appearance, would seem to have been transplanted from some foreign city. Entering one of them, in which, from the obsequious bows bestowed upon him by the portly, bald-headed landlord, and the brisk French waiter, he seemed to be well known and highly respected, Mr. Heath made his way to a small private room on the first floor, not much larger than a warm bath, but prettily furnished and tastefully decorated, and there issued his orders for the repast; which, he said, might be commenced at once, while the soup and fish were in preparation, with a few hors d'œuvres in the shape of prawns and radishes, and a bottle of Sauterne. A deep draught of the rich, mellow wine, for the glass from which he drank was bell-shaped and thin sent the color mantling again through Captain Studley's bloated face, and brought the light into his bleared and rheumy eyes. "That's good tipple, glorious tipple," he said, smacking his lips as he replaced his empty glass upon the table. "If I could drink that always, I should be a man again. I am not the man I was, sir, when we used to do business together. Age has clutched me in his claw, as I recollect hearing one of them say at one of the penny readings; and I am left alone in the world, at a time when I ought to have my friends and family about me." As he concluded these maundering remarks he shook his head solemnly, and pushed his glass across the table. 'You must not give way in this fashion, Studley," said Heath, filling the glass and returning it to his companion with a pleasant smile. "You know the saying, 'There is life in the old dog yet?'" "Yes," said the captain, after sipping his wine, "that's all deuced fine about the old dog, but the quantity of life in him entirely depends upon the state in which he is kept. Let him have the run of the kitchen, stretched before the fire and fed with the scraps whicy fall from the master's table-the master's table," said the captain, repeating the words as with a dull reminiscence of something that he had heard before, and he will go on all right; but if he is left out to sleep in an old barrel, and only gets dirty bones and such like-well, he will have a very bad time of it. And that's my case, Heath; I am rather in the old-barrel-and-dirty-bone line, I am thinking, and I don't see why I should stand it, sir; and, what's more, I don't intend to." "Here is the soup," said Heath; "we will go into that question by-and-by, when we have got rid of the waiter. Don't put any pepper into it, my good fellow," he continued, lifting up his hand in horror; "the cook would faint if he saw you experimenting with his bonne femme after that fashion." "My palate wants a little exciting, it isn't so keen as it was, and that's the fact," said the captain. "I have often heard about the doctors who tell the poor people to supply themselves with good port wine; but I never appreciated the point of the joke until lately. I ought to live well, I know, and I can't, that's about the truth of it." "I don't see that you have much to complain of, Studley," said Heath, without any anger in his tone; "the allowance which I have hitherto been able to make you is certainly not large, but it ought to be enough to keep you going; and if you keep up your old skill at play—” "But I don't sir," said the captain, interrupting him; "both skill and luck seem to be gone. They have introduced some new games, too, that I do not manage to get hold of as I did of old; and even when there seems to be a decided run of luck I find myself funking in backing the card or the color. Besides, I am too old, and too ill, to be carrying on this sort of game any longer. I don't want to be dependent on the clearness of my head or the steadiness of my hand any more. I want enough to keep me in comfort on the ContinentI have lost all taste for London-with my half bottle of wine for my breakfast, my bottle at dinner, and some hot grog at night. What I get now won't do that, and that's why I wrote to you. You got my letter?" "Oh, yes," said Mr. Heath, through his teeth; "I got your letter." "I thought I would come over myself for the answer, as you were not too quick about it," said the captain. They were half through the dinner by this time, and the empty bottle of Sauterne had been replaced by one of Beaune, which was nearly in the same state as its predecessor. "What have you to say to my proposition?" "I do not clearly recollect what it is in detail," said Heath, with a smile; "but I suppose it may be generally taken as asking for more money. I do not wholly object to that, but my notion is you are arguing on false premises. You seem to take me for a wealthy man ?" "I only echo the general opinion," said Studley; and there cannot be much doubt about it, I should think. The manager of Middleham's bank, besides getting a pretty heavy screw of his own, must be in the way of getting certain information which cannot fail to turn into money." "It is precisely by declining to avail myself of any of the information of which you speak, and rigorously confining myself to my duties at the bank, that I have been able to hold my position, and to secure what is, undoubtedly, a very good salary," said Heath. "Well, but the young lady," muttered the captain, whose voice was gradually becoming indistinct, "the heiress that you are going to marry? Hold on a minute, I have got it here-I am not one to speak without book." He fumbled in his breast-pocket, and after much trouble, from the recesses of a greasy note case, produced a newspaper cutting; then with much difficulty in adjusting a pair of glasses on his nose he read Forthcoming marriage.