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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

get

How many times the word 'get' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

days

How many times the word 'days' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

bless

How many times the word 'bless' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

turned

How many times the word 'turned' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

usual

How many times the word 'usual' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

overgrown

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

ground

How many times the word 'ground' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

happiness

How many times the word 'happiness' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

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united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

making

How many times the word 'making' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

found

How many times the word 'found' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

landscape

How many times the word 'landscape' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

those

How many times the word 'those' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

soul

How many times the word 'soul' appears in the text?

united in Let us take the road. I am afraid there would have been a subtle, stealing gratification in her mind if she had known how entirely this saucy, defiant Stephen was occupied with her; how he was passing rapidly from a determination to treat her with ostentatious indifference to an irritating desire for some sign of inclination from her, some interchange of subdued word or look with her. It was not long before he found an opportunity, when they had passed to the music of The Tempest. Maggie, feeling the need of a footstool, was walking across the room to get one, when Stephen, who was not singing just then, and was conscious of all her movements, guessed her want, and flew to anticipate her, lifting the footstool with an entreating look at her, which made it impossible not to return a glance of gratitude. And then, to have the footstool placed carefully by a too self-confident personage, not _any_ self-confident personage, but one in particular, who suddenly looks humble and anxious, and lingers, bending still, to ask if there is not some draught in that position between the window and the fireplace, and if he may not be allowed to move the work-table for her, these things will summon a little of the too ready, traitorous tenderness into a woman s eyes, compelled as she is in her girlish time to learn her life-lessons in very trivial language. And to Maggie such things had not been everyday incidents, but were a new element in her life, and found her keen appetite for homage quite fresh. That tone of gentle solicitude obliged her to look at the face that was bent toward her, and to say, No, thank you ; and nothing could prevent that mutual glance from being delicious to both, as it had been the evening before. It was but an ordinary act of politeness in Stephen; it had hardly taken two minutes; and Lucy, who was singing, scarcely noticed it. But to Philip s mind, filled already with a vague anxiety that was likely to find a definite ground for itself in any trivial incident, this sudden eagerness in Stephen, and the change in Maggie s face, which was plainly reflecting a beam from his, seemed so strong a contrast with the previous overwrought signs of indifference, as to be charged with painful meaning. Stephen s voice, pouring in again, jarred upon his nervous susceptibility as if it had been the clang of sheet-iron, and he felt inclined to make the piano shriek in utter discord. He had really seen no communicable ground for suspecting any ususual feeling between Stephen and Maggie; his own reason told him so, and he wanted to go home at once that he might reflect coolly on these false images, till he had convinced himself of their nullity. But then, again, he wanted to stay as long as Stephen stayed, always to be present when Stephen was present with Maggie. It seemed to poor Philip so natural, nay, inevitable, that any man who was near Maggie should fall in love with her! There was no promise of happiness for her if she were beguiled into loving Stephen Guest; and this thought emboldened Philip to view his own love for her in the light of a less unequal offering. He was beginning to play very falsely under this deafening inward tumult, and Lucy was looking at him in astonishment, when Mrs Tulliver s entrance to summon them to lunch came as an excuse for abruptly breaking off the music. Ah, Mr Philip! said Mr Deane, when they entered the dining-room, I ve not seen you for a long while. Your father s not at home, I think, is he? I went after him to the office the other day, and they said he was out of town. He s been to Mudport on business for several days, said Philip; but he s come back now. As fond of his farming hobby as ever, eh? I believe so, said Philip, rather wondering at this sudden interest in his father s pursuits. Ah! said Mr Deane, he s got some land in his own hands on this side the river as well as the other, I think? Yes, he has. Ah! continued Mr Deane, as he dispensed the pigeonpie, he must find farming a heavy item, an expensive hobby. I never had a hobby myself, never would give in to that. And the worst of all hobbies are those that people think they can get money at. They shoot their money down like corn out of a sack then. Lucy felt a little nervous under her father s apparently gratuitous criticism of Mr Wakem s expenditure. But it ceased there, and Mr Deane became unusually silent and meditative during his luncheon. Lucy, accustomed to watch all indications in her father, and having reasons, which had recently become strong, for an extra interest in what referred to the Wakems, felt an unusual curiosity to know what had prompted her father s questions. His subsequent silence made her suspect there had been some special reason for them in his mind. With this idea in her head, she resorted to her usual plan when she wanted to tell or ask her father anything particular: she found a reason for her aunt Tulliver to leaving the dining-room after dinner, and seated herself on a small stool at her father s knee. Mr Deane, under those circumstances, considered that he tasted some of the most agreeable moments his merits had purchased him in life, notwithstanding that Lucy, disliking to have her hair powdered with snuff, usually began by mastering his snuff-box on such occasions. You don t want to go to sleep yet, papa, _do_ you? she said, as she brought up her stool and opened the large fingers that clutched the snuff-box. Not yet, said Mr Deane, glancing at the reward of merit in the decanter. But what do _you_ want? he added, pinching the dimpled chin fondly, to coax some more sovereigns out of my pocket for your bazaar? Eh? No, I have no base motives at all to-day. I only want to talk, not to beg. I want to know what made you ask Philip Wakem about his father s farming to-day, papa? It seemed rather odd, because you never hardly say anything to him about his father; and why should you care about Mr Wakem s losing money by his hobby? Something to do with business, said Mr Deane, waving his hands, as if to repel intrusion into that mystery. But, papa, you always say Mr Wakem has brought Philip up like a girl; how came you to think you should get any business knowledge out of him? Those abrupt questions sounded rather oddly. Philip thought them queer. Nonsense, child! said Mr Deane, willing to justify his social demeanour, with which he had taken some pains in his upward progress. There s a report that Wakem s mill and farm on the other side of the river Dorlcote Mill, your uncle Tulliver s, you know isn t answering so well as it did. I wanted to see if your friend Philip would let anything out about his father s being tired of farming. Why? Would you buy the mill, papa, if he would part with it? said Lucy, eagerly. Oh, tell me everything; here, you shall have your snuff-box if you ll tell me. Because Maggie says all their hearts are set on Tom s getting back the mill some time. It was one of the last things her father said to Tom, that he must get back the mill. Hush, you little puss, said Mr Deane, availing himself of the restored snuff-box. You must not say a word about this thing; do you hear? There s very little chance of their getting the mill or of anybody s getting it out of Wakem s hands. And if he knew that we wanted it with a view to the Tulliver s getting it again, he d be the less likely to part with it. It s natural, after what happened. He behaved well enough to Tulliver before; but a horsewhipping is not likely to be paid for with sugar-plums. Now, papa, said Lucy, with a little air of solemnity, will you trust me? You must not ask me all my reasons for what I m going to say, but I have very strong reasons. And I m very cautious; I am, indeed. Well, let us hear. Why, I believe, if you will let me take Philip Wakem into our confidence, let me tell him all about your wish to buy, and what it s for; that my cousins wish to have it, and why they wish to have it, I believe Philip would help to bring it about. I know he would desire to do it. I don t see how that can be, child, said Mr Deane, looking puzzled. Why should _he_ care? then, with a sudden penetrating look at his daughter, You don t think the poor lad s fond of you, and so you can make him do what you like? (Mr Deane felt quite safe about his daughter s affections.) No, papa; he cares very little about me, not so much as I care about him. But I have a reason for being quite sure of what I say. Don t you ask me. And if you ever guess, don t tell me. Only give me leave to do as I think fit about it. Lucy rose from her stool to seat herself on her father s knee, and kissed him with that last request. Are you sure you won t do mischief, now? he said, looking at her with delight. Yes, papa, quite sure. I m very wise; I ve got all your business talents. Didn t you admire my accompt-book, now, when I showed it you? Well, well, if this youngster will keep his counsel, there won t be much harm done. And to tell the truth, I think there s not much chance for us any other way. Now, let me go off to sleep. Chapter VIII. Wakem in a New Light Before three days had passed after the conversation you have just overheard between Lucy and her father she had contrived to have a private interview with Philip during a visit of Maggie s to her aunt Glegg. For a day and a night Philip turned over in his mind with restless agitation all that Lucy had told him in that interview, till he had thoroughly resolved on a course of action. He thought he saw before him now a possibility of altering his position with respect to Maggie, and removing at least one obstacle between them. He laid his plan and calculated all his moves with the fervid deliberation of a chess-player in the days of his first ardor, and was amazed himself at his sudden genius as a tactician. His plan was as bold as it was thoroughly calculated. Having watched for a moment when his father had nothing more urgent on his hands than the newspaper, he went behind him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and said, Father, will you come up into my sanctum, and look at my new sketches? I ve arranged them now. I m getting terrible stiff in the joints, Phil, for climbing those stairs of yours, said Wakem, looking kindly at his son as he laid down his paper. But come along, then. This is a nice place for you, isn t it, Phil? a capital light that from the roof, eh? was, as usual, the first thing he said on entering the painting-room. He liked to remind himself and his son too that his fatherly indulgence had provided the accommodation. He had been a good father. Emily would have nothing to reproach him with there, if she came back again from her grave. Come, come, he said, putting his double eye-glass over his nose, and seating himself to take a general view while he rested, you ve got a famous show here. Upon my word, I don t see that your things aren t as good as that London artist s what s his name that Leyburn gave so much money for. Philip shook his head and smiled. He had seated himself on his painting-stool, and had taken a lead pencil in his hand, with which he was making strong marks to counteract the sense of tremulousness. He watched his father get up, and walk slowly round, good-naturedly dwelling on the pictures much longer than his amount of genuine taste for landscape would have prompted, till he stopped before a stand on which two pictures were placed, one much larger than the other, the smaller one in a leather case. Bless me! what have you here? said Wakem, startled by a sudden transition from landscape to portrait. I thought you d left off figures. Who are these? They are the same person, said Philip, with calm promptness, at different ages. And what person? said Wakem, sharply fixing his eyes with a growing look of suspicion on the larger picture. Miss Tulliver. The small one is something like what she was when I was at school with her brother at King s Lorton; the larger one is not quite so good a likeness of what she was when I came from abroad. Wakem turned round fiercely, with a flushed face, letting his eye-glass fall, and looking at his son with a savage expression for a moment, as if he was ready to strike that daring feebleness from the stool. But he threw himself into the armchair again, and thrust his hands into his trouser-pockets, still looking angrily at his son, however. Philip did not return the look, but sat quietly watching the point of his pencil. And do you mean to say, then, that you have had any acquaintance with her since you came from abroad? said Wakem, at last, with that vain effort which rage always makes to throw as much punishment as it desires to inflict into words and tones, since blows are forbidden. Yes; I saw a great deal of her for a whole year before her father s death. We met often in that thicket the Red Deeps near Dorlcote Mill. I love her dearly; I shall never love any other woman. I have thought of her ever since she was a little girl. Go on, sir! And you have corresponded with her all this while? No. I never told her I loved her till just before we parted, and she promised her brother not to see me again or to correspond with me. I am not sure that she loves me or would consent to marry me. But if she would consent, if she _did_ love me well enough, I should marry her. And this is the return you make me for all the indulgences I ve heaped on you? said Wakem, getting white, and beginning to tremble under an enraged sense of impotence before Philip s calm defiance and concentration of purpose. No, father, said Philip, looking up at him for the first time; I don t regard it as a return. You have been an indulgent father to me; but I have always felt that it was because you had an affectionate wish to give me as much happiness as my unfortunate lot would admit, not that it was a debt you expected me to pay by sacrificing all my chances of happiness to satisfy feelings of yours which I can never share. I think most sons would share their father s feelings in this case, said Wakem, bitterly. The girl s father was an ignorant mad brute, who was within an inch of murdering me. The whole town knows it. And the brother is just as insolent, only in a cooler way. He forbade her seeing you, you say; he ll break every bone in your body, for your greater happiness, if you don t take care. But you seem to have made up your mind; you have counted the consequences, I suppose. Of course you are independent of me; you can marry this girl to-morrow, if you like; you are a man of five-and-twenty, you can go your way, and I can go mine. We need have no more to do with each other. Wakem rose and walked toward the door, but something held him back, and instead of leaving the room, he walked up and down it. Philip was slow to reply, and when he spoke, his tone had a more incisive quietness and clearness than ever. No; I can t marry Miss Tulliver, even if she would have me, if I have only my own resources to maintain her with. I have been brought up to no profession. I can t offer her poverty as well as deformity. Ah, _there_ is a reason for your clinging to me, doubtless, said Wakem, still bitterly, though Philip s last words had given him a pang; they had stirred a feeling which had been a habit for a quarter of a century. He threw himself into the chair again. I expected all this, said Philip. I know these scenes are often happening between father and son. If I were like other men of my age, I might answer your angry words by still angrier; we might part; I should marry the woman I love, and have a chance of being as happy as the rest. But if it will be a satisfaction to you to annihilate the very object of everything you ve done for me, you have an advantage over most fathers; you can completely deprive me of the only thing that would make my life worth having. Philip paused, but his father was silent. You know best what satisfaction you would have, beyond that of gratifying a ridiculous rancor worthy only of wandering savages. Ridiculous rancor! Wakem burst out. What do you mean? Damn it! is a man to be horsewhipped by a boor and love him for it? Besides, there s that cold, proud devil of a son, who said a word to me I shall not forget when we had the settling. He would be as pleasant a mark for a bullet as I know, if he were worth the expense. I don t mean your resentment toward them, said Philip, who had his reasons for some sympathy with this view of Tom, though a feeling of revenge is not worth much, that you should care to keep it. I mean your extending the enmity to a helpless girl, who has too much sense and goodness to share their narrow prejudices. _She_ has never entered into the family quarrels. What does that signify? We don t ask what a woman does; we ask whom she belongs to. It s altogether a degrading thing to you, to think of marrying old Tulliver s daughter. For the first time in the dialogue, Philip lost some of his self-control, and coloured with anger. Miss Tulliver, he said, with bitter incisiveness, has the only grounds of rank that anything but vulgar folly can suppose to belong to the middle class; she is thoroughly refined, and her friends, whatever else they may be, are respected for irreproachable honour and integrity. All St Ogg s, I fancy, would pronounce her to be more than my equal. Wakem darted a glance of fierce question at his son; but Philip was not looking at him, and with a certain penitent consciousness went on, in a few moments, as if in amplification of his last words, Find a single person in St Ogg s who will not tell you that a beautiful creature like her would be throwing herself away on a pitiable object like me. Not she! said Wakem, rising again, and forgetting everything else in a burst of resentful pride, half fatherly, half personal. It would be a deuced fine match for her. It s all stuff about an accidental deformity, when a girl s really attached to a man. But girls are not apt to get attached under those circumstances, said Philip. Well, then, said Wakem, rather brutally, trying to recover his previous position, if she doesn t care for you, you might have spared yourself the trouble of talking to me about her, and you might have spared me the trouble of refusing my consent to what was never likely to happen. Wakem strode to the door, and without looking round again, banged it after him. Philip was not without confidence that his father would be ultimately wrought upon as he had expected, by what had passed; but the scene had jarred upon his nerves, which were as sensitive as a woman s. He determined not to go down to dinner; he couldn t meet his father again that day. It was Wakem s habit, when he had no company at home, to go out in the evening, often as early as half-past seven; and as it was far on in the afternoon now, Philip locked up his room and went out for a long ramble, thinking he would not return until his father was out of the house again. He got into a boat, and went down the river to a favourite village, where he dined, and lingered till it was late enough for him to return. He had never had any sort of quarrel with his father before, and had a sickening fear that this contest, just begun, might go on for weeks; and what might not happen in that time? He would not allow himself to define what that involuntary question meant. But if he could once be in the position of Maggie s accepted, acknowledged lover, there would be less room for vague dread. He went up to his painting-room again, and threw himself with a sense of fatigue into the armchair, looking round absently at the views of water and rock that were ranged around, till he fell into a doze, in which he fancied Maggie was slipping down a glistening, green, slimy channel of a waterfall, and he was looking on helpless, till he was awakened by what seemed a sudden, awful crash. It was the opening of the door, and he could hardly have dozen more than a few moments, for there was no perceptible change in the evening light. It was his father who entered; and when Philip moved to vacate the chair for him, he said, Sit still. I d rather walk about. He stalked up and down the room once or twice, and then, standing opposite Philip with his hands thrust in his side pockets, he said, as if continuing a conversation that had not been broken off, But this girl seems to have been fond of you, Phil, else she wouldn t have met you in that way. Philip s heart was beating rapidly, and a transient flush passed over his face like a gleam. It was not quite easy to speak at once. She liked me at King s Lorton, when she was a little girl, because I used to sit with her brother a great deal when he had hurt his foot. She had kept that in her memory, and thought of me as a friend of a long while ago. She didn t think of me as a lover when she met me. Well, but you made love to her at last. What did she say then? said Wakem, walking about again. She said she _did_ love me then. Confound it, then; what else do you want? Is she a jilt? She was very young then, said Philip, hesitatingly. I m afraid she hardly knew what she felt. I m afraid our long separation, and the idea that events must always divide us, may have made a difference. But she s in the town. I ve seen her at church. Haven t you spoken to her since you came back? Yes, at Mr Deane s. But I couldn t renew my proposals to her on several grounds. One obstacle would be removed if you would give your consent, if you would be willing to think of her as a daughter-in-law. Wakem was silent a little while, pausing before Maggie s picture. She s not the sort of woman your mother was, though, Phil, he said, at last. I saw her at church, she s handsomer than this, deuced fine eyes and fine figure, I saw; but rather dangerous and unmanageable, eh? She s very tender and affectionate, and so simple, without the airs and petty contrivances other women have. Ah? said Wakem. Then looking round at his son, But your mother looked gentler; she had that brown wavy hair and gray eyes, like yours. You can t remember her very well. It was a thousand pities I d no likeness of her. Then, shouldn t you be glad for me to have the same sort of happiness, father, to sweeten my life for me? There can never be another tie so strong to you as that which began eight-and-twenty years ago, when you married my mother, and you have been tightening it ever since. Ah, Phil, you re the only fellow that knows the best of me, said Wakem, giving his hand to his son. We must keep together if we can. And now, what am I to do? You must come downstairs and tell me. Am I to go and call on this dark-eyed damsel? The barrier once thrown down in this way, Philip could talk freely to his father of their entire relation with the Tullivers, of the desire to get the mill and land back into the family, and of its transfer to Guest & Co. as an intermediate step. He could venture now to be persuasive and urgent, and his father yielded with more readiness than he had calculated on. _I_ don t care about the mill, he said at last, with a sort of angry compliance. I ve had an infernal deal of bother lately about the mill. Let them pay me for my improvements, that s all. But there s one thing you needn t ask me. I shall have no direct transactions with young Tulliver. If you like to swallow him for his sister s sake, you may; but I ve no sauce that will make him go down. I leave you to imagine the agreeable feelings with which Philip went to Mr Deane the next day, to say that Mr Wakem was ready to open the negotiations, and Lucy s pretty triumph as she appealed to her father whether she had not proved her great business abilities. Mr Deane was rather puzzled, and suspected that there had been something going on among the young people to which he wanted a clew. But to men of Mr Deane s stamp, what goes on among the young people is as extraneous to the real business of life as what goes on among the birds and butterflies, until it can be shown to have a malign bearing on monetary affairs. And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious. Chapter IX. Charity in Full-Dress The culmination of Maggie s career as an admired member of society in St Ogg s was certainly the day of the bazaar, when her simple noble beauty, clad in a white muslin of some soft-floating kind, which I suspect must have come from the stores of aunt Pullet s wardrobe, appeared with marked distinction among the more adorned and conventional women around her. We perhaps never detect how much of our social demeanour is made up of artificial airs until we see a person who is at once beautiful and simple; without the beauty, we are apt to call simplicity awkwardness. The Miss Guests were much too well-bred to have any of the grimaces and affected tones that belong to pretentious vulgarity; but their stall being next to the one where Maggie sat, it seemed newly obvious to-day that Miss Guest held her chin too high, and that Miss Laura spoke and moved continually with a view to effect. All well-dressed St Ogg s and its neighbourhood were there; and it would have been worth while to come even from a distance, to see the fine old hall, with its open roof and carved oaken rafters, and great oaken folding-doors, and light shed down from a height on the many-coloured show beneath; a very quaint place, with broad faded stripes painted on the walls, and here and there a show of heraldic animals of a bristly, long-snouted character, the cherished emblems of a noble family once the seigniors of this now civic hall. A grand arch, cut in the upper wall at one end, surmounted an oaken orchestra, with an open room behind it, where hothouse plants and stalls for refreshments were disposed; an agreeable resort for gentlemen disposed to loiter, and yet to exchange the occasional crush down below for a more commodious point of view. In fact, the perfect fitness of this ancient building for an admirable modern purpose, that made charity truly elegant, and led through vanity up to the supply of a deficit, was so striking that hardly a person entered the room without exchanging the remark more than once. Near the great arch over the orchestra was the stone oriel with painted glass, which was one of the venerable inconsistencies of the old hall; and it was close by this that Lucy had her stall, for the convenience of certain large plain articles which she had taken charge of for Mrs Kenn. Maggie had begged to sit at the open end of the stall, and to have the sale of

