ew _regime_.

"Yes, sir," said John, promptly, and with emphasis. "My mistress
expects you, sir. She's come down to the drawing-room for the first
time. Miss Lucy keeps her room, sir, still; she's dreadfully cut up,
poor dear young lady. My mistress will be glad to see you, sir," said
John. This repetition of a title which Miss Wodehouse had not been in
the habit of receiving was intended for the special advantage of the
new master, whom John had no intention of recognising in that
capacity. "If you should know of any one, sir, as is in want of a
steady servant," the man continued, as he led the way into the house,
with a shrewd glance at Mr Proctor, whose "intentions" were legible
enough to John's experienced eyes--"not as I'm afeared of getting
suited, being well known in Carlingford; but it would come natural to
be with a friend of the family. There aint a servant in the house,
sir, as will stay when the ladies go, and I think as Miss Wodehouse
would speak for me," said John, with natural astuteness. This address
made Mr Proctor a little uneasy. It recalled to him the unpleasant
side of the important transaction in which he was about to engage. He
was not rich, and did not see his way now to any near prospect of
requiring the services of "a steady servant," and the thought made him
sigh.

"We'll see," he said, with a troubled look. To persevere honourably in
his "intentions" was one thing, but to be insensible to the loss of much
he had looked forward to was quite another. It was accordingly with a
grave and somewhat disturbed expression that he went to the interview
which was "to decide his fate." Miss Wodehouse was seated in the
drawing-room, looking slightly flushed and excited. Though she knew it
was very wrong to be thus roused into a new interest the day after her
father's funeral, the events altogether had been of so startling a
description that the usual decorum of an afflicted household had already
been ruthlessly broken. And on the whole, notwithstanding her watching
and grief, Mr Proctor thought he had never seen the object of his
affections looking so well as she did now in the long black dress, which
suited her better than the faint dove colours in which she arrayed
herself by preference. She was not, it is true, quite sure what Mr
Proctor wanted in this interview he had solicited, but a certain
feminine instinct instructed her in its probable eventualities. So she
sat in a subdued flutter, with a litt