enetrating and inquisitive in their gaze; those of Gawtrey
were like balls of fire. He seemed gradually to dilate in his height,
his broad chest expanded, he breathed hard.

"Ah, Doctor," said Mr. Macgregor, "let me introduce you to Lord
Lilburne."

The peer bowed haughtily; Mr. Gawtrey did not return the salutation,
but with a sort of gulp, as if he were swallowing some burst of passion,
strode to the fire, and then, turning round, again fixed his gaze upon
the new guest.

Lilburne, however, who had never lost his self-composure at this strange
rudeness, was now quietly talking with their host.

"Your Doctor seems an eccentric man--a little absent--learned, I
suppose. Have you been to Como, yet?"

Mr. Gawtrey remained by the fire beating the devil's tattoo upon the
chimney-piece, and ever and anon turning his glance towards Lilburne,
who seemed to have forgotten his existence.

Both these guests stayed till the party broke up; Mr. Gawtrey apparently
wishing to outstay Lord Lilburne; for, when the last went down-stairs,
Mr. Gawtrey, nodding to his comrade and giving a hurried bow to the
host, descended also. As they passed the porter's lodge, they found
Lilburne on the step of his carriage; he turned his head abruptly, and
again met Mr. Gawtrey's eye; paused a moment, and whispered over his
shoulder:

"So we remember each other, sir? Let us not meet again; and, on that
condition, bygones are bygones."

"Scoundrel!" muttered Gawtrey, clenching his fists; but the peer had
sprung into his carriage with a lightness scarcely to be expected from
his lameness, and the wheels whirled within an inch of the soi-disant
doctor's right pump.

Gawtrey walked on for some moments in great excitement; at length he
turned to his companion,--

"Do you guess who Lord Lilburne is? I will tell you my first foe
and Fanny's grandfather! Now, note the justice of Fate: here is this
man--mark well--this man who commenced life by putting his faults on my
own shoulders! From that little boss has fungused out a terrible hump.
This man who seduced my affianced bride, and then left her whole soul,
once fair and blooming--I swear it--with its leaves fresh from the dews
of heaven, one rank leprosy, this man who, rolling in riches, learned to
cheat and pilfer as a boy learns to dance and play the fiddle, and (to
damn me, whose happiness he had blasted) accused me to the world of his
own crime!--here is this man who has not left off one vice,