ry pleasant evening because he had been there. "It
all depends upon whether any one has anything to say." That was the
determination to which she came when she endeavoured to explain
to herself how it had come to pass that she had liked dancing
with anybody so very hideous. The Angel of Light would of course
have plenty to say for himself, and would be something altogether
different in appearance. He would be handsome,--or rather, intensely
interesting, and his talk would be of other things. He would not
say of himself that he danced as well as though he were a rogue, or
declare that a lady had been thrown out of a window the week after
she was married. Nothing could be more unlike an Angel of Light
than Colonel Stubbs,--unless, perhaps, it were Tom Tringle. Colonel
Stubbs, however, was completely unangelic,--so much so that the
marvel was that he should yet be so pleasant. She had no horror of
Colonel Stubbs at all. She would go anywhere with Colonel Stubbs, and
feel herself to be quite safe. She hoped she might meet him again
very often. He was, as it were, the Genius of Comedy, without a touch
of which life would be very dull. But the Angel of Light must have
something tragic in his composition,--must verge, at any rate, on
tragedy. Ayala did not know that beautiful description of a "Sallow,
sublime, sort of Werther-faced man," but I fear that in creating her
Angel of Light she drew a picture in her imagination of a man of that
kind.

Days went on, till the last day of Ayala's visit had come, and it was
necessary that she should go back to Kingsbury Crescent. It was now
August, and everybody was leaving town. The Marchesa and Nina were
going to their relations, the Alburys, at Stalham, and could not,
of course, take Ayala with them. The Dosetts would remain in town
for another month, with a distant hope of being able to run down to
Pegwell Bay for a fortnight in September. But even that had not yet
been promised. Colonel Stubbs had been more than once at the house in
Brook Street, and Ayala had come to know him almost as she might some
great tame dog. It was now the afternoon of the last day, and she was
sorry because she would not be able to see him again. She was to be
taken to the theatre that night,--and then to Kingsbury Crescent and
the realms of Lethe early on the following morning.

It was very hot, and they were sitting with the shutters nearly
closed, having resolved not to go out, in order that they migh