t day), he
had taken to look behind him, as though an eye had been knocked in the
back of his head.

Then, was that day of the announcement of Lakelands to Nataly, to be
accounted a gloomy day? He would not have it so.

She was happily occupied with her purchases of furniture, Fredi with her
singing lessons, and he with his business; a grasp of many ribands,
reining-in or letting loose; always enjoyable in the act. Recently only
had he known when at home, a relaxation, a positive pleasure in looking
forward to the hours of the City office. This was odd, but so it was; and
looking homeward from the City, he had a sense of disappointment when it
was not Concert evening. The Cormyns, the Yatts, and Priscilla Graves,
and Pempton, foolish fellow, and that bothering Barmby, and Peridon and
Catkin, were the lineing of his nest. Well, and so they had been before
Lakelands rose. What had induced! . . . he suddenly felt foreign to
himself. The shrouded figure of his lost Idea on London Bridge went by.

A peep into the folds of the shroud was granted him:--Is it a truth, that
if we are great owners of money, we are so swollen with a force not
native to us, as to be precipitated into acts the downright contrary of
our tastes?

He inquired it of his tastes, which have the bad habit of unmeasured
phrasing when they are displeased, and so they yield no rational answer.
Still he gave heed to violent extraneous harpings against money. Epigrams
of Colney's; abuse of it and the owners of it by Socialist orators
reported in some newspaper corner; had him by the ears.

They ceased in the presence of Lady Grace Halley, who entered his office
to tell him she was leaving town for Whinfold, her husband's family-seat,
where the dear man lay in evil case. She signified her resignation to the
decrees from above, saying generously:

'You look troubled, my friend. Any bad City news?'

'I look troubled?' Victor said laughing, and bethought him of what the
trouble might be. 'City news would not cause the look. Ah, yes;--I was
talking in the street to a friend of mine on horseback the other day, and
he kept noticing his horse's queer starts. We spied half a dozen children
in the gutter, at the tail of the horse, one of them plucking at a hair.
"Please, sir, may I have a hair out of your horse's tail?" said the mite.
We patted the poor horse that grew a tail for urchins to pluck at. Men
come to the fathers about their girls. It's my belief that m