A TRUE FRIEND.

CHAPTER I. AN UNSUITABLE FRIENDSHIP
CHAPTER II. LADY CAROLINE'S TACTICS
CHAPTER III. AT HELMSLEY COURT
CHAPTER IV. ON THE ROAD
CHAPTER V. WYVIS BRAND
CHAPTER VI. JANETTA AT HOME
CHAPTER VII. NORA'S NEW ACQUAINTANCE
CHAPTER VIII. FATHER AND CHILD
CHAPTER IX. CONSULTATION
CHAPTER X. MARGARET
CHAPTER XI. JANETTA'S PROMISES
CHAPTER XII. JANETTA REMONSTRATES
CHAPTER XIII. SHADOWS
CHAPTER XIV. JANETTA'S FAILURE
CHAPTER XV. A BONE OF CONTENTION
CHAPTER XVI. SIR PHILIP'S OPINION
CHAPTER XVII. MARGARET'S FRIENDSHIP
CHAPTER XVIII. A NEW FRIEND
CHAPTER XIX. NORA'S PROCEEDINGS
CHAPTER XX. AN ELDER BROTHER
CHAPTER XXI. CUTHBERT'S ROMANCE
CHAPTER XXII. WYVIS BRAND'S IDEAL
CHAPTER XXIII. FORGET-ME-NOTS
CHAPTER XXIV. LADY ASHLEY'S GARDEN PARTY
CHAPTER XXV. SIR PHILIP'S DECISION
CHAPTER XXVI. "FREE!"
CHAPTER XXVII. A BIG BRIBE
CHAPTER XXVIII. "CHANGES MUST COME."
CHAPTER XXIX. MARGARET'S CONFESSION
CHAPTER XXX. IN REBELLION
CHAPTER XXXI. THE PLOUGHMAN'S SON
CHAPTER XXXII. THE FAILURE OF MARGARET
CHAPTER XXXIII. RETROSPECT
CHAPTER XXXIV. FROM DISTANT LANDS
CHAPTER XXXV. JULIET
CHAPTER XXXVI. THE FRUITS OF A LIE
CHAPTER XXXVII. NIGHT
CHAPTER XXXVIII. THE LAST SCENE
CHAPTER XXXIX. MAKING AMENDS
CHAPTER XL. MY FAITHFUL JANET

Janetta was the music governess—a brown little thing of no particular importance, and Margaret Adair was a beauty and an heiress, and the only daughter of people who thought themselves very distinguished indeed; so that the two had not, you might think, very much in common, and were not likely to be attracted one to the other. Yet, in spite of differing circumstances, they were close friends and allies; and had been such ever since they were together at the same fashionable school where Miss Adair was the petted favorite of all, and Janetta Colwyn was the pupil-teacher in the shabbiest of frocks, who got all the snubbing and did most of the hard work. And great offence was given in several directions by Miss Adair's attachment to poor little Janetta.

"It is an unsuitable friendship," Miss Polehampton, the principal of the school, observed on more than one occasion, "and I am sure I do not know how Lady Caroline will like it."

Lady Caroline was, of course, Margaret Adair's mamma.

Miss Polehampton felt her responsibility so keenly in the matter that at last she resolved to speak "very seriously" to her dear Margaret. She always talked of "her dear Margaret," Janetta used to say, when she was going to make herself particularly disagreeable. For "her dear Margaret" was the pet pupil, the show pupil of the establishment: her air of perfect breeding gave distinction, Miss Polehampton thought, to the whole school; and her refinement, her exemplary behavior, her industry, and her talent formed the theme of many a lecture to less accomplished and less decorous pupils. For, contrary to all conventional expectations, Margaret Adair was not stupid, although she was beautiful and well-behaved. She was an exceedingly intelligent girl; she had an aptitude for several arts and accomplishments, and she was remarkable for the delicacy of her taste and the exquisite discrimination of which she sometimes showed herself capable. At the same time she was not as clever—("not as glaringly clever," a friend of hers once expressed it)—as little Janetta Colwyn, whose nimble wits gathered knowledge as a bee collects honey under the most unfavorable circumstances. Janetta had to learn her lessons when the other girls had gone to bed, in a little room under the roof; a room which was like an ice-house in winter and an oven in summer; she was never able to be in time for her classes, and she often missed them altogether; but, in spite of these disadvantages, she generally proved herself the most advanced pupil in her division, and if pupil-teachers had been allowed to take prizes, would have carried off every first prize in the school. This, to be sure, was not allowed. It would not have been "the thing" for the little governess-pupil to take away the prizes from the girls whose parents paid between two and three hundred a year for their tuition (the fees were high, because Miss Polehampton's school was so exceedingly fashionable); therefore, Janetta's marks were not counted, and her exercises were put aside and did not come into competition with those of the other girls, and it was generally understood amongst the teachers that, if you wished to stand well with Miss Polehampton, it would be better not to praise Miss Colwyn, but rather to put forward the merits of some charming Lady Mary or Honorable Adeliza, and leave Janetta in the obscurity from which (according to Miss Polehampton) she was fated never to emerge.

Unfortunately for the purposes of the mistress of the school, Janetta was rather a favorite with the girls. She was not adored, like Margaret; she was not looked up to and respected, as was the Honorable Edith Gore; she was nobody's pet, as the little Ladies Blanche and Rose Amberley had been ever since they set foot in the school; but she was everybody's friend and comrade, the recipient of everybody's confidences, the sharer in everybody's joys or woes. The fact was that Janetta had the inestimable gift of sympathy; she understood the difficulties of people around her better than many women of twice her age would have done; and she was so bright and sunny-tempered and quick-witted that her very presence in a room was enough to dispel gloom and ill-temper. She was, therefore, deservedly popular, and did more to keep up the character of Miss Polehampton's school for comfort and cheerfulness than Miss Polehampton herself was ever likely to be aware. And the girl most devoted to Janetta was Margaret Adair.

"Remain for a few moments, Margaret; I wish to speak to you," said Miss Polehampton, majestically, when one evening, directly after prayers, the show pupil advanced to bid her teachers good-night.

The girls all sat round the room on wooden chairs, and Miss Polehampton occupied a high-backed, cushioned seat at a centre table while she read the portion of Scripture with which the day's work concluded. Near her sat the governesses, English, French and German, with little Janetta bringing up the rear in the draughtiest place and the most uncomfortable chair. After prayers, Miss Polehampton and the teachers rose, and their pupils came to bid them good-night, offering hand and cheek to each in turn. There was always a great deal of kissing to be got through on these occasions. Miss Polehampton blandly insisted on kissing all her thirty pupils every evening; it made them feel more as if they were at home, she used to say; and her example was, of course, followed by the teachers and the girls.

Margaret Adair, as one of the oldest and tallest girls in the school, generally came forward first for that evening salute. When Miss Polehampton made the observation just recorded, she stepped back to a position beside her teacher's chair in the demure attitude of a well-behaved schoolgirl—hands crossed over the wrists, feet in position, head and shoulders carefully erect, and eyes gently lowered towards the carpet. Thus standing, she was yet perfectly well aware that Janetta Colwyn gave her an odd, impish little look of mingled fun and anxiety behind Miss Polehampton's back; for it was generally known that a lecture was impending when one of the girls was detained after prayers, and it was very unusual for Margaret to be lectured! Miss Adair did not, however, look discomposed. A momentary smile flitted across her face at Janetta's tiny grimace, but it was instantly succeeded by the look of simple gravity becoming to the occasion.

When the last of the pupils and the last also of the teachers had filed out of the room, Miss Polehampton turned and surveyed the waiting girl with some uncertainty. She was really fond of Margaret Adair. Not only did she bring credit to the school, but she was a good, nice, lady-like girl (such were Miss Polehampton's epithets), and very fair to look upon. Margaret was tall, slender, and exceedingly graceful in her movements; she was delicately fair, and had hair of the silkiest texture and palest gold; her eyes, however, were not blue, as one would have expected them to be; they were hazel brown, and veiled by long brown lashes—eyes of melting softness and dreaminess, peculiarly sweet in expression. Her features were a very little too long and thin for perfect beauty; but they gave her a Madonna-like look of peace and calm which many were ready enthusiastically to admire. And there was no want of expression in her face; its faint rose bloom varied almost at a word, and the thin curved lips were as sensitive to feeling as could be desired. What was wanting in the face was what gave it its peculiar maidenly charm—a lack of passion, a little lack, perhaps, of strength. But at seventeen we look less for these characteristics than for the sweetness and docility which Margaret certainly possessed. Her dress of soft, white muslin was quite simple—the ideal dress for a young girl—and yet it was so beautifully made, so perfectly finished in every detail, that Miss Polehampton never looked at it without an uneasy feeling that she was too well-dressed for a schoolgirl. Others wore muslin dresses of apparently the same cut and texture; but what the casual eye might fail to observe, the schoolmistress was perfectly well aware of, namely, that the tiny frills at neck and wrists were of the costliest Mechlin lace, that the hem of the dress was bordered with the same material, as if it had been the commonest of things; that the embroidered white ribbons with which it was trimmed had been woven in France especially for Miss Adair, and that the little silver buckles at her waist and on her shoes were so ancient and beautiful as to be of almost historic importance. The effect was that of simplicity; but it was the costly simplicity of absolute perfection. Margaret's mother was never content unless her child was clothed from head to foot in materials of the softest, finest and best. It was a sort of outward symbol of what she desired for the girl in all relations of life.

This it was that disturbed Miss Polehampton's mind as she stood and looked uneasily for a moment at Margaret Adair. Then she took the girl by the hand.

"Sit down, my dear," she said, in a kind voice, "and let me talk to you for a few moments. I hope you are not tired with standing so long."

"Oh, no, thank you; not at all," Margaret answered, blushing slightly as she took a seat at Miss Polehampton's left hand. She was more intimidated by this unwonted kindness of address than by any imaginable severity. The schoolmistress was tall and imposing in appearance: her manner was usually a little pompous, and it did not seem quite natural to Margaret that she should speak so gently.

"My dear," said Miss Polehampton, "when your dear mamma gave you into my charge, I am sure she considered me responsible for the influences under which you were brought, and the friendships that you made under my roof."

"Mamma knew that I could not be hurt by any friendship that I made here," said Margaret, with the softest flattery. She was quite sincere: it was natural to her to say "pretty things" to people.

"Quite so," the schoolmistress admitted. "Quite so, dear Margaret, if you keep within your own grade in society. There is no pupil in this establishment, I am thankful to say, who is not of suitable family and prospects to become your friend. You are young yet, and do not understand the complications in which people sometimes involve themselves by making friendships out of their own sphere. But I understand, and I wish to caution you."

"I am not aware that I have made any unsuitable friendships," said Margaret, with a rather proud look in her hazel eyes.

"Well—no, I hope not," said Miss Polehampton with a hesitating little cough. "You understand, my dear, that in an establishment like mine, persons must be employed to do certain work who are not quite equal in position to—to—ourselves. Persons of inferior birth and station, I mean, to whom the care of the younger girls, and certain menial duties, must be committed. These persons, my dear, with whom you must necessarily be brought in contact, and whom I hope you will always treat with perfect courtesy and consideration, need not, at the same time, be made your intimate friends."

"I have never made friends with any of the servants," said Margaret, quietly. Miss Polehampton was somewhat irritated by this remark.

"I do not allude to the servants," she said with momentary sharpness. "I do not consider Miss Colwyn a servant, or I should not, of course, allow her to sit at the same table with you. But there is a sort of familiarity of which I do not altogether approve——"

She paused, and Margaret drew up her head and spoke with unusual decision.

"Miss Colwyn is my greatest friend."

"Yes, my dear, that is what I complain of. Could you not find a friend in your own rank of life without making one of Miss Colwyn?"

"She is quite as good as I am," cried Margaret, indignantly. "Quite as good, far more so, and a great deal cleverer!"

"She has capabilities," said the schoolmistress, with the air of one making a concession; "and I hope that they will be useful to her in her calling. She will probably become a nursery governess, or companion to some lady of superior position. But I cannot believe, my dear that dear Lady Caroline would approve of your singling her out as your especial and particular friend."

"I am sure mamma always likes people who are good and clever," said Margaret. She did not fly into a rage as some girls would have done, but her face flushed, and her breath came more quickly than usual—signs of great excitement on her part, which Miss Polehampton was not slow to observe.

"She likes them in their proper station, my dear. This friendship is not improving for you, nor for Miss Colwyn. Your positions in life are so different that your notice of her can but cause discontent and ill-feeling in her mind. It is exceedingly injudicious, and I cannot think that your dear mamma would approve of it if she knew the circumstances."

"But Janetta's family is not at all badly connected," said Margaret, with some eagerness. "There are cousins of hers living close to us—the next property belongs to them——"

"Do you know them, my dear?"

"I know about them," answered Margaret, suddenly coloring very deeply, and looking uncomfortable, "but I don't think I have ever seen them, they are so much away from home——"

"I know about them, too," said Miss Polehampton, grimly; "and I do not think that you will ever advance Miss Colwyn's interests by mentioning her connection with that family. I have heard Lady Caroline speak of Mrs. Brand and her children. They are not people, my dear Margaret, whom it is desirable for you to know."

"But Janetta's own people live quite near us," said Margaret, reduced to a very pleading tone. "I know them at home; they live at Beaminster—not three miles off."

"And may I ask if Lady Caroline visits them, my dear?" asked Miss Polehampton, with mild sarcasm, which brought the color again to Margaret's fair face. The girl could not answer; she knew well enough that Janetta's stepmother was not at all the sort of person whom Lady Caroline Adair would willingly speak to, and yet she did not like to say that her acquaintance with Janetta had only been made at a Beaminster dancing class. Probably Miss Polehampton divined the fact. "Under the circumstances," she said, "I think I should be justified in writing to Lady Caroline and asking her to remonstrate a little with you, my dear Margaret. Probably she would be better able to make you understand the impropriety of your behavior than I can do."

The tears rose to Margaret's eyes. She was not used to being rebuked in this manner.

"But—I don't know, Miss Polehampton, what you want me to do," she said, more nervously than usual. "I can't give up Janetta; I can't possibly avoid speaking to her, you know, even if I wanted to——"

"I desire nothing of the sort, Margaret. Be kind and polite to her, as usual. But let me suggest that you do not make a companion of her in the garden so constantly—that you do not try to sit beside her in class or look over the same book. I will speak to Miss Colwyn herself about it. I think I can make her understand."

"Oh, please do not speak to Janetta! I quite understand already," said Margaret, growing pale with distress. "You do not know how kind and good she has always been to me——"

Sobs choked her utterance, rather to Miss Polehampton's alarm. She did not like to see her girls cry—least of all, Margaret Adair.

"My dear, you have no need to excite yourself. Janetta Colwyn has always been treated, I hope, with justice and kindness in this house. If you will endeavor only to make her position in life less instead of more difficult, you will be doing her the greatest favor in your power. I do not at all mean that I wish you to be unkind to her. A little more reserve, a little more caution, in your demeanor, and you will be all that I have ever wished you to be—a credit to your parents and to the school which has educated you!"

This sentiment was so effusive that it stopped Margaret's tears out of sheer amazement; and when she had said good-night and gone to bed, Miss Polehampton stood for a moment or two quite still, as if to recover from the unwonted exertion of expressing an affectionate emotion. It was perhaps a reaction against it that caused her almost immediately to ring the bell a trifle sharply, and to say—still sharply—to the maid who appeared in answer.

"Send Miss Colwyn to me."

Five minutes elapsed before Miss Colwyn came, however, and the schoolmistress had had time to grow impatient.

"Why did you not come at once when I sent for you?" she said, severely, as soon as Janetta presented herself.

"I was going to bed," said the girl, quickly; "and I had to dress myself again."

The short, decided accents grated on Miss Polehampton's ear. Miss Colwyn did not speak half so "nicely," she said to herself, as did dear Margaret Adair.

"I have been talking to Miss Adair about you," said the schoolmistress, coldly. "I have been telling her, as I now tell you, that the difference in your positions makes your present intimacy very undesirable. I wish you to understand, henceforward, that Miss Adair is not to walk with you in the garden, not to sit beside you in class, not to associate with you, as she has hitherto done, on equal terms."

"Why should we not associate on equal terms?" said Janetta. She was a black-browed girl, with a clear olive skin, and her eyes flashed and her cheeks glowed with indignation as she spoke.

"You are not equals," said Miss Polehampton, with icy displeasure in her tone—she had spoken very differently to Margaret. "You have to work for your bread: there is no disgrace in that, but it puts you on a different level from that of Miss Margaret Adair, an earl's grand-daughter, and the only child of one of the richest commoners in England. I have never before reminded you of the difference in position between yourself and the young ladies with whom you have hitherto been allowed to associate; and I really think I shall have to adopt another method—unless you conduct yourself, Miss Colwyn, with a little more modesty and propriety."

"May I ask what your other method would be?" asked Miss Colwyn, with perfect self-possession.

Miss Polehampton looked at her for a moment in silence.

"To begin with," she said, "I could order the meals differently, and request you to take yours with the younger children, and in other ways cut you off from the society of the young ladies. And if this failed, I could signify to your father that our arrangement was not satisfactory, and that it had better end at the close of this term."

Janetta's eyes fell and her color faded as she heard this threat. It meant a good deal to her. She answered quickly, but with some nervousness of tone.

"Of course, that must be as you please, Miss Polehampton. If I do not satisfy you, I must go."

"You satisfy me very well except in that one respect. However, I do not ask for any promise from you now. I shall observe your conduct during the next few days, and be guided by what I see. I have already spoken to Miss Adair."

Janetta bit her lips. After a pause, she said—

"Is that all? May I go now?"

"You may go," said Miss Polehampton, with majesty; and Janetta softly and slowly retired.

But as soon as she was outside the door her demeanor changed. She burst into tears as she sped swiftly up the broad staircase, and her eyes were so blinded that she did not even see a white figure hovering on the landing until she found herself suddenly in Margaret's arms. In defiance of all rules—disobedient for nearly the first time in her life—Margaret had waited and watched for Janetta's coming; and now, clasped as closely together as sisters, the two friends held a whispered colloquy on the stairs.

"Darling," said Margaret, "was she very unkind?"

"She was very horrid, but I suppose she couldn't help it," said Janetta, with a little laugh mixing itself with her sobs. "We mustn't be friends any more, Margaret."

"But we will be friends—always, Janetta."

"We must not sit together or walk together——"

"Janetta, I shall behave to you exactly as I have always done." The gentle Margaret was in revolt.

"She will write to your mother, Margaret, and to my father."

"I shall write to mine, too, and explain," said Margaret with dignity. And Janetta had not the heart to whisper to her friend that the tone in which Miss Polehampton would write to Lady Caroline would differ very widely from the one that she would adopt to Mr. Colwyn.

Helmsley Court was generally considered one of the prettiest houses about Beaminster; a place which was rich in pretty houses, being a Cathedral town situated in one of the most beautiful southern counties of England. The village of Helmsley was a picturesque little group of black and white cottages, with gardens full of old-fashioned flowers before them and meadows and woods behind. Helmsley Court was on slightly higher ground than the village, and its windows commanded an extensive view of lovely country bounded in the distance by a long low range of blue hills, beyond which, in clear days, it was said, keen eyes could catch a glimpse of the shining sea. The house itself was a very fine old building, with a long terrace stretching before its lower windows, and flower gardens which were the admiration of half the county. It had a picture gallery and a magnificent hall with polished floor and stained windows, and all the accessories of an antique and celebrated mansion; and it had also all the comfort and luxury that modern civilization could procure.

It was this latter characteristic that made "the Court," as it was commonly called, so popular. Picturesque old houses are sometimes draughty and inconvenient, but no such defects were ever allowed to exist at the Court. Every thing went smoothly: the servants were perfectly trained: the latest improvements possible were always introduced: the house was ideally luxurious. There never seemed to be any jar or discord: no domestic worry was ever allowed to reach the ears of the mistress of the household, no cares or troubles seemed able to exist in that serene atmosphere. You could not even say of it that it was dull. For the master of the Court was a hospitable man, with many tastes and whims which he liked to indulge by having down from London the numerous friends whose fancies matched his own, and his wife was a little bit of a fine lady who had London friends too, as well as neighbors, whom she liked to entertain. The house was seldom free from visitors; and it was partly for that very reason that Lady Caroline Adair, being in her own way a wise woman, had arranged that two or three years of her daughter's life should be spent at Miss Polehampton's very select boarding-school at Brighton. It would be a great drawback to Margaret, she reflected, if her beauty were familiar to all the world before she came out; and really, when Mr. Adair would insist on inviting his friends constantly to the house, it was impossible to keep the girl so mewed up in the schoolroom that she would not be seen and talked of; and therefore it was better that she should go away for a time. Mr. Adair did not like the arrangement; he was very fond of Margaret, and objected to her leaving home; but Lady Caroline was gently inexorable and got her own way—as she generally did.

She does not look much like the mother of the tall girl whom we saw at Brighton, as she sits at the head of her breakfast-table in the daintiest of morning gowns—a marvelous combination of silk, muslin and lace and pale pink ribbons—with a tiny white dog reposing in her lap. She is a much smaller woman than Margaret, and darker in complexion: it is from her, however, that Margaret inherits the large, appealing hazel eyes, which look at you with an infinite sweetness, while their owner is perhaps thinking of the menu or her milliner's bill. Lady Caroline's face is thin and pointed, but her complexion is still clear, and her soft brown hair is very prettily arranged. As she sits with her back to the light, with a rose-colored curtain behind her, just tinting her delicate cheek (for Lady Caroline is always careful of appearance), she looks quite a young woman still.

It is Mr. Adair whom Margaret most resembles. He is a tall and exceedingly handsome man, whose hair and moustache and pointed beard were as golden once as Margaret's soft tresses, but are now toned down by a little grey. He has the alert blue eyes that generally go with his fair complexion, and his long limbs are never still for many minutes together. His daughter's tranquillity seems to have come from her mother; certainly it cannot be inherited from the restless Reginald Adair.

The third person present at the breakfast-table—and, for the time being, the only visitor in the house—is a young man of seven or eight-and-twenty, tall, dark, and very spare, with a coal-black beard trimmed to a point, earnest dark eyes, and a remarkably pleasant and intelligent expression. He is not exactly handsome, but he has a face that attracts one; it is the face of a man who has quick perceptions, great kindliness of heart, and a refined and cultured mind. Nobody is more popular in that county than young Sir Philip Ashley, although his neighbors grumble sometimes at his absorption in scientific and philanthropic objects, and think that it would be more creditable to them if he went out with the hounds a little oftener or were a rather better shot. For, being shortsighted, he was never particularly fond either of sport or of games of skill, and his interest had always centred on intellectual pursuits to a degree that amazed the more countrified squires of the neighborhood.

The post-bag was brought in while breakfast was proceeding, and two or three letters were laid before Lady Caroline, who, with a careless word of apology, opened and read them in turn. She smiled as she put them down and looked at her husband.

"This is a novel experience," she said. "For the first time in our lives, Reginald, here is a formal complaint of our Margaret."

Sir Philip looked up somewhat eagerly, and Mr. Adair elevated his eyebrows, stirred his coffee, and laughed aloud.

"Wonders will never cease," he said. "It is rather refreshing to hear that our immaculate Margaret has done something naughty. What is it, Caroline? Is she habitually late for breakfast? A touch of unpunctuality is the only fault I ever heard of, and that, I believe, she inherits from me."

"I should be sorry to think that she was immaculate," said Lady Caroline, calmly, "it has such an uncomfortable sound. But Margaret is generally, I must say, a very tractable child."

"Do you mean that her schoolmistress does not find her tractable?" said Mr. Adair, with amusement. "What has she been doing?"

"Nothing very bad. Making friends with a governess-pupil, or something of, that sort——"

"Just what a generous-hearted girl would be likely to do!" exclaimed Sir Philip, with a sudden warm lighting of his dark eyes.

Lady Caroline smiled at him. "The schoolmistress thinks this girl an unsuitable friend for Margaret, and wants me to interfere," she said.

"Pray do nothing of the sort," said Mr. Adair. "I would trust my Pearl's instinct anywhere. She would never make an unsuitable friend!"

"Margaret has written to me herself," said Lady Caroline. "She seems unusually excited about the matter. 'Dear mother,' she writes, 'pray interpose to prevent Miss Polehampton from doing an unjust and ungenerous thing. She disapproves of my friendship with dear Janetta Colwyn, simply because Janetta is poor; and she threatens to punish Janetta—not me—by sending her home in disgrace. Janetta is a governess-pupil here, and it would be a great trouble to her if she were sent away. I hope that you would rather take me away than let such an injustice be done.'"

"My Pearl hits the nail on the head exactly," said Mr. Adair, with complacency. He rose as he spoke, and began to walk about the room. "She is quite old enough to come home, Caroline. It is June now, and the term ends in July. Fetch her home, and invite the little governess too, and you will soon see whether or no she is the right sort of friend for Margaret." He laughed in his mellow, genial way, and leaned against the mantel-piece, stroking his yellow moustache and glancing at his wife.

"I am not sure that that would be advisable," said Lady Caroline, with her pretty smile. "Janetta Colwyn: Colwyn? Did not Margaret know her before she went to school? Are there not some Colwyns at Beaminster? The doctor—yes, I remember him; don't you, Reginald?"

Mr. Adair shook his head, but Sir Philip looked up hastily.

"I know him—a struggling man with a large family. His first wife was rather well-connected, I believe: at any rate she was related to the Brands of Brand Hall. He married a second time after her death."

"Do you call that being well-connected, Philip?" said Lady Caroline, with gentle reproach; while Mr. Adair laughed and whistled, but caught himself up immediately and apologized.

"I beg pardon—I forgot where I was: the less any of us have to do with the Brands of Brand Hall the better, Phil."

"I know nothing of them," said Sir Philip, rather gravely.

"Nor anybody else"—hastily—"they never live at home, you know. So this girl is a connection of theirs?"

"Perhaps not a very suitable friend: Miss Polehampton may be right," said Lady Caroline. "I suppose I must go over to Brighton and see Margaret."

"Bring her back with you," said Mr. Adair, recklessly. "She has had quite enough of school by this time: she is nearly eighteen, isn't she?"

But Lady Caroline smilingly refused to decide anything until she had herself interviewed Miss Polehampton. She asked her husband to order the carriage for her at once, and retired to summon her maid and array herself for the journey.

"You won't go to-day, will you, Philip?" said Mr. Adair, almost appealingly. "I shall be all alone, and my wife will not perhaps return until to-morrow—there's no saying."

"Thank you, I shall be most pleased to stay," answered Sir Philip, cordially. After a moment's pause, he added, with something very like a touch of shyness—"I have not seen—your daughter since she was twelve years old."

"Haven't you?" said Mr. Adair, with ready interest. "You don't say so! Pretty little girl she was then! Didn't you think so?"

"I thought her the loveliest child I had ever seen in all my life," said Sir Philip, with curious devoutness of manner.

He saw Lady Caroline just as she was starting for the train, with man and maid in attendance, and Mr. Adair handing her into the carriage and gallantly offering to accompany her if she liked. "Not at all necessary," said Lady Caroline, with an indulgent smile. "I shall be home to dinner. Take care of my husband, Philip, and don't let him be dull."

"If they are making Margaret unhappy, be sure you bring her back with you," were Mr. Adair's last words. Lady Caroline gave him a kind but inscrutable little smile and nod as she was whirled away. Sir Philip thought to himself that she looked like a woman who would take her own course in spite of advice or recommendation from her husband or anybody else.

He smiled once or twice as the day passed on at her parting injunction to him not to let her husband be dull. He had known the Adairs for many years, and had never known Reginald Adair dull under any circumstances. He was too full of interests, of "fads," some people called them, ever to be dull. He took Sir Philip round the picture-gallery, round the stables, to the kennels, to the flower-garden, to his own studio (where he painted in oils when he had nothing else to do) with never-flagging energy and animation. Sir Philip's interests lay in different grooves, but he was quite capable of sympathizing with Mr. Adair's interests, too. The day passed pleasantly, and seemed rather short for all that the two men wanted to pack into it; although from time to time Mr. Adair would say, half-impatiently, "I wonder how Caroline is getting on!" or "I hope she'll bring Margaret back with her! But I don't expect it, you know. Carry was always a great one for education and that sort of thing."

"Is Miss Adair intellectual—too?" asked Sir Philip, with respect.

Mr. Adair broke into a sudden laugh. "Intellectual? Our Daisy?—our Pearl?" he said. "Wait until you see her, then ask the question if you like."

"I am afraid I don't quite understand."

"Of course you don't. It is the partiality of a fond father that speaks, my dear fellow. I only meant that these young, fresh, pretty girls put such questions out of one's head."

"She must be very pretty then," said Sir Philip, with a smile.

He had seen a great many beautiful women, and told himself that he did not care for beauty. Fashionable, talkative women were his abomination. He had no sisters, but he loved his mother very dearly; and upon her he had founded a very high ideal of womanhood. He had begun to think vaguely, of late, that he ought to marry: duty demanded it of him, and Sir Philip was always attentive, if not obedient, to the voice of duty. But he was not inclined to marry a girl out of the schoolroom, or a girl who was accustomed to the enervating luxury (as he considered it) of Helmsley Court: he wanted an energetic, sensible, large-hearted, and large-minded woman who would be his right hand, his first minister of state. Sir Philip was fairly wealthy, but by no means enormously so; and he had other uses for his wealth than the buying of pictures and keeping up stables and kennels at an alarming expense. If Miss Adair were so pretty, he mused, it was just as well that she was not at home, for, of course, it was possible that he might find a lovely face an attraction: and much as he liked Lady Caroline, he did not want particularly to marry Lady Caroline's daughter. That she treated him with great consideration, and that he had once overheard her speak of him as "the most eligible parti of the neighborhood," had already put him a little on his guard. Lady Caroline was no vulgar, match-making mother, he knew that well enough; but she was in some respects a thoroughly worldly woman, and Philip Ashley was an essentially unworldly man.

As he went upstairs to dress for dinner that evening, he was struck by the fact that a door stood open that he had never seen opened before: a door into a pretty, well-lighted, pink and white room, the ideal apartment for a young girl. The evening was chilly, and rain had begun to fall, so a bright little fire was burning in the steel grate, and casting a cheerful glow over white sheepskin rugs and rose-colored curtains. A maid seemed to be busying herself with some white material—all gauze and lace it looked—and another servant was, as Sir Philip passed, entering with a great white vase filled with red roses.

"Do they expect visitors to-night?" thought the young man, who knew enough of the house to be aware that the room was not one in general use. "Adair said nothing about it, but perhaps some people are coming from town."

A budget of letters was brought to him at that moment, and in reading and answering them he did not note the sound of carriage-wheels on the drive, nor the bustle of an arrival in the house. Indeed, he left himself so little time that he had to dress in extraordinary haste, and went downstairs at last in the conviction that he was unpardonably late.

But apparently he was wrong.

For the drawing-room was tenanted by one figure only—that of a young lady in evening dress. Neither Lady Caroline nor Mr. Adair had appeared upon the scene; but on the hearthrug, by the small crackling fire—which, in deference to the chilliness of an English June evening, had been lighted—stood a tall, fair, slender girl, with pale complexion, and soft, loosely-coiled masses of golden hair. She was dressed in pure white, a soft loose gown of Indian silk, trimmed with the most delicate lace: it was high to the milk-white throat, but showed the rounded curves of the finely-moulded arm to the elbow. She wore no ornaments, but a white rose was fastened into the lace frill of her dress at her neck. As she turned her face towards the new comer, Sir Philip suddenly felt himself abashed. It was not that she was so beautiful—in those first few moments he scarcely thought her beautiful at all—but that she produced on him an impression of serious, virginal grace and innocence which was almost disconcerting. Her pure complexion, her grave, serene eyes, her graceful way of moving as she advanced a little to receive him stirred him to more than admiration—to something not unlike awe. She looked young; but it was youth in perfection: there was some marvelous finish, delicacy, polish, which one does not usually associate with extreme youth.

"You are Sir Philip Ashley, I think?" she said, offering him her slim cool hand without embarrassment.

"You do not remember me, perhaps, but I remember you perfectly well, I am Margaret Adair."

"Lady Caroline has brought you back, then?" said Sir Philip, after his first pause of astonishment.

"Yes," said Margaret, serenely. "I have been expelled."

"Expelled! You?"

"Yes, indeed, I have," said the girl, with a faintly amused little smile. "And so has my great friend, Janetta Colwyn. Here she is: Janetta, I am telling Sir Philip Ashley that we have been expelled, and he will not believe me."

Sir Philip turned in some curiosity to see the girl of whom he had heard for the first time that morning. He had not noticed before that she was present. He saw a brown little creature, with eyes that had been swollen with crying until they were well-nigh invisible, small, unremarkable features, and a mouth that was inclined to quiver. Margaret might afford to be serene, but to this girl expulsion from school had evidently been a sad trouble. He threw all the more kindness and gentleness into his voice and look as he spoke to her.

Janetta might have felt a little awkward if she had not been so entirely absorbed by her own woes. She had never set foot before in half so grand a house as this of Helmsley Court, nor had she ever dined late or spoken to a gentleman in an evening coat in all her previous life. The size and the magnificence of the room would perhaps have oppressed her if she had been fully aware of them. But she was for the moment very much wrapped up in her own affairs, and scarcely stopped to think of the novel situation in which she found herself. The only thing that had startled her was the attention paid to her dress by Margaret and Margaret's maid. Janetta would have put on her afternoon black cashmere and little silver brooch, and would have felt herself perfectly well dressed; but Margaret, after a little consultation with the very grand young person who condescended to brush Miss Colwyn's hair, had herself brought to Janetta's room a dress of black lace over cherry-colored silk, and had begged her to put it on.

"You will feel so hot downstairs if you don't put on something cool," Margaret had said. "There is a fire in the drawing-room: papa likes the rooms warm. My dresses would not have fitted you, I am so much taller than you; but mamma is just your height, and although you are thinner perhaps——But I don't know: the dress fits you perfectly. Look in the glass, Janet; you are quite splendid."

Janetta looked and blushed a little—not because she thought herself at all splendid, but because the dress showed her neck and arms in a way no dress had ever done before. "Ought it to be—open—like this?" she said, vaguely. "Do you wear your dresses like this when you are at home?"

"Mine are high," said Margaret. "I am not 'out,' you know. But you are older than I, and you used to teach——I think we may consider that you are 'out,'" she added, with a little laugh. "You look very nice, Janetta: you have such pretty arms! Now I must go and dress, and I will call for you when I am ready to go down."

Janetta felt decidedly doubtful as to whether she were not a great deal too grand for the occasion; but she altered her mind when she saw Margaret's dainty silk and lace, and Lady Caroline's exquisite brocade; and she felt herself quite unworthy to take Mr. Adair's offered arm when dinner was announced and her host politely convoyed her to the dining-room. She wondered whether he knew that she was only a little governess-pupil, and whether he was not angry with her for being the cause of his daughter's abrupt departure from school. As a matter of fact, Mr. Adair knew her position exactly, and was very much amused by the whole affair; also, as it had procured him the pleasure of his daughter's return home, he had an illogical inclination to be pleased also with Janetta. "As Margaret is so fond of her, there must be something in her," he said to himself, with a critical glance at the girl's delicate features and big dark eyes. "I'll draw her out at dinner."

