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BALONG ISLAND CITY, N. Y.

THE VIVIAN ROMANCE.

V

CHAPTER I.

NUMBER ONE.

"L'Hymen, dit-on, craint les petits cousins."

"ALENTINE VIVIAN was a noticeable man-as Wordsworth said of Coleridgeyet the first thing one noticed about him was his dress. He was sitting, when I desire to introduce him to the reader, in a peculiarly easy lounging-chair, placed in a wide window overlooking a superb sweep of scenery whose beauty was intensified by a summer sunset. Long slopes of perfect lawn were bounded by a ha-ha; and there was a noble park beyond, studded with great oak-trees, populous with deer; and a river, one of England's many Avons, bounded the view. Broadoak Avon is a great estate, as dwellers in the midland counties know full well; and t' Squire of Broadoak Avon well deserves his pricely heritage. But I have not yet come to the Squire.

His

Now, as to Valentine Vivian's dress. coat was of violet velvet; his waistcoat of a brocaded silk, with gold buttons, and in each button a diamond; his trowsers of a lavender cloth. Round his neck he wore a cravat of wondrous lace, and ruffles of the same hid the smallest and whitest hand in the world. Then how perfect a Wellington boot of polished leather concealed his Lilliputian foot! Vivian was altogether Lilliputian. Never, probably, did so ambitious and energetic a spirit find so small a human habitation.

Vivian had long, bright yellow hair, curling over his shoulders, with a silken Vandyck beard to match, and the softest of golden mustaches. His eyes were large, as blue as steel, as keen as a Toledo rapier. You could not see his upper lip for the golden growth above it; but it was of perfect form, like Apollo's bow; while the lower lip, ruddy and voluptuous, made one think of Sir John Suckling.

Valentine Vivian had a companion--a huge mastiff, twice his own weight at least, who bore the name of Thor. Vivian, as the sunset grew deeper in the west, and tinged with saffron and purple the winding Avon, was lazily smoking a cigarette, and glancing at a volume of Alfred de Musset's poems. I think the book was open at one of the Madrid lyrics, wherein was melodious

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ly passionate mention of a certain Andalusian Marquise.

Presently the door opened, and lady Eva Redfern entered.

Lady Eva, sole daughter of the Marquis of Alvescott, and wife of Rupert Redfern, of Broadoak Avon, was a perfect creature of the Artemis type, lithe and lissom, fluent and flexile. Tall and swift and slender, there was no touch of Brobdingnag in her build; she was the very reflex of the inviolate Huntress. Brown eyes had she, and brown hair of divine softness, and a bust of voluptuous curve, and long, light, delicate hands, with a rosy tinge in the flesh of them.

She was twenty-five, Lady Eva. Rupert Redfern, the Squire, was about forty-five. I suppose I must describe the Squire.

He was a man about six feet three inches high, with a portentous stoop in gigantic shoulders. He was huge every way. Mentally or physically, there was nothing babyish about Rupert Redfern. He had taken a double first at Oxford, rather easily. He had pulled stroke in the University boat, and pulled such a stroke that the University did not soon forget it. And now he managed his great estates in a massive magnificent fashion, making the farmers his friends, and the farm-laborers his abject worshippers. He was generous, was the Squire. He would not have misery among his dependents. And, giant though he was, being as tender as a woman, he was quite at home in the cottages of the poor.

"Love had he found in huts where poor men lie."

"Tis not a bad place to find love, if, like Squire Redfern, you set about it in the right way.

Valentine Vivian was ten years older than his beautiful cousin, Eva, though he certainly did not appear so. The Marquis of Alvescott and Sir Alured Vivian married sisters; and, as Lady Vivian died early, and the baronet did not want to be bored by his boy, Valentine was quite at home at Alvescott Manor. Well, cousinship is very nice. When Eva was fifteen, she was a prodigious little romp. She was the perfect fulfillment of Robert Brough's Neighbor Nelly.

"She is tall, and growing taller,
She is vigorous of limb;
You should see her playing cricket
With her little brother Jim."

