Do not imagine that this is to be a love-story. Very few experiences furnish material for such. Rarer still is the ability to use the material, when it falls in one's way. At any rate, I make no pretension thereto.

But it sometimes happens during the earlier and more tumultuous period of a man's life, that casual occurrences take place, which do not indeed at the time immediately influence his actions or his fortunes, but which in later days may be recalled with interest. Of this sort—if I mistake not, or if I do not mar them in the telling—were my three meetings with Mary Verner. I only met her thrice.

The first time—many a year has sped away since; but it seems, if I shut my mental eye to events and feelings with which the interval has been crowded, and my bodily eye to the library table before me, as if the little scene were being enacted here, now, to-day.

Whence this power of summoning up the ghosts of long ago? Why should the comparatively recent refuse to be stamped upon the memory, and the old impressions refuse to fade? Let philosophers answer; I have no more inclination to write an essay than to tell a love-tale. My purpose I have already stated; though I omitted to mention that I write my own veritable experience—with a change of names, a studied obscurity of dates, and a very slight change otherwise.

The precise year I do not remember, nor, consequently, my own exact age; but I must have been about fourteen. George Verner, Mary's brother—poor fellow! I saw his death registered, the other day, in that odious corner of the Times—was my class-mate and play-mate at a school some few miles from London. He was a good-looking and good-tempered fellow, if not remarkable for his abilities. It chanced that I was—in the choice language of the time and place—"a dab at Latin verses." I helped George once in a while with his exercises; and once in a while with the mince-pies, that his mother's a cook used to send him on the sly. The first time that I saw her—Mary Verner I mean, not the cook—was on a whole holiday; George, who lived in the neighbourhood, had invited me to pass it with him. The old family coach came for us at ten o'clock, with the fat old horses and the fat old family coachman, just for all the world as you may often meet them in the story-books that are called "exceedingly natural," and as you now-a-days rarely find them in real life. Pony-phaetons, britzkas, coupÉs, "Croydon-baskets," and nondescript vehicles that, being neither close carriages nor open, are palmed off as both—these have superseded the full-bodied of my early recollections.

I fancy that I see her now.... You perceive that though I note the modern change in the carriage department, I recognize none such in the phraseology of our tongue. I fancy I see her now. You may, if you please, alter the wording; but that's the plain English of it.

As we drove up the sweep that led from the lodge to the front entrance of a very beautiful suburban villa, I leaned out of the window, with the curiosity natural to a boy of fourteen, on strange ground.

Mary Verner—I knew, by the family likeness, that she was George's elder sister, the moment my eye lighted on her—was trimming or watering her geraniums, in one of the recesses on either side of the porch.

"Here, Mary, here's Cuthbert tertius," said George, running up the steps, and pushing me before him.

"I know him; how d'ye do? I'm glad to see you," was the frank reception, spoken in a clear, round-toned, springy voice, that seemed to drop without effort out of a rose-lipped mouth well-filled with well-knit teeth. And as she spoke smilingly, she opened a pair of large brown eyes that I have since thought—for boys don't know much about the law of colours—were designed to harmonize with what we call a clear brunette complexion. Certainly, if the ballad of "The Nut Brown Mayde" be a model imitation of the antique, Mary Verner might have sat for the portrait.

But it was not so much her eyes that took hold of me, open though they did by degrees, wider and wider, until I wondered when they would cease opening; nor her coal-black hair, dressed as you may see it in the likenesses by Sir Thomas Lawrence; nor her rosy mouth; nor her even teeth; nor her figure full of grace, svelte as the French call it, for which we have no answering word. It was not these, or any of them. It was the carolling of her few words, so free and unconcerned in tone. If I had not met her subsequently, I might have forgotten her looks; I doubt whether her voice could have passed from me.

I need not tax my memory or my invention about the trifling though happy events of that day. It was pretty evident who was mistress of the house, though the fond and proud mother of Mary Verner had the air of a dignified and well-bred woman. Silent or talking, it was Mary who dispensed the honours, at least so far as the stranger was concerned. Probably it was the same with all comers; but this is only a surmise.

