looked as though he by no means participated in this feeling, and saying something about his great hurry begged that he might be allowed to go to his food. Then he added that, as far as his memory served him, he had not the honour of knowing the lady who was addressing him.

"You come in to your little dinner," said Sophie," and I will tell you everything as you are eating. Don't mind me. You shall eat and drink, and I will talk. I am Madame Gordeloup,-Sophie Gordeloup. Ah,you know the name now. Yes. That is me. Count Pateroff is my brother. You know Count Pateroff. He knowed Lord Ongar, and I knowed Lord Ongar. We know Lady Ongar. Ah,-you understand now that I can have much to tell. It is well you was not gone without seeing me? Eh; yes! You shall eat and drink, but suppose you send that man into the kitchen?

Sir Hugh was so taken by surprise that he hardly knew how to act on the spur of the moment. He certainly had heard of Madame Gordeloup, though he had never before seen her. For years past her name had been familiar to him in London, and when Lady Ongar had returned as a widow it had been, to his thinking, one of her worst offences that this woman had been her friend. Under ordinary circumstances his judgment would have directed him to desire the servant to put her out into the street as an impostor, and to send for the police if there was any difficulty. But it certainly might be possible that this woman had something to tell with reference to Lady Ongar which it would suit his purposes to hear. At the present moment he was not very well inclined to his sister-in-law, and was disposed to hear evil of her. So he passed on into the dining-room and desired Madame Gordeloup to follow him. Then he closed the room door, and standing up with his back to the fireplace, so that he might be saved from the necessity of asking her to sit down, he declared himself ready to hear anything that his visitor might have to say.

"But you will eat your dinner, Sir 'Oo? You will not mind me. I shall not care."

"Thank you, no ;-if you will just say what you have got to will be obliged to you."

say, I "But the nice things will be so cold! Why should you mind me ? Nobody minds me."

"I will wait, if you please, till you have done me the honour of leaving me."

"Ah, well,-you Englishmen are so cold and ceremonious. But Lord Ongar was not with me like that. I knew Lord Ongar so well.”

"Lord Ongar was more fortunate than I am."

"He was a poor man who did kill himself. Yes. It was always that bottle of Cognac. And there was other bottles was worser still. Never mind; he has gone now, and his widow has got the money. It is she has been a fortunate woman! Sir 'Oo, I will sit down here in the arm-chair." Sir Hugh made a motion with his hand, not daring to forbid her to do as she was minded. "And you, Sir 'Oo;-will not you sit down also ?".

"I will continue to stand if you will allow me.

Very well; you shall do as most pleases you. As I did walk here, and shall walk back, I will sit down."

"And now if you have anything to say, Madame Gordeloup," said Sir Hugh, looking at the silver covers which were hiding the chops and the asparagus, and looking also at his watch, "perhaps you will be good enough to say it."

"Anything to say!

Yes, Sir 'Oo, I have something to say. It is a pity you will not sit at your dinner."

"I will not sit at my dinner till you have left me. So now, if you will be pleased to proceed

"I will proceed. Perhaps you don't know that Lord Ongar died in these arms?" And Sophie, as she spoke, stretched out her skinny hands, and put herself as far as possible into the attitude in which it would be most convenient to nurse the head of a dying man upon her bosom. Sir Hugh, thinking to himself that Lord Ongar could hardly have received much consolation in his fate from this incident, declared that he had not heard the fact before. "No; you have not heard it. She have tell nothing to her friends here. He die abroad, and she has come back with all the money; but she tell nothing to anybody here, so I must tell." "But I don't care how he died, Madame Gordeloup. It is nothing to me."

"But yes, Sir 'Oo. The lady, your wife, is the sister to Lady Ongar. Is not that so? Lady Ongar did live with you before she was married. Is not that so? Your brother and your cousin both wishes to marry her and have all the money. Is not that so? Your brother has come to me to help him, and has sent the little man out of Warwickshire. Is not that so?"

"What the d- is all that to me?" said Sir Hugh, who did not quite understand the story as the lady was telling it.

