Arden smiled, recalling various Regans and Gonerils of his acquaintance; most of whom had talked of their mothers as imbecile, and their fathers as impossible; some of whom indeed had depicted the author of their being as quite the most odious character they had ever encountered; and none of whom believed in any parental virtue except the willingness to write a cheque.

"I wouldn't mind my father being horridly extravagant, if he were not detestably mean," said one.

"I shouldn't complain of his eighteen-penny cigars, if he didn't grumble at every hat I wear," said another.

"I should say nothing about his always being out, if he didn't lead us such a life when he is at home," said a third, who came from Dublin.

And, behold, here was a girl who owned to adoring her parents, and had nothing but praise for them!

Mr. Lorimer was the chief talker during the quarter of an hour after the ladies had gone. He was relating some of his experiences in South America; the revolutions of a week, not without bloodshed; the labour difficulties, the adventures and perils attending the carrying out of a great engineering work in Peru. Arden contrived to move near him, and listened with keen interest. The man was one of nature's gentlemen, strong, straightforward, not the first prosperous man of his race, and not having begun the world with the proverbial half-crown. The primary half-crown had been there two generations back. David Lorimer and David Lorimer's father had been at Winchester and Oxford; but David Lorimer's grandfather came of a race of peasants and Bible Christians, whence the Scriptural name; had trudged to the village day-school with his satchel on his back, and his dinner of bread and bacon in his satchel, and had ended all his schooling at thirteen years of age.

Selby introduced Lorimer to his brother-in-law, as Arden slipped into the empty chair near him.

"I saw you talking to my daughter," the contractor said presently, when he had finished one of his South American stories. "Was she tackling you on one of her pet subjects?"

"We were discussing vegetarianism."

"Oh, that is a trifle. She let you off lightly. It might have been working-girls' clubs, day-nurseries, children's hospitals, old-age pensions. She is as full of philanthropic fads as a provincial newspaper of quack medicines."

"I can imagine that she would care for other people more than for herself."

"Too much, too much. Altruism with her is a passion. But we let her have her own way. It has been a rule with her mother and me to let her do as she likes, ever since she was a baby. But I have watched her like a lynx most of the time; and I have never discovered one unworthy impulse, or one foolish thought; unless it is foolish to worship God and to care for all His creatures. But I am boring you with this talk about my daughter. You see, she is an only child; and her mother and I are a little weak about her."

"You have reason to be proud of her. She is the loveliest girl I have seen for a long time-in all my life, I think."

"Oh, that is only the husk. It is the immortal spark inside that I am proud of. But that's not the way to talk at a dinner-table. Do you see the two novelists over there, nose to nose, talking shop? I'd bet a thousand pounds they are telling each other that, except their own. stories, there hasn't been a good novel written since 'Tom Jones.'"

"Shop is the most delightful talk."

"So it is. I have been telling them my engineering adventures-boring them to death, I dare say; but if there were another civil engineer here, we should want to talk till midnight. Are you going to the duchess's ball? ”

"I shall look in for an hour. I'm sorry Miss Lorimer is not to be there."

"Her mother is sorrier. We are going to put in an appearance, just to show that we are grateful for the card. The duke is one of my best friends, and looks after my interests in the Upper House. But Rachel has set her face against all evening parties this year. She would not have dined here to-night if she were not very much attached to your sister. Lady Mary has gone heart and soul into some of my girl's schemes. You might think she was too fine a

lady to interest herself in an East End crèche; but she is such a many-sided woman."

Arden and his new acquaintance went upstairs together, and strolled through the dazzling suite to the room where Mrs. Lorimer and Mary Selby were sitting.

Lorimer introduced Arden to his wife, with a certain empressement, and presently the conversation turned upon pictures, and upon the great man's gallery in Carlton House Terrace.

"I have heard great praise of your pictures," said Arden.

"You must come and look at them," answered Lorimer. "Very likely you'll be disappointed, and write me down a Philistine. They are all modern. No early Italian masters. Not even a Veronese, or a Titian, or a Rubens. There are four fine Whistlers, six Millais, a Holman Hunt, three of Clara Montalba's Venetian pictures, and some of her London sketches, which I hold no less precious; a lion picture and a dog picture by Briton Riviere, a bit of modern life by Frith, and a 'Return from Egypt' by Frederick Goodall."

