for if a miracle could now be wrought in his favour, and Caroline be restored to him all he had once believed her, his compassion for Willoughby, he felt, would render the remainder of his own life wretched. Yet how did his heart sicken at the thought of the scenes he must witness, the confidences he must hear, the thoughtless railleries he must parry, if he would act successfully the part which he felt it his duty to maintain: for why should he wantonly embitter for another the cup of joy which he was himself forbidden to taste; that other a brother whom he fondly loved—a brother who he knew loved him with the most enthusiastic affection? in short, in a futurity now become evidently unavoidable, he beheld, as it were, all the appalling apparatus of torture displayed before him, yet felt necessitated to submit his spirit to agony, with almost the stern fortitude of an Indian chief, yielding his limbs to the cruelty of his foes.

No sooner did he enter the drawing-room than his sisters began to teaze him, first about the length of his visit; and when they found he had not been admitted, one observed that a runaway lover did not deserve the favour of an audience; another asked archly, if he had commissioned Willoughby to take the sole charge of Caroline in his absence. Lord Darlingford, who was holding a skein of silk on the extended fingers of both hands for Jane to wind, being unconscious how painful the subject was to Alfred, said that he would not suspect Mr. Arden of conduct so imprudent, for that love-making by proxy was universally acknowledged to be extremely perilous.

Louisa declared that with her the lover who was present was always the favourite. Sir James, who was standing beside her, giggled, and drew a step nearer. An expression of disgust passed over her countenance, which, however, she concealed, by stooping closer to her scrap-book, into which she was writing some passionate lines given her by Henry, of the ardour of whose manner when he last repeated the said lines she was reflecting at the moment.

Jane thought, but did not say, that absence would rather add tenderness to feeling where it did exist; without, however, daring to associate the thought with the idea of one now absent—and who had once been remembered with tenderness—for his marriage with another had some time since appeared in the Morning Post.

Madeline, whose heart was free, expressed openly the sentiment Jane had secretly thought, though not without one of those prophetic blushes which will suffuse the cheeks of even disengaged young ladies at the very anticipation of being one time or other in love in their turn.

CHAPTER IV.

Geoffery was still at the billiard table, where, with the assistance of Sir William Orm, he was engaged in plucking a new pigeon, no less a personage than the future head of the Salter family.

Mr. John Salter was a vain, vulgar, selfish fool; in natural clumsiness a caricature of John Bull personified, yet so determined to be French and Frenchified, and so proud of his travels to and through Boulogne, that the young men about the rooms, to whom he afforded infinite amusement, called him the Marquis. Sir William Orm, though he had long since cut the other members of the Salter family, sometimes did the young man the honour to win his money; while Geoffery Arden, and several other fashionables, granted him the privilege of a limited portion of their acquaintance on the same liberal terms. When the Misses Salter, however, saw their brother bow to one gentleman, speak to another, and walk with a third, their drooping hopes naturally revived.

"Who is that, John?—Has he much fortune—Is he married?—Couldn't you ask him to dinner some day?—And who is that? I never saw you speak to him before." Such were the questions and comments addressed by the young ladies to their hopeful brother, who never, however, took the trouble of giving them any satisfaction; his usual polite reply being, "If I choose to ask him to dinner, I won't wait for your leave you may depend upon it."

"Well," said Miss Salter to her sister, "if we get plenty of men acquaintance through John, we needn't much care about the ladies after all. It's the men we want you know."

"I know that," said Grace, "but I don't know that we shall get them: however we might have had both the ladies and the gentlemen, only for your improper conduct to Mrs. Dorothea. Isn't this Mr. Arden that John knows, her nephew; and Sir Willoughby Arden, and the other Mr. Arden both her nephews? besides, her knowing all the fine people; why she would have been the very best acquaintance in Cheltenham, if we had only kept her while we had her."

"Well, I wish you'd keep your temper I know, and not be always harping on that old story."

"Temper, indeed! The less you say on that subject the better; but for that matter I mean to take your advice and keep my temper, as it happens to be one of the best going; but I recommend you to part with yours as soon as possible, for you can't exchange it for a worse let me tell you."

Miss Salter, who had just finished washing her hands, snatched up the basin, flung its contents in her sister's face, and effecting her retreat during the first consternation of the enemy, said, as she flounced out of the room, "except I changed it for yours."

Descending in haste, she encountered her brother, Sir William Orm, and Mr. Geoffrey Arden in the entrance hall. Astonished, delighted, and covered with smiles, she accompanied them into the drawing room; ere however they had time to be seated, in rushed Miss Grace, dripping from the shower bath so lately administered by her affectionate sister, and her eyes so blinded by the visitation of soap suds, that, alas, she saw not the strangers; but having heard her brother's voice as he crossed the hall, she poured forth her bitter complaints, sobbing violently, and relating the particulars of the assault perpetrated by Miss Salter. John laughed rudely—Sir William and Geoffery looked foolish—and Grace, having received a private hint from her sister, wiped her eyes, beheld the gentlemen, and after standing for a moment perfectly aghast, took her departure; while Miss Salter, in utter confusion, and with a countenance of the deepest mortification, yet trying to force a laugh, said it was very childish of Grace to take her silly jest amiss.

"You're such a pair of little innocent children, to be sure," said her brother with a sneer.

"Some people have a particular dislike to practical jokes," observed Sir William Orm.

"This is not the entertainment however that I brought my friends home to receive," continued the amiable Mr. John. "So I beg you'll keep your quarrels to yourselves, and order some dinner."

Mr. Salter entering at the moment Miss Salter made her escape, she flew first to the room to which her sister had returned to repair the injured adornments of her person, opened the door, thrust in her head, grinned a silent defiance, and slamming the door to again, ran down to Mrs. Johnson, to consult in providing a proper entertainment for guests so valuable, or rather so invaluable, as were two fashionable beaux. Hotels and pastry cooks were ordered to be laid under contribution, and no expense spared, let papa scold as he might. In cases of such vital importance, thought Miss Salter, people mustn't stick at trifles. She then ran up stairs again and in breathless haste, with the assistance of a housemaid changed her dress, and throwing on all the gold chains and bracelets she could muster, made her appearance in the drawing-room, looking however, as might have been expected, after so much exertion both mental and corporeal, not quite so cool as she could have wished. Whether, therefore, it was most to her relief or to her disappointment, when she found the gentlemen too much occupied to perceive her entrance, she was not able to define her feelings with sufficient accuracy to decide, although she had plenty of time for self-examination,