Bessie's Fortune

"Yes," Bessie answered, falteringly, not quite understanding him, or knowing whether she should like the brother and sister arrangement as well as the cousin.

Then they talked together of what Bessie had seen in the park, and she told him all Jack Trevellian had said, and how kind he was, and how much she liked him, until Neil felt horribly jealous of his cousin, and wished he had staid in Ireland while Bessie was in London.

"Oh, it must be so fine to drive in a handsome carriage with the crowd. I wish I could try it. Does it cost so very much?" she asked, and Neil detested himself because he did not at once offer to take her and her father for the coveted drive.

"Could he do it?" he asked himself many times, deciding finally that he could not face his fashionable friends, and, more than all, his mother and Blanche, with these country cousins--Archie, in his threadbare coat, and Bessie, in her linen gown, with the big puffs at the top of the sleeves.

Had she been less beautiful he might venture it, but everybody would look at that face and turn to look again, and wonder who she was, and question him about her.

No, he couldn't do it, and so he went away at last, deciding to take the underground road to St. James Park, and meeting, as he was entering the station, Jack Trevellian coming out.

"Hallo, Hallo!" was said by each to the other, while both looked a little conscious, and Neil burst out, impulsively, "I say, Jack, what brings you over here?"

"The same which brought you, I dare say," Jack replied. "I am going to call upon your cousin."

"The deuce you are! I thought so," Neil answered, in a tone of voice indicative of anything but pleasure.

"Have you any objections?" Jack asked, and Neil replied: "No--yes. Jack. You are as good--yes, better than most of the fellows in our set, but--" He hesitated, and Jack rejoined: "But what? Go on."

"By Jove, I will speak out!" Neil continued, going close to his cousin. "You are a man of the world, accustomed to all sorts of girls--girls who laugh and flirt and let you make soft speeches to them and never think of you again because they know you mean nothing. But Bessie is not that kind; she is innocent and pure as a baby, and believes all you say, and--and--by George, Jack, if you harm a hair of her head I'll beat you into a pomace! You understand?"

"Yes, I rather think I do," Jack answered, with a smile; "and, Neil, you are more of a man than I supposed; upon my soul you are; but never fear, I will not flirt with Bessie, I will not make love to her, unless--I fall in love myself, in which case I cannot promise; but don't distress yourself. The Welsh rose is as safe with me as with you. Good-morning!" and so saying, he walked off in the direction of Abingdon road, while Neil rather unwillingly bought his ticket and went through the narrow way and down the stairs to wait for the incoming train.