out your voice. Go about to parties, and see the world, and not be buried in that dismal quarter of the country, where both our houses are. Life is very sweet, and, alas, as short as it is sweet. There is the good woman's charm, and I make him a present of it."

It had effect on the crowd, who went with her, and applauded. The Beauty, more rebellious than ever, vows it most sensible; his wife can only act scorn and indifference. She longed for her wretched visit to be at an end, and the more wretched woman to be expatriated to France. Only a few hours more, and she would be away, out of it.

It seemed, certainly, as though she had been worsted in this little series of encounters. She dared not own it to herself; but she had. The Beauty knew it, too, as she saw in his malevolent eye; but she said not a word. Alas, as with the ingenious monkey who goes round in the circus, if the training be suspended but for a day, it is all blank, and has to be recommenced; so she saw that much hard toil was in store for her, and for her alone. The morning came. The carriage was at the

The guests gather to see guests go away. door, and trunks were coming down. Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Talbot were going away.

"So much obliged to you, Talbot," says the host; "mind we see you here again soon."

The ladies were shaking hands, and Mrs. Talbot and her enemy went through the same ceremony. Mr. Hardman stood by. "We shall soon meet again, ma'am. We are neighbours, and as my daughter and Talbot seem such firm allies in the singing way, I mean to get up a great deal of music——"

A restless trouble and curiosity made her hazard the answer, “O, when she comes back from France ?"

"O, we have changed all that," said Mrs. Labouchere, with a smile. "I am going to be filial, and always to live with my father at The Towers. Bon voyage!"

BOOK THE THIRD.

CHAPTER I.

LADY SHIPLEY.

DURING the absence of Mr. Hardman from The Towers, a new family had arrived in the district. A rather decayed road-side villa had been taken by them, which had been long unlet, and it was presently known that a no less distinguished person than Lady Shipley and her daughter were living there. Lady Shipley was the Dowager Lady Shipley, her daughter was Miss Honoria; to speak the whole truth about them in a single sentence, they were neither more nor less than a pair of marauders, who, like Mr. Carlyle's parson, had scoured the country seeking for "horse meat and man meat;" in short, had settled down in fat and flourishing districts, which they had pillaged socially far and near, left waste, and then moved on to another. They were genteel, poor, and clever, a combination of attributes which really amounted to wealth, or, at least, comfort. Her son, the present Sir Thomas, was married, and was not particularly fond of his mother or sister, who had about four hundred a-year to live on, eked out by the contributions, in kind, of their friends and neighbours. Lady Shipley, it was known, would accept articles of dress and clothing for her Honoria, in a pleasant, sensible way that took the thing quite out of the character of what was eleemosynary.

"Here, Mony," so she called her daughter, "don't be a fool; you won't get a dress like that to suit you, if you were to go round all the shops." Or:

Mony is

"My dear Mrs. very much obliged to you, and has no foolish stuck-up notions about her, I can assure you. She is too well born and well connected to run any chance of being misunderstood, and it will help to keep down her pride a little."

The same lady would invite herself to dinner-to your "little bit of mutton," which was just what she liked, she said, and in this fashion had a most comfortable and enjoyable life. She kept a wary eye out for the sort of people whom she knew would serve her purpose; and when people were inveighing against rich and vulgar people, her elderly ears quivered like a dog's when he hears his master approaching.

It was thus when the term of her cheap mansion was expiring that she heard Mr. Hardman described, and his style of manner and of living; and it occurred to her that he was just the sort of person to be near, to know, i.e., to prey on. "These people, Mony, dear," she said to her daughter, "will be worth a hundred a year to us." She had mapped it all out: a fortnight's visiting every two months, a dinner at least every fortnight, with other perquisites; and a pleasant gentleman giving an agreeable description of the "duke's coachman," and the way that menial was introduced on all occasions, the lady, instead of joining in the laughter, resolved that she should be driven many a time by a person of such august antecedents.

The old villa was procured, "a dead bargain," and some old furniture, which went about with her, was transferred to it.

Mr. Hardman had taken her precisely as she had hoped; had searched his heraldic red and blue books, and had noted with surprise and delight where her exceeding strength lay; was confounded at the noble connections, cousinships, &c., which spread out from her in all directions like the rays of a star-fish. She was exactly what he wished; and he had an instinct that she would graciously lend herself to his humour in a very different fashion from those "stuck-up" Talbots. The great coach and its still greater coachman had already taken him there, from the windows of which cards had duly been handed to a mouldy old man-servant, whom Mr. Hardman regarded with exceeding reverence as an aristocratic retainer. The visit had been returned. Lady Shipley had gone in; had sat a long time, and had delighted him by her easy manners, her wish to please, and to be pleased by him. "You have everything charming about you, Mr. Hardman; such taste, such magnificence! I warn you, you will have me coming here very often. It reminds me of Rams—my cousin Ramsgate's place."