He tried his best, and made himself so agreeable and amusing that Janetta lost a good deal of her shyness, and forgot her troubles. She had a quick tongue of her own, as everybody at Miss Polehampton's was aware; and she soon found that she had not lost it. She was a good deal surprised to find that not a word was said at the dinner table about the cause of Margaret's return: in her own home it would have been the subject of the evening; it would have been discussed from every point of view, and she would probably have been reduced to tears before the first hour was over. But here it was evident that the matter was not considered of great importance. Margaret looked serene as ever, and joined quietly in talk which was alarmingly unlike Miss Polehampton's improving conversation: talk about county gaieties and county magnates: gossip about neighbors—gossip of a harmless although frivolous type, for Lady Caroline never allowed any talk at her table that was anything but harmless, about fashions, about old china, about music and art. Mr. Adair was passionately fond of music, and when he found that Miss Colwyn really knew something of it he was in his element. They discoursed of fugues, sonatas, concertos, quartettes, and trios, until even Lady Caroline raised her eyebrows a little at the very technical nature of the conversation; and Sir Philip exchanged a congratulatory smile with Margaret over her friend's success. For the delight of finding a congenial spirit had brought the crimson into Janetta's olive cheeks and the brilliance to her dark eyes: she had looked insignificant when she went in to dinner; she was splendidly handsome at dessert. Mr. Adair noticed her flashing, transitory beauty, and said to himself that Margaret's taste was unimpeachable; it was just like his own; he had complete confidence in Margaret.

When the ladies went back to the drawing-room, Sir Philip turned with a look of only half-disguised curiosity to his host. "Lady Caroline brought her back then?" he said, longing to ask questions, yet hardly knowing how to frame them aright.

Mr. Adair gave a great laugh. "It's been the oddest thing I ever heard of," he said, in a tone of enjoyment. "Margaret takes a fancy to that little black-eyed girl—a nice little thing, too, don't you think?—and nothing must serve but that her favorite must walk with her, sit by her, and so on—you know the romantic way girls have? The schoolmistress interfered, said it was not proper, and so on; forbade it. Miss Colwyn would have obeyed, it seems, but Margaret took the bit in a quiet way between her teeth. Miss Colwyn was ordered to take her meals at a side table: Margaret insisted on taking her meals there too. The school was thrown into confusion. At last Miss Polehampton decided that the best way out of the difficulty was first to complain to us, and then to send Miss Colwyn home, straight away. She would not send Margaret home, you know!"

"That was very hard on Miss Colwyn," said Sir Philip, gravely.

"Yes, horribly hard. So Margaret, as you heard, appealed to her mother, and when Lady Caroline arrived, she found that not only were Miss Colwyn's boxes packed, but Margaret's as well; and that Margaret had declared that if her friend was sent away for what was after all her fault, she would not stay an hour in the house. Miss Polehampton was weeping: the girls were in revolt, the teachers in despair, so my wife thought the best way out of the difficulty was to bring both girls away at once, and settle it with Miss Colwyn's relations afterwards. The joke is that Margaret insists on it that she has been 'expelled.'"

"So she told me."

"The schoolmistress said something of that kind, you know. Caroline says the woman entirely lost her temper and made an exhibition of herself. Caroline was glad to get our girl away. But, of course, it's all nonsense about being 'expelled' as a punishment; she was leaving of her own accord."

"One could hardly imagine punishment in connection with her," said Sir Philip, warmly.

"No, she's a nice-looking girl, isn't she? and her little friend is a good foil, poor little thing."

"This affair may prove of some serious inconvenience to Miss Colwyn, I suppose?"

"Oh, you may depend upon it, she won't be the loser," said Mr. Adair, hastily. "We'll see about that. Of course she will not suffer any injury through my daughter's friendship for her."

Sir Philip was not so sure about it. In spite of his intense admiration for Margaret's beauty, it occurred to him that the romantic partisanship of the girl with beauty, position, and wealth for her less fortunate sister had not been attended with very brilliant results. No doubt Miss Adair, reared in luxury and indulgence, did not in the least realize the harm done to the poor governess-pupil's future by her summary dismissal from Miss Polehampton's boarding-school. To Margaret, anything that the schoolmistress chose to say or do mattered little; to Janetta Colwyn, it might some day mean prosperity or adversity of a very serious kind. Sir Philip did not quite believe in the compensation so easily promised by Mr. Adair. He made a mental note of Miss Colwyn's condition and prospects, and said to himself that he would not forget her. And this meant a good deal from a busy man like Sir Philip Ashley.

Meanwhile there had been another conversation going on in the drawing-room between the three ladies. Margaret put her arm affectionately round Janetta's waist as they stood by the hearthrug, and looked at her mother with a smile. Lady Caroline sank into an easy-chair on the other side of the fireplace, and contemplated the two girls.

"This is better than Claremont House, is it not, Janet?" said Margaret.

"Indeed it is," Janetta answered, gratefully.

"You found the way to papa's heart by your talk about music—did she not, mamma? And does not this dress suit her beautifully?"

"It wants a little alteration in the sleeve," said Lady Caroline, with the placidity which Janetta had always attributed to Margaret as a special virtue, but which she now found was merely characteristic of the house and family in general, "but Markham can do that to-morrow. There are some people coming in the evening, and the sleeve will look better shortened."

The remark sounded a little inconsequent in Janetta's ear, but Margaret understood and assented. It meant that Lady Caroline was on the whole pleased with Janetta, and did not object to introducing her to her friends. Margaret gave her mother a little smile over Janetta's head, while that young person was gathering up her courage in two hands, so to speak, before addressing Lady Caroline.

"I am very much obliged to you," she said at last, with a thrill of gratitude in her sweet voice which was very pleasant to the ear. "But—I was thinking—what time would be the most convenient for me to go home to-morrow?"

"Home? To Beaminster?" said Margaret. "But you need not go, dear; you can write a note and tell them that you are staying here."

"Yes, my dear; I am sure Margaret cannot part with you yet," said Lady Caroline, amiably.

"Thank you; it is most kind of you," Janetta answered, her voice shaking. "But I must ask my father whether I can stay—and hear what he says; Miss Polehampton will have written to him, and——"

"And he will be very glad that we have rescued you from her clutches," said Margaret, with a soft triumphant little laugh. "My poor Janetta! What we suffered at her hands!"

Lady Caroline lying back in her easy chair, with the candle light gleaming upon her silvery grey and white brocade with its touches of soft pink, and the diamonds flashing on her white hands, so calmly crossed upon the handle of her ivory fan, did not feel quite so tranquil as she looked. It crossed her mind that Margaret was acting inconsiderately. This little Miss Colwyn had her living to earn; it would be no kindness to unfit her for her profession. So, when she spoke it was with a shade more decision than usual in her tones.

"We will drive you over to Beaminster to-morrow, my dear Miss Colwyn, and you can then see your family, and ask your father if you may spend a few days with Margaret. I do not think that Mr. Colwyn will refuse us," she said, graciously. "I wonder when those men are coming, Margaret. Suppose you open the piano and let us have a little music. You sing, do you not?"

"Yes, a little," said Janetta.

"A little!" exclaimed Margaret, with contempt. "She has a delightful voice, mamma. Come and sing at once, Janetta, darling, and astonish mamma."

Lady Caroline smiled. She had heard a great many singers in her day, and did not expect to be astonished. A little governess-pupil, an under-teacher in a boarding-school! Dear Margaret's enthusiasm certainly carried her away.

But when Janetta sang, Lady Caroline was, after all, rather surprised. The girl had a remarkably sweet and rich contralto voice, and it had been well trained; and, moreover, she sang with feeling and passion which were somewhat unusual in one so young. It seemed as if some hidden power, some latent characteristic came out in her singing because it found no other way of expressing itself. Neither Lady Caroline nor Margaret understood why Janetta's voice moved them so much; Sir Philip, who came in with his host while the music was going on, heard and was charmed also without quite knowing why; it was Mr. Adair alone whose musical knowledge and experience of the world enabled him, feather-headed as in some respects he was, to lay his finger directly on the salient features of Janetta's singing.

"It's not her voice altogether, you know," he said afterwards to Philip Ashley, in a moment of confidence; "it's soul. She's got more of that commodity than is good for a woman. It makes her singing lovely, you know—brings tears into one's eyes, and all that sort of thing—but upon my honor I'm thankful that Margaret hasn't got a voice like that! It's women of that kind that are either heroines of virtue—or go to the devil. They are always in extremes."

"Then we may promise ourselves some excitement in watching Miss Colwyn's career," said Sir Philip, dryly.

After Janetta, Margaret sang; she had a sweet mezzo-soprano voice, of no great strength or compass, but perfectly trained and very pleasing to the ear. The sort of voice, Sir Philip thought, that would be soothing to the nerves of a tired man in his own house. Whereas, Janetta's singing had something impassioned in it which disturbed and excited instead of soothing. But he was quite ready to admire when Margaret called on him for admiration. They were sitting together on a sofa, and Janetta, who had just finished one of her songs, was talking to, or being talked to, by Mr. Adair. Lady Caroline had taken up a review.

"Is not Miss Colwyn's voice perfectly lovely?" Margaret asked, with shining eyes.

"It is very sweet."

"Don't you think she looks very nice?"—Margaret was hungering for admiration of her friend.

"She is a very pretty girl. You are very fond of each other?"

"Oh, yes, devoted. I am so glad I succeeded!" said the girl, with a great sigh.

"In getting her away from the school?"

"Yes."

"You think it was for her good?"

Margaret opened her lovely eyes.

"For her good?—to come here instead of staying in that close uncomfortable house to give music lessons, and bear Miss Polehampton's snubs?——" It had evidently never occurred to her that the change could be anything but beneficial to Janetta.

"It is very pleasant for her, no doubt," said Sir Philip, smiling in spite of his disapproval. "I only wondered whether it was a good preparation for the life of hard work which probably lies before her."

He saw that Margaret colored, and wondered whether she would be offended by his suggestion. After a moment's pause, she answered, gravely, but quite gently—

"I never thought of it in that way before, exactly. I want to keep her here, so that she should never have to work hard at all."

"Would she consent to that?"

"Why not?" said Margaret.

Sir Philip smiled and said no more. It was curious, he said to himself, to see how little conception Margaret had of lives unlike and outside her own. And Janetta's brave but sensitive little face, with its resolute brows and lips and brilliant eyes, gave promise of a determination and an originality which, he felt convinced, would never allow her to become a mere plaything or appendage of a wealthy household, as Margaret Adair seemed to expect. But his words had made an impression. At night, when Lady Caroline and her daughter were standing in the charming little room which had always been appropriated to Margaret's use, she spoke, with the unconscious habit of saying frankly anything that had occurred to her, of Sir Philip's remarks.

"It was so odd," she said; "Sir Philip seemed to think that it would be bad for Janetta to stay here, mamma. Why should it be bad for her, mamma, dear?"

"I don't think it will be at all bad for her to spend a day or two with us, darling," said Lady Caroline, keeping somewhat careful watch on Margaret's face as she spoke. "But perhaps it had better be by-and-bye. You know she wants to go home to-morrow, and we must not keep her away from her duties or her own sphere of life."

"No," Margaret answered, "but her duties will not always keep her at home, you know, mamma, dear."

"I suppose not, my dearest," said Lady Caroline, vaguely, but in the caressing tone to which Margaret was accustomed. "Go to bed, my sweetest one, and we will talk of all these things to-morrow."

Meanwhile Janetta was wondering at the luxury of the room which had been allotted to her, and thinking over the events of the past day. When a tap at the door announced Margaret's appearance to say good-night, Janetta was standing before the long looking-glass, apparently inspecting herself by the light of the rose-tinted wax candles in silver sconces which were fixed on either side of the mirror. She was in her dressing-gown, and her long and abundant hair fell over her shoulder in a great curly mass.

"Oh, Miss Vanity!" cried Margaret, with more gaiety of tone than was usual with her, "are you admiring your pretty hair?"

"I was thinking," said Janetta, with the intensity which often characterized her speech, "that now I understood you—now I know why you were so different from other girls, so sweet, so calm and beautiful! You have lived in this lovely place all your life! It is like a fairy palace—a dream-house—to me; and you are the queen of it, Margaret—a princess of dreams!"

"I hope I shall have something more than dreams to reign over some day," said Margaret, putting her arms round her friend's neck. "And whatever I am queen over, you must share my queendom, Janet. You know how fond I am of you—how I want you to stay with me always and be my friend."

"I shall always be your friend—always, to the last day of my life!" said Janetta, with fervor. The two made a pretty picture, reflected in the long mirror; the tall, fair Margaret, still in her soft white silk frock, with her arm round the smaller figure of the dark girl whose curly masses of hair half covered her pink cotton dressing-gown, and whose brown face was upturned so lovingly to her friend's.

"And I am sure it will be good for you to stay with me," said Margaret, answering an unspoken objection in her mind.

"Good for me? It is delicious—it is lovely!" cried Janetta, rapturously. "I have never had anything so nice in my whole life. Dear Margaret, you are so good and so kind—if there were only anything that I could do for you in return! Perhaps some day I shall have the chance, and if ever I have—then you shall see whether I am true to my friend or not!"

Margaret kissed her, with a little smile at Janetta's enthusiasm, which was so far different from the modes of expression customary at Helmsley Court, as to be almost amusing.

Miss Polehampton had, of course, written to Mr. and Mrs. Colwyn when she made up her mind that Janetta was to be removed from school; and two or three letters had been interchanged before that eventful day on which Margaret declared that if Janetta went she should go too. Margaret had been purposely kept in the dark until almost the last moment, for Miss Polehampton did not in the least wish to make a scandal, and annoyed as she was by Miss Adair's avowed preference for Janetta, she had arranged a neat little plan by which Miss Colwyn was to go away "for change of air," and be transferred to a school at Worthing kept by a relation of her own at the beginning of the following term. These plans had been upset by a foolish and ill-judged letter from Mrs. Colwyn to her stepdaughter, which Janetta had not been able to keep from Margaret's eyes. This letter was full of reproaches to Janetta for giving so much trouble to her friends; "for, of course," Mrs. Colwyn wrote, "Miss Polehampton's concern for your health is all a blind in order to get you away: and if it hadn't been for Miss Adair taking you up, she would have been only too glad to keep you. But knowing Miss Adair's position, she sees very clearly that it isn't fit for you to be friends with her, and so she wants to send you away."

This was in the main true, but Janetta, in the blithe confidence of youth, would never have discovered it but for that letter. Together she and Margaret consulted over it, for when Margaret saw Janetta crying, she almost forced the letter from her hand; and then it was that Miss Adair vindicated her claim to social superiority. She went straight to Miss Polehampton and demanded that Janetta should remain; and when the schoolmistress refused to alter her decision, she calmly replied that in that case she should go home too. Miss Polehampton was an obstinate woman, and would not concede the point; and Lady Caroline, on learning the state of affairs, at once perceived that it was impossible to leave Margaret at the school where open warfare had been declared. She accordingly brought both girls away with her, arranging to send Janetta to her own home next morning.

"You will stay to luncheon, dear, and I will drive you over to Beaminster at three o'clock," she said to Janetta at breakfast. "No doubt you are anxious to see your own people."

Janetta looked as if she might find it difficult to reply, but Margaret interposed a remark—as usual at the right moment.

"We will practice our duets this morning—if Janetta likes, that is; and we can have a walk in the garden too. Shall we have the landau, mamma?"

"The victoria, I think, dear," said Lady Caroline, placidly. "Your father wants you to ride with him this afternoon, so I shall have the pleasure of Miss Colwyn's society in my drive."

Margaret assented; but Janetta became suddenly aware, by a flash of keen feminine intuition, that Lady Caroline had some reason for wishing to go with her alone, and that she had purposely made the arrangement that she spoke of. However, there was nothing to displease her in this, for Lady Caroline had been most kind and considerate to her, so far, and she was innocently disposed to believe in the cordiality and sincerity of every one who behaved with common civility.

So she spent a pleasant morning, singing with Margaret, loitering about the garden with Mr. Adair, while Margaret and Sir Philip gathered roses, and enjoying to the full all the sweet influences of peace, refinement, and prosperity by which she was surrounded.

Margaret left her in the afternoon with rather a hasty kiss, and an assurance that she would see her again at dinner. Janetta tried to remind her that by that time she would have left the Court, but Margaret did not or would not hear. The tears came into the girl's eyes as her friend disappeared.

"Never mind, dear," said Lady Caroline, who was observing her closely, "Margaret has forgotten at what hour you were going and I would not remind her—it would spoil her pleasure in her ride. We will arrange for you to come to us another day when you have seen your friends at home."

"Thank you," said Janetta. "It was only that she did not seem to remember that I was going—I had meant to say good-bye."

"Exactly. She thinks that I am going to bring you back this afternoon. We will talk about it as we go, dear. Suppose you were to put on your hat now. The carriage will be here in ten minutes."

Janetta prepared for her departure in a somewhat bewildered spirit. She did not know precisely what Lady Caroline meant. She even felt a little nervous as she took her place in the victoria and cast a last look at the stately house in which she had spent some nineteen or twenty pleasant hours. It was Lady Caroline who spoke first.

"We shall miss your singing to-night," she said, amiably. "Mr. Adair was looking forward to some more duets. Another time, perhaps——"

"I am always pleased to sing," said Janetta, brightening at this address.

"Yes—ye—es," said Lady Caroline, with a doubtful little drawl. "No doubt: one always likes to do what one can do so well; but—I confess I am not so musical as my husband or my daughter. I must explain why dear Margaret did not say good bye to you, Miss Colwyn. I allowed her to remain in the belief that she was to see you again to-night, in order that she might not be depressed during her ride by the thought of parting with you. It is always my principle to make the lives of those dear to me as happy as possible," said Margaret's mother, piously.

"And if Margaret had been depressed during her ride, Mr. Adair and Sir Philip might have suffered some depression also, and that would be a great pity."

"Oh, yes," said Janetta. But she felt chilled, without knowing why.

"I must take you into my confidence," said Lady Caroline, in her softest voice. "Mr. Adair has plans for our dear Margaret. Sir Philip Ashley's property adjoins our own: he is of good principles, kind-hearted, and intellectual: he is well off, nice-looking, and of a suitable age—he admires Margaret very much. I need say no more, I am sure."

Again she looked keenly at Janetta's face, but she read there nothing but interest and surprise.

"Oh—does Margaret know?" she asked.

"She feels more than she knows," said Lady Caroline, discreetly. "She is in the first stage of—of—emotion. I did not want the afternoon's arrangements to be interfered with."

"Oh, no! especially on my account," said Janetta, sincerely.

"When I go home I shall talk quietly to Margaret," pursued Lady Caroline, "and tell her that you will come back another day, that your duties called you home—they do, I am sure, dear Miss Colwyn—and that you could not return with me when you were so much wanted."

"I'm afraid I am not much wanted," said Janetta, with a sigh; "but I daresay it is my duty to go home——"

"I am sure it is," Lady Caroline declared; "and duty is so high and holy a thing, dear, that you will never regret the performance of it."

It occurred dimly to Janetta at that point that Lady Caroline's views of duty might possibly differ from her own; but she did not venture to say so.

"And, of course, you will never repeat to Margaret——"

Lady Caroline did not complete her sentence. The coachman suddenly checked the horses' speed: for some unknown reason he actually stopped short in the very middle of the country road between Helmsley Court and Beaminster. His mistress uttered a little cry of alarm.

"What is the matter, Steel?"

The footman dismounted and touched his hat.

"I'm afraid there has been an accident, my lady," he said, as apologetically, as if he were responsible for the accident.

"Oh! Nothing horrible, I hope!" said Lady Caroline, drawing out her smelling-bottle.

"It's a carriage accident, my lady. Leastways, a cab. The 'orse is lying right across the road, my lady."

"Speak to the people, Steel," said her ladyship, with great dignity. "They must not be allowed to block up the road in this way."

"May I get out?" said Janetta, eagerly. "There is a lady lying on the path, and some people bathing her face. Now they are lifting her up—I am sure they ought not to lift her up in that way—oh, please, I must go just for one minute!" And, without waiting for a reply, she stepped, out of the victoria and sped to the side of the woman who had been hurt.

"Very impulsive and undisciplined," said Lady Caroline to herself, as she leaned back and held the smelling-bottle to her own delicate nose. "I am glad I have got her out of the house so soon. Those men were wild about her singing. Sir Philip disapproved of her presence, but he was charmed by her voice, I could see that; and poor, dear Reginald was positively absurd about her voice. And dear Margaret does not sing so well—it is no use pretending that she does—and Sir Philip is trembling on the verge—oh, yes, I am sure that I have been very wise. What is that girl doing now?"

The victoria moved forward a little, so that Lady Caroline could obtain a clearer view of what was going on. The vehicle which caused the obstruction—evidently a hired fly from an inn—was uninjured, but the horse had fallen between the shafts and would never rise again. The occupants of the fly—a lady, and a much younger man, perhaps her son—had got out, and the lady had then turned faint, Lady Caroline heard, but was not in any way hurt. Janetta was kneeling by the side of the lady—kneeling in the dust, without any regard to the freshness of her cotton frock, by the way—and had already placed her in the right position, and was ordering the half-dozen people who had collected to stand back and give her air. Lady Caroline watched her movements and gestures with placid amusement, and went so far as to send Steel with the offer of her smelling salts; but as this offer was rejected she felt that nothing else could be done. So she sat and looked on critically.

The woman—Lady Caroline was hardly inclined to call her a lady, although she did not exactly know why—was at present of a ghastly paleness, but her features were finely cut, and showed traces of former beauty. Her hair was grey, with rebellious waves in it, but her eyebrows were still dark. She was dressed in black, with a good deal of lace about her; and on her ungloved hand Lady Caroline's keen sight enabled her to distinguish some very handsome diamond rings. The effect of the costume was a little spoiled by a large gaudy fan, of violent rainbow hues, which hung at her side; and perhaps it was this article of adornment which decided Lady Caroline in her opinion of the woman's social status. But about the man she was equally positive in a different way. He was a gentleman: there could be no doubt of that. She put up her eye-glass and gazed at him with interest. She almost thought that she had seen him somewhere before.

A handsome man, indeed, and a gentleman; but, oh, what an ill-tempered one, apparently! He was dark, with fine features, and black hair with a slight inclination to wave or curl (as far at least as could be judged when the extremely well-cropped state of his head was taken into consideration); and from these indications Lady Caroline judged him to be "the woman's" son. He was tall, muscular, and active looking: it was the way in which his black eyebrows were bent above his eyes which made the observer think him ill-tempered, for his manner and his words expressed anxiety, not anger. But that frown, which must have been habitual, gave him a distinctly ill-humored look.

At last the lady opened her eyes, and drank a little water, and sat up. Janetta rose from her knees, and turned to the young man with a smile. "She will soon be better now," she said. "I am afraid there is nothing else that I can do—and I think I must go on."

"I am very much obliged to you for your kind assistance," said the gentleman, but without any abatement of the gloom of his expression. He gave Janetta a keen look—almost a bold look—Lady Caroline thought, and then smiled a little, not very pleasantly. "Allow me to take you to your carriage."

Janetta blushed, as if she were minded to say that it was not her carriage; but returned to the victoria, and was handed to her seat by the young man, who then raised his hat with an elaborate flourish which was not exactly English. Indeed, it occurred to Lady Caroline at once that there was something French about both the travelers. The lady with the frizzled grey hair, the black lace dress and mantel, the gaudy blue and scarlet fan, was quite foreign in appearance; the young man with the perfectly fitting frock-coat, the tall hat, the flower in his button-hole, was—in spite of his perfectly English accent—foreign too. Lady Caroline was cosmopolitan enough to feel an access of greater interest in the pair in consequence.

"They have sent to the nearest inn for a horse," said Janetta, as the carriage moved on; "and I dare say they will not have long to wait."

"Was the lady hurt?"

"No, only shaken. She is subject to fainting fits, and the accident quite upset her nerves, her son said."

"Her son?"

"The gentleman called her mother."

"Oh! You did not hear their name, I suppose?"

"No. There was a big B on their traveling bag."

"B—B—?" said Lady Caroline, thoughtfully. "I don't know any one in this neighborhood whose name begins with B, except the Bevans. They must have been merely passing through; and yet the young man's face seemed familiar to me."

Janetta shook her head. "I never saw them before," she said.

"He has a very bold and unpleasant expression," Lady Caroline remarked, decidedly. "It spoils him entirely: otherwise he is a handsome man."

The girl made no answer. She knew, as well as Lady Caroline, that she had been stared at in a manner that was not quite agreeable to her, and yet she did not like to endorse that lady's condemnation of the stranger. For he was certainly very nice-looking—and he had been so kind to his mother that he could not be entirely bad—and to her also his face was vaguely familiar. Could he belong to Beaminster?

As she sat and meditated, the tall spires of Beaminster Cathedral came into sight, and a few minutes brought the carriage across the grey stone bridge and down the principal street of the quaint old place which called itself a city, but was really neither more nor less than a quiet country town. Here Lady Caroline turned to her young guest with a question—"You live in Gwynne Street, I believe, my dear?"

"Yes, at number ten, Gwynne Street," said Janetta, suddenly starting and feeling a little uncomfortable. The coachman evidently knew the address already, for at that moment he turned the horse's heads to the left, and the carriage rolled down a narrow side-street, where the tall red brick houses had a mean and shabby aspect, and seemed as if constructed to keep out sun and air as much as possible.

Janetta always felt the closeness and the shabbiness a little when she first came home, even from school, but when she came from Helmsley Court they struck her with redoubled force. She had never thought before how dull the street was, nor noticed that the railings were broken down in front of the door with the brass-plate that bore her father's name, nor that the window-curtains were torn and the windows sadly in need of washing. The little flight of stone steps that led from the iron gate to the door was also very dirty; and the servant girl, whose head appeared against the area railings as the carriage drove up, was more untidy, more unkempt, in appearance than ever Janetta could have expected. "We can't be rich, but we might be clean!" she said to herself in a subdued frenzy of impatience, as she fancied (quite unjustly) that she saw a faint smile pass over Lady Caroline's delicate, impassive face. "No wonder she thinks me an unfit friend for dear Margaret. But—oh, there is my dear, darling father! Well, nobody can say anything against him at any rate!" And Janetta's face beamed with sudden joy as she saw Mr. Colwyn coming down the dirty steps to the ricketty little iron gate, and Lady Caroline, who knew the surgeon by sight, nodded to him with friendly condescension.

"How are you, Mr. Colwyn?" she said, graciously. "I have brought your daughter home, you see, and I hope you will not scold her for what has been my daughter's fault—not your's."

"I am very glad to see Janetta, under any circumstances," said Mr. Colwyn, gravely, as he raised his hat. He was a tall spare man, in a shabby coat, with a careworn aspect, and kindly, melancholy eyes. Janetta noticed with a pang that his hair was greyer than it had been when last she went back to school.

"We shall be glad to see her again at Helmsley Court," said Lady Caroline. "No, I won't get out, thank you. I have to get back to tea. Your daughter's box is in front. I was to tell you from Miss Polehampton, Mr. Colwyn, that her friend at Worthing would be glad of Miss Colwyn's services after the holidays."

"I am much obliged to your ladyship," said Mr. Colwyn, with grave formality. "I am not sure that I shall let my daughter go."

"Won't you? Oh, but she ought to have all possible advantages! And can you tell me, Mr. Colwyn, by any chance, who are the people whom we passed on the road to Beaminster—an oldish lady in black and a young man with very dark hair and eyes? They had B on their luggage, I believe."

Mr. Colwyn looked surprised.

"I think I can tell you," he said, quietly. "They were on their way from Beaminster to Brand Hall. The young man was a cousin of my wife's: his name is Wyvis Brand, and the lady in black was his mother. They have come home after an absence of nearly four-and-twenty years."

Lady Caroline was too polite to say what she really felt—that she was sorry to hear it.

On the evening of the day on which Lady Caroline drove with Janetta Colwyn to Beaminster, the lady who had fainted by the wayside was sitting in a rather gloomy-looking room at Brand Hall—a room known in the household as the Blue Drawing-room. It had not the look of a drawing-room exactly: it was paneled in oak, which had grown black with age, as had also the great oak beams that crossed the ceiling and the polished floor. The furniture also was of oak, and the hangings of dark but faded blue, while the blue velvet of the chairs and the square of Oriental carpet, in which blue tints also preponderated, did not add cheerfulness to the scene. One or two great blue vases set on the carved oak mantel-piece, and some smaller blue ornaments on a sideboard, matched the furniture in tint; but it was remarkable that on a day when country gardens were overflowing with blossom, there was not a single flower or green leaf in any of the vases. No smaller and lighter ornaments, no scrap of woman's handiwork—lace or embroidery—enlivened the place: no books were set upon the table. A fire would not have been out of season, for the evenings were chilly, and it would have had a cheery look; but there was no attempt at cheeriness. The woman who sat in one of the high-backed chairs was pale and sad: her folded hands lay listlessly clasped together on her lap, and the sombre garb that she wore was as unrelieved by any gleam of brightness as the room itself. In the gathering gloom of a chilly summer evening, even the rings upon her fingers could not flash. Her white face, in its setting of rough, wavy grey hair, over which she wore a covering of black lace, looked almost statuesque in its profound tranquillity. But it was not the tranquillity of comfort and prosperity that had settled on that pale, worn, high-featured face—it was rather the tranquillity that comes of accepted sorrow and inextinguishable despair.

She had sat thus for fully half an hour when the door was roughly opened, and the young man whom Mr. Colwyn had named as Wyvis Brand came lounging into the room. He had been dining, but he was not in evening dress, and there was something unrestful and reckless in his way of moving round the room and throwing himself in the chair nearest his mother's, which roused Mrs. Brand's attention. She turned slightly towards him, and became conscious at once of the fumes of wine and strong tobacco with which her son had made her only too familiar. She looked at him for a moment, then clasped her hands tightly together and resumed her former position, with her sad face turned to the window. She may have breathed a sigh as she did so, but Wyvis Brand did not hear it, and if he had heard it, would not perhaps have very greatly cared.

"Why do you sit in the dark?" he said at last, in a vexed tone.

"I will ring for lights," Mrs. Brand answered quietly.

"Do as you like: I am not going to stay: I am going out," said the young man.

The hand that his mother had stretched out towards the bell fell to her side: she was a submissive woman, used to taking her son at his word.

"You are lonely here," she ventured to remark, after a short silence: "you will be glad when Cuthbert comes down."

"It's a beastly hole," said her son, gloomily. "I would advise Cuthbert to stay in Paris. What he will do with himself here, I can't imagine."

"He is happy anywhere," said the mother, with a stifled sigh.

Wyvis uttered a short, harsh laugh.

"That can't be said of us, can it?" he exclaimed, putting his hand on his mother's knee in a rough sort of caress. "We are generally in the shadow while Cuthbert is in the sunshine, eh? The influence of this old place makes me poetical, you see."

"You need not be in the shadow," said Mrs. Brand. But she said it with an effort.

"Needn't I?" said Wyvis. He thrust his hands into his pockets and leaned back in his chair with another laugh. "I have such a lot to make me cheerful, haven't I?"

His mother turned her eyes upon him with a look of yearning tenderness which, even if the room had been less dimly lighted, he would not have seen. He was not much in the habit of looking for sympathy in other people's faces.

"Is the place worse than you expected?" she asked, with a tremor in her voice.

"It is mouldier—and smaller," he replied, curtly. "One's childish impressions don't go for much. And it is in a miserable state—roof out of repair—fences falling down—drainage imperfect. It has been allowed to go to rack and ruin while we were away."

"Wyvis, Wyvis," said his mother, in a tone of pain, "I kept you away for your own sake. I thought you would be happier abroad."

"Oh—happier!" said the young man, rather scornfully. "Happiness isn't meant for me: it isn't in my line. It makes no difference to me whether I am here or in Paris. I should have been here long ago if I had had any idea that things were going wrong in this way."

"I suppose," said Mrs. Brand, carefully controlling her voice, "that you will not have the visitors you spoke of if the house is in so bad a state."

"Not have visitors? Of course I shall have visitors. What else is there for me to do with myself? We shall get the house put pretty straight by the 12th. Not that there will be any shooting worth speaking of on my place."

"If nobody comes before the 12th, I think we can make the house habitable. I will do my best, Wyvis."

Wyvis laughed again, but in a softer key. "You!" he said. "You can't do much, mother. It isn't the sort of thing you care about. You stay in your own rooms and do your needle-work; I'll see to the house. Some men are coming long before the 12th—the day after to-morrow, I believe."

"Who?"

"Oh, Dering and St. John and Ponsonby, I expect. I don't know whether they will bring any one else."

"The worst men of the worst set you know!" sighed his mother, under her breath. "Could not you have left them behind?"

She felt rather than saw how he frowned—how his hand twitched with impatience.

"What sort of friends am I likely to have?" he said. "Why not those that amuse me most?"

Then he rose and went over to the window, where he stood for some time looking out. Turning round at last, he perceived from a slight familiar movement of his mother's hand over her eyes that she was weeping, and it seemed as if his heart smote him at the sight.

"Come, mother," he said, kindly, "don't take what I say and do so much to heart. You know I'm no good, and never shall do anything in the world. You have Cuthbert to comfort you—"

"Cuthbert is nothing to me—nothing—compared with you, Wyvis."

The young man came to her side and put his hand on her shoulder. The passionate tone had touched him.

"Poor mother!" he said, softly. "You've suffered a good deal through me, haven't you? I wish I could make you forget all the past—but perhaps you wouldn't thank me if I could."

"No," she said, leaning forward so as to rest her forehead against his arm. "No. For there has been brightness in the past, but I see little brightness in the future either for you or for me."

"Well, that is my own fault," said Wyvis, lightly but bitterly. "If it had not been for my own youthful folly I shouldn't be burdened as I am now. I have no one but myself to thank."

"Yes, yes, it was my fault. I pressed you to do it—to tie yourself for life to the woman who has made you miserable!" said Mrs. Brand, in a tone of despairing self-accusation. "I fancied—then—that we were doing right."

"I suppose we were doing right," said Wyvis Brand sternly, but not as if the thought gave him any consolation. "It was better perhaps that I should marry the woman whom I thought I loved—instead of leaving her or wronging her—but I wish to God that I had never seen her face!"

"And to think that I persuaded you into marrying her," moaned the mother, rocking herself backward and forward in the extremity of her regretful anguish; "I—who ought to have been wiser—who might have interfered——"

"You couldn't have interfered to much purpose. I was mad about her at the time," said her son, beginning to walk about the room in a restless, aimless manner. "I wish, mother, that you would cease to talk about the past. It seems to me sometimes like a dream; if you would but let it lie still, I think that I could fancy it was a dream. Remember that I do not blame you. When I rage against the bond, I am perfectly well aware that it was one of my own making. No remonstrance, no command would have availed with me for a moment. I was determined to go my own way, and I went."

It was curious to remark that the roughness and harshness of his first manner had dropped away from him as it did drop now and then. He spoke with the polished utterance of an educated man. It was almost as though he at times put on a certain boorishness of demeanor, feeling it in some way demanded of him by circumstances—but not natural to him after all.

"I will try not to vex you, Wyvis," said his mother, wistfully.

"You do not vex me exactly," he answered, "but you stir my old memories too often. I want to forget the past. Why else did I come down here, where I have never been since I was a child? where Juliet never set foot, and where I have no association with that miserable passage in my life?"

"Then why do you bring those men down, Wyvis? For they know the past: they will recall old associations——"

"They amuse me. I cannot be without companions. I do not pretend to cut myself off from the whole world."

As he spoke thus briefly and coldly, he stopped to strike a match, and then lighted the wax candles that stood on the black sideboard. By this act he meant perhaps to put a stop to the conversation of which he was heartily tired. But Mrs. Brand, in the half-bewildered condition of mind to which long anxiety and sorrow had reduced her, did not know the virtue of silence, and did not possess the magic quality of tact.

"You might find companions down here," she said, pertinaciously, "people suited to your position—old friends of your father's, perhaps——"

"Will they be so willing to make friends with my father's son?" Wyvis burst out bitterly. Then, seeing from her white and stricken face that he had hurt her, he came to her side and kissed her penitently. "Forgive me, mother," he said, "if I say what you don't like. I've been hearing about my father ever since I came to Beaminster two days ago. I have heard nothing but what confirmed my previous idea about his character. Even poor old Colwyn couldn't say any good of him. He went to the devil as fast as ever he could go, and his son seems likely to follow in his footsteps. That's the general opinion, and, by George, I think I shall soon do something to justify it."

