TABLE of CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER I.

Neville and his faithful guide reached the Waterloo Station during an opportune lull, when a Southampton train was expected, and the cabs had gathered thick at the arrival-platform; but after a careful examination of the various physiognomies of their drivers, Dennis shook his head despondingly.

‘There’s none on’em him,’ he said; ‘I couldn’t just describe him,’cos I seenim only a minit—but I’d know him— I’m sure I’d know him—and it’s a S. W. cab. I seen the letters on the back on it jist as it was a-drivin’ off—and so we’ll find him here some hour in the day—’cos this is his rightful stan’—sure now I understan’ yes, if ye lave it to me, I’m always about the Station, and if I can’t catch him, may I never sell a “ Tiligraph.”’

‘If you had only trusted us and understood us before,’ said Neville, sternly, ‘what valuable time might have been saved. Your obstinacy may be the cause of our total failure, boy.’

‘Faith! I’ll make up for it, sir,’ returned the unabashed Bedouin—‘An’ as to thrustin’, who’d thrust the police,’cept a born-natural. Sure I thought I was doinghe lady a good torn, but never mind, I’ll get the cabby for yes.’

With this very indefinite assurance, Neville was fain to be content, and returned to his gloomy solitude, to pore over disheartening papers, and weary his brain with unaccustomed calculations; striving to have some plan of future exertion and livelihood fixed before his cherished hope—the recovery of his wife —was fulfilled.

In truth it was a perplexing problem— a couple of thousands for a capital—and the world before him, with no busines straining or habits, to what could he turn himself? Yet he knew that he possessed a certain amount of method and capability for organization, with a consciousness that although neither of a quick or brilliant class of intelligence, he had the power of steady and prolonged application.

Some military appointment he knew would be the best solution of his enigma, but he shrunk from the publicity of application; his story was already widely circulated in all military circles, and he quivered at the idea of the pale witticisms, the contemptuous pity, the mocking laughter it must have drawn forth. He felt inclined to rush forth, armed with a horsewhip, for the general flagellation of his acquaintance; could he discover Marie, and show her as his own, his valued, cherished wife, then people might see that the disappointment which furnished harming a source of gossip and condolence was by no means insupportable to him. No! Had his eyes been open from the first, he would still have preferred his own soft, piquant, shy, loving Marie, to the heiress, however wealthy or estimable she might be ; that little, pale, quiet, matter-of-fact, self-reliant creature, comparable to his wife, indeed!

Well! it is well your wife taught you her value by her flight, Captain Neville, for these favourable contrasts never crossed your mind in time to save her the anguish of feeling that she was wanting in the one thing for which she had been sought; and now, after all his efforts, he seemed as far from the object of his search as ever!

That confounded boy! Was there any just cause or impediment why he should not thrash him at all events?

How was it that the skill of detectives, the eagerness of affection, the perseverance of friendship, had alike failed!

‘Well, my dear boy,’ said Mr. Foster, as his grandson and himself sat over an elaborate dessert in the handsome diningroom of his handsome house in Mecklen-burgh Square on the evening after the interview just described—‘You know I ought to be very seriously displeased with you—such a scheme for you to enter into; and 1 am not sure you did not originate it! However, it has been frustrated and recoiled pretty severely on the head of him who intended to profit by it. I am, therefore, inclined to deal indulgently with you. Tell me, now, does not my shy little ward strike you as deserving all my eulogiums? She’s a remarkable girl, an interesting young creature, lonely as she is, and possessed of a princely fortune.’

‘Yes, sir,’ replied the young Baronet, glancing off hastily to the first part of his grandfather’s speech—‘I am an obstinate dog, I admit; and really young heads are but wooden concerns sometimes; but you must not be hard on Neville. He is a fine fellow, and severely punished for taking my advice—there I acknowledge it, you see. Now, my dear grandfather, I want you to be a real brick—forgive the whole affair, and use your powerful influence with the brother, to make up with Neville, and help him. Do, my dear sir! He’ll find the wife some day, and then you know all sorts of little consequences will occur, and he’ll want a pretty little villa, and nursemaids and things, and he’ll want to make money—now he really is a clever fellow, and very steady—well, I mean naturally’—for old Mr. Foster elevated his eyebrows and shook his head. ‘His gambling and all that was merely the want of a real object in life. Suppose you and his brother take him into the concern as a junior partner.’

‘Zounds! sir!’ cried the old gentleman, startled by so audacious a proposition into an old fashioned exclamation—‘Your modem assurance is overwhelming; pray what capital can your friend bring into the “concern,” as you contemptuously term a business which is considerably your senior, and your grandfather’s senior?’

‘Really I don’t know,’ returned Sir Frederic, with polite indifference, ‘but I 3do know he’s a clever fellow and can be steady, would naturally take more interest in the—well, the business, than a stranger, and make you a better servant; that is, if he finds his wife; and, after all, the only drawback to my scheme is that it would be a real benefit to a friend of mine.'

‘Nay, you know I am ever ready to grant you everything—but confess it is rather cool of you to press Captain Neville upon me—the man who intended to frustrate my favourite project—for I will he frank with you, Fred; your union with Miss Delvigne is my favourite project, and you backing him up, too.’Pon my soul, it is too bad, Fred!’

‘I really cannot defend myself sir. But I am sure, with your usual complaisance, you will bury the matter in oblivion— and—and—consider my plan, sir.’ This last was put in insinuatingly.

‘Well, Fred, the morning you are married to Miss Delvigne all safe, I will begin to think the matter over. That governess wife of Neville’s may have drowned herself or hung herself. French women think nothing of suicide—and then—’pon my life—I shouldn’t be surprised if he had another throw for the heiress! ‘‘Pooh, pooh! my dear grandfather, that would be an impossibility! In the first place, Miss Delvigne wonld not endure him.’

‘Why are you sure of that, eh?’ asked the old gentleman, with a knowing look.

‘Oh! it is self-evident. It would be an insult to her.’ » ‘Young ladies, my dear boy, are likely to fancy the first man that makes love to them, andyou are the first in the field, Fred!’

‘Thank you, sir! I don’t much care for the first-come first served-principle in love. And, by Jove! I don’t think Mary Delvigne is the style of girl to fancy the first thing in unmentionables who makes eyes at her! No, no! I dare say she classes poor Neville and myself in the same lump, and despises us both. Then, consider, my dear sir, what an impression I must have made upon her mind, trying to marry her to my spendthrift friend, just to get rid of her. If she wasn’t a deucedly uncommon sort of a girl she wouldn’t hold - any sort of intercourse with me. What a position to have put oneself into!’ concluded the young Baronet, in a tone of deep vexation.

‘Right, Fred, right! you describe yonr friend and transaction capitally.’

‘I don’t admit that, sir. But such is the colour it probably wears in Miss Delvigne’s eyes.’

‘Never mind, my dear boy; a little coolness on your side will but fan the flame. Go, now, like a polite young gentleman, and spend the evening at Mrs. Coleman’s. Say,—oh, say you wish to know how she feels after the fatigue of driving down to the Strand yesterday. And, a—give my love. Say I wish to know, and I am disposed to take a nap.’

‘I shall do no such thing, sir!’ returned the dutiful grandson, with unusual abruptness, for he longed to obey, though a feeling of proud shyness kept him back. ‘I hate going to Mrs. Coleman’s; the whole family, from “ buttons” up to thegrande madame herself look so infernally knowing—and are always dodging out of the room when I am there. I know it annoys Hiss Delvigne, and it sets me furious! Bat I’ll not interfere with yon, sir; I’ll go down and see what Neville has done since morning. And I say, grandfather, for God’s sake let my matrimonial destinies alone for a week or two. Do; and perhaps something better may offer elsewhere —a thousand or two more—to turn the scale, and free Miss Delvigne from prosecution on my account.’

‘Now, Fred, your sarcasm is all very fine; but I believe in your heart you would be right well pleased to be married to my interesting little ward to-morrow. Come, own the truth, and don’t disdain my help!’

Sir Frederic shook his head, laughed with recovered good humour at the old gentleman’s sally, and saying, ‘Till tomorrow, then, good-by,’ walked out into the hall, whence the faint odour of a supreme cheroot was presently wafted.

Old Mr. Foster took a pinch of snuff and smiled, filled another glass of port, which he drank slowly, with the utmost gusto, then, with a sigh of gastronomic satisfaction and virtuous content, threw his silk handkerchief over his bald head and settled himself to slumber.

Neville sat gloomily alone, his papers pushed aside, his head on his hands, when Compton entered. He welcomed his friend warmly; indeed, since his troubles his manner had lost a good deal of the hard composure that formerly distinguished it.

‘You are a good fellow, Compton, to drop in upon my disconsolate solitude/ ‘Have a cheroot,’ said the sympathizing friend, 'and tell me what you have done since/ ‘Well, nothing!’

And Neville proceeded to narrate his fruitless expedition to the Waterloo Station, and the faint hopes he entertained of discovering the cab-driver who took poor Marie from it.

‘They will certainly find the man,’ said Sir Frederic. ‘They always do find these people/ And their conversation flowed on in a somewhat broken stream, on thepros and cons of this unhappy subject.

They were not talkative, yet it was a sort of comfort to Guy to have Compton with him; and the young Baronet knew it was.

An hour had nearly slipped away, when a cab was heard to stop and a sharp, yet indefinite double knock, was performed on the knocker.

‘That’s some fellow uncertain of his position, but sure of his errand,’ said Sir Frederic, and almost as he spoke the detective entered, without asking permission.

‘Well, Captain,’ he said, ‘we have him ; not long about it, eh, sir?’

‘What! the cab-driver from Waterloo Station?.

‘He is below, sir, cab and all, ready to drive us to the house where he took the lady. He says he can’t direct us, but he can take us there.’

Neville had his hat on, while Pim spoke, in silent readiness.

‘Hurrah!’ cried the impetuous Baronet. ‘You’re on the trail at last! God speed you, old boy, all will go right now.’

‘I shall not hope or fear yet,’ said Neville, with a deep sigh, ‘for if we are baffled here my resources at last are at an end.’

‘Well, sir, I think we have a fair course now; the people where she went will put us on her track. Come on, sir. It’s over by Kennington way, and we had better get there before dark. That little Irish wannint has a deal of ingenuity. Lord! what a man he’d make by-and-by for the Force! Come along, sir.’

Sir Frederic shook Neville’s hand cordially, and accompanied him downstairs; bid him God speed once more, and stood looking after the vehicle as it disappeared; then remembering the last occasion when he looked after him, and its differing circumstances, he recalled the sudden gloom which then, in so unaccountable a manner, fell upon him. ‘I trust my present hopefulness will be equally prophetic,’ he thought He lingered yet a moment undecidedly, then suddenly throwing away his cigar, said, half aloud,‘Yes, I ought, I must, lose no time in letting her know,’ so walked quickly into the Strand, hailed a ‘Hansom,’ and directed the driver to St. John’s Wood.

CHAPTER II.

Meantime Neville and Mr. Pim sped away towards Kennington. The former had addressed no question to the driver; an undefinable feeling held him back. Had he been alone with the man he might have cross-examined him, for, in truth, he longed to put a thousand queries, and to hear, perchance, what her lips had uttered, even through the medium of a cab-driver’s repetition.

What if they should find her where they were going, sad, lonely, almost penniless! With what rapture he would hold her to his heart! How tenderly he would reproach her! How amply he would atone for the agony he had thoughtlessly inflicted. But at the recollection of the dumb despair she had evinced—the stricken, agonized expression of those eyes —his heart, which had beaten so tumultuously at the idea of a possible speedy reunion, seemed for a moment to stand still.

‘Can I ever, ever repay her?’ he asked himself, ‘ever atone for the evil I have inflicted ?’

‘I suppose you are sure of your man?’ he said, turning uneasily to his companion.

‘Eh? Oh! of course. He remembers the lady well, he says, for she didn’t rightly seem to know where she wanted to go to, and seemed strange-like, to him.

And her box had a London Bridge label on it—from Folkstone—that struck him, seeing as how he had taken her up at “ Waterloo.”’

‘She didn’t rightly seem to know where she wanted to go!’

Those words appeared to burn into Neville’s brain. His soft, bright, loving Marie cast off—without a friend, without a hope—‘not knowing where to go!’

The drive seemed interminable, but at length they stopped to pay the toll at Kennington Gate, and a few minutes after turned into a quiet, respectable little by-street. Here the pace slackened—grew slower still—and finally the driver pulled up, and turning, tapped at the front window. Neville eagerly lowered it.

‘This is the street; I am sure enough about that, but the houses puzzle me. You see they are all alike, and I never noticed the number. There’s one there, with a card in the window, that looks about it, but I see another lower down; yet I think it was this first one that I stopped at.’

‘We will try,’ said Neville, feeling his pulse increasing, and his mouth dry.

He and the detective alighted.

‘Knock and speak,’ he said to his companion ; ‘I can do nothing.’

Mr. Pirn nodded.

The door was opened by a neat servant, and Mr. Pim had scarce uttered the words, ‘You have some rooms to let, I see,’ when shouted in the direction of the kitchen stairs, ‘Missus, missus, two gents about the apartments!’

An invocation which was speedily answered by the apparition of a stout female in afternoon(i e. full) toilette, and a condition of the highest respectability.

‘Good-evening, mum,’ said the detective ; while Neville politely raised his hat ‘May I ask what rooms you have?’

‘Only this parlour, sir, and a very nice bedroom upstairs. Afraid I cannot accommodate two.’

‘Will you let us have a look, mum?’

‘Certainly!’ and the benign landlady threw open the door of a little parlour.

‘Pretty little room,’ said the detective, with an air of easy patronage. ‘Many other inmates?’

‘No, sir. One highly-respectable gent, as has been in the drawing-rooms nigh two years, and a young man in an office, what you never hears nothink of—and—’

‘What!’ cried Neville, unable to keep silence any longer, ‘No young lady? No dark-haired, tall, slight young lady?’

‘Well, now, Captain,’ the much enduring Mr. Pirn was beginning in accents of remonstrance, when the respectable landlady, interrupting in her turn, exclaimed, ‘No; there’s no such young lady here; but I had one, as I was uncommon doubtful of, about a fortnight ago, for a few days.’

‘Good God!’ exclaimed Neville, ‘and he is gone. Where, my good woman? Pray speak!’

‘That’s just what I cannot tell, sir, but—’

‘Stop!’ said Mr. Pim, ‘let us make sure it is our bird. How and when did this lady come, ma’am ? There’s a handsome reward for whatever will lead to her discovery.’

‘Well, Idid think there was something peculiar about her,’ cried the now excited landlady, who went into a long story, describing the young lady’s arrival, the warming of her own heart towards her— the kind attentions she had lavished on the weary stranger; the advice she had given her, and how the poor young creature feared she could not get pupils, and ‘look before tou leap.’

thought of going out as a milliner’s drudge, or taking in plain work; of the exhortations of her’ (Mrs. Jupp, such was her name) ‘that she should write to her friends; that she did write, but took the letter to the post herself, and stayed out very late that night, too, and went and took other apartments.’

‘Where, where?’ ejaculated Neville.

That was, unfortunately, just what Mrs. Jupp could not telL ‘Well, do you know where she came from, at least?’

‘She came from Southampton, with the intention, she said, of looking for pupils. She said she was a French lady.’

