ce of a few minutes.
Yes, such would have been the discreet course; and then I might have
trusted to my manner, my tact, and a certain something in my general
bearing, to have brought the matter to a successful issue. While I thus
meditated, the waiter re-entered the room, and, cautiously closing
the door, approached me with an ostentatious pretence of secrecy and
mystery.

"I have given her the letter," said he, in a whisper.

"Speak up!" said I, severely; "what answer has the lady given?"

"I think you 'll get the answer presently," said he, with a sort of grin
that actually thrilled through me.

"You may leave the room," said I, with dignity, for I saw how the fellow
was actually revelling in the enjoyment of my confusion.

"They were reading it over together for the third time when I came
away," said he, with a most peculiar look.

"Whom do you mean? Who are they that you speak of?"

"The gentleman that she was expecting. He came by the 9.40 train from
Brussels. Just in time for your note." As the wretch uttered these
words, a violent ringing of bells resounded along the corridor, and he
rushed out without waiting for more.

I turned in haste to my note-book; various copies of my letter were
there, and I was eager to recall the expressions I had employed in
addressing her. Good heavens! what had I really written? Here were
scraps of all sorts of absurdity; poetry, too! verses to the "Fair
Victim of a Recent War," with a number of rhymes for the last word,
such as "low," "snow," "mow," &c.,--all evidences of composition under
difficulty.

While I turned over these rough copies, the door opened, and a large,
red-faced, stern-looking man, in a suit of red-brown tweed, and with
a heavy stick in his hand, entered; he closed the door leisurely after
him, and I half thought that I saw him also turn the key in the lock. He
advanced towards me with a deliberate step, and, in a voice measured as
his gait, said,--

"I am Mr. Jopplyn, sir,--I am Mr. Christopher Jopplyn."

"I am charmed to hear it, sir," said I, in some confusion, for, without
the vaguest conception of wherefore, I suspected lowering weather ahead.

"May I offer you a chair, Mr. Jopplyn? Won't you be seated? We are going
to have a lovely day, I fancy,--a great change after yesterday."

"Your name, sir," said he, in the same solemnity as before,--"your name
I apprehend to be Porringer?"

"Pottinger, if you permit me; Pottinger, not Porringer."