ause he does not move, and keeps his eyes still on her as though he
would never like to remove them, and makes no objection to his sleeve
being brushed up the wrong way.

"It seems like a hundred thousand years since you went away," says
Dulce, with a little happy sigh, after which every one crowds around
him, and he is welcomed with extreme joy into the family circle again.
Indeed, the Boodie exhibits symptoms of insanity, and dances round him
with a vivacity that a dervish might be proud of.

This is, of course, very delightful, specially to Stephen Gower, who is
sitting glooming upon space, and devoured with something he calls
disgust, but might be more generally termed the commonest form of
jealousy. The others are all crowding round Roger, and are telling him,
in different language, but in one breath, how welcome he is.

This universal desire to light mythical tar-barrels in honor of the
wanderer's return suggests at last to Mr. Gower the necessity of
expressing his delight likewise. Rising, therefore, from his seat, he
goes up to Roger, and insists on shaking him cordially by the hand. This
proceeding on his part, I am bound to say, is responded to by Roger in a
very niggardly manner--a manner that even undergoes no improvement when
Mr. Gower expresses his overwhelming satisfaction at seeing him home
again.

"We are all more pleased to see you again than we can say," declares Mr.
Gower, purposely forgetful of that half-hour in the back-yard, when they
had been bent on pommeling each other, and doubtless would have done so
but for Sir Mark.

He says this very well indeed, and with quite an overflow of
enthusiasm--perhaps rather too great an overflow; because Roger, looking
at him out of his dark eyes, decides within himself that this whilom
friend of his is now his bitterest enemy, hating him with all the
passionate hatred of a jealous heart.

The Boodie is in a state of triumph bordering on distraction. "_She_
had always said he (Roger) would return on New Year's Day; _she_ had
believed in his promise; _she_ had known he would not disappoint," and
so on. Every now and then she creeps up to the returned wanderer, to
surreptitiously pat his sleeve or his cheek, looking unutterable things
all the time. Finally she crowns herself by pressing into his hand a
neatly tied little square parcel, with a whisper to the effect that it
is his Christmas-box, that she has been keeping for him all the week.

At this Roger