-We are enabled to state that a marriage has been arranged between Miss Middleham, the heiress whose debut this season has created so great a sensation, and Mr. George Heath, a gentleman who for some years has managed the well-known banking establishment from which the young lady's fortune is derived." "What do you say to that?" "Say, my good friend?" said Heath. "I say that the story is a lie, from beginning to end; that the statement has not the smallest foundation in fact; that some penny-a-lining donkey has learned through the butler, or the kitchen maid, or some other source from which these creatures get their information, that I have been in the habit of seeing a good deal of Miss Middleham which is quite true, having to consult her constantly on matters of business-and has started this idiotic story." "What! do you mean to say that it is not true that you are going to marry Miss Middleham!'' asked the captain, hazily. "No more than that you are going to marry her, my good fellow," said Heath; "and I suppose that is scarcely likely. Do you know what brought me to the Charing-cross station just now? To see Miss Middleham off to Germany, not to escort her there, or take leave of her as a friend or as a lover, as they wish to make out though if I had been her lover, and her affianced lover, I should scarcely have allowed her to go alone. Simply as a matter of business, to see her and her—and her maid, off by the mail train. There is not a word of truth in the report, I tell you." "There does not seem to be," said the captain, shaking his bemuddled head. Then, after a few moments' consideration, he looked up at his com. panion with a stolid glare, and said, "Anyhow that is the future, with which we have nothing to do, sir. My business is with the past, concerning which I shall have certain things to say, which would be found highly interesting in a court of justice." Heath started, but on looking up, he discovered that the captain's head had fallen on his breast, and that he was already in a semi-somnolent state. "Very little wine has an effect upon him now," muttered Heath to himself; "and I suspect it is only when he is in this crazy, muddled state, that he utters threats or thoughts of vengeance. Nevertheless, it will be advisable to get him abroad and keep him there, where his ravings are not so likely to be understood or taken hold of. What a miserable degraded wretch he has become! If his daughter cared but little for him, any filial feeling she might have would probably vanish entirely if she saw him now. Or perhaps the other way," he continued; "merely to find him in such a state of misery and disgrace might soften her heart towards him-women are so perverse, there is no knowing what they may or may not do." He sat there, occupied with his own thoughts for some little time, with his eyes fixed upon the slumbering figure of his companion, listening to the stertorous breathing, and eyeing with scorn the fits of nodding which passed over him, and the contorted postures into which he feil. When the waiter had brought the bill, and received payment, Heath thought it time to arouse the captain from his slumbers-prodding him with his stick, as he might have done to a dog, and telling him sharply to get up and be off. The captain awoke, very much refreshed by the slight nap which he had taken. He had apparently some little difficulty in making out where he was; but recollection, when it came to him, was very full and vivid. "I have had forty winks," he said, yawning and shaking himself, "but they have done me good. A very pleasant dinner, and a very agreeable conversation; so agreeable that I think we omitted to settle anything about the business which we proposed to discuss the question of increasing my allow ance." "It shall be increased," said Heath, shortly; "to what extent I cannot say just now. It is a heavy tax upon me; but I wish you to live in comfort and on the Continent, understand-anywhere out of England. Go back to Ostend, and I will communicate with you at your own lodging. Meantime, here is some money to go on with." He took a ten pound note from his case, and handed it to the old man. As the captain clutched it in his moist palm, and listened to the delicious crisp sound, once so familiar to him, he was nearly relapsing into his maundering state; but he pulled himself together sufficiently to wish his benefactor "Good night," and with a feeble attempt at dignity he tottered off down the street. Even after the retreating figure had fairly passed out of sight, Heath remained standing on the same spot, debating within himself what to do. He had had a hard day of it, and was both physically and mentally weary, and craved for rest; but he knew himself too well to believe that sleep would come to him at once. What he had gone through was of too exciting a