Well; the whole holiday came to an end, and we were driven back to the old school by the old coachman, our pockets full of chestnuts, and our boyish hearts full of a sense of supreme enjoyment, such we believe as, in later life, women feel after the best ball of the season, and men after a splendid whitebait dinner at Blackwall. I recollect telling the fellows in the dormitory what a jolly time we had been having, and how capitally George's pony leaped the fence on the common, round the corner, out of sight of the house. By the way, it was partly owing to that pony having engrossed so much of our time, that I had not regularly fallen in love with Mary Verner. Partly, I say, because I was further saved from this predicament by a standing devotion to my pretty cousin Rose, which the temptation had been strong enough, but not long enough to disturb. I never went to George's house again; and ere long the image of his sister was stowed away on one of the upper shelves of my memory. There it might have been smothered in dust, or even converted into it, if chance had not taken it down and given it an airing.

II

Twenty-one—what a change from fourteen! How the pulse of life beats and bounds! I was running a tilt at the pastimes, and doffing aside the cares of early manhood, when for the second time, I came across Mary Verner. Plump upon her, I would say, if I thought you would pardon the coarseness of the expression. At any rate—and to be genteel—it was unexpectedly. Twenty-one gives very few thoughts to fourteen. It may be a much longer distance thither, when one starts at seventy to go back; but it is surprising how much more quickly you get over the intermediate ground. Let that be; only I don't believe I had given a thought to Mary Verner, since the week or two that followed my first interview with her.

"Do come and dine with us on Monday," said my friend Mrs. F.; "there will be a very charming girl here, whom you would like to see."

"Positively?"

"Sans faute!"

"Then keep a place for me; I'll come."

I went. It was a formal dinner-party. In the drawing-room, before going to table, Mrs. F. came across to me.

"Now I'll introduce you to our belle of the evening. You may escort her down to dinner. There she is, half-hidden behind that drapery. You can't have noticed her."

"Miss Verner, let me present Mr. Cuthbert."

I should have recognized Mary Verner, as she looked up, with those widely-opening brown eyes of hers, if her name had not been mentioned. As it was, it was quite natural for me to remark that I believed I had had the pleasure of seeing Miss Verner before.

And so in a few moments we were gossipping cosily about "old times," as we, not very old people, called them.

The beautiful child had expanded into a very lovely woman, preserving still the same characteristics of person and expression. The charm of her voice was the same. You may be sure that when seated by her side, with the becoming glow of lamp-light overhead heightening, if possible, those attractions which I rather hint than attempt to describe—you may be sure, I say, that I found her very captivating.

We talked of her brother George; of the pleasant house wherein I first met her, and which was still her home; of her amiable and lady-like mother who was still living; of the old pony now gathered to his sires; of the old chestnut-trees even—in short, of all those unimportant associations, out of which, under such circumstances, one endeavours to establish a trivial and flitting but very pleasant little bond of sympathy.

I declare I was half ready to fall head over ears in love with her. And she took it all with a simple unaffected grace, that seemed to be her very nature.

But we did not have all the talk to ourselves. I had not the presumption to engross her entirely. Nor would it have been possible. She was—there is no need to go over it all again—she was Mary Verner.

Nearly opposite to us at table sat a Mr. Easton, a young barrister—young, that is professionally, for he was apparently a man of thirty or thereabouts. He would not have been singled out as a lady-killer, for he was none of your regular Adonises, such as hang by dozens, in portraiture, upon the walls of our Royal Academy Exhibitions, and lounge complacently in our Fop's Alley at the Opera. When, however, the excitement of conversation—in which he took an active and most intelligent part—developed the fine play of his features, you would have pronounced him a man who added, to a cultivated and superior mind, a look that bespoke such gift. In fact there was a manly air about him, that claimed respect, if it did not challenge attention.

About the time when I made this notable discovery, I recollected that at the moment of my introduction to Miss Verner, Mr. Easton was gossipping with her in the secluded corner half-hidden by the drapery, though he moved away, with perfect good breeding, to give place to the new-comer.