confident

How many times the word 'confident' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

fence

How many times the word 'fence' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

ome

How many times the word 'ome' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

foresaw

How many times the word 'foresaw' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

get

How many times the word 'get' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

hat--"so

How many times the word 'hat--"so' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

maksimych

How many times the word 'maksimych' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

give

How many times the word 'give' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

wells

How many times the word 'wells' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

unfamiliar

How many times the word 'unfamiliar' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

broken

How many times the word 'broken' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

present

How many times the word 'present' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

kind

How many times the word 'kind' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

minute

How many times the word 'minute' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

rang

How many times the word 'rang' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

wife

How many times the word 'wife' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

lack

How many times the word 'lack' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

am

How many times the word 'am' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

entreated

How many times the word 'entreated' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

courtyard

How many times the word 'courtyard' appears in the text?

up my mind for anything. If you like, I will steal my sister for you! How she dances! How she sings! And the way she embroiders with gold--marvellous! Not even a Turkish Padishah [13] has had a wife like her!... Shall I? Wait for me to-morrow night, yonder, in the gorge where the torrent flows; I will go by with her to the neighbouring village--and she is yours. Surely Bela is worth your galloper!' "Kazbich remained silent for a long, long time. At length, instead of answering, he struck up in an undertone the ancient song: "Many a beauty among us dwells From whose eyes' dark depths the starlight wells, 'Tis an envied lot and sweet, to hold Their love; but brighter is freedom bold. Four wives are yours if you pay the gold; But a mettlesome steed is of price untold; The whirlwind itself on the steppe is less fleet; He knows no treachery--no deceit." [14] "In vain Azamat entreated him to consent. He wept, coaxed, and swore to him. Finally, Kazbich interrupted him impatiently: "'Begone, you crazy brat! How should you think to ride on my horse? In three steps you would be thrown and your neck broken on the stones!' "'I?' cried Azamat in a fury, and the blade of the child's dagger rang against the coat of mail. A powerful arm thrust him away, and he struck the wattle fence with such violence that it rocked. "'Now we'll see some fun!' I thought to myself. "I rushed into the stable, bridled our horses and led them out into the back courtyard. In a couple of minutes there was a terrible uproar in the hut. What had happened was this: Azamat had rushed in, with his tunic torn, saying that Kazbich was going to murder him. All sprang out, seized their guns, and the fun began! Noise--shouts--shots! But by this time Kazbich was in the saddle, and, wheeling among the crowd along the street, defended himself like a madman, brandishing his sabre. "'It is a bad thing to interfere in other people's quarrels,' I said to Grigori Aleksandrovich, taking him by the arm. 'Wouldn't it be better for us to clear off without loss of time?' "'Wait, though, and see how it will end!' "'Oh, as to that, it will be sure enough to end badly; it is always so with these Asiatics. Once let them get drunk on buza, and there's certain to be bloodshed.' "We mounted and galloped home." CHAPTER IV "TELL me, what became of Kazbich?" I asked the staff-captain impatiently. "Why, what can happen to that sort of a fellow?" he answered, finishing his tumbler of tea. "He slipped away, of course." "And wasn't he wounded?" I asked. "Goodness only knows! Those scoundrels take a lot of killing! In action, for instance, I've seen many a one, sir, stuck all over with bayonets like a sieve, and still brandishing his sabre." After an interval of silence the staff-captain continued, tapping the ground with his foot: "One thing I'll never forgive myself for. On our arrival at the fortress the devil put it into my head to repeat to Grigori Aleksandrovich all that I had heard when I was eavesdropping behind the fence. He laughed--cunning fellow!--and thought out a little plan of his own." "What was that? Tell me, please." "Well, there's no help for it now, I suppose. I've begun the story, and so I must continue. "In about four days' time Azamat rode over to the fortress. As his usual custom was, he went to see Grigori Aleksandrovich, who always used to give him sweetmeats to eat. I was present. The conversation was on the subject of horses, and Pechorin began to sound the praises of Kazbich's Karagyoz. What a mettlesome horse it was, and how handsome! A perfect chamois! In fact, judging by his account, there simply wasn't another like it in the whole world! "The young Tartar's beady eyes began to sparkle, but Pechorin didn't seem to notice the fact. I started to talk about something else, but immediately, mark you, Pechorin caused the conversation to strike off on to Kazbich's horse. Every time that Azamat came it was the same story. After about three weeks, I began to observe that Azamat was growing pale and wasted, just as people in novels do from love, sir. What wonder either!... "Well, you see, it was not until afterwards that I learned the whole trick--Grigori Aleksandrovich exasperated Azamat to such an extent with his teasing that the boy was ready even to drown himself. One day Pechorin suddenly broke out with: "'I see, Azamat, that you have taken a desperate fancy to that horse of Kazbich's, but you'll no more see him than you will the back of your neck! Come, tell me, what would you give if somebody made you a present of him?' "'Anything he wanted,' answered Azamat. "'In that case I will get the horse for you, only on one condition... Swear that you will fulfil it?' "'I swear. You swear too!' "'Very well! I swear that the horse shall be yours. But, in return, you must deliver your sister Bela into my hands. Karagyoz shall be her bridegroom's gift. I hope the transaction will be a profitable one for you.' "Azamat remained silent. "'Won't you? Well, just as you like! I thought you were a man, but it seems you are still a child; it is early for you to be riding on horseback!' "Azamat fired up. "'But my father--' he said. "'Does he never go away, then?' "'True.' "'You agree?' "'I agree,' whispered Azamat, pale as death. 'But when?' "'The first time Kazbich rides over here. He has promised to drive in half a score of rams; the rest is my affair. Look out, then, Azamat!' "And so they settled the business--a bad business, to tell the truth! I said as much to Pechorin afterwards, but he only answered that a wild Circassian girl ought to consider herself fortunate in having such a charming husband as himself--because, according to their ideas, he really was her husband--and that Kazbich was a scoundrel, and ought to be punished. Judge for yourself, what could I say to that?... At the time, however, I knew nothing of their conspiracy. Well, one day Kazbich rode up and asked whether we needed any rams and honey; and I ordered him to bring some the next day. "'Azamat!' said Grigori Aleksandrovich; 'to-morrow Karagyoz will be in my hands; if Bela is not here to-night you will never see the horse.'.. "'Very well,' said Azamat, and galloped to the village. "In the evening Grigori Aleksandrovich armed himself and rode out of the fortress. How they settled the business I don't know, but at night they both returned, and the sentry saw that across Azamat's saddle a woman was lying, bound hand and foot and with her head wrapped in a veil." "And the horse?" I asked the staff-captain. "One minute! One minute! Early next morning Kazbich rode over, driving in half a score of rams for sale. Tethering his horse by the fence, he came in to see me, and I regaled him with tea, for, robber though he was, he was none the less my guest-friend. "We began to chat about one thing and another... Suddenly I saw Kazbich start, change countenance, and dart to the window; but unfortunately the window looked on to the back courtyard. "'What is the matter with you?' I asked. "'My horse!... My horse!' he cried, all of a tremble. "As a matter of fact I heard the clattering of hoofs. "'It is probably some Cossack who has ridden up.' "'No! Urus--yaman, yaman!' [151] he roared, and rushed headlong away like a wild panther. In two bounds he was in the courtyard; at the gate of the fortress the sentry barred the way with his gun; Kazbich jumped over the gun and dashed off at a run along the road... Dust was whirling in the distance--Azamat was galloping away on the mettlesome Karagyoz. Kazbich, as he ran, tore his gun out of its cover and fired. For a moment he remained motionless, until he had assured himself that he had missed. Then he uttered a shrill cry, knocked the gun against a rock, smashed it to splinters, fell to the ground, and burst out sobbing like a child... The people from the fortress gathered round him, but he took no notice of anyone. They stood there talking awhile and then went back. I ordered the money for the rams to be placed beside him. He didn't touch it, but lay with his face to the ground like a dead man. Would you believe it? He remained lying like that throughout the rest of that day and the following night! It was only on the next morning that he came to the fortress and proceeded to ask that the name of the thief should be told him. The sentry who had observed Azamat untying the horse and galloping away on him did not see any necessity for concealment. At the name of Azamat, Kazbich's eyes flashed, and he set off to the village where Azamat's father lived." "And what about the father?" "Ah, that was where the trick came in! Kazbich could not find him; he had gone away somewhere for five or six days; otherwise, how could Azamat have succeeded in carrying off Bela? "And, when the father returned, there was neither daughter nor son to be found. A wily rogue, Azamat! He understood, you see, that he would lose his life if he was caught. So, from that time, he was never seen again; probably he joined some gang of Abreks and laid down his turbulent life on the other side of the Terek or the Kuban. It would have served him right!"... CHAPTER V "I CONFESS that, for my part, I had trouble enough over the business. So soon as ever I learned that the Circassian girl was with Grigori Aleksandrovich, I put on my epaulettes and sword and went to see him. "He was lying on the bed in the outer room, with one hand under his head and the other holding a pipe which had gone out. The door leading to the inner room was locked, and there was no key in the lock. I observed all that in a moment... I coughed and rapped my heels against the threshold, but he pretended not to hear. "'Ensign!' I said, as sternly as I could. 'Do you not see that I have come to you?' "'Ah, good morning, Maksim Maksimych! Won't you have a pipe?' he answered, without rising. "'Excuse me, I am not Maksim Maksimych. I am the staff-captain.' "'It's all the same! Won't you have some tea? If you only knew how I am being tortured with anxiety.' "'I know all,' I answered, going up to the bed. "'So much the better,' he said. 'I am not in a narrative mood.' "'Ensign, you have committed an offence for which I may have to answer as well as you.' "'Oh, that'll do. What's the harm? You know, we've gone halves in everything.' "'What sort of a joke do you think you are playing? Your sword, please!'... "'Mitka, my sword!' "'Mitka brought the sword. My duty discharged, I sat down on the bed, facing Pechorin, and said: 'Listen here, Grigori Aleksandrovich, you must admit that this is a bad business.' "'What is?' "'Why, that you have carried off Bela... Ah, it is that beast Azamat!... Come, confess!' I said. "'But, supposing I am fond of her?'... "Well, what could I say to that?... I was nonplussed. After a short interval of silence, however, I told him that if Bela's father were to claim her he would have to give her up. "'Not at all!' "'But he will get to know that she is here.' "'How?' "Again I was nonplussed. "'Listen, Maksim Maksimych,' said Pechorin, rising to his feet. 'You're a kind-hearted man, you know; but, if we give that savage back his daughter, he will cut her throat or sell her. The deed is done, and the only thing we can do now is not to go out of our way to spoil matters. Leave Bela with me and keep my sword!' "'Show her to me, though,' I said. "'She is behind that door. Only I wanted, myself, to see her to-day and wasn't able to. She sits in the corner, muffled in her veil, and neither speaks nor looks up--timid as a wild chamois! I have hired the wife of our dukhan-keeper: she knows the Tartar language, and will look after Bela and accustom her to the idea that she belongs to me--for she shall belong to no one else!' he added, banging his fist on the table. "I assented to that too... What could I do? There are some people with whom you absolutely have to agree." "Well?" I asked Maksim Maksimych. "Did he really succeed in making her grow accustomed to him, or did she pine away in captivity from home-sickness?" "Good gracious! how could she pine away from home-sickness? From the fortress she could see the very same hills as she could from the village--and these savages require nothing more. Besides, Grigori Aleksandrovich used to give her a present of some kind every day. At first she didn't utter a word, but haughtily thrust away the gifts, which then fell to the lot of the dukhan-keeper's wife and aroused her eloquence. Ah, presents! What won't a woman do for a coloured rag!... But that is by the way... For a long time Grigori Aleksandrovich persevered with her, and meanwhile he studied the Tartar language and she began to understand ours. Little by little she grew accustomed to looking at him, at first furtively, askance; but she still pined and crooned her songs in an undertone, so that even I would feel heavy at heart when I heard her from the next room. One scene I shall never forget: I was walking past, and I looked in at the window; Bela was sitting on the stove-couch, her head sunk on her breast, and Grigori Aleksandrovich was standing, facing her. "'Listen, my Peri,' he was saying. 