character to be easily laid aside, and he doubted whether it would not be better for him to go to the quiet and decorous club to which he belonged, and sit deeper into the night in conversation with some of the acquaintances he was sure to find there, rather than give himself up to thought in his solitary chambers. Finally, however, he came to the resolution that it had to be faced and fought through, and that he had to take immediate decision in regard to his own future-the aspect of which had been so completely altered by the circumstances which had happened during the day just passed. So he turned his face to the north-west, and strode forth in the direction of his home. In selecting his home, Mr. Heath had exercised his usual excellent judgment. With his income he might have lived where he liked; in chambers in the Albany, or a bachelor residence in Mayfair. There were plenty of city men, whose position was nothing like equal to his, who drove away in their broughams, at the conclusion of business hours, and, until they returned again to the hive, were as gay and as useless as any of the drones of West-End society; but Mr. Heath had no purpose to gain by any such exhibition of luxury and ease; he knew, on the contrary, that the less display he made the more highly he would be thought of by those whose good-will it was desirable for him to cultivate, and his own inclination led him to select more modest quarters. He had accordingly taken up his residence in a big rambling block of houses, formerly an Inn of Chancery, but long since unconnected with the law, and let out in chambers to anyone who could give the steward satisfactory references as to his respectability and his rent-paying powers. In the house in which Mr. Heath occupied one portion of the first floor, a queer colony was located. There, at the top of the last steep flight of stairs, was the story occupied by Mr. Crosshatch, the engraver, where the patient man and his assistants sat hour after hour, working away under the shaded lights. There the Nova Zembla Consols Tin Mining Company had its office, the destinies of which were presided over by an old man in a mangy sealskin waistcoat, who looked as if he knew nothing of tin in any shape, and a boy, whose sole occupation appeared to be to write his name on the ink-stained desk, and to smear it out again with his elbow. There, Messrs. Minchin and Minus, solicitors of the highest respectability, carried on their business; and thence Mr. Plandagenet Bouverie, army agent and diamond merchant, otherwise Ezra Moss, bankrupt baked potato salesman, issued his polite circulars to noblemen and gentlemen, offering at once to advance them any sums of money simply on their note of hand. The rooms on the first floor, into which Mr. Heath let himself by his latch key, as seen by the light of the lamp burning on the table, were large and commodious, plainly furnished, with a due regard to comfort, but without any attempt at luxury, save, perhaps, in the well-filled book cases, and in the excellence of the proof prints hanging on the walls. He took some letters from a rack fixed on one side of the mantelpiece, and examined their addresses under the lamp, but they were apparently of no interest, for he put them aside unopened, and throwing himself into an easy chair, was at once immersed in a reverie. Not a reverie of a pleasant kind either, if one could judge from his knitted brow, and the manner in which he gnawed his nether lip. With possess he could indulge himself to the top of his bent; there would be no need either of the dissimulation which he had practiced throughout his career, of the dread so long labored under lest the discovery should be made, that the faultless and decorous bank clerk, so pure and so respectable, had his weaknesses and his passions like other men, and indulged in them as freely as the rest, if with more watchfulness and secrecy. A curse on the thoughts, they would still run in the same groove! The robbery of the bank, so long cogitated over, so cleverly planned, so nearly executed with success, had it not been for the old man's awaking; the figure of the old man wildly fighting for life, and the awful hush that followed when he succumbed! A horrible mistake that matter altogether! The booty secured had been large indeed, but on the acquisition of it had resulted the unintentional murder, and the commencement of the compact between himself and Studley which had placed him in his present dangerous position. A combination of horrors was upon him, from out of which kept looming up, from time to time, distinctly visible, a wornan's face-bright, fascinating, and bewitching-with laughing eyes and a sunny smile; and that reminiscence was the worst of all. He must get rid of it at any cost. Not there, the closeness of the room oppressed him; he would go out into the air and walk it off. unequaled nerve aiding him in the carrying out Into the teeming thoroughfare, teeming still, but with a very different population from that thronging it during the day. The Miranda Music Hall, bowing itself under the strong arm of the law, was closing its doors, turning off its gas, and turning out the customers, who would willingly have remained there