About this time, too, there began—at which end of the table, I forget—an occasional play of badinage, whereof Mr. Easton was the subject. For a grave and earnest man, he seemed to receive it all in exceedingly good part. To my surprise also—to say nothing of annoyance—my fair neighbour was brought, after a while, within its scope. Neither did she—I was forced to acknowledge within myself—evince either mauvaise honte or sensitiveness. The truth was plain. They were engaged.

As a child's card-built house tumbles down when the table is shaken, so down went one of the prettiest little castles-in-the-air, that ever simpleton built out of cards of his own shaping.

Down it went; though I flatter myself I was too much a man of the world, to let a glimpse of its dislocated plan be apparent. Indeed, in a few seconds, I had rallied myself on my own absurdity; gulped down my disappointment; and resigned myself again to the charm that Mary Verner still shed around her, if its tint was somewhat changed. Besides, I availed myself of the sudden opportunity thus afforded, for testing the practical value of one of my favourite theories, when I was a young fellow and affected to bask in the sunshine of human nature: to wit, that, apart from serious love-making, when a woman in either married or betrothed, she has therefrom an additional feather in her social cap. So have I found it through life—always provided that the attractive and companionable qualities were otherwise in abundance. And this theory has at least given heartiness to my good wishes for my fairer acquaintances and friends. Is it not better to come to such a philosophical conclusion, than to be always envying other people's good fortune?

Shifting, therefore, my ground, I was rapidly possessed by a strong interest in Miss Verner's future welfare—much of which was undoubtedly genuine.

Delicately, and by gently leading her on, I gathered something of the story of her courtship, though I must needs confess that I cannot now call to mind a word of it. It may be of more interest to state that she was to make Mr. Easton the happiest of men, within six weeks or so of that time; and that the honey-moon was to be spent in a ramble on the Continent. Very emphatically and very sincerely did I wish her a pleasant time of it.

But the most agreeable evenings will come to a close. This one—with its revival of a boy's casual acquaintance, with its momentary castle-building, and its subsequent benevolence of feeling—this one, like all others, passed away. It did not die out, as the fag-end of a dinner-party sometimes will; it was cut short to me by the "good night!" of Mary Verner, as she took her departure, leaning on Mr. Easton's arm, in the train of an elderly female relative.

When the drawing-room door closed upon her graceful figure, I felt for a moment as though the gas had been suddenly turned off. I recollect, however, the hostess's observation, dropped to the accompaniment of a playfully malicious smile:

"Didn't I tell you, you would like my friend Mary Verner?"

"Yes," was the reply, "and I have passed a most delightful evening; but I don't think it quite fair, Mrs. F."—here there was a terrible smash of the theory—"to open the gates of Paradise, and then slam them in a poor fellow's face?"

I was to have gone, that night, to a ball in Devonshire Place, expressly to meet—Never mind; I was not in the humour for dancing or flirting. I went straight home, and to bed. I tossed about a good deal, and finally dreamed about George and the pony, and that I was climbing the old chestnut-trees. As for Mary Verner, I couldn't in my sleep conjure up her image. When I thought I had it—as is the way in dreams, you know, if you ever studied them—I couldn't get nearer to her than the plaguy old family coachman. It was only when broad awake, the next morning, that I found myself strongly impressed by this, my second meeting. But again—such is life and such is youth—the impression was soon stowed away on an upper shelf in memory's garret.

III.

Two years later; two years and two months.

Did you ever notice the marked difference between youth and old age—aye, and middle age, too—in the matter of reading newspapers? We—I speak of myself now as the writer—who are in the vanguard of the march through life, must have our Times or our Chronicle, as regularly as our morning meal. Is it, as some spitefully assert, that we grow more self-complacent as we pore over the misfortunes or the errors of our fellows; or is it, that we seek refuge from the cares and disappointments of our own lot, in a close scrutiny of that of all the world beside, with the minutiÆ of which the diligent, prying, gossipping press so unceasingly plies our curiosity? It is folly, perhaps, to raise the question, since this is not the place to discuss it; though it were not far from the truth to attribute much of the pettiness of our race, in these days, to this habit of abandoning our thoughts and impulses to the guidance of journalists who trade in them.

