HESTER'S HISTORY.

A NEW SERIAL TALE.

CHAPTER XXII. A LITTLE WHISPER.

MISS MADGE put her finger on her lips, and
closed the door, walking backward and forward
across the floor on tiptoe. Hester had retreated
to the fireside, and stood there, a little horror-
stricken, yet with a fixed determination in the
midst of her confusion, not to put much faith
in what Miss Madge might confide to her. A
recollection came struggling to her mind of
words which Lady Humphrey had spoken to
her about former friendships, and the overturning
of such friendships, between herself and
this family at Glenluce. Enemies, said Lady
Humphrey, had made mischief. Evil tales had
been told and believed. Hard things might be
said. Let Hester not hearken to them. And
in the same breath Lady Humphrey had
announced her intention of watching over the
troubled fortunes of Sir Archie Munro. Such
generous rendering of good for evil had in
one instant kindled Hester's enthusiasm, and
exalted her benefactress to a place in her
estimation which the lady had not before, and in
no other manner could ever have attained to.
To take her down from that place, she having
been there so well established, would have
given Hester the most exquisite pain, even
though she had not time, at this moment, to
realise, or even think of all that such dispossession
might mean and entail. Evil tales were
going to be told, hard things about to be said.
Let Hester close her ears. Let Hester not
hearken to them.

"Miss Madge," said Hester, a little sternly,
"Lady Humphrey has been my friend. I ought
not, and I will not, hear anything against
her."

"Very nice in you, my dear. I like you for
it, and I forgive you that little pertness on
account of it. But all the same, my dear, I
intend you to hear my little whisper. I will
put you on your guard. An innocent young
thing connected with such a woman ought to
be put upon her guard. She writes to you, my
dear, and you write to her. An innocent—
young—thing!"

Miss Madge repeated the last words slowly,
and with a tender meditating air seldom
observed in the flighty lady's manner. She had
taken Hester's hands and held her off a little,
and looked her up and down, and then glanced
at the fire with a sigh, as she had a trick of
doing when especially moved in her heart
towards the girl.

"Sit down, my dear, and make yourself
happy, and don't look so exactly like as if I
were Queen Eleanor standing over you with a
drawn sword and a cup of poison. It is only
a little whisper, and you need not believe it if
you don't like it. I am not going to ask you
to believe it. People who think proper to do
so may believe, but for you it will be enough
just to hear it. It will be painful to you, I
know; but if you had to get both your eyes put
out in order to save your life, your friends
would feel bound to see it done. You will
condemn my little whisper, deny it, and detest it;
but you will never get it out of your memory,
my dear. You may hunt it into the farthest
closet, whip it down, and starve it. You may
pile all your choicest furniture, and all your
worst rubbish—if you have got any—on its
head, but you will never get rid of it while you
live. It will be there as your guardian, you
little simple Fairlocks! better than a bull-dog
at your gate, than a file of armed men round
your door!"

It was getting dark in the tower-room at this
moment, and the firelight had got possession
of Miss Madge's grotesque shadow, and was
making with it a weird pantomime on the wall;
was sending it flying off on little wild excursions
across the length of the ceiling, or gleefully
flattening it down into a struggling heap against
the scanty folds of the tapestry at the window.
Hester's shadow lurked aside a little at her own
elbow, out of the way of the violence of such
play; only, at the flickering of one flame, it
kept starting, starting, like something wincing
in pain.

"Remember, my dear, that it is a secret. We
do not tell it about the world. We never mention
it even here amongst ourselves. If you were
Miss Golden this moment, and were to ask me,
'Pray what do these hints about Lady
Humphrey mean?' I should say, 'Nothing but
nonsense,' and screw up my mouth and walk out of
the room. Miss Golden is intimate with friends
of Lady Humphrey's in London. We do not
want to persecute Lady Humphrey. We only
want to forget Judith Blake. But you, my