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   POPULAR NOVELS.

      BY

_MRS. MARY J. HOLMES_.


  TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.
  ENGLISH ORPHANS.
  HOMESTEAD ON HILLSIDE.
  'LENA RIVERS.
  MEADOW BROOK.
  DORA DEANE.
  COUSIN MAUDE.
  MARIAN GREY.
  EDITH LYLE.
  DAISY THORNTON.
  CHATEAU D'OR.
  QUEENIE HETHERTON.
  BESSIE'S FORTUNE.
  DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
  HUGH WORTHINGTON.
  CAMERON PRIDE.
  ROSE MATHER.
  ETHELYN'S MISTAKE.
  MILBANK.
  EDNA BROWNING.
  WEST LAWN.
  MILDRED.
  FORREST HOUSE.
  MADELINE.
  CHRISTMAS STORIES.
  GRETCHEN (_New_).


    "Mrs. Holmes is a peculiarly pleasant and fascinating writer. Her
    books are always entertaining, and she has the rare faculty of
    enlisting the sympathy and affections of her readers, and of holding
    their attention to her pages with deep and absorbing interest."


G.W. DILLINGHAM, PUBLISHER,

  SUCCESSOR TO

G.W. CARLETON & Co., New York.




    GRETCHEN.

    A Novel.


      BY

MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,


    AUTHOR OF

  TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.--DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.--MILBANK.--ENGLISH
  ORPHANS.--'LENA RIVERS.--ETHELYN'S MISTAKE.--HUGH
  WORTHINGTON.--MADELINE.--WEST LAWN.--EDNA
  BROWNING.--MARIAN GREY.--BESSIE'S
  FORTUNE, ETC.


[Illustration]


  NEW YORK

  _G.W. Dillingham, Publisher_,
  SUCCESSOR TO G.W. CARLETON & CO.

  LONDON: S. LOW, SON & CO.
  MDCCCLXXXVII.




  COPYRIGHT, 1887,
  BY DANIEL HOLMES.
  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  STEREOTYPED BY
  SAMUEL STODDER,
  42 DEY STREET, N.Y.




CONTENTS.


CHAPTER                 PAGE

      I. The Telegram      9

     II. Arthur Tracy      12

    III. Mr. and Mrs. Frank Tracy      19

     IV. Getting Accustomed to It      24

      V. At the Park      32

     VI. The Cottage in the Lane      38

    VII. The Party      45

   VIII. Arthur      48

     IX. Who is Gretchen?      60

      X. Arthur Settles Himself      72

     XI. The Storm      78

    XII. The Tramp House      87

   XIII. The Woman      94

    XIV. Little Jerry      108

     XV. Jerry at the Park      114

    XVI. The Funeral, and After      122

   XVII. "Mr. Crazyman, Do You Want Some Cherries?"      131

  XVIII. Arthur and Jerry      139

    XIX. Arthur's Plan      158

     XX. The Working of Arthur's Plan      164

    XXI. Mrs. Tracy's Diamonds      175

   XXII. Searching For the Diamonds      184

  XXIII. Arthur's Letter      198

   XXIV. Ten Years Later      209

    XXV. The Two Faces in the Mirror      216

   XXVI. Maude's Letter      224

  XXVII. "He Cometh Not," She Said      230

 XXVIII. In Shannondale      237

   XXIX. Why Harold Did Not Go to Vassar      249

    XXX. The Walk Home      258

   XXXI. At Home      264

  XXXII. The Next Day      269

 XXXIII. At the Park House      283

  XXXIV. Under the Pines with Tom      287

   XXXV. The Garden Party      293

  XXXVI. Out in the Storm      301

 XXXVII. Under the Pines with Dick      307

XXXVIII. At Le Bateau      312

  XXXIX. Maude      326

     XL. "Do You Know What You Have Done?"      336

    XLI. What Jerrie Found under the Floor      341

   XLII. Harold and the Diamonds      352

  XLIII. Harold and Jerrie      366

   XLIV. Jerrie Clears Harold      372

    XLV. What Followed      379

   XLVI. The Letters      382

  XLVII. Arthur      389

 XLVIII. What They were Doing and had Done in Shannondale      393

   XLIX. Telling Arthur      404

      L. The Flower Fadeth      416

     LI. Under the Pines with Harold      422

    LII. "For Better, For Worse."      427

   LIII. After Two Years      441




GRETCHEN.




CHAPTER I.

THE TELEGRAM.


    "BREVOORT HOUSE, NEW YORK, Oct. 6th, 18--.

    "To Mr. Frank Tracy, of Tracy Park, Shannondale.

    "I arrived in the Scotia this morning, and shall take the train for
    Shannondale at 3 P.M. Send some one to the station to meet us.

    "ARTHUR TRACY."

This was the telegram which the clerk in the Shannondale office received
one October morning, and dispatched to the Hon. Frank Tracy, of Tracy
Park, in the quiet town of Shannondale, where our story opens.