"You need not live as your father did, Wyvis," said his mother, whose tears were flowing fast.

"If I don't, nobody will believe it," said the young man, moodily. "There is no fighting against fate. The Brands are doomed, mother: we shall die out and be forgotten—all the better for the world, too. It is time we were done with: we are a bad lot."

"Cuthbert is not bad. And you—Wyvis, you have your child."

"Have I? A child that I have not seen since it was six months old! Brought up by its mother—a woman without heart or principle or anything that is good! Much comfort the child is likely to be to me when I get hold of it."

"When will that be?" said Mrs. Brand, as if speaking to herself rather than to him. But Wyvis replied:

"When she is tired of it—not before. I do not know where she is."

"Does she not draw her allowance?"

"Not regularly. And she refused her address when she last appeared at Kirby's. I suppose she wants to keep the child away from me. She need not trouble. The last thing I want is her brat to bring up."

"Wyvis!"

But to his mother's remonstrating exclamation Wyvis paid no attention in the least: his mood was fitful, and he was glad to step out of the ill-lighted room into the hall, and thence to the silence and solitude of the grounds about the house.

Brand Hall had been practically deserted for the last few years. A tenant or two had occupied it for a little time soon after its late master's withdrawal from the country; but the house was inconvenient and remote from towns, and it was said, moreover, to be damp and unhealthy. A caretaker and his wife had, therefore, been its only inhabitants of late, and a great deal of preparation had been required to make it fit for its owner when he at last wrote to his agents in Beaminster to intimate his intention of settling at the Hall.

The Brands had for many a long year been renowned as the most unlucky family in the neighborhood. They had once possessed a great property in the county; but gambling losses and speculation had greatly reduced their wealth, and even in the time of Wyvis Brand's grandfather the prestige of the family had sunk very low. In the days of Mark Brand, the father of Wyvis, it sank lower still. Mark Brand was not only "wild," but weak: not only weak, but wicked. His career was one of riotous dissipation, culminating in what was generally spoken of as "a low marriage"—with the barmaid of a Beaminster public-house. Mary Wyvis had never been at all like the typical barmaid of fiction or real life: she was always pale, quiet, and refined-looking, and it was not difficult to see how she had developed into the sorrowful, careworn woman whom Wyvis Brand called mother; but she came of a thoroughly bad stock, and was not untouched in reputation. The county people cut Mark Brand after his marriage, and never took any notice of his wife; and they were horrified when he insisted on naming his eldest son after his wife's family, as if he gloried in the lowliness of her origin. But when Wyvis was a small boy, his father resolved that neither he nor his children should be flouted and jeered at by county magnates any longer. He went abroad, and remained abroad until his death, when Wyvis was twenty years of age and Cuthbert, the younger son, was barely twelve. Some people said that the discovery of some particularly disgraceful deed was imminent when he left his native shores, and that it was for this reason that he had never returned to England; but Mark Brand himself always spoke as if his health were too weak, his nerves too delicate, to bear the rough breezes of his own country and the brusque manners of his compatriots. He had brought up his son according to his own ideas; and the result did not seem entirely satisfactory. Vague rumors occasionally reached Beaminster of scrapes and scandals in which the young Brands figured; it was said that Wyvis was a particularly black sheep, and that he did his best to corrupt his younger brother Cuthbert. The news that he was coming back to Brand Hall was not received with enthusiasm by those who heard it.

Wyvis' own story had been a sad one—perhaps more sad than scandalous; but it was a story that the Beaminster people were never to hear aright. Few knew it, and most of those who knew it had agreed to keep it secret. That his wife and child were living, many persons in Paris were aware; that they had separated was also known, but the reason of that separation was to most persons a secret. And Wyvis, who had a great dislike to chatterers, made up his mind when he came to Beaminster that he would tell to nobody the history of the past few years. Had it not been for his mother's sad face, he fancied that he could have put it out of his mind altogether. He half resented the pertinacity with which she seemed to brood upon it. The fact that she had forwarded—had almost insisted upon—the unfortunate marriage, weighed heavily upon her mind. There had been a point at which Wyvis would have given it up. But his mother had espoused the side of the girl, persuaded the young man to fulfill his promises to her—and repented it ever since. Mrs. Wyvis Brand had developed an uncontrollable love for strong drink, as well as a temper that made her at times more like a mad woman than an ordinary human being; and when she one day disappeared from her husband's home, carrying his child with her, and announcing in a subsequent letter that she did not mean to return, it could hardly be wondered at if Wyvis drew a long breath of relief, and hoped that she never would.

When Lady Caroline drove away from Gwynne Street, Janetta was left by the tumble-down iron gate with her father, in whose hand she had laid both her own. He looked at her interrogatively, smiled a little and said—"Well, my dear?" with a softening of his whole face which made him positively beautiful in Janetta's eyes.

"Dear, dearest father!" said the girl, with an irrepressible little sob. "I am so glad to see you again!"

"Come in, my dear," said Mr. Colwyn, who was not an emotional man, although a sympathetic one. "We have been expecting you all day. We did not think that they would keep you so long at the Court."

"I'll tell you all about it when I get in," said Janetta, trying to speak cheerily, with an instinctive remembrance of the demands usually made upon her fortitude in her own home. "Is mamma in?" She always spoke of the present Mrs. Colwyn, as "mamma," to distinguish her from her own mother. "I don't see any of the children."

"Frightened away by the grand carriage, I expect," said Mr. Colwyn, with a grim smile. "I see a head or two at the window. Here, Joey, Georgie, Tiny—where are you all? Come and help to carry your sister's things upstairs." He went to the front door and called again; whereupon a side door opened, and from it issued a slip-shod, untidy-looking woman in a shawl, while over her shoulder and under her arm appeared a little troop of children in various stages of growth and untidiness. Mrs. Colwyn had the peculiarity of never being ready for any engagement, much less for any emergency: she had been expecting Janetta all day, and with Janetta some of the Court party; but she was nevertheless in a state of semi-undress, which she tried to conceal underneath her shawl; and on the first intimation of the approach of Lady Caroline's carriage she had shut herself and the children into a back room, and declared her intention of fainting on the spot if Lady Caroline entered the front door.

"Well, Janetta," she said, as she advanced towards her stepdaughter and presented one faded cheek to be kissed, "so your grand friends have brought you home! Of course they wouldn't come in; I did not expect them, I am sure. Come into the front room—and children, don't crowd so; your sister will speak to you by-and-bye."

"Oh, no, let me kiss them now," said Janetta, who was receiving a series of affectionate hugs that went far to blind her eyes to the general deficiency of orderliness and beauty in the house to which she had come. "Oh, darlings, I am so glad to see you again! Joey, how you have grown! And Tiny isn't Tiny any longer! Georgie, you have been plaiting your hair! And here are Curly and Jinks! But where is Nora?"

"Upstairs, curling her hair," shouted the child who was known by the name of Jinks. While Georgie, a well-grown girl of thirteen, added in a lower tone,

"She would not come down until the Court people had gone. She said she didn't want to be patronized."

Janetta colored, and turned away. Meanwhile Mrs. Colwyn had dropped into the nearest arm-chair, and Mr. Colwyn strayed in and out of the room with the expression of a dog that has lost its master. Georgie hung upon Janetta's arm, and the younger children either clung to their elder sister, or stared at her with round eyes and their fingers in their mouths. Janetta felt uncomfortably conscious of being more than usually interesting to them all. Joe, the eldest boy, a dusty lad of fourteen, all legs and arms, favored her with a broad grin expressive of delight, which his sister did not understand. It was Tiny, the most gentle and delicate of the tribe, who let in a little light on the subject.

"Did they send you away from school for being naughty?" she asked, with a grave look into Janetta's face.

A chuckle from Joey, and a giggle from Georgie, were instantly repressed by Mr. Colwyn's frown and Mrs. Colwyn's acid remonstrance.

"What are you thinking of, children? Sister is never naughty. We do not yet quite understand why she has left Miss Polehampton's so suddenly, but of course she has some good reason. She'll explain it, no doubt, to her papa and me. Miss Polehampton has been a great deal put out about it all, and has written a long letter to your papa, Janetta; and, indeed, it seems to me as if it would have been more becoming if you had kept to your own place and not tried to make friends with those above you——"

"Who are those above her, I should like to know?" broke in the grey-haired surgeon with some heat. "My Janet's as good as the best of them any day. The Adairs are not such grand people as Miss Polehampton makes out—I never heard of such insulting distinctions!"

"Fancy Janetta being sent away—regularly expelled!" muttered Joey, with another chuckle.

"You are very unkind to talk in that way!" said Janetta, addressing him, because at that moment she could not bear to look at Mr. Colwyn. "It was not that that made Miss Polehampton angry. It was what she called insubordination. Miss Adair did not like to see me having meals at a side-table—though I didn't mind one single bit!—and she left her own place and sat by me—and then Miss Polehampton was vexed—and everything followed naturally. It was not just my being friends with Miss Adair that made her send me away."

"It seems to me," said Mr. Colwyn, "that Miss Adair was very inconsiderate."

"It was all her love and friendship, father," pleaded Janetta. "And she had always had her own way; and of course she did not think that Miss Polehampton really meant——"

Her weak little excuses were cut short by a scornful laugh from her stepmother.

"It's easy to see that you have been made a cat's-paw of, Janetta," she said. "Miss Adair was tired of school, and took the opportunity of making a to-do about you, so as to provoke the schoolmistress and get sent away. It does not matter to her, of course: she hasn't got her living to earn. And if you lose your teaching, and Miss Polehampton's recommendations by it, it doesn't affect her. Oh, I understand these fine ladies and their ways."

"Indeed," said Janetta, in distress, "you quite misunderstand Miss Adair, mamma. Besides, it has not deprived me of my teaching: Miss Polehampton had told me that I might go to her sister's school at Worthing if I liked; and she only let me go yesterday because she became irritated at—at—some of the things that were said——"

"Yes, but I shall not let you go to Worthing," said Mr. Colwyn, with sudden decisiveness. "You shall not be exposed to insolence of this kind any longer. Miss Polehampton had no right to treat you as she did, and I shall write and tell her so."

"And if Janetta stays at home," said his wife complainingly, "what is to become of her career as a music-teacher? She can't get lessons here, and there's the expense——"

"I hope I can afford to keep my daughter as long as I am alive," said Mr. Colwyn with some vehemence. "There, don't be vexed, my dear child," and he laid his hand tenderly on Janetta's shoulder, "nobody blames you; and your friend erred perhaps from over-affection; but Miss Polehampton"—with energy—"is a vulgar, self-seeking, foolish old woman, and I won't have you enter into relations with her again."

And then he left the room, and Janetta, forcing back the tears in her eyes, did her best to smile when Georgie and Tiny hugged her simultaneously and Jinks beat a tattoo upon her knee.

"Well," said Mrs. Colwyn, lugubriously, "I hope everything will turn out for the best; but it is not at all nice, Janetta, to think that Miss Adair has been expelled for your sake, or that you are thrown out of work without a character, so to speak. I should think the Adairs would see that, and would make some compensation. If they don't offer to do so, your papa might suggest it——"

"I'm sure father would never suggest anything of the kind," Janetta flashed out; but before Mrs. Colwyn could protest, a diversion was effected by the entrance of the missing Nora, and all discussion was postponed to a more fitting moment.

For to look at Nora was to forget discussion. She was the eldest of the second Mrs. Colwyn's children—a girl just seventeen, taller than Janetta and thinner, with the thinness of immature girlhood, but with a fair skin and a mop of golden-brown hair, which curled so naturally that her younger brother's statement concerning those fair locks must surely have been a libel. She had a vivacious, narrow, little face, with large eyes like a child's—that is to say, they had the transparent look that one sees in some children's eyes, as if the color had been laid on in a single wash without any shadows. They were very pretty eyes, and gave light and expression to a set of rather small features, which might have been insignificant if they had belonged to an insignificant person. But Nora Colwyn was anything but insignificant.

"Have your fine friends gone?" she said, peeping into the room in pretended alarm. "Then I may come in. How are you, Janetta, after your sojourn in the halls of dazzling light?"

"Don't be absurd, Nora," said her sister, with a sudden backward dart of remembrance to the tranquil beauty of the rooms at Helmsley Court and the silver accents of Lady Caroline. "Why didn't you come down before?"

"My dear, I thought the nobility and gentry were blocking the door," said Nora, kissing her. "But since they are gone, you might as well come upstairs with me and take off your things. Then we can have tea."

Obediently Janetta followed her sister to the little room which they always shared when Janetta was at home. It might have looked very bare and desolate to ordinary eyes, but the girl felt the thrill of pleasure that all young creatures feel to anything that bears the name of home, and became aware of a satisfaction such as she had not experienced in her luxurious bedroom at Helmsley Court. Nora helped her to take off her hat and cloak, and to unpack her box, insisting meanwhile on a detailed relation of all the events that had led to Janetta's return three weeks before the end of the term, and shrieking with laughter over what she called "Miss Poley's defeat."

"But, seriously, Nora, what shall I do with myself, if father will not let me go to Worthing?"

"Teach the children at home," said Nora, briskly; "and save me the trouble of looking after them. I should like that. Or get some pupils in the town. Surely the Adairs will recommend you!"

This constant reference to possible aid from the Adairs troubled Janetta not a little, and it was with some notion of combatting the idea that she repaired to the surgery after tea, in order to get a few words on the subject with her father. But his first remark was on quite a different matter.

"Here's a pretty kettle of fish, Janet! The Brands are back again!"

"So I heard you say to Lady Caroline."

"Mark Brand was a cousin of your mother's," said Mr. Colwyn, abruptly; "and a bad lot. As for these sons of his, I know nothing about them—absolutely nothing. But their mother——" he shook his head significantly.

"We saw them to day," said Janetta.

"Ah, an accident of that kind would be a shock to her: she does not look strong. They wrote to me from the 'Clown,' where they had stayed for the last two days; some question relative to the drainage of Brand Hall. I went to the 'Crown' and saw them. He's a fine-looking man."

"He has not altogether a pleasant expression," remarked Janetta, thinking of Lady Caroline's strictures; "but I—liked—his face."

"He looks ill-tempered," said her father. "And I can't say that he showed me much civility. He did not even know that your poor mother was dead. Never asked whether she had left any family or anything."

"Did you tell him?" asked Janetta, after a pause.

"No. I did not think it worth while. I am not anxious to cultivate his acquaintance."

"After all, what does it matter?" said the girl coaxingly, for she thought she saw a shadow of disappointment upon his face.

"No, what does it matter?" said her father, brightening up at once. "As long as we are happy with each other, these outside people need not disturb us, need they?"

"Not a bit," said Janetta. "And—you are not angry with me, are you, father, dear?"

"Why should I be, my Janet? You have done nothing wrong that I know of. If there is any blame it attaches to Miss Adair, not to you."

"But I do not want you to think so, father. Miss Adair is the greatest friend that I have in all the world."

And she found a good many opportunities of repeating; this conviction of hers during the next few days, for Mrs. Colwyn and Nora were not slow to repeat the sentiment with which they had greeted her—that the Adairs were "stuck-up" fine people, and that they did not mean to take any further notice of her now that they had got what they desired.

Janetta stood up gallantly for her friend, but she did feel it a little hard that Margaret had not written or come to see her since her return home. She conjectured—and in the conjecture she was nearly right—that Lady Caroline had sacrificed her a little in order to smooth over things with her daughter: that she had represented Janetta as resolved upon going, resolved upon neglecting Margaret and not complying with her requests; and that Margaret was a little offended with her in consequence. She wrote an affectionate note of excuse to her friend, but Margaret made no reply.

In the first ardor of a youthful friendship, Janetta's heart ached over this silence, and she meditated much as she lay nights upon her little white bed in Nora's attic (for she had not time to meditate during the day) upon the smoothness of life which seemed necessary to the Adairs and the means they took for securing it. On the whole, their life seemed to her too artificial, too much like the life of delicate hot-house flowers under glass; and she came to the conclusion that she preferred her own mode of existence—troublous and hurried and common as it might seem in the eyes of the world to be. After all, was it not pleasant to know that while she was at home, there was a little more comfort than usual for her over-worked, hardly-driven, careworn father; she could see that his meals were properly cooked and served when he came in from long and weary expeditions into the country or amongst the poor of Beaminster; she could help Joey and Georgie in the evenings with their respective lessons; she could teach and care for the younger children all day long. To her stepmother she did not feel that she was very useful; but she could at any rate make new caps for her, new lace fichus and bows, which caused Mrs. Colwyn occasionally to remark with some complacency that Janetta had been quite wasted at Miss Polehampton's school: her proper destiny was evidently to be a milliner.

Nora was the one person of the family who did not seem to want Janetta's help. Indirectly, however, the elder sister was more useful to her than she knew; for the two went out together and were companions. Hitherto Nora had walked alone, and had made one or two undesirable girl acquaintances. But these were dropped when she had Janetta to talk to, dropped quietly, without a word, much to their indignation, and without Janetta's knowing of their existence.

It became a common thing for the two girls to go out together in the long summer evenings, when the work of the day was over, and stroll along the country roads, or venture into the cool shadow of the Beaminster woods. Sometimes the children went with them: sometimes Janetta and Nora went alone. And it was when they were alone one evening that a somewhat unexpected incident came to pass.

The Beaminster woods ran for some distance in a northerly direction beyond Beaminster, and there was a point where only a wire fence divided them from the grounds of Brand Hall. Near this fence Janetta and her sister found themselves one evening—not that they had purposed to reach the boundary, but that they had strayed a little from the beaten path. As they neared the fence they looked at each other and laughed.

"I did not know that we were so near the lordly dwelling of your relations!" said Nora, who loved to tease, and knew that she could always rouse Janetta's indignation by a reference to her "fine friends."

"I did not know either," returned Janetta, good-humoredly. "We can see the house a little. Look at the great red chimneys."

"I have been over it," said Nora, contemptuously. "It's a poor little place, after all—saving your presence, Netta! I wonder if the Brands mean to acknowledge your existence? They——"

She stopped short, for her foot had caught on something, and she nearly stumbled. Janetta stopped also, and the two sisters uttered a sudden cry of surprise. For what Nora had stumbled over was a wooden horse—a child's broken toy—and deep in the bracken before them, with one hand beneath his flushed and dimpled cheek, there lay the loveliest of all objects—a sleeping child.

"He must have lost his way," said Janetta, bending over him. "Poor little fellow!"

"He's a pretty little boy," said Nora, carelessly. "His nurse or his mother or somebody will be near, I dare say—perhaps gone up to the house. Shall I look about?"

"Wait a minute—he is awake—he will tell us who he is."

The child, roused by the sound of voices, turned a little, stretched himself, then opened his great dark eyes, and fixed them full on Janetta's face. What he saw there must have reassured him, for a dreamy smile came to his lips, and he stretched out his little hands to her.

"You darling!" cried Janetta. "Where did you come from, dear? What is your name?"

The boy raised himself and looked about him. He looked about five years old, and was a remarkably fine and handsome child. It was in perfectly clear and distinct English—almost free from any trace of baby dialect—that he replied—

"Mammy brought me. She said I should find my father here. I don't want my father," he remarked, decidedly.

"Who is your father? What is your name?" Nora asked.

"My name is Julian Wyvis Brand," said the little fellow, sturdily; "and I want to know where my father lives, if you please, 'cause it'll soon be my bed-time, and I'm getting very hungry."

Janetta and her sister exchanged glances.

"Is your father's name Wyvis Brand, too?" asked Janetta.

"Yes, same as mine," said the boy, nodding. He stood erect now, and she noticed that his clothes, originally of fashionable cut and costly material, were torn and stained and shabby. He had a little bundle beside him, tied up in a gaudy shawl; and the broken toy-horse seemed to have fallen out of it.

"But where is your mother?"

"Mammy's gone away. She told me to go and find my father at the big red house there. I did go once; but they thought I was a beggar, and they sent me away. I don't know what to do, I don't. I wish mammy would come."

"Will she come soon?"

"She said no. Never, never, never. She's gone over the sea again," said the boy, with the abstracted, meditative look which children sometimes assume when they are concocting a romance, and which Janetta was quick to remark. "I think she's gone right off to America or London. But she said that I was to tell my father that she would never come back."

"What are we to do?" said Nora, in an under tone.

"We must take him to Brand Hall," Janetta answered, "and ask to see either Mrs. Brand or Mr. Wyvis Brand."

"Won't it be rather dreadful?"

Janetta turned hastily on her sister. "Yes," she said, with decision, "it is very awkward, indeed, and it may be much better that you should not be mixed up in the matter at all. You must stay here while I go up to the house."

"But, Janetta, wouldn't you rather have some one with you?"

"I think it will be easier alone," Janetta answered. "You see, I have seen Mrs. Brand and her son already, and I feel as if I knew what they would be like. Wait for me here: I daresay I shall not be ten minutes. Come, dear, will you go with me to see if we can find your father?"

"Yes," said the boy, promptly putting his hand in hers.

"Are these your things in the bundle?"

"Yes; mammy put them there. There's my Sunday suit, and my book of 'Jack, the Giantkiller,' you know. And my wooden horse; but it's broke. Will you carry the horse for me?—and I'll carry the bundle."

"Isn't it too heavy for you?"

"Not a bit," and the little fellow grasped it by both bands, and swung it about triumphantly.

"Come along, then," said Janetta, with a smile. "Wait for me here, Nora, dear: I shall then find you easily when I come back."

She marched off, the boy stumping after her with his burden. Nora noticed that after a few minutes' walk her sister gently relieved him of the load and carried it herself.

"Just like Janetta," she soliloquized, as the two figures disappeared behind a clump of tall trees; "she was afraid of spoiling the moral if she did not let him try at least to carry the bundle. She always is afraid of spoiling the moral: I never knew such a conscientious person in my life. I am sure, as mamma says, she sets an excellent example."

And then Nora balanced herself on the loose wire of the fence, which made an excellent swing, and poising herself upon it she took off her hat, and resigned herself to waiting for Janetta's return. Naturally, perhaps, her meditations turned upon Janetta's character.

"I wish I were like her," she said to herself. "Wherever she is she seems to find work to do, and makes herself necessary and useful. Now, I am of no use to anybody. I don't think I was ever meant to be of use. I was meant to be ornamental!" She struck the wire with the point of her little shoe, and looked at it regretfully. "I have no talent, mamma says. I can look nice, I believe, and that is all. If I were Margaret Adair I am sure I should be very much admired! But being only Nora Colwyn, the doctor's daughter, I must mend socks and make puddings, and eat cold mutton and wear old frocks to the end of the chapter! What a mercy I am taller than Janetta! My old dresses are cut down for her, but she can't leave me her cast-off ones. That little wretch, Georgie, will soon be as tall as I am, I believe. Thank goodness, she will never be as pretty." And Miss Nora, who was really excessively vain, drew out of her pocket a small looking-glass, and began studying her features as therein reflected: first her eyes, when she pulled out her eyelashes and stroked her eyebrows; then her nose, which she pinched a little to make longer; then her mouth, of which she bit the lips in order to increase the color and judge of the effect. Then she took some geranium petals from the flowers in her belt and rubbed them on her cheeks: the red stain became her mightily, she thought, and was almost as good as rouge.

Thus engaged, she did not hear steps on the pathway by which she and Janetta had come. A man, young and slim, with a stoop and a slight halt in his walk, with bright, curling hair, worn rather longer than Englishmen usually wear it, with thin but expressive features, and very brilliant blue eyes—this was the personage who now appeared upon the scene. He stopped short rather suddenly when he became aware of the presence of a young lady upon the fence—perhaps it was to him a somewhat startling one: then, when he noted how she was engaged, a smile broke gradually over his countenance. He once made a movement to advance, then restrained himself and waited; but some involuntary rustle of the branches above him or twigs under his feet revealed him. Nora gave a little involuntary cry, dropped her looking-glass, and colored crimson with vexation at finding that some one was watching her.

"What ought I to do, I wonder?" Such was the thought that flashed through the young man's mind. He was remarkably quick in receiving impressions and in drawing conclusions. "She is not a French girl, thank goodness, fresh from a convent, and afraid to open her lips! Neither is she the conventional young English lady, or she would not sit on a fence and look at herself in a pocket looking-glass. At least, I suppose she would not: how should I know what English girls would do? At any rate, here goes for addressing her."

All these ideas passed through his mind in the course of the second or two which elapsed while he courteously raised his hat, and advanced to pick up the fallen hand-glass. But Nora was too quick for him. She had slipped off the fence and secured her mirror before he could reach it; and then, with a look of quite unnecessary scorn and anger, she almost turned her back upon him, and stood looking at the one angle of the house which she could see.

The young man brushed his moustache to conceal a smile, and ventured on the remark that he had been waiting to make.

"I beg your pardon; I trust that I did not startle you."

"Not at all," said Nora, with dignity. But she did not turn round.

"If you are looking for the gate into the grounds," he resumed, with great considerateness of manner, "you will find it about twenty yards further to your left. Can I have the pleasure of showing you the way?"

"No, thank you," said Miss Nora, very ungraciously. "I am waiting for my sister." She felt that some explanation was necessary to account for the fact that she did not immediately walk away.

"Oh, I beg your pardon," said the young man once more, but this time in a rather disappointed tone. Then, brightening—"But if your sister has gone up to our house why won't you come in too?"

"Your house?" said Nora, unceremoniously, and facing him with an air of fearless incredulity, which amused him immensely. "But you are not Mr. Brand?"

"My name is Brand," said the young fellow, smiling the sunniest smile in the world, and again raising his hat, with what Nora now noticed to be a rather foreign kind of grace: "and if you know it, I feel that it is honored already."

Nora knitted her brows. "I don't know what you mean," she said, impatiently, "but you are not Mr. Brand of the Hall, are you?"

"I live at the Hall, certainly, and my name is Brand—Cuthbert Brand, at your service."

"Oh, I see. Not Wyvis Brand?" said Nora impulsively. "Not the father of the dear little boy that we found here just now?"

Cuthbert Brand's fair face colored. He looked excessively surprised.

"The father—a little boy? I am afraid," he said, with some embarrassment of manner, "that I do not exactly know what you mean——"

"It is just this," said Nora, losing her contemptuous manner and coming closer to the speaker; "when my sister and I were walking this way we saw a little boy lying here fast asleep. He woke up and told us that his name was Julian Wyvis Brand, and that his mother had left him here, and told him to find his father, who lived at that red house."

"Good heavens! And the woman—what became of her?"

"The boy said she had gone away and would not come back."

"I trust she may not," muttered Cuthbert angrily to himself. A red flush colored his brow as he went on. "My brother's wife," he said formally, "is not—at present—on very friendly terms with him; we did not know that she intended to bring the child home in this manner: we thought that she desired to keep it—where is the boy, by the way?"

"My sister has taken him up to the Hall. She said that she would see Mr. Brand."

Cuthbert raised his eyebrows. "See my brother?" he repeated as if involuntarily. "My brother!"

"She is his second cousin, you know: I suppose that gives her courage," said Nora smiling at the tone of horror which she fancied must be simulated for the occasion. But Cuthbert was in earnest—he knew Wyvis Brand's temper too well to anticipate anything but a rough reception for any one who seemed inclined to meddle with his private affairs. And if Nora's sister were like herself! For Nora did not look like a person who would bear roughness or rudeness from any one.

"Then are you my cousin, too?" he asked, suddenly struck by an idea that sent a gleam of pleasure to his eye.

"Oh, no," said Nora, demurely. "I'm no relation. It is only Janetta—her mother was Mr. Brand's father's cousin. But that was not my mother—Janetta and I are stepsisters."

"Surely that makes a relationship, however," said Cuthbert, courageously. "If your stepsister is my second cousin, you must be a sort of step-second-cousin to me. Will you not condescend to acknowledge the connection?"

"Isn't the condescension all on your side?" said Nora coolly. "It may be a connection, but it certainly isn't a relationship."

"I am only too glad to hear you call it a connection," said Cuthbert, with gravity. And then the two laughed—Nora rather against her will—Cuthbert out of amusement at the situation, and both out of sheer light-heartedness. And when they had laughed the ice seemed to be broken, and they felt as if they were old friends.

"I did not know that any of our relations were living in Beaminster," he resumed, after a moment's pause.

"I suppose you never even heard our name," said Nora, saucily.

"I don't—know——" he began, in some confusion.

"Of course you don't. Your father had a cousin and she married a doctor—a poor country surgeon, and so of course you forgot all about her existence. She was not my mother, so I can speak out, you know. Your father never spoke to her again after she married my father."

"More shame to him! I remember now. Your father is James Colwyn."

Nora nodded. "I think it was a very great shame," she said.

"And so do I," said Cuthbert, heartily.

"It was all the worse," Nora went on, quite forgetting in her eagerness whom she was talking to, "because Mr. Brand was not himself so very much thought of, you know—people did not think—oh, I forgot! I beg your pardon!" she suddenly ejaculated, turning crimson as she remembered that the man to whom she was speaking was the son of the much-abused Mr. Brand, who had been considered the black sheep of the county.

"Don't apologize, pray," said Cuthbert, lightly. "I'm quite accustomed to hearing my relations spoken ill of. What was it that people did not think?"

"Oh," said Nora, now covered with confusion, "of course I could not tell you."

"It was so very bad, was it?" said the young man, laughing. "You need not be afraid. Really and seriously, I have been told that my poor father was not very popular about here, and I don't much wonder at it, for although he was a good father to us he was rather short in manner, and, perhaps, I may add, in temper. Wyvis is like him exactly, I believe."

"And are you?" asked Nora.

Cuthbert raised his hat and gave it a tremendous flourish. "Mademoiselle, I have not that honor," he replied.

"I suppose I ought not to have asked," said Nora to herself, but this time she restrained herself and did not say it aloud. "I wonder where Janetta is?" she murmured after a moment's silence. "I did not think that she would be so long."

If Cuthbert thought the remark ungracious, as he might well have done, he made no sign of discomfiture. "Can I do anything?" he asked. "Shall I go to the house and find out whether she has seen my brother? But then I shall have to leave you."

"Oh, that doesn't matter," said Nora, innocently.

"Doesn't it? But I hardly like the idea of leaving you all alone. There might be tramps about. If you are like all the other young ladies I have known, you will have an objection to tramps."

"I am sure," said Nora, with confidence, "that I am not at all like the other young ladies you know; but at the same time I must confess that I don't like tramps."

"I knew it. And I saw a tramp—I am sure I did—a little while ago in this very wood. He was ragged and dirty, but picturesque. I sketched him, but I think he would not be a pleasant companion for you."

"Do you sketch?" said Nora quickly.

"Oh, yes, I sketch a little," he answered in a careless sort of way—for what was the use of telling this little girl that his pictures had been hung in the Salon and the Academy, or that he had hopes of one day rising to fame and fortune in his recently adopted profession? He was not given to boasting of his own success, and besides, this child—with her saucy face and guileless eyes—would not understand either his ambitions or his achievements.

But Nora's one talent was for drawing, and although the instruction she had received was by no means of the best, she had good taste and a great desire to improve her skill. So Cuthbert's admission excited her interest at once.

"Have you been sketching now?" she asked. "Oh, do let me see what you have done?"

Cuthbert's portfolio was under his arm. He laughed, hesitated, then dropped on one knee beside her and began to exhibit his sketches. It was thus—side by side, with heads very close together—that Janetta, much to her amazement, found them on her return.

Janetta had set off on her expedition to Brand Hall out of an impulse of mingled pity and indignation—pity for the little boy, indignation against the mother who could desert him, perhaps against the father too. This feeling prevented her from realizing all at once the difficult position in which she was now placing herself; the awkwardness in which she would be involved if Mr. Brand declared that he knew nothing of the child, or would have nothing to do with it. "In that case," she said to herself, with an admiring glance at the lovely little boy, "I shall have to adopt him, I think! I wonder what poor mamma would say!"

She found her way without difficulty to the front-door of the long, low, rambling red house which was dignified by the name of Brand Hall. The place had a desolate look still, in spite of its being inhabited. Scarcely a window was open, and no white blinds or pretty curtains could be seen at the casements. The door was also shut; and as it was one of those wide oaken doors, mantled with creepers, and flanked with seats, which look as if they should always stand hospitably open, it gave the stranger a sense of coldness and aloofness to stand before it. And, also, there was neither bell nor a knocker—a fact which showed that few visitors ever made their appearance at Brand Hall. Janetta looked about her in dismay, and then tapped at the door with her fingers, while the child followed her every movement with his great wondering eyes, and finally said, gravely—

"I think they have all gone to sleep in this house, like the people in the 'Sleeping Beauty' story."

"Then you must be the Fairy Prince to wake them all up," said Janetta, laughingly.

The boy looked at her as if he understood; then, suddenly stooping, he picked up a fallen stick and proceeded to give the door several smart raps upon its oaken panels.

This summons procured a response. The door was opened, after a good deal of ineffectual fumbling at bolts and rattling of chains, by an old, white-haired serving man, who looked as if he had stepped out of the story to which Julian had alluded. He was very deaf, and it was some time before Janetta could make him understand that she wanted to see Mrs. Brand. Evidently Mrs. Brand was not in the habit of receiving visitors. At last he conducted her to the dark little drawing-room where the mistress of the house usually sat, and here Janetta was received by the pale, grey-haired woman whom she had seen fainting on the Beaminster road. It was curious to notice the agitation of this elderly lady on Janetta's appearance. She stood up, crushed her handkerchief between her trembling fingers, took a step towards her visitor, and then stood still, looking at her with such extraordinary anxiety that Janetta was quite confused and puzzled by it. Seeing that her hostess could not in any way assist her out of her difficulty, she faced it boldly by introducing herself.

"My name is Janetta Colwyn," she began. "I believe that my mother was a relation of Mr. Brand's—a cousin——"

"Yes, a first cousin," said Mrs. Brand, nervously. "I often heard him speak of her—I never saw her——"

She paused, looked suspiciously at Janetta, and colored all over her thin face. Janetta paused also, being taken somewhat by surprise.

"No, I don't suppose you ever saw her," she said, "but then you went abroad, and my dear mother died soon after I was born. Otherwise, I daresay you would have known her."

Mrs. Brand gave her a strange look. "You think so?" she said. "But no—you are wrong: she always looked down on me. She never would have been friendly with me if she had lived."

"Indeed," said Janetta, very much astonished. "I always heard that it was the other way—that Mr. Brand was angry with her for marrying a poor country surgeon, and would not speak to her again."

"That is what they may have said to you. But you were too young to be told the truth," said the sad-faced woman, beginning to tremble all over as she spoke. "No, your mother would not have been friends with me. I was not her equal—and she knew I was not."

"Oh, indeed, you make a mistake: I am sure you do," cried Janetta, becoming genuinely distressed as this view of her mother's character and conduct was fixed upon her. "My mother was always gentle and kind, they tell me; I am sure she would have been your friend—as I will be, if you will let me." She held out her hands and drew those of the trembling woman into her warm young clasp. "I am a cousin too," she said, blushing a little as she asserted herself in this way, "and I hope you will let me come to see you sometimes and make you less lonely."

"I am always lonely, and I always shall be lonely to the end of time," said Mrs. Brand, slowly and bitterly. "However"—with an evident attempt to recover her self-possession—"I shall always be pleased to see you. Did—did—your father send you here to-night?"

"No," said Janetta, remembering her errand. "He does not know——"

"Does not know?" The pale woman again looked distressed. "Oh," she said, turning away with a sigh and biting her lip, "then I shall not see you again."

"Indeed you will," said Janetta, warmly. "My father would never keep me away from any one who wanted me—and one of my mother's relations too. But I came to-night because I found this dear little boy outside your grounds. He tells me that his name is Julian Wyvis Brand, and that he is your son's little boy."