I only mean to say that being still youthful at twenty-three, I "cared for none of these things," As for heeding who was born, or buried, or married, beyond the circle of one's own intimate connections—I should as soon have set to work to trace the pedigree of a New Zealander. Probably, I heard in due time that Mary Verner had become Mrs. Easton. Certainly I did not learn it from the usual printed record. In short, I then very seldom read newspapers at all; and this I beg you to bear in mind. What a shocking ignoramus I should be voted, if I were to say so of this present time.

That, too, was the season of darkness, ere Albert Smith was the Lecturer par excellence; ere Oxford and Cambridge men, returning from their "long-vacation" rambles, disputed in the daily papers their respective prowess in scaling the precipices of Monte Rosa, or discovering new pathways up Mont Blanc. How changed are we to-day! Save for the voluminous records of the Crimean war, what Mamelons and Malakoffs would the pedestrians, Smith and Jones, be now fighting over, in the Times!

Nevertheless, though they made less fuss about it, Englishmen were then, as now, prone to scurrying off to Switzerland in the Autumn—some in the true cockney spirit—some because they found there the most sublime of all spectacles, together with the most exhilarating exercise for the body, and relaxation of mind in its fullest sense. With myself it amounted to a passion; "Cuthbert's hobby" it was dubbed by acquaintances, who could eke out delight from Leamington and Cheltenham.

Profiting by the leisure afforded me during successive seasons, I had become tolerably familiar with the Alps; with what exquisite and inexhaustible enjoyment I am not going here to trouble you. But August had come round again. The knapsack was stitched, where it wanted mending. The Alpenstock was dragged to light, from the lumber-room. The thick-soled gaiter-boots were freshly studded with hobnails. The well-worn Swiss map was conned over once more, and a new route, leading over yet untrodden passes, was set down in the Autumnal programme.

Suddenly I changed my mind—under the influence of an hour's talk with an enthusiastic mountaineer—who had, during the previous season, explored the Pyrenees. "You may not find," said he, "quite so much grandeur; but the valleys are decidedly more picturesque, the foliage more varied, the very tints of the mountains glowing with warmer colours." Thereupon, a change of plan and passport. Behold me at Cauterets in France, instead of at Grindelwald in Switzerland!

Were my object merely to fill a certain number of pages, I might here descant at length upon the comparative beauties of the Alps and the Pyrenees—the latter having, at present, the advantage of not being done to death by tourists. But I will abstain. I will speak only of one day's adventure; the day whereon, for the third and last time, I found myself associated with Mary Verner.

Cauterets may be a pleasant place enough to those who bathe in, or imbibe for medicinal purposes, the mineral waters that have made its fame. It is finely placed too, pitched in, as it were, into a nook, with lofty peaks and fringes of fir forests over-topping its somewhat formal streets. It does not, however, offer much attraction to the connoisseur in fine scenery. One excursion alone is to be made. Its objects are the Pont d'Espagne and the Lac de Gaube. The former is a group of pine trunks bridging a cascade. The latter is a tarn at the foot of the glaciers of the Vignemale, which, you know, is one of the mountain-monarchs hereabouts.

Before proceeding further, I may mention that I am enabled to set down my reminiscences of this particular time and place, by reference to my rough notes penned on the spot, journal-wise. The little memorandum book lies under my hand, with its pages written in ink of various tints, as hotel, or cabaret, or hut furnished the material at the moment. I like to preserve these records. Such souvenirs are the bonnes fortunes of those whose travels are ended. You see that I incline to be sentimental as I draw towards the dÉnouement of my story.

Heavens and earth, how it rains in the Pyrenees! What a young deluge swept down the steep stone-guttered pavements, on the morning of the 29th of August! Still, I did not choose to devote more than one day to the neighbourhood of Cauterets; and so, having made, from my window, a few such profound observations as the one just set down, I ordered a horse and guide. The polite waiter was astonished, and protested, to the extent of two or three "Mais Monsieur!" The guide thought the storm would expend itself in twenty-four hours; but on my hinting that the path would not be difficult to find, without his aid, nor impracticable, on foot, he subsided, with an air of conviction, into the accustomed "Bien, Monsieur!"