‘What was she like?’ asked the detective.

'Oh, tall and slight, with big, dark eyes, very pale and sad-looking, and spoke very low and sweet, not like an Englishwoman.’

‘It must be Marie,’ said Neville, almost unconsciously.

‘Yes, sir—it was; for the evening she wrote such a lot, and counted over her money. She tore up a lot of papers, and there was Mary, spelt rather queer, on one scrap as I picked up.’

‘And,’ asked the detective, ‘what reason did she give for leaving your house?’

‘Well, you see, my rooms is rather first-class, and she said as how they was rather expensive. She wanted a bedroom only, but that was not at all in my line, so she left.

Mrs. Jupp paused abruptly, and Neville ground his teeth in silent agony at the picture of struggle and desolation thus conjured up.

‘Then you can give us no further trace?’ he ejaculated, both to relinquish this last hope. ‘Remember, I will give fifty pounds to whoever will supply such information as may lead to her discovery.’

‘Law, now, think of that!’ returned the discomfited conscience-stricken Mrs. Jupp. ‘Let me ask the girl,’ she added.

And she called ‘Susan’ audibly enough down the stairs.

‘Susan,’ she repeated, as that individual appeared, ‘you remember the lady as come here from the Waterloo Station, about a fortnight past, and paid in advance to be took in?’

‘Yes,’m, I do,’ said Susan.

‘Well, did you notice the cab she went oif in?’

‘No,’m. Don’t you know as you were angry with me for helping her down with her box, and set me to clean the back kitchen, so she got a cab herself, and—’

‘There—there—those girls do talk so fast!’ exclaimed Mrs. Jupp, eager to cut short these revelations.

‘Come away,’ said Neville, with fierce impatience to his ally. ‘Don’t you see they turned her out, and have lost all trace of her?’ and he walked away, deaf to the eager explanations of the landlady, with whom Mr. Pim lingered to exchange a few more words, and then followed his employer.

They took their places once more in the cab.

‘Where to?’ asked cabby.

‘Eh? Back again, I suppose, sir,’ said Pim, in a rather crestfallen tone.

‘Ay—back. We have played our last card,’ returned Neville, in a strange, hard, bitter voice.

‘Well, it does look blue,’ returned the detective, ‘though—’

But Neville did not hear—at last— at last, hope failed him. He had had such a fearfully suggestive glimpse of his beloved one’s present condition, subjected to all the spurns that wait on poverty— the dangers—the difficulties!

And she was alone—he had driven her to it; and now he could not atone, he could not find her. They were drifting farther and farther apart on the gloomy sea of life! Great God! what straits might she now be reduced to—what snares might not be closing round her, so young, so lovely, so deserted!

CHAPTER III.

We must now retrace the course of events with Marie, and go back to the agitated evening on which Neville and Sir Frederic had sought Miss Redoubt It closed gloomily, with a thick, warm rain; and the atmosphere seemed a ton or two heavier than usual.

In a small back parlour, in one of the narrow streets leading from the main line near Kennington Gate,.neatly and stiffly furnished, sat Mrs. Guy Neville. Before her was a penny ink bottle, a few sheets of note paper, and a needle-like steel pen.

She had taken her whole fortune from herporte-mormaie, and was counting it— seven gold sovereigns and a half, eight shillings, and a few halfpence.

She spread them out before her, and gazed upon them sadly.

The night before, she had slept heavily —the dreamless sleep of exhaustion. The day had passed in a sort of agonized bewilderment, and now she had roused herself to think, and to do.

To do what? A difficult question; but of a necessity, something. There lay her all, and she had nowhere to turn when it was exhausted.

On reaching London the night before, she had decided on Kennington as the locality farthest from all she had hitherto 36nown of London; and after passing the toll-gate, shrinking from the noise and publicity of the main road, had directed the cab-driver to turn down the first quiet, shady-looking street she observed. Here a plentiful crop of ‘Apartments to let’ offered her a choice, and selecting one at random, she submitted to a very galling cross-examination before she could gain admittance, and did so at last only by paying a week’s rent in advance.

Here, the excitement and sense of wrong gradually subsiding, she would almost have hailed death as a deliverer from the appalling sense of desolation under which she was ready to sink.

And now what to do? First, she must get cheaper lodgings—these two miserable rooms cost her twenty-one shillings. A bedroom would be quite enough.

She knew how difficult, even under favourable circumstances, it was to gain employment of any kind, and under hers, what a task! She must spin out her little capital to the very utmost. Surely, in three months, she would either succeed or be no more. But seven pounds! Could she pay rent and live upon it for thirteen weeks? Alas! even her moderate estimate showed the difficulty.

What could she do? She could teach French and Italian well. She could draw cleverly, and was singularly expert with her little pretty fingers at all kinds of needlework; but if there was an art in which she especially excelled, it was millinery. In music, she thought herself deficient. To what should she turn? Should she consult her landlady? Yes! though a more awful specimen of the genus can scarce be imagined!

She rang, and asked in her quiet, gentle tones, if Mrs. Jupp was disengaged, and if she could see her.

Yes, Mrs. Jupp was disengaged, and at her young lodger’s disposal In truth, Marie’s air of distinction, her sweet, winning manner, and sad, innocent face had roused the curiosity and almost the heart of the veteran Mrs. Jupp; but this latter commodity had lain too long in a fossil state to show much vitality, and, indeed, had probably been born dead. But Mrs. Jupp opined there was a mystery in the wind — an aristocratic mystery too. Might not the elegant young lady in the back parlour have escaped from some tyrannical Earl of a father, and then what a halo would surround 17, Acacia Row! Mrs. Jupp had serious thoughts of venturing four shillings and sixpence on an advertisement, beginning ‘Supposed to have strayed from her friends.’ Well would it have been had she done so; but the ensuing conversation soon dispersed such airy visions.

‘Good-evening,’ said Marie, as Mrs. Jupp, in a substantial ‘afternoon’s’ dress, a stern cap with pink ribbons, a bow of hair over each temple, well secured by a band of black velvet, opened the door.

‘Good-evening, miss,’ returned the landlady, and relapsed into watchful silence.

Mrs. Jupp was stout, and short of breath; indeed, respiration was a series of mild snores, and thebust of the brown Llama afternoon garment bore the aspect of an eccentrically-shaped pincushion, stuffed until the texture of the covering could hold no more.

‘Pray, sit down,’ resumed Marie, somewhat embarrassed how to begin. ‘I have troubled you to come to me, for I want a little advice in a matter which my ignorance of your customs renders difficult/ ‘She’s a Lord’s daughter, at the very least, and wants to pass herself as my servant gal, or summut like that,’ thought Mrs. Jupp.

‘I’ve a deal of experience, miss,’ she returned, guardedly, ‘having kept lodgings close on twenty years; and if that doesn’t show you life, I don’t know what does. I’ll be happy to give you the best advice I can.’

‘Thank you,’ said Marie. ‘You see I am a total stranger here, having come over from France to endeavour to earn my own bread, either by teaching or needlework, or—Do you think I should be likely to gain pupils in this neighbourhood?’

‘I’m sure I can’t tell,’ replied Mrs. Jupp, reluctant to relinquish her theory of the Earl’s daughter.

‘My connection has always been very genteel; I never had no lodgers but what was in an independent way of business.’

‘I should much like to get a few pupils,’ began poor Marie; ‘and I have thought of writing a card, and leaving it at the nearest library, or chemist’s shop—places where people stop and talk, you know—or an advertisement? Or, should you think I could get employment in any of those monstrous millinery establishments I passed in driving here from the Station? I have a taste for millinery.’

‘What Station?’ asked Mrs. J.

‘Waterloo,’ returned Marie, with an air of unmistakable truth.

‘She’s come from Southampton,’ thought Mrs. J., ‘and she knows too much to be a Lord’s daughter; that card dodge would never enter into one of their heads, I’ll be bound. No, no; she’s just a foreign chit scrambling after what she can pick up.’

‘I am sure these sort of things is quite out of my line, miss,’ said Mrs. Jupp, aloud. ‘I dare say you’d have a better chance at the millinery, if you have no recommends tions; but what do I know about them?’ she concluded, rather scornfully.

Marie winced and coloured; she felt she had made a mistake in confiding to this cast-metal imitation of humanity.

‘One word more, and I will detain you no longer. Could you let me have a bedroom alone? I find the rent of two rooms more than I can meet.’

‘A bedroom only!’ repeated Mrs. Jupp. ‘No, by no means! My drawing-rooms is let this two years and more to a most respectable party what dines in the City, and I’ve just this room and your bedroom besides, and I could not break the set.’

‘Then,’ said Marie—her heart sinking at the idea of being cast adrift from even this icy refuge—‘I must leave you next Thursday.’

‘Well, I was thinking as much,’ returned the landlady, with the easy familiarity with which the vulgar address those they consider inferiors. ‘There’s lots of little places nearer town, and the shops as would suit you better—though a respectable residence is quite necessary if you take to teaching.’

‘On Thursday, then; and I need trouble you no further,’ said poor Marie, sadly.

‘Thursday, before noon; if after that, you’re liable for another week; and you’ll not mind my showing the apartments, though you are in them—not to lose time.’

Without deigning to wait a reply, Mrs. Jupp sailed out of the room, and Marie was again alone.

Alone—terribly alone.

No! not she herself could express the terrible sense of desolation which wrapped her like an icy winding-sheet. It numbed and stupefied her.

What should she do? Should she write to her old French aunt, who had been her only friend since her father’s death, and tell her she had changed her employment? or should she keep silence ?

The old lady had never shown her much affection; indeed, she looked on her as a lost sheep, because Marie had always held to Protestantism.

Still Guy might through this relative gain some clue to her;if he took the trouble of seeking. Ah! would he care for, and wish her back? Down in the secret depths of her heart she hoped he would; and also in those secret depths she hid a sort of unacknowledged, undefined hope, that in thus letting this remote clue escape her, she held by a slender thread—yet still a thread—to the delicious but momentary past She wrote guardedly, and without an address, merely informing her aunt that she had changed her abode and employers —that she was well, and would write soon again when she was more settled; but that she was at present in excellent health and spirits.

When this was accomplished, it was still but seven o’clock; and, prompted by the restlessness of misery, she determined herself to seek her way to the post. Rolling herself in a large shawl, she made a few inquiries of the servant, and soon discovered the required locality — too soon.

She could not return yet, so she strolled till she lost her way, and at last found herself beside a large white-washed building, the windows of which showed a strong light within, and from the open doors of which came forth a strong, deep tide of human voices, intoning with tolerable accuracy the well-known hymn — ‘There is a Land of pure delight.'

An impulse to enter, and taste even the vague companionship of a multitude of strangers — even the shadowy sympathy of common prayer — seized her. The seats were full, and many stood in the aisles. The warm atmosphere and volume of sound, the nameless, hushed excitement, drew her for a moment from herself. By degrees the gradual movement of those behind her pressed Marie forward; and when the hymn ceased, she was beside a small pew, occupied by a large woman, three little girls from five to ten, and a rough-looking, sandy-haired boy of twelve, with a red comforter round his throat, who was always trying to choke down a cough.

Marie had stood a few seconds by the door, when the large woman suddenly turned a broad, kindly, and surprisingly-youthful face towards her. She immediately stretched a stout arm across her little flock, thereby disarranging their hats considerably, and signed to the rough boy to open the door—indicating with a polite smile to Marie, that she might enter. The boy stepped out to accommodate her entrance, and she found herself next a blue eyed, flaxen-haired mite, who looked up, half-smiling, half-awed, in her lace.

CHAPTER IV.

A tall, quaint man, with wild-looking hair, who had mounted the pulpit, upraised a bony hand, and now the congregation bent in prayer; it was a long, rambling oration, telling a great deal about sin and temptation and the devil, but asking for nothing intelligbly; and Marie’s attention began to wander back to her own troubles.

Then they sang another hymn—a sweet old tune, ‘Rock of Ages’—which affected poor Marie inexpressibly.

Then the sermon began—a quaint and stirring discourse, which riveted our heroine’s attention; and in the preacher’s eloquent description of how to win the entrance of that world ‘where all sighing and sorrow is at end,’ and all ‘tears wiped from off all faces,’ she forgot the crowd— all—save the blessed picture, till she was roused from the vision by the flaxen-head falling against her in more than the heaviness of sleep.

Marie looked down, the pretty little round face was deadly pale. She felt one of the small ungloved and not very clean hands, it was icy cold. She leant across, and whispered to the fat woman—

‘I fear your little girl is not well—as I am next the door, I will lift her out.’

‘Oh, dear! goodness gracious!’ whispered the mother, eagerly, ‘whatever are we to do?’ (She said ‘never.’)

Bat Marie made no reply, except to lift the unconscious child, an effort almost too much for her strength; and rousing the rough-headed boy from an uneasy slumber, she carried her little burden to the door, where she was speedily followed by the frightened mother and the other children, while an attendant of the chapel brought them a glass of water.

‘I never saw her like this before,’ said the alarmed mother, ‘though she is a delicate little creature. Agnes, my pet, speak to mamma.’

‘Do not be too much alarmed,’ said Marie, quietly, ‘I have seen children overcome by the heat and exhausted atmosphere of a crowd, very readily;’ and she tenderly removed the child’s hat, and bathed her brow with water.

Soon the little girl opened her large blue eyes, and smiled at the mother, then putting her hand to her head, said, faintly—

‘Albert, you naughty boy; you’ve been throwing water on my head.’

‘Never mind,’ said Marie, kissing her, ‘well soon make it nice and dry,’ and she began wiping it with her handkerchief.

‘Oh I’ cried the mother, the tears in her eyes, ‘you’re quite well now, Agnes dear — you must not turn like that again.’

‘Don’t frighten her,’ whispered Marie; ‘let her forget she was faint.’

‘Well, and I’m sure’m, I’m for ever obliged to you for your kindness and help. If you’d been the child’s mother, you couldn’t have treated her gentler,’ exclaimed the fat lady, heartily. ‘I hope you’ll let' me know who I am so much indebted to! And now, how to get the poor thing home! it’s a good step, and we’re out of the omnibus line.’

‘A cab,’ suggested Marie.

‘Oh, no!’ exclaimed her new friend, eagerly, ‘I never enter a cab. It’s that way half the diseases are caught—they take all sorts of subjects to hospitals, and you don’t know what—no, well just get along quietly; Albert will help to carry his sister, and—’

‘If my accompanying you will be of use,' began Marie, glad to find any distraction to her thoughts.’

‘If my accompanying you will be of use,' began Marie, glad to find any distraction to her thoughts.’

H’oh! you’re quite too good; I could not think of troubling you—really, you are good.’ I am glad to be of any use—let me go with, and help you,’ returned Marie; your little girl seems content with me— I will carry her a little while—shall I, Agnes?’

Yes, please,’ said Agnes, with a sigh of content, and laying her head on Marie’s of content, and laying her head on Marie’s shoulder.

‘Well, now, that is surprising! I never see Agnes take to a stranger before.’

‘She is a gentlewoman, evidently;

The fat lady gathered her flock about her, and hoisted a cotton umbrella over the head of the invalid—for there was still a slight drizzle—and the party, turning to the left (the opposite direction from which Marie had approached), proceeded down a long, dark road, which seemed interminable to Marie, though her little burden was not now quite so heavy as when unconscious. At length she was obliged to stop.