For the first time Mrs. Brand turned her eyes upon the child. Hitherto she had not noticed him much, evidently thinking that he belonged to Janetta, and was also a visitor. But when she saw the boy's sweet little face and large dark eyes, she turned pale, and made a gesture as of warning or dislike.

"Take him away! take him away," she said. "Yes, I can see that it is her child—and his child too. She must be here too, and she has been the ruin of my boy's life!" And then she sank into a chair and burst into an agony of tears.

Janetta felt, with an inexpressible pang, that she had set foot in the midst of some domestic tragedy, the like of which had never come within her ken before. She was conscious of a little recoil from it, such as is natural to a young girl who has not learnt by experience the meaning of sorrow; but the recoil was followed by a rush of that sympathy for which she had always shown a great capacity. Her instinct led her instantly to comfort and console. She knelt down beside the weeping woman and put one arm round her, drawing the little boy forward with her left hand as she spoke.

"Oh, don't cry—don't cry!" she murmured. "He has come to be a joy and a comfort to you, and he wants you to love him too."

"Won't you love me, grandmamma?" said the sweet childish voice. And Julian laid his hand on the poor woman's shaking knee. "Don't cry, grandmamma."

It was this scene which met the eyes of Wyvis Brand when he turned the handle of the drawing-room door and walked into the room. His mother weeping, with a child before her, and a dark-haired girl on her knees with one arm round the weeping woman and one round the lovely child. It was a pretty picture, and Wyvis Brand was not insensible to its beauty.

He stood, looking prom one to another of the group.

"What does all this mean?" he asked, in somewhat harsh tones.

His mother cried aloud and caught the child to her breast.

"Oh, Wyvis, be kind—be merciful," she gasped. "This is your child—your child. You will not drive him away. She has left him at our door."

Wyvis walked into the room, shut the door behind him, and leaned against it.

"Upon my word," he said, sarcastically, "you will give this lady—whose name I haven't the pleasure of knowing—a very fine idea of our domestic relations. I am not such a brute, I hope, as to drive away my own child from my door; but I certainly should like to know first whether it is my child; and more particularly whether it is my son and heir, as I have no doubt that this young gentleman is endeavoring to persuade you. Did you bring the child here?" he said, turning sharply to Janetta.

"I brought him into the house, certainly," she said, rising from her knees and facing him. "I found him outside your fence; and he told me that his name was Julian Wyvis Brand."

"Pretty evidence," said Mr. Brand, very rudely, as Janetta thought. "Who can tell whether the child is not some beggar's brat that has nothing to do with me?"

"Don't you know your own little boy when you see him?" Janetta demanded, indignantly.

"Not I. I have not set eyes on him since he was a baby. Turn round, youngster, and let me have a look at you."

The child faced him instantly, much as Janetta herself had done. There was a fearless look in the baby face, an innocent, guileless courage in the large dark eyes, which must surely, thought Janetta, touch a father's heart. But Wyvis Brand looked as if it would take a great deal to move him.

"Where do you come from?" said Mr. Brand, sternly.

"From over the sea."

"That's no answer. Where from?—what place?"

The boy looked at him without answering.

"Are you dumb?" said Wyvis Brand, harshly. "Or have you not been taught what to say to that question? Where do you come from, I say?"

Mrs. Brand murmured an inarticulate remonstrance; Janetta's eyes flashed an indignant protest. Both women thought that the boy would be dismayed and frightened. But he, standing steady and erect, did not flinch. His color rose and his hands clenched themselves at his side, but he did not take his eyes from his father's face as he replied.

"I come with mammy from Paris."

"And pray where is your mother?"

"Gone back again. She told me to find my father. Are you my father?" said the child, with the utmost fearlessness.

"What is your name?" asked Wyvis, utterly disregarding the question.

"Julian Wyvis Brand."

"He's got the name pat enough," said Wyvis, with a sardonic laugh. "Well, where did you live in Paris? What sort of a house had you?"

"It was near the church," said the little boy, gravely. "The church with the big pillars round it. There was a bonnet shop under our rooms, and the rooms were all pink and white and gold—prettier than this," he said, wistfully surveying the gloomy room in which he stood.

"And who took care of you when your mother was out?" asked Mr. Brand. Even Janetta could see, by the swift, subtle change that had passed over his face, that he recognized the description of the room.

"Susan. She was my nurse and mammy's maid as well. She was English."

The man nodded and set his lips. "He knows what to say," he remarked.

"Oh, Wyvis!" exclaimed his mother, as if she could repress her feelings no longer; "don't you see how like he is to you!—don't you feel that he is your own child?"

"I confess the paternal feelings are not very strong in me," said her son, dryly, "but I have a fancy the boy is mine for all that. Haven't you a letter or a remembrance of some sort to give me, young man?"

The boy shook his head.

"There may be something amongst his things—some book or trinket that you would remember," said Janetta, speaking with timidity. Mr. Brand gave her a keen look, and Mrs. Brand accepted the suggestion with eagerness.

"Oh, yes, yes, let us look. Have you a box, my dear, or a bag?—oh, a bundle, only: give it me, and let me see what is inside."

"It is unnecessary, mother," said Wyvis, coldly. "I am as convinced as you can wish me to be that this is Juliet's child."

But Mrs. Brand, with trembling fingers and parted lips, was helping Janetta to unfasten the knots of the big handkerchief in which the child's worldly goods were wrapped up. Wyvis Brand stood silently beside the two women, while little Julian pressed closer and pointed out his various treasures as they were one by one disclosed.

"That's my book," he said; "and that's my best suit. And that's—oh, I don't know what that is. I don't know why mammy put it in."

"I know," said Wyvis Brand, half under his breath.

The object that called forth this remark was a small morocco box, loosely wrapped in tissue-paper. Wyvis took it out of his mother's hand, opened it, and stood silently gazing at its contents. It held a ring, as Janetta could easily see—a hoop of gold in which were three opals—not a very large or costly-looking trinket, but one which seemed to have memories or associations connected with it—to judge, at least, by the look on Wyvis Brand's dark face. The women involuntarily held their breath as they glanced at him.

At last with a short laugh, he slipped the little case into his pocket, and turned upon his heel.

"I suppose that this is evidence enough," he said. "It is a ring I once gave her—our engagement ring. Not one of much value, or you may be sure that she would never have sent it back."

"Then you are convinced—you are certain——" His mother did not finish the sentence, but her son knew what she meant.

"That he is my son? my wife's child? Oh, yes, I am pretty sure of that. He had better be put to bed," said Wyvis, carelessly. "You can find a room for him somewhere, I dare say."

"There is the old nursery," said Mrs. Brand, in breathless eagerness. "I looked into it yesterday; it is a nice, cheerful room—but it has not been used for a long time——"

"Do as you like; don't consult me," said her son. "I know nothing about the matter." And he turned to the door, without another look towards his son.

But little Julian was not minded to be treated in this way. His large eyes had been fixed upon his father with a puzzled and rather wistful expression. He now suddenly started from his position at Mrs. Brand's knee, and pursued his father to the door.

"Say good-night, please," he said, pulling at Mr. Brand's coat with a fearlessness which amused Janetta and startled Mrs. Brand.

Wyvis looked down at him with a curious and indescribable expression. "You're not shy, at any rate," he said, drily. "Well, good-night, young man. What?"—the boy had held up his face to be kissed.

The father hesitated. Then a better and softer feeling seemed to pass over his face. He stooped down and let the child put his arms round his neck, and press a warm kiss on his cheek. A short laugh then escaped his lips, as if he were half-ashamed of his own action. He went out of the room and shut the door behind him without looking round, and little Julian returned to his grandmother's knee, looking well satisfied with himself.

Janetta felt that she ought to go, and yet that she hardly liked trusting the child to the sole care of Mrs. Brand, who was evidently so much unnerved as to be of little use in deciding what was to be done with him. And at the first hint of departure grandmother and child both clung to her as if they felt her to be their sheet-anchor in storm. She was not allowed to go until she had inspected the nursery and pronounced it too damp for Julian's use, and seen a little bed made up for the child in Mrs. Brand's own room, where a fire was lighted, and everything looked cosey and bright. Poor little Julian was by this time half-dead with sleep; and Janetta could not after all make up her mind to leave him until she had seen him tucked up and fast asleep. Then she bethought herself of Nora, and turned to go. Mrs. Brand, melted out of her coldness and shy reserve, caught her by the hand.

"My dear," she said, "what should we have done without you?"

"I don't think that I have done very much," said Janetta, smiling.

"You have done more than I could ever do. If I had brought that child to my son he would never have acknowledged it."

"He does not look so hard," said the girl involuntarily.

"He is hard, my dear—hard in his way—but he is a good son for all that—and he has had sore trouble, which has made him seem harder and sterner than he is. I cannot thank you enough for all that you have done to-day."

"Oh, Mrs. Brand, I have done nothing," said Janetta, blushing at the elder woman's praise. "But may I come to see you and little Julian again? I should like so much to know how he gets on."

"You may come, dear, if your father will let you," said Mrs. Brand, with rather a troubled look. "It would be a blessing—a charity—to me: but I don't know whether it would be right to let you—your father must decide."

And then Janetta took her leave.

She was surprised to find that Mr. Brand was lounging about the hall as she came out, and that he not only opened the door for her but accompanied her to the garden gate. He did not speak for a minute or two, and Janetta, not seeing her way clear to any remarks of her own, wondered whether they were to walk side by side to the gate in utter silence. Presently, however, he said, abruptly.

"I have not yet heard to whom I am indebted for the appearance of that little boy in my house."

"I am not exactly responsible," said Janetta, "I only found him outside and brought him in to make inquiries. My name is Janetta Colwyn."

"Colwyn? What? the doctor's daughter?"

"Yes, the doctor's daughter," said Janetta, smiling frankly at him, "and your second cousin."

Wyvis Brand's hand went up to his hat, which he lifted ceremoniously.

"I wish I had had the introduction earlier," he said, in a much pleasanter tone.

Janetta could not exactly echo the sentiment, and therefore maintained a discreet silence.

"You must have thought me a great brute," said Wyvis, with some sensitiveness in his tone.

"Oh, no: I quite saw how difficult it was for you to understand who I was, and how it had all come about."

"You saw a great deal, then."

"Oh, I know that it sounds impertinent to say so," Janetta answered, blushing a little and walking a trifle faster, "but I did not mean it rudely, I assure you."

He seemed to take no notice. He was looking straight before him, with a somewhat sombre expression in his fine dark eyes.

"What you could not see," he said, perhaps more to himself than to her, "was what no one will ever guess. Nobody knows what the last few years have been to me. My mother has seen more of it than any one else, but even to her my life has been something of a mystery—a sealed book. You should remember this—remember all that I have passed through—before you blame me for the way in which I received that child to-day."

"I did not blame you," said Janetta, eagerly. "I only felt that there was a great deal which I could not understand."

He turned his gloomy eyes upon her. "Just so," he said. "You cannot understand. And it is useless for you to try."

"I am very sorry," Janetta faltered, scarcely knowing why she said so.

Wyvis laughed. "Don't trouble to be sorry over my affairs," he said. "They are not worth sorrow, I assure you. But—if I may make one request—will you kindly keep silence (except, of course, to your parents) about this episode? I do not want people to begin gossiping about that unhappy woman who has the right, unfortunately, to call herself my wife."

Janetta promised, and with her promise the garden gate was reached, and the interview came to an end.

Janetta was rather surprised that Mr. Wyvis Brand did not offer to accompany her for at least part of her way homewards, but she set down his remissness to absorption in his own rather complicated affairs. In this she was not mistaken. Wyvis was far more depressed, and far more deeply buried in the contemplation of his difficulties, than anybody knew, and it completely escaped his memory until afterwards that he ought to have offered Miss Colwyn an escort. Janetta, however, was well used to going about the world alone, and she proceeded briskly to the spot where she had left Nora, and was much astonished to find that young person deep in conversation with a strange young man.

But the young man had such an attractive face, such pleasant eyes, so courteous a manner, that she melted towards him before he had got through his first sentence. Nora, of course, ought to have introduced him; but she was by no means well versed in the conventionalities of society, and therefore left him to do what he pleased, and to introduce himself.

"I find that I am richer than I thought," said Cuthbert Brand, "in possessing a relative whom I never heard of before! Miss Colwyn, are we not cousins? My name is Brand—Cuthbert Brand."

Janetta's face lighted up. "I have just seen Mrs. Brand and your brother," she said, offering him her hand.

"And, oh, Janetta!" cried Nora at once, "do tell us what happened. Have you left the little boy at Brand Hall? And is it really Mr. Brand's little boy?"

"Yes, it is, and I have left him with his father," said Janetta, gravely. "As it is getting late, Nora, we had better make the best of our way home."

"You will let me accompany you?" said Cuthbert, eagerly, while Nora looked a little bit inclined to pout at her sister's serious tone. "It is, as you say, rather late; and you have a long walk before you."

"Thank you, but I could not think of troubling you. My sister and I are quite accustomed to going about by ourselves. We escort each other," said Janetta, smiling, so that he should not set her down as utterly ungracious.

"I am a good walker," said Cuthbert, coloring a little. He was half afraid that they thought his lameness a disqualification for accompanying them. "I do my twenty miles a day quite easily."

"Thank you," Janetta said again. "But I could not think of troubling you. Besides, Nora and I are so well used to these woods, and to the road between them and Beaminster, that we really do not require an escort."

A compromise was finally effected. Cuthbert walked with them to the end of the wood, and the girls were to be allowed to pursue their way together along the Beaminster road. He made himself very agreeable in their walk through the wood, and did not leave them, without a hope that he might be allowed one day to call upon his newly-discovered cousins.

"He has adopted us, apparently, as well as yourself," said Nora, as the two girls tramped briskly along the Beaminster road. "He seems to forget that we are not his relations."

"He is very pleasant and friendly," said Janetta.

"But why did you say he might call?" pursued Nora. "I thought that you would say that we did not have visitors—or something of that sort."

"My dear Nora! But we do have visitors."

"Yes; but not of that kind."

"Don't you want him to come?" said Janetta, in some wonderment; for it had struck her that Nora had shown an unusual amount of friendliness to Mr. Cuthbert Brand.

"No, I don't," said Nora, almost passionately. "I don't want to see him down in our shabby, untidy little drawing-room, to hear mamma talk about her expenses and papa's difficulties—to see all that tribe of children in their old frocks—to see the muddle in which we live! I don't want him there at all."

"Dear Nora, I don't think that the Brands have been accustomed to live in any very grand way. I am sure the rooms I went into this evening were quite shabby—nearly as shabby as ours, and much gloomier. What does it matter?"

"It does not matter to you," said Nora; "because you are their relation. It is different for us. You belong to them and we don't."

"I think you are quite wrong to talk in that way. It is nothing so very great and grand to be related to the Brands."

"They are 'County' people," said Nora, with a scornful little emphasis on the word. "They are like your grand Adairs: they would look down on a country doctor and his family, except just now and then when they could make them useful."

"Look down on father? What are you thinking of?" cried Janetta, warmly. "Nobody looks down on father, because he does good, honest work in the world, and everybody respects him; but I am afraid that a good many people look down on the Brands. You know that as well as I do, Nora; for you have heard people talk about them. They are not at all well thought of in this neighborhood. I don't suppose there is much honor and glory to be gained by relationship to them."

In which Janetta was quite right, and showed her excellent sense. But Nora was not inclined to be influenced by her more sagacious sister.

"You may say what you like," she observed; "but I know very well that it is a great advantage to be related to 'the County.' Poor papa has no connections worth speaking of, and mamma's friends are either shopkeepers or farmers; but your mother was the Brands' cousin, and see how the Adairs took you up! They would never have made a fuss over me."

"What nonsense you talk, Nora!" said Janetta, in a disgusted tone.

"Nonsense or not, it is true," said Nora, doggedly; "and as long as people look down upon us, I don't want any of your fine friends and relations in Gwynne Street."

Janetta did not condescend to argue the point; she contented herself with telling her sister of Wyvis Brand's desire that the story of his wife's separation from him should not be known, and the two girls agreed that it would be better to mention their evening's adventure only to their father.

It was quite dark when they reached home, and they entered the house in much trepidation, fearing a volley of angry words from Mrs. Colwyn. But to their surprise and relief Mrs. Colwyn was not at home. The children explained that an invitation to supper had come to her from a neighbor, and that "after a great deal of fuss," as one of them expressed it, she had accepted it and gone, leaving word that she should not be back until eleven o'clock, and that the children were to go to bed at their usual hour. It was past the younger children's hour already, and they of course were jubilant.

The elder sisters set to work instantly to get the young ones into their beds, but this was a matter of some difficulty. A general inclination to uproariousness prevailed in Mrs. Colwyn's absence, and it must be confessed that neither Janetta nor Nora tried very hard to repress the little ones' noise. It was a comfort to be able, for once, to enjoy themselves without fear of Mrs. Colwyn's perpetual snarl and grumble. A most exciting pillow-fight was going on in the upstairs regions, and here Janetta was holding her own as boldly as the boldest, when the sound of an opening door made the combatants pause in their mad career.

"What's that? The front door? It's mamma!" cried Georgie, with conviction.

"Get into bed, Tiny!" shouted Joey. Tiny began to cry.

"Nonsense, children," said Nora, with an air of authority. "You know that it can't be mamma. It is papa, of course, coming in for his supper. And one of us must go down."

"I'll go," said Janetta, hurriedly. "I want a little talk with him, you know."

There was a general chorus of "Oh, don't go, Janetta!" "Do stay!" "It will be no fun when you are gone!" which stimulated Nora to a retort.

"Well, I must say you are all very polite," she said. "One would think that I was not here at all!"

"You are not half such good fun as Janetta," said Joey. "You don't throw yourself into everything as she does."

"I must throw myself into giving father his supper, I'm afraid," said Janetta, laughing, "so good-night, children, and do go to bed quietly now, for I don't think father will like such a dreadful noise."

She was nearly choked by the fervent embraces they all bestowed upon her before she went downstairs. Nora, who stood by, rolling up the ribbon that she had taken from Tiny's hair, felt a little pang of jealousy. Why was it that everyone loved Janetta and valued her so much? Not for what she did, because her share of household duty was not greater than that of Nora, but for the way in which she did it. It always seemed such a pleasure to her to do anything for any one—to serve another: never a toil, never a hardship, always a deep and lasting pleasure. To Nora it was often a troublesome matter to help her sister or her schoolboy brother, to attend on her mother, or to be thoughtful of her father's requirements; but it was never troublesome to Janetta. And as Nora thought of all this, the tears came involuntarily to her eyes. It seemed so easy to Janetta to be good, she thought! But perhaps it was no easier to Janetta than to other people.

Janetta ran down to the dining-room, where she found her father surveying with a rather dissatisfied air the cold and scanty repast which was spread out for him. Mr. Colwyn was so much out that his meals had to be irregular, and he ate them just when he had a spare half hour. On this occasion he had been out since two o'clock in the afternoon, and had not had time even for a cup of tea. He had been attending a hopeless case, moreover, and one about which he had been anxious for some weeks. Fagged, chilled, and dispirited, it was no wonder that he had returned home in not the best of tempers, and that he was a little disposed to find fault when Janetta made her appearance.

"Where is mamma?" he began. "Out, I suppose, or the children would not be making such a racket overhead."

"They are going to be quiet now, dear father," said his daughter, kissing him, "and mamma has gone out to supper at Mrs. Maitland's. I am going to have mine with you if you will let me."

"And is this what you are going to have for your supper?" said Mr. Colwyn, half ruefully, half jestingly, as he glanced again at the table, where some crusts of bread reposed peacefully on one dish, and a scrag of cold mutton on another. "After your sojourn at Miss Polehampton's and among the Adairs, I suppose you don't know how to cook, Jenny?"

"Indeed I do, father, and I'm going to scramble some eggs, and make some coffee this very minute. I am sorry the table is not better arranged, but I have been out, and was just having a little game with the children before they went to bed. If you will sit down by the fire, I shall be ready in a very few minutes, and then I can tell you about a wonderful adventure that Nora and I had this evening in the Beaminster wood."

"You should not roam about those woods so much by yourselves; they are too lonely," said Mr. Colwyn; but he said it very mildly, and dropped with an air of weariness into the arm-chair that Janetta had wheeled forward for him. "Well, well! don't hurry yourself, child. I shall be glad of a few minutes' rest before I begin my supper."

Janetta in a big white apron, Janetta flitting backwards and forwards between kitchen and dining-room, with flushed cheeks and brightly shining eyes, was a pretty sight—"a sight to make an old man young," thought Mr. Colwyn, as he watched her furtively from beneath his half-closed eyelids. She looked so trim, so neat, so happy in her work, that he would be hard to satisfy who did not admire her, even though she was not what the world calls strictly beautiful. She succeeded so well in her cooking operations, with which she would not allow the servant to intermeddle, that in a very short time a couple of dainty dishes and some coffee smoked upon the board; and Janetta bidding her father come to the table, placed herself near him, and smilingly dispensed the savory concoction.

She would not enter upon any account of her evening's work until she felt sure that the wants of her father's inner man were satisfied; but when supper was over, and his evening pipe—the one luxury in the day he allowed himself—alight, she drew up a hassock beside his chair and prepared for what she called "a good long chat."

Opportunities for such a chat with her father were rather rare in that household, and Janetta meant to make the most of this one. Nora had good-naturedly volunteered to stay away from the dining-room, so as to give Janetta the chance that she wished for; and as it was now barely ten o'clock, Janetta knew that she might perhaps have an hour of her father's companionship—if, at least, he were not sent for before eleven o'clock. At eleven he would probably go to Mrs. Maitland's to fetch his wife home.

"Well, Janet, and what have you to tell me?" he said kindly, as he stretched out his slippered feet to the blaze, and took down his pipe from the mantel-piece. The lines had cleared away from his face as if by magic; there was a look of rest and peace upon his face that his daughter liked to see. She laid her hand on his knee and kept it there while she told him of her experiences that evening at Brand Hall.

Mr. Colwyn's eyebrows went up as he listened. His face expressed astonishment, and something very like perplexity. But he heard the whole story out before he said a word.

"Well, you have put your head into the lion's den!" he said at last, in a half-humorous tone.

"What I want to know is," said Janetta, "why it is thought to be a lion's den! I don't mean that I have heard the expression before, but I have gathered in different ways an impression that people avoid the house——"

"The family, not the house, Janet!"

"Of course I mean the family, father, dear. What have they done that they should be shunned?"

"There is a good deal against them in the eyes of the world. Your poor mother, Janetta, always stood up for them, and said that they were more sinned against than sinning."

"They? But these young men were not grown up then?"

"No; it was their father and——"

Mr. Colwyn stopped short and seemed as if he did not like to go on.

"Tell me, father," said Janetta, coaxingly.

"Well, child, I don't know that you ought to hear old scandals. But you are too wise to let them harm you. Brand, the father of these two young fellows, married a barmaid, the daughter of a low publican in the neighborhood."

"What! The Mrs. Brand that I saw to-day? She a barmaid—that quiet, pale, subdued-looking woman?"

"She has had trouble enough to make her look subdued, poor soul! She was a handsome girl then; and I daresay the world would have overlooked the marriage in time if her character had been untarnished. But stories which I need not repeat were afloat; and from what I have lately heard they are not yet forgotten."

"After all these years! Oh, that does seem hard," said Janetta, sympathetically.

"Well—there are some things that the world does not forgive, Janet. I have no doubt that the poor woman is much more worthy of respect and kindness than her wild sons; and yet the fact remains that if Wyvis Brand had come here with his brother alone, he would have been received everywhere, and entertained and visited and honored like any other young man of property and tolerable repute; but as he has brought his mother with him, I am very much afraid that many of the nicest people in the county mean to 'cut' him."

"It is very unfair, surely."

"Yes, it is unfair; but it is the way of the world, Janetta. If a woman's reputation is ever so slightly blackened, she can never get it fair and white again. Hence, my dear, I am a little doubtful as to whether you must go to Brand Hall again, as long as poor Mrs. Brand is there."

"Oh, father, and I promised to go!"

"You must not make rash promises another time, my child."

"But she wants me, father—she is so lonely and so sad?"

"I am sorry, my Janet, but I don't know——"

"Oh, do let me, father. I shall not be harmed; and I don't mind what the world says."

"But perhaps I mind," said Mr. Colwyn, quaintly.

Janetta looked so rueful at this remark that her father laughed a little and pulled her ear.

"I am not given to taking much notice of what the world says," he told her, "and if I thought it right for you to go to Brand Hall I should take no notice of town talk; but I think that I can't decide this matter without seeing Mrs. Brand for myself."

"I thought you had seen her, father?"

"For ten minutes or so, only. They wanted to ask me a question about the healthiness of Brand Hall, drains, and all that kind of thing. That young Brand struck me as a very sullen-looking fellow."

"His face lightens up when he talks," said Janetta, coloring and feeling hurt for a moment, she could not have told why.

"He did not talk to me," said her father, drily. "I am told that the other son has pleasanter manners."

"Cuthbert? Oh, yes," Janetta said, quickly. "He is much more amiable at first sight; he made himself very agreeable to Nora and me." And forthwith she related how the second son had made acquaintance with her sister and herself.

Mr. Colwyn did not look altogether pleased.

"H'm!—they seem very ready to cultivate us," he said, with a slight contraction of the brow. "Their father used not to know that I existed. Janet, I don't care for Nora to see much of them. You I can trust; but she is a bit of a featherbrain, and one never knows what may happen. Look to it."

"I will, father."

"And I will call on Mrs. Brand and have a chat with her. Poor soul! I daresay she has suffered. Still that does not make her a fit companion for my girls."

"If I could be of any use to her, father——"

"I know that's all you think of, Janet. You are a good child—always wanting to help others. But we must not let the spirit of self-sacrifice run away with you, you know."

He pinched her cheek softly as he spoke, and his daughter carried the long supple fingers of his hand to her lips and kissed them tenderly.

"Which reminds me," he went on rather inconsequently, "that I saw another of your friends to-day. A friend whom you have not mentioned for some time, Janetta."

"Who was that?" asked Janetta, a little puzzled by his tone.

"Another friend whom I don't quite approve of," said her father, in the same half-quizzical way, "though from a different reason. If poor Mrs. Brand is not respectable enough, this friend of yours, Janet, is more than respectable; ultra-respectable—aristocratic even——"

"Margaret Adair!" cried Janetta, flushing to the very roots of her hair. "Did you see her, father? Has she quite forgotten me?" And the tears stood in her eyes.

"I did not see Miss Margaret Adair, my dear," said her father kindly. "I saw her mother, Lady Caroline."

"Did you speak to her, father?"

"She stopped her ponies and spoke to me in the High Street, Janet. She certainly has very winning manners."

"Oh, has she not, father!" Janetta's cheeks glowed. "She is perfectly charming, I think. I do not believe that she could do anything disagreeable or unkind."

Mr. Colwyn shook his head, with a little smile. "I am not so sure of that, Janetta. These fine ladies sometimes do very cold and cruel things with a perfectly gracious manner."

"But Lady Caroline would not," said Janetta, coaxingly. "She was quite kind and sweet to me all the time that I stayed at her house, although——"

"Although afterwards," said Mr. Colwyn, shrewdly, "she could let you stay here for weeks without seeming to remember you, or coming near you for an hour!"

Janetta's cheeks crimsoned, but she did not reply. Loyal as she was to her friend, she felt that there was not much to be said for her at that moment.

"You are a good friend," said her father, in a half-teasing, half-affectionate tone. "You don't like me to say anything bad of her, do you? Well, my dear, for your comfort I must tell you that she did her best to-day to make up for past omissions. She spoke very pleasantly about you."

"Did she say why—why——" Janetta could not complete the sentence.

"Why they had not written or called? Well, she gave some sort of an explanation. Miss Adair had been unwell—she had had a cold or something which looked as if it might turn to fever, and they did not like to write until she was better."

"I knew there was some good reason!" said Janetta fervently.

"It is well to take a charitable view of things," returned her father, rather drily; but, seeing her look of protest, he changed his tone. "Well, Lady Caroline spoke very kindly, my dear, I must acknowledge that. She wants you to go over to Helmsley Court to-morrow."

"Can I go, father?"

Mr. Colwyn made a grimace. "Between your disreputable friends and your aristocratic ones, I'm in a difficulty, Janet."

"Don't say so, father dear!"

"Well, I consented," said Mr. Colwyn, in rather a grudging tone. "She said that she would send her carriage for you to-morrow at noon, and that she would send you back again between six and seven. Her daughter was most anxious to see you, she said."

Janetta lifted up a happy face. "I knew that Margaret would be true to me. I never doubted her."

Mr. Colwyn watched her silently for a moment, then he put his hand upon her head, and began smoothing the thick black locks. "You have a very faithful nature, my Janet," he said, tenderly, "and I am afraid that it will suffer a great many shocks in this work-a-day world of ours. Don't let it lead you astray, my child. Remember there is a point at which faithfulness may degenerate into sheer obstinacy."

"I don't think it will ever do so with me."

"Well, perhaps not, for you have a clear head on those young shoulders of yours. But you must be careful."

"And I may go to Lady Caroline's, father?"

"Yes, my dear, you may. And now I must go: my time is up. I have had a very pleasant hour, my Janet."

As she raised herself to receive her father's kiss, she felt a glow of pleasure at his words. It was not often that he spoke so warmly. He was a man of little speech on ordinary occasions: only when he was alone with his best-loved daughter, Janetta, did he ever break forth into expressions of affection. His second marriage had been in some respects a failure; and it did not seem as if he regarded his younger children with anything approaching the tenderness which he bestowed upon Janetta. Good-humored tolerance was all that he gave to them: a deep and almost passionate love had descended from her mother to Janetta.

He went out to fetch his wife home from her supper-party; and Janetta hastened up to her room, not being anxious to meet her stepmother on her return, in the state of rampant vanity and over-excitement to which an assembly of her friends usually brought her. It could not be said that Mrs. Colwyn actually drank too much wine or beer or whisky; and yet there was often a sensation abroad that she had taken just a little more than she could bear; and her stepdaughter was sensitively aware of the fact. From Nora's slighting tone when she had lately spoken of her mother, Janetta conjectured that the sad truth of Mrs. Colwyn's danger had dawned upon the girl's mind also, and it certainly accounted for some new lines in Mr. Colwyn's face, and for some additional streaks of white in his silvering hair. Not a word had been said on the subject amongst the members of the family, but Janetta had an uneasy feeling that there were possibly rocks ahead.

At this moment, however, the prospect of seeing her dear Margaret again completely obliterated any thought of her stepmother from Janetta's mind; and when she was snugly ensconced in her own little, white bed, she could not help shedding a few tears of relief and joy. For Margaret's apparent fickleness had weighed heavily on Janetta's mind; and she now felt proud of the friend in whom she had believed in spite of appearances, and of whose faithfulness she had steadily refused to hear a doubt. These feelings enabled her to bear with cheerfulness some small unpleasantnesses next morning from her stepmother on the subject of her visit. "Of course you'll be too grand to do a hand's turn about the house when you come back again from Helmsley Court!" said Mrs. Colwyn, snappishly.

"Dear mamma, when I am only going for half a day!"

"Oh, I know the ways of girls. Because Miss Adair, your fine friend, does nothing but sit in a drawing-room all day, you'll be sure to think that you must needs follow her example!"

"I hope Margaret will do something beside sit in a drawing-room," said Janetta, with her cheery laugh; "because I am afraid that she might find that a little dull."

But in spite of her cheeriness her spirits were perceptibly lowered when she set foot in the victoria that was sent for her at noon. Her stepmother's way of begrudging her the friendship which school-life had bestowed upon Janetta was as distasteful to her as Miss Polehampton's conviction of its unsuitability had been. And for one moment the tears of vexation gathered in her brown eyes as she was driving away from the shabby little house in Gwynne Street; and she had resolutely to drive away unwelcome thoughts before she could resign herself to enjoyment of her visit.

The day was hot and close, and the narrow streets of old Beaminster were peculiarly oppressive. It was delightful to bowl swiftly along the smooth high road, and to enter the cool green shades of the park round Helmsley Court. "How pleasant for Margaret to live here always!" Janetta said to herself with generous satisfaction in her friend's good fortune. "I wonder what she would do in Gwynne Street!" And then Janetta laughed, and felt that what suited her would be very inappropriate to Margaret Adair.

Janetta's unselfish admiration for her friend was as simple as it was true, and it was never alloyed by envy or toadyism. She would have been just as pleased to see Margaret in a garret as in a palace, supposing that Margaret were pleased with the garret. And it was with almost passionate delight that she at length flung herself into her friend's arms, and felt Margaret's soft lips pressed to her brown flushed cheeks.

"Margaret! Oh, it is delightful to see you again!" she exclaimed.

"You poor darling: did you think that we were never going to meet?" said Margaret. "I have been so sorry, dear——"

"I knew that you would come to see me, or send for me as soon as you could," said Janetta quickly. "I trusted you, Margaret."

"I have had such a bad cold," Margaret went on, still excusing herself a little, as it seemed to Janetta. "I have had to stay in two rooms for nearly a fortnight, and I went down to the drawing-room only last night."

"I wish I could have nursed you! Don't you remember how I nursed you through one of your bad colds at school?"

"Yes, indeed. I wish you could have nursed me now; but mamma was afraid that I had caught measles or scarlet fever or something, and she said it would not be right to send for you."

Janetta was almost pained by the accent of continued excuse.

"Of course, dear, I understand," she said, pressing her friend's arm caressingly. "I am so sorry you have been ill. You look quite pale, Margaret."

The two girls were standing in Margaret's sitting-room, adjoining her bedroom. Margaret was dressed completely in white, with long white ribbons floating amongst the dainty folds of her attire; but the white dress, exquisitely as it was fashioned, was less becoming to her than usual, for her face had lost a little of its shell-like bloom. She turned at Janetta's words and surveyed herself a little anxiously in a long glass at her side.

"I do look pale in this dress," she said. "Shall I change it, Janetta?"

"Oh, no, dear," Janetta answered, in some surprise. "It is a charming dress."

"But I do not like to look so pale," said Margaret, gravely. "I think I will ring for Villars."

"You could not look nicer—to me—in any dress!" exclaimed her ardent admirer.

"You dear—oh, yes; but there may be visitors at luncheon."

"I thought you would be alone," faltered Janetta, with a momentary glance at her own neat and clean, but plain, little cotton frock.

"Well, perhaps there will be only one person beside yourself," said Margaret, turning aside her long neck to catch a glimpse of the shining coils behind. "And I don't know that it matters—it is only Sir Philip Ashley."

"Oh, I remember him. He was here when we came back from Brighton."

"He is often here."

"What lovely flowers!" Janetta exclaimed, rather to break a pause that followed than because she had looked particularly at a bouquet that filled a large white vase on a table. But the flowers really were lovely, and Margaret's face expressed some satisfaction. "Did they come out of your garden?"

"No, Sir Philip sent them."

"Oh, how nice!" said Janetta. But she was a little surprised too. Had not the Adairs plenty of flowers without receiving contributions from Sir Philip's conservatories?

"And you have a dog, Margaret?"—as a pretty little white Esquimaux dog came trotting into the room. "What a darling! with a silver collar, too!"

"Yes, I like a white dog," said Margaret, tranquilly. "Mamma's poodle snaps at strangers, so Sir Philip thought that it would be better for me to have a dog of my own."

Sir Philip again! Janetta felt as if she must ask another question or two, especially when she saw that her friend's white eyelids had been lowered, and that a delicate flush was mantling the whiteness of her cheek; but she paused, scarcely knowing how to begin; and in the pause, the gong for luncheon sounded, and she was (somewhat hastily, she fancied) led downstairs.