And so we started. I had borrowed one of the long, thick, hooded Spanish cloaks, commonly used in that region which borders on Spain; and a very effectual protection it was against the steady down-pouring of the rain. But what is perfect in this world? A German counterpane, on a summer's night, is not more oppressive than was this excellent protection from the wet.

Handing, then, the heavy encumbrance to the guide, I was drenched to the skin in about two minutes. This was a comfort. It settled the point. I dislike uncertainty. I could be at my ease, and look about. Remember it was yet August.

And the Val de JÉret, up which I was riding, was so grandly gloomy; the state of the weather excluding all but close views! My note-book thus speaks of it, the writer never dreaming that his impressions would be told to the readers of a newspaper, with many of whom Niagara and Montmorenci are familiar sights: "The valley presents a succession of splendid waterfalls; and, singularly enough, as your route lies upwards, they increase in size and beauty, from the Mahourat, the first, to the Pont d'Espagne, the last and most celebrated. The three intervening, that are dignified with names, are the CÉrizet, the BoussÉ, and the Pas de l'Ours. Besides these, there are an infinity of smaller falls, the whole course of the Gave (or torrent) de Marcadaou—along which the path lies—boiling over broken masses of rock. The eye is charmed by endless variety, amid perpetual repetition. The deluge of rain, which covered the lofty rocks on each side of the defile with clouds, had gloriously swollen the turbulent waters. I know of nothing in natural scenery—thus the manuscript rather enthusiastically proceeds—that impresses one so forcibly as a cascade of large dimensions. By large I mean broad, not lofty. The effect is apt to diminish, with vast height. These, in the Val de JÉret, I found absolutely bewitching; for is it not a sort of infatuation, by which we are beguiled into drawing nearer and nearer, until you almost touch the foaming sheets as they flurry past, and are yourself driven back, for your pains, half blind and breathless? One fine waterfall would be enough to digest in a day. During these two or three hours, I had a very feast of them."

If I extract this somewhat rhapsodical passage, it is to show that my inward man was not dampened, by the dampening process externally applied. On the contrary, I am disposed to be jubilant, almost defiant, in proportion to the fury of the storm; that is to say when no serious personal inconvenience is caused by stress of weather. In a mountain region too, above all others, clouds play so great a part in the combination of fine effects, that I have many times fairly welcomed a tempestuous spell.

Thus from the Pont d'Espagne I continued my ride an hour or so further, in order to reach the Lac de Gaube, knowing perfectly well that the chances were a hundred to one against my getting a glimpse of the glaciers of the Vignemale, at whose feet this small sheet of water is imbedded. Small it may well be termed, for it is not quite three miles in circumference, though the largest lake in the Pyrenees.

On the rocky shore where the rough pathway terminates, stands, or stood at the period of which I write, a solitary hut. There, during the short summer season, might be found a family who earned a scanty subsistence, by catching the lake trout and serving them up to chance travellers; by rowing, in the solitary punt, any one who cared to paddle about the dark waters; or by escorting any still more adventurous stranger desirous of exploring the glaciers above-named, or ascending the lower heights of the Vignemale.

Stepping up to the door of this cabin, I entered into conversation with its chief occupant, who probably combined in his own person the various offices of restaurateur, fisherman, muleteer, guide, and smuggler. Possibly I libel him in the last respect; but along that frontier of France and Spain, it is rare to find a mountaineer guiltless of the contraband trade.

A visitor on such a day was a welcome sight to the poor fellow, who was eloquent in regrets that his mountain and his glaciers and his other local points of interest were all wrapped in the impenetrable mist. He seemed, I remember now, to care more about it than I did; for I had revelled in the exhibition of cascades, and was rather tickled at the notion of having come up to this lone and savage spot, where nothing whatever was to be seen.

If a spirit had whispered me, that the moment of my third rencontre was close at hand, I should have smiled incredulously.

The fog lifted. I could see to a distance of half a dozen yards.

"What's that?"

"If Monsieur will give himself the trouble of walking up to it, he will see."

It was on a jutting promontory of rock, close at hand. A small enclosure was railed in. It held what was obviously a monumental tablet, in white marble, but discoloured by exposure.