'Let me walk now,’ said the child, ‘and hold the lady’s hand—why shouldn’t I walk?’

'We might let her, I think,’ said her mother, appealing to Marie.

To which Marie agreed.

‘As we are so far,’m, I hope you’ll stop and take a bit of supper,’m,’ continued Marie’s new acquaintance.

‘I do feel so much obliged, and I should like my husband, who is very partial to the child, to thank you.’

‘Well, mamma,’ cried the eldest girl, a keen, hatchet-faced, dark-eyed imp, ‘you see, if Jemimar ain’t out, that’s all! and you’ll not be able to get no supper, I tell you! She always is out when we go to chapel’

‘Hold your tongue, Augusta Jane! ’ said the mother, placidly. ‘Yes, ’m, I should feel obliged if you’d join us in our evening meal. Mr. Bushel (my name’s Bushel) would be so happy.’

‘You are very good,’ said Marie, ‘I will accompany you home; perhaps,’ she thought,' I might get these little girls for pupils.’

We are living in a very humble way at present,’ continued Mrs. Bushel. ‘ My husband has not been fortunate, though he is of a good old county family in Devonshire, and I am not able to bring up my children in the way I should like— as I was brought up by my late Pa, who was well known in the City—but when we cannot control circumstances, we had best bow to them, especially when we know they are sent to make us sit loose to earthly things. Nevertheless, there are certain habits of life I can never relinquish : and I trust our home, though humble, is genteel.’

And, regardless of reply, the fat lady plunged into a long personal history of the elegancies of her earlier days — the distinguished friends of her late Pa—his unmerited misfortunes—the various mysterious enemies of her husband—a man of the highest refinement, who played on the flute.

‘Because, you see,’m, if his eldest second cousin was to die, there would only be an old gentleman of seventy, and a baby eighteen months old, between him and a splendid estate in North Devon; but they are such a proud lot, they never forgive him for marrying me — though, after all, if they come to that, my poor mother’s great-aunt was presented to George the Third, and I’ve a miniature of her in powder; and the furniture we now have, plain but substantial, was bought with my money. Law, bless me! don’t you go lift that heavy child again. Come to mamma, Agnes, dearie.’

So she ran on, branching off into inextricable details, resulting in nothing particular, but intended to enlighten Marie as to all particulars of her history.

Marie scarce heard, but took a quiet glance at thetoumure of the party.

Mrs. Bushel was a stout young woman with a kindly, honest face, fair hair, and a double chin, and mountainous shoulders; she was attired in a light dress of some gray material, with very full flounces striped with broad blue bands, a black silk cloak of fashionable shape, but showing by many a half-obliterated streak and slimy mark where former seams and plaits had lain; her bonnet touched the parting between the back and front hair, where a wreath of tumbled flowers were crushed under the narrow leaf (it was the era of small bonnets).

The children were equally characteristic—they all had tight, long, coloured stockings, and boots, more or less worn, and ill-fastened hair nets, and hats, with mangy feathers, flounced frocks, the flounces a good deal ripped; still the two younger did not look absolutely common, they were naturally genteel. But the boy was hopeless, a sort of figure you see playing hop-scotch in the street with the news boy, and the doctor’s boy, &c.

Before Marie had well concluded her observations, they paused at the gate of a small house in a small row, with small gardens, and Marie read on a large zinc plate, which nearly swallowed up the gate, ‘E. Bushel, Gas Inspector and Collector, Coal Agent, &c.’

Here, after ringing for some time, a slatternly girl opened the door, over which, by the light of a small gas jet, Marie perceived a white card indicating lodgings to let. She felt a sort of dreary comfort in this.

The fat lady was a slattern, the children were slatternly, the air of a daily and hourly scramble hung about the whole concern, yet the people were evidently kindly and respectable. Here, surely, she might find shelter at a moderate rate.

It was getting late, and she was anxious to return, yet she would not lose this chance, so she waited patiently while Mrs. Bushel bustled into a tiny front parlour and lit the gas, entreated her new friend to remove her bonnet, turned a deaf ear to Marie’s observations that she could not possibly remain, and despatched Albert for some beer, and Augusta Jane to tell Jemmimar to bring up the bread and cheese.

Here Mr. Bushel made his appearance —a tall, seedy, helpless-looking man, with a tolerably good face, and an innocent expression, long, lanky legs, terminating in large carpet slippers of remote antiquity.

He brought with him a feint, stale odour of smoke, and was very quiet and civiL To him Mrs. Bushel volubly detailed the sudden seizure of little Agnes (who speedily nestled on her lather's knee), and described, glowingly, the kindness of the young lady, &c.

‘I do not think anyone could have done less for the pretty child,’ said Marie. ‘And now, if you will excuse my leaving you abruptly, I must do so, as I wish to return to my present lodgings.'

She paused.

‘I see,’ she resumed, ‘a card in your window. May I ask if you let any part of your house? ’

An eager rejoinder that the drawing room floor was vacant and at her service, was Mrs. Bushel’s reply.

Whereupon, Marie, in a few words, explained that she had come to England to seek employment, and could not afford luxurious quarters—that she was a total stranger, and unable to offer any references; but that if, under these circumstances they would let her engage a bedroom, she would be happy to do so.

With very little hesitation this was agreed to; and Marie, before many minutes were over, had inspected and taken a small back bedroom at the large sum of seven shillings per week. Here she agreed to move on the following Monday.

‘I used to give lessons in France,’ she concluded, after arranging with Mrs. Bushel. ‘But here I must get more immediate employment; at least, until I can make some friends; and I think of endeavouring to do needlework. I, too, have seen vicissitudes, my dear madam!’

‘Dear, dear! to think of that!’ cried Mrs. Bushel.

At the word lesson, she had glanced at her three little girls, who, from babyhood, shared the family councils.

‘Well, anyone can see you’re a lady, at any rate; but dear, dear! you’ll do nothing at the needle. We’ll see what we can do when you come here—and now, what name?’

This puzzled Marie for a moment. She felt instinctively that she must not give her own name, and she was unprepared with another; but she speedily recovered and recalling at random some of her father’s few relations, said, calmly, ‘Madlle Thibaut, No. —, Acacia Row.’

‘Oh!’ replied Mrs. Bushel, ‘a French lady! I thought you did not speak English quite like us,’ and she smiled graciously.

The bare notion of her children having lessons from a real live French woman, fresh, perhaps, from Paris, raised Mrs. Bushel at once to a pinnacle of gentility she had scarce ever hoped to reach.

Marie begged a cab might be called, as she feared to return so late alone; and as Mrs. Bushel did not now suggest any fearful' results from the indulgence of that extravagance, she took her leave.

‘Well,’ said Mr. Bushel, stroking the head of his little Agnes, ‘I don’t know, but it’s not very prudent. Eh!’

‘Law! Bushel, you never have no faith or enterprise; she’s a lady, and a sweet creature, and she shall teach these dear lambs French, and perhaps music.’

CHAPTER V.

And Marie knelt in agonized yet thankful supplication.

‘If I can but maintain myself awhile honestly, perhaps Guy will seek me out! Oh! Guy, Guy! why did you speak so cruelly, and yet you did love me? The greed for my supposed fortune could not have given your eyes such a light—your tones so much tenderness.’

After striving to fix some plan for the morrow, and struggling with the bitter memories, the sad anticipations which\ crowded on her, she wept herself to sleep—the beloved name still on her lips.

The morrow broke bright and clear— so bright that Marie felt fearful every one would recognize and brand her as a runaway wife; for to aggravate her sufferings, doubts would every now and then cross her, whether in acting on the wild impulse of wounded feeling she had done right. She knew she had not deceived Captain Neville. Ought she to have stayed by him, and lived down his suspicions; now could her wild scheme of disappearing for ever enable him to marry; or would it not inflict fresh injury upon him? But then how could she remain to eat the bread of a man who loathed her as the source of his ruin? Banished from his path, he might think of her with tenderness and regret, and this alone was worth agonies to secure; present with him, he would view her with impatience and disgust, or at best with forced endurance, and to this death was incomparably preferable!

Who can say that she was not right? Our hero was but an average man, and average men are not often gifted with the generosity that can forgive an injury to dear self, however unconsciously committed, especially when the inflictor is within sight.

Separation—especially if that separation involves the loss of something not otherwise attainable, may restore tenderness.

Marie erred, no doubt, erred in judgment, common sense, even principle, in leaving her husband; but, had she remained, it is not pleasant to think what might have beeh her lot even with a man who is supposed to have more reason, more self-control, more breadth of character than women possess; even with a gentleman supposed by birth and profession to be imbued with the exalted sentiment called chivalry!

Better, far, O reader! in such a dilemma, be cast on the native generosity of a woman humble in origin, lowly in nurture, than upon the reason, self-control, and chivalry of any ‘average gentleman!’

‘I must act, not dream,’ thought poor Marie, as she went through the form of swallowing a cup of tea and a morsel of bread. She felt strangely averse to resume her old occupation of teaching—first, it would recall such bitter remembrances —secondly, she felt too changed by trouble to do it properly. Some little variety of employment she craved for; so, after informing her landlady that she had taken other lodgings, and dressing herself in the most workwomanlike-way she could devise, she sallied forth—first, to find her way to her new friends, and from that to proceed, after taking counsel with Mrs. Bushel, to some of the great millinery depôts she had noticed.

Mrs. Bushel, who had been giving Marie’s future room a ‘regular turn-out,’ received her most graciously; a handkerchief tied over her head, and a carpet-broom in her hand.

‘I thought I’d just make all right at once, and then you can come in when yon like. You’ll excuse my appearance, but inexperienced servants require to be personally looked after,’ said Mrs. Bushel, in *one of her frequent bursts of gentility.

Marie got the names of two large emporiums of Millinery for the Million, and one or two general shops, the directions to which she wrote down carefully, and proceeded to the farthest first—intending to work her way slowly back.

It was a weary walk, yet she felt little or none of the depression which a search for employment would have thrown over a girl with less practical experience of life. She had been educated to earn her bread, and to earn that bread honestly; to give full value for the money received, never suggested any idea of degradation. She was, in the highest sense, a gentlewoman, and a refined one. Nevertheless her whole life was a totally different grade from her husband’s. She could not imagine the repugnance with which he would have regarded her proceedings—the degradation he would have considered such an occupation! She was dimly conscious that aristocrats disdained to soil their hands; but she did not realize it as an absolute fact. No work, in her estimation, left so indelible a stain upon the hand as the goldbestowed which might be earned: besides, as the rod of Aaron swallowed up those of the magicians, so the terrible blow which had fallen on her hushed all minor sorrows.

Her first two applications were at once rejected — not rudely, people are not gratuitously rude, especially men, to women with soft voices—for Marie’s carefully-arranged veil left but a shadowy glimpse of her face. The third was at a general shop, not on a very large scale. Here she had a rather lengthened interview with a tall, thin, mechanical female, who cross-examined her closely; but when she found she was French, and had studied millinery in Paris, she seemed better disposed towards the applicant.

‘You had better leave me your address, and if we require an additional hand I’ll send for you. I can say no more at present’

Marie accordingly wrote down her adopted name and new address, and went on to the last place on her list with rather a sinking heart What if she could get no employment 1 What was to become of her? Return to France with the disastrous story to her old aunt whose very first act (she felt rather than thought) would be to enforce her claims, if she had any, upon her husband? She unconsciously quickened her pace, and eagerly inquired the nearest way to Wire and Netall’s emporium of millinery.

It was a monster establishment—three or four shops in one—with vast windows, gay with bonnets, caps, and hats of every hue, ticketed with fabulously low prices. Crowds of women and children lounged outside, making imaginary choice, while within crowds of women of every grade and age— from the well-dressed lady, whose brougham awaited her, and who hoped her fifteen-shilling piece of finery would, pass for a Bond Street article at ‘two ten,’ to poor Sarah Jane, the maid-of-all-work, expending her month’s wages to captivate the baker’s young man—almost bewildered the experienced young ladies, and ran the little cashiers nearly off their legs.

Indifferent though she was, Marie almost shrank from the din and tumult. Nevertheless she penetrated the arena, and was immediately addressed by the only individual apparently at leisure in the crowd, a well-dressed and almost fashionable man, with a white tie, who asked, with a fascinating smile, ‘And what can we do for you,’m.’

Marie remembered the effect which her French origin had before produced. With-a pardonable ruse she spoke rather brokenly, and preferred her request for employment with more of foreign gesture natural to her.

‘Oh! you are a French lady, I presume,’ said her interrogator; ‘have the goodness to step this way and he opened a door covered by a large looking-glass, which admitted them from the splendours of the showroom to the darkest, meanest, dirtiest of little staircases.

At the top of this, in a box rather than a room, was another man, not so fresh in attire, with a meagre, hunted, anxious look, but cool and quiet in manner; he was surrounded by piles of millinery boxes, and piles of papers, files of papers, oceans of papers; and was dictating something to a yellow-looking boy, crammed in between a whitened window and a rugged desk.

‘New hand, Mr. Frump,’ said Marie’s conductor.

‘Oh!’ said Mr. Frump. ‘Been in any English house of business?’

Marie stated she had studied millinery in Paris, and was quite a stranger, therefore without references.

‘Awkward, rather, is it not?’ replied Mr. Frump; and after a short whisper with the gentleman in the white tie, Marie was taken upstairs to a large, low, workroom, crowded with pale, pasty looking girls; and having gone through a cross-examination by a severe-looking woman, fashionably dressed in black, was informed she might come on trial for a week without pay, and after, if she suited, would receive six shillings per week and her dinner, for which she was to work from nine to eight.

Some material was then given to her, and with a short break, about two o’clock, when she went, with the second batch of workers, to dinner, she sat till seven. By that time she had finished two caps, which were favourably received by the forewoman, who merely observed she must be quicker in future, as time was money.

The dinner, though of good and wholesome food, was not very appetizing by the time the second relay reached the table, nevertheless Marie was thankful. Here was the bare means of subsistence, at any rate.

‘Easier work and better grub than at the grand West End establishments,’ as one experienced worker whispered.

‘If I am to go so early to-morrow morning,’ thought Marie, ‘would it not be better to settle myself at Mrs. Bushel’s to-night?’

She therefore determined to call there first, and acquaint her new landlady with her intention. Very weary and dizzy,yet upheld by the hope of self-support, she struggled on. She must sustain the life which God had given her, though it held out little prospect of a cheering nature.

Mrs. Bushel was as gracious as usual, and rather more genteel. She was very glad to find Marie had so far succeeded, and perfectly ready to receive her at once.

‘I think you have brought me luck, my dear,’ she said; ‘we’ve let the drawing-rooms to such a nice young man, from the City. To breakfast and tea here; me providing, and two-and-twenty a week! I only wish you had a genteeler engagement. But we must try and get you some pupils. Have some tea before you go on.’

‘Not till I return, thank you,’ said Marie, fearful of resting till all was accomplished.

She therefore toiled on to Acacia Row, and in spite of Mrs. Jupp’s exclamations and contemptuous surprise, insisted on settling all extra charges, the amount of which rather surprised her. At last, however, all was arranged. Mrs. Jupp disdained to make any inquiries; and after helping the servant to take down her box, Marie went herself to call a cab.