'Surely you know that you will have to be mine sooner or later--why, then, do you but torture me? Is it that you are in love with some Chechene? If so, I will let you go home at once.' "She gave a scarcely perceptible start and shook her head. "'Or is it,' he continued, 'that I am utterly hateful to you?' "She heaved a sigh. "'Or that your faith prohibits you from giving me a little of your love?' "She turned pale and remained silent. "'Believe me, Allah is one and the same for all races; and, if he permits me to love you, why, then, should he prohibit you from requiting me by returning my love?' "She gazed fixedly into his face, as though struck by that new idea. Distrust and a desire to be convinced were expressed in her eyes. What eyes they were! They sparkled just like two glowing coals. "'Listen, my dear, good Bela!' continued Pechorin. 'You see how I love you. I am ready to give up everything to make you cheerful once more. I want you to be happy, and, if you are going to be sad again, I shall die. Tell me, you will be more cheerful?' "She fell into thought, her black eyes still fixed upon him. Then she smiled graciously and nodded her head in token of acquiescence. "He took her by the hand and tried to induce her to kiss him. She defended herself feebly, and only repeated: 'Please! Please! You mustn't, you mustn't!' "He went on to insist; she began to tremble and weep. "'I am your captive,' she said, 'your slave; of course, you can compel me.' "And then, again--tears. "Grigori Aleksandrovich struck his forehead with his fist and sprang into the other room. I went in to see him, and found him walking moodily backwards and forwards with folded arms. "'Well, old man?' I said to him. "'She is a devil--not a woman!' he answered. 'But I give you my word of honour that she shall be mine!' "I shook my head. "'Will you bet with me?' he said. 'In a week's time?' "'Very well,' I answered. "We shook hands on it and separated. "The next day he immediately despatched an express messenger to Kizlyar to purchase some things for him. The messenger brought back a quite innumerable quantity of various Persian stuffs. "'What think you, Maksim Maksimych?' he said to me, showing the presents. 'Will our Asiatic beauty hold out against such a battery as this?' "'You don't know the Circassian women,' I answered. 'They are not at all the same as the Georgian or the Transcaucasian Tartar women--not at all! They have their own principles, they are brought up differently.' "Grigori Aleksandrovich smiled and began to whistle a march to himself." CHAPTER VI "AS things fell out, however," continued Maksim Maksimych, "I was right, you see. The presents produced only half an effect. She became more gracious more trustful--but that was all. Pechorin accordingly determined upon a last expedient. One morning he ordered his horse to be saddled, dressed himself as a Circassian, armed himself, and went into her room. "'Bela,' he said. 'You know how I love you. I decided to carry you off, thinking that when you grew to know me you would give me your love. I was mistaken. Farewell! Remain absolute mistress of all I possess. Return to your father if you like--you are free. I have acted wrongfully towards you, and I must punish myself. Farewell! I am going. Whither?--How should I know? Perchance I shall not have long to court the bullet or the sabre-stroke. Then remember me and forgive.' "He turned away, and stretched out his hand to her in farewell. She did not take his hand, but remained silent. But I, standing there behind the door, was able through a chink to observe her countenance, and I felt sorry for her--such a deathly pallor shrouded that charming little face! Hearing no answer, Pechorin took a few steps towards the door. He was trembling, and--shall I tell you?--I think that he was in a state to perform in very fact what he had been saying in jest! He was just that sort of man, Heaven knows! "He had scarcely touched the door, however, when Bela sprang to her feet, burst out sobbing, and threw herself on his neck! Would you believe it? I, standing there behind the door, fell to weeping too, that is to say, you know, not exactly weeping--but just--well, something foolish!" The staff-captain became silent. "Yes, I confess," he said after a while, tugging at his moustache, "I felt hurt that not one woman had ever loved me like that." "Was their happiness lasting?" I asked. "Yes, she admitted that, from the day she had first cast eyes on Pechorin, she had often dreamed of him, and that no other man had ever produced such an impression upon her. Yes, they were happy!" "How tiresome!" I exclaimed, involuntarily. In point of fact, I had been expecting a tragic ending--when, lo! he must needs disappoint my hopes in such an unexpected manner!... "Is it possible, though," I continued, "that her father did not guess that she was with you in the fortress?" "Well, you must know, he seems to have had his suspicions. After a few days, we learned that the old man had been murdered. This is how it happened."... My attention was aroused anew. "I must tell you that Kazbich imagined that the horse had been stolen by Azamat with his father's consent; at any rate, that is what I suppose. So, one day, Kazbich went and waited by the roadside, about three versts beyond the village. The old man was returning from one of his futile searches for his daughter; his retainers were lagging behind. It was dusk. Deep in thought, he was riding at a walking pace when, suddenly, Kazbich darted out like a cat from behind a bush, sprang up behind him on the horse, flung him to the ground with a thrust of his dagger, seized the bridle and was off. A few of the retainers saw the whole affair from the hill; they dashed off in pursuit of Kazbich, but failed to overtake him." "He requited himself for the loss of his horse, and took his revenge at the same time," I said, with a view to evoking my companion's opinion. "Of course, from their point of view," said the staff-captain, "he was perfectly right." I was involuntarily struck by the aptitude which the Russian displays for accommodating himself to the customs of the people in whose midst he happens to be living. I know not whether this mental quality is deserving of censure or commendation, but it proves the incredible pliancy of his mind and the presence of that clear common sense which pardons evil wherever it sees that evil is inevitable or impossible of annihilation. CHAPTER VII IN the meantime we had finished our tea. The horses, which had been put to long before, were freezing in the snow. In the west the moon was growing pale, and was just on the point of plunging into the black clouds which were hanging over the distant summits like the shreds of a torn curtain. We went out of the hut. Contrary to my fellow-traveller's prediction, the weather had cleared up, and there was a promise of a calm morning. The dancing choirs of the stars were interwoven in wondrous patterns on the distant horizon, and, one after another, they flickered out as the wan resplendence of the east suffused the dark, lilac vault of heaven, gradually illumining the steep mountain slopes, covered with the virgin snows. To right and left loomed grim and mysterious chasms, and masses of mist, eddying and coiling like snakes, were creeping thither along the furrows of the neighbouring cliffs, as though sentient and fearful of the approach of day. All was calm in heaven and on earth, calm as within the heart of a man at the moment of morning prayer; only at intervals a cool wind rushed in from the east, lifting the horses' manes which were covered with hoar-frost. We started off. The five lean jades dragged our wagons with difficulty along the tortuous road up Mount Gut. We ourselves walked behind, placing stones under the wheels whenever the horses were spent. The road seemed to lead into the sky, for, so far as the eye could discern, it still mounted up and up, until finally it was lost in the cloud which, since early evening, had been resting on the summit of Mount Gut, like a kite awaiting its prey. The snow crunched under our feet. The atmosphere grew so rarefied that to breathe was painful; ever and anon the blood rushed to my head, but withal a certain rapturous sensation was diffused throughout my veins and I felt a species of delight at being so high up above the world. A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become as children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again. He whose lot it has been, as mine has been, to wander over the desolate mountains, long, long to observe their fantastic shapes, greedily to gulp down the life-giving air diffused through their ravines--he, of course, will understand my desire to communicate, to narrate, to sketch those magic pictures. Well, at length we reached the summit of Mount Gut and, halting, looked around us. Upon the mountain a grey cloud was hanging, and its cold breath threatened the approach of a storm; but in the east everything was so clear and golden that we--that is, the staff-captain and I--forgot all about the cloud... Yes, the staff-captain too; in simple hearts the feeling for the beauty and grandeur of nature is a hundred-fold stronger and more vivid than in us, ecstatic composers of narratives in words and on paper. "You have grown accustomed, I suppose, to these magnificent pictures!" I said. "Yes, sir, you can even grow accustomed to the whistling of a bullet, that is to say, accustomed to concealing the involuntary thumping of your heart." "I have heard, on the contrary, that many an old warrior actually finds that music agreeable." "Of course, if it comes to that, it is agreeable; but only just because the heart beats more violently. Look!" he added, pointing towards the east. "What a country!" And, indeed, such a panorama I can hardly hope to see elsewhere. Beneath us lay the Koishaur Valley, intersected by the Aragva and another stream as if by two silver threads; a bluish mist was gliding along the valley, fleeing into the neighbouring defiles from the warm rays of the morning. To right and left the mountain crests, towering higher and higher, intersected each other and stretched out, covered with snows and thickets; in the distance were the same mountains, which now, however, had the appearance of two cliffs, one like to the other. And all these snows were burning in the crimson glow so merrily and so brightly that it seemed as though one could live in such a place for ever. The sun was scarcely visible behind the dark-blue mountain, which only a practised eye could distinguish from a thunder-cloud; but above the sun was a blood-red streak to which my companion directed particular attention. "I told you," he exclaimed, "that there would be dirty weather to-day! We must make haste, or perhaps it will catch us on Mount Krestov.--Get on!" he shouted to the drivers. Chains were put under the wheels in place of drags, so that they should not slide, the drivers took the horses by the reins, and the descent began. On the right was a cliff, on the left a precipice, so deep that an entire village of Ossetes at the bottom looked like a swallow's nest. I shuddered, as the thought occurred to me that often in the depth of night, on that very road, where two wagons could not pass, a courier drives some ten times a year without climbing down from his rickety vehicle. One of our drivers was a Russian peasant from Yaroslavl, the other, an Ossete. The latter took out the leaders in good time and led the shaft-horse by the reins, using every possible precaution--but our heedless compatriot did not even climb down from his box! When I remarked to him that he might put himself out a bit, at least in the interests of my portmanteau, for which I had not the slightest desire to clamber down into the abyss, he answered: "Eh, master, with the help of Heaven we shall arrive as safe and sound as the others; it's not our first time, you know." And he was right. We might just as easily have failed to arrive at all; but arrive we did, for all that. And if people would only reason a little more they would be convinced that life is not worth taking such a deal of trouble about. Perhaps, however, you would like to know the conclusion of the story of Bela? In the first place, this is not a novel, but a collection of travelling-notes, and, consequently, I cannot make the staff-captain tell the story sooner than he actually proceeded to tell it. Therefore, you must wait a bit, or, if you like, turn over a few pages. Though I do not advise you to do the latter, because the crossing of Mount Krestov (or, as the erudite Gamba calls it, le mont St. Christophe [15]) is worthy of your curiosity. Well, then, we descended Mount Gut into the Chertov Valley... There's a romantic designation for you! Already you have a vision of the evil spirit's nest amid the inaccessible cliffs--but you are out of your reckoning there. The name "Chertov" is derived from the word cherta (boundary-line) and not from chort (devil), because, at one time, the valley marked the boundary of Georgia. We found it choked with snow-drifts, which reminded us rather vividly of Saratov, Tambov, and other charming localities of our fatherland. "Look, there is Krestov!" said the staff-captain, when we had descended into the Chertov Valley, as he pointed out a hill covered with a shroud of snow. Upon the summit stood out the black outline of a stone cross, and past it led an all but imperceptible road which travellers use only when the side-road is obstructed with snow. Our drivers, declaring that no avalanches had yet fallen, spared the horses by conducting us round the mountain. At a turning we met four or five Ossetes, who offered us their services; and, catching hold of the wheels, proceeded, with a shout, to drag and hold up our cart. And, indeed, it is a dangerous road; on the right were masses of snow hanging above us, and ready, it seemed, at the first squall of wind to break off and drop into the ravine; the narrow road was partly covered with snow, which, in many places, gave way under our feet and, in others, was converted into ice by the action of the sun by day and the frosts by night, so that the horses kept falling, and it was with difficulty that we ourselves made our way. On the left yawned a deep chasm, through which rolled a torrent, now hiding beneath a crust of ice, now leaping and foaming over the black rocks. In two hours we were barely able to double Mount Krestov--two

drive

How many times the word 'drive' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

almighty

How many times the word 'almighty' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

hold

How many times the word 'hold' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

fright

How many times the word 'fright' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