Lady Caroline and Mr. Adair received their visitor with great civility. Sir Philip came forward to give her a very kindly greeting. Their behavior was so cordial that Janetta could hardly believe that she had doubted their liking for her. She was not experienced enough as yet to see that all this apparent friendliness did not mean anything but the world's way of making things pleasant all round. She accepted her host's attentions with simple pleasure, and responded to his airy talk so brightly that he lost no time in assuring his wife after luncheon that his daughter's friend was really "a very nice little girl."

After luncheon, Janetta thought at first that she was again going to be defrauded of a talk with her friend. Margaret was taken possession of by Sir Philip, and walked away with him into a conservatory to gather a flower; Mr. Adair disappeared, and Janetta was left for a few moments' conversation with Lady Caroline. Needless to remark, Lady Caroline had planned this little interview; she had one or two things that she wanted to say to Miss Colwyn. And she really did feel kindly towards the girl, because—after all—she was Margaret's friend, and the mother was ready to allow Margaret her own way to a very great extent.

"Dear Miss Colwyn," she began, "I have been so sorry that we could not see more of you while our poor Margaret was ill. Now I hope things will be different."

Janetta remarked that Lady Caroline was very kind.

"I have been thinking of a method by which I hoped to bring you together a little more—after the holidays. Of course we are going away very soon now—to Scotland; and we shall probably not return until October; but when that time comes—my dear Miss Colwyn, I am sure you will not be offended by the question I am going to ask?"

"Oh, no," said Janetta, hastily.

"Are you intending to give any singing or music lessons in the neighborhood?"

"If I can get any pupils, I shall be only too glad to do so."

"Then will you begin with dear Margaret?"

"Margaret?" said Janetta, in some astonishment. "But Margaret has had the same teaching that I have had, exactly!"

"She needs somebody to help her. She has not your talent or your perseverance. And she would so much enjoy singing with you. I trust that you will not refuse us, Miss Colwyn."

"I shall be very glad to do anything that I can for Margaret," said Janetta, flushing.

"Thank you so much. Once a week then—when we come back again. And about terms——"

"Oh, Lady Caroline, I shall be only too glad to sing with Margaret at any time without——"

"Without any talk about terms?" said Lady Caroline, with a charming smile of comprehension. "But that, my dear, I could not possibly allow. No, we must conduct the matter on strictly business-like principles, or Mr. Adair would be very much displeased with me. Suppose we say——" And she went on to suggest terms which Janetta was too much confused to consider very attentively, and agreed to at once. It was only afterwards that she discovered that they were lower than any which she should ever have thought of suggesting for herself, and that she should have to blush for Lady Caroline's meanness in mentioning them to her father! But at present she saw nothing amiss.

Lady Caroline went on smoothly. "I want her to make the most of her time, because she may not be able to study up by-and-bye. She will come out this winter, and I shall take her to town in the spring. I do not suppose that I shall ever have another opportunity—if, at least, she marries as early as she seems likely to do."

"Margaret! Marry!" ejaculated Janetta. She had scarcely thought of such a possibility.

"It is exceedingly probable," said Lady Caroline, rather coldly, "that she will marry Sir Philip Ashley. It is a perfectly suitable alliance."

It sounded as if she spoke of a royal marriage!

"But please," Lady Caroline proceeded, "do not mention what I have said to anyone, least of all to Margaret. She is so sensitive that I should not like her to know what I have said."

"I will not say anything," said Janetta.

And then Lady Caroline's desire for conversation seemed to cease. She proposed that they should go in search of her daughter, and Janetta followed her to the conservatory in some trouble and perplexity of mind. It struck her that Margaret was not looking very well pleased when they arrived—perhaps, she thought, because of their appearance—and that Sir Philip had a very lover-like air. He was bending forward a little to take a white flower from Margaret's hand, and Janetta could not help a momentary smile when she saw the expression of his face. The earnest dark eyes were full of tenderness, which possibly he did not wish to conceal. Janetta could never doubt but that he loved her "rare pale Margaret" from the very bottom of his heart.

The two moved apart as Lady Caroline and Janetta came in. Lady Caroline advanced to Sir Philip and walked away with him, while Margaret laid her hand on Janetta's arm and led her off to her own sitting-room. She scarcely spoke until they were safely ensconced there together and then, with a half-pouting, mutinous expression on her softly flushed face—

"Janetta," she began, "there is something I must tell you."

"Yes, dear?"

"You saw Sir Philip in the conservatory?"

"Yes."

"I can't think why he is so foolish," said Margaret; "but actually, Janetta—he wants to marry me."

"Am I to call him foolish for that?"

"Yes, certainly. I am too young. I want to see a little more of the world. He is not at all the sort of man that I want to marry."

"Why not?" said Janetta, after waiting a little while.

"Oh," said Margaret, with an intonation that—for her—was almost petulant; "he is so absurdly suitable!"

"Absurdly suitable, dear Margaret?"

"Yes. Everything is so neatly arranged for us. He is the right age, he has the right income, the right views, the right character—he is even"—said Margaret, with increasing indignation—"even the right height! It is absurd. I am not to have any will of my own in the matter, because it is all so beautifully suitable. I am to be disposed of like a slave!"

Here was indeed a new note of rebellion.

"Your father and mother would never make you marry a man whom you did not like," said Janetta, a little doubtfully.

"I don't know. Papa would not; but mamma!—--I am afraid mamma will try. And it is very hard to do what mamma does not like."

"But you could explain to her——"

"I have nothing to explain," said Margaret, arching her delicate brows. "I like Sir Philip very well. I respect him very much. I think his house and his position would suit me exceedingly well; and yet I do not want to marry him. It is so unreasonable of me, mamma says. And I feel that it is; and yet—what can I do?"

"There is—nobody—else?" hazarded Janetta.

Margaret opened her lovely eyes to their fullest extent.

"Dearest Janetta, who else could there be? Who else have I seen? I have been kept in the schoolroom until now—when I am to be married to this most suitable man! Now, confess, Janetta, would you like it? Do your people want to marry you to anybody?"

"No, indeed," said Janetta, smiling. "Nobody has expressed any desire that way. But really I don't know what to say, Margaret; because Sir Philip does seem so perfectly suitable—and you say you like him?"

"Yes, but I only like him; I don't love him." Margaret leaned back in her chair, crossed her hands behind her golden head, and looked dreamily at the opposite wall. "You know I think one ought to love the man one marries—don't you think so? I have always thought of loving once and once only—like Paul and Virginia, you know, or even Romeo and Juliet—and of giving all for love! That would be beautiful!"

"Yes, it would. But it would be very hard too," said Janetta, thinking how lovely Margaret looked, and what a heroine of romance—what a princess of dreams—she would surely be some day. And she, poor, plain, brown, little Janetta! There was probably no romance in store for her at all.

But Life holds many secrets in her hand; and perhaps it was Janetta and not Margaret for whom a romance was yet in store.

"Hard? Do you call it hard?" Margaret asked, with a curiously exalted expression, like that of a saint absorbed in mystic joys. "It would be most easy, Janetta, to give up everything for love."

"I don't know," said Janetta—for once unsympathetic. "Giving up everything means a great deal. Would you like to go away from Helmsley Court, for instance, and live in a dingy street with no lady's maid—only a servant of all-work—on three hundred a year?"

"I think I could do anything for a man whom I loved," sighed Margaret; "but I cannot feel as if I should ever care enough for Sir Philip Ashley to do it for him."

"What sort of a man would you prefer for a husband, then?" asked Janetta.

"Oh, a man with a history. A man about whom there hung a melancholy interest—a man like Rochester in 'Jane Eyre'——"

"Not a very good-tempered person, I'm afraid!"

"Oh, who cares about good temper?"

"I do, for one. Really, Margaret, you draw a picture which is just like my cousin, Wyvis Brand."

Janetta was sorry when she had said the words. Margaret's arms came down from behind her head, and her eyes were turned to her friend's face with an immediate awakening of interest.

"Mr. Brand, of Brand Hall, you mean? I remember you told me that he was your cousin. So you have met him? And he is like Rochester?"

"I did not say that exactly," said Janetta, becoming provoked with herself. "I only said that you spoke of a rather melancholy sort of man, with a bad temper, and I thought that the description applied very well to Mr. Brand."

"What is he like? Dark?"

"Yes."

"Handsome?"

"I suppose so. I do not like any face, however handsome, that is disfigured by a scowl."

"Oh, Janetta, how charming! Tell me some more about him; I am so much interested."

"Margaret, don't be silly! Wyvis Brand is a very disagreeable man—not a good man either, I believe—and I hope you will never know him."

"On the contrary," said Margaret, with a new wilful light in her eyes, "I intend mamma to call."

"Lady Caroline will be too wise."

"Why should people not call upon the Brands? I hear the same story everywhere—'Oh, no, we do not intend to call.' Is there really anything wrong about them?"

Janetta felt some embarrassment. Had not she put nearly the same question to her own father the night before? But she could not tell Margaret Adair what her father had said to her.

"If there were—and I do not know that there is—you could hardly expect me to talk about it, Margaret," she said, with some dignity.

Margaret's good breeding came to her aid at once. "I beg your pardon, dear Janetta. I was talking carelessly. I will say no more about the Brands. But I must remark that it was you who piqued my curiosity. Otherwise there is nothing extraordinary in the fact of two young men settling down with their mother in a country house, is there?"

"Nothing at all."

"And I am not likely to see anything of them. But, Janetta," said Margaret, reverting to her own affairs, "you do not sympathize with me as I thought you would. Would not you think it wrong to marry where you did not love? Seriously, Janetta?"

"Yes, seriously, I should," said Janetta, her face growing graver, and her eyes lighting up. "It is a profanation of marriage to take for your husband a man whom you don't love with your whole heart. Oh, yes, Margaret, you are quite, quite right in that—but I am sorry too, because Sir Philip seems so nice."

"And, Janetta, dear, you will help me, will you not?"

"Whenever I can, Margaret? But what can I do for you?"

"You can help me in many ways, Janetta. You don't know how hard it is sometimes"—and Margaret's face resumed a wistful, troubled look. "Mamma is so kind; but she wants me sometimes to do things that I do not like, and she is so surprised when I do not wish to do them."

"You will make her understand in time," said Janetta, almost reverentially. Her ardent soul was thrilled with the conception of the true state of things as she imagined it; of Margaret's pure, sweet nature being dragged down to Lady Caroline's level of artificial worldliness. For, notwithstanding all Lady Caroline's gentleness of manner, Janetta was beginning to find her out. She began to see that this extreme softness and suavity covered a very persistent will, and that it was Lady Caroline who ruled the house and the family with an iron hand in a velvet glove.

"I am afraid not," said Margaret, submissively. "She is so much more determined than I am. Neither papa nor I could ever do anything against her. And in most things I like her to manage for me. But not my marriage!"

"No, indeed."

"Will you stand by me, Janetta, dear?"

"Always, Margaret."

"You will always be my friend?"

"Always dear."

"You make me feel strong when you say 'always' so earnestly, Janetta."

"Because I believe," said Janetta, quickly, "that friendship is as strong a tie as any in the world. I don't think it ought to be any less binding than the tie between sisters, between parents and child, even"—and her voice dropped a little—"even between husband and wife. I have heard it suggested that there should be a ceremony—a sort of form—for the making of a friendship as there is for other relations in life; a vow of truth and fidelity which two friends could promise to observe. Don't you think that it would be rather a useless thing, even if the thought is a pretty one? Because we make and keep or break our vows in our own heart, and no promise would bind us more than our own hearts can do."

"I hope yours binds you to me, Janetta?" said Margaret, half playfully, half sadly.

"It does, indeed."

And then the two girls kissed each other after the manner of impulsive and affectionate girls, and Margaret wiped away a tear that had gathered in the corner of her eye. Her face soon became as tranquil as ever; but Janetta's brow remained grave, her lips firmly pressed together long after Margaret seemed to have forgotten what had been said.

Things went deeper with Janetta than with Margaret. Girlish and unpractical as some of their speeches may appear, they were spoken or listened to by Janetta with the utmost seriousness. She was not of a nature to take things lightly. And during the pause that followed the conversation about friendship, she was mentally registering a very serious and earnest resolution, worthy indeed of being ranked as the promise or the vow of which she spoke, that she would always remain Margaret's true and faithful friend, in spite of all the chances and changes of this transitory world. A youthful foolish thing to do, perhaps; but the world is so constituted that the things done or said by very young and even very foolish persons sometimes dominate the whole lives of much older and wiser persons. And more came out of that silent vow of Janetta's than even she anticipated.

The rest of the day was very delightful to her. She and Margaret were left almost entirely to themselves, and they formed a dozen plans for the winter when Margaret should be back again and could resume her musical studies. Janetta tried to express her natural reluctance at the thought of giving lessons to her old school-companion, but Margaret laughed her to scorn. "As if you could not teach me?" she said. "Why, I know nothing about the theory of music—nothing at all. And you were far ahead of anybody at Miss Polehampton's! You will soon have dozens of pupils, Janetta. I expect all Beaminster to be flocking to you before long."

She did not say, but it crossed her mind that the fact of her taking lessons from Janetta would probably serve as a very good advertisement. For Miss Adair was herself fairly proficient in the worldly wisdom which did not at all gratify her when exhibited by her mother.

Janetta was sent home in the gathering twilight with a delightfully satisfied feeling. She was sure that Margaret's friendship was as faithful as her own. And why should there not be two women as faithful to each other in friendship as ever Damon and Pythias, David and Jonathan, had been of old? "Margaret will always be her own sweet, high-souled self," Janetta mused. "It is I who may perhaps fall away from my ideal—I hope not; oh, I hope not! I hope that I shall always be faithful and true!"

There was a very tender look upon her face as she sat in Lady Caroline's victoria, her hands clasped together upon her lap, her mouth firmly closed, her eyes wistful. The expression was so lovely that it beautified the whole of her face, which was not in itself strictly handsome, but capable of as many changes as an April day. She was so deeply absorbed in thought that she did not see a gentleman lift his hat to her in passing. It was Cuthbert Brand, and when the carriage had passed him he stood still for a moment and looked back at it.

"I should like to paint that girl's face," he said to himself. "There is soul in it—character—passion. Her sister is prettier by far; but I doubt whether she is capable of so much."

But the exalted beauty had faded away by the time Janetta reached her home, and when she entered the house she was again the bright, sensible, energetic, and affectionate sister and daughter that they all knew and loved: no great beauty, no genius, no saint, but a generous-hearted English girl, who tried to do her duty and to love her neighbor as herself.

Her father met her in the hall.

"Here you are," he said. "I hardly expected you home as yet. Everybody is out, so you must tell me your experiences and adventures if you have any to tell."

"I have not many," said Janetta, brightly. "Only everybody has been very, very kind."

"I'm glad to hear of it; but I should be surprised if people were not kind to my Janet."

"Nobody is half so kind as you are," said Janetta, fondly. "Have you been very busy to-day, father?"

"Very, dear. And I have been to Brand Hall."

He drew her inside his consulting-room as he spoke. It was a little room near the hall-door, opposite the dining-room. Janetta did not often go there, and felt as if some rather serious communication were to be made.

"Did you see the little boy, father?"

"Yes—and his grandmother."

"And may I go to see Mrs. Brand?"

Mr. Colwyn paused for a moment, and when he spoke his voice was broken by some emotion. "If you can do anything to help and comfort that poor woman, my Janet," he said at length, "God forbid that I should ever hinder you! I will not heed what the world says in face of sorrow such as she has known. Do what you can for her."

"I will, father; I promise you I will."

"It is the second promise that I have made to-day," said Janetta, rather thoughtfully, as she was undressing herself that night; "and each of them turns on the same subject—on being a friend to some one who needs friendship. The vocation of some women is to be a loving daughter, a true wife, or a good mother; mine, perhaps, is to be above everything else a true friend. I don't think my promises will be hard to keep!"

But even Janetta, in her wisdom, could not foresee what was yet to come.

It was with a beating heart that Janetta, a few days later, crossed once more the threshold of her cousin's house. Her father's words about Mrs. Brand had impressed her rather painfully, and she felt some shyness and constraint at the thought of the reason which he had given her for coming. How she was to set about helping or comforting Mrs. Brand she had not the least idea.

These thoughts were, however, put to flight by an un-looked-for scene, which broke upon her sight as she entered the hall. This hall had to be crossed before any of the other rooms could be reached; it was low-ceiled, paneled in oak, and lighted by rather small windows, with stained glass in the lower panes. Like most rooms in the house it had a gloomy look, which was not relieved by the square of faded Turkey carpet in the centre of the black polished boards of the floor, or by the half-dozen dusky portraits in oak frames which garnished the walls. When Janetta was ushered in she found this ante-room or entrance chamber occupied by three persons and a child. These, as she speedily found, consisted of Wyvis Brand and his little boy, and two gentlemen, one of whom was laughing immoderately, while the other was leaning over the back of the chair and addressing little Julian.

Janetta halted for a moment, for the old servant who had admitted her seemed to think that his work was done when he had uttered her name, and had already retreated; and his voice being exceedingly feeble, the announcement had passed unnoticed by the majority of the persons present, if not by all. Wyvis Brand had perhaps seen her, for his eyes were keen, and the shadow in which she stood was not likely to veil her from his sight; but he gave no sign of being conscious of her presence. He was standing with his back to the mantel-piece, his arms crossed behind his head; there was a curious expression on his face, half-smile, half-sneer, but it was evident that he was merely looking and listening, not interfering with what was going on.

It needed only a glance to see that little Julian was in a state of extraordinary excitement. His face was crimson, his eyes were sparkling and yet full of tears; his legs were planted sturdily apart, and his hands were clenched. His head was drawn back, and his whole body also seemed as if it wanted to recoil, but placed as he was against a strong oaken table he could evidently go back no further. The gentleman on the chair was offering him something—Janetta could not at first see what—and the boy was vehemently resisting.

"I won't have it! I won't have it!" he was crying, with the whole force of his lungs. "I won't touch it! Take the nasty stuff away!"

Janetta wondered whether it were medicine he was refusing, and why his father did not insist upon obedience. But Wyvis Brand, still standing by the mantel-piece, only laughed aloud.

"No shirking! Drink it up!" said the strange gentleman, in what Janetta thought a curiously unpleasant voice. "Come, come, it will make a man of you——"

"I don't want to be made a man of! I won't touch it! I promised I never would! You can't make me!"

"You must be taught not to make rash promises," said the man, laughing. "Come now——"

But little Julian had suddenly caught sight of Janetta's figure at the door, and with a great bound he escaped from his tormentor and flung himself upon her, burying his face in her dress, and clutching its folds as if he would never let them go.

"It's the lady! the lady!" he gasped out. "Oh, please don't let them make me drink it! Indeed, I promised not."

Janetta came forward a little, and at her appearance every one looked more or less discomfited. The gentleman on the chair she recognized as a Mr. Strangways, a man of notoriously evil life, who had a house near Beaminster, and was generally shunned by respectable people in the neighborhood. He started up, and looked at her with what she felt to be a rather insolent gaze. Wyvis Brand stood erect, and looked sullen. The other gentleman, who was a stranger, rose from his chair in a civiller manner than his friend had done.

Janetta put her arms round the little fellow, and turned a rather bewildered face towards Mr. Brand. "Was it—was it—medicine?" she asked.

"Of a kind," said Wyvis, with a laugh.

"It was brandy—eau-de-vie—horrid hot stuff that maman used to drink," said little Julian, with a burst of angry sobs, "and I promised not—I promised old Susan that I never would!"

"It was only a joke," said the master of the house, coming forward now, and anxious perhaps to avert the storm threatened by a sudden indignant flash of Janetta's great dark eyes. "We were not in earnest of course." (A smothered laugh and ejaculation from Mr. Strangways passed without notice.) "The boy does not know how to take a joke—he's a milksop."

"I'm not! I'm not!" said little Julian, still struggling with violent sobs. "I'm not a milksop! Oh, say that I'm not! Do tell father that I'm not—not——"

"Certainly you are not. You are a very brave little boy, and know how to keep your word," said Janetta, with decision. "And now you must come with me to your grandmother; I came to see her this afternoon."

She gathered him into her strong, young arms as if she would have carried him from the room, but he struggled manfully to keep his feet, although he still held her dress. Without a word, Wyvis strode to the door and held it open for the pair. Janetta forgot to thank him, or to greet him in any way. She swept past him in a transport of silent fury, flashing upon him one look of indignation which Wyvis Brand did not easily forget. It even deafened him for a moment to the sneering comment of Mr. Strangways, which fell on Janetta's ears just as she was leaving the room.

"That's a regular granny's boy. Well for him if he always gets a pretty girl to help him out of a difficulty."

Wyvis, who had stood for a moment as if transfixed by Janetta's glance, hastily shut the door.

Janetta paused in the corridor outside. She was flushed and panting; she felt that she could not present herself to Mrs. Brand in that state. She held the boy close to her, and listened while he poured forth his story in sobbing indistinctness.

"Old Susan—she was their English servant—she had been always with maman—she had told him that brandy made people mad and wicked—and he did not want to be mad and wicked—and he had promised Susan never to drink brandy; and the naughty gentleman wanted him to take it, and he would not—would not—would not!—--"

"Hush, dear," said Janetta, gently. "There is no need to cry over it. You know you kept your word as a gentleman should."

The boy's eyes flashed through his tears. "Father thinks I'm a—I'm a milksop," he faltered.

"Show him that you are not," said Janetta. She saw that it was no use to talk to Julian as to a baby. "If you are always brave and manly he won't think so."

"I will be always brave," said the little fellow, choking back his sobs and regarding her with the clear, fearless gaze which she had noticed in him from the first. And at this moment a door opened, and Mrs. Brand, who had heard voices, came out in some surprise to see what was the matter.

Janetta was glad to see the loving way in which the boy ran into his grandmother's arms, and the tenderness with which she received him. Mrs. Brand courteously invited her guest into the drawing-room, but her attention was given far more to little Julian than to Janetta, and in two minutes he had poured the whole story into her ear. Mrs. Brand did not say much; she sat with him in her lap looking excessively pained and grieved; and that frozen look of pain upon her face made Janetta long—but long in vain—to comfort her. Tea was brought in by-and-bye, and then Julian was dismissed to his nursery—whither he went reluctantly, holding his face up to be kissed by Janetta, and asking her to "come back soon." And when he was gone, Mrs. Brand seemed unable to contain herself any longer, and broke forth passionately.

"A curse is on us all—I am sure of that. The boy will be ruined, and by his father too."

"Oh, no," Janetta said, earnestly. "His father would not really hurt him, I feel sure."

"You do not know my son. He is like his own father, my husband—and that is the way my husband began with Wyvis."

"But—he did not succeed?"

"Not altogether, because Wyvis had a strong head, and drew back in time; but his father did him harm—untold harm. His father was a bad man. I do not scruple to say so, although he was my husband; and there is a taint, a sort of wild strain, in the blood. Even the boy inherits it; I see that too clearly. And Wyvis—Wyvis will not hold himself in for long. He is falling amongst those racing and betting men again—the Strangways were always to be feared—and before long he will tread in his father's steps and break my heart, and bring down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave."

She burst into a passion of tears as she spoke. Janetta felt inexpressibly shocked and startled. This revelation of a dark side of life was new and appalling to her. She could hardly understand Mrs. Brand's dark anticipations.

She took the mother's hand and held it gently between her own, uttering some few soothing sentences as she did so. Presently the poor woman's sobs grew quieter, and she returned the pressure of Janetta's hand.

"Thank you, my dear," she said at last. "You have a very kind heart. But it is no use telling me to be comforted. I understand my sons, as I understood my husband before them. They cannot help it. What is in the blood will come out."

"Surely," said Janetta, in a very low tone, "there is always the might and the mercy of God to fall back upon—to help us when we cannot help ourselves."

"Ah, my dear, if I could believe in that I should be a happier woman," said Mrs. Brand, sorrowfully.

Janetta stayed a little longer, and when she went the elder woman allowed herself to be kissed affectionately, and asked in a wistful tone, as Julian had done, when she would come again.

The girl was glad to find that the hall was empty when she crossed it again. She had no fancy for encountering the insolent looks (as she phrased it to herself) of Wyvis Brand and his hateful friends. But she had reckoned without her host. For when she reached the gate into the high-road, she found Mr. Brand leaning against it with his elbows resting on the topmost bar, and his eyes gloomily fixed on the distant landscape. He started when he saw her, raised his hat and opened the gate with punctilious politeness. Janetta bowed her thanks, but without any smile; she was not at all in charity with her cousin, Wyvis Brand.

He allowed her to pass him, but before she had gone half a dozen yards, he strode after her and caught her up. "Will you let me have a few words with you?" he said, rather hoarsely.

"Certainly, Mr. Brand." Janetta turned and faced him, still with the disapproving gravity upon her brow.

"Can't we walk on for a few paces?" said Wyvis, with evident embarrassment. "I can say what I want to say better while we are walking. Besides, they can see us from the house if we stand here."

Privately Janetta thought that this would be no drawback, but she did not care to make objections, so turned once more and walked on silently.

"I want to speak to you," said the man, presently, with something of a shamefaced air, "about the little scene you came upon this afternoon——"

"Yes," said Janetta. She did not know how contemptuously her lips curled as she said the word.

"You came at an unfortunate moment," he went on, awkwardly enough. "I was about to interpose; I should not have allowed Jack Strangways to go too far. Of course you thought that I did not care."

"Yes," said Janetta, straightforwardly. Wyvis bit his lip.

"I am not quite so thoughtless of my son's welfare," he said, in a firmer tone. "There was enough in that glass to madden a child—almost to kill him. You don't suppose I would have let him take that?"

"I don't know. You were offering no objection to it when I came in."

"Do you doubt my word?" said Wyvis, fiercely.

"No. I believe you, if you mean really to say that you were not going to allow your little boy to drink what Mr. Strangways offered him."

"I do mean to say it"—in a tone of hot anger.

Janetta was silent.

"Have you nothing to say, Miss Colwyn?"

"I have no right to express any opinion, Mr. Brand."

"But I wish for it!"

"I do not see why you should wish for it," said Janetta, coldly, "especially when it may not be very agreeable to you to hear."

"Will you kindly tell me what you mean?" The words were civil, but the tone was imperious in the extreme.

"I mean that whether you were going to make Julian drink that poisonous stuff or not, you were inflicting a horrible torture upon him," said Janetta, as hotly as Wyvis himself could have spoken. "And I cannot understand how you could allow your own child to be treated in that cruel way. I call it wicked to make a child suffer."

Had she looked at her companion, she would have seen that his face had grown a little whiter than usual, and that he had the pinched look about his nostrils which—as his mother would have known—betokened rage. But she did not look; and, although he paused for a moment before replying, his voice was quite calm when he spoke again.

"Torture? Suffering? These are very strong words when applied to a little harmless teasing."

"I do not call it harmless teasing when you are trying to make a child break a promise that he holds sacred."

"A very foolish promise!"

"I am not so sure of that."

"Do you mean to insult me?" said Wyvis, flushing to the roots of his hair.

"Insult you? No; certainly not. I don't know why you should say so!"

"Then I need not explain," he answered drily, though still with that flush of annoyance on his face. "Perhaps if you think over what you have heard of that boy's antecedents, you will know what I mean."

It was Janetta's turn to flush now. She remembered the stories current respecting old Mr. Brand's drinking habits, and the rumors about Mrs. Wyvis Brand's reasons for living away from her husband. She saw that her words had struck home in a manner which she had not intended.

"I beg your pardon," she said involuntarily; "I never meant—I never thought—anything—I ought not to have spoken as I did."

"You had much better say what you mean," was the answer, spoken with bitter brevity.

"Well, then, I will." Janetta raised her eyes and looked at him bravely. "After all, I am a kinswoman of yours, Mr. Brand, and little Julian is my cousin too; so I have some sort of a right to speak. I never thought of his antecedents, as you call them, and I do not know much about them; but if they were—if they had been not altogether what you wish them to be—don't you see that this very promise which you tried to make him break was one of his best safeguards?"

"The promise made by a child is no safeguard," said Wyvis, doggedly.

"Not if he is forced to break it!" exclaimed Janetta, with a touch of fire.

They walked on in silence for a minute or two, and then Wyvis said,

"Do you believe in a promise made by a child of that age?"

"Little Julian has made me believe in it. He was so thoroughly in earnest. Oh, Mr. Brand, do you think that it was right to force him to do a thing against his conscience in that way?"

"You use hard words for a very simple thing, Miss Colwyn," said Wyvis, in a rather angry tone. "The boy was not forced—I had no intention of letting him drink the brandy."

"No," said Janetta, indignantly. "You only let him think that he was to be forced to do it—you only made him lose faith in you as his natural protector, and believe that you wished him to do what he thought wrong! And you say there was no cruelty in that?"

Wyvis Brand kept silence for some minutes. He was impressed in spite of himself by Janetta's fervor.

"I suppose," he said, at last, "that the fact is—I don't know what to do with a child. I never had any teaching or training when I was a child, and I don't know how to give it. I know I'm a sort of heathen and savage, and the boy must grow up like me—that is all."

"It is often said to be a heathen virtue to keep one's word," said Janetta, with a half smile.

"Therefore one that I can practice, you mean? Do you always keep your word when you give it?"

"I try to."

"I wish I could get you to give your word to do one thing."

"What is that?"

Wyvis spoke slowly. "You see how unfit I am to bring up a child—I acknowledge the unfitness—and yet to send him away from us would almost break my mother's heart—you see that."

"Yes."

"Will not you sometimes look in on us and give us a word of advice or—or—rebuke? You are a cousin, as you reminded me, and you have the right. Will you help us a little now and then?"

"You would not like it if I did."

"Was I so very savage? I have an awful temper, I know. But I am not quite so black as I'm painted, Miss Colwyn. I do want to do the best for that boy—if I knew how——"

"Witness this afternoon," said Janetta, with good-humored satire.

"Well, that shows that I don't know how. Seriously, I am sorry—I can't say more. Won't you stand our friend, Cousin Janetta?"

It was the first time he had addressed her in that way.

"How often am I to be asked to be somebody's friend, I wonder!" said Janetta to herself, with a touch of humor. But she answered, quite gravely, "I should like to do what I can—but I'm afraid there is nothing that I can do, especially"—with a sudden flush—"if your friends—the people who come to your house—are men like Mr. Strangways."

Wyvis looked at her sideways, with a curious look upon his face.

"You object to Mr. Strangways?"

"He is a man whom most people object to."

"Well—if I give up Mr. Strangways and his kind——"

"Oh, will you, Cousin Wyvis?"

She turned an eager, sparkling face upon him. It occurred to him, almost for the first time, to admire her. With that light in her eye, that color in her cheek, Janetta was almost beautiful. He smiled.

"I shall be only too glad of an excuse," he said, with more simplicity and earnestness than she had as yet distinguished in his voice. "And then—you will come again?"

"I will—gladly."

"Shake hands on it after your English fashion," he said, stopping short, and holding out his own hand. "I have been so long abroad that I almost forget the way. But it is a sign of friendliness, is it not?"

Janetta turned and laid her hand in his with a look of bright and trustful confidence. Somehow it made Wyvis Brand feel himself unworthy. He said almost nothing more until they parted at Mr. Colwyn's door.

But Janetta had not much chance of keeping her promise for some time to come. She was alarmed to find, on her return home that evening, that her father had come in sick and shivering, with all the symptoms of a violent cold, followed shortly by high fever. He had caught a chill during a long drive undertaken in order to see a motherless child who had been suddenly taken ill, and in whose case he took a great interest. The child rapidly recovered, but Mr. Colwyn's illness had a serious termination. Pleurisy came on, and made such rapid inroads upon his strength that in a very few days his recovery was pronounced impossible. Gradually growing weaker and weaker, he was not able even to give counsel or direction to his family, and could only whisper to Janetta, who was his devoted nurse, a few words about "taking care" of the rest.

"I will always do my very best for them, father; you may be sure of that," said Janetta, earnestly. The look of anxious pain in his eyes gave her the strength to speak firmly—she must set his mind at ease at any cost.

"My faithful Janet," she heard him whisper; and then he spoke no more. With his hand still clasped in hers he died in the early morning of a chill October day, and the world of Beaminster knew him no more.

The world seemed sadly changed for Janetta when her father had gone forth from it; and yet it was not she who made the greatest demonstration of mourning. Mrs. Colwyn passed from one hysterical fit into another, and Nora sobbed herself ill; but Janetta went about her duties with a calm and settled gravity, a sober tearlessness, which caused her stepmother to dub her cold and heartless half a dozen times a day. As a matter of fact the girl felt as if her heart were breaking, but there was no one but herself to bear any of the commonplace little burdens of daily life which are so hard to carry in the time of trouble; and but for her thoughtful presence of mind the whole house would have degenerated into a state of chaos. She wrote necessary letters, made arrangements for the sad offices which were all that could be rendered to her father now, interviewed the dressmaker, and ordered meals for the children. It was to her that the servants and tradespeople came for orders; it was she who kept her mother's room quiet, and nursed Nora, and provided necessary occupation for the awed and bewildered children.

"You don't seem to feel it a bit, Janetta," Mrs. Colwyn said to her on the day before the funeral. "And I'm sure you were always your father's favorite. He never cared half so much for any of the children as he did for you, and now you can't even give him a tributary tear."

Mrs. Colwyn was fond of stilted expressions, and the thought of "a tributary tear" seemed so incongruous to Janetta when compared with her own deep grief, that—much to Mrs. Colwyn's horror—she burst into an agitated little laugh, as nervous people sometimes do on the most solemn occasions.

"To laugh when your father is lying dead in the house!" ejaculated Mrs. Colwyn, with awful emphasis. "And you that he thought so loving and dutiful——!"

Then poor Janetta collapsed. She was worn out with watching and working, and from nervous laughter she passed to tears so heart-broken and so exhausting that Mrs. Colwyn never again dared to accuse her openly of insensibility. And perhaps it was a good thing for Janetta that she did break down in this way. The doctor who had attended her father was growing very uneasy about her. He had not been deceived by her apparent calmness. Her white face and dark-ringed eyes had told him all that Janetta could not say. "A good thing too!" he muttered when, on a subsequent call, Tiny told him, with rather a look of consternation, that her sister "had been crying." "A good thing too! If she had not cried she would have had a nervous fever before long, and then what would become of you all?"

During these dark days Janetta was inexpressibly touched by the marks of sympathy that reached her from all sides. Country people trudged long distances into town that they might gaze once more on the worn face of the man who had often assuaged not only physical but mental pain, and had been as ready to help and comfort as to prescribe. Townsfolk sent flowers for the dead and dainties for the living; but better than all their gifts was the regret that they expressed for the death of a man whom everyone liked and respected. Mr. Colwyn's practice, though never very lucrative, had been an exceedingly large one; and only when he had passed away did his townsfolk seem to appreciate him at his true worth.

In the sad absorption of mind which followed upon his death, Janetta almost forgot her cousins, the Brands. But when the funeral took place, and she went with her brother Joe to the grave, as she insisted upon doing in spite of her stepmother's tearful remonstrances, it was a sort of relief and satisfaction to her to see that both Wyvis and Cuthbert Brand were present. They were her kinsmen, after all, and it was right for them to be there. It made her feel momentarily stronger to know of their presence in the church.

But at the grave she forgot them utterly. The beautiful and consoling words of the Burial Service fell almost unheeded on her ear. She could only think of the blank that was made in her life by the absence of that loving voice, that tender sympathy, which had never failed her once. "My faithful Janet!" he had called her. There was no one to call her "my faithful Janet" now.

She was shaken by a storm of silent sobs as these thoughts came over her. She made scarcely a sound, but her figure was swayed by the tempest as if it would have fallen. Joe, the young brother, who could as yet scarcely realize the magnitude of the loss which he had sustained, glanced at her uneasily; but it was not he, but Wyvis Brand, who suddenly made a step forward and gave her—just in time—the support of his strong arm. The movement checked her and recalled her to herself. Her weeping grew less violent, and although strong shudders still shook her frame, she was able to walk quietly from the grave to the carriage-door, and to shake hands with Wyvis Brand with some attempt at calmness of demeanor.