CHAPTER IV.

Marie had been now four or five days at her new employment, and felt as though an equal number of years intervened between her past and present, so wide and impassable seemed the gulf that separated her from Guy and the flash of momentary happiness connected with him.

As she settled into her routine, and morning and evening brought no romantic discovery—such as she dimly, unconsciously, hoped for—she seemed to drift farther and farther into oblivion, and a heavy gloom weighed her down, lending a sad, pained, longing look to her sweet, dark eyes, and inexpressible mournfulness to the smile with which she strove to speak to Mrs. Bushel’s children. She felt herself quickly becoming a mere working machine, toiling for the daily bread, so tasteless and unpalatable, unseasoned as it was by the salt of hope.

The minor discomforts of Mrs. Bushel’s scrambling establishment were swallowed up in her constant sense of griefs, and so the hours rolled on.

‘Your tea is all ready for you, my dear,’ said her kindly, untidy landlady, one evening, towards the close of her first week, as Marie entered. ‘Just let me come in and speak to you a bit, while you take it. You’re very late.’

‘Come in, pray,’ said Marie, ascending rapidly, and opening her door.

Mrs. Bushel panted after, and threw herself into the first chair.

‘Now, you see, I only want yes or no. Don’t you think 1 want to over-persuade you; but I thought it might lie a mutual benefit,’ began Mrs. Bushel, as Marie removed her bonnet ‘Yes,’ she replied, interrogatively.

‘Well, we’ve had a rather advantageous offer from the young gent in the drawirooms, to accommodate a chum of his, if we could make out another bedroom; so I thought I’d make you a proposal to change your room for one in the next floor to the front — a nice little place — not quite so large as this’—looking round as though she surveyed an area of vast extent—‘but a more cheerful look-out, and a nice iron bedstead. Then, if you have no objection to give my little girls a French lesson every evening — say an hour—I shall consider the rent of my room paid. You see it will be a mutual advantage.’

‘Thank you!’ said Marie. ‘I should like to see the room.’

‘O yes, by all means!’ replied her hostess, bouncing up, ‘and then I’ll tell Mr. Tucker, to-morrow, when I know your answer.’

The room was undoubtedly small, and the cheerful look-out existed rather in Mrs. B.’s imagination. Nevertheless, Marie was pleased to make her rent so cheaply, as she considered it, for she had become interested in little Agnes, who, as well as the other children, always showed a strong partiality to her; and she now wished for some distraction to the mind, for while her fingers were so busily employed all day, her poor aching heart would wander, and’ act over and over again the brief episode of love and joy which had flashed make its after-desolation more dark and drear'.

The general public of the workroom little thought what wear}’ metaphysics of feeling revolved behind that pale brow’, and lent such dreamy tenderness to the large, soft eyes, which yet were always kind.

Instinctively, the gentle, uncomplaining girl won a certain respect, unconsciously drawn forth, perhaps unconsciously given. But in her new task of instruction, Marie found some relief, even though partly caused by vexation.

With much difficulty, she collected a few old French books, but the Herculean task of getting the children together, of preserving the quiet necessary for instruction in the general sitting-room, of suppressing the long harangues of Mrs. Bushel, meant to enforce order and attention, almost exceeded her powers at first. Gradually, she acquired a little habitual authority, however; and, as Mrs. Bushel about this time, with much exultation, accepted the post of district visitor, for which, she informed Marie, her worthy pastor, the Rev. Josiah Grumble ton, considered her especially fitted, the evenings, which she generally devoted to distributing weak tracts to strong men, and preaching looseness to the world, to their poor draggle-tailed wives, whose highest conception of existence was meat every day, and a new dress for Sundays, were therefore less disturbed; and at the end of a week, Marie began to hope that by-and-by she might possibly see her little riotous pupils attentive and improving.

A few days after this, hope began to dawn. Mrs. Bushel was unusually late in her return. Marie remained on with the children, for Jemima, seeing her mistress had left no particular orders about anything, concluded there was no necessity for her to remain at home. And the seedy papa, finding no supper or society, had rummaged out a ‘screw’ of tobacco, and gone to see what news was stirring in the Mechanics’ Institution.

Mrs. Bushel’s ring was speedily followed by her appearance, bearing a pleased and somewhat preoccupied expression.

‘Well, it’s half-past nine, I do declare. I’m sure, mademoiselle, I am greatly obliged to you for staying on with these troublesome children. What a good-for-nothing girl that Jemima is to go off, and me out! I declare, servants are a bad set, and if you change, you must go from bad to worse, or I would pack her off tomorrow. But, you see, our good Pastor asked me, when 1 met him there in Little Philpot Lane—and oh! dear, there’s an old laundress there that is just the most wonderful example of grace you ever heard of. She was intoxicated frequently, and used the most’orrid language; but since I took up the district, she has been very poorly, and read three tracts—“ Where are you going?” “ What are you doing? ” and “ Stop!” It’s a series of tracts most striking, and now she only takes tea and mutton broth, and says she’s a brand plucked from the burning, poor thing! She has a dreadful red face, certainly—and! what was I saying?—oh! yes, I met the Rev. Mr. Girumbleton at the end of her lane. He just asked me to step in to a committee of ladies (I forgot to say the doctor has ordered her three glasses of gin a-day, to keep up the system, sothat, you know, helps to make her face red). Well, a committee of ladies about this treat to the Ragged School next Wednesday— and really, when he is so good as to consider my opinion of consequence, I do not like to refuse’ (with an air of modest consequence); ‘so I went, and we settled it all beautiful. They are to have tea and buns, and several eminent gentlemen will address the meeting; each lady is to provide and pour out tea, and buns, for twenty children—they are each to have two penny buns, that’s—let me see — one-and-eightpence and three-and-fourpence ; and I suppose it will take a quarter of tea—eh, mademoiselle? It ought’ned to be too strong, you know, for children.’

‘I’ll help to pour out the tea. Oh, do let me. And do let me have a new hat, my hat’s shocking bad.’

‘Yes’—‘And me!’—‘and me!’ chorused the others.

‘Oh ; don’t tease, my dears!’ returned Mrs. Bushel. ‘You must come, too, mademoiselle. It will be quite a treat, elegant speaking, and a good work, too, —elevating to the soul—if you can get away in time.’

‘I thank you,’ said Marie, vaguely.

‘I suppose we shall have the same clergyman who preached at your chapel the first Sunday I was there?’

‘O yes! You mean Mr. Probemwell. I think he’ll be sure to speak, and he is most imposing. Well, I hope you had good girls to-night!’

CHAPTER VII.

When the important Wednesday arrived, Marie felt idly inclined to accompany her landlady—she felt a sort of refuge too, poor girl, in topics which described the rest, the joy, the love of another life—she had not naturally much of that morbid, religious feeling, which some excellent persons prize as a high tone of spirituality ; and though fondly and earnestly looking to a future life, was more disposed to find religion in the performance of present duties, than in vague speculations as to future reward and punishment. But now! weighed as she had been in the balance of worldly estimation, and found so terribly wanting, where could she turn for sympathy, save to that Great Reader of the human heart, who alone can measure its strength and weakness, and alone can judge how much of pure ore and base alloy enters into its actuating motives,hen its efforts seem noblest, or its abasement deepest?

Religious addresses, sermons, prayers, were a relief to Marie in her present state of mind; and, at all events, some tendency she could not quite account for, had she tried, inclined her to accompany her energetic hostess to the meeting.

By taking an omnibus, she contrived to reach Tivoli Gardens, Mrs. Bushel’s residence, in tolerable time, and found the household in an uproar.

‘What do you think, my dear? there’s that tiresome Tucker and Mr. Gaussin—of all days in the year—they have brought a young friend home to tea, and a rump-steak, and, of course, how could I attend to it—what with putting up the tea and sugar, and getting the children ready— and that girl Jemima is so vexed, because she made sure of going out, that she’s gone and burnt it to a cinder—not that she can cook much at the best of times— but shecan do a steak — and Tucker has been swearing awful. I think I had better send him a tract. But come what will, I can’t disappoint Mr. Grumbleton, when he counts upon me.’

After some farther scrambling and hurrying, the party got under weigh— Marie leading little Agnes.

The tea-meeting was held in the schoolroom of the chapel where Marie had first met the Bushel family, and was crowded to overflowing when they entered, and hot and unpleasant to no slight degree.

At the upper end was a sort of temporary dais or stage, which, at the commencement of the proceedings, contained only empty chairs.

‘This way, mum,’ said one of the chapel pew-openers to Mrs. Bushel, as panting and heated, her arm aching with the weight it sustained in the shape of a huge basket of buns, &c., fussed into the crowd, and with her party she was ushered to an important and prominent table at the upper end of the room, near the platform, a tribute to her worth and gentility, which greatly delighted the excellent matron ; her broad face beamed with satis‘faction, as it also shone from other causes, as she took her place and gathered her flock around her.

‘Sit opposite to me, my dear,’ she said to Marie, ‘and yon will see beautiful!— and there’s nothing like seeing, as well as hearing. Augusta Jane, go, there’s a good girl, and see if you can get some hot water—boiling, mind! Goodness, but it’s hot! I wish some one would open that window!’

‘They can’t, mar, don’t you see it’s a wentilator?’

‘Dear, dear! that child sees everything!’ cried the mother, with admiration.

But her distinguished position quickly told upon the exhausted and panting Mrs. Bushel. Cup after cup was poured out and replenished, till she was fain to give the post of honour to Marie, whose complexion fortunately tended to grow pale instead of red, under the effect of heat or excitement So the feast proceeded, the piles of buns disappeared, the last waterings of the teapots were exhausted, and the poor little guests began to pinch and tease each other for want of better amusement.

Suddenly there was a lull.

The Reverend, and other gentlemen, about to address the meeting began to assemble, climbing up the two or three rude steps which led to the platform— stiffly, easily, lightly, or puffingly, as the case might be.

There was the Rev. Mr. Tompkins, the minister of the Lambeth Circus Branch Chapel, and the Rev. Josias Pitcher, the Congregational minister, and the Wesleyan clergyman, and, as Mrs. Bushel enthusiastically exclaimed, ‘Our own dear Pastor!’ some of the deacons, and a tall, bony, iron-gray man, greatly at variance in style, dress, and look from his companions—he had a rugged aspect, with deep-set, grave eyes, and a close-shut, wide, firm mouth, and heavy jaw; his clothes, of uniform, dark colour, were well made, his boots, his hat, his gloves, had an air of freshness, and though as unfashionable as any of the rest, he was emphatically a gentleman, and evidently a man of substance and position ; yet he looked hard, and cold, and dry, and as opposed as possible to the unctuous, self-contented air of his coadjutors; he took his place rather in the background, and seemed to decline the polite, nay, deferential, nods and becks of his companions, when they strove to make him take a foremost place.

Marie gazed upon him fascinated and alarmed—it was her companion in that wretched journey from Dover, every moment, every incident of which was stereotyped on her brain—for ever and for ever!!

Bat an old clergyman now rose and ottered the words, ‘Let us ask a blessing,’ whereupon every one present, more or less, assumed an attitude of prayer.

This passed and all reassumed their previous positions, without affording to Marie any opportunity to shrink out of sight. She felt an instinctive dread of her fellow-traveller—a certainty that could he know her true history he would condemn her utterly. He looked as though he was always ready to lay down comfort and happiness, and geniality, on the shrine of duty, uncompromisingly himself and that this native power on his side, gave him an undoubted right to expect similar strength from his fellow-labourers in life’s rough field. If. not, you were a castaway, and it seemed to Marie that nothing could be hidden from those cold, penetrating gray eyes, and that nothing could save her from the verdict of those close-shut thin lips, so she sat very uncomfortably bearing, without listening to, a long harangue about ragged schools in general, and the Lambeth institutions, the work progressing in the ‘Lord’s vineyard,’ &c., interspersed largely with anecdotes of wonderful little boys and girls who all died at an early period of life.

The colour came and went in her cheek—she kept her eyes fixed on the ground, fearful of meeting those of the iron-gray man, yet ever nervously anxious to know if he was looking at her, she could not resist stealing upward glances every few minutes to see if she was observed. For some time he did not seem to see her or anyone, but to be lost in attention or thought; at length after a round of applause which followed the Rev. speaker’s description of the successful career of a ragged schoolboy, Marie once more took a furtive glance, and, to her dismay, met her former companion’s keen eyes bent upon her with an expression of surprise and doubt, yet unmixed with severity and not untinged with pleasure.

It was a look which said, unconsciously, ‘Do I at last see her who has been so much in my thoughts?’

Marie vaguely gave herself up as lost, that is—committed in some inexplicable manner to some severe course of duty, self-denial and mortification!

The remainder of the speech was a mist to her, she heard dimly, at intervals, well-known quotations and allusions to spiritual influences, and to the damnable doctrines of Rome, but all was swallowed up in the horror of detection, the dread of she knew not what! Being driven back to Guy perhaps, albeit reluctantly received, and leading a life of constant duty-doing and heart-breaking! Yes—her ex-companion looked capable of exacting more than a ‘pound of flesh'—even of distilling the tears of weak hearts into the bitterness of enforced endurance, and he seemed a man of power too!

Fearing and thinking thus, the eloquence of the varied exhortations fell dimly on Marie’s ear; at last her iron-gray friend rose, and her attention immediately woke up to its utmost. His tone and manner were very unlike his precursors’, extremely dry—yet clear; without an unnecessary word he laid before his hearers the inestimable benefit of education—and dwelt, with more force than perhaps was quite suitable to the character of the meeting, on the wordly advantages arising from good habits, good principles, good training; then he turned to higher motives, but here, though evidently much in earnest he was less at home, stammered slightly, and was embarrassed. His Deity—was a God of vengeance and an uncompromising taskmaster, whom ’twere best to propitiate in time, and whose relations even to the best-conducted of ragged school boys, were of a doubtful nature, so invariably is each man’s God a reflex of himself.

CHAPTER VIII.

The speech was listened to with profound attention, but not loudly applauded. Though dour in tone, it was yet bracing, and, moreover, the very voice and accent, the mode of speech, the nameless refinement, despite its unadorned plainness, gave the speaker all that wondrous effect which is ever produced by one we feel to be undoubtedly superior, not only in mind and attainments, but also in social position. This peroration accomplished, and the atmosphere having risen almost to boiling point, in spite of the cooling influence of the last speaker, there was a whispered consultation among the gentlemen on the platform, and a fat, oily man, in a limp, white tie, rose and said—

‘Dear friends, let us return thanks for the refreshment that has been granted unto us’—he meant the speeches, not the buns—and then the whole congregation rose, and adopted devotional attitudes.

There was a long wrestling in prayer; but all was at last ended, the children scuffled out, and Marie eagerly tied on the little girls' hats as a hint to their mother that it was time to ‘move on.’ But the hint was not taken. The flattered, fevered, panting Mrs. Bushel was anxious to crown the evening’s glories by remaining for special notice from some or all of the Reverend gentlemen who had addressed the meeting.

They had now descended from the platform, and, with the humility which marks' great minds, mingled with the throng of teachers, tea-makers, and district-visitors, who gradually crowded together as the small guests of the evening departed, eager for notice and commendation.

