William was growing bitter.

Nearly opposite

to them sat Gertrude, with one of the Miss Apleys, and several men around them. Maurice was sitting on a chair a little behind her, and she now and then turned round to speak to him.

"I wonder," he said, in a low voice, "if they would think M. d'Arberg quite sane here, if they knew some of the things he does. To me, who know how a great deal of his time is employed and the use he makes of his fortune, it seems so odd to see him in this sort of society making himself agreeable like any ordinary man of the world."

"He is very rich, is not he?"

"Very rich; I believe his mother was an heiress, his father married her when he was an émigré. His good works are prodigious, also; but they are done so secretly that few people know anything of them. I am convinced he will end by being a priest." Gertrude turned pale; Maurice saw it and a jealous pang shot through his heart. Thank Heaven, she was going the next day, and

d'Arberg would not, probably, stay long in England. They might never meet again. Why had he not dreaded their becoming acquainted? Why, fool that he was, had he talked to her so much about him? He went on in an odd abrupt manner to say that he must have hurt his fortune by his extravagant charities, that this was probably the reason why he had never married

"O, no," she said in a quiet manner, “Mr. Audley, who knows him well, says he has large property both in France and in Ireland."

"You have ascertained that he is rich ?" he answered in a tone of ill-disguised agitation.

"I have heard it," she said, and then became absent, for the hand of the French clock was travelling fast, and her impatience was becoming almost intolerable. At last the conversation at the opposite table came to an end, and Adrien, as if he had perceived her for the first time that evening, came and sat in the chair opposite to her. Miss Apley was talking eagerly to some

one on the other side of the couch. Maurice had seized a newspaper, and seemed engrossed with it, but was still near enough to hear every word that passed. "I hear you are going home to-morrow," Adrien said, and looked at her with an expression of interest. "Yes," she answered, without raising her eyes from the nosegay she held in her hand, "life cannot be spent amongst flowers not mine at least."

:

"You have enjoyed yourself here?"

66

Almost too much. I wish I had not been thrown on this bed of roses, for I am afraid it has unfitted me for another couch."

"Well, it certainly is not a very bracing atmosphere that we live in here. It is floating down the stream, instead of pulling against it."

"And yet," she said, "what fault can be found with such an existence as Lady Clara's? How innocent it is! how affectionate she is! Loving and beloved, giving pleasure and receiving it. I think it is a delightful sight to see her, so

beautiful herself, in the midst of beauty of every

kind.

By changing a single word, one could

apply to her that pretty French line,

"Et rose elle a vécu, comme vivent les roses.'

"True," he answered, with one of his slow smiles, "but was she sent into the world to live the life of a rose, or to bear her part in the great battle-field of life? Her existence always seems to me too much like Eve's in Paradise—Eve before not after the Fall."

Gertrude pulled off all the pink petals of one of the flowers in her hand and showed him the green calyx which formed a sort of cross. "Ay!" he exclaimed, "it will be found in the end, but ought it not to have been taken up sooner?"

"I should like the battle-field of life," she said, "but to sit still is what I dread."

"We must each of us fight at our post," he answered. "The order of the day is all that concerns us. Do you go early to-morrow?"

"Not very early," she replied, with a faltering voice.

"I wanted to ask you if on Sunday I might hear mass at the chapel at Lifford Grange, it is nearer than Stonehouseleigh, and I should be glad to see Father Lifford at the same time.” Her eyes flashed with a joy that she could not disguise, and she assented briefly, but in a manner that showed the delight she felt.

Mamma will see you, perhaps, if she is pretty

well."

"Would she? I should be so glad to know

her."

"She never receives strangers, but

"But you think she would see me?"

"I have read to her your books; and you have been so kind to me."

"Kind!" he said with a smile.

"Yes; you carried me here the day of my accident. I am sure she will wish to thank you. Can you speak Spanish?"