Amethyst: The Story of a Beauty

“Help you? Oh, my love, is it possible that you love me? I have hoped it – half believed it – but now it seems beyond belief.”

“Oh,” said Amethyst with full conviction, “I never could have given all my love to any one else in the world! I can be good with you!”

“There is one thing I must tell you,” said Sylvester, when at last they were sitting side by side and talking more quietly; “you know I have never had enough work to fill up my life. Whatever other men have made of my position, I have taken it easy. Now, through friends at Oxford, I have been asked to undertake the head-mastership of a new public school, which is going to be started in the Midlands. It will be a great concern, and will have to be organised, and begun from the very beginning. I used to talk over the first idea of it with some of the men interested; and that, and my degree, have, I suppose, led them to think of me. It would be hard anxious work, and out of society; but it is a great opening, and – is it utterly throwing you away, to think of taking you there?”

“Oh,” cried Amethyst, eagerly, “I should like it. I like work; I would help you all I can. Last year I had quite made up my mind that I would take to teaching myself. I think it would be delightful to begin and see everything grow and prosper. Nothing can be too different from what I have known lately.”

Her eyes shone and her lips smiled. Her strong young spirits sprang up once more, and she looked ready indeed for the stir of life.

“There comes my father – ” said Sylvester. “Father; she will!”

Mr Riddell took Amethyst in his arms and kissed her tenderly, then dropped a kiss on his son’s brow, and pressed his hand.

“So,” he said with a smile, “Iris is won. Now, my children, look for the Heavenly vision together. They were very pretty verses, Syl, with some genuine stuff in them, and I have read them over several times with much pleasure.”

“They have been honoured above their desert,” said Sylvester, speaking low, and thinking of Lucian’s words.

There is little more to say. The plan sketched out in the four sisters’ conversation took shape. Lady Haredale lived at Cleverley, and marvellously accommodated herself to the life there expected of her.

Mrs Leigh and her daughters came back to Ashfield Mount; for Carrie Carisbrooke’s fortune did not come intact out of her uncle’s hands, and she preferred to settle herself with Miss Haredale at Silverfold.

Tory went to school and began her career of independence. Kattern became the star of the Cleverley country, and some people thought her “more pleasing than the beauty, if not so handsome.” If she has chances, she will probably be able to use them.

And Una waited. No one’s story is all told at eighteen, no one’s trials are over so early. But she will always be one of those who stretch out helping hands to others, whether she remains solitary, or whether her heart awakens to new hopes. Her life will never be without struggle, but the battle each time will be fought on higher and higher ground. And Amethyst and Sylvester went into a world of great, numerous, and wholesome interests, in which they took their parts nobly, and were more and more helpmeets to each other, as Amethyst’s story ran on to its close.

The Haredale amethysts disappeared for ever in the crash of the family fortunes. But Lucian’s ring was the symbol of a memory that will guard Amethyst till she becomes indeed a jewel in that Heavenly City, to which he is gone before.

The End.