'Papa, Miss Wyndham says we're all cowards,' exclaimed Carrie, determined to overwhelm Norah by calling up this tremendous reinforcement. Mr. Summers simply gazed confounded at Norah, who, reddening to the roots of her hair quite as much with vexation as with confusion, said hesitatively,

'I only said that I thought hunting a hare cowardly.'
'Cowardly!' gasped Mr. Summers.

'I mean that it's so weak and timid and defenceless,' pleaded Norah.

I presume you know, Miss Wyndham, that some of the best people in England hunt, from the Prince of Wales down, and they're not exactly the milksops and cowards of the country.' Mr. Summers was so much affronted by the audacious charge brought against him personally, (for, of course, he thought only of himself,) that he spoke with exceeding stiffness and severity even. Wherefore Miles, though of the opposite camp, deserted at once to Norah.

'Well, it depends on what you mean by "cowardly," he said. 'It isn't cowardly in the sense that a milksop is cowardly-without nerve or courage—but it is cowardly in the sense that a bully is cowardly. You call a man a coward who beats a woman, because she can't resist him; and in this sense there's certainly something cowardly in a crowd of men and dogs running a wretched hare "into jelly," as Miss Carrie describes it.'

Miles, having overheard this expression, was not sorry to administer the rebuke in retaliation for Carrie's attempt to make mischief.

'The class of people who hunt and course are not exactly the class of people, I take it, who beat their wives. I have yet to learn that the English aristocracy are cowardly in any sense,' retorted Mr. Summers, with an access of pomposity. He was as much amazed as annoyed by being opposed and even lectured!

'A man may do a cowardly thing, without being a coward, just as he may do a cruel thing, without being cruel-from thoughtlessness:

Evil is wrought by want of thought

As well as want of heart.

Or, as Tennyson puts it:

Cruel as a schoolboy ere he grows

To pity. More from ignorance than will.

But indeed,' added Miles, rather ashamed of the didactic vein into which he had drifted, I ought to be the last person, as Norah will tell you, to preach to others on the subject. I have

killed as many harmless, dumb, defenceless creatures in my day as most men.'

'Do I understand that you object to join us?' asked Mr. Summers frigidly. He was so unaccustomed to opposition as to take it for impertinence. Miles was not the man to forget the complaisance of a guest because of a host's discourtesy. Besides, to tell the truth, his heart was in the sport, say what he would; and he felt free to enjoy it, since Norah would need no police protection in the absence of the whole household.

'I shall be very glad to join you,' he said basely, laughing at his own inconsistency.

"“I see a good amendment of life in thee," quoted Reid aptly. And Miles with a like readiness replied,

666

Why, Hal, 'tis my vocation." I've done nothing else all my life—more's the pity—and it's too late to turn over a new leaf now.'

Thus Norah was left at home with Mrs. Summers and Effie, or rather with Effie, for Mrs. Summers, who had a frugal mind, was busy about the house. At first, Effie, furious at not being allowed to join the party, was unapproachable. She knelt on a chair at the window which commanded a view of the avenue, and watched through her tears the departure of the party. After a bit the storm of sobs subsided and the rain of tears ceased; and then Norah overheard this young person apparently catechising a fly on the window-pane, putting her questions in grown-up English, but the fly's answers were in the tongue of infancy:

'Little fly, who made you?'

'Dod.'

'Do you love God, little fly?'

'Me dove Dod.'

'Do you love God very, very much, little fly?'

Ve'y, ve'y much.'

'Little fly, would you like to go to God?'

'Yeth.'

Then came a sudden and savage dab on the pane, and the mangled body of the eager little martyr stained the glass.

This Puritan sanctification of slaughter made Norah wonder what kind of woman this child would turn out, who began by being what her sister Ann had come to.

When she had recovered her gravity and could speak with a composed face she said to Effie, 'Effie dear, you shouldn't kill anything.'

'My papa kills things, and so does yours,' with a defiant nod. "They've gone to kill things now.'

'But how would you like a great big giant to come and dash you to pieces against the wall, like that?' pointing to the smashed

fly.

'I'd hit him with a stone in the middle of his forehead, and cut off his head with his sword, and carry it on Ranger' (one of the carriage horses) to Carrie, and we'd dance round it, and papa would give me a shilling.' Here the stories of the deaths of Goliath and of the Baptist were welded together with creditable coherence, a charger' being naturally mistaken for a horse.

'I've got fourteen shillings, and papa says I shall get ever, ever so much money for my Dorking cock when it grows up; but it won't grow up,' with a vehement nod of impatience at the cock's contumacy.

6

You'll be quite a rich woman, Effie, with all that money. What are you going to do with it all?'

6

6

Shan't tell you,' with a leer of elfish cunning. Ann says you've come here to get all Reid's money from him. She says you're an Irish apprentice'-rather a wild version of adventuress.'

This frank disclosure of Ann's flattering judgment was heard by both the people concerned-for Reid stood at the open door.

