the next moment about her present solitary position; and then generally about the inconveniences of being alone in the world, with no lord and master to utilise or to abuse landlords for you,-which struck our friend as conceived, if not in the spirit of levity, still in that of suggestiveness.

on.

Now lack of self-satisfaction was not at any time one of Mr. Kennedy's most conspicuous failings. There were some of his friends, or enemies, severe enough to say, that he monopolised so much of the good opinion of himself, as to leave scarcely any share for others. To-day he was decidedly disposed to take a more than usually cheerful view of matters. The world was smiling upon him -Mrs. Merton in particular. The champagne was excellent. He was fresh from town, well posted-up in all the latest items of gossip, and in most of those of scandal. The former he imparted to Major Jones Gervase's guests at large, the latter he reserved for Mrs. Merton a widow, it was one of the main articles in Bob's creed, likes this sort of thing; in fact, to use his own expression, he was in great form that evening. The ladies withdrew, and Bob rattled "By Jove!" said Captain Colville, when talking of this gentleman's fluency of discourse some two or three hours later, on his arrival in London, at the Deipnosophist, "Kennedy had so much to say, that no one else could get their oar in." There was the clergyman of the parish. Bob was great in ecclesiastical matters. Major Gervase was the squire. Bob shifted the theme to affairs of a more mundane description; and then, to combine both characteristics and to please both gentlemen, Mr. Kennedy elaborated a little theory of his own, that parochial administration was but the miniature and reflex of the scheme of the national government; that the two secular and religious elements in our country's rule were symbolised here in this hamlet of Kingscourt as much as they were existent in the metropolis; that the squire was the emblem and representative of the state, just as the parson was the embodiment of the church. This great truth comfortably elucidated and succinctly expressed, Bob was induced to try the Burgundy again, and launched forth into a genial discussion of the game-laws.

The butler entered with a fresh bottle of that very excellent Chambertin, to which a portion possibly of Mr. Kennedy's eloquence was attributable, and also with an intimation that the dog-cart was waiting to convey Captain Colville to the neighbouring station, that he might catch the night express to town.

"Good-bye, Bob," was the parting speech of this gentleman, pitched in a very judiciously low key. "You'll enjoy yourself here, I can see; but don't forget the widow. She's a capital of more than 40,000l.; a splendid woman of business, knows more about railway shares than you and I put together."

Little fear, thought Bob, of forgetting; and the retrospect which

he took of the dinner was distinctly satisfactory. The progress, which he mentally reported to himself, was undeniably considerable; he had made a hit, he ventured to think, and the only thing which remained was to follow it up.

When Mr. Kennedy entered the drawing-room, Mrs. Jones Gervase motioned him to her side. She hoped he would like Kingscourt. It really was a good place enough in its way, though after London it must and would seem strangely dull. However, Mr. Kennedy must remember that he was in every way his own master, free to do whatever he wished, and wander whithersoever his own sweet fancy might lead him. Mrs. Gervase hoped, too, he would find some not unpleasant companions. Mrs. Lester in particular, his next-door neighbour at dinner, she could decidedly recommend ; but Bob paid little or no attention to the recommendation; for his thoughts were where his eye was, and that was fixed upon the bright, witty, and sprightly widow, Mrs. Merton.

Time wore away pleasantly enough at Kingscourt manor. The shooting was excellent; and Bob Kennedy, not a little proud of his excellence as a shot, experienced considerable satisfaction in surpassing the native sportsmen of the district.

"I don't know, Mr. Kennedy," said the Major, "whether you are most dangerous amid the stubble or in the drawing-room. You are certainly a practised hand with the partridges. I should say you were scarcely less experienced with ladies' hearts. Do you think I gave you too glowing an account of Mrs. Merton, when I introduced you to her on your first evening ?" asked the Major, and at the same time gave a significant little laugh.