Mr. Frank Tracy, who, since his election to the State Legislature for
two successive terms, had done nothing except to attend political
meetings and make speeches on all public occasions, had an office in
town, where he usually spent his mornings, smoking, reading the papers,
and talking to Mr. Colvin, his business agent and lawyer, for, though
born in one of the humblest New England houses, where the slanting roof
almost touched the ground in the rear, and he could scarcely stand
upright in the chamber where he slept, Mr. Frank Tracy was a man of
leisure now, and as he dashed along the turnpike in his handsome
carriage, with his driver beside him, people looked admiringly after
him, and pointed him out to strangers as the Hon. Mr. Tracy, of Tracy
Park, one of the finest places in the county. It is true it did not
belong to him, but he had lived there so long that he looked upon it as
his, while his neighbors, too, seemed to have forgotten that there was a
Mr. Arthur Tracy, who might at any time come home to claim his own and
demand an account of his brother's stewardship. And it was this Arthur
Tracy, whose telegram announcing his return from Europe was read by his
brother with feelings of surprise and consternation.

"Not that everything isn't fair and above board, and he is welcome to
look into matters as much as he likes," Frank said to himself, as he sat
staring at the telegram, while the cold chills ran up and down his back
and arms. "Yes, he can examine all Colvin's books; he will find them
straight as a string, and didn't he tell me to take what I thought right
as remuneration for looking after his property while he was gallivanting
over the world; and if he objects that I have taken too much, I can at
once transfer those investments in my name to him. No, it is not that
which affects me so; it is the suddenness of the thing, coming without
warning, and to night of all nights, when the house will be full of
carousing and champagne. What will Dolly say? Hysterics, of course, if
not a sick headache. I don't believe I can face her till she has had a
little time to brace up. Here, boy, I want you!" and he rapped on the
window at a young lad who happened to be passing with a basket on his
arm. "I want you to do an errand for me," he continued, as the boy
entered the office and, removing his cap, stood respectfully before him.
"Take this telegram to Mrs. Tracy, and here is a dime for you."

"Thank you; but I don't care for the money," the boy said. "I was going
to the park anyway to tell Mrs. Tracy that grandma is sick and can't go
there to-night."

"Sick! What is the matter?" Mr. Tracy asked, in dismay, feeling that
here was a fresh cause of trouble and worry for his wife.

"She catched cold yesterday fixing up mother's grave," the boy replied;
and, as if the mention of that grave had sent Mr. Tracy's thoughts
straying backward to the past, he looked thoughtfully at the child for a
moment, and then said:

"How old are you, Harold?"

"Ten, last August," was the reply; and Mr. Tracy continued:

"You do not remember your mother?"

"No, sir; only a great crowd, and grandma crying so hard," was Harold's
reply.

"You look like her," Mr. Tracy said.

"Yes, sir," Harold answered; while into his frank, open face there came
an expression of regret for the mother who had died when he was three
years old, and whose life had been so short and sad.

"Now, hurry off with the telegram, and mind you don't lose it. It is
from my brother. He is coming to night."

"Mr. Arthur Tracy, who sent the monument for my mother--is he coming
home? Oh, I am so glad!" Harold exclaimed, his face lighting up with
joy, as he put the telegram in his pocket and started for Tracy Park,
wondering if he should encounter Tom, and thinking that if he did, and
Tom gave him any chaff, he should thresh him, or try to.

"Darn him!" he said to himself, as he recalled the many times when Tom
Tracy, a boy about his own age, had laughed at him for his poverty and
coarse clothes. "He ain't any better than I am, if he does wear velvet
trousers and live in a big house. 'Tain't his'n; it's Mr. Arthur's, and
I'm glad he is coming home. I wonder if he will bring grandma anything.
I wish he'd bring me a pyramid. He's seen 'em, they say."

Meantime, Mr. Frank Tracy had resumed his seat, and, with his hands
clasped over his head, was wondering what effect his brother's return
would have upon him. Would he be obliged to leave the park, and the
luxury he had enjoyed so long, and go back to the old life which he
hated so much?

"No; Arthur will never be so mean," he said. "He has always shown
himself generous, and will continue to do so. Besides that, he will want
somebody to keep the house for him, unless----" And here the
perspiration started from every pore as Frank Tracy thought: "What if he
is married, and the _us_ in his telegram means a wife, instead of a
friend or servant as I imagined!"

That would indeed be a calamity, for then his reign was over at Tracy
Park, and the party he and his wife were to give that night to at least
three hundred people would be their last.

