to bow the neck of this proud woman to his
yoke, and break the strong cord of her allegiance to her absent lover.
With many girls it might have been possible to find a way, but Angela
was not an ordinary girl. He had tried, and Lady Bellamy had tried,
and they had both failed, and as for Philip he would take no active
part in the matter. What more could be done? Only one thing that he
could think of, he could force Lady Bellamy to search her finer brains
for a fresh expedient. Acting upon this idea, he at once despatched a
note to her, requesting her to come and see him at Isleworth on the
following morning.

That night passed very ill for the love-lorn George. Angela's vigorous
and imaginative expression of her entire loathing of him had pierced
even the thick hide of his self-conceit, and left him sore as a
whipped hound, altogether too sore to sleep. When Lady Bellamy arrived
on the following morning, she found him marching up and down the
dining-room, in the worst of his bad tempers, and that was a very
shocking temper indeed. His light blue eyes were angry and bloodshot,
his general appearance slovenly to the last degree, and a red spot
burned upon each sallow cheek.

"Well, George, what is the matter? You don't look quite so happy as a
lover should."

He grunted by way of answer.

"Has the lady been unkind, failed to appreciate your advances, eh?"

"Now look here, Anne," he answered, savagely, "if I have to put up
with things from that confounded girl, I am not going to stand your
jeers, so stop them once and for all."

"It is very evident that she has been unkind. Supposing that instead
of abusing me you tell me the details. No doubt they are interesting,"
and she settled herself in a low chair, and glanced at him keenly from
under her heavy eyelids.

Thus admonished, George proceeded to giver her such a version of his
melancholy tale as best suited him, needless to say not a full one,
but his hearer's imagination easily supplied the gaps, and, as he
proceeded, a slow smile crept over her face as she conjured up the
suppressed details of the scene in the lane.

"Curse you! what are you laughing at? You came here to listen, not
laugh," broke out George furiously, when he saw it.

She made no answer, and he continued his thrilling tale without
comment on her part.

"Now," he said, when it was finished, "what is to be done?"

"There is nothing to be done; you have failed to win her affections,
and th