he matter better or more effectually. It breathed ardent love,
tempered by a determination to sell her charms in the best and highest
matrimonial market.

"Now, I know this man, C.," I said when I had finished. "And I want to
ask whether you will let me show him Miss Montague's letter. It would
set him against the girl, who, as a matter of fact, is wholly unwor--I
mean totally unfitted for him."

"Let you show it to him? Like a bird! Why, Sissie promised me herself
that if she couldn't bring 'that solemn ass, C.,' up to the scratch by
Christmas, she'd chuck him and marry me. It's here, in writing." And he
handed me another gem of epistolary literature.

"You have no compunctions?" I asked again, after reading it.

"Not a blessed compunction to my name."

"Then neither have I," I answered.

I felt they both deserved it. Sissie was a minx, as Hilda rightly
judged; while as for Nettlecraft--well, if a public school and an
English university leave a man a cad, a cad he will be, and there is
nothing more to be said about it.

I went straight off with the letters to Cecil Holsworthy. He read them
through, half incredulously at first; he was too honest-natured himself
to believe in the possibility of such double-dealing--that one could
have innocent eyes and golden hair and yet be a trickster. He read them
twice; then he compared them word for word with the simple affection and
childlike tone of his own last letter received from the same lady. Her
versatility of style would have done honour to a practised literary
craftsman. At last he handed them back to me. "Do you think," he said,
"on the evidence of these, I should be doing wrong in breaking with
her?"

"Wrong in breaking with her!" I exclaimed. "You would be doing wrong if
you didn't,--wrong to yourself; wrong to your family; wrong, if I may
venture to say so, to Daphne; wrong even in the long run to the girl
herself; for she is not fitted for you, and she IS fitted for Reggie
Nettlecraft. Now, do as I bid you. Sit down at once and write her a
letter from my dictation."

He sat down and wrote, much relieved that I took the responsibility off
his shoulders.

"DEAR MISS MONTAGUE," I began, "the inclosed letters have come into
my hands without my seeking it. After reading them, I feel that I
have absolutely no right to stand between you and the man of your real
choice. It would not be kind or wise of me to do so. I release you
at once, and consider myself rele