But, as there was no brother Jim in her case, | He had fought a duel in the Bois de Boulogne,. thereby earning a half-column of Whitehurst. He had written & couple of volumes of verse— one at Venice, the other at Rome. The Venetian brochure was a witty wicked story in octave rhyme-the rhyme of Pulci and Byron: while at Rome he had gone in for passionate lyrics and lurid ironies. Both books were good enough as works of art-were the product, indeed, of a volatile, versatile, vivacious mind; and were deservedly maltreated by the sensible and sagacious critics of London. Those critics, as we all have excellent reason for knowing, are grave and serious men, who sternly disapprove of immoralities and levities. They object (and who shall gainsay them?) to the whimsical fantasies of an effervescent mind. This is a world for statistics and didactics; a world in which he is a god who can make money, and he is a demi-god who can write a money article. And it is clear

she was wont to victimize her cousin, Valentine. The Marquis was a devotee of the turf; the Marchioness was a confirmed invalid; and Lady Eva's governess, Miss Lister, was her most obedient slave. The said governess, when first she came to Alvescott, had endeavored to enforce regularity and propriety; but nothing would have effected this short of actual corporal punishment; and Lady Eva could much more easily have inflicted this on the governess than the governess on her. So Miss Lister prudently accepted the situation, taught her pupil when her pupil was inclined to learn, and obeyed orders excellently. Lady Eva, however, was not idle. There were times when she chose to learn, and things which she liked to learn; and, as she had free access to her father's splendid library, she got a fair sort of irregular education.

such a world to waste their own and other people's money, to draw caricatures and write exciting lyrics.

But "dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale ?" And because thou art solemn and stupid, pre

henceforth be no effervescence of Champagne ? I think otherwise. I have an enormous reverence for the tribe of statisticians; but I confess, when Vivian's thin volume of amorous octaves came home from Venice, I put aside a most interesting article by Mr. Newmarch, and read it right through before I went to bed. I am half ashamed to acknowledge such frivolity.

Eva at fifteen or sixteen was a romp; at sev-ly wicked to tolerate persons who come into enteen or eighteen she had developed into a flirt. People who remembered her the most reckless of young hoydens, were amazed at her sudden acquirement of dignity and stateliness. Putting her into long dresses seemed immediately to have made a woman of her. There was only one person who would not accept the change-ferring small-beer to all other liquids, shall there her cousin, Valentine. He laughed at her airs and graces, and insisted on regarding her as just the mere child she was a year or two previously. It was very provoking, but Valentine was unmanageable. He would not resign any privilege of cousinship; he would treat her as if she were a little girl. He never condescended to flirt with her, and certainly never made love to her. This last he might have done with impunity, perhaps with success, for the Marchioness would have been delighted to see the cousins married; while the Marquis thought a good deal more about a bay filly that he had named after his daughter, than about the young lady herself. But Valentine was not a marrying man. He liked to be on easy terms with his cousin, but had not the remotest idea of making serious love to her. He teased her abominably.

By-and-by the time came for Lady Eva to be a bride. She had plenty of wooers, be sure; and when she chose Squire Redfern from among them, a good many of the insolent young sprigs of fashion who had followed her professed to be perfectly shocked. The Squire was forty, at least-double her age; he was immensely rich, which showed how mercenary she was. He was a man who liked to live on his estates and look after his people; so she vanished from society, and went to live a quiet life down at Broadoak Avon.

Five years had passed since their marriage. There were no children. Vivian, during that period, had seen but little of his cousin : he had been abroad for long intervals, he said; at any rate, he was very seldom seen in England, but had been encountered both in Paris and Baden. He had, however, been heard of in England.

This was the sort of thing:

"In a right Protestant mood, extremely bitter,

I watched the purple proud procession swerving Through the white street, and marked the priestly glitter,

And then I saw one girl, with bosom curving Voluptuously, and graceful figure, fitter

For Pagan days than ours. Had Edward Irving Such sensuous syllogism to urge, I hope

He very quickly would convert the Pope."

Sheer shallow nonsense this, as we all know. After reading a couple of hundred such stanzas, imagine the gusto wherewith I returned to Newmarch!

Returning to England, Vivian found himself made very welcome by his cousin's husband. He came to Broadoak for a week, and staid for months. The Squire, in fact, would not let him go away. So, although he had rooms in town, he was seldom to be met with except just in the height of the season. He wasted his time in rhyming and singing (he had a divine tenor voice), sketching and smoking; but, by way of letting off a little superfluous steam, he was in the habit of taking long lonely rides every day. A perfect horseman, and the lightest of light weights, he enjoyed long hours in the saddle more than any thing else in the world.

"Lazy as usual, Val," said his cousin, when

she entered. me?

"Won't you come and walk with | been present. I am going to visit some old women." "Poor child! I hope somebody will come and visit you when you are an old woman. Where's the Squire ?"

"He went over to Riverdale, to attend a meeting of magistrates. There have been a series of burglaries lately, and people are getting quite frightened."

"To be sure, I remember. I wish they'd try this place. It would be a nice break in one's ennui."