"My dear David," remonstrated his wife, "Mr. Arden will find the catalogue in the gallery. You may spare him to-night."

"Come and see my pictures. I should like your opinion of them."

"Indeed, I am no connoisseur."

"Then you are not like most of Lady Mary's friends, who pretend to know more about pictures than the men who paint them."

Oh, the only infallible judges are the men who don't paint," said Arden.

"I am always at home on Saturday afternoons," said Mrs. Lorimer.

"You are very kind. I shall take an early opportunity."

"Do. Saturday is my half-holiday," said Lorimer. "I'll show you Rachel's den, if she's out of the way, and you'll see what a woman of business she is-only nineteen on her last birthday."

"Only nineteen."

Arden thought of the girl in the little back parlour, the

girl of nineteen, whose life was broken off short like the snapped stem of a flower. The flower remained above ground, but withered and faded, colour and perfume gone for ever.

While they were talking, Arden's eyes had wandered to the octagon room, where the two novelists, Mrs. Kelvin and Rachel Lorimer, were carrying on an animated conversation.

The talk was of books, and the widow had in a manner gone to the top of the class, on its being discovered that she had read all the notorious French novels of the last few years, without any prudish restrictions. Mr. Jordan's delicate stories she declared she knew by heart, and owned without a blush to having "devoured” “Femme Funeste."

"When are you going to horrify us again?" she asked, and, without waiting for the Frenchman's answer, turned to the American. "And you, Mr. Jordan? I hope your next is ready for Mudie?"

"It seems ungrateful to complain," murmured Mr. Jordan, smilingly, "but one's readers have an idea that a novelist never has occasion to rest upon his oars and look about him for a subject."

"There are

"He has no occasion," retorted the widow. no subjects in our modern novels; only beautiful words, exquisite phrases, 'jewels five words long,' as Browning says."

"Tennyson," murmured Rachel, involuntarily.

"Ah, then you do read something, Miss Lorimer,” said Jordan, who had been gazing at her in quiet ecstasy.

She had confessed to not knowing his novels, or anybody's novels, except Scott, Dickens, and Thackeray; and he had not been offended. How could any man be offended with such divine beauty? She was a type he had dreamt of, pen in hand, in the stillness of a summer morning, far away among his lakes and mountains. "You do read sometimes?" he repeated.

"I read Tennyson and Browning, my twin stars." "And Shakespeare?"

66

Yes, and Wordsworth, and Coleridge."

"And Shelley?"

"I used to worship Shelley; but his dreams are too vague. I cannot grasp them."

The Frenchman had been careful not to inquire if she had read his books.

"In my country young ladies do not read novels," he said deprecatingly. "That deprives us of an exquisite reward, but affords us a wider liberty. There are, indeed, a few who write for la jeunesse; but, alas, when we are chaste we are intolerably dull. I would recommend mademoiselle to stick to Racine, and Lafontaine's Fables, rather than to bore herself with our virtuous romances."

Mrs. Lorimer summoned her daughter, and the little group scattered itself. Rachel shook hands with the widow, and bowed her good night to the three men; but Arden attended her and her mother to their carriage, which was to convey Rachel to Carlton House Terrace before taking Mr. and Mrs. Lorimer to the ball.

"Don't you repent, even at this last moment, of having refused the best party of the season ?" he asked Rachel. "Not in the least. I have ever so many letters to write before midnight."

"Busy person! You fill me with awe. Good night." "Good night."

His hand sought hers across the carriage door, after shaking hands with her mother, and the slender little gloved hand fluttered into his own for a moment, light as a falling leaf.

He walked to Jermyn Street. His step was buoyant. The June air smelt of Paradise.

Oh, I have been happy! I have been happy!" he said to himself. "My burden has been lifted off. There was no unseen wickedness hovering near me while I was with her."

Life seemed new; his very being had changed. Hope had come back to him, the divine forward-looking spirit which lightens the life that is with the vague sweetness of joys that are to come. Hope had been dead in him since those days in Paris. But now his heart beat high, and he began again to look forward.

He forgot all about the duchess's ball, and spent an hour in the stillness of the Mall, looking up now and then at the