o, like a good boy--Master Pinney won't go
without you, and I must put him to bed while they are dishing up.
Come, sir, I've got a mince-pie for you."

"And some oysters--Bobby said I should have some oysters!"

"Yes, yes; come along, sir."

And Master Ducky submitted to his fate, while Julius looked his
wonder, and asked, "Is he nursery-maid?"

"Just now, since the bonne went," said Lenore. "He is a most
faithful, attached servant, who will do anything for them. _She_
does attach people deeply when the first shock is over."

"I am coming to believe so," he answered. "There seem to me to be
excellent elements."

"I am so glad!" said Lenore; "she is so thorough, so true and frank;
and much of this oddness is really an inconsistent struggle to keep
out of debt."

"Well! at any rate I am thankful to her for this opportunity of
seeing you," said Julius. "We have both been longing to speak our
welcome to you."

"Thank you. It is so kind," she fervently whispered; "all the
kinder for the state of things that is insisted on--though you know
that it can make no real difference," she added, apparently
addressing the goldfish.

"Frank knows it," said Julius, in a low voice.

"I trust he does, though I cannot see him to assure him--you will?"
she added, looking up at him with a shy brightness in her eye and a
flush on her cheek.

"Yes, indeed!" he said, laying his hand on hers for a moment. "I
fear you may both have much to pull through, but I think you are of
a steadfast nature."

"I hope so--I think I am, for none of my feelings seem to me ever to
change, except that I get harder, and, I am afraid, bitterer."

"I can understand your feeling that form of trial."

"Oh, if you could, and would help me!"

"As a brother; if I may."

Again she laid a hand on his, saying, "I have longed to talk openly
to you ever since we met in the cow-shed; but I could not make any
advance to any of you, because," she whispered in haste, "I thought
it my duty to hold back from Frank. And now, till we go away,
Camilla watches me and occupies me every minute, will not even let
me ride out with papa. I wonder she lets me talk to you now."

"We know each other," said Julius, shortly.

It was so. Once, in the plain-spoken days of childhood, Miles and
Julius had detected Camilla Vivian in some flagrant cheating at a
game, and had roundly expressed their opinion. In the subsequent
period of Raymond's courtship, Miles had s