Marie was hemmed in, and felt much as the wretched prisoner in the ‘Iron, shroud’ must have done, as the human walls closed around her.

At last the Rev. Mr. Grumbleton, ‘our own dear Pastor,’ came up, and by his side Marie’s gray ‘Phantom of sadness.’ It was all over: she must face and acknowledge him.

‘This, sir,’ said Mr. Grumbleton, as though in continuation of something—‘is one of our most active and persevering district visitors’—waving his hand towards the delighted Mrs. Bushel. ‘‘Within the last month, this good lady has distributed not less than 167 tracts, of the most stirring description, and circulated 48 New Testaments; but four days ago she discovered a pernicious publication, entitled “ Hints for Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Mary,” concealed in two of your cottages in Mortimer Terrace, Pelham Park, where we had hoped the good work was prospering. The emissaries of Rome, sir, are unwearied in evil, watchful to lay wait.’

‘I am happy to make your acquaintance,’ said the iron-gray man, with cold politeness? ‘such energy is its own reward. But I am concerned to hear that our Romish adversaries have invaded a district so carefully tended as Pelham Park.’

Mrs. Bushel smiled, and curtsied, and fluttered out a confused answer, in which ‘our worthy Pastor’s encouraging notice,’ and ‘your kind approbation, sir,’ were jumbled up with her ‘own poor efforts and undeserved success.’

But all this time Marie felt rather than knew the keen, dark, gray eye, which had yet something mysteriously familiar in its severity, was fixed upon her.

Mr. Grumbleton then began some undertoned and earnest conversation with Mrs. Bushel; and then Marie’s ex-companion approaching a step nearer, said, in cold, composed tones, as though their meeting was the most natural and commonplace thing in the world—

‘I am glad to find you engaged in so good a work. May I hope you have prospered since we met, and obtained a situation of the nature you required?’

Marie raised her large, sad eyes beseechingly towards him, and his softened as they met her glance. A more experienced or designing woman might have surmised that fire could be struck even from so flinty a personage, had she seen the expression. But poor Marie heeded not.

‘You are very kind to remember me,’ she replied, in her low, sweet tones. ‘These little girls are my pupils then’, half-ashamed of the partial evasion, added, with a smile—‘and in the mornings I work in a large millinery establishment.’

‘That can scarce be a profitable employment for body or soul,’ returned her interrogator, with a shade of additional coldness.

‘It suits me,’ replied Marie, in unaffected humility.

There was a pause—and still the iron-gray man lingered beside her. ‘You did not, then, findit, necessary to use the address I gave you? You have probably found other friends,’ he resumed.

‘Friends!’ responded Marie, the tears starting to her eyes. ‘Alas! I have in gratitude for your kindness to a total stranger;’ and again she looked up to him with a glance so speaking, that he involuntarily responded to it.

‘Where are you living at present?’ he asked, after another rather uneasy pause.

‘With this,’ she hesitated—‘this lady,’ indicating Mrs. Bushel — who, having finished her confidential communications with Mr. Grrumbleton, now stood at ‘attention,’ rather astonished to find an acquaintanceship existed between her humble inmate and the lordly patron of Pelham Park Institution.

‘That is well,’ said that gentleman, with more cordiality than he had yet spoken. ‘I am now somewhat pressed for time, but I should be glad to assist you to some situation more suitable to your seeming position than daily work in a milliner’s establishment I am generally to be found on alternate Saturday and Wednesday afternoons at the “Youths’ Institute;” if Mrs. Bushel would kindly accompany you thither,’ he added, with a vague sense of guarding against something. ‘Meantime, permit me to take your address;’ and he again produced the pocket-book and massive silver pencil Marie so well remembered.

After some quiet explanation

‘Oh dear! to be sure,’ said Mrs. Bushel, highly pleased, ‘No. 25, Tivoli Gardens—not twenty minutes’ walk from jour Institution, sir—an’umble, but, I trust, genteel abode of contentment and love.’

He bowed stiffly.

‘Let me hope I was enabled to speak a word in season when I saw you in such deep sorrow?’ he said, in a low tone. ‘And suffer me to suggest that candour is the surest means to secure friendship.’

He bowed again.

‘You are very kind,’ murmured Marie, indistinctly, as he moved away. ‘Ah! he is good,’ she thought—‘but terrible —he will tear my secret from me some day.’

‘Law! my dear,’ exclaimed Mrs. Bushel, when they were outside the school-room, ‘however did you know Mr. Watson?’

‘Watson! yes, that was the name he wrote. Who is Mr. Watson?’

‘Oh! a very rich, high gentleman indeed! he lives in Belgrave Square or some such place—in a palace of a house Mr. Grumbleton was telling me—and knows Lord Shaftesbury, and Dr. Cum-ming, and lots of lords and ladies—and yet he is always doing good and mixing himself up with all sorts of humble, not to say low, people. He bought all this property about here, Pelham Park, and that just to do good to the poor, though I have heard it’s a wonderful improving property —wonderful. You see—“A little that the righteous hath is better than”—no, that’s not quite it,’ breaking off. ‘But how did you know him, mademoiselle, dear?’

‘Oh, accidentally. I travelled in the same railway carriage, and was not very —very well, and he was most kind.’

‘Oh! I dare say, and he’s quite the gentleman—quite. Augusta Jane, don’t be scuffling your feet in the dust, it’s most unladylike! dear, dear. Well, it was very gratifying, but rather warm, and I must say I’d be the better of a good glass of porter!’

And Mr. Watson threw himself back in the first ‘Hansom’ he could find. He lay back and strove to think of the progress of education and godliness among his poorer brethren; of the routine of to-morrow’s business; of the investment which offered yesterday for certain loose thousands; of that opening to trade and religion (we beg pardon), religion and trade on the West Coast of Africa—but all these trains of thought were broken and rendered futile by the light of those sweet, sad eyes which still seemed to look into his, and draw forth his very soul despite himself; the echo of that gentle voice, the murmured music of her soft ‘You are very kind!’ The iron-gray man almost started to find how they haunted him, and with fierce resolve he tore his mind away savagely, turning from the tenderness which involuntarily stole over him, as the image so repeatedly banished, rose up again and again.

He was a lonely man—why, none could tell, not even himself, for he had always possessed wealth, and had also ‘been lord of himself,’ for many a year, but business or coldness, or religion or something, had always preoccupied and saved him from the wiles even of the most charming and diligent district visitors, bazaar furnishers and tract distributors; and now, at his mature age and advanced Christianity, was he to be haunted by the nameless charm, the tender grace, of an insignificant milliner’s apprentice, a creature he had picked up in a railway carriage, of unknown and doubtful antecedents and very uncertain religious views,—forbid it respectability, prudence, common sense! It was but an unusual amount of pity for an uncommon case.

‘She is a gentlewoman, evidently; perhaps the orphan of some improvident parents; possibly the victim of some—’ Pah! how his soul revolted as the chance of a not unheard-of reason for evading friends and inquiries glanced across his mind. His spare, bony hand involuntarily clenched, and tendencies very much opposed to Gospel injunction braced his muscles for a moment.

‘As a Christian it is my duty to rescue her in some way;’ but why should he feel so deep an interest?

‘Curious fool, be still! Is human love the growth of human will?’

CHAPTER IX.

It was several days before Marie could recover the strange species of terror and excitement which Mr. Watson’s recognition had caused her. Why should she fear this man, who, with all his grave respectability and measured coldness, was yet evidently anxious to befriend her? She could not explain her own feelings; reason as she would, they always returned. She did not want help; she wanted merely to go on earning obscurely what was sufficient to pay her humble way, not to be cross-examined and tortured, and humiliated!

The Bushel household had recovered the excitement of the ‘tea-meeting,’ the justly-incensed ‘ drawing-rooms’ had for-given his burnt steak, and matters had subsided to their usual level—when one evening, as Marie was endeavouring to impress the intricacies of a piece of vocabulary on her little favourite ‘Agnes,’ down in the front-kitchen, dignified in the establishment as the breakfast-parlour, a ring of the bell claimed immediate attention from its tone of decision. A hasty rush to the front-door—a trampling of several pairs of boots—and then Mrs. Bushel descended like an avalanche on the French class—with a radiant face.

‘Goodness gracious, my dear, come up directly, here’s our dear good Pastor and Mr. Watson himself and they want to see you/ ‘To see me? Oh! what can they want with me, Mrs. Bushel?’ cried poor Marie, shrinking and turning pale.

‘Don’t delay, now. You’ll soon hear, I’ve no doubt, and you look quite neat— come along, do.’

Mrs. Bushel almost propelled her young friend upstairs before her.

The front-parlour, always of narrow dimensions, looked smaller than ever, as Marie entered it, and confronted the ‘good Pastor,’ whose goodly breadth was dominated by the superior height of Mr. Watson, who, though spare, was a large-boned,road-shouldered man. He stood on the hearth-rug—his hat held behind him, looking keen, cool, iron-gray as usual; and Marie would have given the wealth of worlds, could she have commanded it, poor child, to escape his eager, questioning glance.

The source of its power she little knew, the strange hunger it expressed to gather up the secrets of her soul; so she stood irresolute—her colour changing—her unconsciously - appealing, shrinking look, which stirred the stem philanthropist so deeply—contending with the air of composure she struggled hard to preserve.

Mr. Watson bowed as she entered, and moved a chair forward with grave politeness, involuntarily treating the object of his would-be patronage, as an equal.

Mr. Grumbleton put out a fat, warn hand, with ostentatious condescension— ‘Very glad, my young friend, to be the means of forwarding our respected benefactor’s views in your favour. He will explain them to you himself.’

‘I am sure the Lord has been very good to her,’ panted Mrs. Bushel, ‘to see the kind interest you good gentlemen—’

‘The proposition I wish to make is this,’ interrupted Mr. Watson, with surprised impatience: ‘I have nearly organized a new Institution for the training of female children of a class above the attendants of Ragged Schools, whose parents are willing to pay a small sum weekly. I have already an excellent Matron, but I should wish a somewhat higher class of teacher— one calculated to influence the children— and this situation I offer to you, with a salary of fifty pounds—if you conscientiously consider yourself equal to fulfill it. I want a little better instruction than what is ordinarily bestowed in Charity Schools, with the intention of giving those who wish to elevate themselves, a chance of doing so; and this, I imagine, you would be capable of imparting—while it would be more suited to, and profitable for, you than your present occupation.

‘I scarcely know how to answer you,’ returned Marie, sorely embarrassed— ‘Your great kindness in thus searching out a poor stranger to bestow unasked benefits—is—is—more than I can express. But, oh! sir, I am, indeed, unequal to such an undertaking. I am weak, and my nerves so treacherous. No! Let me stay quietly at my “ needlework.” I shall earn my living by that— and—’

‘Law, my dear! How do you know but they’ll turn you off when the dull season comes? You know you are only an extra, and may be dismissed any morning. Now don’t fly in the face of Providence,’ cried Mrs. Bushel.

‘If our respected Mend judges you to be worthy the calling, you should rest content, young woman,’ said the Rev. Mr. Grumbleton, in a tone of rebuke.

‘No,’ replied Marie, with gentle firmness. ‘He calls upon me to judge myself, and I fear, in truth, I should not fulfill his expectations. I am not equal to much now,’ she added, in a lower tone.

There was a pause. Mr. Watson looked down silently, as in thought; then addressing Mrs. Bushel, said, a shade more coldly,—

‘I should wish to speak with this young person alone.’

‘O yes, certainly, sir. If you’ll just come upstairs, Mr. Grumbleton’ (the drawing-rooms is out), ‘I will show you the report of the Philpot Dorcas Society;’ and Mrs. Bushel led the way, with her "st ceato” movement, so suddenly, that Mr. Grumbleton felt compelled to follow very rapidly.

‘Sit down,’ said Mr. Watson; and laying aside his hat, and something of his cold composure, drew a chair to the opposite side of the table, and Marie obeyed, in a sort of helpless despair, yet resolved to defend her secret to the last. Her heart beat, and the little hand she unconsciously pressed to her brow, trembled visibly.

There was a moment’s silence; the grave Elder’s heart beat also. What charm was there in the mingled strength and weakness of this poor young stranger that moved him so powerfully, though he did not—dared not—acknowledge it? He could have clasped her to his heart as a friendless child, to be cherished and protected. He adoringly worshipped the gentle strength which dominated, yet submitted to him.

‘You must feel I am your friend,’ he began, in quiet tones, which had a ring of kindliness in them; ‘why,,then, will you not allow me to assist you, and confide in me? Permit me to say that a young and friendless creature like yourself should not throw away a friend because of some self-opinionated scruple about revealing your past history. We are all liable to error, and a confession of past shortcomings will not lesson my desire to set you right in the future. Your natural position is evidently superior to your present state; but, humble as the calling of teacher in the class I suggest is, it is more worthy of you than your present occupation. Why do you shrink from it? You are more than equal, I feel assured, to the task. There is some hidden reason, and I desire to know it; or, I must come to some conclusion detrimental to the good opinion I would fain form of your character.’

And he looked into Marie’s sad eyes with a keen, stedfast gaze, as though he defied their dark, lustrous depths to hide any secret from him.

‘I will speak all truth to you, so far as I dare,’ returned Marie, with parched lips, and pressing her clasped hands tightly together. ‘I do not accept your offer, because grief has unhinged and unfitted me for it. I am unequal to control even myself but principally because I have a secret which I will not reveal—not if the keeping of it cost me life; and I fear you —I fear your kindness, your sternness, your influence; good as you are, friend though you be, I would rather never see you again than tell you my secret, for it is not all mine. And have I not a right to a secret?’ she continued, rising from her seat, and speaking with a little excitement. ‘You are a great and a good gentleman, but we all—men and women —have a right to the sanctity of our own memories, as well as to the bread we can win! Ah! sir, I love and respect you, and would give much to win your esteem in the path you have pointed out to me; but there is only one way I can undertake it. Trust me! I have done nothing wrong! I have been true to those with whom I have had to do—true to myself. If you will let my life begin from the present, and trust my own word for the past, I will obey you, and confide as a child to a parent; but you must believe me—I have done nothing wrong — nothing!’

She stopped abruptly. Mr. Watson frowned ominously; his sallow cheek grew a shade paler, and the hand that rested on the table twitched; but he spoke calmly, when after a few moments’ thought he said,—

‘I may be unwise, Miss.Thibaut’ (he had never called her by her name before), but I will trust and try you; hereafter, perhaps—but the future will shape itself.

Remember, however, you have yet to win my full approbation. For the present 1 engage you, as I should any other young woman with satisfactory references, and no one has a right to question you when I am satisfied.’

‘O yes, yes!’ cried Marie, impulsively catching and pressing his hand.

As she did so, she met his eyes, and in their troubled expression, there was a nameless something that, strange as it seemed, recalled Guy—Guy, in his fondest moods—so vividly, that the great tears welled over, and she rushed from the room sobbing as though her heart would break.

Mr. Watson stood for a moment as she had left him, passed his hand once or twice across his brow, then collecting himself, rang the bell.

‘I have partly overcome Miss Thibaut’s scruples,’ he said to Mr. Grumbleton, as Mrs. Bushel and that gentleman entered; ‘and I will give her a day or two to think the matter over—at present, I am somewhat pressed for time. Mr. Grumble-ton will see her again, and explain the subject more fully.’

