"I don't quite understand you," Angelo remarked; "but———”

"Please don't try to understand me," said Mabel interrupting him, "it will not do for a gentleman of your position in life to make a study of a lady who has no visible means of subsistence. Your father will prove this more clearly to you."

"Oh! Miss Westbrook

Here he stopped, as her musical voice rippled off into pleasant, unaffected laughter at his astonishment.

"You will think me a very bold young woman to tell you this," said Mabel," but misfortune has the privilege of speaking frankly sometimes."

"If any―"

"And I did want to say, that having a fortune in my own right, from my poor deceased grandmother, and not knowing what to do with one-twentieth part-What's this?"

Mabel had put the purse which she had been making into his hands, wherein she left her own hand warmly and confidently.

"Something to keep your money in," she said, laughing again, "will you take it for my sake?"

"Have you been really making this for me?"

"Yes-it is not much of a keepsake-I should say, a present, is it?"

"I will treasure it all my life, Miss Westbrook."

"You can't do that, because it will wear out too quickly," said the practical Mabel,

"I want you to do me a favour," she said.

Anything—everything," he

"Certainly. answered with alacrity.

"I want you to go for a stroll across the meadows for an hour or two."

"With you?" he asked timidly.

"Oh! no," she replied, "I am busy this morning, and cannot afford the time for a long walk, which would do you a deal of good."

"I am really quite well, Miss Westbrook, I assure you," was his reply.

"You are pale," said Mabel. "Yes-but

"And I wish you to go very much." "Yes-but-will you not tell me why?" were the words he contrived to stammer forth at last.

"Not this morning," said Mabel, shaking her head.

"When I see you again, then?" "When I see you again--very likely." "I don't mind getting out of your way, or going anywhere you wish," said Angelo, "of course not. Still I should like you to understand before I go this morning

Once more, the inexorable Mabel cut him short in his oration.

"It is impossible that this important business will allow me to understand anything fresh just now," said Mabel quickly.

"That's it!" exclaimed Angelo with renewed excitement, "I knew you were grieving and suffering, and-and so on."

"Not I," said Mabel confidently.

all you would have said in the way of offering me a loan, if I had the time to negotiate' one, as the phrase runs. Yes," she added in a different and more earnest tone, "thank you very heartily for such kind thought of me, Angelo."

She withdrew her hand from his and left the purse within his grasp instead, and he walked slowly from the room, as he knew that she wished him to do. He walked in dreamland nevertheless, and his heart-his secret heart-was light, not heavy, for all the money losses which had come to Mabel Westbrook. She seemed nearer to that heart now, and she had called him Angelo for the first time in his life-and life was surely brightening and becoming something that he could comprehend more clearly, in its new solemnity of love and responsibility of care.

As he went across the quadrangle towards the archway beyond, he looked towards Mabel at the window, who smiled brightly and waved her hand, towards him-even kissed her hand to him in a light, graceful fashion, that was French-like in its way, although more English in its honest impulse.

"God bless her," said Angelo, "I am glad she is not cast down by her trouble. I will take her for a drive this afternoon."

the library, whither a forced retirement had not conduced to any of that composure of which he had gone in search. The Master of St. Lazarus was curled up in his arm-chair with Mabel's letter in his hands.

"Did you want me very particularly, Gregory?" asked Mrs. Salmon as she entered, "because I hardly like to leave poor Mabel at present."

"Yes, I do. Poor Mabel indeed!-a pretty nice mess we have made of this poor Mabel business," he groaned forth.

66

'Why, what have we done?" "Acted like a couple of fools, Mrs. Salmon," said her husband. "But will you shut the door, and sit down for a moment?" "Certainly, Gregory."

Mrs. Salmon closed the door, and took a seat which her husband had indicated by a somewhat imperious wave of his hand. She waited for his communication, and her round blue eyes and half-open mouth gave her a stronger resemblance to her son at that time.

"We have been very indiscreet, Mrs. Salmon," continued her husband; "we have believed this young woman's statements as to her position in life, and we have been deceived."

"I don't remember her making any statement, Gregory, and if she had

"My dear, don't interrupt me," said the Master, "at all events, you and I and Angelo have become, as it were, on terms of intimacy with Miss Westbrook, who, after all, is penniless."

"Poor thing!"

"Who after all may be an adventuress, Mrs. Salmon-a long-headed, designing young woman.'

"I will never believe that," said his wife firmly; "I don't think, Gregory, you can look me in the face and say that that's your conviction."

"Mrs. Salmon," said the Master, "I don't know what my conviction is. Here is a stranger, clever and fascinating we will grant, who meets with Angelo in America, sees how weak and trusting a young fellow he is, becomes his friend, arrives with a letter of introduction from him, settles down in our circle, confuses us with a cock-and-bull story -for presumably it may be a cock-and-bull story of restitution to Adam Halfday, is made our guest, and then tells us one fine morning that she is as poor as a church

mouse, and has kept that fact from us for the last ten days."

