hen."

"And I remember you at the bijou."

"I should think so. I knew then so well what was going to happen,"
said Ayala.

"What did you know?"

"That you and Lucy were to fall in love with each other."

"I had done my part of it already," said he.

"Hardly that, Isadore," said Lucy, "or you would not have passed me
in Kensington Gardens without speaking to me."

"But I did speak to you. It was then I learned where to find you."

"That was the second time. If I had remained away, as I ought to have
done, I suppose you never would have found me."

Ayala was then taken round to see all those magnificent groups and
figures which Sir Thomas would have disposed of at so many shillings
apiece under the auctioneer's hammer. "It was cruel,--was it not?"
said Lucy.

"He never saw them, you know," said Ayala, putting in a goodnatured
word for her uncle.

"If he had," said the sculptor, "he would have doubted the
auctioneer's getting anything. I have turned it all in my mind very
often since, and I think that Sir Thomas was right."

"I am sure he was wrong," said Lucy. "He is very goodnatured, and
nobody can be more grateful to another person than I am to him;--but
I won't agree that he was right about that."

"He never would have said it if he had seen them," again pleaded
Ayala.

"They will never fetch anything as they are," continued the sculptor,
"and I don't suppose that when I made them I thought they would. They
have served their purpose, and I sometimes feel inclined to break
them up and have them carted away."

"Isadore!" exclaimed Lucy.

"For what purpose?" asked Ayala.

"They were the lessons which I had to teach myself, and the play
which I gave to my imagination. Who wants a great figure of Beelzebub
like that in his house?"

"I call it magnificent," said Ayala.

"His name is Lucifer,--not Beelzebub," said Lucy. "You call him
Beelzebub merely to make little of him."

"It is difficult to do that, because he is nearly ten feet high. And
who wants a figure of Bacchus? The thing is, whether, having done
a figure of Bacchus, I may not be better able to do a likeness of
Mr. Jones, when he comes to sit for his bust at the request of his
admiring friends. For any further purpose that it will answer,
Bacchus might just as well be broken up and carted away in the
dust-cart." To this, however, the two girls expressed their vehement
opposition, and were of opinion that the time would come when
Beelzeb