He bowed to Mrs. Bushel, and departed, carrying the Pastor with him.

CHAPTER X.

‘Well, indeed, my dear; I never knew such luck,’ said Mrs. Bushel, seating herself with a flop on the side of Marie’s little bed, ‘and you crying instead of rejoicing. Come—come, it is right downlying in the face of Providence not to be joyful over such a lift—and that hard work was killing you, my dear—killing you by inches. Mr. Grumbleton has been telling me that it is thirty pounds a year, and a room to yourself.

Marie, taking her hand, said, ‘Do not mind my tears, I am very thankful in spite of them ; but—but I was obliged to speak to Mr. Watson on some painful topics, and felt overcome.’

‘Oh!’ said Mrs. Bushel, curious, yet satisfied, as she interpreted Marie’s innocently ambiguous phrase into a full confession of her previous history to Mr-Watson, and his approval thereof. ‘Well, my dear, I’m sure you couldn’t do no better than tell that kind, good gentleman everything; but at the same time, where one has the feelings of a mother towards you, and no inclination to gossip or talk, but the reverse, confidence would not be misplaced, not that I have any desire to pry,’ &c.

At last Mrs. Bushel wore out her conjectures, and expended her time. She started affectionately from her mysterious inmate, too genial in nature to be soured even by curiosity unsatisfied, and confidence withheld.

Marie thought long and deeply.

She did not question her own discretion in accepting Mr. Watson’s offer. She felt she was powerless in the matter; and though he had generously consented to respect her secret, she knew instinctively it was but a postponement of the evil day.

There was that in the ‘iron-gray man’ which would rend it from her, sooner or later. There was a strange sympathy between them, coupled on her side with dread, which yet did not diminish her liking and respect for him. There was gold fused with the rugged quartz of his nature.

And how did it stand?—that account with the unknown future, she shunned to reckon up. Her daily bread was provided while health was left her. She was respectably sheltered, and in the employment of one who would not leave a profitable servant to starve or die in the workhouse when unable to work; so far, all was better than she could have dared to hope on that terrible day when she fled from Guy, and love, and hope.

Nevertheless, she sat motionless, gazing at vacancy, paralyzed with a despair of life, which no human eloquence could express.

It was as if some bloodless ghost was left her—some pale shadow of existence, without colour, or flavour, or vitality and must she submits to this! Never— never more seek out her husband, her love! Oh, to see him once more! to hear his voice, even if it said Farewell! Yet, would not this deadly silence be better than to find herself still rejected, and viewed as an impostor—a clog—something to be rid of? she kept away, out of sight, might he not regret her! So she must endure to the end, and strive and do her best; but nature’s voice whispered that this state of things could not last. Youth is so strong, the heart so elastic, that it must throw off the weight which oppresses it, or perish. The future always terrified her—she knew not why.

‘God help me!—God guide me I’ she ejaculated, as she rose to busy herself with some necessary needlework, to chase these terrible thoughts away.

In less than a week all things were arranged, and Marie moved her few belongings to the neat little chamber assigned to her in the new wing of Pelham Park Institution, where Mr. Watson had organized his school.

The matron was a somewhat stern, silent, but inoffensive woman, nevertheless disposed in a quiet way to treat Marie as a dependent; this, however, gave the former little annoyance.

Marie took her meals with the matron in a sitting-room allotted to their joint use; bat always, on three evenings in the week, walked over to Mrs. Bushel’s, to give a French lesson gratis to her little pupils in Tivoli Gardens.

The school being in its infancy, she did not find it so overwhelming a task as she at first expected, and the number gradually increasing, she found her strength grow to it The severe matron assisted her considerably both in school hours by maintaining discipline, and out of them by the practical suggestions of experience.

So time wore on. Mr. Watson occasionally called, generally on a Saturday, and appeared satisfied with the working of his plan.

Marie’s dread of him had considerably subsided; no approach had been made to the forbidden subject ; and though cold and guarded enough in speech, there was a tender and wistful expression in his eyes, to which Marie’s heart unconsciously warmed.

As for him, a graver and a sterner man might well feel his pulses quicken to see that pale, sad face, and its downcast eyes brighten.and revive, when they met his glance, and then only. Oh, wondrous magnetism of feeling!—no bond can ever bind, no chain enslave, like the consciousness that some other feeble struggling heart out of its dim groping for life, which is love, calls upon yours, and says, ‘Come, be mine.’

And this dry, practical man, for whom the spring-time of life had been but a talent hidden in a napkin, was waking to its magnificence. The glow and warmth of the subtile master was coming back to his soul with the enhanced glory of an Indian summer! but how to bring back the fresh loveliness of spring, or the momentary and tropic heat, which makes the quickly succeeding ice and frost of winter but more bitterly felt?

To the respectable Mr. Watson, ‘behold all things were becoming new!’ The severity which made ‘duty’ an unrelaxing ‘Juggernaut,’ was now tinged with a vague indulgence, partaking of the ‘love which forgiveth and hopeth all things,’ and the inflexible justice of the Deity less present to his imagination than the boundless mercy set forth by Him who alone knoweth the Father.

‘And you find the system of reward rather than punishment, on the whole successful?’

He was conversing alone with Marie, after she had been about four weeks established in her new employment.

‘Certainly; and I have great faith in it. I have always found there is no chance for a naughty child until you have accorded total and complete forgiveness and oblivion—then they have some ground to stand upon, and begin a new career—as you, dear, kind sir, have permitted me — though, remember, I do not admit I was a naughty child!’

And she looked in his face with eyes so expressive of tender gratitude and a tinge of her old, soft archness, that a strange, electric yearning quivered through his heart, and made it beat high and strong for a moment ‘Dear child,’ he returned, subduing himself to grave kindness, ‘I have long ceased to doubt you, though I hope and believe the day will come, and that soon, when you will trust me, even as much as I have trusted you. I begin to see, young Mend, that despite the safeguard of religious faith, a life passed among hardening influences—men, money, business—has deadened me too. much to the softer maxims of our great Teacher. But I can atone—I can atone,’ he murmured to himself and then paused abruptly.

Neither Marie nor her benefactor had observed the confidential tone which had gradually coloured their communications ; and she felt no surprise when he said, ‘Had I a relative—a daughter like yourself—the intercourse with a fresh, young mind would have done much to keep me freer from coldness and self.’

‘You cold or selfish!’ cried Marie, indignantly. ‘You, the kindest and truest!’

‘Hush!’ returned Mr. Watson, rising to walk to and fro. ‘I am not sure how for my kindness may not be selfish, but I have distant glimpses of more than I deserve—yet it is premature to speak—I may advise your removal.’

Marie was listening, a good deal puzzled to these disjoined sentences, when the matron entered, and the conversation turned upon some details of school management, in discussing which Marie observed Mr. Watson was rather absent, at length he looked at his watch:

‘I have overstayed my time,’ he said; ‘but, Miss Thibaut, you can deliver a message to your Mend Mrs. Bushel—tell her to send her husband to me to-morrow before ten—there is my private address— 1 think I have found a clerkship for which he is suited. You continue to teach her children? You are grateful! you would do much for gratitude?’ he asked.

Marie, wondering at his unusual tone and manner, replied in the affirmative, and he left the room followed by the obsequious matron.

CHAPTER XI.

A month had passed since Neville’s fruithless visit to the benevolent Mrs. Jnpp. The revulsion of feeling it had caused him—coming after so much and such long-continued excitement had laid him prostrate with a severe and lowering fever, which his medical attendant assured him imperatively demanded repose — physical repose at any rate he added, on Neville’s exclaiming that there could be no rest for him. ‘You will utterly unfit yourself for the search you are so bent upon, if you do not take a month’s complete rest.’ But even then Neville’s usually powerful frame was but ill able to second his eager desire to be ‘up and doing.’

However the opening of the present chapter finds him in Paris, whither he had gone in the vague hope of discovering some trace of Marie’s aunt, who had never taken any notice of his long explanatory letter, or otherwise communicated with him.

Thither he was accompanied by his stanch friend Sir Frederic Compton, who purposed proceeding to Switzerland and the North of Italy, having got a couple of months’ leave. But Neville could not as yet look further forward than another week. To settle plans or projects seemed utterly impossible when he lived in the nervous anticipation that each morning and evening would bring some conclusive tidings of his lost one.

Paris was hot and full of visitors when the young men reached it—and poor Neville terribly exhausted by his journey —albeit taken in easy stages. He strove in vain to shake off the languor which hung round him, like some charmed garment, rendering every effort a labour, and despite his eagerness to be up and doing, he found it impossible to leave his room or face the roar and rush of the streets, till a couple of days' complete rest had somewhat restored him. Then —the total change of scene and air produced a reviving effect, and on the third morning after their arrival the friends sallied forth to the Rue St. Lazare —to the address given them by Miss Redoubt.

It was a mean entrance—and theconcierge had a small den on the top of the first flight, where a half-glass door enabled inquirers to see him constantly bending over some dilapidated boot or shoe—for his metier was the useful though humble calling of a cobbler. To him our friends addressed themselves—and he replied with vivacity and intelligence so unlike the profound yet not ill-meant indifference with which a Saxon says he knows nothing about the subject of your inquiries, and then relapses into silence.

Monsieur le concierge evidently knew nothing either—nevertheless he had a great deal to say about it: ‘‘Madame Rouviac—mais non—yet hold—there was an old lady, au quatrihme, nearly blind, who took much snuff—might she not be the lady they sought? Her name was Grenier—it’s true, still an old lady— but hold—how long was it since the old lady sought by Monsieur resided in Numero vingt-sept?’

‘Two or three months back.’

‘My faith—all the world is upset since three months—look now—the proprietor dies—all things are sold—the present proprietor,Monsieur le concierge himself, and various locataires, have all been settled in No. 27 since, for the others!’— a pause—and theconcierge extends his fingers like a fan, with a sudden movement indicative of the scattering abroad of the former inmates.

‘Then yon know nothing of Madame Bouviac?’

But no! He knew nothing. La has— perhaps—the charbonnier—could perhaps inform them. He had been there many years.

La las was the entrance of the passage to the right of which was a wood store.

The proprietor was out, but Madame was visible. Now Madame is generally in France quite equal to Monsieur, and Madame had much information to give, only unfortunately it was not very relevant She remembered Madame Rouviac, an old lady, very well; an irate personage, according to general report, but most amiable to Madamela charbonniere, because, you see, she loved her much. She thought, but was not quite sure, that the old lady had gone to live with a ‘cousin, or a nephew, who had great affection for the old lady, because, you see, she was secret with her affairs; but they say she has wherewithal in the Fonds Publiques. Madame la charbonniere knew nothing, certainly, but—’

‘Can you give us any clue to her present abode? Did she leave no address for the facteur ? How were her letters forwarded?’

‘Letters! Ma foil The old lady never received letters. But, hold! I recall a morning, seven or eight weeks back, when there was a demand for Madame Rouviac, and I was asked—knowing the affection of that amiable lady for me—for her address; but no one knew it It was the faeteur who asked, but I can tell no more.’

‘It must have been my letter, in all probability,’ said Neville to Compton. ‘It is about that time I wrote. Pardon the trouble I have caused you,’ he added, raising his hat to Madamela charbonniere, who volubly assured them it was a pleasure to converse with two gentlemen so polite and distinguished.

They turned away.

‘I shall lose no time in applying to the police,’ said Neville, putting his arm through that of Compton; ‘they will soon discover this old lady. Is it not curious how every clue fails? Is it fete? By Heavens! Fred, I am so changed; I shall' turn a drivelling fatalist next! Call a fiacre, I feel shaky still’

There was such deep despondency in his tones that his companion’s kind heart felt a pang of the warmest sympathy, and he silently resolved to postpone his autumn rambles until he could leave his friend in a better frame of mind. He assisted him into the fiacre, and they drove back to the hotel. Here Sir Frederic insisted on Neville remaining quiet, while he sought the police.

‘I know everything as well as you, and can act for you as well as you could act for yourself. I tell you, you are more shaken by that attack than you know, and if you don’t take care, you’ll be laid on your beam ends again.’

With these words of wisdom he sallied forth, and after a few directions from the host strolled down the beautiful Rue Rivoli, feeling, in spite of friendship and sympathy, something of the infectious brightness, and gaiety of the place. At the junction of the Rue Royale and the Place de la Concorde, he stood for a few moments watching the stream of vehicles setting towards the Champs Elyses, when his eye suddenly brightened, and his cheek flushed, for a pale young face, enshrined in a dainty bonnet, bent forward to him from a smart open carriage, and a small, neatly-gloved hand was rather eagerly waved.

A large lady, who accompanied this pleasant vision, arrested the coachman, and the vehicle was drawn up by the pavement, and the next moment Sir Frederic held the little hand in his.

‘What an unexpected pleasure!’ he exclaimed, after he had exchanged greetings with Miss Delvigne and her companion, Mrs. Coleman. ‘When did you arrive? I had no idea I should see you in Paris.’ ‘Neither Evelina nor Miss Delvigne has ever been to Paris before; so, as my eldest daughter has gone on a visit to an old school friend, in Scotland, we. set off, and are only awaiting Mr. Coleman to start for Germany.’

‘But / knew you were here, Sir Frederic/ said the heiress, ‘and we are at the same hotel. I inquired for you this morning, but you were out. I have a letter Miss Redoubt sent me the night before last, directed to Mademoiselle Delvigne. I brought it with me, for I do not think anyone but Captain Neville ought to open it How is poor Captain Neville?’

‘Oh, he is better, though weak enough still; but this letter? Why, it may reveal everything. Where is it?’

‘In my dressing-case. I must give it to you. Do, dear Mrs. Coleman, drive back to Meurice’s, and let me get the letter. ‘Well, my dear, half-an-hour will not make much difference; and 1 promised to call for Evelina, at thecoiffeur**!

The young heiress’s countenance fell.

‘Just let me oat, then; and Sir Frederic will take care of me back—it is such 4, short way.’

Before the startled Mrs. Coleman could agree or dissent from this audacious proposal, Sir Frederic had opened the carriage-door, and Miss Delvigne stood upon the pavement.

‘Well, then, I suppose you must,’ said Mrs. Coleman, not so much averse, under the peculiar circumstances, as she otherwise would have been to so unorthodox a proceeding.

‘I shall return in less than half-an-hour, and take you to the Bois de Boulogne.’

She bowed, smiled, and drove away.

‘You had better take my arm in this crowd,’ said Sir Frederic, feeling unaccountably elated and joyous. ‘You are our good genius, Miss Delvigne,’ he continued, as she accepted his offer; *if we find my poor friend’s wife, it will be through you. You always bring good luck.’

‘I am not sure,’ she said, in her simple, manner, though secretly pleased at the ill-repressed joy of her companion at their rencontre.

' This letter has a French stamp, and is directed with such pale ink, and in such a queer, cramped hand—such an ugly hand—I am sure it is from some cross old woman; perhaps it is from Marie’s aunt; perhaps it is nothing particular. I have been greatly tempted to open it. I should, I think, only we were just coming on here, and Mr. Foster told me you would be at Meurice’s.’

‘You might have opened it, I dare say; but as Neville will now so soon have it, it is of little consequence. Suppose we go round through the Tuilerie Gardens — it is such a charming day,’ added the young Baronet.