He came to the house a few days after the funeral, but Janetta happened to be out, and Mrs. Colwyn refused to see him. Possibly he thought that some slight lurked within this refusal, for he did not come again, and a visit at a later date from Mrs. Brand was so entirely embarrassing and unsatisfactory that Janetta could hardly wish for its repetition. Mrs. Colwyn, in the deepest of widow's weeds, with a white handkerchief in her hand, was yet not too much overcome by grief to show that she esteemed herself far more respectable than Mrs. Brand, and could "set her down," if necessary; while poor Mrs. Brand, evidently comprehending the reason of Mrs. Colwyn's bridlings and tossings, was nervous and flurried, sat on the edge of a chair, and looked—poor, helpless, elderly woman—as if she had never entered a drawing-room before.

The only comfort Janetta had out of the visit was a moment's conversation in the hall when Mrs. Brand took her leave.

"My dear—my dear," said Mrs. Brand, taking the girl's hand in hers, "I am so sorry, and I can't do anything to comfort you. Your father was very kind to me when I was in great trouble, years ago. I shall never forget his goodness. If there is anything I can ever do for you, you must let me do it for his sake."

Janetta put up her face and kissed the woman to whom her father had been "very kind." It comforted her to hear of his goodness once again. She loved Mrs. Brand for appreciating it.

That little sentence or two did her more good than the long letters which she was receiving every few days from Margaret, her chosen friend. Margaret was sincerely grieved for Janetta's loss, and said many consoling things in her sweet, tranquil, rather devotional way; but she had not known Mr. Colwyn, and she could not say the words that Janetta's heart was aching for—the words of praise and admiration of a nobly unselfish life which alone could do Janetta any good. Yes, Margaret's letters were distinctly unsatisfactory—not from want of feeling, but from want of experience of life.

Graver necessities soon arose, however, than those of consolation in grief. Mr. Colwyn had always been a poor man, and the sum for which he had insured his life was only sufficient to pay his debts and funeral expenses, and to leave a very small balance at his banker's. He had bought the house in Gwynne Street in which he lived, and there was no need, therefore, to seek for another home; and Mrs. Colwyn had fifty pounds a year of her own, but of course it was necessary that the two elder girls should do something for themselves. Nora obtained almost immediately a post as under-teacher in a school not far from Beaminster, and Georgie was taken in as a sort of governess-pupil, while Joe was offered—chiefly out of consideration for his father's memory—a clerkship in a mercantile house in the town, and was considered to be well provided for. Curly, one of the younger boys, obtained a nomination to a naval school in London. Thus only Mrs. Colwyn, Tiny, and "Jinks" remained at home—with Janetta.

With Janetta!—That was the difficulty. What was Janetta to do? She might probably with considerable ease have obtained a position as resident governess in a family, but then she would have to be absent from home altogether. And of late the Colwyns had found it best to dispense with the maid-servant who had hitherto done the work of the household—a fact which meant that Janetta, with the help of a charity orphan of thirteen, did it nearly all herself.

"I might send home enough money for you to keep an efficient servant, mamma," she said one day, "if I could go away and find a good situation."

It never occurred either to her or to her stepmother that any of her earnings were to belong to Janetta, or be used for her behoof.

"It would have to be a very good situation indeed, then," said Mrs. Colwyn, with sharpness. "I don't suppose you could get more than fifty pounds a year—if so much. And fifty pounds would not go far if we had a woman in the house to feed and pay wages to. No, you had better stay at home and get some daily teaching in the neighborhood. With your recommendations it ought to be easy enough for you to do so."

"I am afraid not," said Janetta, with a little sigh.

"Nonsense! You could get some if you tried—if you had any energy, any spirit: I suppose you would like to sit with your hands before you, doing nothing, while I slaved my fingers to the bone for you," said Mrs. Colwyn, who never got up till noon, or did anything but gossip and read novels when she was up; "but I would be ashamed to do that if I were a well-educated girl, whose father spent I don't know how much on her voice, and expected her to make a living for herself by the time she was one-and-twenty! I must say, Janetta, that I think it very wrong of you to be so slack in trying to earn a little money, when Nora and Georgie and Joey are all out in the world doing for themselves, and you sitting here at home doing nothing at all."

"I am sorry, mamma," said Janetta, meekly. "I will try to get something to do at once."

She did not think of reminding Mrs. Colwyn that she had been up since six o'clock that morning helping the charity orphan to scrub and scour, cooking, making beds, sewing, teaching Tiny between whiles, and scarcely getting five minutes' rest until dinner-time. She only began to wonder how she could manage to get all her tasks into the day if she had lessons to give as well. "I suppose I must sit up at night and get up earlier in the morning," she thought to herself. "It is a pity I am such a sleepy person. But use reconciles one to all things."

Mrs. Colwyn meanwhile went on lecturing.

"And above all things, Janetta, remember that you ask high terms and get the money always in advance. You are just like your poor father in the way you have about money; I never saw anyone so unpractical as he was. I'm sure half his bills are unpaid yet, and never will be paid. I hope you won't be like him, I'm sure——"

"I hope I shall be like him in every possible respect," said Janetta, with compressed lips. She rose as she spoke and caught up the basket of socks that she was mending. "I don't know how you can bear to speak of him in that slighting manner," she went on, almost passionately. "He was the best, the kindest of men, and I cannot bear to hear it." And then she hurriedly left the room and went into her father's little surgery—as it had once been called—to relieve her overcharged heart with a burst of weeping. It was not often that Janetta lost patience, but a word against her father was sufficient to upset her self-command nowadays. She rested her head against the well-worn arm-chair where he used to sit, and kissed the back of it, and bedewed it with her tears.

"Poor father! dear father!" she murmured. "Oh, if only you were here, I could bear anything! Or if she had loved you as you deserved, I could bear with her and work for her willingly—cheerfully. But when she speaks against you, father dear, how can I live with her? And yet he told me to take care of her, and I said I would. He called me 'his faithful Janet.' I do not want to be unfaithful, but—oh father, father, it is hard to live without you!"

The gathering shades of the wintry day began to gather round her; but Janetta, her face buried in the depths of the arm-chair, was oblivious of time. It was almost dark before little Tiny came running in with cries of terror to summon her sister to Mrs. Colwyn's help.

"Mamma's ill—I think she's dying. Come, Janet, come," cried the child. And Janetta hurried back to the dining-room.

She found Mrs. Colwyn on the sofa in a state of apparent stupor. For this at first Janetta saw no reason, and was on the point of sending for a doctor, when her eye fell upon a black object which had rolled from the sofa to the ground. Janetta looked at it and stood transfixed.

There was no need to send for a doctor. And Janetta saw at once that she could not be spared from home. The wretched woman had found a solace from her woes, real and imaginary, in the brandy bottle.

The terrible certainty that Janetta had now acquired of Mrs. Colwyn's inability to control herself decided her in the choice of an occupation. She knew that she must, if possible, earn something; but it was equally impossible for her to leave home entirely, or even for many hours at a stretch; she was quite convinced that constant watching, and even gentle restraint, could alone prevail in checking the tendency which her stepmother evinced. She understood now better than she had ever done why her father's brow had been so early wrinkled and his hair grey before its time. Doubtless, he had discovered his wife's unfortunate tendency, and, while carefully concealing it or keeping it within bounds, had allowed it often to weigh heavily upon his mind. Janetta realized with a great shock that she could not hope to exert the influence or the authority of her father, that all her efforts might possibly be unavailing unless they were seconded by Mrs. Colwyn herself, and that public disgrace might yet be added to the troubles and anxieties of their lives.

There is something so particularly revolting in the spectacle of this kind of degradation in a woman, that Janetta felt as if the discovery that she had made turned her positively ill. She had much ado to behave to the children and the servant as if nothing were amiss; she got her stepmother to bed, and kept Tiny out of the room, but the effort was almost more than she knew how to bear. She passed a melancholy evening with the children—melancholy in spite of herself, for she did her best to be cheerful—and spent a sleepless night, rising in the morning with a bad headache and a conviction as of the worthlessness of all things which she did not very often experience.

She shrank sensitively from going to Mrs. Colwyn's room. Surely the poor woman would be overcome with pain and shame; surely she would understand how terrible the exposure of her disgrace had been to Janetta. But at last Mrs. Colwyn's bell sounded sharply, and continued to ring, and the girl was obliged to run upstairs and enter her stepmother's room.

Mrs. Colwyn was sitting up in bed, with the bell-rope in her hand, an aggrieved expression upon her face.

"Well, I'm sure! Nine o'clock and no breakfast ready for me! I suppose I may wait until everybody else in the house is served first; I must say, Janetta, that you are very thoughtless of my comfort."

Contrary to her usual custom Janetta offered no word of excuse or apology. She was too much taken aback to speak. She stood and looked at her stepmother with slightly dilated eyes, and neither moved nor spoke.

"What are you staring at?" said Mrs. Colwyn, sinking back on her pillows with a faint—very faint—touch of uneasiness in her tones. "If you are in a sulky mood, Janetta, I wish you would go away, and send my breakfast up by Ph[oe]be and Tiny. I have a wretched headache this morning and can't be bothered."

"What would you like?" said Janetta, with an effort.

"Oh, anything. Some coffee and toast, perhaps. I dare say you won't believe it—you are so unsympathetic—but I was frightfully ill last night. I don't know how I got to bed; I was quite insensible for a time—all from a narcotic that I had taken for neuralgia——"

"I'll go and get your breakfast ready," said Janetta abruptly. "I will send it up as soon as I can."

She left the room, unheeding some murmured grumbling at her selfishness, and shut the door behind her. On the landing it must be confessed that she struck her foot angrily on the floor and clenched her hands, while the color flushed into her mobile, sensitive little face. There was nothing that Janetta hated more than a lie. And her stepmother was lying to her now.

She sent up the breakfast tray, and did not re-enter the room for some time. When at last she came up, Mrs. Colwyn had had the fire lighted and was sitting beside it in a rocking-chair, with a novel on her lap. She looked up indolently as Janetta entered.

"Going out?" she said, noticing that the girl was in her out-door wraps. "You are always gadding."

"I came to speak to you before I went out," said Janetta, patiently. "I am going to the stationer's, and to the Beaminster Argus Office. I mean to make it well known in the town that I want to give music and singing-lessons. And, if possible, I shall give them here—at our own house."

"You'll do nothing of the sort!" said Mrs. Colwyn, shrilly. "I'll not have a pack of children about the house playing scales and singing their Do, Re, Mi, till my head is fit to split. You'll remember, Miss, that this is my house, and that you are living on my money, and behave yourself."

"Mamma," said Janetta, steadily, advancing a step nearer, and turning a shade paler than she had been before, "please think what you are saying. I am willing to work as hard as I can, and earn as much as I can. But I dare not go away from home—at any rate for long—unless I can feel sure that—that what happened last night—will not occur again."

"What happened!—what happened last night?—I don't know what you mean."

"Don't say that, mamma: you know—you know quite well. And think what a grief it would have been to dear father—what a disgrace it will be to Joe and Nora and the little ones and all of us—if it ever became known! Think of yourself, and the shame and the sin of it!"

"I've not the least notion what you are talking about, Janetta, and I beg that you will not address me in that way," said Mrs. Colwyn, with an attempt at dignity. "It is very undutiful indeed, and I hope that I shall hear no more of it."

"I'll never speak of it again, mamma, unless you make it necessary. All I mean is that you must understand—I cannot feel safe now—I must be at home as much as possible to see that Tiny is safe, and that everything is going on well. You must please let me advertise for pupils in our own house."

Mrs. Colwyn burst into tears. "Oh, well, have your own way! I knew that you would tyrannize, you always do whenever you get the chance, and very foolish I have been to give you the opportunity. To speak in that way to your father's wife—and all because she had to take a little something for her nerves, and because of her neuralgia! But I am nobody now: nobody, even in my own house, where I'm sure I ought to be mistress if anybody is!"

Janetta could do or say nothing more. She gave her stepmother a dose of sal volatile, and went away. She had already searched every room and every cupboard in the house, except in Mrs. Colwyn's own domain, and had put every bottle that she could find under lock and key; but she left the house with a feeling of terrible insecurity upon her, as if the earth might open at any moment beneath her feet.

She put advertisements in the local papers and left notices at some of the Beaminster shops, and, when these attempts produced no results, she called systematically on all the people she knew, and did her best—very much against the grain—to ask for pupils. Thanks to her perseverance she soon got three or four children as music pupils, although at a very low rate of remuneration. Also, she gave two singing lessons weekly to the daughter of the grocer with whom the Colwyns dealt. But these were not paid for in money, but in kind. And then for a time she got no more pupils at all.

Janetta was somewhat puzzled by her failure. She had fully expected to succeed as a teacher in Beaminster. "When the Adairs come back it will be better," she said, hopefully, to herself. "They have not written for a long time, but I am sure that they will come home soon. Perhaps Margaret is going to be married and will not want any singing lessons. But I should think that they would recommend me: I should think that I might refer to Lady Caroline, and surely people would think more of my abilities then."

But it was not confidence in her abilities that was lacking so much as confidence in her amiability and discretion, she soon found. She called one day at the house of a schoolmistress, who was said to want assistance in the musical line, and was received with a stiffness which did not encourage her to make much of her qualifications.

"The fact is, Miss Colwyn," said the preceptress at length, "I have heard of you from Miss Polehampton."

Janetta was on her feet in a moment. "I know very well what that means," she said, rather defiantly.

"Exactly. I see that Miss Polehampton's opinion of you is justifiable. You will excuse my mentioning to you, as it is all for your own good, Miss Colwyn, that Miss Polehampton found in you some little weakness of temper, some want of the submissiveness and good sense which ought to characterize an under-teacher's demeanor. I have great confidence in Miss Polehampton's opinion."

"The circumstances under which I left Miss Polehampton's could be easily explained if you would allow me to refer you to Lady Caroline Adair," said Janetta, with mingled spirit and dignity.

"Lady Caroline Adair? Oh, yes, I have heard all about that," said the schoolmistress, in a tone of depreciation. "I do not need to hear any other version of the story. You must excuse my remarking, Miss Colwyn, that temper and sense are qualities as valuable in music-teaching as in any other; and that your dismissal from Miss Polehampton's will, in my opinion, be very much against you, in a place where Miss Polehampton's school is so well known, and she herself is so much respected."

"I am sorry to have troubled you," said Janetta, not without stateliness, although her lips trembled a little as she spoke. "I will wish you good-morning."

The schoolmistress bowed solemnly, and allowed the girl to depart. Janetta hastened out of the house—glad to get away before the tears that had gathered in her eyes could fall.

At an ordinary time she would have been equally careful that they did not fall when she was in the street; but on this occasion, dazed, wounded, and tormented by an anxiety about the future, which was beginning to take the spring out of her youth, she moved along the side-walk with perfect unconsciousness that her eyes were brimming over, and that two great tears were already on her cheeks.

It was a quiet road, and there was little likelihood of encountering any one whom she knew. Therefore Janetta was utterly abashed when a gentleman, who had met her, took off his hat, glanced at her curiously, and then turned back as if by a sudden impulse, and addressed her by name.

"Miss Colwyn, I think?"

She looked up at him through a blinding haze of tears, and recognized the tall, spare figure, the fine sensitive face, the kind, dark eyes and intellectual forehead. The coal-black beard and moustache nearly hid his mouth, but Janetta felt instinctively that this tell-tale feature would not belie the promise of the others.

"Sir Philip Ashley," she murmured, in her surprise.

"I beg your pardon," he said, with the courtesy that she so well remembered; "I stopped you on impulse, I fear, because I felt a great desire to express to you my deep sympathy with you in your loss. It may seem impertinent for me to speak, but I knew your father and respected and trusted him. We had some correspondence about sanitary matters, and I was greatly relying on his help in certain reforms that I wish to institute in Beaminster. He is a great loss to us all."

"Thank you," Janetta said unsteadily.

"Will you let me ask whether there is anything in which I can help you just now."

"Oh, no, nothing, thank you." She had brushed away the involuntary tear, and smiled bravely as she replied. "I did not think that I should meet anybody: it was simply that I was disappointed about—about—some lessons that I hoped to get. Quite a little disappointment, you see."

"Was it a little disappointment? Do you want to give lessons—singing lessons?"

"Yes; but nobody will have me to teach them," said Janetta, laughing nervously.

Sir Philip looked back at the house which they had just passed. "That is Miss Morrison's school: you came out of it, did you not? Does she not need your help?"

"I do not suit her."

"Why? Did she try your voice?"

"Oh, no. It was for other reasons. She was prejudiced against me," said Janetta, with a little gulp.

"Prejudiced? But why?—may I ask?"

"Oh, she had heard something she did not like. It does not matter: I shall get other pupils by-and-bye."

"Is it important to you to have pupils?" Sir Philip asked, as seriously and anxiously as if the fate of the empire depended on his reply.

"Oh, most important." Janetta's face and voice were more pathetic than she knew. Sir Philip was silent for a moment.

"I have heard you sing," he said at length, in his grave, earnest way. "I am sure that I should have no hesitation in recommending you—if my recommendation were of any use. My mother may perhaps hear of somebody who wants lessons, if you will allow me to mention the matter to her."

"I shall be very much obliged to you," said Janetta, feeling grateful and yet a little startled—it did not seem natural to her in her sweet humility that Sir Philip and his mother should interest themselves in her welfare. "Oh, very much obliged."

Sir Philip raised his hat and smiled down kindly upon her as he said good-bye. He had been interested from the very first in Margaret's friend. And he had always been vaguely conscious that Margaret's friendship was not likely to produce any very desirable results.

Janetta went on her way, feeling for the moment a little less desolate than she had felt before. Sir Philip turned homewards to seek his mother, who was a woman of whom many people stood in awe, but whose kindness of heart was never known to fail. To her Sir Philip at once poured out his story with the directness and Quixotic ardor which some of his friends found incomprehensible, not to say absurd. But Lady Ashley never thought so.

She smiled very kindly as her son finished his little tale.

"She is really a good singer, you say? Mr. Colwyn's daughter. I have seen him once or twice."

"He was a good fellow."

"Yes, I believe so. Miss Morrison's school, did you mention? Why, Mabel Hartley is there." Mabel Hartley was a distant cousin of the Ashleys. "I will call to-morrow, Philip, and find out what the objection is to Miss Colwyn. If it can be removed I don't see why she should not teach Mabel, who, I remember, has a voice."

Lady Ashley carried out her intention, and announced the result to her son the following evening.

"I have not succeeded, dear. Miss Morrison has been prejudiced by some report from Miss Polehampton, with whom Miss Colwyn and Margaret Adair were at school. She said that the two girls were expelled together."

Sir Philip was silent for a minute or two. His brows contracted. "I was afraid," he said, "that Miss Adair's championship of her friend had not been conducted in the wisest possible manner. She has done Miss Colwyn considerable harm."

Lady Ashley glanced at him inquiringly. She was particularly anxious that he should marry Margaret Adair.

"Is Lady Caroline at home?" her son asked, after another and a longer pause.

"Yes. She came home yesterday—with dear Margaret. I am sure, Philip, that Margaret does not know it if she has done harm."

"I don't suppose she does, mother. I am sure she would not willingly injure any one. But I think that she ought to know the circumstances of the case."

And then he opened a book and began to read.

Lady Ashley never remonstrated. But she raised her eyebrows a little over this expression of Sir Philip's opinion. If he were going to try to tutor Margaret Adair, whose slightest wish had never yet known contradiction, she thought it probable that the much-wished for marriage would never take place at all.

Poor Janetta, plodding away at her music lessons and doing the household work of her family, never guessed that she was about to become a bone of contention. But such she was fated to be, and that between persons no less distinguished than Lady Caroline Adair and Sir Philip Ashley—not to speak of Sir Philip and Margaret!

Two days after Janetta's unexpected meeting with Sir Philip, that gentleman betook himself to Helmsley Court in a somewhat warm and indignant mood. He had seen a good deal of Margaret during the autumn months. They had been members of the same house-party in more than one great Scottish mansion: they had boated together, fished together, driven and ridden and walked together, until more than one of Lady Caroline's acquaintances had asked, with a covert smile, "how soon she might be allowed to congratulate".... The sentence was never quite finished, and Lady Caroline never made any very direct reply. Margaret was too young to think of these things, she said. But other people were very ready to think of them for her.

The acquaintance had therefore progressed a long way since the day of Margaret's return from school. And yet it had not gone quite so far as onlookers surmised, or as Lady Caroline wished. Sir Philip was most friendly, most attentive, but he was also somewhat absurdly unconscious of remark. His character had a simplicity which occasionally set people wondering. He was perfectly frank and manly: he spoke without arrière-pensée, he meant what he said, and was ready to believe that other people meant it too. He had a pleasant and courteous manner in society, and liked to be on friendly terms with every one he met; but at the same time he was not at all like the ordinary society man, and had not the slightest idea that he differed from any such person—as indeed he did. He had very high aims and ideals, and he took it for granted, with a really charming simplicity, that other people had similar aims and similar (if not higher) ideals. Consequently he now and then ran his head against a wall, and was laughed at by commonplace persons; but those who knew him well loved him all the better for his impracticable schemes and expectations.

But to Margaret he seemed rather like a firebrand. He took interest in things of which she had never heard, or which she regarded with a little delicate disdain. A steam-laundry in Beaminster, for example—what had a man like Sir Philip Ashley to do with a steam-laundry? And yet he was establishing one in the old city, and actually assuring people that it would "pay." He had been exerting himself about the drainage of the place and the dwellings of the poor. Margaret was sorry in a vague way for the poor, and supposed that drainage had to be "seen to" from time to time, but she did not want to hear anything about it. She liked the pretty little cottages in the village of Helmsley, and she did not mind begging for a holiday for the school children (who adored her) now and then; and she had heard with pleasure of Lady Ashley's pattern alm-houses and dainty orphanage, where the old women wore red cloaks, and the children were exceedingly picturesque; but as a necessary consequence of her life-training, she did not want to know anything about disease or misery or sin. And Sir Philip could not entirely keep these subjects out of his conversation, although he tried to be very careful not to bring a look that he knew well—a look of shocked repulsion and dislike—to Margaret's tranquil face.

She welcomed him with her usual sweetness that afternoon. He thought that she looked lovelier than ever. The day was cold, and she wore a dark-green dress with a good deal of gold embroidery about it, which suited her perfectly. Lady Caroline, too, was graciousness itself. She received him in her own little sitting-room—a gem of a room into which only her intimate friends were admitted, and made him welcome with all the charm of manner for which she was distinguished. And to add to her virtues, she presently found that she had letters to write, and retired into an adjoining library, leaving the door open between the two rooms, so that Margaret might still be considered as under her chaperonage, although conversation could be conducted without any fear of her overhearing what was said. Lady Caroline knew so exactly what to do and what to leave undone!

As soon as she was gone, Sir Philip put down his tea-cup and turned with an eager movement to Margaret.

"I have been wanting to speak to you," he said. "I have something special—something important to say."

"Yes?" said Margaret, sweetly. She flushed a little and looked down. She was not quite ignorant of what every one was expecting Sir Philip Ashley to say.

"Can you listen to me for a minute or two?" he said, with the gentle eagerness of manner, the restrained ardor which he was capable—unfortunately for him—of putting into his most trivial requests. "You are sure you will not be impatient?"

Margaret smiled. Should she accept him? she was thinking. After all, he was very nice, in spite of his little eccentricities. And really—with his fine features, his tall stature, his dark eyes, and coal-black hair and beard—he was an exceedingly handsome man.

"I want you to help me," said Sir Philip, in almost a coaxing tone. "I want you to carry out a design that I have formed. Nobody can do it but you. Will you help me?"

"If I can," said Margaret, shyly.

"You are always good and kind," said Sir Philip, warmly. "Margaret—may I call you Margaret? I have known you so long."

This seemed a little irregular, from Miss Adair's point of view.

"I don't know whether mamma——" she began, and stopped.

"Whether she would like it? I don't think she would mind: she suggested it the other day, in fact. She always calls me 'Philip,' you know: perhaps you would do the same?"

Again Margaret smiled; but there was a touch of inquiry in her eyes as she glanced at him. She did not know very much about proposals of marriage, but she fancied that Sir Philip's manner of making one was peculiar. And she had had it impressed upon her so often that he was about to make one that it could hardly be considered strange if his manner somewhat bewildered her.

"I want to speak to you," said the young man, lowering his earnest voice a little, "about your friend, Miss Colwyn."

Now, why did the girl flush scarlet? Why did her hand tremble a little as she put down her cup? Philip lost the thread of the conversation for a minute or two, and simply looked at her. Then Margaret quietly took down a screen from the mantel-piece and began to fan herself. "It is rather hot here, don't you think?" she said, serenely. "The fire makes one feel quite uncomfortable."

"It is a large one," said Sir Philip, with conviction. "Shall I take any of the coal off for you? No? Well, as I was saying, I wished to speak to you about your friend, Miss Colwyn."

"She has lost her father lately, poor thing," said Margaret, conversationally. "She has been very unhappy."

"Yes, and for more reasons than one. You have not seen her, I conclude, since his death?"

"No, he died in August or September, did he not? It is close upon December now—what a long time we have been away! Poor Janetta!—how glad she will be to see me!"

"I am sure she will. But it would be just as well for you to hear beforehand that her father's death has brought great distress upon the family. I have had some talk with friends of his, and I find that he left very little money behind."

"How sad for them! But—they have not removed?—they are still at their old house: I thought everything was going on as usual," said Margaret, in a slightly puzzled tone.

"The house belongs to them, so they might as well live in it. Two or three of the family have got situations of some kind—one child is in a charitable institution, I believe."

"Oh, how dreadful! Like Lady Ashley's Orphanage?" said Margaret, shrinking a little.

"No, no; nothing of that kind—an educational establishment, to which he has got a nomination. But the mother and the two or three children are still at home, and I believe that their income is not more than a hundred a year."

Sir Philip was considerably above the mark. But the mention of even a hundred a year, though not a large income, produced little impression upon Margaret.

"That is not very much, is it?" she said, gently.

"Much! I should think not," said Sir Philip, driven almost to discourtesy by the difficulty of making her understand. "Four or five people to live upon it and keep up a position! It is semi-starvation and misery."

"But, Sir Philip, does not Janetta give lessons? I should have thought she could make a perfect fortune by her music alone. Hasn't she tried to get something to do?"

"Yes, indeed, poor girl, she has. My mother has been making inquiries, and she finds that Miss Colwyn has advertised and done everything she could think of—with very little result. I myself met her three or four days ago, coming away from Miss Morrison's, with tears in her eyes. She had failed to get the post of music-teacher there."

"But why had she failed? She can sing and play beautifully!"

"Ah, I wanted you to ask me that! She failed—because Miss Morrison was a friend of Miss Polehampton's, and she had heard some garbled and distorted account of Miss Colwyn's dismissal from that school."

Sir Philip did not look at her as he spoke: he fancied that she would be at once struck with horror and even with shame, and he preferred to avert his eyes during the moment's silence that followed upon his account of Janetta's failure to get work. But, when Margaret spoke, a very slight tone of vexation was the only discoverable trace of any such emotion.

"Why did not Janetta explain?"

Sir Philip's lips moved, but he said nothing.

"That affair cannot be the reason why she has obtained so little work, of course?"

"I am afraid that to some extent it is."

"Janetta could so easily have explained it!"

"May I ask how she could explain it? Write a letter to the local paper, or pay a series of calls to declare that she had not been to blame? Do you think that any one would have believed her? Besides—you call her your friend: could she exculpate herself without blaming you; and do you think that she would do that?"

"Without blaming me?" repeated Margaret. She rose to her full height, letting the fan fall between her hands, and stood silently confronting him. "But," she said, slowly—"I—I was not to blame."

Sir Philip bowed.

"You think that I was to blame?"

"I think that you acted on impulse, without much consideration for Miss Colwyn's future. I think that you have done her an injury—which I am sure you will be only too willing to repair."

He began rather sternly, he ended almost tenderly—moved as he could not fail to be by the soft reproach of Margaret's eyes.

"I cannot see that I have done her any injury at all; and I really do not know how I can repair it," said the girl, with a cold stateliness which ought to have warned Sir Philip that he was in danger of offending. But Philip was rash and warm-hearted, and he had taken up Janetta's cause.

"Your best way of repairing it," he said, earnestly, "would be to call on Miss Morrison yourself and explain the matter to her, as Miss Colwyn cannot possibly do—unless she is a very different person from the one I take her for. And if that did not avail, go to Miss Polehampton and persuade her to write a letter——"

He stopped somewhat abruptly. The look of profound astonishment on Margaret's face recalled him to a sense of limitations. "Margaret!" he said, pleadingly, "won't you be generous? You can afford to do this thing for your friend!"

"Go to Miss Morrison and explain! Persuade Miss Polehampton!—after the way she treated us! But really it is too ridiculous, Sir Philip. You do not know my friend, Miss Colwyn. She would be the last person to wish me to humiliate myself to Miss Polehampton!"

"I do not see that what she wishes has much to do with it," said Sir Philip, very stiffly. "Miss Colwyn is suffering under an injustice. I ask you to repair that injustice. I really do not see how you can refuse."

Margaret looked as if she were about to make some mutinous reply; then she compressed her lips and lowered her eyes for a few seconds.

"I will ask mamma what she thinks," she said at last, in her usual even tones.

"Why should you ask her?" said Sir Philip, impetuously. "What consultation is needed, when I simply beg you to be your own true self—that noble, generous self that I am sure you are! Margaret, don't disappoint me!"

"I didn't know," said the girl, with proud deliberateness, "that you had any special interest in the matter, Sir Philip."

"I have this interest—that I love you with all my heart, Margaret, and hope that you will let me call you my wife one day. It is this love, this hope, which makes me long to think of you as perfect—always noble and self-sacrificing and just! Margaret, you will not forbid me to hope?"

He had chosen a bad time for his declaration of love. He saw this, and his accent grew more and more supplicating, for he perceived that the look of repulsion, which he knew and hated, was already stealing into Margaret's lovely eyes. She stood as if turned into stone, and did not answer a word. And it was on this scene that Lady Caroline broke at that moment—a scene which, at first sight, gave the mother keen pleasure, for it had all the orthodox appearance of love-making: the girl, silent, downcast, embarrassed; the man passionate and earnest, with head bent towards her fair face, and hands outstretched in entreaty.

But poor Lady Caroline was soon to be undeceived, and her castle in the air to come tumbling down about her ears.

"Is anything the matter?" said Lady Caroline, suavely.

She had been undecided for a minute as to whether she had not better withdraw unseen, but the distressed expression on her-daughter's face decided her to speak. She might at least prevent Margaret from saying anything foolish.

Sir Philip drew back a little. Margaret went—almost hurriedly—up to her mother, and put her hand into Lady Caroline's.

"Will you tell him? will you explain to him, please?" she said. "I do not want to hear any more: I would rather not. We could never understand each other, and I should be very unhappy."

Sir Philip made an eager gesture, but Lady Caroline silenced him by an entreating glance and then looked straight into her daughter's eyes. Their limpid hazel depths were troubled now: tears were evidently very near, and Lady Caroline detested tears.

"My darling child," she said, "you must not agitate yourself. You shall hear nothing that you do not want to hear. Sir Philip would never say anything that would pain you."

"I have asked her to be my wife," said Sir Philip, very quietly, "and I hope that she will not refuse to hear me say that, at least."

"But that was not all," said Margaret, suddenly turning on him her grieving eyes—eyes that always looked so much more grieved than their owner felt—and her flushing, quivering face: "You told me first that I was wrong—selfish and unjust; and you want me to humiliate myself—to say that it was my fault——"

"My dearest Margaret!" exclaimed Lady Caroline, in amaze, "what can you mean? Philip, are we dreaming?—Darling child, come with me to your room: you had better lie down for a little time while I talk to Sir Philip. Excuse me a moment, Sir Philip—I will come back."

Margaret allowed herself to be led from the room. This outbreak of emotion was almost unprecedented in her history; but then Sir Philip had attacked her on her tenderest side—that of her personal dignity. Margaret Adair found it very hard to believe that she was as others are, and not made of a different clay from them.

Some little time elapsed before Lady Caroline's return. She had made Margaret lie down, administered sal volatile, covered her with an eiderdown quilt, and seen her maid bathing the girl's forehead with eau de Cologne and water before she came back again. And all this took time. She apologized very prettily for her delay, but Sir Philip did not seem to heed her excuses: he was standing beside the fire, meditatively tugging at his black beard, and Lady Caroline had some difficulty in thinking that she could read the expression of his face.

"I do not quite understand all this," she said, with her most amiable expression of countenance, as she seated herself on the other side of the soft white hearthrug. "Margaret mentioned Miss Colwyn's name: I am quite at a loss to imagine how Miss Colwyn comes to be mixed up in the matter."

"I am very sorry," said Sir Philip, ruefully. "I never thought that there would be any difficulty. I seem to have offended Margaret most thoroughly."

Lady Caroline smiled. "Girls soon forget a man's offences," she said, consolingly. "What did you say?"

And then Sir Philip, with some hesitation, told the story of his plea for Janetta Colwyn.

The smile was frozen on Lady Caroline's lips. She sat up straight, and stared at her visitor. When he had quite ended his explanation, she said, as icily as she knew how to speak—

"And you asked my daughter to justify Miss Colwyn at the cost of her own feelings—I might almost say, of her own social standing in the neighborhood!—--"

"Isn't that a little too strong, Lady Caroline? Your daughter's social standing would not be touched in the least by an act of common justice. No one who heard of it but would honor her for exculpating her friend!"

"Exculpating! My dear Philip, you are too Quixotic! Nobody accuses either of the girls of anything but a little thoughtlessness and defiance of authority——"

"Exactly," said Philip, with some heat, "and therefore while the report of it will not injure your daughter, it may do irreparable harm to a girl who has her own way to make in the world. The gossip of Beaminster tea-tables is not to be despised. The old ladies of Beaminster are all turning their backs on Miss Colwyn, because common report declares her to have been expelled—or dismissed—in disgrace from Miss Polehampton's school. The fact that nobody knows exactly why she was dismissed adds weight to the injury. It is so easy to say, 'They don't tell why she was sent away—something too dreadful to be talked about,' and so on. My mother tells me that there is a general feeling abroad that Miss Colwyn is not a person to be trusted with young girls. Now that is a terrible slur upon an innocent woman who has to earn her own living, Lady Caroline; and I really must beg that you and Margaret will set yourselves to remove it."

"Really, Philip! Quite a tirade!"

Lady Caroline laughed delicately as she spoke, and passed a lace handkerchief across her lips as though to brush away a smile. She was a little puzzled and rather vexed, but she did not wish to show her true opinion of Sir Philip and his views.

"And so," she went on, "you said all this to my poor child; harrowed her feelings and wounded her self-respect, and insisted on it that she should go round Beaminster explaining that it was her fault and not Janetta Colwyn's that Miss Polehampton acted in so absurdly arbitrary a manner!"

"You choose to put it in that way," said Sir Philip, drawing down his brows, "and I cannot very well contradict you; but I venture to think, Lady Caroline, that you know quite well what I mean."

"I should be glad if you would put it into plain words. You wish Margaret—to do—what?"

"I very much wish that she would go to Miss Morrison and explain to her why Miss Colwyn left school. There is no need that she should take any blame upon herself. You must confess that it was she who took the law into her own hands, Lady Caroline; Miss Colwyn was perfectly ready to submit. And I think that as this occurrence has been made the ground for refusing to give Miss Colwyn the work that she urgently needs, it is Miss Adair's plain duty to try at least to set the matter right. I do not see why she should refuse."

"You have no pride yourself, I suppose? Do you suppose that Mr. Adair would allow it?"