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up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

lies

How many times the word 'lies' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

into

How many times the word 'into' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

dishtowel

How many times the word 'dishtowel' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

tossing

How many times the word 'tossing' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

teases

How many times the word 'teases' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

lazy

How many times the word 'lazy' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

profits

How many times the word 'profits' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

unexpressed

How many times the word 'unexpressed' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

unlaces

How many times the word 'unlaces' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

closet

How many times the word 'closet' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

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How many times the word 'kit' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

wedding

How many times the word 'wedding' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

when

How many times the word 'when' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

downstairs

How many times the word 'downstairs' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

v.0

How many times the word 'v.0' appears in the text?

up off the floor and shrugs it on. Suzanne snatches his car keys off the coffee table. Infuriated, he grabs for his keys, but she holds them away behind her back. SUZANNE -- You're going to talk to me! ALEX When I get back. SUZANNE With more of your fucking lies! I hate you! Wasting my (slapping at his arm with her free hand) -- life! ALEX Sssh, calm down -- She tries to slap him again, but he gets hold of her hand. ALEX -- Give me my keys, I need my keys. I don't want to hurt you. SUZANNE That's all you ever do! He twists her hand up behind her back, forcing her onto the sofa. SUZANNE Go to hell! He smothers her into the cushion and twists her hand up and up. She grips his keys tighter. ALEX (breathless from the STRUGGLE) Open your hand, Suzanne. Pinning her down, he painfully pries open her fingers. She drives her elbow into his face. SUZANNE You sonofabitch! He hits her back, her nose starts to gush, the keys drop to the-floor. He bends to pick them up. Suzanne seizes a standing metal ashtray and savagely swipes him across the temple. (CONTINUED) 54. 75 75 CONTINUED: (3) The blow sends him sprawling to the floor; he doesn't move. She is stunned by what she has done. In a panic she races up the stairs, the heel of her hand to her nose to staunch the bleeding. 76 76 INT. MASTER BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne spills everything out of Alex's suitcase and starts throwing in her own clothes, blood-spotting them in her haste. 77 77 INT. JASON'S BEDROOM - NIGHT Suzanne jerks out his drawers so fast that she dumps them on the floor. She pulls his suit out of the closet along with an armful of other clothes. 78 INT. CONDO, STAIRS - NIGHT 78 Suzanne drags two suitcases clattering down the stairs. ALEX hasn't moved. Suzanne drops to her knees beside him and squeamishly lifts his wallet out of his pocket, snatches the cash, lets the wallet fall back beside him. Her breathing is so rapid and shallow it sounds like whimpers. 79 EXT. CONDO - NIGHT 79 Suzanne backs out the door pulling the suitcases, right into Jason. She cries out in fright. JASON -- Hey, hey. SUZANNE (FRANTIC) -- Don't go in therel We're LEAVINGS He sees the blood smeared all over her face, her clothe:,, and charges past her. SUZANNE - JA-SONII 55. 80 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 80 Ready to kill, Jason is shocked to see the job apparently already done for him. He bends over Alex to see if he's dead, and is equally sorry and relieved to find out he isn't. SUZANNE (O.S.) I won't wait for you! Jason takes the stairs two at a time. 81 INT. JASON'S ROOM - NIGHT 81 He yanks his map of the Gulf off the wall and grabs his fishing gear. 82 INT. CONDO, DOWNSTAIRS - NIGHT 82 Alex's unconscious body blocks the closet. door. Jason tries to open it anyway, but Alex is 'too heavy. Seizing hold of him, Jason drags him away from the door. The jewelry pouch spills out of Alex's pocket. Jason doesn't see it. The HORN BLARES, outside. Jason pulls his rod out of the closet. As he steps over Alex, he spots the pouch, the drawstring loose enough to let the necklace protrude. The HORN BLASTS again. Jason swoops up the pouch. 83 EXT. CONDO.- NIGHT 83 Jason runs for the car with his gear and climbs in. Suzanne peels away before the door is completely closed. 84 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) - 84 Jason and Suzanne. She can't look at him. She concentrates on her driving. JASON What the hell happened in there? SUZANNE Is he dead? JASON Not enough. What'd you hit him with? SUZANNE -+ The ashtray. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 56. 84 84 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) (a laugh bubbles out of HER) Jesus, an ashtray. (LAUGHING HARDER) He-doesn't even smoke! On the verge of hysteria, she's laughing so hard, she can hardly drive. Tears run down her face, muddying the dried blood; she's a holy mess. JASON Pull over, pull over. He wrenches the wheel and steers the car to the curb. JASON I'm driving. 85 85 EXT. CAR - NIGHT He gets out and lopes around the car to the driver's side. The car recedes down the highway. 86 86 EXT. GABRIELLA'S COUSIN'S HOUSE - NIGHT Gabriella is sitting on the front step with her suitcase, waiting. She rubs her legs as though she has been there a long time. The DOGS are BARKING inside. 87 87 INT. CONDO - NIGHT The PHONE is RINGING. Alex still hasn't moved. 88 88 EXT. GAS STATION - NIGHT Jason is waiting behind the wheel. Suzanne gets back in the car. She has pulled a cotton sweater over her bloody clothes and washed her face. She's presentable again, and subdued. He starts the car... 89 INT. CAR - NIGHT (TRAVELING) 89 . drives. (CONTINUED) 57. 89 89 CONTINUED: SUZANNE Did you figure out where we're going? JASON We'll head for the Gulf, see what we like. He sounds like her contemporary, not her kid. SUZANNE . I remember your dad saying the sand was as white as the whites of God's eyes, on the Gulf. JASON Do you still miss him? Slowly she shakes her head no. SUZANNE I can't see his face anymore. I can't hear his voice. (DREAMILY) -- But when you come home from fishing -- with the sea and the salt and the engine oil? It's like he's walking through the door. I love that smell -- I can still smell him. She watches the highway posts clack past. 90 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT 90 Victor is soaking a dishtowel under the faucet. He wrings it out. VICTOR Mugged-by your wife. How ironic. 91 INT. CONDO, LIVING ROOM - NIGHT 91 Victor comes into the room with the wet towel and throws it at Alex, who is sitting now on the couch. Alex catch:s it, holds it to his bloody head. ALEX I'll fucking kill her. VICTOR When do the Reeses come home? (CONTINUED) 58. 91 CONTINUED: 91 ALEX Not for a month. Plenty of time. Victor sighs. VICTOR How long a drive is it? ALEX To the Gulf? Three hours. He removes the towel from his head. VICTOR You're going to need stitches. Do you have a sewing kit? ALEX I'll stop at my doctor's. VICTOR I darned my own socks in prison. 92 EXT. COFFEE SHOP - DAY 92 Suzanne and Jason cross the parking lot toward the coffee shop, which anchors a suburban surface mall. He notices a jewelry store. They reach the restaurant. He opens the door for Suzanne. JASON Order something for me, okay? I'm stiff, I need to walk around. He's already walking away. Concern and exasperation cancel each other; she goes inside. 93 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY 93 Jason approaches the cheerful, elderly JEWELER repairing an earring behind the case. The man puts away his smile. Jason's long hair and leather jacket offend him. JASON My grandmother asked me to bring in a necklace of hers -- Jason takes the velvet pouch out of his pocket, unlaces it, spreads out the necklace on the counter. He leans forward on his elbows while the jeweler examines it with a loupe. When the jeweler looks up, he's angry. (CONTINUED) 59. 93 CONTINUED: 93 JEWELER Your grandmother lets you carry around a million dollars worth of jewelry? Go put it back where you found it. The jeweler pours the necklace back in the pouch, cinches it closed, slaps it on top of the case. JASON -- Those aren't real diamonds. JEWELER Tell your grandmother to bring it in. The jeweler BUZZES the door to release it. Jason grabs the velvet pouch, strides out. 94 INT. RESTAURANT - DAY 94 The WAITRESS unloads plate after plate on the table where Suzanne is waiting for Jason. WAITRESS -- pan san, strawberry waffle, eggs over, side of wheat toast, ham steak, hash browns, fruit cup, two O.J.'s,, coffee, milk -- SUZANNE' -- Extra syrup? Jason returns. JASON We'll starve. The waitress laughs as she strolls away. SUZANNE I'm hungry. He's worried about the jeweler. JASON Let's pack it up, picnic on the beach someplace. SUZANNE (with a grin) What a romantic. 60. 95 EXT. CAR - DAY 95 As Jason and Suzanne reach the car, he sees the jeweler on the sidewalk now, outside the store, gesticulating to a sign painter. JASON MOM -- He wants to tell her he took the necklace. SUZANNE (BREEZILY) -- No, 1111 drive. The jeweler happens to glance in their direction. Jason ducks into the car, unnoticed. 96 EXT. PIER - DAY 96 Jason and Suzanne are sitting on a small, rickety pier, eating from the takeout boxes open on their laps. SUZANNE -- I feel... exhilarated. JASON Adrenalin does that. SUZANNE -- It ain't adrenalin, it's freedom. And she slips her wedding ring off her finger and hurls it overhand as far as she can. It drops into the sea. SUZANNE (EXULTANT) I don't want one goddamn thing of HISS She eats with gusto. Jason is staring at the water. JASON I can't believe you did that. 97 INT. CAR - LATE DAY (TRAVEL?NG) 97 Suzanne is driving now. She glances over at Jason sprawled low in the seat. SUZANNE You're quiet. She doesn't think he's going to answer her. (CONTINUED) 97 97 CONTINUED: JASON I didn't even say goodbye. SUZANNE It'll work itself out. People manage. We're here. This is what you always wanted. JASON -- How much money do we have? Suzanne doesn't reply. 98 EXT. MOTEL - LATE DAY 98 At the reception window Suzanne is checking in with the MOTEL OWNER, a solidly-built, ruddy woman in her fifties who shouldn't wear sleeveless blouses. Suzanne has her wallet open. Her fingers hesitate at the credit card. OWNER There's a cash discount. Ten percent. SUZANNE (SMILING) Sounds like cash. She starts to count it out. 99 EXT. MOTEL POOL - LATE DAY 99 Ensconced at a table under an umbrella, Jason is writing on a paper towel. JASON (V.O.) Dear Gabriella. I don't know if you'll get this letter. I don't know if I'll send it. All I know is that for some reason I need to write it... SUZANNE AND THE OWNER cross the parking lot. SUZANNE (CALLING) Jase! He crumples the paper towel. She holds up the keys for him to see. (CONTINUED) 62. 99 CONTINUED: 99 OWNER (ENVIOUSLY) I should have given you the king- size. Suzanne isn't offended. SUZANNE He's my son. The owner gives her a startled glance. OWNER You look great! Suzanne laughs. 100 EXT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 100 Jason is sitting on the lawn chair outside the room door, working on his letter again under the yellow bug light. The Coke MACHINE HUMS noisily next to him. JASON (V.0.) That day on the boat made me realize I understand the sea better than I do the world. 101 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 101 Suzanne stirs awake, disoriented, spooked. SUZANNE Jason? She sits up in bed. Jason comes in from outside. JASON I'm right here. Suzanne shoves her fingers through her damp hair, swallows to clear her voice. SUZANNE ... I dreamed I was in jail. You'd come to see me, you were on the other side of the plastic -- like at the bank?. And you were talking, but I couldn't hear you. I put my ear to the holes and I couldn't hear you, but your mouth was moving. (MORE) (CONTINUED) 63. 101 101 CONTINUED: SUZANNE (CONT'D) And then I realized you couldn't talk anymore. He'd cut your vocal cords, like that dog next door. JASON What dog? She lies down again. SUZANNE- When you were a kid? JASON (GENTLY) -- I'm on watch. Don't worry. 102 102 EXT. CAR - DAY The. car speeds north. Alongside, the Gulf shimmers under the mirror of the sky. JASON (V.O.) -- I know what lure to use to catch any fish in the water, but what's the lure for a woman? Truth? Lies? 103 INT. ANOTHER MOTEL - DAY 103 A tint combed through her hair, the plastic cap tied in a rakish bow, Suzanne lays out what remains of her cash by denomination. She records the amount in a pocket notebook she's using as a ledger. JASON (V.0.) One morning, just as the sky started to lighten -- 104 EXT. PIER - DAY 104 Jason is fishing. JASON (V.0.) -- I caught a fish that had three hooks grown through his lips. Three times he'd gotten away. He kept taking the hook. 64. 105 EXT. PIER - DAY (LATER) 105 Jason is gutting and skinning his catch. JASON (V.0.) It occurs to me that you're the fisherman, not me. I can feel the tension of the line. I've taken the hook just like he did. CUT TO: A MAP OF THE GULF 106 Coastal towns have been crossed out, one after the other. 107 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 107 Alex, stitches in his head, pores over the map while Victor talks on the phone. He circles a new town on the Gulf, farther north. VICTOR -- eight-faceted cut... quite unique... could be the whole piece or individual stones, preference for the whole piece. Will you put out the word?... (LAUGHING) No, I'm consulting for the insurance company, isn't life strange? -- Love and kisses. He hangs up. His cheeriness vanishes. He coughs, more like a gag, and heads for the bathroom. 108 INT. BATHROOM - DAY 108 Victor spits blood in the sink. Then, after catching his breath, squirts medicine down his throat with his inhaler, exits. 109 INT. MOTEL ROOM - DAY 109 VICTOR I've called the whole network of fences from here to Tampa. ALEX Let's hope we'll find her before she sells. (CONTINUED) 65. 