Bob had not the slightest wish to accuse the Major of undue exaggeration of encomium; and so he said, taking, however, the remark with a perfect air of insouciance. In truth, however, Mr. Kennedy began to realise the fact that matters must soon be brought to a head, that some understanding must be arrived at, and that either he must make up his mind to interrogate Mrs. Merton, or else to take himself off. That the lady had not a ready-made family he had ascertained from her lips-that was one point in her favour. Then he had heard from Captain Colville that the widow was possessed of 40,000l.-that was emphatically another point. Beyond that there were several other items, which, duly considered, he found by no means to tell against her; she was certainly a charming woman, knew the world, had acquired from a year or two's residence in India a graceful frankness of manner which seems only capable of being developed under a tropical sun, and was altogether calculated to become an admirable headpiece of decoration for Mr. Kennedy's dining-table. Then, on the other hand, Bob did not feel quite certain of his ground. No doubt that Mrs. Merton liked him well enough; but a preference in the present, as Bob felt perfectly

assured, is by no means a guarantee of a passion in the future. Again, Mr. Kennedy was apt to regard with a very judicious scepticism popular accounts of widowed wealth in general. He must know something more about it, he felt. How was it to be done? To be sure, he might have frankly informed Mrs. Merton that he was prepared to offer an eligible heart in return for a commensurate fortune; but this way of putting the matter, though it might possess the merit of point, would be singularly deficient, Bob decided, in delicacy. It would be difficult also to say, Bob argued with himself, how far Mrs. Merton had given him any direct encouragement; these Indian women, this gentleman astutely remarked, get such a singularly impartial, free-and-easy air. Finally, there was some talk occasionally of the anticipated return of a certain Colonel Merton, a cousin, so far as Bob could gather, of "his widow," as he would speak of the lady in question to his correspondent, Captain Colville; and Mr. Kennedy was extremely suspicious in the matter of cousins. "The cousin of to-day may become the lover of tomorrow," he was in the habit of saying.

"Don't you admire Mrs. Lester, Mr. Kennedy?" inquired Mrs. Merton one morning, when Bob, after smoking his post-prandial cheroot on the lawn, had strolled into the drawing-room to enjoy that apartment in the most attractive of its phases during the twentyfour in a country house; "I'm sure you do!" and as the positive assertion was interrogatively made, Mrs. Merton lifted up her eyes from her embroidery - frame full in Bob's face, in that peculiarly tantalising way which seemed to insinuate, "You admire me ten times more.

"Admire, Mrs. Merton! what an opinion you must have of me! firstly, of my taste; secondly, of my character. Admire a woman who is something more than embonpoint, who has scarcely ten words to say, and who, for what I know, is not only married, but has half-a-dozen children!"

Mrs. Merton seemed amused and, to Bob, not displeased.

"Well, Mr. Kennedy," she replied, "all I can say is, that I fear Mrs. Lester is less scrupulous than you, both from an æsthetical and ethical point of view; for I assure you, you occupy a prominent place in her very best books."

"Bah!" responded Bob; "I dislike married flirts."

"I shouldn't have thought you were so exceptional in your tastes," was Mrs. Merton's laughing answer. "What say you, Mr. Kennedy, shall we drive to the Fairburn Caves? Mrs. Gervase has been good enough to place her phaeton at my disposal; will you do the same with your services as my charioteer? I wouldn't ask you, but Mrs. Lester is called to London, and I may not have another chance."

Bob Kennedy said something about Mrs. Lester the reverse of

adulatory, and declared himself ready to start whenever Mrs. Merton was prepared.

"

The weather was delicious. The sky was scarcely flecked by a cloud, and the earth revelled in a largesse of golden sunshine. On through the leafy lanes they went; the country was mellowed with the first autumnal hues; and through the golden stubble was heard the frequent gun." As Bob reflected on the whole situation, watched the beauty of the landscape, talked with Mrs. Merton on things in general, and on himself and herself in particular, he came to the conclusion that there were many things less tolerable in existence than to handle a pair of perfect horses, to be seated the while beside a charming woman without encumbrance and worth 40,000l., and to be carried at a pace not inconveniently rapid through as pretty woodland scenery as England possesses. The freshness of the air seemed infectious; the sparkling of the dew on the pendent boughs of the larches reflected itself in the general tone of the conversation. Bob was in unusually good spirits, and Mrs. Merton was complimentary enough to say that his talk was brighter than usual.