"Confound the party!" he thought, as he arose from his chair and began
to pace the room. "Arthur won't like that as a greeting after eleven
years' absence. He never fancied being cheek by jowl with Tom, Dick, and
Harry; and that is just what the smash is to night. Dolly wants to
please everybody, thinking to get me votes for Congress, and so she has
invited all creation and his wife. There's old Peterkin, the roughest
kind of a canal <DW15> when Arthur went away. Think of my fastidious
brother shaking hands with him and Widow Shipley, who kept a low tavern
on the tow path! She'll be there, in her silks and long gold chain, for
she has four boys, all voters, who call me _Frank_ and slap me on the
shoulder. Ugh! even I hate it all;" and, in a most perturbed state of
mind, the would be Congressman continued to walk the room, lamenting the
party, and wondering what his aristocratic brother would say to such a
crowd in his house on the night of his return.

And if there should be a Mrs. Arthur Tracy, with possibly some little
Tracys! But that idea was too horrible to contemplate, and he tried to
put it from his mind, and to be as calm and quiet as possible until
lunch time, when, with no very great amount of alacrity and
cheerfulness, he started for home.




CHAPTER II.

ARTHUR TRACY.


Although it was a morning in October, the grass in the park was as green
as in early June, while the flowers in the beds and borders, the
geraniums, the phlox, the stocks, and verbenas, were handsomer, if
possible, than they had been in the summer-time; for the rain, which had
fallen almost continually during the month of September, had kept them
fresh and bright. Here and there the scarlet and golden tints of autumn
were beginning to show on the trees; but this only added a new charm to
a place which was noted for its beauty, and was the pride and admiration
of the town.

And yet Mrs. Frank Tracy, who stood on the wide piazza, looking after a
carriage which was moving down the avenue which lead through the park to
the highway, did not seem as happy as the mistress of that house ought
to have been, standing there in the clear, crisp morning, with a silken
wrapper trailing behind her, a coquettish French cap on her head, and
costly jewels on her short, fat hands, which once were not as white and
soft as they were now. For Mrs. Frank Tracy, as Dorothy Smith, had known
what hard labor and poverty meant, and slights, too, because of the
poverty and labor. Her mother was a widow, sickly and lame, and Dorothy
in her girlhood had worked in the cotton mills at Langley, and bound
shoes for the firm of Newell & Brothers, and rebelled at the fate which
had made her so poor and seemed likely to keep her so.

But there was something better in store for her than binding shoes, or
working in the mills, and from the time when young Frank Tracy came to
Langley as clerk in the Newell firm, Dorothy's life was changed and her
star began to rise. They both sang in the choir, standing side by side,
and sometimes using the same book, and once their hands met as both
tried to turn the leaves together. Dorothy's were red and rough, and not
nearly as delicate as those of Frank, who had been in a store all his
life; and still there was a magnetism in their touch which sent a thrill
through the young man's veins, and made him for the first time look
critically at his companion.

She was very pretty, he thought, with bright black eyes, a healthful
bloom, and a smile and blush which went straight to his heart, and made
him her slave at once. In three months' time they were married and
commenced housekeeping in a very unostentatious way, for Frank had
nothing but his salary to depend upon. But he was well connected, and
boasted some blue blood, which, in Dorothy's estimation, made amends for
lack of money. The Tracys of Boston were his distant relatives, and he
had a rich bachelor uncle, who spent his winters in New Orleans and his
summers at Tracy Park, on which he had lavished fabulous sums of money.
From this uncle Frank had expectations, though naturally the greater
part of his fortune would go to his godson and namesake, Arthur Tracy,
who was Frank's elder brother, and as unlike him as one brother could
well be unlike another.

Arthur was scholarly in his tastes, and quiet and gentlemanly in his
manners, and, though subject to moods and fits of abstraction and
forgetfulness, which won for him the reputation of being a "little
queer," he was exceedingly popular with everyone. Frank was very proud
of his brother, and with Dorothy felt that he was honored when, six
months after their marriage, he came for a day or so to visit them, and
with him his intimate friend, Harold Hastings, an Englishman by birth,
but so thoroughly Americanized as to pass unchallenged for a native.
There was a band of crape on Arthur's hat, and his manner was like one
trying to be sorry, while conscious of an inward feeling of resignation,
if not content. The rich uncle had died suddenly, and the whole of his
vast fortune was left to his nephew Arthur--not a farthing to Frank, not
even the mention of his name in the will; and when Dorothy heard it, she
put her white apron over her face, and cried as if her heart would
break. They were so poor, she and Frank, and they wanted so many things,
and the man who could have helped them was dead, and had left them
nothing. It was hard, and she might not have made the young heir very
welcome if he had not assured her that he should do something for her
husband. And he kept his word, and bought out a grocery in Langley and
put Frank in it, and paid the mortgage on his house, and gave him a
thousand dollars, and invited Dolly to visit him; and then it would seem
as if he forgot them entirely, for with his friend Harold, he settled
himself at Tracy Park, and played the role of the grand gentleman to
perfection.

Few ladies ever called at the house, for, with two or three exceptions,
Arthur held himself aloof from the people of Shannondale. It was said,
however, that sometimes, when he and his friend were alone, there was
the sound of music in the parlor,