for three or four hours more. Out they came, streaming into the street, a motley crew. Boy clerks, with wizened old faces and youthful figures; dissolute vagabonds, knights of the paveinent and heroes of the kennel; and women among whom, great Heavens! Heath saw the face which had risen so often before his mental vision that night. The same face, but oh, how different? The light had died out of the eyes, and the smile had gone from off the lips. The woman was worn, weary looking, and glaringly dressed. He moved aside in horror, and though her gown touched him as she stepped into a Hansom cab, which an attendant sprite had hailed There was no more walking for Mr. Heath that night. He hurried straight home, and put him self to sleep with a strong narcotic. BOOK III. CHAPTER III. A FATAL TEST. THE earlier portion of the journey was passed in ordinary conversation. Remembering how Anne had always shrunk from any allusion to Mr. Heath, Grace made but the slightest occasional mention of that gentleman, and amused herself by recounting to her companion the principal incidents of her life since they had parted, and the most interesting episodes in her London career. Amused herself, and, at the same time, did exactly what Anne would most have wished; for she could sit by and listen, throwing in here and there an ejaculation of surprise, which contented the narrator, while all the time she was turning over in her own mind the manner in which she could bring about the revelation which sooner or later must be made. But, even in all her preoccupation, Anne was sufficiently attentive to notice the undoubted improvement in Grace's mental faculties; the childish ways had gone, and in their place there was a mixture of dignity and firmness which argued ill for the success of any one endeavoring to turn the heiress from her settled determination, or to interfere from the exercises of her will. It was evident, too, that Grace had a thorough appreciation of Mrs. Crutchley, and of the various members of the Waddledot family; and of them and their machinations she spoke with such genuine sarcastic humor, that Anne was, from time to time, aroused from her reverie to give more than usual attention to what her friend was saying, and pay her the tribute of a smile. duties she had prescribed to herself, even though it might have a baneful effect on her future, which was even then not too hopeful. They arrived at Brussels in the afternoon, and put up at the Hotel de Flandre, securing tæ rooms at the back of the hotel, far from the no.sy trouble of the Place Royale, and looking on to the palace, at that season of the year silent ard deserted, with its blinds drawn down, and a couple of sentries sleepily sauntering on the ter race walk. There would be disturbance later on in the mews immediately underlying the hote! windows, when the carriages came back from Waterloo, and the other excursions on which they had taken the English tourists, when the big Flemish horses would be plunging about te paved yard, and unwillingly submitting themselves to the washing and cleaning preparatory to their short rest. But at that moment all was silence and tranquility; the hot air was filled with fragrance from the flowers of the royal garder, and a delightful sense of nothing-doing pervaded the place. Notwithstanding this, however, and the fatigue consequent upon her journey, Grace found it impossible to secure the sleep upon which she had been reckoning. "It's of no use," she said, arising from the couch on which she had thrown herself, in her white peignoir, after having unbound her hair, and let it fall over her shoulders. "I am uncomfortable and restless, and sleep seems impossible to me. And you too, Anne, you are working away as though you had only just risen, instead of having been cramped up for hours in that dreadful railway carriage, and that worse than dreadful steamer." "I am only patching up a rent made in my gown, in getting out of that worse than dreadful steamer,' as you call it," said Anne, with a smile. Then changing her tone, she added, “I am glad, however, dear, to find that you are not disposed to sleep just now, as I have something of great importance to say to you." It was at Brussels, their first halting-place, that Anne determined to tell her friend as much as was necessary of what had transpired, to explain to her the deception she had practised upon her, and the imperative necessity that existed of her having been brought away from London. She knew the difficulties that lay before her, the danger she incurred of being misunderstood, the possibility of Grace, in an access of rage at having been played upon, declining to acknowledge the service which had been rendered her, and, deter-"will probably try your patience and self commined to be governed solely by her own thoughts, wishes, and impulses; but Anne knew also that she had acted rightly in electing to discharge the "More somethings of great importance," said Grace, petulantly; "when shall we have done with them and get a little peace ?" "What I have to say to you now," said Anne, mand, will require the exercise of that love for me, which I know you have, and your belief in that clearness of thought and common sense for |