109 CONTINUED: 109 Victor picks up a chair and smacks it down. ALEX Hey! What's wrong? VICTOR This is not a water-view suite in Marbella! Did you notice? There's no fruit and champagne from the management. I don't see Swiss chocolate on the pillows. My masseuse is not at the door. And I am fucking dying, Alex! ALEX (SHOCKED) Jesus. Victor. VICTOR I don't intend to cough to death in a county clinic because you screwed up! ALEX (QUIETLY) That's not fair. The plan was for you to move the necklace. I wouldn't have had the goddamn thing. Come on... sit down... try to relax. He reaches for victor's cigarettes and crumples the package in his fist. Victor looks at his ruined smokes. VICTOR I'm not good at giving up things. 110 INT. DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT - DAY 110 Jason eats a sandwich at a'table, working on his letter. JASON (V.0.) I want to take you out with me when the wind's blowing whitecaps and the current's running against the wind, just to hear your hair slap against your skin. When will I see you? He glances up. (CONTINUED) 66. 110 110 CONTINUED: SUZANNE her hair a better, brighter color under her chef's hat, is cooking on the grill behind the counter, kidding the customers, enjoying herself. The greasy-aproned OWNER pats her rump as he goes by, not for the first time. SUZANNE Long arms, short dick, they always say. One of the Fishermen guffaws. The owner looks pissed. So does Jason who witnessed it all. OWNER (aside; to Suzanne) Can I see you in the office after lunch, please? SUZANNE (NOT INTIMIDATED) About what? 111 INT. MOTEL - DAY 111 Suzanne luxuriates in a. bubble bath, a glass of wine in her hand, the bottle next to the tub. She's talking to Jason through the closed door. SUZANNE I was not-fired, you jerk. I quit. 112 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 112 Jason is prying a diamond out of the necklace with his fishing knife. SUZANNE (O.S.) (with a laugh) For about a minute it was very satisfying. JASON (concentrating on the WORK) You did the right thing. 113 EXT. SECOND JEWELRY STORE - DAY 113 Jason has put on his suit, changed his looks. He sizes up the store. 67. 114 INT. STORE - DAY 114 Jason scans the case as he approaches the JEWELER. JEWELER. Help you? JASON Do you buy estate diamonds? JEWELER Sure. Jason takes out a zip-lock bag and lays it on the counter, one of the diamonds inside. The jeweler takes it out with respect and holds it under his loupe. If Jason's nervous, it doesn't show. JASON It belonged to my mother. The jeweler's heard every version. He doesn't care. JEWELER - .Price is the same. I can give you eighty-five hundred. 115 EXT. BEACH - DAY 115 The classified section already folded and marked beside her, Suzanne has propped herself on her elbows. She's looking out to sea. Talking heads bob like buoys, the waders. She notices, some distance away, a man in a suit walking along the beach. The image amuses her. He's moving in her direction. She finally recognizes Jason and raises her hand. SUZANNE (CALLING OUT) Hey, sailor... She puts on her hat to cut the glare. From under the brim she admires his approach. SUZANNE (as he reaches her) ... Look at you. What's the occasion? Jason squats down beside her and balls up the classifieds. JASON You don't need another grab-ass job. I been out talking to peoplel (MORE) (CONTINUED) 68. 115 115 CONTINUED: JASON (CONT'D) There's charter outfits a coupla towns up the coast. (NAMES OF TOWNS). They need skippers, they need crews. She stands up, brushes off the sand, rolls up her towel. SUZANNE So we're packing. They start walking together. From the water a MAN calls out to Suzanne. MAN Hey, I thought you were coming back in. She smiles and waves goodbye. SUZANNE ... Too bad. I kinda liked that GUY- She and Jason keep walking. He no longer looks like a boy. 116 116 INT. BAR - NIGHT Alex is smelling his brandy in a booth. He looks defeated. Victor swings onto a bar stool. He takes out a wallet photo of Suzanne and Jason and passes it across to the BARTENDER. VICTOR Seen them, by any chance? BARTENDER Why are you asking? VICTOR My wife and son. He's been selling fish around these parts. He's totally believable. The bartender feels for his pain and takes another look at the photo, shakes his head no. BARTENDER She's a little classier than our usual clientele, y'know? VICTOR Maybe you could pass it down anyway. (CONTINUED) 69. 116 116 CONTINUED: The bartender takes the photo. BARTENDER Sure, man. VICTOR joins Alex in the booth. Victor raises his hand. Alex instinctively pulls his head back. VICTOR Don't move. He leans across the table and plucks the last stitch out of Alex's wound. Alex winces. VICTOR It's been irritating me all day. Did I hurt you? Threat implied. Alex stares him down. MALE VOICE (O.S.) Hey, I know this kid -- Alex and victor glance over to the bar and see Henry. He's looking at the photo Victor passed around. HENRY Hunches a catch like a depth finder. Victor is already out of the booth. VICTOR AND HENRY Henry senses money to be made. HENRY Who are you? VICTOR His father. HENRY I thought his father was dead. (shaking his head) Well, you look bad all right, but not dead. VICTOR (DEFENSIVELY) Hungover, that's all. I'm his stepfather. (CONTINUED) 70. 116 116 CONTINUED: (2) HENRY (with a chuckle) Oh, man, now I see why he blew town. victor's insulted enough to lose his patience and his poise. VICTOR The question before us is where did he go. Henry says nothing. He wants to be paid. Victor whips out a fifty-dollar bill from his top pocket. Henry reaches for it, but victor holds it back, wanting an answer first. HENRY He wouldn't be on the Gulf. He hated the Gulf. Alex has moved up to the bar to listen behind him, unnoticed. He shakes his head at victor. HENRY He's down in the Keys somewhere. Victor puts the fifty back in his own pocket. Henry stands aggressively. HENRY That ain't cool in my book! In a swift, unexpected move, victor jams Henry back down on his bar stool. The bartender starts toward them. Alex slips out the door. The stool and Henry are toppling over. Victor catches them both, sets Henry upright. VICTOR (EVENLY) Now sit there,. and calm down. Victor is ill, but not weak. Henry looks away, the classic signal of submission. VICTOR Thank you. 117 117 EXT. BAR - NIGHT. Alex is waiting for victor outside. (CONTINUED) 71. 117 117 CONTINUED: ALEX (PLEASED) They can't be too far. Victor stares at him. VICTOR I never understand your optimism. ALEX Or he wouldn't have lied. HENRY (O.S.) Hey, mister! ALEX (TO VICTOR) I think you made a friend. Victor turns around, Alex keeps walking. HENRY is in the doorway to the bar. HENRY What's it to you if I see the kid? Victor smiles. 118 EXT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 118 From a distance we see Jason follow a beefy, jeans-wearing salesman into the building. 119 ' INT. DRYDOCK - LONG SHOT - DAY 119 The Salesman walks Jason past the vertical rows of boats, stacked from ceiling to floor, extolling the virtues of his stock. Jason inspects a modest boat, takes out cash. 120 EXT. GULF - BOAT - DAY 120 Jason is helming a classic wooden fishing boat, THE HERCULES II, old and not too big, but with good lines. He's purely happy. 72. 121 121 EXT. WATER - DAY Jason steers toward the beach and drops anchor. There's a cabin among the palmettos. No car. 122 122 INT. CABIN - DAY Jason comes into the cabin. JASON (just to be sure) Mom? The cabin is silent. He uses his fishing knife to pop loose a section of the cheap wall paneling. Behind it, a square of sheet rock has been sliced away between the studs to accommodate the pouch. He drops the pouch in his tackle box. A CAR is heard pulling up. Jason frantically starts to jam the paneling back in place. It won't hold. 123 123 EXT. CABIN - DAY Suzanne takes a flat of geraniums out of the trunk and sets them on the porch. She opens the door. 124 124 INT. CABIN - DAY Just as Suzanne steps through the screen door, Jason sees that his tackle box is open, the velvet pouch in plain sight. He kicks the top closed, bends to lock it. SUZANNE (CASUALLY) They'll think you stole it. He looks up at her, caught. She's walking toward the kitchen sink to wash the nursery dirt off her hands. She looks out the window at the boat again. SUZANNE Nice boat. (over her shoulder) Are you allowed just to run around with it? 'His tension ebbs. He picks up his tackle box. JASON I forgot my tackle box. SUZANNE -- Don't take advantage, Jason. They trusted you with the job. (CONTINUED) 73. 124 124 CONTINUED: He kisses her quickly. JASON It's not a problem. He escapes out the door. 125 125 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT Alex is sitting on the bed, dialing a number. He can see Victor shirtless in the bathroom. (His scars surprise us). Victor is trying with effort to suppress a cough. 126 126 INT. CONDO, KITCHEN - NIGHT Gabriella is cooking herself dinner. GABRIELLA Hello? She's greedily grateful to hear Alex's voice. GABRIELLA -- Hi! I saw on the news there's rain in San Francisco. Are you wet and miserable? 127 127 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Exhausted, Alex stretches out on the bed to talk to her. ALEX Napa's farther north. Victor comes out of the bathroom. He's waiting for news. 128 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 128 She leans on the counter, flirting with his voice. GABRIELLA Tell me you love me. ALEX (V.0.) I love you. Her smile vanishes. GABRIELLA Who just laughed? 74. 129 129 INT. MOTEL - NIGHT Alex holds the phone out to Victor. ALEX She wants to talk to you. VICTOR Oh, please. Why? ALEX Just fucking say hello, okay? Victor takes the phone. VICTOR Hello, dear. Alex snatches the phone back from him. ALEX Happy? Satisfied? I'm working. 130 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 130 His harsh tone unsettles her. GABRIELLA I miss you. ALEX (V.O.) Are there any messages? She carries the phone to the counter where she keeps mail and any messages and starts to leaf through the stack. Her eye falls on a crumpled light blue envelope; she moves it out from the pile. It has been forwarded several times. And it's addressed to her. GABRIELLA It's lonely here. There's no return address. She slits it open with her thumbnail. A trickle of sand falls out. ALEX (V.O.) What about the messages? GABRIELLA I'm looking! Instead, she opens the letter. (CONTINUED) 75. 130 130 CONTINUED: JASON (V..O.-)` Dear Gabriella. I've started this letter a dozen times -- ALEX (V..0. ) Gabby? She puts down the letter and quickly- finds the message memo. GABRIELLA Here it is. Mr. Raines called from (NAME OF TOWN). He said you-Id know what it was about. Do you,- need the number? 131 INT. MOTEL ROOM - NIGHT 131 Sitting up, Alex signals success to Victor and writes down the number. ALEX Thanks, honey. I'll call-you tomorrow. G'd'night . He hangs up, excited. Victor has already started to pack. ALEX (TO VICTOR) And you had no faith.. VICTOR I'll save the party hats until it's in our hands. 132 INT. CONDO - NIGHT 132 Gabriella is reading the second page of Jason's letter. JASON (V.0.) I look out at the flat blue sea, and the darker bl ue where the Gulf deepens and I want you next to me. I want to walk across the. sugar sand and wade into the water with you until the current lifts us and floats us, nothing weighting us down -- as'light and thoughtless as fish. Will I ever see you?... Love,: Jason. (CONTINUED) 76. 132 132 CONTINUED: She's deeply moved. And it occurs to her that she has picked the wrong man. 133 133 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY NEAR THE Modest, nondescript. Victor parallel parks jewelry store with his usual careful manner. 134 134 INT. CAR - DAY Victor and Alex kid each other without rancor for the moment. ALEX - I miss the Cadillac. Top down. Air on. VICTOR (LAUGHING) You have pimp's tastes, Alex. At least my car's inconspicuous. Alex starts to get out. Victor doesn't. ALEX You all right? VICTOR A lot of these jewelers might know my face. It's risky. ALEX How about for me? Victor takes out the photo of Alex with the necklace and holds it up for him. VICTOR Nobody's seen this yet. ALEX You're sick. I'll do it. Alex throws open the door and barrels out of the car. 135 135 INT. JEWELRY STORE - DAY The jeweler who bought the diamond from Jason lays it on a velvet pad for Alex, who's posing as the insurance investigator. (CONTINUED) 77. 135 135 CONTINUED: JEWELER (with a shrug) Said it was his mother's. ALEX A seventeen-year-old kid waltzes in with a diamond as big as your toenail, and you don't wonder?? You shouldn't have touched iti You know that! All right, okay. When we recover the rest of the necklace, I'll be back. Do not, do not sell it. I'll see what I can do for you, Raines. JEWELER i appreciate that. 136 136 INT. BAR - DAY Victor and Alex are having a beer near the wide-screen TV. A game is on. ALEX Smart lady. She lets Jason make the sale. They get caught, he's underage, and she don't know a thing. I gotta give her credit. VICTOR You have interesting taste in women. Alex's gaze wanders to the game, but he can't get interested. 137 137 EXT. VICTOR'S CAR - DAY It barrels up the highway, passing the same landmarks Suzanne and Jason did. 138 138 INT. CAR - DAY (TRAVELING) Victor is driving, Alex reading the map. He circles a town name. Victor cranes to see it. 139 139 EXT. DOCKS - LATE DAY A storm is blowing in, and Jason walks quickly along the docks to his boat and swings aboard. 78. 140 140 EXT. BOAT - LATE DAY The waves have already started to slap against the sides of the boat. Jason tosses over his fenders and secures them to protect the boat from the pilings. He starts toward the cabin. The lock has been popped. The door is slightly ajar. He hears a NOISE inside. He draws his knife. 141 141 INT. CABIN - LATE DAY Jason throws open the door. A figure is bent over in the galley. It turns, and by the light of the refrigerator Jason recognizes Henry. JASON Jesus, Henry... What the hell you doing?... How'd you know this was my boat?? HENRY I saw you cast off. Good little sport boat you got, too. Oh, whoa -- hear that? JASON (PARANOID) Where -- what?? Henry rubs his stomach. HENRY Right here, man. I ain't been eating my share since my fishing partner ran off. Without so much as goodbye/good luck. Jason blows out a breath. JASON It's complicated. HENRY (NODDING) Always is. The boat is rockirg now. The WIND has picked up. They hear the CLANKING and RUBBING of the other boats. Jason starts checking all the hasps and latches while Henry eats the sandwich he made. JASON So why are you on the Gulf? (CONTINUED) 79. 141 141 CONTINUED: HENRY My baby finally sank on me. Right at the dock. I thought I'd work

o.j.