"Then you might do it for her, Lady Caroline," said Sir Philip, turning round on her, with his winning, persuasive manner, of which even at that moment she felt the charm. "It would be so easy for you to explain it quietly to Miss Morrison, and ask her to give that poor girl a place in her school! Who else could do it better? If Margaret is not—not quite strong enough for the task, then will you not help us out of our difficulty, and do it for her?"

"Certainly not, Sir Philip. Your request seems to me exceedingly unreasonable. I do not in the least believe that Miss Morrison has refused to take her for that reason only. There is some other, you may depend upon it. I shall not interfere."

"You could at least give her a strong recommendation."

"I know nothing about the girl except that she sings fairly well," said Lady Caroline, in a hard, determined voice. "I do not want to know anything about her—she has done nothing but make mischief and cause contention ever since I heard her name. I begin to agree with Miss Polehampton—it was a most unsuitable friendship."

"It has been a disastrous friendship for Miss Colwyn, I fear. You must excuse me if I say that it is hardly generous—after having been the means of the loss of her first situation—to refuse to help her in obtaining another."

"I think I am the best judge of that. If you mean to insinuate, Sir Philip, that your proposal for Margaret's hand which we have talked over before, hinges on her compliance with your wishes in this instance, you had better withdraw it at once."

"You must be aware that I have no such meaning," said Sir Philip, in a tone that showed him to be much wounded.

"I am glad—for your own sake—to hear it. Neither Mr. Adair nor myself could permit Margaret to lower herself by going to explain her past conduct to a second-rate Beaminster schoolmistress."

Sir Philip stood silent, downcast, his eyebrows contracting over his eyes until—as Lady Caroline afterwards expressed it—he positively scowled.

"You disagree with me, I presume?" she inquired, with some irony in her tone.

"Yes, Lady Caroline, I do disagree with you. I thought that you—and Margaret—would be more generous towards a fatherless girl."

"You must excuse me if I say that your interest in 'a fatherless girl' is somewhat out of place, Sir Philip. You are a young man, and it is not quite seemly for you to make such a point of befriending a little music governess. I am sorry to have to speak so plainly, but I must say that I do not think such interest befits a gentleman, and especially one who has been asking us for our daughter."

"My love for Margaret," said Sir Philip, gravely, "cannot blind me to other duties."

"There are duties in the world," rejoined Lady Caroline, "between which we sometimes have to choose. It seems to me that you may have to choose between your love for Margaret and your 'interest' in Janetta Colwyn."

"I hardly think," said her guest, "that I deserve this language, Lady Caroline. However, since these are your opinions, I can but say that I deeply regret them—and take my leave. If you or Miss Adair should wish to recall me you have but to send me a word—a line: I shall be ready to come. Your daughter knows my love for her. I am not yet disposed to give up all hope of a recall."

And then he took his leave with a manner of punctilious politeness which, oddly enough, made Lady Caroline feel herself in the wrong more than anything that he had said. She was more ruffled than Margaret had ever seen her when at last she sought the girl's room shortly before the ringing of the dressing-bell.

She found Margaret looking pale and a little frightened, but perfectly composed. She came up to Lady Caroline and put her arms round her mother's neck with a caressing movement.

"Dear mamma," she said, "I am afraid I was not quite polite to Sir Philip."

"I think, dear, that Sir Philip was scarcely polite to you. I am not at all satisfied with his conduct. He is quite unreasonable."

Margaret slowly withdrew her arms from her mother's neck, looked at her uneasily, and looked down again.

"He thinks that I ought to do something for Janetta—to make people think well of her, I suppose."

"He is utterly preposterous," said Lady Caroline.

"Do you think I ought to go to Miss Morrison about Janetta, mamma?"

"No, indeed, my dearest. Your father would never hear of it."

"I should like to do all that I could for her. I am very fond of her, indeed I am, although Sir Philip thinks me so selfish." And Margaret's soft hazel eyes filled with tears, which fell gently over her delicate cheeks without distorting her features in the least.

"Don't cry, my darling; please don't cry," said her mother, anxiously. "Your eyelids will be red all the evening, and papa will ask what is the matter. Have you any rose water?—Of course you will do all you can for your poor little friend: you are only too fond of her—too generous!—Sir Philip does not understand you as I do; he has disappointed me very much this afternoon."

"He was very unkind," said Margaret, with the faintest possible touch of resentment in her soft tones.

"Think no more of him for the present, dear. I dare say he will be here to-morrow, penitent and abashed. There goes the dressing-bell. Are you ready for Markham now? Put on your pink dress."

She spoke pleasantly, and even playfully, but she gave Margaret a searching glance, as though she would have read the girl's heart if she could. But she was reassured. Margaret was smiling now; she was as calm as ever; she had brushed the tears from her eyes with a filmy handkerchief and looked perfectly serene. "I am rather glad that you have found Sir Philip unreasonable, mamma," she said, placidly; "I always thought so, but you did not quite agree with me."

"The child's fancy is untouched," said Lady Caroline to herself as she went back to her room, "and I am thankful for it. She is quite capable of a little romantic folly if nobody is near to put some common-sense into her sometimes. And Philip Ashley has no common-sense at all."

She was glad to see that at dinner Margaret's serenity was still unruffled. When Mr. Adair grumbled at the absence of Sir Philip, whom he had expected to see that evening, the girl only looked down at her plate without a blush or a word of explanation. Lady Caroline drew her daughter's arm through her own as they left the dining-room with a feeling that she was worthy of the race to which she belonged.

But she was not in the least prepared for the first remark made by Margaret when they reached the drawing-room.

"Mamma, I must go to see Janetta to-morrow."

"Indeed, dear? And why?"

"To find out whether the things that Sir Philip has been saying are true."

"No, Margaret, dear, you really must not do that, darling. It would not be wise. What Sir Philip says does not matter to us. I cannot have you interfering with Miss Colwyn's concerns in that way."

Margaret was very docile. She only said, after a moment's pause—

"May I not ask her to give me the singing lessons we arranged for me to take?"

Lady Caroline considered for a minute or two and then said—

"Yes, dear, you may ask her about the singing lessons. In doing that you will be benefiting her, and giving her a practical recommendation that ought to be very valuable to her."

"Shall I drive over to-morrow?"

"No, write and ask her to come here to lunch. Then we can arrange about hours. I have not the least objection to your taking lessons from her ... especially as they are so cheap," said Lady Caroline to herself, "but I do not wish you to talk to her about Miss Polehampton's conduct. There is no use in such discussions."

"No, mamma," said the dutiful Margaret.

"And Sir Philip will be pleased to hear that his favorite is being benefited," said her mother, with a slightly sarcastic smile.

Margaret held up her stately head. "It matters very little to me whether Sir Philip is pleased or not," she said with a somewhat lofty accent, not often heard from the gentle lips of Margaret Adair.

Margaret wrote her note to Janetta, and put her friend into something of a dilemma. She always felt it difficult to leave Mrs. Colwyn alone for many hours at a time. She had done her best to prevent her from obtaining stimulants, but it was no easy thing to make it impossible; and it was always dangerous to remove a restraining influence. At last she induced an old friend, a Mrs. Maitland, to spend the day with her stepmother, while she went to Helmsley Court; and having thus provided against emergencies, she was prepared to spend some pleasant hours with Margaret.

The day was cold and frosty, with a blue sky overhead, and the ground hard as iron underfoot. A carriage was sent for Janetta, and the girl was almost sorry that she had to be driven to her destination, for a brisk walk would have been more to her taste on this brilliant December day. But she was of course bound to make use of the carriage that came for her, and so she drove off in state, while Tiny and Jinks danced wildly on the doorstep and waved their hands to her in hilarious farewells. Mrs. Colwyn was secluding herself upstairs in high indignation at Janetta's presumption—first, in going to Helmsley Court at all, and, secondly, in having invited Mrs. Maitland to come to dinner—but Janetta did her best to forget the vexations and anxieties of the day, and to prepare herself as best she might for the serene atmosphere of Helmsley Court.

It was more than three months since her father's death, and she had not seen Margaret for what seemed to her like a century. In those three months she had had some new and sad experiences, and she almost wondered whether Margaret would not think her changed beyond knowledge by the troubles of the past. But in this fancy Janetta only proved herself young at heart; in later years she found, as we all find, that the outer man is little changed by the most terrible and heart-rending calamities. It was almost a surprise to Janetta that Margaret did not remark on her altered appearance. But Margaret saw nothing very different in her friend. Her black mourning garments certainly made her look pale, but Margaret was not a sufficiently keen observer to note the additional depth of expression in Janetta's dark eyes, or the slightly pathetic look given to her features by the thinning of her cheeks and the droop of her finely curved mouth. Lady Caroline, however, noticed all these points, and was quite aware that these changes, slight though they were, gave force and refinement to the girl's face. Secretly, she was embittered against Janetta, and this new charm of hers only added to her dislike. But, outwardly, Lady Caroline was sweetness and sympathy personified.

"You poor darling," said Margaret, when she stood with Janetta in Miss Adair's own little sitting-room, awaiting the sound of the luncheon bell; "what you must have suffered! I have felt for you, Janetta—oh, more than I can tell! You are quite pale, dear; I do hope you are better and stronger than you were?"

"I am quite well, thank you," said Janetta.

"But you must have had so much to bear! If I lost my friends—my dear father or mother—I know I should be broken-hearted. You are so brave and good, Janetta, dear."

"I don't feel so," said Janetta, sorrowfully. "I wish I did. It would be rather a comfort sometimes."

"You have a great deal of trouble and care, I am afraid," said Margaret, softly. She was resolved to be staunch to her friend, although Sir Philip had been so disagreeable about Janetta. She was going to show him that she could take her own way of showing friendship.

"There have been a good many changes in the family, and changes always bring anxieties with them," said Janetta, firmly. She had particularly resolved that she would not complain of her troubles to the Adairs; it would seem like asking them to help her—"sponging upon them," as she disdainfully thought. Janetta had a very fair share of sturdy pride and independence with which to make her way through the world.

Margaret would have continued the subject, but at that moment the bell rang, and Janetta was glad to go downstairs.

It was curious, as she remembered afterwards, to find that the splendors of the house, the elaboration of service, now produced not the slightest impression upon her. She had grown out of her former girlish feeling of insignificance in the presence of powdered footmen and fashionable ladies' maids. The choice flowers, the silver plate, the dainty furniture and hangings, which had once excited and almost awed her imagination, were perceived by her with comparative indifference. She was a woman, not a child, and these things were but as toys to one who had stood so lately face to face with the larger issues of life and death. Mr. Adair and Lady Caroline talked pleasantly to her, utterly ignoring, of course, any change in her circumstances or recent source of trouble, and Janetta did her best to respond. It was by way of trying to introduce a pleasant subject of conversation that she said at length to her hostess—

"I met Sir Philip Ashley the other day. He is so kind as to say that he will try to find me some pupils."

"Indeed," said Lady Caroline, drily. She did not approve of the introduction of Sir Philip's name or of Janetta's professional employment. Margaret flushed a little, and turned aside to give her mother's poodle a sweet biscuit.

"Sir Philip is a kind, good fellow," said Mr. Adair, who had not been admitted behind the scenes; "and I am sure that he will do what he can. Do you know his mother yet? No? Ah, she's like an antique chatelaine: one of the stateliest, handsomest old ladies of the day. Is she not, Caroline?"

"She is very handsome," said Lady Caroline, quietly, "but difficult to get on with. She is the proudest woman I ever knew."

The servants were out of the room, or she would not have said so much. But it was just as well to let this presuming girl know what she might expect from Sir Philip's mother if she had any designs upon him. Unfortunately her intended warning fell unheeded upon Janetta's ear.

"Is she, indeed?" said Mr. Adair, with interest. He was the greatest gossip of the neighborhood. "She is one of the Beauchamps, and of course she has some pride of family. But otherwise—I never noticed much pride about her. Now, how does it manifest itself, do you think?"

"Really, Reginald," said Lady Caroline, with her little smile; "how can I tell you? You must surely have noticed it for yourself. With her equals she is exceedingly pleasant; but I never knew anyone who could repress insolence or presumption with a firmer hand."

"What a pleasant person!" said Mr. Adair, laughing and looking mirthfully at Margaret. "We shall have to be on our good behavior when we see her, shall we not, my Pearl?"

This turn of conversation seemed to Lady Caroline so unfortunate that she rose from the table as soon as possible, and adjourned further discussion of the Ashleys to another period. And it was after luncheon that she found occasion to say to Janetta, in her softiest, silkiest tones—

"Perhaps it would be better, dear Miss Colwyn, if you would be so very kind as not to mention Sir Philip Ashley to Margaret unless she speaks of him to you. There is some slight misunderstanding between them, and Sir Philip has not been here for a day or two; but that it will be all cleared up very shortly, I have not the slightest doubt."

"Oh, I am sure I hope so! I am very sorry."

"There is scarcely any occasion to be sorry; it is quite a temporary estrangement, I am sure."

Janetta looked at Margaret with some concern when she had an opportunity of seeing her closely and alone, but she could distinguish no shade upon the girl's fair brow, no sadness in her even tones. Margaret talked about Janetta's brothers and sisters, about music, about her recent visits, as calmly as if she had not a care in the world. It was almost a surprise to Janetta when, after a little pause, she asked with some hesitation—

"You said you saw Sir Philip Ashley the other day?"

"Yes," answered Janetta, blushing out of sympathy, and looking away, so that she did not see the momentary glance of keen inquiry which was leveled at her from Margaret's hazel eyes.

"What did he say to you, dear?" asked Miss Adair.

"He spoke of my father—he was very kind," said Janetta, unconscious that her answer sounded like a subterfuge in her friend's ears. "He asked me if I wanted pupils; and he said that he would recommend me."

"Oh," said Margaret. Then, after another little pause—"I daresay you have heard that we are not friends now?"

"Yes," Janetta replied, not liking to say more.

For a moment Margaret raised her beautiful eyebrows.

"So Sir Philip had told her already!" she said to herself, with a little surprise. And she was not pleased with this mark of confidence on Sir Philip's part. It did not occur to her that Lady Caroline had been Janetta's informant.

"I refused him," she said, quietly. "Mamma is vexed about it, but she does not wish to force me to marry against my will, of course."

"Oh, but surely, Margaret, dear, you will change your mind?" said Janetta.

"No, indeed," Margaret answered, slightly lifting her graceful head. "Sir Philip is not a man whom I would ever marry."

And then she changed the subject. "See what a dear little piano I have in my sitting-room. Papa gave it to me the other day, so that I need not practice in the drawing-room. And what about our singing lessons, Janetta? Could you begin them at once, or would you rather wait until after the Christmas holidays?"

Janetta reflected. "I should like to begin them at once, dear, if I can manage it."

"Have you so many pupils, then?" Margaret asked quickly.

"Not so very many; but I mean—I am afraid I cannot spare time to come to Helmsley Court to give them. Do you go to Beaminster? Would you very much mind coming to our house in Gwynne Street?"

"Not at all," said Margaret, ever courteous and mindful of her friend's feelings. "But I must speak to mamma. It may be a little difficult to have the horses out sometimes ... that will be the only objection, I think."

But it seemed as if there were other objections. For Lady Caroline received the proposition very coldly. It really took her aback.. It was one thing to have little Miss Colwyn to lunch once a week, and quite another to send Margaret to that shabby little house in Gywnne Street. "Who knows whether the drains are all right, and whether she may not get typhoid fever?" said Lady Caroline to herself, with a shudder. "There are children in the house—they may develop measles or chicken-pox at any moment—you never know when children of that class are free from infection. And I heard an odd report about Mrs. Colwyn's habits the other day. Oh, I think it is too great a risk."

But when she said as much after Janetta's departure, she found Margaret for once recalcitrant. Margaret had her own views of propriety, and these were quite as firmly grounded as those of Lady Caroline. She had treated Janetta, she considered, with the greatest magnanimity, and she meant to be magnanimous to the end. She had made the gardener cut Miss Colwyn a basket of his best flowers and his choicest forced fruit; she had herself directed the housekeeper to see that some game was placed under the coachman's box when Miss Colwyn was driven home; and she had sent a box of French sweets to Tiny, although she had never seen that young lady in her life, and had a vague objection to all Janetta's relations. She felt, therefore, perfectly sure that she had done her duty, and she was not to be turned aside from the path of right.

"I don't think that I shall run into any danger, mamma," she said, quietly. "The children are to be kept out of the way, and I shall see nobody but Janetta. She said so, very particularly. I daresay she thought of these things."

"I don't see why she should not come here."

"No, nor I. But she says that she has so much to do."

"Then it could not be true that she had no pupils, as she told Sir Philip," said Lady Caroline, looking at her daughter.

Margaret was silent for a little time. Then she said, very deliberately—

"I am almost afraid, mamma, that Janetta is not quite straightforward."

"That was always my own idea," said Lady Caroline, rather eagerly. "I never quite trusted her, darling."

"We always used to think her so truthful and courageous," said Margaret, with regret. "But I am afraid——You know, mamma, I asked her what Sir Philip said to her, and she did not say a single word about having talked to him of our leaving Miss Polehampton's. She said he had spoken of her father, and of getting pupils for her, and so on."

"Very double-faced!" commented Lady Caroline.

"And—mamma, she must have seen Sir Philip again, because he had told her that we—that I—that we had quarreled a little, you know." And Margaret really believed that she was speaking the truth.

"I think it is quite shocking," said Lady Caroline. "And I really do not understand, dearest, why you still persist in your infatuation for her. You could drop her easily now, on the excuse that you cannot go to Beaminster so often."

"Yes, I know I could, mamma," said Margaret, quietly. "But if you do not mind, I would rather not do so. You see, she is really in rather difficult circumstances. Her father has left them badly off, I suppose, and she has not many advanced pupils in Beaminster. We always promised that she should give me lessons; and if we draw back now, we may be doing her real harm; but if I take—say, a dozen lessons, we shall be giving her a recommendation, which, no doubt, will do her a great deal of good. And after that, when she is 'floated,' we can easily drop her if we wish. But it would be hardly kind to do it just now, do you think?"

"My darling, you are quite too sweet," said Lady Caroline, languidly. "Come and kiss me. You shall have your way—until Easter, at any rate."

"We should be giving Sir Philip no reason to blame us for want of generosity, either," said Margaret.

"Exactly, my pet."

There was again a silence, which Margaret broke at last by saying, with gentle pensiveness—

"Do you think that she will ask me to be her bridesmaid, mamma, if she marries Sir Philip? I almost fancy that I should decline."

"I should think that you would," said Lady Caroline.

Margaret's presents of fruit, flowers, and game conciliated Mrs. Colwyn's good-will, and she made no objection when Janetta informed her a few days later that Miss Adair's singing lessons were about to begin. There was time for two lessons only before Christmas Day, but they were to be continued after the first week in the New Year until Margaret went to town. Janetta was obliged, out of sheer shame, to hide from Mrs. Colwyn the fact that Lady Caroline had tried to persuade her to lower the already very moderate terms of payment, on the ground that her daughter would have to visit Gwynne Street for her lessons.

However, the first lesson passed off well enough. Margaret brought more gifts of flowers and game, and submitted gracefully to Janetta's instructions. There was no time for conversation, for the carriage came punctually when an hour had elapsed, and Margaret, as she dutifully observed, did not like to keep the horses waiting. She embraced Janetta very affectionately at parting, and was able to assure Lady Caroline afterwards that she had not seen any other member of the family.

Just as Miss Adair's carriage drove away from Mrs. Colwyn's door, another—a brougham this time—was driven up. "The Colwyns must be having a party," said a rather censorious neighbor, who was sitting with a friend in the bow-window of the next house. "Or else they are having very fine pupils indeed." "That's not a pupil," said her companion, craning forward to get a better view of the visitor; "that's Lady Ashley, Sir Philip Ashley's mother. What's she come for, I wonder?"

Janetta wondered too.

She was greatly impressed by Lady Ashley's personality. The lofty forehead, the aquiline nose, the well-marked eyebrows, the decided chin, the fine dark eyes, all recalled Sir Philip to her mind, and she said to herself that when his hair became silvery too, the likeness between him and his mother would be more striking still. The old lady's dignified manner did not daunt her as Lady Caroline's caressing tones often did. There was a sincerity, a grave gentleness in Lady Ashley's way of speaking which Janetta thoroughly appreciated. "Lady Ashley is a true grande dame, while Lady Caroline is only a fine lady," she said to herself, when analyzing her feelings afterwards. "And I know which I like best."

Lady Ashley, on her side, was pleased with Janetta's demeanor. She liked the plainness of her dress, the quiet independence of her manner, and the subdued fire of her great dark eyes. She opened proceedings in a very friendly way.

"My son has interested me in your career, Miss Colwyn," she said, "and I have taken the liberty of calling in order to ask what sort of teaching you are willing to undertake. I may hear of some that will suit you."

"You are very kind," Janetta answered. "I was music governess at Miss Polehampton's, and I think that music is my strong point; but I should be quite willing to teach other things—if I could get any pupils."

"And how is it that you do not get any pupils?"

Janetta hesitated, but a look into the old lady's benevolent face invited confidence. She answered steadily—

"I am afraid that my sudden departure from Miss Polehampton's school has prejudiced some people against me."

"And could not somebody write to Miss Polehampton and get her to give you a testimonial?"

"I am afraid she would refuse."

"And that is all Margaret Adair's fault, is it not?" said Lady Ashley, shrewdly but kindly.

She was amused to see the flush of indignation in Janetta's face. "Margaret's fault? Oh no, Lady Ashley. It was not Margaret's fault any more than mine. We were both not very—not very respectful, perhaps, but I was, if anything, much worse than Margaret. And she shared my fate with me; she left when I did."

"You are a staunch friend, I see. And are you friendly with her still?"

"Oh yes," said Janetta, with enthusiasm. "She is so good—so kind—so beautiful! She has been here to-day to have a singing lesson—perhaps you saw her drive away just as you came up? She brought me these lovely flowers this afternoon."

There was a kindly look in Lady Ashley's eyes.

"I am very glad to hear it," she said. "And now, my dear, would you mind singing me something? I shall be better able to speak of your qualifications when I have heard you."

"I shall be very pleased to sing to you," said Janetta, and she sat down to the piano with a readiness which charmed Lady Ashley as much as the song she sang, although she sang it delightfully.

"That is very nice—very nice indeed," murmured Lady Ashley. Then she deliberated for a moment, and nodded her head once or twice. "You have been well taught," she said, "and you have a very sympathetic voice. Would you mind singing at an evening party for me in the course of the winter? You will be seen and heard; and you may get pupils in that way."

Janetta could but falter out a word of thanks. An introduction of this sort was certainly not to be despised.

"I will let you know when it takes place," said Lady Ashley, "and give you a hint or two about the songs. Will two guineas an evening satisfy you as you are a beginner?—for two songs, I mean? Very well, then, I shall count upon you for my next evening party."

She was rising to go, when the door was suddenly thrown open, and a tall, untidy figure made its appearance in the aperture. The daylight had almost faded, and the fire gave a very uncertain light—perhaps it was for that reason that Mrs. Colwyn took no notice of Lady Ashley, and began to speak in a thick, broken voice.

"It's shameful, shameful!" she said. "Visitors all afternoon—never brought them—t'see me—once. Singing and squalling all the time—not able to get a wink—wink o' sleep——"

"Oh, please, come away," said Janetta, going hurriedly up to the swaying figure in the faded dressing-gown, and trying gently to force her backwards. "I will tell you all about it afterwards; please come away just now."

"I'll not come away," said Mrs. Colwyn, thickly. "I want some money—money—send Ph[oe]be for a drop o' gin——"

"I'll go, my dear Miss Colwyn," said Lady Ashley, kindly. She was touched by the despair in Janetta's face. "I can't do any good, I am afraid. You shall hear from me again. Don't come to the door. Shall I send my servants to you?"

"Who's that? Who's that?" screamed the half-maddened woman, beginning to fling herself wildly out of Janetta's restraining arms. "Let me get at her, you bad girl! letting people into my house——"

"Can you manage? Do you want help?" said Lady Ashley, quickly.

"No, no, nothing; I can manage if you will only please go," Janetta cried, in her desperation. And Lady Ashley, seeing that her departure was really wished for, hurried from the house. And Janetta, after some wrestling and coaxing and argument, at last succeeded in putting her stepmother to bed, and then sat down and wept heartily.

What would Lady Ashley think? And how could she now recommend pupils to go to a house where a drunken woman was liable at any moment to appear upon the scene?

As a matter of fact, this was just what Lady Ashley was saying at that moment to her son.

"She is a thorough little gentlewoman, Philip, and a good musician; but, with such a connection, how can I send any one to the house?"

"It was unlucky, certainly," said Sir Philip, "but you must remember that you came unexpectedly. Her pupils' hours will be guarded, most probably, from interruption."

"One could never be sure. I have been thinking of sending Miss Bevan to her. But suppose a contretemps of this kind occurred! Poor Mary Bevan would never get over it."

"It is her stepmother, not her own mother," said Sir Philip, after a little pause. "Not that that makes it much better for her, poor little thing!"

"I assure you, Philip, it went to my heart to see that fragile girl struggling with that big woman. I would have helped her, but she entreated me to go, and so I came away. What else could I do?"

"Nothing, I suppose. There may be murder committed in that house any day, if this state of things goes on."

Lady Ashley sighed. Sir Philip walked about the room, with his hands in his pockets and his head bent on his breast.

"Margaret Adair had been there to-day," said his mother, watching him.

Sir Philip looked up.

"Why?" he said, keenly.

"To take a singing lesson. She had brought flowers. Miss Colwyn spoke of her very warmly, and when I touched on the subject of Miss Polehampton's treatment, would not allow that Margaret had anything to do with it. She is a very faithful little person, I should think."

"Far more generous than Margaret," muttered her son. Then, sombrely, "I never told you what happened at Helmsley Court the other day. Margaret refused me."

"Refused you—entirely?"

"No appeal possible."

"On what grounds?"

"Chiefly, I think, because I wanted her to make reparation to Miss Colwyn."

"Then, Philip, she is not worthy of you."

"She has had a bad training," he said, slowly. "A fine nature ruined by indulgence and luxury. She has never been crossed in her life."

"She will find out what it is to be crossed some day. My poor Phil! I am very sorry."

"We need not talk about it, mother, dear. You will be all in all to me now."

He sat down beside her, and took her hand in his, then kissed it with a mingling of tenderness and respect which brought the tears to Lady Ashley's eyes.

"But I do not want to be all in all to you, you foolish boy," she assured him. "I want to see you with a wife, with children of your own, with family ties and interests and delights."

"Not yet, mother," he answered in a low tone. "Some day, perhaps."

And from the pained look in his dark eyes she saw that he suffered more than he would have liked to own for the loss of Margaret. She said no more, but her heart ached for her boy, and she was hardly able to comfort herself with the recollection that Time heals all wounds—even those that have been made by Love.

Sir Philip had accepted Margaret's refusal as final. He had no reason to hope that she would ever change her mind towards him. Perhaps if he had known how large a part of her thoughts he occupied, in spite of her declaration that she did not like him, he might have had some hope of a more favorable hearing in the future. But he had no conception of any under-current of feeling in Margaret Adair. She had always seemed to him so frank, with a sweet, maidenly frankness, so transparent—without shallowness, that he was thrown into despair when she dismissed him. He was singularly ignorant of the nature of women, and more especially of young girls. His mother's proud, upright, rather inflexible character, conjoined with great warmth of affection and rare nobility of mind, had given him a high standard by which to judge other women. He had never had a sister, and was not particularly observant of young girls. It was therefore a greater disappointment to him than it would have been to many men to find that Margaret could be a little bit obstinate, a little bit selfish, and not at all disposed to sacrifice herself for others. She lowered his whole conception of womankind.

At least, so he said to himself, as he sat that evening after dinner over his library fire, and fell into a mood of somewhat sombre hue. What poets and philosophers had said of the changeful, capricious, shallow, and selfish nature of women was then true? His mother was a grand exception to the rule, 'twas true; but there were no women like her now. These modern girls thought of nothing but luxury, comfort, self-indulgence. They had no high ideals, no thought of the seriousness of life.

But even as he made his hot accusation against women of the present day, his heart smote him a little for his injustice. He certainly did know one girl who was eminently faithful and true; who worked hard, and, as he had just found out, suffered greatly—a girl whose true nobility of mind and life was revealed to him as if by a lightning flash of intuition.

What a helpmate Janetta Colwyn would be to any man! Her bright intelligence, her gift of song, her piquante, transitory beauty, her honesty and faithfulness, made up an individuality of distinct attractiveness. And yet he was not very much attracted. He admired her, he respected her; but his pulses did not quicken at the thought of her as they quickened when he thought of Margaret. Why should they indeed? She was a country surgeon's daughter, of no particular family; she had very undesirable connections, and she was very poor—there was nothing in Janetta's outer circumstances to make her a fitting wife for him. And yet the attraction of character was very great. He wanted a wife who would be above all things able to help him in his work—work of reform and of philanthropy: a selfish, luxurious, indolent woman could be no mate for him. Janetta Colwyn was the woman that he had been seeking since first he thought of marriage; and yet—ah, there was nothing wrong with her except that she was not Margaret. But of Margaret he must think no more.

Lady Ashley would have been very much astonished if she had known how far her idolized son had gone that night along the road of a resolution to ask Janetta Colwyn to be his wife.

Janetta scarcely expected to hear from Lady Ashley again, and was not surprised that days and weeks passed on in silence as regarded her engagement to sing at the evening party. She did not reflect that Christmas brought its own special duties and festivities, and that she was not likely to be wanted until these were over. In the meantime, the holidays began, and she had to prepare as best she could, though with a heavy heart, for the homecoming of her brothers and sisters. There was very little to "keep Christmas" upon; and she could not but be grateful when her scanty store was enlarged by gifts from the Adairs, and also (to her great astonishment) from Sir Philip Ashley and from Wyvis Brand.

"Game, of course!" said Nora, whom she told of these windfalls on the first night of the sisters' arrival from their school. "Well, I'm not sorry: we don't often have grouse and woodcock at the luxurious table of Miss Peacock & Co.; but from three people at once! it will surely be monotonous."

"Don't be ridiculous, Nora. Lady Caroline has sent me a turkey, and the Brands have presented us with fowls and a side of home-cured bacon—very acceptable too, I can tell you! It is only Sir Philip who has sent game."

"Ah, he is the fine gentleman of them all," said Nora, whose spirits were high in spite of the depression that occasionally overcast the whole family when they remembered that this Christmas would be spent without their father's loving presence in their home. "The others are commonplace! Have they been here lately?"

"Wyvis Brand called when I was out, and did not come in. Mrs. Brand has been."

"Not the other one—Cuthbert?" said Nora, with great carelessness.

"No. I think he has been in Paris."

"And haven't you been there at all?"

"I couldn't go, Nora. I have been too busy. Besides—there is something that I must tell you—I wish I could put it off, but I want you to help me."

The two girls were in their bedroom, and in the darkness and stillness of the night Janetta put her arms round Nora's neck and told her of her mother's besetting weakness. She was surprised and almost alarmed at the effect upon her stepsister. Nora shuddered two or three times and drew several painful breaths; but she did not cry, and Janetta had expected an agony of tears. It was in a low, strained voice that the girl said at last—

"You say you have tried to hide it. Even if you have succeeded, it is not a thing that can be hidden long. Everybody will soon know. And it will go on from bad to worse. And—oh, Janetta, she is not your own mother, but she is mine!"

And then she burst at last into the fit of weeping for which Janetta had been waiting. But it was more piteous than violent, and she seemed to listen while Janetta tried to comfort her, and passively endured rather than returned the elder sister's caresses. Finally the two girls fell asleep in each other's arms.

The effect upon Nora of this communication was very marked. She looked pale and miserable for the next few days, and was irritable when her depression was remarked. For the children's sakes, Janetta tried to make a few mild festivities possible: she had a tiny Christmas tree in the back dining-room, and a private entertainment of snapdragon on Christmas Eve; and on Christmas Day afternoon the younger ones roasted chestnuts in the kitchen and listened to the tales that nobody could tell half so well as "dear old Janet." But Mrs. Colwyn openly lamented the hard-heartedness thus displayed, and locked herself into her bedroom with (Janetta feared) some private stores of her own; and Nora refused to join the subdued joviality in the kitchen, and spent the afternoon over a novel in the front sitting-room. From the state of her eyes and her handkerchief at tea-time, however, Janetta conjectured that she had been crying for the greater part of the time.

It was useless to remonstrate with Mrs. Colwyn, but Janetta thought that something might be done with her daughter. When Nora's depression of spirits had lasted for some days, Janetta spoke out.

"Nora," she said, "I told you of our trouble, because I thought that you would help me to bear it; but you are making things worse instead of better."

"What do you mean?" asked Nora.

"It is no use fretting over what cannot be helped, dear. If we are careful we can do much to lessen the danger and the misery of it all. Mamma has been much better lately: there has been nothing—no outbreak—since Lady Ashley came. It is possible that things may be better. But we must keep home cheerful, dear Nora: it does nobody any good for you and me to look miserable."

"But I feel so miserable," said Nora, beginning to cry again.

"And is that the only thing we have to think of?" demanded Janetta, with severity.

"She is not your mother," murmured the girl.

"I know that, darling, but I have felt the trouble of it as much as I think you can do."

"That is impossible!" said Nora, sitting up, and pushing back the disheveled blonde curls from her flushed face—she had been lying on her bed when Janetta found her and remonstrated; "quite impossible. Because you are not of her blood, not of her kith and kin: and for me—for all of us—it is worse, because people can always point to us, and say, 'The taint is in their veins: their mother drank—they may drink, too, one day,' and we shall be always under a ban!"

Janetta was struck by the fact that Nora looked at the matter entirely from her own point of view—that very little affection for her mother was mingled with the shame and the disgrace that she felt. Mrs. Colwyn had never gained her children's respect; and when the days of babyhood were over she had not retained their love. Nora was hurt, indignant, ashamed; but she shrank from her mother more than she pitied her.

"What do you mean by 'under a ban?'" Janetta asked, after a little silence.

Nora colored hotly.

"I mean," she said, looking down and fingering her dress nervously; "I mean—that—if any of us wanted to get married——"

Janetta laughed a little. "Hadn't we better wait until the opportunity arises" she said, half-satirically, half affectionately.

"Oh, you don't know!" exclaimed Nora, giving her shoulders a little impatient twist. "I may have had the opportunity already, for all you know!"

Janetta's tone changed instantly. "Nora, dear, have you anything of that sort to tell me? Won't you trust me?"

"Oh, there's nothing to tell. It's only—Cuthbert."

"Cuthbert Brand! Nora! what do you know of him?"

"Didn't you know?" said Nora, demurely. "He teaches drawing at Mrs. Smith's school."

"Teaches—but, Nora, why does he teach?"

"He is an artist: I suppose he likes it."

"How long has he been teaching there?"

"Soon after I went first," said Nora, casting down her eyes. There was a little smile upon her face, as though she were not at all displeased at the confession. But a cold chill crept into Janetta's heart.

"Has it been a scheme—a plot, then? Did you suggest to him that he should come—and pretend that he was a stranger."

"Oh, Janetta, don't look so solemn! No, I did not suggest it. He met me one day when I was out with Georgie shopping, and he walked with us for a little way and found out where we lived, and all about us. And then I heard from Mrs. Smith that she had arranged with him to teach drawing to the girls. She did not know who he was, except that he had all sorts of medals and certificates and things, and that he had exhibited in the Royal Academy."

"And you did not say to her openly that he was a connection of yours?"

"He isn't," said Nora, petulantly. "He is your connection, not mine. There was no use in saying anything, only Georgie used to giggle so dreadfully when he came near her that I was always afraid we should be found out."

"You might at least have left Georgie out of your plot," said Janetta, who was very deeply grieved at Nora's revelations. "I always thought that she was straightforward."

