--they drag the very life out of her. I
shall go and find her."

He marched away, noting as he went, with much dissatisfaction, that Mrs.
Heron was inviting Vivian to dinner, and that he was accepting the
invitation.

He went to the top of the house, where he knew that a room was
appropriated to the use of the younger children. Here he found Elizabeth
for once without the three little Herons. She was standing in the middle
of the room, engaged in the prosaic occupation of folding up a
table-cloth.

He stood in the doorway looking at her for a minute or two before he
spoke. She was a tall girl, with fine shoulders, and beautiful arms and
hands. He noticed them particularly as she held up the cloth, shook it
out, and folded it. A clear, fine-grained skin, with a colour like that
of a June rose in her cheeks, well-opened, calm-looking, grey-blue eyes,
a mass of golden hair, almost too heavy for her head; a well-cut
profile, and rather stately bearing, made Elizabeth Murray a noticeable
person even amongst women more strictly beautiful than herself. She was
poorly and plainly dressed, but poverty and plainness became her,
throwing into strong relief the beauty of her rose-tints and
finely-moulded figure. She did not start when she saw Percival at the
door; she smiled at him frankly, and asked why he had come.

"Do you know anything of the Luttrells?" he asked, abruptly.

"The Luttrells of Netherglen? They are my third cousins."

"You never speak of them."

"I never saw them."

"Do you know what has happened to one of them."

"Yes. He shot his brother by mistake a few days ago."

"I was thinking rather of the one who was killed," said Percival. "Where
did you see the account? In the newspaper?"

"Yes." Then she hesitated a little. "And I had a letter, too."

"From the Luttrells themselves?"

"From their lawyer."

"And you held your tongue about it?"

"There was nothing to say," said Elizabeth, with a smile.

Percival shrugged his shoulders, and went back to the drawing-room.

CHAPTER IX.

ELIZABETH'S WOOING.

Percival and his friend dined with the Herons that evening. Mr. Heron
was an artist by profession; he was a fair, abstracted-looking man, with
gold eye-glasses, which he was always sticking ineffectually upon the
bridge of his nose and nervously feeling for when they tumbled down
again. He had painted several good pictures in his time, and was in the
habit of earning a fairly good income