dowed Laura
alone. Between ringing the bell and the opening of the door, he could
hardly support himself. He asked for Mrs. Palmer in a gasping voice
which caused the servant to look at him with surprise.

The lady was at home. At the drawing-room door, before his name could
be announced, he caught the unwelcome sound of voices in lively
conversation. It seemed to him that a score of persons were assembled.
In reality there were six, three of them callers.

Mrs. Palmer met him with the friendliest welcome. A stranger would have
thought her pretty, but by no means impressive. She was short, anything
but meagre, fair-haired, brisk of movement, idly vivacious in look and
tone. The mourning she wore imposed no restraint upon her humour, which
at present was not far from gay.

'Is it really Mr. Moxey?' she exclaimed. 'Why, I had all but forgotten
you, and positively it is your own fault! It must be a year or more
since you came to see me. No? Eight months?--But I have been through so
much trouble, you know.' She sighed mechanically. 'I thought of you one
day at Bordighera, when we were looking at some funny little
sea-creatures--the kind of thing you used to know all about. How is
your sister?'

A chill struck upon his heart. Assuredly he had no wish to find
Constance sunk in the semblance of dolour; such hypocrisy would have
pained him. But her sprightliness was a shock. Though months had passed
since Mr. Palmer's decease, a decent gravity would more have become her
condition. He could reply only in broken phrases, and it was a relief
to him when the widow, as if tiring of his awkwardness, turned her
attention elsewhere.

He was at length able to survey the company. Two ladies in mourning he
faintly recognised, the one a sister of Mr. Palmer's, comely but of
dull aspect; the other a niece, whose laugh was too frequent even had
it been more musical, and who talked of athletic sports with a young
man evidently better fitted to excel in that kind of thing than in any
pursuit demanding intelligence. This gentleman Christian had never met.
The two other callers, a grey-headed, military-looking person, and a
lady, possibly his wife, were equally strangers to him.

The drawing-room was much changed in appearance since Christian's last
visit. There was more display, a richer profusion of ornaments not in
the best taste. The old pictures had given place to showily-framed
daubs of the most popular school. On a little table at