Short Cruises

"What d'ye mean Miss?" demanded the farmer, hotly.

"Don't speak like that before his lordship, father," said his daughter, hastily. "I'm not blaming you; you're no worse than the other men about here. You haven't had an opportunity of learning before, that's all. It isn't your fault."

"Learning?" bellowed the farmer, turning an inflamed visage upon his apprehensive guest. "Have you noticed anything wrong about my behavior?"

"Certainly not," said his lordship, hastily.

"All I know is," continued Miss Rose, positively, "I wish you were going to stay here another six months for father's sake."

"Look here—" began Mr. Rose, smiting the table.

"And Annie's," said Jane, raising her voice above the din. "I don't know which has improved the most. I'm sure the way they both drink their tea now—"

Mr. Rose pushed his chair back loudly and got up from the table. For a moment he stood struggling for words, then he turned suddenly with a growl and quitted the room, banging the door after him in a fashion which clearly indicated that he still had some lessons to learn.

"You've made your father angry," said his lordship.

"It's for his own good," said Miss Rose. "Are you really sorry to leave us?"

"Sorry?" repeated the other. "Sorry is no word for it."

"You will miss father," said the girl.

He sighed gently.

"And Annie," she continued.

He sighed again, and Jane took a slight glance at him cornerwise.

"And me too, I hope," she said, in a low voice.

"Miss you!" repeated his lordship, in a suffocating voice. "I should miss the sun less."

"I am so glad," said Jane, clasping her hands; "it is so nice to feel that one is not quite forgotten. Of course, I can never forget you. You are the only nobleman I have ever met."

"I hope that it is not only because of that," he said, forlornly.

Miss Rose pondered. When she pondered her eyes increased in size and revealed unsuspected depths.

"No-o," she said at length, in a hesitating voice.

"Suppose that I were not what I am represented to be," he said slowly.

"Suppose that, instead of being Lord Fairmount, I were merely a clerk."

"A clerk?" repeated Miss Rose, with a very well-managed shudder. "How can I suppose such an absurd thing as that?"

"But if I were?" urged his lordship, feverishly.

"It's no use supposing such a thing as that," said Miss Rose, briskly; "your high birth is stamped on you."

His lordship shook his head. "I would sooner be a laborer on this farm than a king anywhere else," he said, with feeling.

Miss Rose drew a pattern on the floor with the toe of her shoe.

"The poorest laborer on the farm can have the pleasure of looking at you every day," continued his lordship passionately. "Every day of his life he can see you, and feel a better man for it."

Miss Rose looked at him sharply. Only the day before the poorest laborer had seen her—when he wasn't expecting the honor—and received an epitome of his character which had nearly stunned him. But his lordship's face was quite grave.

"I go to-morrow," he said.

"Yes," said Jane, in a hushed voice.

He crossed the room gently and took a seat by her side. Miss Rose, still gazing at the floor, wondered indignantly why it was she was not blushing. His Lordship's conversation had come to a sudden stop and the silence was most awkward.

"I've been a fool, Miss Rose," he said at last, rising and standing over her; "and I've been taking a great liberty. I've been deceiving you for nearly a fortnight."

"Nonsense!" responded Miss Rose, briskly.

"I have been deceiving you," he repeated. "I have made you believe that I am a person of title."

"Nonsense!" said Miss Rose again.

The other started and eyed her uneasily.

"Nobody would mistake you for a lord," said Miss Rose, cruelly. "Why, I shouldn't think that you had ever seen one. You didn't do it at all properly. Why, your uncle Cray would have done it better." Mr. Cray's nephew fell back in consternation and eyed her dumbly as she laughed. All mirth is not contagious, and he was easily able to refrain from joining in this.

"I can't understand," said Miss Rose, as she wiped a tear-dimmed eye—"I can't understand how you could have thought I should be so stupid."

"I've been a fool," said the other, bitterly, as he retreated to the door. "Good-by."

"Good-by," said Jane. She looked him full in the face, and the blushes for which she had been waiting came in force. "You needn't go, unless you want to," she said, softly. "I like fools better than lords."

ALF'S DREAM

"I've just been drinking a man's health," said the night watchman, coming slowly on to the wharf and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand; "he's come in for a matter of three 'undred and twenty pounds, and he stood me arf a pint—arf a pint!"

He dragged a small empty towards him, and after planing the surface with his hand sat down and gazed scornfully across the river.

"Four ale," he said, with a hard laugh; "and when I asked 'im—just for the look of the thing, and to give 'im a hint—whether he'd 'ave another, he said 'yes.'"

The night watchman rose and paced restlessly up and down the jetty.

"Money," he said, at last, resuming his wonted calm and lowering himself carefully to the box again—"money always gets left to the wrong people; some of the kindest-'arted men I've ever known 'ave never had a ha'penny left 'em, while teetotaler arter teetotaler wot I've heard of 'ave come in for fortins."

It's 'ard lines though, sometimes, waiting for other people's money. I knew o' one chap that waited over forty years for 'is grandmother to die and leave 'im her money; and she died of catching cold at 'is funeral. Another chap I knew, arter waiting years and years for 'is rich aunt to die, was hung because she committed suicide.

It's always risky work waiting for other people to die and leave you money. Sometimes they don't die; sometimes they marry agin; and sometimes they leave it to other people instead.