more eager than common, and in his eyes came an anxious expression that only one woman, the one woman it was so difficult to forget, had ever been able to call into them before.

'Look odd!' he repeated while he set down her cup and gave her back the fan he had been holding. 'I thought you were above all that, Miss Bruce, and did what you liked, without respect to the fools who stare, and can't understand.'

She drew up her head with a proud gesture peculiar to her. 'How do you know I do like it?' said she, haughtily.

He looked hurt and lowered his voice to a whisper. 'Forgive me,' he said, 'I have no right to suppose it. I have been presumptuous, and you are, entitled to be unkind. I have monopolized you too much, and you're-you're bored with me. It's my own fault.'

'I never said so,' she answered in the same tone; 'who is unkind now?' Then the dark eyes were raised for one moment to look full in his, and it was all over with Lord Bear warden.

'You will dance with me again before I go,' said he, recovering his former position with an alacrity that denoted some previous practice. 'I shall ask nobody else-why should I? You know I only came here to see you. One waltz, Miss Brucepromise!'

'I promise,' she answered, and again came into her eyes that smile which so fascinated her admirers to their cost. 'I shall get into horrid disgrace for it, and so I shall for sitting here so long now. I'm always doing wrong. However, I'll risk it if you will.'

Her manner was playful, almost tender; and Puckers, adding another large infusion of tea, wondered to see her look so soft and kind.

A crowded waltz was in course of performance, and the tea-room, but for this preoccupied couple, would have been empty. Two men looked in, as they passed the door, the one hurried on in search of his partner, the other started, scowled, and turned back amongst the crowd. Puckers the lynx-eyed, observing and recognizing both, had sufficient skill in

VOL. XV.-NO. LXXXIX.

physiognomy to pity Mr. Stanmore and much mistrust Tom Ryfe.

The former, indeed, felt a sharp keen pang, when he saw the face that so haunted him in close proximity to another face belonging to one who, if he should enter for the prize, could not but prove a dangerous rival. Nevertheless, the man's generous instincts stifled and kept down so unworthy a suspicion, forcing himself to argue against his own conviction that, at this very moment, the happiness of his life was hanging by a thread. He resolved to ignore everything of the kind. Jealousy was a bad beginning for a lover, and after all, if he should allow himself to be jealous of every man who admired and danced with Maud, life would be unbearable. How despicable, besides, would she hold such a sentiment! With her disposition, how would she resent anything like espionage or surveillance! How unworthy it seemed both of herself and of him! In two minutes he was heartily ashamed of his momentary discomfiture, and plunged energetically once more into the duties of the ball-room. Nevertheless, from that moment, the whole happiness of the evening had faded out for Dick.

There is a light irradiating all such gatherings which is totally irrespective of gas or wax-candles. It can shed a mellow lustre on dingy rooms, frayed carpets, and shabby furniture; nay, I have seen its tender rays impart a rare and spiritual beauty to an old, worn, long-loved face; but on the other hand, when this magic light is quenched or even temporarily shaded, not all the illuminations of a royal birthday are brilliant enough to dispel the gloom its absence leaves about the heart.

Mr. Stanmore, though whirling a very handsome young lady through a waltz, began to think it was not such a good ball after all.

Tom Ryfe, on the other hand, congratulated himself on his tactics in having obtained an invitation, not without considerable pressure put upon Miss Bruce, for a gathering, of which his social standing hardly entitled him to form a part. He

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was now, so to speak, on the very ground occupied by the enemy, and though he saw defeat imminent, could at least make his own effort to avert it. After all his misgivings as regarded Stanmore, it seemed that he had been mistaken, and that Lord Bearwarden was the rival

he ought to dread. In any case but his own, Mr. Ryfe was a man of the world quite shrewd enough to have reasoned that in this duality of admirers there was encouragement and hope. But Tom had lost his heart, such as it was, and his head, though of much better material, had naturally gone with it. Like other gamblers, he determined to follow his ill-luck to the utmost, bring matters to a crisis, and so know the worst. In all graver affairs of life, it is doubtless good sense to look a difficulty in the face; but in the amusements of love and play practised hands leave a considerable margin for that uncertainty which constitutes the very essence of both pastimes; and this is why, perhaps, the man in earnest has the worst chance of winning at either game.

So Tom Ryfe turned back into the crowd and waited his opportunity for a few minutes' conversation with Miss Bruce.

It came at last. She had danced through several engagements, the night was waning, and a few carriages had already been called up. Maud occupied the extreme end of a bench, from which a party of ladies had just risen to go away; she had declined to dance, and for the moment was alone. Tom slipped into the vacant seat by her side and thus cut her off from the whole surrounding world. A waltz requiring much terrific accompaniment of brass instruments pealed out its deafening strains within ten feet of them, and in no desert island could there have been less likelihood that their conversation would be overheard.

