Shirley

always in turmoil, get quite belligerent. Really there's an ardour excited by the thoughts of danger that makes my heart pant. When Mrs. Sykes is afraid of the house being attacked and broke open – as she is every night – I get quite excited. I couldn't describe to you, sir, my feelings: really, if anybody was to come – thieves or anything – I believe I should enjoy it, such is my spirit.«
    The hardest of laughs, though brief and low, and by no means insulting, was the response of the Rector. Moore would have pressed upon the heroic mill-owner a third tumbler, but the clergyman, who never transgressed, nor would suffer others in his presence to transgress the bounds of decorum, checked him.
    »Enough is as good as a feast, is it not, Mr. Sykes?« he said, and Mr. Sykes assented; and then sat and watched Joe Scott remove the bottle at a sign from Helstone, with a self-satisfied simper on his lips, and a regretful glisten in his eye. Moore looked as if he should have liked to fool him to the top of his bent. What would a certain young kinswoman of his have said, could he have seen her dear, good, great Robert – her Coriolanus – just now? Would she have acknowledged in that mischievous sardonic visage the same face to which she had looked up with such love, which had bent over her with such gentleness last night? Was that the man who had spent so quiet an evening with his sister and his cousin – so suave to one, so tender to the other – reading Shakspeare and listening to Chénier?
    Yes, it was the same man, only seen on a different side; a side Caroline had not yet fairly beheld, though perhaps she had enough sagacity faintly to suspect its existence. Well, Caroline had, doubtless, her defective side too: she was human, she must then have been very imperfect, and had she seen Moore on his very worst side, she would probably have said this to herself and excused him. Love can excuse anything except Meanness; but Meanness kills Love, cripples even Natural Affection: without Esteem, True Love cannot exist. Moore with all his faults might be esteemed; for he had no moral scrofula in his mind, no hopeless polluting taint, such, for instance, as that of falsehood; neither was he the slave of his appetites; the active life to which he had been born and bred had given him something else to do than to join the futile chase of the pleasure-hunter: he was a man undegraded, the disciple of Reason,
not
the votary of Sense. The same might be said of old Helstone: neither of these two would look, think, or speak a lie; for neither of them had the wretched black bottle, which had just been put away, any charms; both might boast a valid claim to the proud title of »lord of the creation,« for no animal vice was lord of them: they looked and were superior beings to poor Sykes.
    A sort of gathering and trampling sound was heard in the yard, and then a pause. Moore walked to the window, Helstone followed; both stood on one side, the tall junior behind the under-sized senior, looking forth carefully, so that they might not be visible from without, their sole comment on what they saw was a cynical smile flashed into each other's stern eyes.
    A flourishing oratorical cough was now heard, followed by the interjection, »Whisht!« designed, as it seemed, to still the hum of several voices. Moore opened his casement an inch or two to admit sound more freely.
    »Joseph Scott,« began a snuffling voice – Scott was standing sentinel at the counting-house door – »might we inquire if your master be within, and is to be spoken to?«
    »He's within, ay!« said Joe, nonchalantly.
    »Would you, then, if
you
please (emphasis on ›you‹), have the goodness to tell
him
that twelve gentlemen wants to see him.«
    »He'd happen ax what for,« suggested Joe. »I mught as weel tell him that at t'same time.«
    »For a purpose,« was the answer. Joe entered.
    »Please, sir, there's twelve gentlemen wants to see ye ›for a purpose.‹«
    »Good, Joe; I'm their man. Sugden, come when I whistle.«
    Moore went out, chuckling drily. He advanced into the yard, one hand in his pocket, the other in his waistcoat, his cap brim over his eyes, shading in some measure their deep dancing ray of scorn. Twelve men waited in the yard, some in their shirt-sleeves, some in blue aprons: two figured conspicuously in the van of the party. One, a little dapper strutting man, with a turned-up nose; the other, a broad-shouldered fellow, distinguished no less by