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"But the girls had not the gout!-you told them, did not you ?" (with great animation).

Paul looks down, and his expression is embarrassed.

"Yes," he says, slowly, "I did."

"And showed them my photograph?"

"Ye-es."

"I hope you told them that my hair was not so dark as it looks there" (very anxiously). "Did not they think it pretty? Did not they say what a good figure I must have?"

"I daresay they would not have thought it polite to make personal remarks about you to me," Paul answers, looking thoroughly confused; "and they never are girls to say civil things, don't you know?"

Leonore puts up one dog-skin gloved hand and hides her mouth: it is the mouth that, in its altered and quivering lines, betrays mortification most.

"Did not they did not they say anything?" she asks, in a blank

voice.

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"They looked at the name of the photographer on the back,” he answers, with a smile of recollected annoyance, " and said, 'Oh, yes; he was a good man, they knew.' I remember that, because it made me so savage

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"And-and your cousin ?-what did she say?"

"She was not there."

"But-but when you told her you were going to be married-what did she say then?"

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"Pshaw!" cries he, impatiently, reddening slightly. "What extraordinary questions you do ask! What can it matter to you or me either what she said? She said the-the-usual thing, I suppose (turning his head half away, and viciously knocking a big fungushead off with his stick).

"I do not believe a word of it," cries Lenore, in a fury. "Why do you hate talking about her? Why do you always slide away from the subject when I lead to it? You do not look as if you were telling truth? I believe she-she-she-wanted to marry you herself."

Sometimes the innocent wear the pale livery of guilt, by some ingenious freak of nature. At this audacious statement Paul certainly looks whiter than his wont. "You are talking nonsense," he says, brusquely; "childish, unladylike nonsense," and so speaking, he drops her arm, and stalks on by himself.

She rustles after him through the dead leaves, half-penitent, halfsuspicious, till they reach a stile that gives egress from the wood into a meadow-a December meadow-a very different matter from one of June's buttercup gardens-a meadow flowerless, grey-coloured, and drenched. There, having overtaken him, she lays a hand on each of his arms. "Why will you insist on rousing my devil ?" she says,

impulsively. "Do you do it on purpose? I do not know whether other women have a devil, but I have, I know."

"It is so remarkably easily roused," he answers, drily. "There is not a gooder woman in the world than I am sometimes,' she continues, naïvely. "Why will not you let me always be?"

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"Let you," he repeats, laughing, a little ironically, but looking down with a mollified expression at her repentant fond face, freshened by the cool moist wind. I am sure I do not know what I do to hinder you; I wish to heaven you would be!"

CHAPTER VI.

WHAT JEMIMA SAYS.

THAT evening fate, in the shape of a sleek little widow, wills that we shall have a small dinner-party. We should all have much preferred to have kept to our family circle, and, lounging in our chairs, have wooed little contraband sleeps, in recollection of our last night's fatigues, and preparation for those of the next. But Sylvia is obdurate. "Say what you please," she says, pronouncing each word very distinctly. "Call me a prude if you like-it will not be the first time-I cannot help it, but it does feel so odd, we three quite young women sitting down and hobnobbing with those two young men; nobody belonging to anybody else, don't you know."

"I beg to say I do belong to somebody," interrupts Lenore, holding up her head.

"I am sure nobody can feel more kind and sisterly than I do to Paul," continues Sylvia, with an air of conscious modest merit; "but still there is no use denying that he is a comparative stranger, and I confess I should like him to see that we have some idea of civilisation." So to prove our civilisation, we enlarge our little circle by the addition of the three Websters, of a couple of stray marauding girls, and of three diffident foot-soldiers from the Barracks.

"We used to have really nice regiments always," Sylvia says, in apology for these poor young gentlemen, before their arrival, as she stands with one round white elbow leant on the mantelpiece, looking up with her large appealing eyes to Paul-Sylvia's eyes have appealed and besought and implored all their life, but what for, nobody ever could make out" really nice regiments-the Enniskillens, and the 9th Lancers, don't you know; but now we have only those nasty walking things.

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Paul laughs: "I like nasty walking things; I was one myself." There are no mistakes as to pairing to-day. I, who have no claim upon anybody-I, to whom it is absolutely indifferent who leads me, so that I ultimately reach the savoury haven of dinner, and Mr. Scrope,

who also has no right to anybody present, march in together. During soup, he tries to make feverish and unnatural love to me, which I rightly attribute to the fact of Lenore's blue ribbons and sweet peas being fluttering and flowering opposite; but as I indignantly decline to be the victim of any such imposture, he relapses into a sulky silence, and I into my usual trite vein of moralizing.

If people could but hear the comments made on them. For instance, if Miss Webster had but lurked behind the window-curtains at luncheon to-day, how clothed and lowered and quiet would her shoulders be. I look: they are still playfully shrugged and lifted in all their lean and virgin nakedness.

It is evening. Tea has re-united those whom claret parted. The footmen have wheeled in the card-table, and are now clearing another table for a round game-that noisy refuge of those who cannot talkwhereat loud and inarticulate sounds, like to the bray of the ass, the shrill clucking and calling of a distracted hen-roost, take the place of low-voiced and rational conversation. We are all making our selection between the two games: there are far more candidates for the boisterous mirth of the one than for the silent dignity of the other. The infantry, and their attendant houris, the Websters, in short all the externes, distinctly decline a rubber.

