say they only pocketed the money."

"That they did, no doubt. But they gave me something for it. A hundred
and twenty-three advertisements addressed to Fenwicks--none of them
to me!"

"But have we advertised enough?"

"Oh, heavens, yes. Think of the answers we've had! I've just received
the hundred and forty-second. From a lady in distressed circumstances
who bought a piano ten years ago from a party of my name and
initials--thought I might be inclined to buy it back at half-price.
She proposes to call on me early next week."

"Poor Mr. Fenwick! It _is_ discouraging, I admit. But, oh dear! fancy
if there's some poor thing breaking her heart somewhere! It's easy
enough for you--_you_ don't believe in her."

"That's it; I don't!" He dropped a tone of pleasantry, and spoke more
seriously. "Dear Mrs. Nightingale, if my absence of conviction of
the existence of this lady did not rise to the height of a definite
disbelief in her altogether--well, I should be wretched. But I feel
very strongly that I need not make myself a poor miserable about her.
I _don't_ believe in her, that's the truth!"

"You don't believe a man could forget his wife?"

"I _can't_ believe it, try how I may! Anything--anybody else--but his
wife, no!"

Fenwick had come in late in the evening, as he was in the habit of
doing, often three or four times in the week. He looked across from
his side of the hearthrug, where he had been standing watching the
fire, but could not see the face opposite to him. Mrs. Nightingale was
sitting with her back to the light sheltering her eyes from the blaze
with a fire-screen. So Fenwick saw only the aureole the lamp made in
her hair--it was a fine halo with a golden tinge. Sally was very proud
of mamma's hair; it was much better fun to do than her own, said the
vulgar child. But even had she not been hidden by the screen, the
expression on her face might have meant nothing to him--that is,
nothing more than the ready sympathy he was so well accustomed to.
A little anxiety of eye, a tremor in the lip, the birth of a frown
without a sequel--these might have meant anything or nothing. She
might even have turned whiter than she did, and yet not be said to
show the cross-fire of torments in her heart. She was, as we told you,
a strong woman, either by nature, or else her life had made her one.

For, think of what the recesses of her memory held; think of the past
she looked back on, and knew to be nothing but a blank