"She wished to be sure of the truth, Gregory."

"She wished to remain here and ensnare our Angelo, that's the only truth I can see, ma'am," affirmed the Rev. Gregory Salmon. "Here is a poor, young, handsome, sharp woman, and a rich and impressionable young man, and we, like two fools, have, without a single inquiry, done our best to throw them together, and make a match of it."

"Oh, Gregory, don't be so harsh and uncharitable. You can't think all this-I'm sure you can't," said Mrs. Salmon, bursting into tears.

"I have said, Mrs. Salmon, that I do not know what to think,” replied her husband, speaking very slowly and deliberately now; "but I am a man in my right senses, and the whole matter strikes me, at present, as an ingenious and elaborate plan, most skilfully carried out. But there is no occasion to make that noise over it, Mrs. Salmon, that I can possibly see.”

"Mabel is such a dear g―g-good girl," sobbed Mrs. Salmon.

"Yes-a very dear girl to us, if we don't keep our eyes open," replied her husband, and that is all I will ask you to do, madam. Miss Westbrook," he added, sinking his voice to a whisper, "must be got out of this house as soon as we can gracefully do it— she must return to America, if possible, and as quickly as possible-and I will take upon myself to put Angelo on his guard. There is no harm done; the mine has been sprung before its time, I think. I will answer for Angelo's good behaviour under these trying circumstances, if you will get that young person out of the establishment."

"Do you mean to-day?"

"I haven't," said Mrs. Salmon. "And you may leave Angelo to me. Thank Heaven, he is a character that I thoroughly understand, and completely influence. His weakness of disposition has been to us a trial before this," said the Master, "but, after all, it proves a blessing. He is a child, and to be talked out of a fancy like a child."

"Yes-that's true," assented the wife, "but I would not say a word against Miss Westbrook to him."

"I would not say a word of disparagement of Miss Westbrook to any living soul," affirmed Mr. Salmon, who had a bad memory, and regarded his better half from a soulless point of view, like a Mahommedan. Mrs. Salmon shed a few more tears over Mabel's new position in life, but she was not prepared to argue the point very deeply with her lord and master. The reverend gentleman had a strong will of his own, and she had never had any strength of purpose to boast of. She was a passive female, with a good but flabby heart, and disputes and troubles were out of her way, and distressed her too much to face with philosophy. Perhaps it was all for the best that Mabel Westbrook was to leave the premises—she was certainly poor now-and Angelo's position could always secure him at bride from one of the best families in the country. She was very sorry, nevertheless, and it was all very dreadful, and she had grown fond of Mabel, but probably it was the wisest course to get her out of the house.

"Have you left Angelo alone with Miss Westbrook?" asked Mr. Salmon suddenly. "Yes, I have."

"Go back, please, and tell him that I want him," said Gregory, "it will not do to leave those two together. God bless me, I should not wonder if he has not already offered to lend her all his money."

And this was not very far from the truth, as the reader is aware.

Mrs. Salmon departed, and in two minutes reappeared.

"Angelo is not with her, Gregory," she said; one of the brothers tells me that he has just gone across the meads."

"I'll follow him and settle this at once," cried the energetic Master; "a few words will do, and they had better be said, for all our sakes."

"Well-perhaps they had," assented Mrs. Salmon with a sigh.

The Reverend Gregory Salmon was following in his son's track a few minutes afterwards. It did not take long to discover the young man. Angelo had given up at the second meadow, and was lying, full length, on the grass, under a big elm tree, and in company with three thoughtful cows who had got there also out of the heat of the sun. They moved politely and sedately away as the Master of St. Lazarus arrived, but Angelo did not perceive the movement or the cause of it. He was far gone in his own dreamland, and unaware of the presence of his father. He was face downwards, with his elbows in the grass, and his hands clutching his well-shaven cheeks, and before him lay a purse, bright with steel and gold beads, and which was evidently the object of all his attention and admiration. Romance had opened out to him, when grim Reality threw its shadow across the path of his rejoicing.

"Angelo," said Mr. Salmon.

"Ah! father, is that you?" said Angelo, sitting up and quickly putting his purse out of sight.

"Yes, it is I. I have come for a little serious talk with you, my son.' "Concerning Miss Westbrook ?" said Angelo quickly.

"Yes. What made you think so?"

"I don't know," answered Angelo; " perhaps because I can't get her out of my head, and fancy she must be in everybody else's. I am glad it is about Miss Westbrook."

"Are you, though?" said the father, "why?"

"I don't care to speak about anything or anyone else."

The Reverend Gregory Salmon eyed his son somewhat doubtfully.

"You will not like my way of speaking of her perhaps, Angelo," he said, "but you will not misinterpret my reason for it."

"I hope not," answered the son.
"Shall we walk across to the next field ?"
"If you like.”

Angelo rose and joined his father.

"Proceed," said Angelo, with a gravity and firmness for which his sire was wholly unprepared, "and you will be careful what you say, for her sake-and my own."

(To be continued.)