How many times the word 'o.j.' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

ye

How many times the word 'ye' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

great

How many times the word 'great' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

never

How many times the word 'never' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

imagination

How many times the word 'imagination' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

rested

How many times the word 'rested' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

information

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upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

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upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

hewn

How many times the word 'hewn' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

scotland

How many times the word 'scotland' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

altogether

How many times the word 'altogether' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

child

How many times the word 'child' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

still

How many times the word 'still' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

believe

How many times the word 'believe' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

memory

How many times the word 'memory' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

fathers

How many times the word 'fathers' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

flowers

How many times the word 'flowers' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

know

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upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

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upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

england

How many times the word 'england' appears in the text?

upon having Punch called back. So Wilkins was forced to swallow his remonstrances and his dignity, and go in pursuit of the objectionable object. Amy came rushing out, with her hair flying and Mabel in her arms; and she and Katy had a real treat of Punch and Judy, with all the well-known scenes, and perhaps a few new ones thrown in for their especial behoof; for the showman seemed to be inspired by the rapturous enjoyment of his little audience of three at the first-floor windows. Punch beat Judy and stole the baby, and Judy banged Punch in return, and the constable came in and Punch outwitted him, and the hangman and the devil made their appearance duly; and it was all perfectly satisfactory, and "just exactly what she hoped it would be, and it quite made up for the muffins," Katy declared. Then, when Punch had gone away, the question arose as to what they should choose, out of the many delightful things in London, for their first morning. Like ninety-nine Americans out of a hundred, they decided on Westminster Abbey; and indeed there is nothing in England better worth seeing, or more impressive, in its dim, rich antiquity, to eyes fresh from the world which still calls itself "new." So to the Abbey they went, and lingered there till Mrs. Ashe declared herself to be absolutely dropping with fatigue. "If you don't take me home and give me something to eat," she said, "I shall drop down on one of these pedestals and stay there and be exhibited forever after as an 'h'effigy' of somebody belonging to ancient English history." So Katy tore herself away from Henry the Seventh and the Poets' Corner, and tore Amy away from a quaint little tomb shaped like a cradle, with the marble image of a baby in it, which had greatly taken her fancy. She could only be consoled by the promise that she should soon come again and stay as long as she liked. She reminded Katy of this promise the very next morning. "Mamma has waked up with rather a bad headache, and she thinks she will lie still and not come to breakfast," she reported. "And she sends her love, and says will you please have a cab and go where you like; and if I won't be a trouble, she would be glad if you would take me with you. And I won't be a trouble, Miss Katy, and I know where I wish you would go." "Where is that!" "To see that cunning little baby again that we saw yesterday. I want to show her to Mabel,--she didn't go with us, you know, and I don't like to have her mind not improved; and, darling Miss Katy, mayn't I buy some flowers and put them on the Baby? She's so dusty and so old that I don't believe anybody has put any flowers for her for ever so long." Katy found this idea rather pretty, and willingly stopped at Covent Garden, where they bought a bunch of late roses for eighteen pence, which entirely satisfied Amy. With them in her hand, and Mabel in her arms, she led the way through the dim aisles of the Abbey, through grates and doors and up and down steps; the guide following, but not at all needed, for Amy seemed to have a perfectly clear recollection of every turn and winding. When the chapel was reached, she laid the roses on the tomb with gentle fingers, and a pitiful, reverent look in her gray eyes. Then she lifted Mabel up to kiss the odd little baby effigy above the marble quilt; whereupon the guide seemed altogether surprised out of his composure, and remarked to Katy,-- "Little Miss is an h'American, as is plain to see; no h'English child would be likely to think of doing such a thing." "Do not English children take any interest in the tombs of the Abbey?" asked Katy. "Oh yes, m'm,--h'interest; but they don't take no special notice of one tomb above h'another." Katy could scarcely keep from laughing, especially as she heard Amy, who had been listening to the conversation, give an audible sniff, and inform Mabel that she was glad _she_ was not an English child, who didn't notice things and liked grown-up graves as much as she did dear little cunning ones like this! Later in the day, when Mrs. Ashe was better, they all drove together to the quaint old keep which has been the scene of so many tragedies, and is known as the Tower of London. Here they were shown various rooms and chapels and prisons; and among the rest the apartments where Queen Elizabeth, when a friendless young Princess, was shut up for many months by her sister, Queen Mary. Katy had read somewhere, and now told Amy, the pretty legend of the four little children who lived with their parents in the Tower, and used to play with the royal captive; and how one little boy brought her a key which he had picked up on the ground, and said, "Now you can go out when you will, lady;" and how the Lords of the Council, getting wind of it, sent for the children to question them, and frightened them and their friends almost to death, and forbade them to go near the Princess again. A story about children always brings the past much nearer to a child, and Amy's imagination was so excited by this tale, that when they got to the darksome closet which is said to have been the prison of Sir Walter Raleigh, she marched out of it with a pale and wrathful face. "If this is English history, I never mean to learn any more of it, and neither shall Mabel," she declared. But it is not possible for Amy or any one else not to learn a great deal of history simply by going about London. So many places are associated with people or events, and seeing the places makes one care so much more for the people or the events, that one insensibly questions and wonders. Katy, who had "browsed" all through her childhood in a good old-fashioned library, had her memory stuffed with all manner of little scraps of information and literary allusions, which now came into use. It was like owning the disjointed bits of a puzzle, and suddenly discovering that properly put together they make a pattern. Mrs. Ashe, who had never been much of a reader, considered her young friend a prodigy of intelligence; but Katy herself realized how inadequate and inexact her knowledge was, and how many bits were missing from the pattern of her puzzle. She wished with all her heart, as every one wishes under such circumstances, that she had studied harder and more wisely while the chance was in her power. On a journey you cannot read to advantage. Remember that, dear girls, who are looking forward to travelling some day, and be industrious in time. October is not a favorable month in which to see England. Water, water is everywhere; you breathe it, you absorb it; it wets your clothes and it dampens your spirits. Mrs. Ashe's friends advised her not to think of Scotland at that time of the year. One by one their little intended excursions were given up. A single day and night in Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon; a short visit to the Isle of Wight, where, in a country-place which seemed provokingly pretty as far as they could see it for the rain, lived that friend of Mrs. Ashe who had married an Englishman and in so doing had, as Katy privately thought, "renounced the sun;" a peep at Stonehenge from under the shelter of an umbrella, and an hour or two in Salisbury Cathedral,--was all that they accomplished, except a brief halt at Winchester, that Katy might have the privilege of seeing the grave of her beloved Miss Austen. Katy had come abroad with a terribly long list of graves to visit, Mrs. Ashe declared. They laid a few rain-washed flowers upon the tomb, and listened with edification to the verger, who inquired,-- "Whatever was it, ma'am, that lady did which brings so many h'Americans to h'ask about her? Our h'English people don't seem to take the same h'interest." "She wrote such delightful stories," explained Katy; but the old verger shook his head. "I think h'it must be some other party, Miss, you've confused with this here. It stands to reason, Miss, that we'd have heard of 'em h'over 'ere in England sooner than you would h'over there in h'America, if the books 'ad been h'anything so h'extraordinary." The night after their return to London they were dining for the second time with the cousins of whom Mrs. Ashe had spoken to Dr. Carr; and as it happened Katy sat next to a quaint elderly American, who had lived for twenty years in London and knew it much better than most Londoners do. This gentleman, Mr. Allen Beach, had a hobby for antiquities, old books especially, and passed half his time at the British Museum, and the other half in sales rooms and the old shops in Wardour Street. Katy was lamenting over the bad weather which stood in the way of their plans. "It is so vexatious," she said. "Mrs. Ashe meant to go to York and Lincoln and all the cathedral towns and to Scotland; and we have had to give it all up because of the rains. We shall go away having seen hardly anything." "You can see London." "We have,--that is, we have seen the things that everybody sees." "But there are so many things that people in general do not see. How much longer are you to stay, Miss Carr?" "A week, I believe." "Why don't you make out a list of old buildings which are connected with famous people in history, and visit them in turn? I did that the second year after I came. I gave up three months to it, and it was most interesting. I unearthed all manner of curious stories and traditions." "Or," cried Katy, struck with a sudden bright thought, "why mightn't I put into the list some of the places I know about in books,--novels as well as history,--and the places where the people who wrote the books lived?" "You might do that, and it wouldn't be a bad idea, either," said Mr. Beach, pleased with her enthusiasm. "I will get a pencil after dinner and help you with your list if you will allow me." Mr. Beach was better than his word. He not only suggested places and traced a plan of sight-seeing, but on two different mornings he went with them himself; and his intelligent knowledge of London added very much to the interest of the excursions. Under his guidance the little party of four--for Mabel was never left out; it was _such_ a chance for her to improve her mind, Amy declared--visited the Charter-House, where Thackeray went to school, and the Home of the Poor Brothers connected with it, in which Colonel Newcome answered "Adsum" to the roll-call of the angels. They took a look at the small house in Curzon Street, which is supposed to have been in Thackeray's mind when he described the residence of Becky Sharpe; and the other house in Russell Square which is unmistakably that where George Osborne courted Amelia Sedley. They went to service in the delightful old church of St. Mary in the Temple, and thought of Ivanhoe and Brian de Bois-Guilbert and Rebecca the Jewess. From there Mr. Beach took them to Lamb's Court, where Pendennis and George Warrington dwelt in chambers together; and to Brick Court, where Oliver Goldsmith passed so much of his life, and the little rooms in which Charles and Mary Lamb spent so many sadly happy years. On another day they drove to Whitefriars, for the sake of Lord Glenvarloch and the old privilege of Sanctuary in the "Fortunes of Nigel;" and took a peep at Bethnal Green, where the Blind Beggar and his "Pretty Bessee" lived, and at the old Prison of the Marshalsea, made interesting by its associations with "Little Dorrit." They also went to see Milton's house and St. Giles Church, in which he is buried; and stood a long time before St. James Palace, trying to make out which could have been Miss Burney's windows when she was dresser to Queen Charlotte of bitter memory. And they saw Paternoster Row and No. 5 Cheyne Walk, sacred forevermore to the memory of Thomas Carlyle, and Whitehall, where Queen Elizabeth lay in state and King Charles was beheaded, and the state rooms of Holland House; and by great good luck had a glimpse of George Eliot getting out of a cab. She stood for a moment while she gave her fare to the cabman, and Katy looked as one who might not look again, and carried away a distinct picture of the unbeautiful, interesting, remarkable face. With all this to see and to do, the last week sped all too swiftly, and the last day came before they were at all ready to leave what Katy called "Story-book England." Mrs. Ashe had decided to cross by Newhaven and Dieppe, because some one had told her of the beautiful old town of Rouen, and it seemed easy and convenient to take it on the way to Paris. Just landed from the long voyage across the Atlantic, the little passage of the Channel seemed nothing to our travellers, and they made ready for their night on the Dieppe steamer with the philosophy which is born of ignorance. They were speedily undeceived! The English Channel has a character of its own, which distinguishes it from other seas and straits. It seems made fractious and difficult by Nature, and set as on purpose to be barrier between two nations who are too unlike to easily understand each other, and are the safer neighbors for this wholesome difficulty of communication between them. The "chop" was worse than usual on the night when our travellers crossed; the steamer had to fight her way inch by inch. And oh, such a little steamer! and oh, such a long night! CHAPTER VI. ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Dawn had given place to day, and day was well advanced toward noon, before the stout little steamer gained her port. It was hours after the usual time for arrival; the train for Paris must long since have started, and Katy felt dejected and forlorn as, making her way out of the terrible ladies'-cabin, she crept on deck for her first glimpse of France. The sun was struggling through the fog with a watery smile, and his faint beams shone on a confusion of stone piers, higher than the vessel's deck, intersected with canal-like waterways, through whose intricate windings the steamer was slowly threading her course to the landing-place. Looking up, Katy could see crowds of people assembled to watch the boat come in,--workmen, peasants, women, children, soldiers, custom-house officers, moving to and fro,--and all this crowd were talking all at once and all were talking French! I don't know why this should have startled her as it did. She knew, of course, that people of different countries were liable to be found speaking their own languages; but somehow the spectacle of the chattering multitude, all seeming so perfectly at ease with their preterits and subjunctives and never once having to refer to Ollendorf or a dictionary, filled her with a sense of dismayed surprise. "Good gracious!" she said to herself, "even the babies understand it!" She racked her brains to recall what she had once known of French, but very little seemed to have survived the horrors of the night! "Oh dear! what is the word for trunk-key?" she asked herself. "They will all begin to ask questions, and I shall not have a word to say; and Mrs. Ashe will be even worse off, I know." She saw the red-trousered custom-house officers pounce upon the passengers as they landed one by one, and she felt her heart sink within her. But after all, when the time came it did not prove so very bad. Katy's pleasant looks and courteous manner stood her in good stead. She did not trust herself to say much; but the officials seemed to understand without saying. They bowed and gestured, whisked the keys in and out, and in a surprisingly short time all was pronounced right, the baggage had "passed," and it and its owners were free to proceed to the railway-station, which fortunately was close at hand. Inquiry revealed the fact that no train for Paris left till four in the afternoon. "I am rather glad," declared poor Mrs. Ashe, "for I feel too used up to move. I will lie here on this sofa; and, Katy dear, please see if there is an eating-place, and get some breakfast for yourself and Amy, and send me a cup of tea." "I don't like to leave you alone," Katy was beginning; but at that moment a nice old woman who seemed to be in charge of the waiting-room appeared, and with a flood of French which none of them could follow, but which was evidently sympathetic in its nature, flew at Mrs. Ashe and began to make her comfortable. From a cupboard in the wall she produced a pillow, from another cupboard a blanket; in a trice she had one under Mrs. Ashe's head and the other wrapped round her feet. "Pauvre madame," she said, "si p le! si souffrante! Il faut avoir quelque chose boire et manger tout de suite." She trotted across the room and into the restaurant which opened out of it, while Mrs. Ashe smiled at Katy and said, "You see you can leave me quite safely; I am to be taken care of." And Katy and Amy passed through the same door into the _buffet_, and sat down at a little table. It was a particularly pleasant-looking place to breakfast in. There were many windows with bright polished panes and very clean short muslin curtains, and on the window-sills stood rows of thrifty potted plants in full bloom,--marigolds, balsams, nasturtiums, and many colored geraniums. Two birds in cages were singing loudly; the floor was waxed to a glass-like polish; nothing could have been whiter than the marble of the tables except the napkins laid over them. And such a good breakfast as was presently brought to them,--delicious coffee in bowl-like cups, crisp rolls and rusks, an omelette with a delicate flavor of fine herbs, stewed chicken, little pats of freshly churned butter without salt, shaped like shells and tasting like solidified cream, and a pot of some sort of nice preserve. Amy made great delighted eyes at Katy, and remarking, "I think France is heaps nicer than that old England," began to eat with a will; and Katy herself felt that if this railroad meal was a specimen of what they had to expect in the future, they had indeed come to a land of plenty. Fortified with the satisfactory breakfast, she felt equal to a walk; and after they had made sure that Mrs. Ashe had all she needed, she and Amy (and Mabel) set off by themselves to see the sights of Dieppe. I don't know that travellers generally have considered Dieppe an interesting place, but Katy found it so. There was a really old church and some quaint buildings of the style of two centuries back, and even the more modern streets had a novel look to her unaccustomed eyes. At first they only ventured a timid turn or two, marking each corner, and going back now and then to reassure themselves by a look at the station; but after a while, growing bolder, Katy ventured to ask a question or two in French, and was surprised and charmed to find herself understood. After that she grew adventurous, and, no longer fearful of being lost, led Amy straight down a long street lined with shops, almost all of which were for the sale of articles in ivory. Ivory wares are one of the chief industries of Dieppe. There were cases full, windows full, counters full, of the most exquisite combs and brushes, some with elaborate monograms in silver and colors, others plain; there were boxes and caskets of every size and shape, ornaments, fans, parasol handles, looking-glasses, frames for pictures large and small, napkin-rings. Katy was particularly smitten with a paper-knife in the form of an angel with long slender wings raised over its head and meeting to form a point. Its price was twenty francs, and she was strongly tempted to buy it for Clover or Rose Red. But she said to herself sensibly, "This is the first shop I have been into and the first thing I have really wanted to buy, and very likely as we go on I shall see things I like better and want more, so it would be foolish to do it. No, I won't." And she resolutely turned her back on the ivory angel, and walked away. The next turn brought them to a gay-looking little market-place, where old women in white caps were sitting on the ground beside baskets and panniers full of apples, pears, and various queer and curly vegetables, none of which Katy recognized as familiar; fish of all shapes and colors were flapping in shallow tubs of sea-water; there were piles of stockings, muffetees, and comforters in vivid blue and red worsted, and coarse pottery glazed in bright patterns. The faces of the women were brown and wrinkled; there were no pretty ones among them, but their black eyes were full of life and quickness, and their fingers one and all clicked with knitting-needles, as their tongues flew equally fast in the chatter and the chaffer, which went on without stop or stay, though customers did not seem to be many and sales were few. Returning to the station they found that Mrs. Ashe had been asleep during their absence, and seemed so much better that it was with greatly amended spirits that they took their places in the late afternoon train which was to set them down at Rouen. Katy said they were like the Wise Men of the East, "following a star," in their choice of a hotel; for, having no better advice, they had decided upon one of those thus distinguished in Baedeker's Guide-book. The star did not betray their confidence; for the H tel de la Cloche, to which it led them, proved to be quaint and old, and very pleasant of aspect. The lofty chambers, with their dimly frescoed ceilings, and beds curtained with faded patch, might to all appearances have been furnished about the time when "Columbus crossed the ocean blue;" but everything was clean, and had an air of old-time respectability. The dining-room, which was evidently of more modern build, opened into a square courtyard where oleanders and lemon trees in boxes stood round the basin of a little fountain, whose tinkle and plash blended agreeably with the rattle of the knives and forks. In one corner of the room was a raised and railed platform, where behind a desk sat the mistress of the house, busy with her account-books, but keeping an eye the while on all that went forward. Mrs. Ashe walked past this personage without taking any notice of her, as Americans are wont to do under such circumstances; but presently the observant Katy noticed that every one else, as they went in or out of the room, addressed a bow or a civil remark to this lady. She quite blushed at the recollection afterward, as she made ready for bed. "How rude we must have seemed!" she thought. "I am afraid the people here think that Americans have _awful_ manners, everybody is so polite. They said 'Bon soir' and 'Merci' and 'Voulez-vous avoir la bont ,' to the waiters even! Well, there is one thing,--I am going to reform. To-morrow I will be as polite as anybody. They will think that I am miraculously improved by one night on French soil; but, never mind! I am going to do it." She kept her resolution, and astonished Mrs. Ashe next morning, by bowing to the dame on the platform in the most winning manner, and saying, "Bon jour, madame," as they went by. "But, Katy, who is that person? Why do you speak to her?" "Don't you see that they all do? She is the landlady, I think; at all events, everybody bows to her. And just notice how prettily these ladies at the next table speak to the waiter. They do not order him to do things as we do at home. I noticed it last night, and I liked it so much that I made a resolution to get up and be as polite as the French themselves this morning." So all the time that they went about the sumptuous old city, rich in carvings and sculptures and traditions, while they were looking at the Cathedral and the wonderful church of St. Ouen, and the Palace of Justice, and the "Place of the Maid," where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burned and her ashes scattered to the winds, Katy remembered her manners, and smiled and bowed, and used courteous prefixes in a soft pleasant voice; and as Mrs. Ashe and Amy fell in with her example more or less, I think the guides and coachmen and the old women who showed them over the buildings felt that the air of France was very civilizing indeed, and that these strangers from savage countries over the sea were in a fair way to be as well bred as if they had been born in a more favored part of the world! Paris looked very modern after the peculiar quaint richness and air of the Middle Ages which distinguish Rouen. Rooms had been engaged for Mrs. Ashe's party in a _pension_ near the Arc d' toile, and there they drove immediately on arriving. The rooms were not in the _pension_ itself, but in a house close by,--a sitting-room with six mirrors, three clocks, and a pinched little grate about a foot wide, a dining-room just large enough for a table and four chairs, and two bedrooms. A maid called Amandine had been detailed to take charge of these rooms and serve their meals. Dampness, as Katy afterward wrote to Clover, was the first impression they received of "gay Paris." The tiny fire in the tiny grate had only just been lighted, and the walls and the sheets and even the blankets felt chilly and moist to the touch. They spent their first evening in hanging the bedclothes round the grate and piling on fuel; they even set the mattresses up on edge to warm and dry! It was not very enlivening, it must be confessed. Amy had taken a cold, Mrs. Ashe looked worried, and Katy thought of Burnet and the safety and comfort of home with a throb of longing. The days that ensued were not brilliant enough to remove this impression. The November fogs seemed to have followed them across the Channel, and Paris remained enveloped in a wet blanket which dimmed and hid its usually brilliant features. Going about in cabs with the windows drawn up, and now and then making a rush through the drip into shops, was not exactly delightful, but it seemed pretty much all that they could do. It was worse for Amy, whose cold kept her indoors and denied her even the relaxation of the cab. Mrs. Ashe had engaged a well-recommended elderly English maid to come every morning and take care of Amy while they were out; and with this respectable functionary, whose ideas were of a rigidly British type and who did not speak a word of any language but her own, poor Amy was compelled to spend most of her time. Her only consolation was in persuading this serene attendant to take a part in the French lessons which she made a daily point of giving to Mabel out of her own little phrase-book. "Wilkins is getting on, I think," she told Katy one night. "She says 'Biscuit glac ' quite nicely now. But I never will let her look at the book, though she always wants to; for if once she saw how the words are spelled, she would never in the world pronounce them right again. They look so very different, you know." Katy looked at Amy's pale little face and eager eyes with a real heartache. Her rapture when at the end of the long dull afternoons her mother returned to her was touching. Paris was very _triste_ to poor Amy, with all her happy facility for amusing herself; and Katy felt that the sooner they got away from it the better it would be. So, in spite of the delight which her brief glimpses at the Louvre gave her, and the fun it was to go about with Mrs. Ashe and see her buy pretty things, and the real satisfaction she took in the one perfectly made walking-suit to which she had treated herself, she was glad when the final day came, when the belated dressmakers and artistes in jackets and wraps had sent home their last wares, and the trunks were packed. It had been rather the fault of circumstances than of Paris; but Katy had not learned to love the beautiful capital as most Americans do, and did not feel at all as if she wanted that her "reward of virtue" should be to go there when she died! There must be more interesting places for live people, and ghosts too, to be found on the map of Europe, she was sure. Next morning as they

