though it was often the case with
her that she did not in truth expatriate herself for more than six
weeks. She was careful to have a fashionable seat in a fashionable
church. She dearly loved to see her name in the papers when she was
happy enough to be invited to a house whose entertainments were
chronicled. There were a thousand little tricks,--I will not be harsh
enough to call them unworthy,--by which she served Mammon. But she
did not limit her service to the evil spirit. When in her place in
church she sincerely said her prayers. When in London, or out of it,
she gave a modicum of her slender income to the poor. And, though she
liked to see her name in the papers as one of the fashionable world,
she was a great deal too proud of the blood of the Houstons to toady
any one or to ask for any favour. She was a neat, clean, nice-looking
old lady, who understood that if economies were to be made in eating
and drinking they should be effected at her own table and not at that
of the servants who waited upon her. This was the confidential friend
whom Frank trusted in his new career.

It must be explained that Aunt Rosina, as Miss Houston was called,
had been well acquainted with her nephew's earlier engagement,
and had approved of Imogene as his future wife. Then had come the
unexpected collapse in the uncle's affairs, by which Aunt Rosina as
well as others in the family had suffered,--and Frank, much to his
aunt's displeasure, had allowed himself to be separated from the lady
of his love on account of his comparative poverty. She had heard
of Gertrude Tringle and all her money, but from a high standing of
birth and social belongings had despised all the Tringles and all
their money. To her, as a maiden lady, truth in love was everything.
To her, as a well-born lady, good blood was everything. Therefore,
though there had been no quarrel between her and Frank, there had
been a cessation of sympathetic interest, and he had been thrown into
the hands of the Battledores and Shuttlecocks. Now again the old
sympathies were revived, and Frank found it convenient to drink tea
with his aunt when other engagements allowed it.

"I call that an infernal interference," he said to his aunt, showing
her Imogene's letters.

"My dear Frank, you need not curse and swear," said the old lady.

"Infernal is not cursing nor yet swearing." Then Miss Houston, having
liberated her mind by her remonstrance, proceeded to read the letter.
"I ca