of the
astringent nature of that mixture he had equally small idea, until he
turned the last corner, and came in sight of the Countess's face. There
was an aspect of the avenging angel about Lady Oxford, as she stood up,
tall and stately, in that corner of the gallery, and held out to Aubrey
what that indiscreet young gentleman recognised as a lost solitaire that
was wont to fasten the lace ruffles on his wrist.

"Is this yours, Mr Louvaine?" Her voice said, "Guilty or not guilty?"
so plainly that he was almost ready to respond, "Of what?"

Aubrey gave the garnet solitaire a more prolonged examination than it
needed. He felt no doubt of its identity.

"Yes, Madam, I think it is," he answered slowly. "At the least, I have
lost one that resembles it."

"I think it is, too," said the Countess no less sternly. "Do you know
where this was found, Mr Louvaine?"

Aubrey began to feel thoroughly alarmed.

"No, Madam," he faltered.

"In the chamber of Thomas Winter, the traitor and Papist, at the sign of
the Duck, in the Strand. Perhaps you can tell me how it came thither?"

Aubrey was silent, from sheer terror. A gulf seemed to yawn before his
feet, and the Countess appeared to him in the light of the minister of
wrath waiting to push him into it. With the rapidity of lightning, his
whole life seemed to pass in sudden review before him--his happy
childhood and guarded youth at Selwick Hall, the changed circumstances
of his London experiences, his foolish ways and extravagant expenditure,
his friendship with Winter, the quiet home at the White Bear into which
his fall would bring such disgrace and sorrow, the possible prison and
scaffold as the close of all. Was it to end thus? He had meant so
little ill, had done so little wrong. Yet how was he to convince any
one that he had not meant the one, or even that he had not done the
other?

In that moment, one circumstance of his early life stood out bright and
vivid as if touched with a sunbeam:--an act of childish folly, done
fifteen years before, for which his grandfather had made him learn the
text, "Thou God seest me." It came flashing back upon him now. Had God
seen him all this while? Then He knew all his foolishness--ay, and his
innocence as well. Could He--would He--help him in this emergency?
Aubrey Louvaine had never left off the outward habit of saying prayers;
but it was years since he had really prayed before that unheard cry went
up in the gal