"Well, see if you can get rid of a little of your ennui by walking with me to the village. It will do you good."

"Will it? I don't know. However, I'll come if I may smoke. I won't carry tracts and beef-tea, please to observe. You are not going very far, of course; it is getting too late." "I have just one or two old folks that I want to see before dinner. There is plenty of time. Rupert won't be back till the last moment, I expect."

So the cousins started for the village, on whose outskirts Lady Eva had a couple of her pet pensioners to relieve. They arrived at a comfortable red-brick cottage in a pleasant garden. Just across the road there was a stile entering a path through Squire Redfern's woodsbeautiful beech-woods, populous with pheasants. On this stile Vivian sat and smoked his cigarctte, while Lady Eva paid her philogynic visit.

It

As he sat there, indolent of mood, a shrill sharp whistle sounded through the copse. was a whistle unique of its kind-not the sort of music which bucolic boys utter with unskilled lips. It caused Vivian to spring over the stile and look curiously into the depths of the wood. He perceived advancing along one of the paths a slight, agile man, in a blue dress with brass buttons, bearing all the marks of able seamanship. There was instant recognition.

"Well, Mark, what is it?" he asked. "You are badly wanted, sir. The men are making fools of themselves. Could you come to-night ?".

Riverdale and the whole county were consternated. For weeks past there had been the most daring burglaries and highway robberies. A skillful gang were at work, evidently. Plate and jewelry had been stolen from half a dozen great houses. There was not a farmer in the county who dared ride home alone from market. Mr. Severne, the chief constable of Riverdale, who had never been baffled before, was utterly baffled now.

"I never heard of so perfect an organization," said the Squire. "They seem to know exactly when and exactly where to make their burglarious attacks. They ransacked the platechest at Chilham House, going straight in and straight out, as if the butler had shown them the way. They stopped poor Henderson, the lawyer, on the loneliest part of his road home, with two hundred sovereigns in gold in his valise. I don't believe the old boy had had so much gold about him for years. They are doing the thing so cleverly that the police are perfectly puzzled and perplexed."

"I sometimes think it would be rather fun to be a detective," said Vivian.

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"We have a wonderfully clever fellow in Severne," said the Squire. "He's a gentleman, and a Cambridge man, and seems to have taken to the business from mere liking. He'll catch these fellows in time, I feel certain." "But

"Let us hope so," replied Valentine.

I am weary of these thieves. Let us have some coffee and music. If the scoundrels would attack us here, I should feel disposed to forgive them."

So there followed one of the pleasant indolent evenings which are the delight of English country life. Lady Eva gave her husband and cousin their coffee; and then there was an interval of Mendelssohn and Rossini, Vivian's glorious tenor doing wondrous work; and then they sat a while, chatting over the great excitement of the day-the mysterious systematic robberies.

"Your stories are alarming," said Vivian to the Squire, drinking his final draught of iced seltzer. "I shall load my revolver to-night." Which indeed he did. Arriving in his cham"Very well, indeed. I will tell them you ber, he took from its case a very elegant little are coming."

"Will two o'clock do ?" he asked.

Although this brisk sailor vanished as rapidly as he appeared, Lady Eva Redfern noticed him as she left the cottage. She asked her cousin what he was.

"Only a beggar," he replied. "There are always plenty of them on the road."

"I hope he wasn't a poacher," she said. "Rupert detests poachers."

"He was dressed like a sailor," said Vivian. "I believe your swell poachers prefer to dress like dignitaries of the Church."

They walked home together through the summer twilight. The Squire's mail phaeton had just reached the door as they arrived. When they sat down to dinner, Mr. Redfern was full of the magistrates' conference at which he had

six-shooter and charged it carefully. Then he quietly divested himself of the elegant attire in which we have seen him, and put on a businesslike riding-dress-top-boots, buckskin breeches, and a close-fitting coat. Then he sat a while,

smoking a big regalia, and meditating.

By-and-by, having finished, his cigar, he rose from his lounging-chair, took a big gulp of brandy-and-water, and descended stealthily through the corridors, which were dim and silent. He had keys for all doors that he desired to pass. He made his way to the stables, and reached a stall wherein stood a coal-black mare, nearly thorough-bred. She whinnied at his approach. He saddled her, led her out, locked the stable door behind him, and rode away rapidly.

There was a bright full moon.

