eartache.

He thought, too, of Nancy's child, his own son. That Nancy was a tender
mother, he knew from the letter she had written him after the baby's
birth,--a letter he would have liked to read again, but forbore. Must
not the separation from her child be hard? If he saw the poor little
mortal, how would the sight affect him? At moments he felt a longing
perhaps definable as the instinct of paternity; but he was not the man
to grow sentimental over babies, his own or other people's. Irony and
sarcasm--very agreeable to a certain class of newspaper readers--were
just now his stock-in-trade, and he could not afford to indulge any
softer mode of meditation.

His acquaintances agreed that the year of absence had not improved him.
He was alarmingly clever; he talked well; but his amiability, the poetry
of his mind, seemed to have been lost in America. He could no longer
admire or praise.

For his own part, he did not clearly perceive this change. It struck
him only that the old friends were less interesting than he had thought
them; and he looked for reception in circles better able to appreciate
his epigrams and paradoxes.

A few weeks of such life broke him so completely to harness, that he
forgot the seasonable miseries which had been wont to drive him from
London at the approach of November. When the first fog blackened against
his windows, he merely lit the lamp and wrote on, indifferent. Two years
ago he had declared that a London November would fatally blight his
soul; that he must flee to a land of sunshine, or perish. There was
little time, now, to think about his soul.

One Monday morning arrived a letter which surprised and disturbed him.
It ran thus:

'Mrs. Eustace Damerel presents her compliments to Mr. Tarrant, and would
take it as a great favour if he could call upon her, either to-morrow or
Tuesday, at any hour between three and seven. She particularly desires
to see Mr. Tarrant on a private matter of mutual interest.'

Now this could have but one meaning. Mrs. Eustace Damerel was, of
course, Nancy's relative; from Nancy herself, or in some other way, she
must have learnt the fact of his marriage. Probably from Nancy, since
she knew where he lived. He was summoned to a judicial interview.
Happily, attendance was not compulsory.

Second thoughts advised him that he had better accept the invitation.
He must know what measures were in progress against him. If Nancy had
already broken her word, she m