rden, Mr. and Mrs. Stanmore, drove down from
London many days in the week to the pretty Putney villa. Simon was
truly rejoiced to see them, while the old ladies vibrated all over,
caps, fronts, ribbons, lockets, and laces, with excitement and
delight. The very flowers had a sweeter perfume, the laburnums a
richer gold, the river a softer ripple, than in the experience of all
previous springs.

"They may say what they like," continued Lord Bearwarden, still with
the weekly paper in his hand. "I maintain the criterion of merit
is success. I maintain that the Rhymer and the Fairy Queen is an
extraordinary picture, and the general public the best judge. Why
there was no getting near it at the Academy. The people crowded round
as they do about a Cheap Jack at a fair. I'm not a little fellow, but
I couldn't catch a glimpse of any part except the Fairy Queen's head.
I think it's _the_ most beautiful face I ever saw in my life!"

"Thank you, Lord Bearwarden," said Nina, laughing. "He'd such a
subject, you know; it's no wonder he made a good picture of it."

No wonder, indeed! Did she ever think his brush was dipped in colours
ground on the poor artist's heart?

"It's very like _you_ and it's very like Maud," answered Lord
Bearwarden. "Somehow you don't seem to me so like each other as you
used to be. And yet how puzzled I was the second time I ever set eyes
on you!"

"How cross you were! and how you scolded!" answered saucy Mrs.
Stanmore. "I wouldn't have stood it from Dick. Do you ever speak to
Maud like that?"

The look that passed between Lord and Lady Bearwarden was a sufficient
reply. The crowning beauty had come to those dark eyes of hers, now
that their pride was centred in another, their lustre deepened and
softened with the light of love.

"It was lucky for you, dear, that he _was_ angry," said her ladyship.
"If he had hesitated a moment, it's frightful to think what would have
become of you, at the mercy of those reckless, desperate men!"

"They were punished, at any rate," observed Nina gravely. "I shall
never forget that dead fixed face in the hall. Nor the other man's
look, the cowardly one, while he prayed to be forgiven. Forgiven,
indeed! One ought to forgive a great deal, but not such an enormity as
that!"

"I think he got off very cheap," interposed Dick Stanmore. "He
deserved to be hanged, in my opinion, and they only transported
him--not even for life!"

"Think of the temptation, Dick," replied