nd, and this young fellow's wish,--and if
you'll come down to the Bank next week we'll arrange it for you; I
think you'll admit they're doing the handsome to you and yours. And
therefore," he lowered his voice confidentially, "you'll see, Bradley,
that it will only be the honorable thing in you, you know, to look upon
the affair as finished, and, in fact, to do all you can"--he drew his
chair closer--"to--to--to drop this other foolishness."

"I don't think I quite understand you!" said Bradley, slowly.

"But your wife does, if you don't," returned Richardson, bluntly; "I
mean this foolish flirtation between Louise Macy and Mainwaring, which
is utterly preposterous. Why, man, it can't possibly come to anything,
and it couldn't be allowed for a moment. Look at his position and hers.
I should think, as a practical man, it would strike you--"

"Only one thing strikes me, Richardson," interrupted Bradley, in a
singularly distinct whisper, rising, and moving nearer the speaker; "it
is that you're sitting perilously near the edge of this veranda. For, by
the living God, if you don't take yourself out of that chair and out of
this house, I won't be answerable for the consequences!"

"Hold on there a minute, will you?" said Mainwaring's voice from the
window.

Both men turned towards it. A long leg was protruding from Mainwaring's
window; it was quickly followed by the other leg and body of the
occupant, and the next moment Mainwaring come towards the two men, with
his hands in his pockets.

"Not so loud," he said, looking towards the house.

"Let that man go," said Bradley, in a repressed voice. "You and I,
Mainwaring, can speak together afterwards."

"That man must stay until he hears what I have got to say," said
Mainwaring, stepping between them. He was very white and grave in
the moonlight, but very quiet; and he did not take his hands from his
pockets. "I've listened to what he said because he came here on MY
business, which was simply to offer to do you a service. That was all,
Bradley, that I told him to do. This rot about what he expects of you in
return is his own impertinence. If you'd punched his head when he began
it, it would have been all right. But since he has begun it, before he
goes I think he ought to hear me tell you that I have already OFFERED
myself to Miss Macy, and she has REFUSED me! If she had given me the
least encouragement, I should have told you before. Further, I want to
say that, in spi