the Zoological Gardens?--Crew, or Brew, or some astonishing
name of the kind?"

"I don't suppose," answered the girl defensively, "that you really want
to know how he is, but Mr. Trew is quite well, and he isn't in the
least eccentric, and he doesn't profess to be a gentleman."

Henry touched her shoulder with a gesture of appeal; she gave an
impatient movement.

"But how extremely interesting," cried Lady Douglass, with something
like rapture. "And do most of your friends work for a living?"

"All of 'em. I don't care for loafers."

"I myself have been up to my eyebrows in industry this week," said the
other, self-commiseratingly. "I sometimes wish charity could be
abolished altogether. It does entail such an enormous amount of hard
labour. One might as well be in Wormwood Scrubbs."

She paused and looked at the girl intently.

"By the bye, where is Wormwood Scrubbs? One often hears of it."

"Over beyond Shepherd's Bush."

"Have you ever been there?"

"No," answered Gertie; "and I've never been to Portland, and I'm not
acquainted with Dartmoor, and I don't know much about Newgate. Why do
you ask?"

"I am hugely interested in prison life," declared the other.

"You mustn't be surprised," interposed Henry, addressing Gertie, "at
any new subject that my sister-in-law mentions. I haven't heard her
speak of this before; and it's only fair to her to say that when she
takes up anything fresh, she drops it long before it has the chance of
becoming stale. Another cup?"

He went to the table.

"A strange lad," said Lady Douglass musingly. "His heart is in the
right place, but sometimes I wonder whether it is the right kind of
heart. Do you mind dining at seven for once in your life. Miss
Higham? It's a ridiculous hour, I know, but we must be at the hall
sharp by eight. Miss Loriner will show you your room when you are
ready. I have a thousand and one things to do," she added exhaustedly.

When Jim Langham joined the party and sat on the grass beside Miss
Higham's chair, the girl rose, and Miss Loriner conducted her into the
house; Henry regarded them with a cheerful smile as they left. The
doors gave entrance to a square hall, with a broad staircase going up
and turning suddenly to an open corridor that went around three sides.
Gertie looked about her astonishedly.

"I've never been in a house like this before," she explained.

They went up the highly-polished staircase, Gertie holding at the