ther, older than yourself, and
more experienced, I insist that you encourage the Bishop.'

'Don't quarrel with me, Louis!' she said piteously. 'We don't know that
he thinks anything of me,--we only guess.'

'I know it,--and you shall hear how I know. I am of a curious and
conjectural nature, as you are aware. Last night, when everybody had
gone to bed, I stepped out for a five minutes' smoke on the lawn, and
walked down to where you get near the vicarage windows. While I was
there in the dark one of them opened, and Bishop Helmsdale leant out. The
illuminated oblong of your window shone him full in the face between the
trees, and presently your shadow crossed it. He waved his hand, and
murmured some tender words, though what they were exactly I could not
hear.'

'What a vague, imaginary story,--as if he could know my shadow! Besides,
a man of the Bishop's dignity wouldn't have done such a thing. When I
knew him as a younger man he was not at all romantic, and he's not likely
to have grown so now.'

'That's just what he is likely to have done. No lover is so extreme a
specimen of the species as an old lover. Come, Viviette, no more of this
fencing. I have entered into the project heart and soul--so much that I
have postponed my departure till the matter is well under way.'

'Louis--my dear Louis--you will bring me into some disagreeable
position!' said she, clasping her hands. 'I do entreat you not to
interfere or do anything rash about me. The step is impossible. I have
something to tell you some day. I must live on, and endure--'

'Everything except this penury,' replied Louis, unmoved. 'Come, I have
begun the campaign by inviting Bishop Helmsdale, and I'll take the
responsibility of carrying it on. All I ask of you is not to make a
ninny of yourself. Come, give me your promise!'

'No, I cannot,--I don't know how to! I only know one thing,--that I am
in no hurry--'

'"No hurry" be hanged! Agree, like a good sister, to charm the Bishop.'

'I must consider!' she replied, with perturbed evasiveness.

It being a fine evening Louis went out of the house to enjoy his cigar in
the shrubbery. On reaching his favourite seat he found he had left his
cigar-case behind him; he immediately returned for it. When he
approached the window by which he had emerged he saw Swithin St. Cleeve
standing there in the dusk, talking to Viviette inside.

St. Cleeve's back was towards Louis, but, whether at a sig