"I will explain, Sir 'Oo, what the d- it is to you; only I wish you were eating the nice things on the table. This Lady Ongar is treating me very bad. She treat my brother very bad too. My brother is Count Pateroff. We have been put to-oh, such expenses for her! It have nearly ruined me. I make a journey to your London here altogether for her. Then, for her, I go down to that accursed little island ;—what you call it ?-where she insult me. Oh! all my time is gone. Your brother and your cousin, and the little man out of Warwickshire, all coming to my house, just as it please them."

"But what is this to me?" shouted Sir Hugh.

"A great deal to you," screamed back Madame Gordeloup. see I know everything, everything. I have got papers."

"You

"What do I care for your papers? Look here, Madame Gordeloup, you had better go away."

"Not yet, Sir 'Oo; not yet. You are going away to Norway-I know; and I am ruined before you come back."

"Look here, madame; do you mean that you want money from me?” "I want my rights, Sir 'Oo. Remember, I know everything;-everything; oh, such things! If they were all known,-in the newspapers, you understand, or that kind of thing, that lady in Bolton Street would lose all her money to-morrow. Yes. There is uncles to the little lord; yes! Ah, how much would they give me, I wonder? They would not tell me to go away."

Sophie was perhaps justified in the estimate she had made of Sir Hugh's probable character from the knowledge which she had acquired of his brother Archie; but, nevertheless, she had fallen into a great mistake. There could hardly have been a man then in London less likely to fall into her present views than Sir Hugh Clavering. Not only was he too fond of his money to give it away without knowing why he did so; but he was subject to none of that weakness by which some men are prompted to submit to such extortions. Had he believed her story, and had Lady Ongar been really dear to him, he would never have dealt with such a one as Madame Gordeloup otherwise than through the police.

"Madame Gordeloup," said he, "if you don't immediately take yourself off, I shall have you put out of the house."

He would have sent for a constable at once, had he not feared that by doing so, he would retard his journey.

"What!" said Sophie, whose courage was as good as his own. put out of the house! Who shall touch me?"

"Me

"My servant shall; or if that will not do, the police. Come, walk." And he stepped over towards her as though he himself intended to assist in her expulsion by violence.

66

Well, you are there; I see you; and what next?" said Sophie. "You, and your valk! I can tell you things fit for you to know, and you say, Valk. If I valk, I will valk to some purpose. I do not often valk for nothing when I am told-Valk!" Upon this, Sir Hugh rang the bell with some violence. "I care nothing for your bells, or for your servants, or for your policemen. I have told you that your sister owe me a great deal of money, and you say,-Valk. I vill valk." Thereupon the servant came into the room, and Sir Hugh, in an angry voice, desired him to open the front door. "Yes, open vide," said Sophie, who, when anger came upon her, was apt to drop into a mode of speaking English which she was able to avoid in her cooler moments. "Sir 'Oo, I am going to valk, and you shall hear of my valking."

"Am I to take that as a threat?' said he.

"Not a tret at all," said she; "only a promise. Ah, I am good to keep my promises! Yes, I make a promise. Your poor wife,-down with the daises; I know all, and she shall hear too. That is another promise. And your brother, the captain. Oh! here he is, and the little man out of Warwickshire." She had got up from her chair, and had moved towards the door with the intention of going; but just as she was passing out into the hall, she encountered Archie and Doodles. Sir Hugh, who had been

altogether at a loss to understand what she had meant by the man out of Warwickshire, followed her into the hall, and became more angry than before at finding that his brother had brought a friend to his house at so very inopportune a moment. The wrath in his face was so plainly expressed that Doodles could perceive it, and wished himself away. The presenco also of the Spy was not pleasant to the gallant captain. Was the wonderful woman ubiquitous, that he should thus encounter her again, and that so soon after all the things that he had spoken of her on this morning? "How do you do, gentlemen ?" said Sophie. "There is a great many boxes here, and I with my crinoline have not got room." Then she shook hands, first with Archie, and then with Doodles; and asked the latter why he was not as yet gone to Warwickshire. Archie, in almost mortal fear, looked up into his brother's face. Had his brother learned the story of that seventy pounds? Sir Hugh was puzzled beyond measure at finding that the woman knew the two men ; but having still an eye to his lamb chops, was chiefly anxious to get rid of Sophie and Doodles. together.