He had started with the party as a blind to baffle Ann's vigilance, which last night had, from being obvious, become obtrusive; but he had stopped at the lodge under the pretext of some business with the gardener, and had returned thence to the house, when the party was well out of sight. He reached the open door of the library just in time to hear Effie's disclosure of the construction Ann put upon Norah's visit. For a moment he hesitated whether to enter or retire-for he was as yet unseen and unheard. If he advanced, Norah would know that he had heard the child's words; but, on the other hand, he might make them the text of an indignant denunciation of Ann's spitefulness, as a preface to a proposal urged so humbly as to rob the degrading charge of its sting. But would not Norah's knowledge that he had overheard the charge deepen her mortification, and rouse and range her pride in double force against his suit? With these two sets of considerations in balance, a natural cowardice to face an awkward situation decided him to retreat. He stole away to the breakfast-room to wait there till Norah and till he himself had somewhat recovered equanimity.

Meanwhile, Norah's equanimity was certainly upset-much more upset than a heroine's should have been. She should have remembered that the shame of such a charge was wholly the

accuser's; who, in making it, had degraded herself below the anger and even the contempt of the accused. But, instead of regarding the charge from this serene and superb height, Norah was, we must confess, furious. Every drop of her southern Irish blood seemed to tingle in her veins and rush in a sudden flood to her face. It was only after some time and some effort that she recovered self-command enough to say, 'Effie, you should never repeat what you hear.'

Now, what Lucan ungallantly says of women

Ubi velis nolunt; ubi nolis volunt ultro

is, of course, true of all children with more or less limitation; but of this little wretch, Effie, it was true without any limitation at all. Only tell her not to say or do anything, and she would say or do it again and again with 'damnable iteration,' never ceasing until it seemed to have lost its power to annoy you. No sooner, therefore, had Norah reproved her for repeating what she had heard, than she slipped quietly off the chair on which she had been kneeling, got to what she considered a safe distance, and then shouted over and over again, dancing about the while like one possessed: 'Irish apprentice! Irish apprentice! Irish apprentice! That's what we call you. Irish apprentice! Irish apprentice! Irish apprentice!' &c. &c. When, however, Norah's look of disgust at the child's spitefulness changed into one of amusement at the senselessness of what Effie considered to be a most stinging and expressive nickname, the little wretch flung aside this blunted sword to try another with a newer edge. And Ann says you've got no clothes; she says Here her disclosures were brought to an abrupt stop. Reid, entering at this moment behind her, seized her roughly by the arm, thrust her outside the door and locked it behind her. This prompt attempt to suppress her was not altogether effective. No sooner did the child recover from her amazement at the indignity offered her than she set up the most unearthly yells, and kicked the door like a madwoman. Suddenly the kicks and screams ceased, and Reid and Norah heard Ann's thin, screedy voice.

What is the matter, Effie?'

6

'They've-locked-me out,' sobbed Effie.

'Who have locked you out?'

'Reid and her.'

'And Miss Wyndham !' exclaimed Ann in a loud, shocked tone meant to make Norah blush, if anything could make her blush. Then came two peremptory knocks from those lean knuckles, followed by the request in ice-cold, cutting accents; Reid, open the door, please,'

There was nothing for it but to obey, as otherwise Ann would assuredly have made a scandalous disturbance about the business. When the door was opened, Effie rushed in first, triumphant, and shouted again her shrill war-cry, 'Irish apprentice!' till Ann cried, 'Silence, Effie!' in such a tone that even Effie was subdued for the moment.

'I thought you were going to see the coursing,' Ann said then, turning to her brother, and speaking in a tone of scathing sar

casm.

'I changed my mind,' he replied impatiently.

'For the same reason, I have no doubt, that made Miss Wyndham decline to accompany us.' And the sneer said as plainly as words that Norah's real reason for staying at home was the hope of a tête-à-tête with her brother. Indeed, she was now absolutely certain of this. She suspected it at the time when Norah gave her singular reason for her singularity in separating herself from the entire party. When she missed her brother on the road there was little doubt of it left in her mind; and now there was none at all when she found, upon making all haste back to the house, the two absolutely locked into a room by themselves.

'I shall not have Miss Wyndham insulted,' cried Reid intemperately.

6

Then why insult her? Any lady must feel insulted by being locked into a room with a gentleman in this way,' with an appreciable emphasis on the word lady.'

'Good heavens! woman,' exclaimed her brother, wild and at his wits' end, you don't know what you're saying. I didn't lock Miss Wyndham in, but this—this imp out, whom you have filled with your venom. She was screaming out all the monstrous things you said in her hearing of Miss Wyndham.'

Ann was a little taken aback for a moment, but, recovering herself, began, 'I said nothing of Miss Wyndham-' when she was interrupted by Norah, who, as though come at last to herself, stepped forward to put. a stop to a disgraceful scene. Up to this she had been standing drawn up to her full height, her head thrown back a little, her face white to the lips, which were curled in disdain and disgust, and her eyes wide with surprise and anger. But now, as though realising at last, thoroughly, the charge of shamelessness imputed to her, she stepped forward to say slowly in a cold, collected voice: 'Excuse me, Miss Summers, but you've said enough to make what you say or think nothing to me.--Mr. Summers, would you be so kind as to tell my father I wish to see him?' And before either had