"A favourite poodle, perhaps, of the Duchesse de Berri—or one of our eccentric Englishmen doing honour to a Pyrenean bear!" Such I thought it might be, as I carelessly lounged up to it, and stooped to read the inscription.

It was in French and English. I took no copy of the words. But it was placed there in memory of Mr. and Mrs. Easton, drowned in the lake, within one month of their marriage, on the 20th of September, 18—! The facts were simply stated. I wish the record of them had been placed a little further off from the rendezvous of the thoughtless and light-hearted.

This was the last of my associations with her. But it would not interest the reader, to be told with what feelings of surprise and sorrow I thus learned the close of a career, which bid so fair for happiness and usefulness. Poor Mary Verner!

Before setting-off on my return to Cauterets, I heard, from the lips of the man with whom I had been conversing, the sad particulars of this harrowing event. Never could the common phrase, that speaks of "painful curiosity," have been more applicable than it was in my case, as I stood and listened to him. Poor fellow; he had been an eye-witness. He saw my emotion. "Monsieur knew the young couple?"—thus did he break the thread of his little narrative, more than once.

I cannot pretend to set down his words. This is the substance of what he told me.

The season was nearly over. The weather was splendidly fine, but very cold. Travellers were scarcely expected; when on that brilliant September morning, up rode the bride and bridegroom. After resting awhile, they took the single skiff that was there, Mr. Easton offering to row his wife across the lake, to which she very reluctantly assented. I recollect the narrator dwelling on this fact.

The shore shelves off very rapidly. The water, in some parts, reaches to the depth of three or four hundred feet. At all times it is of marvellous clearness—as I observed myself—and, except during the heats of summer, so piercingly cold, as to be altogether unbearable to the swimmer.

My informant helped them into the boat. Mr. Easton was evidently used to the handling of oars. The tragedy was immediately—perhaps one should say, ostensibly—caused by those two qualities of the water of the Lac de Gaube, to which I have just alluded—its clearness and its coldness.

The boat was at some considerable distance from the shore. The boatman was watching them. Suddenly, Mr. Easton paused in his rowing. He and his wife looked over the side, as though guessing at the depth. Mr. Easton then stood up, and plunged one oar downwards into the water, with the confident action of a man who is certain that he shall touch the bottom. The transparency had deceived him. His oar met no resistance; and he himself plunged heavily overboard. Such at least was the impression of the boatman on land; and he could scarcely be mistaken.

So far as he could see, Mr. Easton did not rise to the surface. The cold numbed him, and he sunk, not to rise again. The bereaved wife stood upright for a moment in the boat, gazing on the water that had swallowed up her husband before her eyes. Then she too was seen to be in it; but not one of the two or three, who witnessed the fearful sight, could tell whether she threw herself in, or whether she fell in, senseless. That secret will never be solved; and what matters it to us, though the manner of the widowed wife's death was so remarkable, that I cannot refrain from mentioning it? In talking it over, they agreed that she did not sink at all. As she fell, the water inflated her dress, and she was buoyed-up, floating; though there was no sign of life or movement on her part, observable to the agonized spectators. After a time—I forget whether it was half an hour, or half a day—the remains of what once was loved as Mary Verner were wafted tranquilly to the shore. Assistance also having been procured, Mr. Easton's body was dragged-up from the bottom of the lake. One grave in a church-yard in Essex now holds the coffins of the ill-fated pair.

And was there no effort at rescue? Could nothing be done? This idea will have crossed the reader's mind. It suggested many questions to me, with which I plied the boatman, who seemed to feel keenly in them the bitterness of unintended reproach. But his explanation—grievous as it was—was satisfactory. There was no boat, no raft, no means of reaching the spot. "Two of us," said he, "plunged up to our necks into the water, in the irrepressible desire to swim out to them; though we knew that it was certain death to go beyond our depth. Besides, Monsieur," he added with touching simplicity, "I can't help fancying that the poor lady was dead before she fell out of the boat. Monsieur knew her; doesn't he think that her heart was already broken?"

"God help her, and all of us, my brave friend; I have not the smallest doubt of it!"