"I know; Lord Ramsgate. Indeed! 'Pon my word! Then, I hope you will come very often, Lady Shipley. I hope to see you whenever you find it convenient to yourself." "And the pictures, and your flowers! I doat on both; I could live and die among pictures and flowers. Mony, dear, you know that—” "You like flowers? Here! I say. Send for the gardener, and let him follow us. I have got the finest gardener in the whole shire. Lord Loveland tried to get him from me; but his lordship could not conveniently manage the wages the man asked, and is well worth. Now, Lady Shipley, I request you will point out what you like, and it shall be cut and sent over to you. Fruit-care for fruit, Lady Shipley?"

VOL. IV., N. S. 1870.

B B

"Ah! why you know all my tastes! I could live and die in a hothouse, my dear Mr. Hardman."

The marauder, in fact, could live and die anywhere where there was any of the good things of life. She had the odd gift of announcing as her special taste, a liking for wines, fruits, meats, or everything of the best. Her heavily-built, dowdy person was, indeed, excellent evidence of this fancy. Before she left the garden it was arranged that a great basket, containing flowers and fruits, should be sent over. A dinner, also, had been sketched out. This was not a bad morning's work. But she had not done yet.

"I have heard of Mrs. Labouchere," she said, "and am dying to know her. But you have some one else-a son?"

"Yes, yes," said Mr. Hardman, loftily, as if owning to a luxury which every gentleman ought to possess. "Oh certainly!"

"Oh, where is young Mr. Hardman ?" went on Lady Shipley. "I should so like to know him."

Young Mr. Hardman was sent for and produced; and Lady Shipley, after some expressions of implied gratification at the exhibition of such a treasure, adroitly "shunted" herself to a siding with Mr. Hardman, leaving the two young carriages coupled behind. The well-trained Honoria lost not a moment, and in a very short time had forced a sort of intimacy, founded on volunteered confidences of her own life, feelings, &c., and of questions as to his.

In this artful way there can be established a perfect intimacy and friendship which, though all on one side, seems as good to spectators as any other. The young man, who had reasons for keeping his father in good humour, did his best to make himself agreeable. Then they went away.

His father had been at home some three days, and every morning the son had intended walking straight into the study, to speak with him on a very important matter. The young man, since his father's return, had been very nervous indeed with the news which he had to break; and after the ladies had gone, seeing that Mr. Hardman was in excellent humour and even spirits, thought it a good opportunity. He knocked at the study door.

"Come in," said his father. "Well! What do you want?" "Perhaps, sir, you are engaged? If so, I can come another time." The father looked at him with a dark mistrust.

"This is some damned concealed tailor's bill, sir, or something of the sort. You always come skulking in this way when you have that on hand."

"No, no, sir! indeed, nothing of the kind."

Yet it was something of the kind, inasmuch as the communication was attended with similar nervousness.

"Then, what is it, sir?"

"What I wished to say, sir, is this: I have always tried to be a good son-at least, to do my best to please you. You, sir, have been a kind father—on the whole-that is, when I deserved it." "Rubbish, sir! What are you coming to, with all this palaver? You're driving at something disagreeable; and I tell you what, I'll make it disagreeable to you. What is it? Don't waste my time." Desperate, the young fellow brought it-blurted it-out. father was not in a rage; but took it quite coolly.

His

"Well! and what is this to me? Are you not in a free country? Don't you know I can't force you to do anything? But I can do this, my lad-let you be a beggar, which I will, as sure as the stocks rise and fall in the market. Ah! don't talk folly; don't come to me with such trash. Are you a baby or a schoolboy?"

The young man protested, very earnestly, that he was serious. He was pledged-engaged—and must go on. He was bound by honour and duty and affection.

"I won't have it," said Mr. Hardman. "You are a low whining cur. Do you think I made all my money, that bought you that rag of a red coat, and raised you out of the puddle, all for this?. I won't have it. I don't choose to have my name connected with those infernal, stuck-up, stiff-backed people. Ah! I'll give 'em a lesson yet, and show them my money is as good as their pride any day. Don't bother me, sir,” he said, vehemently, "any more! I won't put up with it! I'm ashamed of you, you sneak! with your love and your whine. You raise your family! Raise money is all you'll do, you selfish cur, you !-that won't do a hand's turn to raise me, on whom you fatten. You're no good, and as helpless as any country oaf. Another smart lad, with your advantages and my banker's book at your back, would have pushed forward and made a splendid marriage. Don't talk to me any more about such stuff! I don't see it, and won't see it. There!"

Mrs. Labouchere was to arrive the following morning from town; and the young man-though brother and sister, they were not too affectionate-thought his best course would be to wait until she came. He had noted that since the marriage she had a sort of influence over her father, the truth being that the mean nature of Mr. Hardman grovelled a little before her in her new position and good connection. She came, and her brother told her all. She started with a scornful and bitter look.