THE

SECOND MRS. TILLOTSON.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "NEVER FORGOTTEN."

BOOK II.

CHAPTER VI. THE END OF A LOVE.

THAT visit to St. Alans was before Tillotson
always. It had, indeed, coloured his life strangely,
and no one could guess how much. The men
who met him in business always knew that he
was "a curious, mooning, stand-off man," and
those who knew him still better, said "the
fact was, you know, he had got a blow some
years before, a domestic business, which he had
never got over." But none of them could
divine the new trouble he had brought away
with him. Down at that little, remote, dried-up,
crusted, rusted little town, he had left behind
him, as in an ancient, old-fashioned, but precious
little shrine, his new-found hopes, something
that lived and burned, something that had light
and warmth, to which his heart was drawn back
with an inexpressible yearning, as he now walked
among the cold corridors of the world, and laid
his fingers on what were to him merely cold
statues. He had found new thoughts, new
interest, something that seemed a complement
to, and that would repair his own jagged and
shattered poor heart, something that seemed to
whisper to him, "Live once more, enjoy light
and the cheerful fires of life. You are young,
and happiness may come back once more. The
past is not so hopelessly gone!"

Strange to say, the more the distance
increased, the picture he had left behind increased
in all the glow and intensity of colour and
happiness. Between his eyes and the cold rows
of figures and dry reports, now becoming more
and more barren every hour, it stole in softly,
and finally took the place of all else. From
the board-room—from the Babel of discussion
over discounts and exchange, with glib tongues
and wits keen as razors, and sharp eyes all about
him, he alone abstracted, was far away, looking
back to that soft picture of the golden-haired girl
floating so tranquilly from duty to duty. And
when he came back to what was about him, he
found himself as in a jail, with windows barred,
the iron at his very heart. Some strange voice
seemed to whisper to him that happiness was
now finally gone from him for ever, the very
last chance that was open to him, and that now
he had best cast himself into the arms of
despair.

This, after all, was but a morbid tone of
thought, wrought up daily more and more by
constant harping and dwelling on the one theme.
His health was poor at all times, and the habit
of living alone worked on him still more.

"Why," he often said, in his lonely room,
pacing up and down, as his habit was—"why
could I not have been left as I was? I was
content with my old stock of miseries; this dull
preying on them and turning them over had become
habitual. I was content with that wretchedness,
and would have gone to my grave satisfied with
my round of trouble. But now, to have this
glimpse of paradise presented only to be snatched
from me, which would have restored me to
sensible, practical, peaceful life, made me useful,
given me tranquillity—to have this hope taken
from me! Surely it had been better to have
been left as I was with all my old misery!"

This was nearly his nightly meditation in his.
gaunt room in the bachelor's house as he paced
up and down—a foolish, profitless parading that
would end foolishly, as a friendly doctor warned
him; not very profitable for his soul, either, as
a friendly spiritual physician would have told
him, from pulpit or confessional—a state of mind
certainly to be pitied.

"My dear Tillotson," said Mr. Bowater to
him, clearing away some specks from his own
coat with the double glass, " I want to speak to
you. You see, I remark you are not in good
tone latterly. Now, really you should make a
push for it. We all have our battle of life, you
know, and we all know that you have your peck
of troubles." Mr. Bowater pronounced this
phrase with great unction, as if it were part of
that peck of malt which Willie had brewed.
"A peck of troubles. I know———"

"Yes," said Mr. Tillotson, sadly; "but
please———"

"Ah! but yes, though," said Mr. Bowater.
"I assure you there is but one remedy—work.
Keep the mind going, my dear friend. When I
missed the Medway Dock estate—offered to me,
I give you my honour and soul, for literally next
to a song (you know what a property it is now!)
—I was going to stint myself—give up going
out to dinners, and that sort of thing—when a
friend recommended business—hard, earnest