much for them) were released,
while it was found on inquiry that both Ægisthus and Cassandra were
missing, and no trace of either of them was ever found again; but it
was generally understood that, with a delicate unselfishness, they had
been unwilling to remain where their presence would lead to inevitable
complications.

And from that night--until the fatal day, some six short weeks
afterwards, when each, by an unfortunate oversight, partook of a mixture
which had been carefully prepared for the other--there was not a happier
royal couple in all Argos than Clytemnestra and Agamemnon.

_THE WRAITH OF BARNJUM._[1]

[Illustration: I]

I frankly admit, whatever may be the consequences of doing so, that I
was not fond of Barnjum; in fact, I detested him. Everything that fellow
said and did jarred upon me to an absolutely indescribable extent,
although I did not discover for some time that he regarded me with a
strange and unreasonable aversion.

We were so essentially unlike in almost every particular--I, with my
innate refinement and high culture, my over-fastidious exclusiveness in
the choice of associates; and he, a big, red, coarse brute, with neither
sweetness nor light, who knew himself a Philistine, and seemed to like
it--we were so unlike, that I often asked him, with a genuine desire for
information, _what_ had I in common with him?

[Footnote 1: Reprinted from _Temple Bar_ for March 1879, by permission
of the Proprietors.]

And yet it will scarcely be believed, perhaps, that with such good
reasons for keeping apart, we were continually seeking one another's
company with a zest that knew no satiety. The only explanation I can
offer for such a phenomenon is, that our mutual antipathy had become so
much a part of ourselves, that we could not let it perish for lack of
nourishment.

Perhaps we were not conscious of this at the time, and when we agreed to
go on a walking tour together in North Wales, I think it was chiefly
because we knew that we could devise no surer means of annoying one
another; but, however that may be, in an ill-starred day for my own
peace of mind, we started upon a journey from which but one of us was
fated to return.

I pass by the painful experiences of the first few days of that unhappy
tour. I will say nothing of Barnjum's grovelling animalism, of his
consummate selfishness, his more than bucolic indifference to the charms
of Nature, nor even of the mean and sordid way in which he contrived to
let me in for railway tickets and hotel bills.

I wish to tell my melancholy story with perfect impartiality, and I am
sure that I am not reduced to exciting any prejudice to secure the
sympathies of all readers.

I shall pass, then, to the memorable day when my disgust, so long pent
up, so imperfectly concealed, culminated in one grand outburst of a not
ignoble indignation, to the hour when I summoned up moral courage to
sever the bonds which linked us so unequally.

I remember it so well, that brilliant morning in June when we left the
Temperance Hotel, Doldwyddlm, and scaled in sulky silence the craggy
heights of Cader Idris, which, I presume, still overhang that
picturesque village, while, as we ascended, an ever-changing and
ever-improving panorama unrolled itself before my delighted eyes.

The air up there was keen and bracing, and I recollect that I could not
repress an æsthetic shudder at the crude and primitive tone which
Barnjum's nose had assumed under atmospheric influences. I mentioned
this (for we still maintained the outward forms of friendship), when he
retorted, with the brutal personality which formed so strong an
ingredient of his character, that if I could only see myself in that
suit of mine, and that hat (referring to the dress I was then wearing),
I should feel the propriety of letting his nose alone. To which I
replied, with a sarcasm that I feel now was a little too crushing, that
I had every intention of doing so, as it was quite painful enough to
merely contemplate such a spectacle; and he, evidently meaning to be
offensive, remarked, that no one could help his nose getting red, but
that any man in my position could at least _dress_ like a gentleman I
took no notice of this insult; a Bunting (I don't think I mentioned
before that my name is Philibert Bunting)--a Bunting can afford to pass
such insinuations by; indeed, I find it actually cheaper to do so, and I
flattered myself that my dress was distinguished by a sort of studied
looseness, that would appeal at once to a cultivated and artistic eye,
though of course Barnjum's hard and shallow organs could not be expected
to appreciate it.

I overlooked it, then, and presently we found ourselves skirting the
edge of a huge chasm, whose steep sides sloped sheer down into the
slate-blue waters of the lake below.

How can I hope to give an idea of the magnificent view which met our
eyes as we stood there--a view of which, as far as I am aware, no
description has ever yet been attempted?

To our right towered the Peaks of Dolgelly, with their saw-like outline
cutting the blue sky with a faint grating sound, while the shreds of
white cloud lay below in drifts. At our feet were the sun-lit waters of
the lake, upon which danced a fleet of brown-sailed herring-boats;
beyond was the plain of Capel Curig, and there, over on the left,
sparkled the falls of Y-Dydd.

As I took all this in I felt a longing to say something worthy of the
occasion. Being possessed of a considerable fund of carefully-dried and
selected humour, I frequently amuse myself by a species of intellectual
exercise, which consists in so framing a remark that a word or more
therein may bear two entirely opposite constructions; and some of the
quaint names of the vicinity seemed to me just then admirably adapted
for this purpose.

I was about to gauge my dull-witted companion's capacity by some such
test, when he forestalled me.

'You ought to live up here, Bunting,' said he; 'you were made for this
identical old mountain.'

I was not displeased, for, Londoner as I am, I have the nerve and
steadiness of a practised mountaineer.

'Perhaps I was,' I said good-humouredly; 'but how did _you_ find it
out?'

'I'll tell you,' he replied, with one of his odious grins. 'This is
Cader Idris, ain't it? well, and you're a _cad awry dressed_, ain't you?
Cader Idrissed, see?' (he was dastard enough to explain) 'That's how _I_
get at it!'

He must have been laboriously leading up to that for the last ten
minutes!

I solemnly declare that it was not the personal outrage that roused me;
I simply felt that a paltry verbal quibble of that description, emitted
amidst such scenery and at that altitude, required a protest in the name
of indignant Nature, and I protested accordingly, although with an
impetuosity which I afterwards regretted, and of which I cannot even now
entirely approve.

He happened to be standing on the brink of an abyss, and had just turned
his back upon me, as, with a vigorous thrust of my right foot, I
launched him into the blue æther, with the chuckle at his unhallowed
jest still hovering upon his lips.

I am aware that by such an act I took a liberty which, under ordinary
circumstances, even the licence of a life-long friendship would scarcely
have justified; but I thought it only due to myself to let him see
plainly that I desired our acquaintanceship to cease from that instant,
and Barnjum was the kind of man upon whom a more delicate hint would
have been distinctly thrown away.

I watched his progress with some interest as he rebounded from point to
point during his descent. I waited--punctiliously, perhaps, until the
echoes he had aroused had died away on the breeze, and then, slowly and
thoughtfully, I retraced my steps, and left a spot which was already
becoming associated for me with memories the reverse of pleasurable.

I took the next up-train, and before I reached town had succeeded in
dismissing the incident from my mind, or if I thought of it at all, it