severe

How many times the word 'severe' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

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How many times the word 'dead' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

along

How many times the word 'along' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

likened

How many times the word 'likened' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

thinking

How many times the word 'thinking' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

heard

How many times the word 'heard' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

gave

How many times the word 'gave' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

her

How many times the word 'her' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

love

How many times the word 'love' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

arm

How many times the word 'arm' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

exporting

How many times the word 'exporting' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

reason

How many times the word 'reason' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

delayed

How many times the word 'delayed' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

which

How many times the word 'which' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

milton

How many times the word 'milton' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

any

How many times the word 'any' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

suggests

How many times the word 'suggests' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

pay

How many times the word 'pay' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

water

How many times the word 'water' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

begun

How many times the word 'begun' appears in the text?

us a helping hand, and get this young soldier where she wants to be." And soon Benny and baby were eating out of the same dish, and it would have been hard to decide which enjoyed it most. So day after day passed away, and Benny kept putting off the promised visit to Brooklands. Mrs. Fisher was constantly reminding him of his promise, and yet every day he found some fresh excuse for staying away. One afternoon, however, about a fortnight after the accident, he announced to Mrs. Fisher that he was going to pay his promised visit to the lions that afternoon. "That's right, Benny; though I don't think from your own experience that you have any occasion to call the ladies lions," and Mrs. Fisher bent on him a knowing look. "Right you are, mammy; I believe they are mostly angels after all, and perhaps those at Brooklands will be no exception to the rule." "I'm sure they will be kind to you, Benny; so you had better be off and get ready." Half an hour later he came into the sitting-room to Mrs. Fisher, dressed for his visit. "Now, mammy," he said, "am I presentable?" "Go away with you," she said, laughing, though casting at the same time an admiring look at the manly young fellow that stood before her, "you'll be as proud as a peacock soon." "Right you are again. I feel the pride creeping up already. But now for a sight of the angels, so good-bye." And off he started to pay a visit that was to be fraught with vastly more important issues than he had any conception of. CHAPTER XXII. Recognition. "That strain again; it had a dying fall: Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour."--_Tempest_. When our hero reached the bridge that spanned the narrow dell, he paused for a moment and looked over the low parapet at the deep gully that had been worn away by the action of the water, and shuddered as he thought of what would have happened had he failed to grasp the bridle-rein. "I expect this breakneck place will be remedied now," he said, "that a couple of lives have come near being lost over it. If the horse had not been stopped there could not have been the least possible chance of their escape. Well, well, I'm thankful the affair ended in nothing worse than a broken arm." Passing through the lodge gates, he wended his way slowly along the carriage drive towards the house. High above his head the leafy canopy swayed gently in the summer breeze, making pleasant music, and here and there an industrious bee droned dreamily on leaf and flower. From distant fields the sheep-bells jingled gently, and mingled with the whistling of a plough-boy riding home his tired team, while from a neighbouring farmyard the patient cows lowed lazily while waiting to be milked. When Benny reached the door of the Munroe mansion, he felt strongly tempted to turn and go back again; but concluding that such an action would be exceedingly foolish, he seized the bell-handle, gave it a vigorous pull, and waited. "Is Mr. Munroe at home?" he inquired of the servant who opened the door. "Yes; but he's engaged at present. Will you give me your name?" "Bates. But never mind, you need not disturb him; another time will do as well." "I think the master has been expecting you to call," with a glance at Benny's arm. "Very likely. I said I would call some afternoon." "I'm sure he will see you, then. Come this way, please, into the library." Benny followed without a word, and soon found himself surrounded on every side with books. "Oh, my!" he said, "I think I should enjoy spending a fortnight here. I wonder how long it would take me to read all these books, and how much longer to understand them? Ay, that's the rub--understanding and remembering what one does read." Then he ran his eye along shelf after shelf, reading only the titles. "I expect I should feel like a boy in a sweet-shop, not knowing which bottle to start with. Ah, Wordsworth!" as his eye caught the name. "I've heard of him. I wonder what the inside is like?" He must have found something very interesting, for when Mr. Munroe came into the room half an hour later, Benny did not notice his entrance. Mr. Munroe watched him with an amused smile on his face for about five minutes, then said, "I'm glad you've found something to take your fancy, Mr. Bates." Benny started, and blushed to the roots of his hair. In the first place he thought he was alone, and in the second place it was the first time that he had ever been addressed as "mister." "I beg pardon," he stammered out at length. "I did not know you were in the room." "Don't mention it. I'm glad to see that you are fond of books; and I'm glad to see you here." Benny blushed again, but did not reply. "I was afraid you were not coming," went on Mr. Munroe; "but how is your arm?" "Getting on nicely, thank you; the doctor says it will soon be as right as ever." "I'm glad to hear it. It's a mercy we were not every one of us killed; but I'm having a new bridge built. I've been _going_ to have it done for the last ten years, but kept putting it off; however, they are going to start with the job next week." "I'm very glad to hear it," said Benny. "It's not safe as it is at present." "No, no; you're quite right there." Then there was an awkward pause, and Benny began to feel uncomfortable. Mr. Munroe was the first to speak. "I wanted to see you here," he said, "to have a little conversation with you about--about--yourself," bringing out the last word with a jerk. Benny did not know what reply to make to this, so he said nothing. "I understand you have not always lived in the country?" questioned Mr. Munroe. "No, sir; I lived in Liverpool till I was twelve or thirteen years of age." "And how do you like farming?" "Very well, I think; but, really, I've scarcely thought about it." "You are not uncomfortable, then?" "Oh, no! far from it. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher took me in when I was houseless, homeless, friendless, and all but dead, and ever since have treated me with the utmost kindness. I have a better home now than I ever had before in my life, and as for the work I do, I feel that it's but poor compensation for the kindness bestowed upon me." "You have no wish, then, to be anything different to what you are?" "I did not say so, sir; but as I have no expectation of being other than what I am, I try to be content." "Ah, just so; and yet I am told you have paid considerable attention to intellectual pursuits." "I have tried to make the most of my opportunities for acquiring knowledge. I'm fond of books--very; and knowledge I love for its own sake." "Well spoken, Mr. Bates. I like to hear a young man talk in that way. You are a good penman, Mr. Jones tells me." "He has paid me that compliment before, but I am scarcely a judge." "You understand bookkeeping?" "A little." "Double entry?" "Yes." "Quick at accounts?" "I should think not. I have scarcely had sufficient practice." "I suppose if you stay on the farm there is no prospect of your rising to anything higher than a day labourer?" "Not much, I fear." "Well, now, Mr. Bates, I may as well out with it first as last. I am very much pleased with you; I am, indeed. I cannot forget that you saved my life, and the life of my niece; and I am anxious to help you to something better than being a farm labourer if you will let me. Almost any one can do farm work, and I think you are deserving of something better, because you have educated yourself for it. Now, I shall be glad to take you into my city office, and give you a start in life. I commenced as a clerk at the desk, and what I have accomplished there is no reason why you may not. What do you say, now?" "I hardly know what to say," said Benny. "I am very much obliged to you for your kind offer, but I would like to talk with Mr. and Mrs. Fisher about the matter before I come to a decision." "You are quite right, Mr. Bates. Let me know this day week; and now let us go into the drawing-room and see the ladies." Benny followed Mr. Munroe like one in a dream up a broad flight of stairs, and into a large and luxuriantly furnished room. Then commenced the introduction which he had so much dreaded. He bowed to each one in turn, Mr. Munroe mentioning the name of each person; but Benny never heard a word he said, and was never quite certain whether he was bowing to a lady or gentleman. It was over, however, at length, and he sat down with a feeling of infinite relief, and took up a volume of Milton that was lying on a table near him. Then Miss Munroe came forward with the question-- "Are you fond of poetry, Mr. Bates?" "Yes, very." "You know Wordsworth, of course?" "No. I ought to be ashamed to say so, but I do not." And then followed a conversation about poets and authors of various kinds, and Benny soon forgot his shyness, and chatted away with as much freedom as if he had been at Scout Farm. By-and-bye Eva Lawrence came forward shyly, and with a soft blush tinging neck and face; and Miss Munroe rose and left her and Benny together. It was growing dusk by this time, and she sat with her back to the light, so that Benny could scarcely see her face. "I am very grateful to you, Mr. Bates," she began in a low voice, "for your bravery in stopping our horse the other night." Benny started, for something in the voice reminded him again of other days, and he did not reply for a moment; and Eva went on-- "Uncle tells me that if you had not stopped the horse, nothing could have saved us;" and she shuddered slightly. "I am very thankful, indeed, that I have been permitted to be of service to you," began Benny. Then Mrs. Munroe came forward, and the conversation drifted off into matters in general, for which he was very thankful, and ended in Eva being requested to sing. "What are your favourite songs?" asked Mrs. Munroe. "Well, I hardly know," said Benny, blushing. "I know so very few; but the simpler they are the better they please me, as a rule." "Could you mention one or two?" "Yes; there is one called 'Love at Home,' which I like very much." "Oh, that's one of your old songs, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, turning to Eva. "You remember it, don't you?" "Yes, quite well; but I don't care to sing it, aunt, unless Mr. Bates very much wishes to hear it." "I should like to hear it again very much," said Benny; "but don't sing it if you would rather not." "I will do my best, anyhow;" and she got up and went to the piano. "Ring for lights, dear," said Mrs. Munroe, addressing her daughter; "it is getting quite dark." "No, no, aunt, please," said Eva; "I know it quite well without the music, and I think the gloaming is the nicest part of the day;" and she sat down and began to play over the air; then there was a long pause, for Eva's thoughts had wandered away elsewhere. "We are all attention, dear," said Mrs. Munroe. "Excuse me," said Eva; "but I was thinking of something else. I will tell you all about it directly, if you care to hear." Then, clear and sweet, rang out the words, "There is beauty all around, When there's love at home." And Benny felt thankful that the lights had not been brought, for in the gloom he could hide his emotion. When the song was finished, Eva swung herself round on the music-stool, and said, "You will think me very silly, I have no doubt, but I never sing that old song without thinking of what happened years ago." "Dear me, how old you talk!" laughed her cousin. "Well, Dot, I _am_ getting old; but never mind, I was only a little girl then. Pa and I were returning from Chester, and when we landed from the railway-boat, a pale hungry-looking lad came up to pa and asked him to carry his bag. Well, pa had been delayed, and consequently he was in a hurry, so he said 'No' to the boy in a stern voice, and pushed roughly past, and I saw the boy turn away and begin to cry; so scarcely thinking what I was doing, I went to the boy and asked him why he cried, and he said he was hungry and cold, that he had no father or mother, and that he had just buried his little sister, and nobody would employ him; so I gave him a new shilling that pa had given me, and asked him if he was generally on the landing-stage. "'Yes,' he said; and his face brightened wonderfully at the sight of the shilling, and an honest-looking face it was too; 'I'm mostly hereabouts.' "Well," continued Eva, after a pause, "I thought no more about the lad for several days, when one afternoon I was in the dining-room alone, and I began to play and sing 'Love at Home.' When I had finished, I rose to close the window, and there just outside was the very boy I had given the shilling to, his eyes full of tears; but when he saw he was noticed he shrank away, as if ashamed he had been caught listening." "And so you conceived a romantic attachment to the lad?" chimed in Mr. Munroe. "Of course I did, uncle; but to be serious. Teacher had been telling us that we ought to be little missionaries, etc, and I thought this was a likely case to experiment on. So I got pa interested, and in the end the boy was taken into his office, and a better boy pa said he never had. He was honest, truthful, industrious, and seemed very anxious to learn." Then there was another pause, and if Benny ever felt thankful for the darkness, he did then. It was all clear to him now. This, then, was his little angel, grown into a grand lady! and yet she had not forgotten the poor street boy. He would like to have spoken, and put an end to further revelations, but he dared not trust himself to speak. Then Eva went on again: "I am come to the most painful part of the story. This boy had been with pa six months, when one Saturday afternoon he left him in charge of the office, but he had scarcely got a hundred yards from the door when he remembered that he had left a bank note on his desk, and instantly turned back for it. Well, when he got into the office the note was gone. Nobody had been in the office but the boy, and yet he denied ever having seen it. Well, pa was quite in a way. He searched everywhere, but it was not to be found. So the boy was apprehended on suspicion, and taken to the police-station. I was in a great way too, for it was through me that pa had employed the boy; still, I could not believe that he was dishonest. At the trial he was given the benefit of the doubt and dismissed, and has never been seen or heard of since. But the strangest part of all is, about a month later pa wanted to look at the Directory--a book he does not use very often--and the first thing on which his eye fell as he opened the book was the missing bank-note. He _was_ in a way when he came home, and we chatted about nothing else all the evening, for he remembered then very distinctly how he had laid the note on the open book, and before he went out had shut it up quickly, and placed it on the shelf. What troubled pa so much was, the boy had been robbed of his character, for the magistrates had little doubt of his guilt, though there was no positive evidence; and when a lad's character is gone his fortune is gone. All inquiries concerning him have been fruitless. And pa says sometimes that he feels occasionally as if he had driven the poor boy to destruction. So you see whenever I sing that song it always brings back to my mind this painful story." After the story was ended there was silence for a few moments. Benny would liked to have spoken, but his heart was too full--to think that the shadow was lifted from his life at last! He wished he could have been alone for a few moments, that he might out of the fulness of his heart have thanked God. "What a pity," said Mrs. Munroe at length, "that the boy could not be found." Then Benny got up, and said in a voice tremulous with emotion, "I must go now, please; but before I go I would like to say that I am the lost boy." "You!" they all said in chorus. "Yes. I cannot say more now." And he sat down again, and hid his face in his hands. "How strange!" said Eva; "but I see it all now. I could not think who you reminded me of; but you have strangely altered." "Yes, I suppose I have," he said huskily; "and yet, perhaps, not more than you have." "How thankful pa will be!" she said, not heeding his last remark. "I will write and tell him to-morrow." "Well," said Mr. Munroe, speaking at length, "if this is not the strangest ending to a story that I ever came across!" "It's as good as a novel," said Miss Munroe. "I declare it would make a capital tale." "And your father is satisfied that I am honest now?" said Benny, going towards Eva. "Yes; but I don't think that he ever really believed you were dishonest." "And you never doubted my honesty?" "No, never." That was all that passed between them. When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension." "And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly." "He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly." "He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest." "But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong." "He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief." Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last? In a lonely part of the road he paused and listened, but no sound broke the stillness. Above him twinkled the silent stars; around him all nature lay hushed and still. "God is here," he said; and lifting up his face to the sky, and clasping his hands together, he poured out his heart in thanksgiving. "O God!" he said, "I thank Thee for all things; for the sorrow, and pain, and loss, for the darkness through which I have wandered, and for the burdens I have had to bear. Thou hast never forsaken me. Thou hast always been good. I thank Thee for bringing me here, and for the discipline of toil. And now that Thou hast lifted off the cloud that so long has darkened my life, help me to praise Thee, and love Thee more and more. I want to be good, and noble, and true. Help me, O Father, for Thy mercy's sake." Benny slept but little that night. In the long silent hours he lived all his life over again, and wondered at the mercy of God. CHAPTER XXIII. The Question Settled. Life's withered leaves grow green again and fresh with childhood's spring. As I am welcomed back once more within its rainbow ring; The past, with all its gathered charms, beckons me back in joy, And loving hearts and open arms re-clasp me as a boy. --Massey. Next morning Benny was unusually quiet, so much so that Mrs. Fisher thought he was not well; but he insisted that nothing was the matter with him, and she did not like to question him further. But when Mr. Fisher came in to breakfast he began to rally Benny at once, and to ask him how he got on with the grand folks on the previous evening. "Very well, I think," Benny answered, simply; "they all seemed very grateful for the little service I had been able to render them." "And did you find the ladies lions, Benny?" inquired Mrs. Fisher. "Indeed no," said Benny, colouring; "they all of them made me think more of angels than of lions." "Indeed?" said Mrs. Fisher, in a questioning tone. "Yes, they treated me with the utmost kindness, every one of them; but, now I think of it, the ladies always have done so," said Benny, with a laugh. "I should think so," interposed Mr. Fisher; "but Mr. Munroe spoke to me about helping you in some way: did he say anything to you about it?" "Yes; that was what he wanted to see me at his house for principally." "Well, lad, out with it: did he make you an offer of some sort?" "Yes, he made me a very kind offer indeed." "Well, Ben, what was it like? You are precious slow this morning." "Am I?" "You are, indeed. He hasn't proposed suicide to you, has he?" "Not quite. But I had better tell you all that passed between us." "Of course you accepted his offer?" said Mr Fisher, when he had done. "No, I did not." "You didn't?" "No; I said I would like to talk to you about it before coming to a decision." "You needn't fear, lad," said Mr. Fisher, with a little shake in his voice, "that I will put a straw in your way. I shall be very sorry to lose you, I confess, for you have been a great help to me, especially as neither Harry nor George would take to farming, and I know you have been a great comfort to the missus." "That he has," said Mrs. Fisher, as if speaking to herself. "But," continued Mr. Fisher, without heeding his wife's remark, "I have thought for some time past that you might do better for yourself than slaving on a farm all the days of your life; and now that you've got the chance of bettering your condition, my advice is, accept it by all means, and think yourself a lucky dog for getting such an offer." "Oh, yes, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, "I think you had better accept Mr. Munroe's offer: such a chance does not often come twice in a lifetime; and besides, you can still make this your home--that is, you will be able to come on a Saturday night and stay until Monday morning." "Of course you will, Ben; I never thought of that," said Mr. Fisher. "I believe you have got into luck's way at last." "But I have something more to tell you yet," said Benny, looking up with a smile. "More in the way of good luck?" said Mr. Fisher. "Well, I don't think the word luck will apply exactly, and yet what I have to tell you is to me very good news indeed." "Well, lad, out with it: you are beating about the bush in tremendous style this morning, and no mistake." "Oh, you are so impatient!" laughed Benny; "and I declare you look a great deal more curious than Mrs. Fisher does." "Well, and what has that to do with it, you tantalizing young vagabond?" "Oh, a great deal!" said Benny, laughing: "you always profess that curiosity is a feminine weakness which you are a stranger to, and yet here you are as curious and impatient as a schoolgirl!" and Benny laughed again. "Well, Ben," laughed Mr. Fisher, "you have me this time, I'll admit. I am a bit curious; there's no denying it; so let us know what this piece of good news is." "You have heard me speak," said Benny, "of the little girl that gave me my lucky shilling years ago?" "The angel, you mean, Benny," said Mrs. Fisher, with a smile. "Yes, that's who I mean," said Benny, blushing; "and I am not quite certain that she is not an angel yet." "Well, and what of her?" said Mr. Fisher. "I daresay you will think it a strange story, but it seems she is a niece of Mr. Munroe, and is staying at present at Brooklands. She was with Mr. Munroe the night the horse took fright, and so without knowing it I saved the life of the little girl that befriended me in the hour of my greatest need. A little girl no longer, however, for she has grown into a grand lady, and yet she seems as good and kind as ever." "Well, I never!" said Mr. Fisher. "And you recognized each other at once?" inquired his wife. "No, that we didn't: she has grown out of recollection quite; and I suppose I have also." "Well, I should rather think you have," said Mr. Fisher, with a broad grin; "you were a scarecrow when you found your way here, and no mistake." "But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher. "By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar. "Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher. "I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment." "Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him. After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will." Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend--"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?" Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane

pumping

How many times the word 'pumping' appears in the text?