It was from the major of the regiment, the fortunate officer who now succeeded "without purchase." Dick Lumley, with great presence of mind, said aloud, "O ah! a business thing!" not from any compassion for the wife; but simply in homage to the decencies of the little party, and the fuss and discomfort it would cause him personally. Mrs. Talbot alone was disquieted, and it was with something like malice, but of which he was unconscious, that he told her. "It seems that poor Labouchere is dead, and the widow coming over by the next packet."

"Coming over!" she repeated, starting up. "Coming back here!" Mr. Hardman re-entered; he had been himself to see about the duke's coachman, and also the messenger. He returned with a mysterious importance. He was, at all events, now the centre figure. Telegrams, dispatches, brought in, always import a factitious dignity, or, at least, an air of fuss. He bade his wife come away, wrung Lord Robert by the hand affectionately. "I shall not forget," he said, “depend on me, and if you want advice on any point, command me. This blow will interfere for a time, and, indeed, I was hoping we would have had you over for a few days at 'The Towers.' But by-and-bye, by-and-bye." Mr. Hardman threw a plaintiveness into his voice, as though he were now crushed, and the wind might be tempered to such a shorn lamb as he was. Then they drove away.

The party remained laughing and chatting, and Old Dick Lumley quite excelled in his cheerful touchings and recollections of the pompous bereaved gentleman. Lord Robert was specially merry on "my son-in-law Labouchere," and with a social disloyalty which is not at all uncommon, presented a series of comic etchings of the absent guest, more creditable to his memory than to his gratitude. This, indeed, is always the most tempting and irresistible season for another renewed party, the sense of relief from stiffness, with a joyous laissez faire sets in, and a guest with some gifts must be of more than early Christian asceticism who can resist such a tempting opportunity. Every one stretches his arms and breathes freely; the buckram has passed away, there are a few precious minutes, we are all happy, and so—a live animal is sacrificed. So it was with Mr. Hardman; and while the duke's coachman was driving his great horses homewards at a pace that suited himself, the little cheerful circle was laughing in intense enjoyment at the competing histrionics of Old Dick Lumley and young Lord Robert-all, save Mrs. Talbot, who sat in her Chalon attitude, reflecting, and with a distrustful and disquieted face.

CHAPTER III.

AN INVITATION.

FOR the miniature household there was still the same tranquil existence. It might have been almost called domestic,-the very essence of domestic. And yet this effect might seem strange, with such mundane elements as a veteran Beauty, (veteran in the sense of one who has served her ten years), and an Exquisite who has sold out of that regiment prematurely, and thinks he has made a mistake. But there was in the household one binding and purifying element, the watchful, loving daughter, whose very labour and energy and application that never tired or slept, performed miraculous prodigies, as it always will do. The strange charm of that earnestness and affection, seen to be so utterly unselfish, never failed, or, rather, it was increasing in power every day. The fragile soul of Beauty Talbot would have been helpless before even a weaker mind: and he was, in truth, being kept like some of those youths, brought up in fairy valleys, jealously guarded from the knowledge of men and women and the world, an attempt which even in the fairy tales, alas! invariably broke down!

Even had the mind of her father been nourishing any thoughts of enfranchisement, any longing looks backwards towards the fairy gardens he had been taken from, he was soon to see what difficulties there were in the way of his emancipation. He was kept in by a succession of barriers of soft wood and moss, endless in number, and likely to take up too much time and trouble to break through. Thus the task of education went on, a drive three times a week, and the greater expedition to town from Pengley Station, and the solemn dinner-party at distant gorgeous palaces, whither the whole party set out in grand tenue, and returned more or less prostrated-but still having done their duty, as the country expects every man and woman to do. Then there was the working together, and the lighting of the lamp, with the applause for the Beauty's last composition, and the reading out by Livy of novel or poem, the former carefully selected, as illustrating him and his wife,-this was in the hands of this gentle schoolmistress, their daughter. They had their round of duties and little pleasures. She read to them, him rather, and amused him, was ever watchful and ready at a moment to dart in to the place when any of his squad of entertainers flagged or dropped down in the ranks. The round of life became as regular as that of an

titution. There was the little box of a place and its green garden

and flowers, there was the walk after breakfast, and the walk after lunch, there was the village and the town, with the young happy husbands and happy circles, men who ambled round the domestic circus with a contented monotony. Sometimes she read out even such a work as one of Mr. Froude's romances, and her voice was so steady and musical that she imparted to the rather dry proceedings of King Harry and Queen Mary, glimpses of interest, though at times the Beauty flagged, and yawned, and wandered to the piano to embody "a thought" by way of relief. He became rather proud of his historical knowledge thus refreshed, and thus administered-he could never have tackled the volumes themselves, and rather bewildered some of his friends whom he favoured with scraps, and made them ask what on earth was Beauty putting such things into his well oiled head for. The effect of all was discipline, and the Beauty felt that in this little house, and in these little tranquil pursuits life would go on always, and he would grow full, and stout, and heavy, and old, while the old charms and attractions were to become smaller and dimmer, and more uninteresting, as their little waggonette rolled easily down the hill. Livy, the genius of the household, might now halt. Her work was done.

