lo and
a pedestal--why, when she discovers the truth, I shall really be
_finished off_. But after all," with reviving cheerfulness, "it ain't
my fault if she is kind enough to endow me with imaginary virtues. She
blushed, anyhow. And when a girl accepts a man, it's as if she gave
him leave to teach her the difference between creatures in books, and
fellows as they are. And if she's agreeable, why, so am I; with all my
heart, says I. That's my theory."

"Bob, you are really in earnest? It isn't one of your jokes?"

"Jokes, indeed!" said Charteris, in high dudgeon. "I'll show you how
much in earnest I am, Lieutenant Henry Gerrard. We'll go to business
to-morrow, if you please."

"Then you wish to draw the lots to-night?"

"No, don't let us have any melodramatic nonsense with straws, or bits
of wood of different lengths. We'll go down to the gateway to-morrow
between one and two, when there's scarcely a creature about, and one
shall look up the street, and the other down. Whoever can count twenty
human beings first shall have first right to speak. Are you agreeable?"

"All serene. But what if we both call out at once?"

"Try again, of course. It ain't likely to happen twice. The sentry
will think we have got a wager on, so there won't be any fuss."

* * * * * *

Charteris proved successful in the counting competition, announcing his
twenty while Gerrard had only reached seventeen. As he was dining with
the Cinnamonds that night, the fates seemed to be propitious. But when
Gerrard came back from supping with the James Antonys, he found his
friend reclining on the verandah, in an attitude suggestive of
despondency.

"Sold again!" said a sepulchral voice from the recesses of the long
chair.

"You don't mean that she has refused you, Bob?"

"Oh, don't I?" the voice suggested something more than sulkiness. "If
I don't, I'm very much mistaken. She told me that I wasn't what she
expected, in a way that implied I was a very poor creature indeed. If
that was acceptance, all I can say is, I hope you may be accepted too!"

CHAPTER XV.

MUTTERINGS OF THE STORM.

"Onora, my dearest little one, have you anything to tell me?" Unable
to bear the suspense any longer, Lady Cinnamond had pursued her
daughter to her room.

"No, mamma; only that he is gone."

"But you have not sent him away?"

"I told him again that I could not marry him."

"But I thought you care