"You needn't be so hard on us, Janetta," murmured Nora. "I'm sure we did not mean to be anything but straightforward."

"It was not straightforward to conceal your acquaintance with Mr. Cuthbert Brand from Mrs. Smith. Especially," said Janetta, looking steadily at her sister, "if you had any idea he came there to see you."

She seemed to wait for an answer, and Nora felt obliged to respond.

"He never said so. But, of course"—with a little pout—"Georgie and I knew quite well. He used to send me lovely flowers by post—he did not write to me, but I knew where they came from, for he would sometimes put his initials inside the lid; and he always looked at my drawings a great deal more than the others—and he—he looked at me too, Janetta, and you need not be so unbelieving."

There was such a curious little touch of Mrs. Colwyn's irritability in Nora's manner at that moment that Janetta stood and looked at her without replying, conscious only of a great sinking at the heart. Vain, affected, irresponsible, childish!—were all these qualities to appear in Nora, as they had already appeared in her mother, to lead her to destruction? Mr. Colwyn's word of warning with respect to Nora flashed into her mind. She brought herself to say at last, with dry lips—

"This must not go on."

Nora was up in arms in a moment. "What must not go on? There is nothing to stop. We have done nothing wrong!"

"Perhaps not," said Janetta, slowly. "Perhaps there is nothing worse than childish folly and deceit on your part, but I think that Mr. Cuthbert Brand is not acting in an honorable manner at all. Either you must put a stop to it, Nora, or I shall."

"What can I do, I should like to know?"

"You had better tell Mrs. Smith," said the elder sister, "that Mr. Brand is a second-cousin of mine. That the connection was so distant that you had not thought of mentioning it until I pointed out to you that you ought to do so, and that you hope she will pardon you for what will certainly seem to her very underhand conduct."

Nora shrank a little. "Oh, I can't do that, Janetta: I really can't. She would be so angry!"

"There is another way, then: you must tell Cuthbert Brand not to send you any more flowers, and ask him to give no more drawing lessons at that school."

"Oh, Janetta, I can't. He has never said that he came to see me, and it would look as if I thought——"

"What you do think in your heart," said Janetta. Then, thinking that she had been a little brutal, she added, more gently—"But there is perhaps no need to decide to-day or to-morrow what we are to do. We can think over it and see if there is a better way. All that I am determined upon is that your doings must be fair and open."

"And you won't speak to anybody else about it, will you?" said Nora, rather relieved by this respite, and hoping to elude Janetta's vigilance still.

"I shall promise nothing," Janetta answered. "I must think about it."

She turned to leave the room, but was arrested by a burst of sobbing and a piteous appeal.

"You are very unkind, Janetta. I thought that you would have sympathized."

Janetta stood still and sighed. "I don't know what to say, Nora," she said.

"You are very cold—very hard. You do not care one bit what I feel."

Perhaps, thought Janetta, the reproach had some truth in it. At any rate she went quietly out of the room and closed the door, leaving Nora to cry as long and as heartily as she pleased.

The elder sister went straight to Georgie. That young person, frank and boisterous by nature, was not given to deceit, and, although she was reluctant at first to betray Nora's confidence, she soon acknowledged that it was a relief to her to speak the truth and the whole truth to Janetta. Her account tallied in the main with the one given by Nora. There did not seem to have been more than a little concealment, a little flirting, a little folly; but Janetta was aghast to think of the extent to which Nora might have been compromised, and indignant at Cuthbert Brand's culpable thoughtlessness—if it was nothing worse.

"What people have said of the Brands is true," she declared vehemently to herself. "They work mischief wherever they go; they have no goodness, no pity, no feeling of right and wrong. I thought that Cuthbert looked good, but he is no better than the others, and there is nothing to be hoped from any of them. And father told me to take care of his children—and I promised. What can I do? His 'faithful Janetta' cannot leave them to take their own way—to go to ruin if they please! Oh, my poor Nora! You did not mean any harm, and perhaps I was hard on you!"

She relieved herself by a few quiet but bitter tears; and then she was forced to leave the consideration of the matter for the present, as there were many household duties to attend to which nobody could manage but herself.

When she was again able to consider the matter, however, she began to make up her mind that she must act boldly and promptly if she meant to act at all. Nora had no father, and practically no mother: Janetta must be both at once, if she would fulfil her ideal of duty. And by degrees a plan of action formed itself in her mind. She would go to the Brands' house, and ask for Cuthbert himself. Certainly she had heard that he was in Paris, but surely he would have returned by this time—for New Year's Day if not for Christmas Day! She would see him and ask him to forbear—ask him not to send flowers to her little sister, who was too young for such attentions—to herself Janetta added, "and too silly." He could be only amusing himself—and he should not amuse himself at Nora's expense. He had a nice face, too, she could not help reflecting, he did not look like a man who would do a wanton injury to a fatherless girl. Perhaps, after all, there was some mistake.

And if she could not see him, she would see Mrs. Brand. The mother would, no doubt, help her: she had been always kind. Of Wyvis Brand she scarcely thought. She hoped that she might not see him—she had never spoken to him, she remembered, since the day when he had asked her to be his friend.

She did not say a word to Nora about her scheme. The next day—it was the third of January, as she afterwards remembered—was bright and clear, a good day for walking. She told her sisters that she had business abroad, and gave them the directions respecting the care of their house and their mother that she thought they needed; then set forth to walk briskly from Gwynne Street to the old Red House.

She purposely chose the morning for her expedition. She was not making a call—she was going on business. She did not mean to ask for Mrs. Brand even, first of all; she intended to ask for Mr. Cuthbert Brand. Wyvis would probably be out; but Cuthbert, with his sedentary habits and his slight lameness, was more likely to be at home painting in the brilliant morning light than out of doors.

It was nearly twelve o'clock when she reached her destination. She went through the leafless woods, for that was the shortest way and the pleasantest—although she had thought little of pleasantness when she came out, but still it was good to hear the brittle twigs snap under her feet, and note the slight coating of frost that made the rims of the dead leaves beautiful—and it was hardly a surprise to her to hear a child's laugh ring out on the air at the very spot where, months before, she and Nora had found little Julian Brand. A moment later the boy himself came leaping down the narrow woodland path towards her with a noisy greeting; and then—to Janetta's vexation and dismay—instead of nurse or grandmother, there emerged from among the trees the figure of the child's father, Wyvis Brand. He had a healthier and more cheerful look than when she saw him last: he was in shooting coat and knickerbockers, and he had a gun in his hand and a couple of dogs at his heels. He lifted his hat and smiled, as if suddenly pleased when he saw her, but his face grew grave as he held out his hand. Both thought instinctively of their last meeting at her father's grave, and both hastened into commonplace speech in order to forget it.

"I am glad to see you again. I hope you are coming to our place," he said. And she—

"I hope Mrs. Brand is well. Is she at home?"

"No, she's not," said little Julian, with the frank fearlessness of childhood. "She's gone out for the whole day with Uncle Cuthbert, and father and I are left all by ourselves; and father has let me come out with him; haven't you, father?" He looked proudly at his father, and then at Janetta, while he spoke.

"So it appears," said Wyvis, with a queer little smile.

"Grandmother said I was to take care of father, so I'm doing it," Julian announced. "Father thinks I'm a brave boy now—not a milksop. He said I was a milksop, you know, the last time you came here."

"Come, young man, don't you chatter so much," said his father, with a sort of rough affectionateness, which struck Janetta as something new. "You run on with the dogs, and tell the servants to get some wine or milk or something ready for Miss Colwyn. I'm sure you are tired," he said to her, in a lower tone, with a searching glance at her pale face.

It was hardly fatigue so much as disappointment that made Janetta pale. She had not expected to find both Mrs. Brand and Cuthbert out, and the failure of her plan daunted her a little, for she did not often find it an easy thing to absent herself from home for several hours.

"I am not tired," said Janetta, unsteadily, "but I thought I should find them in—Mrs. Brand, I mean——"

"Did you want to see them—my mother, I mean—particularly?" asked Wyvis, either by accident or intention seeming to parody her words.

"I have not seen her for a long time." Janetta evaded giving a direct answer. "I thought that I should have had a little talk with her. If she is out, I think that I had better turn back."

"You had better rest for a little while," he said. "It is a long walk, and in spite of what you may say, you do look tired. If you have business with my mother, perhaps I may do as well. She generally leaves all her business to me."

"No," said Janetta, with considerable embarrassment of manner. "It is nothing—I can come another time."

He looked at her for a moment as if she puzzled him.

"You have been teaching music in Beaminster, I believe?"

"Yes—and other things."

"May I ask what other things?"

Janetta smiled. "I have a little sister, Tiny," she said, "and I teach her everything she learns. Reading, writing, and arithmetic, you know. And a neighbor's little boy comes in and learns with her."

"I have been wondering," said Wyvis, "whether you would care to do anything with that boy of mine."

"That dear little Julian? Oh, I should be glad," said Janetta, more freely than she had yet spoken. "He is such a sweet little fellow."

"He has a spirit of his own, as you know," said the father, with rather an unwilling smile. "He is not a bad little chap; but he has lately attached himself a good deal to me, and I have to go into the stables and about the land a good deal, and I don't think it's altogether good for him. I found him"—apologetically—"using some very bad language the other day. Oh, you needn't be afraid; he won't do it again; I think I thrashed it out of him—"

"Oh, that's worse!" said Janetta, reproachfully.

"What do you mean?"

"To strike a little fellow like that, when he did not know that what he was saying was wrong! And why did you take him where he would hear language of that kind? Wasn't it more your fault than his?"

Wyvis bent his head and shrugged his shoulders. "If the truth were known, I dare say he heard me use it," he said dryly. "I'm not mealy-mouthed myself. However, I've taught him that he must not do it."

"Have you, indeed? And don't you think that example will prove stronger than precept, or even than thrashing?" said Janetta. "If you want to teach him not to use bad words, you had better not use them yourself, Mr. Brand."

"Mr. Brand?" said Wyvis; "I thought it was to be Cousin Wyvis. But I've disgusted you; no wonder. I told you long ago that I did not know how to bring up a child. I asked you to help us—and you have not been near the place for months."

"How could I help you, if you mean to train him by oaths and blows?" asked Janetta.

"That's plain speaking, at any rate," he said. "Well, I don't mind; in fact, I might say that I like you the better for it, if you'll allow me to go so far. I don't know whether you're right or not. Of course it won't do for him to talk as I do while he's a baby, but later on it won't signify; and a thrashing never did a boy any harm."

"Do you mean that you are in the habit of swearing?" said Janetta, with a direct simplicity, which made Wyvis smile and wince at the same time.

"No, I don't," he said. "I always disliked the habit, and I was determined that Julian shouldn't contract it. But I've lived in a set that was not over particular; and I suppose I fell into their ways now and then."

"Apart from the moral point of view, no gentleman ever does it!" said Janetta, hotly.

"Perhaps not. Perhaps I'm not a gentleman. My relations, the publicans of Roxby, certainly were not. The bad strain in us will out, you see."

"Oh, Cousin Wyvis, I did not mean that," said Janetta, now genuinely distressed. "It is only that—I do wish you would not talk in that way—use those words, I mean. Julian is sure to catch them up, and you see yourself that that would be a pity."

"I am to govern my tongue then for Julian's sake?"

"Yes, and for your own."

"Do you care whether I govern it or not, Janetta?"

How oddly soft and tender his voice had grown!

"Yes, I do care," she answered, not very willingly, but compelled to truthfulness by her own conscience and his constraining gaze.

"Then I swear I will," he exclaimed, impetuously. "It is something to find a woman caring whether one is good or bad, and I won't prove myself utterly unworthy of your care."

"There is your mother: she cares."

"Oh, yes, she cares, poor soul, but she cries over my sins instead of fighting them. Fighting is not her métier, you know. Now, you—you fight well."

"That is a compliment, I suppose?" said Janetta, laughing a little and coloring—not with displeasure—at his tone.

"Yes," he said; "I like the fighting spirit."

They had been walking slowly along the path, and now they had reached the gate that opened into the grounds. Here, as he opened it, Janetta hesitated, and then stopped short.

"I think I had better make the best of my way back," she said. "It is getting late."

"Not much after twelve. Are we not friends again?"

"Oh yes."

"And will you think over what I said about my boy?"

"Do you really mean it?"

"Most decidedly. You couldn't come here, I suppose—you wouldn't leave home?"

"No, I could not do that. How would he get to me every day?"

"I would bring him myself, or send him in the dog-cart. I or my brother would look after that." Then, seeing a sudden look of protest in Janetta's face, he added quickly—"You don't like that?"

"It is nothing," said Janetta, looking down.

"Is it to me or to my brother that you object?"

He smiled as he spoke, but, a little to his surprise, Janetta kept silence, and did not smile. Wyvis Brand was a man of very quick perceptions, and he saw at once that if she seemed troubled she had a reason for it.

"Has Cuthbert offended you?" he asked.

"I have only spoken to him once—four months ago."

"That is no answer. What has he been about? I have some idea, you know," said Wyvis, coolly, "because I came across some sketches of his which betrayed where his thoughts were straying. Your pretty sister quite captivated him, I believe. Has he been getting up a flirtation?"

"I suppose it is a joke to him and to you," said Janetta, almost passionately, "but it is no joke to us. Yes, I came to speak to him or to your mother about it. Either she must leave the school where she is teaching, or he must let her alone."

"You had better not speak to my mother; it will only worry her. Come in, and tell me about it," said Wyvis, opening the gate, and laying his hand gently on her arm.

She did not resent his tone of mastery. In spite of the many faults and errors that she discerned in him, it always seemed to her that a warmer and finer nature lay below the outside trappings of roughness and coldness than was generally perceptible. And when this better nature came to the front, it brought with it a remembrance of the tie of kinship, and Janetta's heart softened to him at once.

He took her into a room which she guessed to be his own private sanctum—a thoroughly untidy place, littered with books, papers, tools, weapons, gardening implements, pipes and tobacco jars, in fine confusion. He had to clear away a pile of books from a chair before she could sit down. Then he planted himself on a corner of the solid, square oak table in the middle of the room, and prepared to listen to her story. Julian, who interrupted them once, was ordered out of the room again in such a peremptory tone that Janetta was somewhat startled. But really the boy did not seem to mind.

By dint of leading questions he drew from her an outline of the facts of the case, but she softened them, for Nora's sake, as much as possible. She looked at him anxiously when she had done, to see whether he was angry.

"You know," she said, "I don't want to sow dissension of any kind between you."

Wyvis smiled. "I know you don't. But I assure you Cuthbert and I never quarreled in our lives. That is not one of the sins you can lay to my charge. He is a whimsical fellow, and I suspect that this has been one of his freaks—not meaning to hurt anybody. If you leave him to me, I'll stop the drawing-lessons at any rate, and probably the flowers."

"Don't let him think that Nora cares," she said. "She is quite a child—if he had sent her bonbons she would have liked them even better than flowers."

"I understand. I will do my best—as you are so good as to trust me," he answered, lowering his voice.

A little silence fell between them. Something in the tone had made Janetta's heart beat fast. Then there rose up before her—she hardly knew why—the vision of a woman, an imaginary woman, one whom she had never seen—the woman with Julian's eyes, the woman who called herself the wife of Wyvis Brand. The thought had power to bring her to her feet.

"And now I must really go."

"Not yet," he said, smiling down at her with a very kindly look in his stern dark eyes. "Do you know you have given me a great deal of pleasure to-day? You have trusted me to do a commission for you—a delicate bit of work too—and that shows that you don't consider me altogether worthless."

"You may be sure that I do not."

"Yes, we are friends. I have some satisfaction in that thought. Do you know that you are the first woman who has ever made a friend of me? who has ever trusted me, and taught me—for a moment or two—to respect myself? It is the newest sensation I have had for years."

"Not the sensation of respecting yourself, I hope?"

"Yes, indeed. You don't know—you will never know—how I've been handicapped in life. Can you manage to be friendly with me even when I don't do exactly as you approve? You are at liberty to tell me with cousinly frankness what you dislike."

"On that condition we can be friends," said Janetta, smiling and tendering her hand. She meant to say good-bye, but he retained the little hand in his own and went on talking.

"How about the boy? You'll take him for a few hours every day?"

"You really mean it?"

"I do, indeed. Name your own terms."

She blushed a little, but was resolved to be business-like.

"You know I can't afford to do it for nothing," she said. "He can come from ten to one, if you like to give me——" and and then she mentioned a sum which Wyvis thought miserably inadequate.

"Absurd!" he cried. "Double that, and then take him! When can he come?"

"Next week, if you like. But I mean what I say——"

"So do I, and as my will is stronger than yours I shall have my own way."

Janetta shook her head, and, having by this time got her hand free, she managed to say good-bye, and left the house much more cheerfully than she had entered it. Strange to say, she had a curious feeling of trust in Wyvis Brand's promise to help her; it seemed to her that he was a man who would endeavor at all costs to keep his word.

Janetta was hardly surprised when, two days later, she was asked to give a private audience to Mr. Cuthbert Brand. She had not yet told Nora of the course that she had pursued, for she was indeed rather unnecessarily ashamed of it. "It was just like a worldly mamma asking a young man his intentions about her daughter," she said to herself, with a whimsical smile. "Probably nothing will come of it but a cessation of these silly little attentions to Nora." But she felt a little shy and constrained when she entered the drawing-room, and, while shaking hands with her cousin, she did not lift her eyes to his face.

When she had taken a seat, however, and managed to steal a glance at him, she was half-provoked, half-reassured. Cuthbert's mobile face was full of a merry, twinkling humor, and expressed no penitence at all. She was so much astonished that she forgot her shyness, and looked at him inquiringly without opening her lips.

Cuthbert laughed—an irrepressible little laugh, as if he could not help it. "Look here, Cousin Janetta," he said, "I'm awfully sorry, but I really can't help it. The idea of you as a duenna and of Wyvis as a heavy father has been tickling me ever since yesterday, and I shall have to have it out sooner or later. I assure you it's only a nervous affection. If I didn't laugh, I might cry or faint, and that would be worse, you know."

"I don't quite see the joke," said Janetta, gravely.

"The joke," said Cuthbert, "lies in the contrast between yourself and the role you have taken upon you."

"It is a role that I am obliged to take upon me," interposed Janetta; "because my sisters have no father, and a mother whose health makes it impossible for her to guard them as she would like to do."

"Now you're going to be severe," said Cuthbert; "and indeed I am guiltless of anything but a little harmless fooling. I can but tender my humblest apologies, and assure you that I have resigned my post in Mrs. Smith's educational establishment, and that I will keep my flowers in future to myself, unless I may send them with your consent and that of my authoritative elder brother."

Janetta was not mollified. "It is easy for you to talk of it so lightly," she said, "but you forget that you might have involved both my sisters in serious trouble."

"Don't you think I should have been able to get them out again?" said Cuthbert, with all the lightness to which she objected. "Don't you think that I could have pacified the schoolmistress? There is one thing that I must explain. My fancy for teaching was a fad, undertaken for its own sake, which led me accidentally at first to Mrs. Smith's school. I did not know that your sisters were there until I had made my preliminary arrangements."

Janetta flushed deeply, and did not reply. Nora's imagination had been more active than she expected. Cuthbert, who was watching her, saw the flush and the look of surprise, and easily guessed what had passed between the sisters.

"Did you ever read Sheridan's 'Rivals?'" he asked, quietly. "Don't you remember the romantic heroine who insisted on her romance? She would hardly consent to marry a man unless he had a history, and would help her to make one for herself?"

"I don't think that Nora is at all like Lydia Languish."

"Possibly not, in essentials. But she loves romance and mystery and excitement, as Lydia Languish did. It is a very harmless romance that consists in sending a few cut flowers by Parcel Post, Cousin Janetta."

"I know—it sounds very little," Janetta said, "but it may do harm for all that."

"Has it done harm to your sister, then?" Cuthbert inquired, with apparent-innocence, but with the slight twinkle of his eye, which told of inward mirth. Janetta was again growing indignant, and was about to answer rather sharply, when he once more changed his tone. "There," he said, "I have teased you quite enough, haven't I? I have been presuming on our relationship to be as provoking as I could, because—honestly—I thought that you might have trusted me a little more. Now, shall I be serious?"

"If you can," said Janetta.

"That's awfully severe. By nature, I must tell you, I am the most serious, not to say melancholy, person in creation. But on a fine day my spirits run away with me. Now, Janetta—I may call you Janetta, may not I?—I am going to be serious, deadly serious, as serious as if it were a wet day in town. And the communication that I wish to make to you as the head of the family, which you seem to be, is that I am head over ears in love with your sister Nora, and that I beg for the honor of her hand."

"You are joking," said his hearer, reproachfully.

"Never was joking further from my thoughts. Getting married is an exceedingly solemn business, I believe. I want to marry Nora and take her to Paris."

"Oh, this is ridiculous: you can't mean it," said Janetta.

"Why ridiculous? Did I not tell you that I admired Miss Lydia Languish? Her desire for a romance was quite praiseworthy: it is what every woman cherishes in her heart of hearts: only Nora, being more naive and frank and child-like than most women, let me see the desire more clearly than women mostly do. That's why I love her. She is natural and lovable and lovely. Don't tell me that I can't win her heart. I know I may have touched her fancy, but that is not enough. Let me have the chance, and I think that I can go deeper still."

"You said that you would be serious, but you don't know how serious this is to me," said Janetta, the tears rising to her eyes. "My father told me to take care of her: she is very young—and not very wise; and how am I to know whether you mean what you say?"

"I do mean it, indeed!" said Cuthbert, in a much graver tone. "I have got into the habit of talking as if I felt very little—a ridiculous habit, I acknowledge—but, in this matter, I mean it from the bottom of my heart."

"I suppose, then," said Janetta, tremulously, "that you must speak to mamma—and to Nora. I am not at all the head of the house, although you are pleased—in fun—to call me so. I am only Nora's half-sister, fond of her and anxious about her, and ready to do all that I can do for her good."

Cuthbert looked at her intently. Her face was pale, and the black dress that she wore was not altogether becoming to her dark eyes and complexion, but there was something pathetic to him in the weight of care which seemed to sit upon those young brows and bear down the slender shoulders of the girl. The new sensation thus given caused him to say, with sudden earnestness—

"Will you forgive me for having spoken and acted so thoughtlessly? I never meant to cause you so much anxiety. You see, I am not very well acquainted with English ways, and I may have made more mistakes than I knew. When Nora is my wife you shall not have to fear for her happiness."

"You speak very confidently of making her your wife," said Janetta, forgiving him in her heart, nevertheless. "But you have no house—no profession, have you?"

"No income, you mean?" said Cuthbert, with his merry smile. "Oh, yes, I have a profession. It does not pay me quite so well as it might do, but I think I shall do better by-and-bye. Then I have a couple of hundreds a year of my own. Is it too much of a pittance to begin upon?"

"Nora is quite too young to begin upon anything. If only you would leave her alone for a year or two!—till she is a little more staid and sensible!"

"But that's too late, don't you see? That's where my apologies have to come in. I have disturbed the peace already, haven't I?"

"Mr. Brand," said Janetta, gravely, in spite of an exclamation of protest from her cousin, "I don't think that we are going quite deeply enough into the matter. There are one or two things that I must say: there is no one else to say them. Nora is young and foolish, but she is affectionate and sensitive, and if she once cares for you, you may make the happiness or the misery of her life. Our dear father told me to take care of her. And I am not sure that he would have sanctioned her engagement to you."

"I'd better send Wyvis to talk to you," said Cuthbert, starting up and nearly upsetting a chair in his eagerness. "I knew he could manage and—and explain things better than I could. He's well up in the family affairs. Will you see him now?"

"Now?"

"He's outside waiting. He wouldn't come in. I'll go and send him to you. No, don't object: there are ever so many things that you two elders had better talk over together. I must say," said Cuthbert, beginning to laugh again in his light-hearted way, "that, when I think of Wyvis as a family man, bent on seeing his younger brother se ranger, and you as Nora's stern guardian, I am seized with an access of uncontrollable mirth."

He caught up his hat and left the room so quickly that Janetta, taken by surprise, could not stop him. She tried to follow, but she was too late: he had rushed off, leaving the hall-door open, and a draught of cold air was ascending the stairs and causing her stepmother peevishly to remark that Janetta's visitors were really intolerable. "Who was it, this time?" she asked of her second daughter Georgie, who was standing at the window—the mother and her girls being assembled in Mrs. Colwyn's bedroom, her favorite resort on cold afternoons.

Georgie gave a little giggle—her manners were not perfect, in spite of a term at Mrs. Smith's superior seminary for young ladies—and answered, under her breath—

"It was Mr. Cuthbert Brand."

Nora's book fell from her knee. When she picked it up her cheeks were crimson and her eyes were flashing fire.

"Don't be absurd, Georgie. It was not."

"Indeed it was, Nora. I suppose he came to see Janetta, and Janetta has sent him away. Oh, how he's running, although he is a little lame! He has caught some one—his brother, I believe it is; and now the brother's walking back with him."

"I shall go down," said Mrs. Colwyn, with dignity. "It is not at all proper for a young person like Janetta to receive gentlemen alone. I shall go and sit in the drawing-room myself."

"Then Janetta will take her visitors into the dining-room," said Nora, abruptly. "She has only business with these people, mamma: they don't come to visit us because they like us—it is only when they want us to do something for them; so I would not put myself out for them if I were you. And as for Janetta's being young, she is the oldest person amongst us." And then Nora turned to her book, which she held upside down without being at all aware of it.

"I do not know what you mean, Nora," was Mrs. Colwyn's fretful response; "and if the other brother is coming here, I shall certainly not disturb myself, for I believe him to be a wild, dissipated, immoral, young man."

"Just the sort of man for Janet to receive alone," murmured Georgie, maliciously. Georgie was the member of the family who "had a tongue."

Meanwhile Wyvis had come into the house, though without Cuthbert, who had thought it better to disappear into the gathering darkness; and Janetta received him in the hall.

He laughed a little as he took her hand. "Cuthbert is a little impatient, is he not? Well, he has persuaded me into talking this matter over with you. I'm to come in here, am I?" as Janetta silently opened the sitting-room door for him. "This looks pleasant," he added after a moment's pause.

In the gathering evening gloom the shabbiness of the furniture could not be seen, and the fire-light danced playfully over the worn, comfortable-looking chairs drawn up to the hearth, on the holly and mistletoe which decorated the walls, and the great cluster of geranium and Christmas roses which the Adairs had sent to Janetta the day before. Everything looked homelike and comfortable, and perhaps it was no wonder that Wyvis—accustomed to the gloom of his own home, or the garish splendor of a Paris hotel—felt that he was entering a new sphere, or undergoing some new experience.

"Don't light the lamp," he said, in his imperious way: "let us talk in this half-light, if you don't mind? it's pleasanter."

"And easier," said Janetta, softly.

"Easier? Does it need an effort?"

"I am afraid I have something unpleasant to say."

"So have I. We are quits, then. You can begin."

"Your brother has been asking if he maybe engaged to Nora——"

"If he may marry her out of hand, you mean. That's what he wants to do."

"We know very little of him," said Janetta, rather unsteadily, "or of you. Things have been said against you in Beaminster—you have yourself told me things that I did not like—indeed, my father almost warned me against you——"

A murmur from Wyvis Brand sounded uncommonly like "the devil he did!"—but Janetta did not stop to listen.

"I never heard anything but vague generalities against him, but then I never heard anything particularly good. I don't like the way in which he has pursued his acquaintance with Nora. I have no authority with her—not much influence with her mother—and, therefore, I throw myself on you for help," said Janetta, her musical voice taking a pathetically earnest cadence; "and I ask you to beg your brother to wait—to let Nora grow older and know her own mind a little better—to give us the chance of knowing him before he asks to take her away."

"You have not said either of the things that I was expecting to hear," said Wyvis.

"What were those?"

"How much money he had a year!"

"Oh, he told me about that."

"Or—an allusion to his forbears: his father's character and his mother's relations—the two bugbears of Beaminster."

"I think nothing of those, if Cuthbert himself is good."

"Well, he is good. He is as different from me as light is from darkness. He is a little thoughtless and unpractical sometimes, but he is sweet-tempered, honest, true, clean-living, and God-fearing. Will that suit you?"

"If he is all that——"

"He is that and more. We are not effusive, Cuthbert and I, but I think him one of the best fellows in the world. She'll be lucky who gets him, in my opinion."

"All the more reason, then, why I must say a still more unpleasant thing than ever," she replied. "Nora is in great trouble, because she has been told what I have known for some time. Her mother does not always control herself; you know what I mean? She must not marry without telling this—we cannot deceive the man who is to be her husband—he must know the possible disgrace."

"If every woman were as straightforward and honorable as you, Janetta, there would be fewer miserable marriages," said Wyvis, slowly. "You are, no doubt, right to speak; but, on the other hand, our family record is much worse than yours. If one of you can condescend to take one of us, I think we shall have the advantage."

Janetta drew a long breath.

"Then, will you help me in what I ask?"

"Yes, I will. I'll speak to Cuthbert and point out how reasonable you are. Then—you'll let him cultivate your sister's acquaintance, I suppose? In spite of your disclaimers, I believe you are supreme in the house. I wish there were more like you to be supreme, Janetta. I wish—to God I wish—that I had met you—a woman like you—eight years ago."

And before she could realize the meaning of what he had said to her, the man was gone.

Everything was satisfactorily settled. Cuthbert was put on his probation; Nora was instructed in the prospect that lay before her, and was allowed to correspond with her "semi-betrothed," as he insisted on calling himself. Mrs. Colwyn was radiant with reflected glory, for although she despised and hated Mrs. Brand, she was not blind to the advantages that would accrue to herself through connection with a County family. She was not, however, as fully informed in the details of the little love-affair as she imagined herself to be. Janetta's share in bringing about a dénouement and retarding its further development was quite unknown to her. The delay, which some of Mr. Colwyn's old friends urged with great vigor, was ascribed by her chiefly to the hostile influences of Wyvis Brand, and she made a point of being openly uncivil to that gentleman when, on fine mornings, he brought his boy to Gwynne Street or fetched him away on a bright afternoon. For it had been decided that little Julian should not only come every day at ten, but on two days of the week should stay until four o'clock in the afternoon, in order to enjoy the advantages of Tiny's society. He had been living so unchild-like a life of late that Janetta begged to keep him for play as well as for lessons with other children.

Nora went back to her school somewhat sobered by the unexpected turn of events, and rather ashamed of her assumption (dispelled by Janetta) that Cuthbert Brand had given drawing lessons at Mrs. Smith's in order to be near her. Mr. Cuthbert Brand discontinued these lessons, but opened a class in Beaminster at the half-deserted Art School, and made himself popular wherever he went. Janetta was half inclined to doubt the genuineness of his affection for Nora when she heard of his innocent, but quite enthusiastic, flirtations with other girls. But he always solemnly assured her that Nora had his heart, and Nora only; and as long as he made Nora happy Janetta was content. And so the weeks passed on. She had more to do now that Julian came every day, but she got no new music pupils, and she heard nothing about the evening parties at Lady Ashley's. She concluded that Sir Philip and his mother had forgotten her, but such was not the case. There had been a death in the family, and the consequent period of mourning had prevented Lady Ashley from giving any parties—that was all.

For some little time, therefore, Janetta's life seemed likely to flow on in a very peaceful way. Mrs. Colwyn "broke out" only once between Christmas and Easter, and was more penitent and depressed after her outbreak than Janetta had ever seen her. Matters went on more quietly than ever after this event. Easter came, and brought Nora and Georgie home again, and then there was a period of comparative excitement and jollity, for the Brands began to come with much regularity to the little house in Gwynne Street, and there were merry-makings almost every day.

But when the accustomed routine began again, Janetta, in her conscientious way, took herself seriously to task. She had not been governing herself, her thoughts, her time, her temper, as she conceived that it was right for her to do. On reflection, it seemed to her that one person lately filled up the whole of her mental horizon. And this person she was genuinely shocked to find was Wyvis Brand.

Why should she concern herself so much about him? He was married; he had a child; his mother and brother lived with him, and supplied his need of society. He went out into the world about Beaminster more than he used to do, and might have been fairly popular if he had exerted himself, but this he would never do. There were fewer reports current about his bad companions, or his unsteady way of life; and Janetta gathered from various sources that he had entirely abandoned that profane and reckless method of speech for which she had rebuked him. He was improving, certainly. Well, was that any reason why she should think about him so much, or consider his character and his probable fate so earnestly? She saw no reason in it, she told herself; and perhaps she was right.

There was another reason even more potent for making her think of him. He had had an unsatisfactory, troublous sort of life; he had been unfortunate in his domestic relations, and he was most decidedly an unhappy man. Many a woman before Janetta has found reasons of this kind suffice for love of a man. Certainly, in Janetta's case, they formed the basis of a good deal of interest. She told herself that she could not help thinking of him. He came very often, on pretext of bringing or of fetching Julian—especially on the days when Julian stayed until four o'clock, for then he would stray in and sit down to chat with Janetta and her mother until it was sheer incivility not to offer him a cup of tea. Softened by the pleasures of hospitality, Mrs. Colwyn would be quite gracious to him at these times. But now and then she left him to be entertained by Janetta, saying rather sharply that she did not care to meet the man who chose to behave "so brutally to her darling Nora."

So that Janetta got into the way of sitting with him, talking with him on all subjects, of giving him her sage advice when he asked for it, and listening with interest to the stories that he told her of his past life. It was natural that she should think about him a good deal, and about his efforts to straighten the tangled coil of his life, and to make himself a worthier father for his little son than his own father had been to him. There was nothing in the world more likely than this sort of intercourse to bring these two kinsfolk upon terms of closest friendship. And as Janetta indignantly told herself—there was nothing—nothing more.

She always remembered that his wife was living; she never forgot it for a moment. He was, of course, not a man whom she ever thought of loving—she was angry with herself for the very suggestion—but he was certainly a man who interested her more than any one whom she had ever met. And he was interested in her too. He liked to talk to her, to ask her advice and listen to her pet theories. She was friend, comrade, sister, all in one. Nothing more. But the position was, whether they knew it or not, a rather dangerous one, and an innocent friendship might have glided into something closer and more harmful had not an unexpected turn been given to the events of both their lives.

For some time Janetta had seen little of the Adairs. They were very much occupied—visiting and receiving visits—and Margaret's lessons were not persevered in. But one afternoon, shortly after Easter, she called at Mrs. Colwyn's house between three and four, and asked when she might begin again. Before the day was settled, however, they drifted into talk about other things, and Margaret was soon deeply engaged in an account of her presentation at Court.

"I thought you were going to stay in town for the season?" Janetta asked.

Margaret shook her head. "It was so hot and noisy," she murmured. "Papa said the close rooms spoiled my complexion, and I am sure they spoiled my temper!" She smiled bewitchingly as she spoke.

She was charmingly dressed in cream-colored muslin, with a soft silk sash of some nondescript pink hue tied round her waist, and a bunch of roses at her throat to match the Paris flowers in her broad-brimmed, slightly tilted, picturesque straw hat. A wrap for the carriage-fawn-colored, with silk-lining of rose-pink toned by an under-tint of grey—carried out the scheme of color suggested by her dress, and suited her fair complexion admirably. She had thrown this wrap over the back of a chair and removed her hat, so that Janetta might see whether she was altered or not.

"You are just a trifle paler," Janetta confessed.

As a matter of fact there were some tired lines under Margaret's eyes, and a distinct waning of the fresh faint bloom upon her cheek—changes which made of her less the school girl than the woman of the world. And yet, to Janetta's thinking, she was more beautiful than ever, for she was acquiring a little of the dignity given by experience without losing the simple tranquillity of the exquisite child.

"I am a little tired," Margaret said. "One sees so much—one goes to so many places. I sighed for Helmsley Court, and dear mamma brought me home."