see that everybody else was on the _qui vive_. The
constitutional candidate was, perhaps, as little interested in the
coming strife as any man in the limits of the constituency, but he had
allowed himself to be entered for the race, and was bound to a pretence
of warmth even if he could not feel it. Ruth was not much in his mind
while he was away, but when he came back again he found time once more
hanging heavy on his hands; and being greeted by her when he went to
listen to the quartette party precisely as he had been from the first,
he determined more than ever to start a pronounced flirtation with the
haughty little hussy, and bring her to a proper sense of her position.
So he went early to church afoot on Sunday morning, leaving his lordship
to follow alone in his carriage, and he chatted affably with the members
of the little crowd that lingered about the lich-gate and the porch, and
there awaited Ruth's coming.

Fuller was rather impressed with the young man's civility as a general
thing, being open to the territorial sentiment, and was proud to
be singled out from the rest by the Earl of Barfield's visitor,
and publicly talked to on terms of apparent equality. And Ruth, who
accompanied her father, was on this particular morning not quite what
she had been hitherto. "When Ferdinand raised his hat and proffered her
his hand she blushed, and her eyes held a singular uncertainty he had
never before remarked in them. He could even feel in the few brief
seconds for which her hand lay in his own that it trembled slightly.
Aha! She began to awake, then. The young Ferdinand plumed himself and
spread himself for her vision. The old man, not unwilling that his
neighbors should remark him in familiar intercourse with the great of
the land, lingered at the porch, and for once Ruth did not desert his
side and run into the church alone.

"Upon my word," said Ferdinand, "there is something in the air of Heydon
Hay, Mr. Fuller, which would seem to be unusually favorable to the
growth of feminine charms. May I congratulate Miss Ruth upon her aspect
this morning?"

He meant the little thing no harm. He could compliment her in her
father's presence as easily as out of it, and perhaps with a better
conscience. Whensoever loosed from the string the arrow of compliment
would find its mark. Besides, the very carelessness of his appreciation
would help its force. He might be a little kinder and more confidential
later on.

"Well,