How?’ asked Miss Delvigne, a little indignantly—‘when there is so important a matter on hand ?’

‘Well, you see,’ said Frederic, hesitatingly—‘I wish, if possible, to prolong the pleasure of a walk with you — a pleasure I have so little chance of tasting again; for I know too well what an idiot I have been—what a bad impression I must have made on your mind. I am the most unlucky dog in the universe!’

The heiress looked up in his face with an air of the sincerest surprise. Then an amused expression stole round her mouth as she noted his look of vexation.

‘Oh! if you mean I am vexed because you did not want to marry me, you are quite mistaken. When I thought you did, I hated you. But it is such a pity you did not contrive to tell me candidly at first, that you were not going to second your grandfather’s plans, and that I was all safe — we would have been such friends; for then I would never have proposed to Marie to pass for me, and no mischief would have been done.’

This very candid speech was annihilating to poor Sir Frederic. He was silent for a few minutes.

‘Your words,’ he said, at length, and very gloomily, ‘prove the truth of my assertion, I am most unfortunate.’

They were now at the entrance of Meurice’s, and Miss Delvigne, struck by the tone of his last words, kept silence, while they ascended to Mrs. Coleman’s salon.

‘Wait a few minutes—I will bring you the letter immediately,’ she said, and left the room.

Those few minutes Sir Frederic employed in walking up and down, and forming a resolution.

‘Here it is,’ said the heiress, re-enter-font style= "font-size:large;font-family:AngsanaUPC, serif;font-weight:bold;"172ng. ‘Just, look at it, Sir Frederic; is it not a curious hand?’

‘It is,’ he returned, speaking slowly. ‘But I think it is a man’s.’

‘Do you really—I had determined it was the aunt’s.’

‘Miss Delvigne,’ began Sir Frederic, ‘I shall take your advice and speak with candour to prevent future mistakes or mischief. In spite of your evident indifference, I love you—most truly, most fondly—your unselfishness, your earnest thoughtful friendship, the strength and tenderness you have shown throughout this unhappy matter might well fascinate any man—and it makes me mad to think what a treasure I have lost the chance of securing! for after all it was but chance. Do not let this avowal influence your making use of me as your veriest tool in the search for poor Mrs. Neville. I will never again offend you in the same way. But remember, I love you.’ He took and warmly kissed her hand.

Before she had recovered the astonishment his words had caused her, he had left the room. The young heiress laughed, then stopped suddenly, looked in the glass and smiled, and then all at once, in an unaccountable and unreasonable manner, burst into a hearty fit of crying.

CHAPTER XII.

Neville was sleeping when Sir Frederic returned to his room, after half-an-hour’s solitary, but not altogether unsatisfactory, reflection. Come what would, Miss Delvigne could not say he had left her in ignorance of his sentiments. But perhaps she might shun him now; well, he would not think about it any more, but commit himself to the winds and waves of circumstances.

The kindly consideration, which was one of the young Baronet’s characteristics, would not permit himself to rouse his friend from the tranquil repose he appeared to be enjoying. So he drew a chair and sat playing with the letter he held, thinking in a desultory manner.

At last Neville turned uneasily and ground his teeth, muttering, ‘Marie— Marie.’

‘Well, open your eyes, old fellow; here —here’s something perhaps that will give you tidings of her.’

Neville raised himself on his elbow, and gazed bewildered at his friend, while he rapidly recounted his meeting with Miss Delvigne—omitting his own exposition of feeling—and then he handed the letter to Neville, who by this time fully roused, had sat up on the sofa.

He tore it open, and devoured the contents with eager eyes.

‘It is from an Alphonse something,’ he exclaimed; ‘look, Compton.’ And Sir Frederic read over his shoulder.

‘No. 39, Rue £ Auvergne, Patsy.’

‘My beautiful and good Cousin, ‘The dear aunt charges me to keep thee informed of her health, and to demand thy news. For she disquiets herself that she has not received letters from thee for a long time. The dear aunt has consented to share the humble abode of her nephew and dutiful relative, since the death of Monsieur, the proprietor of her residence in the rue St. Lazare, since three months past; it is, therefore, possible that some of thy little billets may not have reached our dear relative. I therefore pray thee write without delay, because she is a little out of humour against thee, and like all charming ladies, has her caprices, more or less embittered. Nevertheless, knowing the simplicity of thy tranquil life, we are at rest concerning thee. We do the impossible to render the life of our dear aunt as happy as we can.

‘She has a new directéur, a man very distinguished, and my wife is a little sympathetic society for her. When the dear good cousin can manage a congé for a few weeks, my wife and myself shall be delighted to receive her, for a little diversion after the solemnities of that sad blit respectable country where so much money is made, and so little enjoyed.

‘With many embraces from my wife, and the benediction of the dear aunt, ‘T am, with friendship sincere and ‘Respectful, ‘My dear Cousin’s devoted kinsman,‘Alphonse Dupuis.’

At the conclusion of this characteristic epistle, Neville looked up with a blank expression — ‘Not much information there,’ he said.

‘I don’t know—you have got the address we want at any rate. But it is evident they know nothing more than we do. What’s the date? Six days back—

no—there will not be much to learn there. Still I must see this man; let us go to Passy directly.’

Afiacre was called and they started. The trajet was long‘and of course tiresome ; but at least it was not aggravated by the feverish expectation which had at once irritated and supported Neville on former occasions—a dull kind of apathetic despair was stealing over his heart, like the cold-induced slumber of the snow-slayed traveller—who sinks, thus lulled, to death. In his weak state destiny seemed too strong for him.

But the long drive was to no avail, when, after some inquiries, the friends discovered the rue d’Auvergne, which, by the way, was considerably less important than its name. They found the dear aunt too unwell to see anyone. Monsieur gone to hisbureau, and all the rest of the world gone out.

With some difficulty they obtained the address of Monsieur’sbureau—in a passage off the rue de Eichelièu—and thither they patiently wended their way; and were at last successful in finding Monsieur Alphonse, who conducted the foreign correspondence of a large silk warehouse, and had a dark den in entresol all to himself.

He was a short, broad man, with close-cut black hair, and a close-shaven blue beard, showing clearly round cheek and chin, small moustache, and the necessary chin-tuft, being all of his hirsute honours left unshorn. He had a semi-military look, and eager glancing jet-black eyes. He was considerably puzzled by the visit, and Neville’s intricate story told in the best French at his and the Baronet’s command, was still more inexplicable. Finally, the little man grew very wroth.

‘It appears to me,’ he said between his teeth, addressing Sir Frederic, whose French was the most comprehensible of the two—‘that your friend is a scoundrel; where, then, is my cousin? Poor child— so good—so wise. What a country— what a society! Mon Dim  That a girl so prudent should have been contaminated! Where, then, is my cousin?’

‘Quietly,’ returned Sir Frederic, more amused than angry—‘That is precisely the question we come to ask you,’ and, put in Neville, ‘as her husband, I have. surely some title to your commiseration. I would give all I possess to find her.’

‘Her husband!’ repeated the bewildered Alphonse, somewhat mollified at the magic word— ‘Why did she leave you, then? Ah! there is some deep villany here.’

‘By Heaven!’ cried the Baronet, in despair—‘we’ve made a mess of it. We shouldn’t have stirred without Miss Delvigne—let us go for her—she will explain it better than we can.’

‘Yes!’ the Frenchman was saying, meantime—‘Some villain has got her ear, and has taken advantage of some cruelty,n your part A woman leave her husband without a companion! Bah!’ j/The iast force of contemptuous incredulity was thrown into his ‘Bah!’

‘But a girl so well brought up; true she was a Protestant—slightly anesprit fort,'

‘Silence!’ cried Neville, furiously. ‘No infant at its mother’s breast is purer than my wife.’

The hearty feeling of this outburst touched the good-natured little Frenchman.

‘Monsieur is not without heart,’ he muttered.

‘Come,’ interposed Sir Frederic, ‘there’s no use getting angry; and we only half-understand each other.’

‘There is a lady of rank,’ he put in, with unconscious tact, ‘at present in Paris—the dear friend of Madame Neville, your cousin, who speaks French like an angel If Monsieur could spare time to accompany us to Meurice’s, she will fully explain all things/ At the mention of a lady, the Frenchman subsided a good deal; and after speaking to a subordinate, and locking up sundry drawers and desks, he declared himself ready to accompany Messieurs.

Though but a few hours had elapsed since Sir Frederic had spoken so openly as to his sentiments, he was so much interested in the matter in hand, that meet Miss Delvigne with little or no embarrassment, a grave and distant respect marked his manner.

It was announced, on inquiring from her maid, that ‘Miss Delvigne was indisposed, with a bad headache, and lying down.’

‘Give her my card,’ said Neville, hastily tracing a line in pencil upon it.

‘Delvigne! mais comment?’ cried M. Dupuis.

‘Wait awhile, the lady will tell you all about it.’

Neville’s card and message brought the heiress very quickly to their presence, and she, blushing vividly as she met Sir Frederic’s eye, soon comprehended the tableau.

After some quiet explanation, the sanguine Frenchman began to perceive the true position of affairs, and to glean, as he imagined, that his little cousin had made a great parti.

He immediately began to hope that her disappearance was but temporary— that she could not long live apart from a husband so worthy and so distinguished —that all things would terminate happily, and the belle enfant reign triumphant in the most brilliant circles of London— perhaps even now a letter, full of intelligence and good tidings, was awaiting him, the faithful friend, at his domicile. ‘Mon Dim!’ he would fly at once to see. He had the honour to salute Mademoiselle. He would keep himselfen rapport with Monsieur his much-esteemed cousin, &c., &c.

There was a time when Neville would have shrunk not a little from the kindred thus claimed by the good little Alphonse, now it mattered not.

Undertaking to put the police on the alert to discover any possible trace of the lost girl which might be found in France, and which, as a native, he could better do, he bid them an elaborate adieu.

‘You know there is not the least use in it all,’ said Miss Delvigne to Neville; ‘she never crossed the Channel. She is in London, I feel an unaccountable conviction.’

‘How is it then that we have Med?’ returned Neville, dejectedly.

‘I cannot tell; but what more is to be done—oh! to sit idle is terrible when she—’

Miss Delvigne stopped abruptly, the tears pouring down her pale cheek, and Sir Frederic made a movement towards her, which he hastily checked.

‘I feel unhinged, and am not like myself,’ she was beginning, apologetically, when Mrs. Coleman and her daughter entered, and the conversation became general, ending in an invitation from that respectable matron to dine and spend the evening, which Neville at first refused, and then, at the instigation of his friend, accepted.

When the little party re-assembled at seven o’clock, Sir Frederic was a good deal disturbed at the kind of affectionate sisterly attention lavished by Miss Delvigne on Neville.

She silently drew forward the most comfortable fauteuil for his accommodation, closed the window lest he should suffer from the draught, and seemed to make him a sort of screen between herself and Compton.

The good-natured young Baronet felt almost sulky. ‘By Jove, that French girl will drown herself, or hang herself, and then Neville will marry the heiress;’ but the next moment he laughed at his own fancies, and devoted himself to the amusement of Miss E. Coleman with that remarkable success which not unusually attends the efforts of well-to-do baronets.

The dinner finished, the little party was sufficiently well pleased with each other, not to separate after the meal was over. But Neville, unfit for exertion, availed himself of his reputation as an invalid to say good-night, considerably before Sir Frederic thought of stirring.

He had not, however, been many minutes gone, before, to the surprise of every one, he returned again, holding a letter open in his hand.

‘This is an eventful day, Compton— here’s a letter from Mr. Foster—found it in my room when I went up—he says my brother has been thrown out of a “ Hansom,” and very seriously injured, that after lying insensible for several hours, he asked twice for me; and your grandfather concludes, by recommending my immediate return.’

‘And you?’ asked Sir Frederic, eagerly.

‘Will go at once; that is, by the earliest train.’

‘Will it not knock you up terribly?’ said Miss Delvigne.

‘No; I feel quite strong again! besides, wishing to see my brother, ashe wishes it Your strong impression respecting Marie, makes me anxious to be back once more in London.’

With some hasty apologies to Mrs. Coleman for quitting her so unceremoniously—the young men left together, Neville, to make preparations, and write Monsieur Dupuis and his ‘tides Achates’ to assist him.

CHAPTER XIII.

Despite the recovered strength of which Neville had boasted the day before to his friends, he felt giddy with fatigue when the cab drew up at his brother’s elegant but quiet residence in Chester Square.

The door was opened by a respectable female servant (instead of the usual episcopal-looking butler), who, in reply to Neville’s inquiries, informed him that his brother still lay at the house into which he had been carried when the accident first occurred, but that he was much better, and considered out of immediate danger.

‘Just direct the driver, if you please’ said Neville, averse to unnecessary talk; ‘and the shortest way/ After what seemed elaborate instructions, they again proceeded, and Neville took little heed of the road—he mused upon the singularity of his brother’s wish to see him—‘Probably’ he thought, ‘now that death has approached, he sees the comparative small importance of my delinquencies, and, with that instinctive feeling of clanship all we Northerners possess, craves for one of his own kin to be by him; well, let by-gones be by-gones, if he will—’

Here the cab drew up before a neat building of some architectural pretensions, it might be a small meeting-house or the chief office of a gas company.

‘The left-hand entrance, sir,’ said the cabman, opening the door—after speaking to a shock-headed boy with a hoop, who stood by.

Neville walked across a small square of grass, through the centre of which was a paved footway, and rang at the modest door, which was quickly opened by his to other’s profoundly respectable servant ‘Oh, Captain Neville!’ he said, seemingly well pleased, ‘we scarcely hoped you would arrive so soon; my master has twice asked for you; he is quite sensible this morning, will you please walk up?’

Neville, with light step, entered the darkened room; it was small, but exquisitely neat and clean.

The bed on which the sufferer lay was a mere iron pallet, without ornament of any kind; but a temporary curtain had been fastened at the side next the window to exclude the light.

The sick man lay asleep, his head wrapped in bandages; and for some moments Neville contemplated him, not with any vivid feeling, we confess, but coloured with one subject as all his thoughts now were, he reflected, that had he Marie by him in such an emergency, how tenderly, how lovingly she would nurse and cherish him. At this point in his musings, a gentle smile played round his brother’s mouth --he opened his eyes with an expectant look, and seemed disappointed when they fell on Guy. However, he smiled again, and feebly, still in silence, put out his hand. Guy, much struck by the undefinable change which seemed to have passed over him, took it, and.thus the estranged brothers were for a few moments, hand in hand, as though the dearest and most sympathizing of friends.

' Glad to find you so much better,’ said Guy, at last, with a little embarrassment.

'Thanks be to God,’ murmured his brother, in a weak voice; ‘I had a marvellous escape. The horse in some way got his hind legs over the splashboard, and almost kicked me to death.’ He paused. ' But 1 feel 1 shall recover now, I am so well tended.’ Another pause.

‘Much light seems to break in upon me,’ he continued, dreamily. ‘I may have been harsh. I now feel that love is the whole fulfilling of the law.’

‘He is wandering, poor fellow,’ thought Guy, somewhat embarrassed how to reply.

Here a small hand quietly lifted the curtain, at the other side of the bed, and a slight figure in a black dress, bearing a cup of some cooling drink, slid gently to the sufferer’s side.