Major Webster has arrived at the age when a man insists on being classed among "the young people." Being ten years his sister's senior, he is almost as old for a man as she for a woman. He likes to get near the youngest girl in the company-he loves bread and butter, that surest sign of advancing age-to bank with her, look over her cards, and tell her all about himself. Paul chooses whist: I am amused to hear Lenore (the amount of whose knowledge of the game I am acquainted with) follow suit. Mr. Scrope does the same; so does Sylvia. As for me, I am nobody. I have been a spectator all my life. I am a spectator still. Laura has walked over to a cabinet, close to where I am sitting, to look for some whist-markers. Scrope has followed her on the same pretence.

"Why do not you join the round game?" I hear her ask him hurriedly, in a low voice. "I wish you would-three-lived commerce and a pony-just the game for a nice little schoolboy."

"Just" (flushing a little and looking rather mulish).

"Do! there's a good boy!" she says, almost imploringly, "I'm really in earnest."

"I will play bézique, if you like," he says, eagerly; "let me get the little round table; you shall deal every time."

She does not speak in answer, but only turns down the corners of her mouth, with an expression of the completest scorn.

"What are you two whispering about over there?" cries Sylvia, playfully, from the table; "no whispering allowed!"

"Let us cut for partners," says Scrope, eagerly advancing.

"It is not much use," replies Lenore, bluntly; "for whoever I cut with, I mean to play with Paul."

They begin. It is Sylvia's deal-Lenore to lead. It is some time before she realises this fact.

"Oh! is it me? What a bore! What on earth shall I play? I have no more idea-Paul, I wish you would suggest something?" Paul looks resolutely, gravely impenetrable.

"When in doubt, play trumps !" suggests Scrope, laughing.

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Trumps!" (with an expression of profound contempt). "Very likely!—as if I did not know that one ought always to keep them to the very end."

Having half-played several cards, and withdrawn them-having gazed imploringly at Paul, who ill-naturedly will not lift his eyeshaving tried to look over Scrope's hand, she at length embarks on the ace of diamonds. The others play little ones to it, and the trick is hers.

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"Oh! it is mine again, is it?" (with a tone of annoyance). "If I had thought of that, I would not have played it. Now it is all to come over again. I suppose" (looking vaguely round for counsel) "that it is not a bad plan to play all one's big ones out first, is it?"

Paul conscientiously tries to veil the expression of extreme dissent that this proposition calls into his countenance, and so successfully, that the ace of hearts instantly and confidently follows his brother. He is succeeded by the ace of spades.

"You have every ace in the pack," Sylvia says, pettishly.

"That I have not!" answers Lenore, glancing up with a mischievous gaiety at Scrope. "You know better than that, do not you, Charlie ?"

At the unnecessary and illegal candour displayed by the first half of the sentence, Paul shudders slightly; but at the familiar abbreviation of his friend's name he forgets all about his cards. He would not look at his betrothed before, when she sought mute counsel from him. He looks at her quickly enough now, with an expression of the most unfeigned, displeased surprise. But, unluckily, she does not see it. Her gaze has strayed to the other table, and she is whispering to Scrope.

"Look at the Major-we always call him 'The Major,' as if there was only one in the world. He is telling that little Miss beside him how a cricket-ball once hit him in the left eye, and asking her to look in and see the mark."

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"How on earth can you tell at this distance ?" asks Scrope, eagerly, answering in the same tone, and playing at haphazard the first card that comes.

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"I know his little ways," she says, laughing. "Once I used to be invited to look into his eye. Ah! Nous avons changé tout cela.' I am too old now."

"Would you mind going on, when you are quite ready?" Paul asks, with an extreme politeness of tone a little contradicted by the unamiable expression of his countenance. Let those who blame him recollect that he loved strict whist, and the rules of the game, with a love hardly inferior to that of the renowned Mrs. Battle.

"My turn!" cries Lenore, returning to the consideration of her cards. "You do not say so! It is always my turn. Now what next? Have spades ever been out before? Surely not.”

She herself, as I have before observed, led the ace three minutes ago, and Sylvia threw away her queen on it. She now boldly advances her king, which is naturally trumped. At this catastrophe she expresses the extremest surprise, which she calls upon Paul to share. In another quarter of an hour, not only the game, but the rubber is ended. Absolutely thrown away!" cries Paul, tossing down his last card, with a gesture of unrestrained irritation. "Two by honours, and excellent playing cards! It is enough to make a saint swear!"

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"I do not know what you mean?" cried Lenore, reddening. "I am sure I did nothing wrong, did I?" (appealing to her adversaries). "I did not revoke, and I returned his lead whenever I remembered what it was, and I led out all my big things. One cannot expect to do much with those little nasty twos and threes!"

"Let us change partners," cries Scrope, his broad blue eyes flashing eagerly. "I am the worst player in Europe."

"By all means," says Lenore, with empressement, glaring angrily across at Paul, though there are tears in her treacherous eyes. "I should like nothing better."

"Not for worlds!" says Sylvia, with a little emphasis on the words, rising, and gathering together her gloves, fan, and scent bottle. "I would not expose my poor little manoeuvres to Paul's criticism for any earthly consideration; I do not mind you; you are a child; you are nobody!"

The guests are gone-"Good-night time" has come-we discreetly issue forth into the hall, and drink claret and sherry-and-water, while Paul and Lenore are saying it in the drawing-room. They do not, however, speak very low, as I overhear them.

"One thing is certain, Paul," says Lenore, playfully, but with a sort of uneasy dignity in her tone, "and that is, that when we are married we will not play cards; I wish you would not be cross to me before people. I do not mind when we are by ourselves."

"I wish you would not call men by their Christian names under my very nose," Paul answers, in a tone that sounds half-jealous, halfashamed.

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