What a contrast to the brilliant sunshine of the open, the gloomy interior of these chilly caves!-for they had reached them by this time, and the natty little groom was holding the horses while the pair devoted themselves to the investigation of the abodes of stalactites, darkness, and cold. An idea struck Bob Kennedy. He was not unprolific in ideas, but this seemed to him an exceptionally happy one-an opportunity for delicately putting a leading question, and neatly leading up to an important point. Mrs. Merton had told him in the morning, that this might be their last chance of visiting the caves. Why? Was his widow about to desert him just as conquest seemed fairly within his grasp? Bob Kennedy wished to understand the full significance of the remark; and so, struck by the atmospheric contrast, which, on entering where he now stood, he had just experienced, he thought that it might be conveniently utilised for the extraction of the information which he required. As we have said, Bob was struck with a notion: the brightness outside, the gloom in. Why not, by a felicitous application of metaphor, make these point a moral and adorn a tale? Something Mrs. Merton had told him this morning marvellously reminded him of the change from brightness to gloom which they had just experienced. What was it? Mrs. Merton would so like to know.

"Well, Mrs. Merton," replied the complimentary Bob, "your proposal, that we should visit the caves, removed the superincumbent chill upon my depressed soul, just as the sunshine does the dew" (a slight confusion of similes here, thought Bob, but it doesn't matter); "and your intelligence immediately accompanying it, that it might be the last chance we should have, by suggesting to me the probability of our parting, fell as a damp upon me, even as the

temperature of this infernal" (Bob Kennedy had just brought his tibia into contact with a projecting angle of the rock, so that the expression may be in part pardoned) "cave."

"Very prettily turned," replied Mrs. Merton; "but you have a little bit mistaken my meaning," she added, just with the slightest significance in her voice.

"Mrs. Merton," said Mr. Kennedy, his key of badinage exchanged for one of earnestness, "if what I supposed is not the case, pray tell me. If you will not tell me, there is at least something which I might tell-"

"Ah, Kennedy," said a cheery voice kindly, "didn't know you were so fond of prying into the viscera of the earth."

"My luck again," muttered Bob to himself, and looking round, he saw the rubicund countenance of Major Gervase.

Sly dog," whispered the old officer to him as they stepped out on to the sunlit sward once again; "knew 'twas your last chance, didn't you, now ?"

Bob had no opportunity to reply, but he did soliloquise in a few sentences to himself. "What the devil does it all mean ? That sudden appearance of the Major not at all a bad apology for her celestial highness pronuba Juno."

During the return journey, Major Jones Gervase insisted upon keeping up with the phaeton the whole way; consequently all chances of reopening the conversation at the interesting point at which it had been interrupted were destroyed. Bob Kennedy was not in a good humour. It is annoying when you are out shooting to see your final vesuvian fail you in endeavouring to strike a light for your pipe. It is not less annoying, when you are in country quarters, beyond the reach of effervescing fluids, to discover that just as your parched throat was panting for cognac and seltzer, the last bottle of that refrigerating and refreshing alkaline compound has burst in your cupboard. Tantalus doubtless experienced a good deal of discomfort at the disgusting resistance which the fugitive water offered to his thirst-cracked lips. But it may be questioned whether any of these tortures are more excruciating than the fact of being suddenly pulled-up short when the accents of a declaration of passion are trembling on your lips. And this was precisely Bob's condition at the present time. In course of the homeward drive, however, his ruffled feelings regained something of their normal tranquillity; and when, as she contrived to do, Mrs. Merton whispered to him as they came up to the hall-door at Kingscourt manor, "Mr. Kennedy, if you should happen to be walking in the rosegarden to-morrow morning before breakfast, say from 8.30 to 9.30, you might see me, and have an opportunity, if you like to use it, of finishing your speech to me,"-Bob, charmed with Mrs. Merton's Anglo-Indian candour of manners, had completely recovered his