han well,
rode his machine down a steep hill and escaped destruction only by
miracle. Christian laughed desperately, and declared that he had never
heard anything so good.

But the tension of his nerves was unendurable. Five minutes more of
anguish, and he sprang up like an automaton.

'Must you really go, Mr. Moxey?' said Constance, with a manner which of
course was intended to veil her emotion. 'Please don't be another year
before you let us see you again.'

Blessings on her tender heart! What more could she have said, in the
presence of all those people? He walked all the way to Notting Hill
through a pelting rain, his passion aglow.

Impossible to be silent longer concerning the brilliant future. Arrived
at home, he flung off hat and coat, and went straight to the
drawing-room, hoping to find Marcella alone. To his annoyance, a
stranger was sitting there in conversation, a very simply dressed lady,
who, as he entered, looked at him with a grave smile and stood up. He
thought he had never seen her before.

Marcella wore a singular expression; there was a moment of silence, for
Christian decidedly embarrassing, since it seemed to be expected that
he should greet the stranger.

'Don't you remember Janet?' said his sister.

'Janet?' He felt his face flush. 'You don't mean to say--? But how you
have altered! And yet, no; really, you haven't. It's only my
stupidity.' He grasped her hand, and with a feeling of genuine
pleasure, despite awkward reminiscences.

'One does alter in eleven years,' said Janet Moxey, in a very pleasant,
natural voice--a voice of habitual self-command, conveying the idea of
a highly cultivated mind, and many other agreeable things.

'Eleven years? Yes, yes! How very glad I am to see you! And I'm sure
Marcella was. How very kind of you to call on us!'

Janet was as far as ever from looking handsome or pretty, but it must
have been a dullard who proclaimed her face unpleasing. She had eyes of
remarkable intelligence, something like Marcella's but milder, more
benevolent. Her lips were softly firm; they would not readily part in
laughter; their frequent smile meant more than that of the woman who
sets herself to be engaging.

'I am on my way home,' she said, 'from a holiday in the South,--an
enforced holiday, I'm sorry to say.'

'You have been ill?'

'Overworked a little. I am practising medicine in Kingsmill.'

Christian did not disguise his astonishment.

'Medicine?'

'You don