ed her delicate eyebrows till they looked like notes of
interrogation, and blushed a little. This was quite a new style for Sir
Eustace. Was he in earnest? she wondered. Impossible!

"And now for business," he continued; "not that there is much business;
as I understand it, you have only to sign this document, which I have
already witnessed, and the stock can be transferred."

She signed the paper which he had brought in a big envelope almost
without looking at it, for she was thinking of Sir Eustace's remark, and
he put it back in the envelope.

"Is that all the business, Sir Eustace?" she asked.

"Yes; quite all. Now I suppose that as I have done my duty I had better
go away."

"I wish to Heaven he would!" groaned Bottles to himself behind the
curtains. He did not like his brother's affectionate little ways or
Madeline's tolerance of them.

"Indeed, no; you had better sit down and talk to me--that is, if you
have got nothing pleasanter to do."

We can guess Sir Eustace's prompt reply and Madeline's smiling reception
of the compliment, as she seated herself in a low chair--that same low
chair she had occupied the day before.

"Now for it," said Sir Eustace to himself. "I wonder how George is
getting on?"

"My brother tells me that he came to see you yesterday," he began.

"Yes," she answered, smiling again, but wondering in her heart how much
he had told him.

"Do you find him much changed?"

"Not much."

"You used to be very fond of each other once, if I remember right?" said
he.

"Yes, once."

"I often think how curious it is," went on Sir Eustace in a reflective
tone, "to watch the various changes time brings about, especially where
the affections are concerned. One sees children at the seaside making
little mounds of sand, and they think, if they are very young children,
that they will find them there to-morrow. But they reckon without their
tide. To-morrow the sands will have swept as level as ever, and the
little boys will have to begin again. It is like that with our youthful
love affairs, is it not? The tide of time comes up and sweeps them away,
fortunately for ourselves. Now in your case, for instance, it is, I
think, a happy thing for both of you that your sandhouse did not last.
Is it not?"

Madeline sighed softly. "Yes, I suppose so," she answered.

Bottles, behind the curtains, rapidly reviewed the past, and came to a
different conclusion.

"Well, that is all done with," said Sir