"This is my friend Boodle,-Captain Boodle," said Archie, trying to put a bold face upon the crisis. "He has come to see me off."

“Very kind of him," said Sir Hugh. "Just make way for this lady, will you? I want to get her out of the house if I can. Your friend seems to know her; perhaps he'll be good enough to give her his arm?”

46

Who;-I?" said Doodles. "No; I don't know her particularly. I did meet her once before, just once,-in a casual way."

"Captain Booddle and me is very good friends," said Sophie. "He come to my house and behave himself very well; only he is not so handy a man as your brother, Sir 'Oo."

Archie trembled, and he trembled still more when his brother, turning to him, asked him if he knew the woman.

"Yes; he know the woman very well," said Sophie. "Why do you not come any more to see me? You send your little friend; but I like you better yourself. You come again when you return, and all that shall

be made right."

But still she did not go. She had now seated herself on a gun-case which was resting on a portmanteau, and seemed to be at her ease. The time was going fast, and Sir Hugh, if he meant to eat his chops, must eat them at once.

"See her out of the hall, into the street," he said to Archie; "and if she gives trouble, send for the police. She has come here to get money from me by threats, and only that we have no time, I would have her taken to the lock-up house at once." Then Sir Hugh retreated into the dining-room and shut the door.

"Lock-up-ouse!" said Sophie, scornfully. "What is dat ?

"He

means a prison," said Doodles.

"Prison! I know who is most likely be in a prison. Tell me of a prison! Is he a minister of state that he can send out order for me to be

made prisoner? Is there lettres de cachet now in England? I think not. Prison, indeed!"

"But really, Madame Gordeloup, you had better go; you had, indeed," said Archie.

"You, too-you bid me go? Did I bid you go when you came to me? Did I not tell you, sit down? Was I not polite ? Did I send for a police? or talk of lock-up-ouse to you? No. It is English that do these things; only English."

Archie felt that it was incumbent on him to explain that his visit to her house had been made under other circumstances,-that he had brought money instead of seeking it; and had, in fact, gone to her simply in the way of her own trade. He did begin some preliminaries to this explanation; but as the servant was there, and as his brother might come out from the dining-room, and as also he was aware that he could hardly tell the story much to his own advantage, he stopped abruptly, and, looking piteously at Doodles, implored him to take the lady away.

"Perhaps you wouldn't mind just seeing her into Mount Street," said

Archic.

"Who; I?" said Doodles, electrified.

"It is only just round the corner," said Archie.

"Yes, Captain Booddle, we will go," said Sophie. "This is a bad house; and your Sir 'Oo,—I do not like him at all. Lock-up, indeed! I tell you he shall very soon be locked up himself. There is what you call Davy's locker. I know;-yes."

Doodles also trembled when he heard this anathema, and thought once more of the character of Jack Stuart and his yacht.

"Pray go with her," said Archie.

"But I had come to see you off."

"Never mind," said Archie. "He is in such a taking, you know. God bless you, old fellow; good-by! I'll write and tell you what fish we get, and mind you tell me what Turriper does for the Bedfordshire. Goodby, Madame Gordeloup-good-by."

There was no escape for him, so Doodles put on his hat and prepared to walk away to Mount Street with the Spy under his arm,—the Spy as to whose avocations, over and beyond those of her diplomatic profession, he had such strong suspicions! He felt inclined to be angry with his friend, but the circumstances of his parting hardly admitted of any expression of

anger.

"Good-by, Clavvy," he said. "Yes; I'll write; that is, if I've got anything to say."

"Take care of yourself, captain," said Sophie.

"All right," said Archie.

"Mind you come and see me when you come back," said Sophie.

"Of course I will," said Archie.

Gentlemen, when they

"And we'll make that all right for you yet. have so much to gain, shouldn't take a No too casy. You come with your