Vivian rode for the most part across open moorland soft to the mare's tread, fragrant to the rider's nostril. About three hours' travel brought him to a large town, a quaint old-fashioned town when you reached the centre of it. He rode through back streets till he came to a narrow alley, at whose entrance a man was waiting. Vivian dismount

fragments of old ballads, the work of forgotten singers in distant, simple days. "Silly sooth" are such rhymes as these, no doubt:

"Lady Mary Ann was a flower in the dew,

Sweet was its smell and bonny was its hue,
And the longer it blossomed the sweeter it grew,
For the lily in the bud will be bonny yet."

ed, left his horse in this man's care without say-But when you hear them wedded to simple meling a word, and walked down the alley.

Half-way down a door opened the moment he reached it. He entered, and was in the small parlor, apparently, of a public-house. It was a room about fifteen feet square, and there were in it about a dozen of the most truculent ruffians you ever saw, smoking the most villainous tobacco you ever smelt.

odies, and sung by a sweet soft voice under a mulberry-tree, they have a magic of their own. So at least thought John Grainger, a distant relation of Farmer Ashow's, who was living with him to learn the art and mystery of farming. John was only a few months older than Mary, and so of course was as bashful as possible in her presence. He was a stalwart fellow from

As Vivian entered the room every man rose Westmoreland, as strong as a bull and a great to receive him.

CHAPTER II.

NUMBER TWO.

"In town a maid da zee muore life,
An' I don't underriate her,
But ten to oone the sprackest wife
'S a farmer's woldest daeter."

HALF a mile from Squire Redfern's park gates, on a beautiful reach of the Avon, is Broadoak Mill Farm. It is as quaint a place as you would wish to see. The farm-house and the mill, both ancient timbered buildings of red brick, are on opposite sides of the river, which is crossed by a narrow wooden bridge. Old Ralph Ashow is farmer and miller also a warm man, no doubt, with an account at Riverdale Bank, and, it is commonly believed, a hoard of guineas in his strong-box at home. But his choicest possession, in his own opinion and in that of the young farmers of the vicinage, is his daughter Mary, a charming little coquette of eighteen.

deal uglier. His hideous, honest face, with eyes hidden under heavy eyebrows, and a nose that turned up as if there were Irish blood in him, and a mouth some sizes too large, made one think of an ogre. He had the best temper and appetite and the roughest head of hair in the world. He was a studious youth, with a great liking for mathematics, botany, and chemistry. When he came of age he would have money enough to take a good-sized farm; and his friends thought he would be likely to succeed in Australia. He had been disposed to agree with them, before he came to live at Broad-oak Mill Farm, and to see Mary Ashow every day.

It was afternoon, and at four o'clock precisely the farmer and John Grainger would come to tea. Mary saw the time by the turret clock over the mill-door, and sprang from her seat, and went away singing to make the necessary preparations. A pleasant summer parlor opened on the garden, and here the meal was set: bright silver and curious old china appeared on the table; the tea was fragrant; the butter and cream delicious; the virgin honey full of floral flavor. The young mistress of the farm did her ministrations deftly, fascinating poor John Grainger to such an extent that he was always making some absurd mistake-swallowing his tea at its hottest, or committing some other awkwardness. The farmer was a macilent man, who looked as if he had been in a good many storms, and had only grown the harder for the encounter. People were wont to say that old Ashow was as tough as ash. He certainly looked so.

She is sitting now under the great mulberrytree in the old-fashioned garden, where bloom the dear old homely flowers which modern horticulturists despise. Pigeons are flying, a many-colored flock, through the sunlit air, and there is a drowsy hum of bees from the long row of straw hives beneath the southern wall. Half in shadow and half in shine, Mary Ashow is knitting under the mulberry-tree-a petite figure, yet plump and rounded, with blond hair "They've not caught these house-breakers and watchet eyes, and a rosy, laughing face. yet, I'm told," he remarked to his daughter. She wears a light print dress, but her white"We shall have them here some night, Mary. arms are bare; her sole ornament is a maiden- Mind you lock yourself up carefully." blush rose at her bosom. I wish I could sketch her under that grand old tree, with eyes that try to look demure under their long lashes, and lips that will betray those eyes by pouting into an incipient laugh. Mary was as gay as a bird, and as busy as a bee-a model farmer's daughter. Every now and then she would burst into a snatch of song-not echoes of opera or quasi-comic chanson from the casino, but fanciful |

"I'm not worth the trouble of carrying away," she said. "They're more likely to look for your money, father.”

"I don't think they'll find very much,” replied the old gentleman. "I should not like them to get at the silver, though; it has been so long in the family."

"It is always carefully locked up," said Mary. "Aye, but they're so cunning. They got at

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