Page:Life's little ironies (1894).pdf/82

stitution—a sight more lawful than your mother was till some time after you were born !”

Joshua had for many years before heard whispers that his father had cajoled his mother in their early acquaintance, and had made somewhat tardy amends; but never from his father’s lips till now. It was the last stroke, and he could not bear it. He sank back against the hedge. “It is over!” he said, “He ruins us all!”

The millwright moved on, waving his stick triumphantly, and the two brothers stood still They could see his drab figure stalking along the path, and over his head the lighte from the conservatory of Narrobourne House, inside which Albert Fellmer might possibly be sitting with Rosa at that moment, holding her hand, and asking her to share his home with him,

The staggering whitey- brown form, advancing to pat a biot on all this, had been diminishing in the shade ; and now suddenly disappeared beside a wear. There waa the noise of a flounce in the water,

“He has fallen in !” said Cornelius, starting forward to run for the place at which his father had vanished.

Joshua, awaking from the stupefied reverie into which he had sunk, rushed to the other's side before he had taken ten steps. “Stop, stop, what are you thinking of ?” he whispered, hoarsely, grasping Cornelius’s arm.

"Pulling him out!”

“Yes, yes—so amI. But—wait a moment-—"

"But, Joshua!”

“Her life and happiness, you know— Cornelius—and your reputation and mine—and our chance of riaing together, all three—”

He clutched his brother’s arm to the bone; and as they atood breathless the splashing and floundering in