So intent was the young girl on her office, that she had set down the cup on a small table before she heeded the visitor ; while he stood one moment transfixed, the electric currents of joy, love, astonishment, shivering through every vein—it was his lost Marie! And before the half-suppressed cry of almost agonized delight had left her lips, he had caught her to his heart, exclaiming,—

‘My love, my life, my own Marie at last f’

Then the thirsty lips clung to hers, and all in utter disregard of her patient.

Marie was the first to recover.

‘But poor Mr. Watson, we shall do him harm. Oh! dearest, I do not want to force myself upon you; oh! beloved, hold me to your heart again! And how came you here? What blessed chance! But, see! I must not neglect my benefactor. And, ah! our meeting has been too much for him; he is feint. He is like death. Oh! come here. Roberts.’

And she ran to the door to summon the experienced valet; but even his skill was of no avail.

The doctor was sent for, and the first two hoars of the ardently-anticipated meeting were spent by Marie and Neville in close attendance on the ‘iron-gray man,’ whose condition terribly puzzled the erudite physician.

‘I left him so very much improved this morning; and now the whole nervous system seems to have received some tremendous shock. It was very imprudent, though scarcely to be wondered at, Captain Neville, your giving such open expression to your feelings, in his presence. It was, I admit, altogether an unprecedented position, and I must prescribe for Mrs. Neville, who, by the way, is one of the best nurses I ever saw. She must not do any more than oversee in future; however, I’ll send in a very respectable person,’ &c., &c., and the worthy physician departed.

When, at length, the ‘iron-gray man’ had sunk to repose, and the incoherent ramblings which so distressed his hearers were hushed, evening had closed in, and Neville was much in need of some refreshment.

Ah! where is the pen that could convey the deep rapture of that simple meal, to which Marie would attend herself though weak and trembling from prolonged excitement, lavishing every watchful care on her recovered idol, as though hers had been the transgression?

To hang upon his words, to commiserate his haggard cheek and sunken eyes, to revel in the assurance of his love, to feel the heavenly security, the unspeakable rest of certainty in his affection, ‘never to part again,’ while he could scarce bring himself.to relinquish his hold of her little hand for a moment.

‘But tell me, how has it all been? How have you eluded our earnest search? And my brother—by what strange chance do I find you in charge of him?’

‘Your brother? How? How comes Mr. Watson to be your brother?’

‘Easily,’ returned Neville. ‘He is only my half-brother; and with his mother’s fortune took her name. His real appellation is Neville Watson.’

‘Let me see if he still sleeps,’ said Marie, ‘then I will tell you all.’

She stole quietly to the sick room; Neville almost held his breath till she returned.

But it was with grave looks she joined him.

‘He is very restless,’ she said; ‘though asleep, he moans and murmurs. I must not leave him for long; I fancy I can soothe him better than a stranger. But now I will tell you my history.’

Beginning from their parting at Dover, she detailed the progress we have traced, very simply, yet with unconscious touches here and there, which struck Neville to the heart. What strength and constancy; what depths of love and pride and tenderness were in this gentle girl! And then the graceful shyness, which, after the first wild rapture of their meeting, threw a sort of rosy transparent reserve over the expression of her love and joy!

The very paleness of her cheek, the soft shade of darkness which weary watching and patient grief had left beneath her eyes, were but new beauties to her delighted husband.

‘And when at last,’ she thus continued her tale, ‘your good brother placed me so comfortably and respectably, I felt sadder than ever. 1 had no daily fears about winning my bread to disturb me, and so I thought of you all day, and dreamed of you all night I scarce knew how the time went by; but four days ago, after school had broken up, your brother called to see how we progressed. He had not been for some time, and was, oh! so kind and gentle. I now know why his eyes made my heart thrill always— there is a kind of shadow of you in them, dearest, yet I feared him, too. Well, we talked much, and he strove to win my secret from me; and in truth, I never felt so much inclined to confide in him. But I kept silence still; at last, and saying it was later than he thought, he bade me adieu. He was not many minutes gone, when I heard a confusion without, but I never heeded what went on in the street. Then there was a trampling of feet, and knocking at my door. I opened it, and beheld my benefactor lying like death—carried by many men, and covered with blood. The horse had suddenly turned furious, and dragged round the cab—one of those Hansoms, you call it —and got his hind leg over the board in front, and how Mr. Watson escaped with life none could tell. I had him taken to my little chamber, and sent for Mrs. Bushel, the kind woman of whom I spoke to you. She knew where Mr. Watson resided, and sent word there. Then his servant came and brought a great doctor, and another gentleman whom I did not see; so I watched him, for the great doctor would not hear of his being removed, and I was greatly rewarded in seeing that he would take nothing, save from my hand, and that I could be of service to him. Is it not strange, Guy— dear Guy—that I should have found a kind Mend in him who, if I remember right, would have been one of the most violent opponents of our marriage?’

And she leant her cheek thoughtfully against his breast ‘Don’t talk of that, darling,’ he returned, Get our marriage date from this blessed meeting. Here—see I have kept your ring next my heart; let me place it on your finger once more, never—never again to be moved.’

And Marie, returning his fond embrace, murmured, ‘Never! Never!’

This long talk had been interrupted by frequent visits to the sufferer, whose increasing restlessness filled them with anxiety, and Neville and Marie mounted guard by turns.at his bedside throughout the night, and with the first dawn of day, the physician was again summoned.

A week of constant watching and peril ensued. Neville Watson was delirious— and raved of the terrors of hell, of some dark crime he was doomed to expiate by unheard-of tortures — of heavenly joys, from which he was for ever shut out Yet, amid all his mental and bodily agony, he seemed to receive some vague, dim comfort from Marie’s presence, from the touch of her cool, soft hand.

But all this by degrees subsided, and the loving care of his watchful attendants, the skill of the great doctor, as Marie called him, were rewarded, and Neville Watson, much emaciated, gaunt, and grim to look at, nevertheless clothed and in his right mind, was removed to his own house, whither Mr. and Mrs. Guy Neville accompanied him; for though he had apparently passed from the excitement of fever to a state of deep depression, and preserved an almost unbroken silence, he once spake with his lips, as he saw preparations making for his departure, and feebly holding out his hand to Guy and Marie, said, ‘Don’t leave me—come with me— both.’

So, behold the brothers, after having been swept so far apart by the capricious tide of circumstances, domiciled under the same roof, and forming, with Marie, emphatically a family.

CHAPTER XIV.

All that we have detailed above ought, of course, to have been broken by anxious visits of inquiry from Mr. Foster, and letters from Sir Frederic, who, notwithstanding his friendship and anxiety, preferred remaining in Paris.

Miss Delvigne also wrote rapturously, and besieged her guardian with entreaties to be brought back that she might rejoice with her friend. To this Mr. Foster not unwillingly agreed, and as soon as a proper escort could be found, the young heiress returned to London, and took up her abode in her guardian’s gloomy residence, spending a large share of each day with her friend Mrs. Neville. Mr. Foster, however, was far from satisfied; for that unaccountable young scapegrace, Sir Frederic Compton, instead of showing his usual devotion to Neville’s affairs, and returning to assist in arranging them, had chosen to start for Germany, in company with Mr. and Mrs. Coleman, and their fair-haired, affected daughter — anything more absurd and contradictory could not be conceived! Mr. Foster fidgeted about it a good deal. His first meeting with Marie was at once a source of triumph and of laughter to his ward.

She, the despised French teacher, was suddenly installed as mistress of his partner’s house—a partner, whose force of character made him considerably the old gentleman’s master.

Mrs. Neville was in her favourite costume of black silk, and employed in writing to Sir Frederic Compton, and Miss Delvigne, looking very pale and depressed, sat beside her, pretending to work. The stiff solidity of a bachelor’s drawing-room was somewhat toned down by the introduction of work-boxes, writing-books, and belongings of Mrs. Neville.

Mr. Watson was propped in an easy-chair—the composure of exhaustion, rather than that of mind, stilling his gaunt, stem face.

When Mr. Foster was announced, Mrs. Neville rose to meet him with the calmelf-possession of an assured position. The old gentleman felt bewildered at the change of all things; the simple, good breeding of Guy Neville’s wife emphatically put him in his place.

He bowed, and took her hand with an attempted compliment, which she received with an indulgent smile; and then he occupied himself with his partner. But here he could not get rid of Marie; for if Mr. Watson wanted a paper, or a quotation from the prices current, or any kind of assistance, he invariably appealed to Mrs. Neville, as he always termed his young sister-in-law, with fond respect.

All parties by tacit consent appeared to bury the past in oblivion, and even the future was not mentioned, partly because the present was so delicious, partly because the ‘iron-gray’ brother must not be disturbed.

With the mental operations of this latter personage, our story has not to do; though we would fain display them—an author, of course, being able to discern those conflicts which are (fortunately for the dignity of human nature) hidden from other eyes.

Neville Watson’s battles with himself however, would have done him no discredit, and though sorely shaken by the contest, he carried forth both sword and shield, while his whole nature seemed mellowed and purified by the storm that thus cleared his moral atmosphere.

‘He has had a terrible shake,’ said old Mr. Foster, confidentially, to his head clerk; ‘never knew a man so altered— shouldn’t be surprised now if he sank into a regular invalid, and fell completely into the hands of that little designing French woman.’

Nevertheless, Neville Watson slowly gained strength.

Some days after the interview we have described, as Miss Delvigne and Marie Neville were sitting at luncheon, Sir Frederic Compton was most unexpectedly announced.

He entered with bis usual frank, pleasant smile.

‘Well, Mrs. Neville, I could punish myself no longer. I have been longing to see you, so here I am.’

‘And why the deuce then did you go off on that German excursion?-’ cried Neville, shaking the young Baronet’s hand with hearty cordiality; ‘I never knew such a fellow!’

‘Miss Delvigne!’ exclaimed Sir Frederic, colouring; ‘I did not expect to have the pleasure of seeingyou here.’

‘If you prefer it, I’ll go away,’ she returned, with such undisguised petulance, that both Neville and Marie burst out laughing, and Sir Frederic visibly brightening, began an elaborate explanation.

‘You must be considerably stupefied by your Continental rambles, my dear fellow,’ interrupted Neville, ‘if you did not know the very most likely place to find Miss Delvigne was with us.’

Sir Frederic laughed, hesitated, and then said,—

‘Well, if I were not afraid to say so, perhaps I did.’

‘How did you leave Mrs. Coleman?’ asked Miss Delvigne, colouring; and soon after she left the room.

‘Ah, Neville!’ cried Sir Frederic; ‘what an unlucky fellow I am! you see she can’t bear me, and I—I am wild about her. Isn’t it too bad?—and I protest there are lots of girls would think me a nice young man enough,’ he concluded, with a rueful kind of laugh. ‘Do you think, Mrs. Neville, she will ever come round.’

‘Oh! I would not offer an opinion,’ returned Marie, demurely. ‘Why do you not ask her yourself?’

‘So I did once. Yet, stay! No, I didn’t. I said she must be disgusted with me, or something to that effect, and she did not contradict me.’

‘Pooh, man,’ cried Neville; ‘don’t be so easily put off! Go now; I dare say she is in the drawing-room alone. Ask her straightforward, and put an end to all uncertainties.’

‘It’s a tremendous effort, eh? Give me the sherry!’

He drained a bumper, exclaiming, ‘Here’s success,’ and hastily left the room.

‘I trust it will all go right,’ said Mrs. Neville to her husband, anxiously, ‘but she is a little peculiar.’

‘Everything goes right now,’ replied Neville, fondly.

Some half-an-hour after Mr. Foster arrived to see Mr. Watson, and after exchanging salutations with Captain and Mrs. Neville, expressed a wish to speak to the former on his descent from his partner’s room. Marie and Neville therefore waited very patiently, and at length the old gentleman came in, with a portentous expression of countenance, and began an harangue somewhat solemnly, ‘Captain Neville, your brother has been making a proposition to me, about which, before I entertain it, I should like to have some conversation with you.’

Here the door opened, and enter Sir Frederic Compton, triumphantly, radiant, leading after him the young heiress, who, though a tear glistened on her long eye-lashes, looked demurely pleased.

‘What! you here, my dear sir?’ cried Sir Frederic. ‘Just in time. Here is your dutiful ward, and your equally obedient grandson, come to beg your blessing. Neville 1 dear old boy! I am the happiest fellow in existence. Miss Delvigne, my dear Mary, has deigned to forgive and overlook all my mistakes, and take me for better, for worse!’

‘Eh! God bless my soul! my dear boy, you don’t say so. Come here, my child,’ — to Miss Delvigne — ‘God bless you. Blessme, I thought you had gone off to Germany, at a tangent; and it’s all right now; no more fear of mistakes?’

‘No fear of anything! But, my dear grand-dad, you’ve a promise to fulfil. You promised that the day I was married to Miss Delvigne, you’d take Neville into the bank as a partner; and Miss Delvigne, for friendship’s sake, will fix an early day.’

‘Not so fast, Fred. But, as I did say something about the matter, and my partner has espoused your view of the case, I will tell what Ido agree to; that, if on making himself acquainted with the routine of the business, Captain Neville would like to become a banker, he shall be a junior partner, Mr. Neville Watson placing 1O,OOO£ as Mrs. Neville’s fortune, in the concern. Eh, Fred?’

Up with the curtain for the last tableau.

A tastefully-furnished dining-room in Captain, now Mr. Neville’s, elegant though unassuming villa, in the new and improving neighbourhood of Notting Hill; the table is spread with fruit and flowers, and Sir Frederic and Lady Compton, and Mr. Neville Watson, are the guests of our old friends.

It is June, some six years after the close of our last scene; the perfume of mignonette and clematis comes through the open French windows.

The ‘iron-gray man,’ considerably grayer than when we first saw him, holds a little fair-haired girl of three years old on his knee—a tiny graceful thing, with lustrous, beseeching, dark eyes—wondrously dark, to be accompanied by such 224air locks; and she plays with his watch-chain, and clings to him with undefinable, sympathetic love, which nothing can imitate or explain.

‘Dear uncle,’ said Mrs. Guy Neville, who is looking handsomer than ever—‘we must not let you spoil that little one so much.’

The uncle only replied by pressing a kiss on the little head, every fair curl of which was dearer to him than all the wealth in the coffers of Foster and Co.

‘My little Marie will spoil uncky by-and-by, when he is a weak old man— which will be soon, Compton,’ he added— ‘for since your grandfather’s death, I have felt the business too much for me; but I have a good successor. I never thought that an ex-dragoon would make so wide-a-wake a banker, Guy!’

‘That metamorphose is due to you, Mrs. Neville,’ said Sir Frederic.

‘What a row they are making,’ said Guy, rising to look at a couple of children, who, with their attendants, were making the garden ring with shouts of glee—one a large-boned, blue-eyed, tawny-haired, boy, of about five, was rolling a slight, active, black-haired, dark imp, a year younger than himself, over and over on the grass, in spite of the exertions of a dignified nurse.

‘I hope they will always be friends,’ said Lady Compton, who had grown softer and more sentimental since her marriage.

‘He is too much for your little fellow, Lady Compton,’ said Neville, laughing; ‘I must teach him fair play.’

‘Better, still, dear Guy,’ said Marie, slyly—‘Teach him “ to look before he leaps!”’

THE END.