The people about Pengley naturally fancied that the news of the death of his son-in-law would take down Mr. Hardman's airs a little. But, in truth, he was not at all displeased "at the turn matters had taken," his own phrase. In the first place, he missed-and woefully missed the invaluable aid of his daughter, though not for a moment would he acknowledge such a thing, even to himself. In his social advances he found himself of a sudden as powerless as the boy from whom Sir Walter Scott cut off the button. She had taken herself off, as he put it, and had thrown all the duties of the place on his poor back. How could he find time to be going to see ladies? As for her-Mrs. Hardman—as well might he put one of the sirloins hanging in Stubber's shop in the carriage, and tell it to go paying visits. Selfishly she had taken care of herself, and left him there to manage as he could. The relations, too, of the deceased Colonel had behaved in execrable taste. They had been cold and "stand-off." It had been conveyed to him that they did not approve or disapprove the connection. This he laid entirely to the account of his daughter, who "had no knowledge of the world," and, at her age, was still as helpless as a child. Indeed, when he came calmly to consider the alliance-the brilliant smoke having cleared away with the petards of the wedding, &c.-he found it was a poor and profitless business enough. "He took nothing by it but expense."

Still, on the sudden demise of his son-in-law, it was wonderful the large amount of discount that he got out of the transaction. His favourite and often-quoted domestic sank into the second place beside "the death of my son-in-law," the "great blow we have all sustained," &c. The worst was, the very nature of the distinction cut him off from all public opportunity of celebrating it. He could not dine out, or have people to dine; and yet without these occasions how was he to impress on the public the splendour of the loss he had sustained? He might pay visits, but that would be scarcely decent; and very few came to visit him. Still he could make his servants exhibit the most poignant and conspicuous grief; and the London tailor fitted Miller, who had driven the Duke, with an inky garment, that seemed to shine and reflect all things with the glassiness of a deep well, and hung about him with festoons and hawsers of a sepulchral cordage. But the quiet contempt of the wearer, his sarcastic smile as he appeared in these sables, was a perfect protest, and undid the whole effect.

If Mr. Hardman could have set up a hatchment on the face of his house, he would have done so; but even the undertaker, whom he consulted, said they could scarcely go so far as that. He would not even have objected to the expense and trouble of "bringing the body over," and some faint notion crossed his mind of consulting some of the late Colonel's noble relations on the matter; but he shrank from the cold snubbing which he had instinct enough to perceive would be in store for him.

Of the "bereaved widow," as he delighted in styling her, "my daughter, Mrs. Labouchere-her husband carried off suddenly-a most unfortunate business, sir,"-he, strange to say, heard little. She barely deigned to communicate her movements to him. She went to a small French port by herself, and remained there. Those who saw her privately-and no better judge than her own maid that had "gone out" and returned with her-bore testimony to her strong grief and desolation after the husband she had lost. With all the hard crystallization that had grown round her heart in that household-the damp, unwholesome, graveyard fungi, which had so unhealthily crept over her soul in defiance of her struggles-she had learned to appreciate the honest, elderly devotion of the man who had chosen her; and his death had been a great shock. Their past life had been pleasant, though disturbed by a few storms; but it was when he was gone that she discovered that she could, as time went on, have been supremely happy with him, had fate allowed; and this deprivation she somehow associated with those who had thwarted and mortified her. As her liking for him grew and opened, she

seemed to hold the idea that something was "between them "—that those who disliked her had inspired him with the idea that she was not his equal in rank and refinement-a something which, if removed, their happiness would have been great. On his death-bed he thanked her in his chivalrous, high-bred way. "If I had lived, dearest," he said, "I could have shown you what I thought of the great honour you did me; and if I had been allowed to live, I would have tried to prove it still you have been the best of wives, and if I had had time I would have understood you better. A good deai," he added, with his soft, good-natured smile, "was done to prevent me from understanding you—indeed, to keep me from you for ever; but, thank God, that did not succeed. I never believed that story, dearest, though ample proof was offered."

"What they said about what took place in Ireland—”

"Not a word of it! not a word! Not if they had sent me a dozen more letters. I tore them up, and never read beyond the line where their calumny began."

"I know that. I believe it. Oh, if we had but time, the best refutation would be my life, and the love it would show for you. I could tell you her name who wrote these falsehoods to you."

"Ah, women!" he said, smiling; "they catch at all weapons in these cases; and they are not so much to blame. It would be different with men. But you will know this, dearest: they had no effect on me."

"What, not in those first days when you possibly neglected me and looked down on us; and that woman's insidious hints and stories never came back to you; that loving a low rich man's daughter? You were too noble, dearest husband, to be conscious of it; but that was working in you-that was her work-and, oh, if I but live, if I but get back to England--"

She spoke so sternly, coldly, and solemnly, that he half raised himself on his elbow to look at her.

"What woman? Who is this?"

She saw the dangerous colour mounting on his cheek, and quietly floated the subject away, as one might a log in the water. Long months after it came drifting up to her as she stood at the strand. She had been expecting it wistfully, anxiously. What had restrained her was the rigorous decencies of widowhood. She must be sorrowful, secundum artem, before she could think of other things. That dismal quarantine of mourning must be put in, else she dare not mingle with her kind. Six, seven, eight months went by. Then surely she might "divert her thoughts." Then people began to tell her it was