Miss Bruce looked very happy, and in thorough good-humour. Tom Ryfe opened the trenches quietly enough.

'You haven't danced with me the whole evening,' said he, with only rather a bitter inflection of voice.

'You never asked me,' was the natural rejoinder.

'And I'm not going to ask you now,' proceeded Mr. Ryfe; 'you and I, Miss Bruce, have something more than a mere dancing acquaintance, I think.'

An impatient movement, a slight curl of the lip, was the only answer.

'You may drop an acquaintance when you are tired of him, or a friend when he gets troublesome. It's done every day. It's very easy, Miss Bruce.'

He spoke in a tone of irony that roused her.

'Not so easy,' she answered, with tightening lips, 'when people have no tact-when they are not gentlemen.'

The taunt went home. The beauty of Mr. Ryfe's face was at no time in its expression-certainly not now. Miss Bruce, too, seemed well disposed to fight it out. Obviously it must be war to the knife!

'Did you get my letter?' said he, in low, distinct syllables. 'Do you believe I mean what I say? Do you believe I mean what I write?

She smiled scornfully. A panting couple who stopped just in front of them imagined they were interrupting a flirtation, and, doing as they would be done by, twirled

on.

'I treat all begging-letters alike,' answered Maud, and make yours no exception, because they contain threats, and abuse into the bargain. You have chosen the wrong person to try and frighten, Mr. Ryfe. It only shows how little you understand my character.'

He would have caught at a straw even then. 'How little chance I have had of studying it!' he exclaimed. 'It is not my fault. Heaven knows I have been kept in ignorance, uncertainty, suspense, till it almost drove me mad. Miss Bruce, you have known the worst of me; only the worst of me, indeed, as yet.'

The man was pleading for his life, you see. Was it pitiable, or only ludicrous, that his voice and manner had to be toned down to the staid pitch of general conversa

tion, that a fat and happy German was puffing at a cornet-à-piston within arm's-length of him? But for a quiver of his lip, any bystander might have supposed he was asking Miss Bruce if he should bring her an ice.

'I have seen enough!' she replied, very resolutely, 'and I am determined to see no more. Mr. Ryfe, if you have no pleasanter subjects of conversation than yourself and your arrangements, I will ask you to move for an instant that I may pass, and find Mrs. Stanmore.'

Lord Bearwarden was at the other end of the room, looking about, apparently, for some object of unusual interest. Perhaps Miss Bruce saw him-as ladies do see people without turning their eyesand the sight fortified her resolution.

'Then you defy me!' whispered Tom, in the low suppressed tones that denote rage, concentrated and intensified for being kept down. 'By Heaven, Miss Bruce, you shall repent it! I'll show you up! I'll expose you! I'll have neither pity nor remorse! You think you've won a heavy stake, do you? Hooked a big fish, and need only pull him ashore? He shan't be deceived! He shall know you for what you are! He shall by

-!'

The adjuration with which Mr. Ryfe concluded this little ebullition was fortunately drowned to all ears but those for which it was intended by a startling flourish on the cornetà-piston. Miss Bruce accepted the challenge readily. Do your worst!' said she, rising with a scornful bow, and taking Lord Bearwarden's arm,

much to that gentleman's delight, walked haughtily away.

Perhaps this declaration of open war may have decided her subscquent conduct; perhaps it was only the result of those circumstances which form the meshes of a certain web we call Fate. Howbeit, Miss Bruce was too tired to dance. Miss Bruce would like to sit down in a cool place. Miss Bruce would not be bored with Lord Bearwarden's companionship, not for an hour, not for a week-no, not for a lifetime!

Dick Stanmore, taking a lady down to her carriage, saw them sitting alone in the tea-room, now deserted by Puckers and her assistants. His honest heart turned very sick and cold. Half an hour after, passing the same spot, they were there still; and then, I think, he knew that he was overtaken by the first misfortune of his life.

Later, when the ball was over, and he had wished Mrs. Stanmore good-night, he went up to Maud with a grave, kind face.

'We never had our waltz, Miss Bruce,' said he; 'and-and-there's a reason, isn't there?'

He was white to his very lips. Through all her triumph, she felt a twinge, far keener than she expected, of compunction and re

morse.

'Oh, Dick!' she said, 'I couldn't help it! Lord Bearwarden proposed to me in that room.'

'And you accepted him?' said Dick, trying to steady his voice, wondering why he felt half suffocated all the time.

'And I accepted him!'