it that that made you behave as you did? You are sure you had no other reason?"

["If I say I had," thought Peter, "she will ask me what it was."] "I will be as frank as possible, Miss Tyrrell," he replied. "I had no other reason. What other reason could I have had?"

"I half fancied—but I ought to have seen from the first that, whatever it was, it was not that. And now you have made everything quite clear."

"I am glad you find it so," said Peter, with a touch of envy.

"But I might have gone on misunderstanding and misjudging, putting you down as proud and cold and unsociable, or prejudiced, but for the accident which brought us together, in spite of your determination that we should remain total strangers!"

It was an accident which had made them acquainted, then? He would draw the cheque which contained that episode of his extra time sooner or later; but it was distinctly inconvenient not to have at least some idea of what had happened.

"A fortunate accident for me, at all events!" he said, with a judicious recourse to compliment.

"It might have been a very unfortunate one for poor papa," she said, "but for you. I do believe he would have been quite inconsolable."

Peter felt an agreeable shock. Had he really been fortunate enough to distinguish himself by rescuing the Judge's fair daughter from some deadly peril? It looked very like it. He had often suspected himself of a latent heroism which had never had an opportunity of being displayed. This opportunity must have occurred, and he have proved equal to the occasion, in one of those extra hours!

"I can quite imagine that he would be inconsolable indeed!" he said gallantly. "Fortunately, I was privileged to prevent such a calamity."

"Tell me again exactly how you did it," she said. "I never quite understood."

Peter again took refuge in a discreet vagueness.

"Oh," he replied, modestly, "there's not much to tell. I saw the—er—danger, and knew there wasn't a moment to lose; and then I sprang forward, and—well, you know the rest as well as I do!"

"You only just caught him as he was going up the rigging, didn't you?" she asked.

So it was the Judge he had saved—not his daughter! Peter felt a natural disappointment. But he saw the state of the case now: a powerful judicial intellect overstrained, melancholia, suicidal impulses—it was all very sad; but, happily, he had succeeded in saving this man to his country.

"I—ventured to detain him," he said, considerately, "seeing that he was—er—rather excited."

"But weren't you afraid he would bite you?"

"No," said Peter, pained at this revelation of the Judge's condition, "that possibility did not occur to me. In fact, I am sure that—er—though the strongest intellects are occasionally subject to attacks of this sort, he would never so far forget himself as to—er—bite a complete stranger."

"Ah!" she said, "you don't know what a savage old creature he can be sometimes. He never ought to be let loose; I'm sure he's dangerous!"

"Oh! but think, Miss Tyrrell," remonstrated Peter, unmistakably shocked at this unfilial attitude towards a distinguished parent; "if he was—er—dangerous, he would not be upon the Bench now, surely!"

She glanced over her shoulder, with evident apprehension.

"How you frightened me!" she said. "I thought he was really there! But I hope they'll shut him up in future, so that he won't be able to do any more mischief. You didn't tell me how you got hold of him. Was it by his chain, or his tail?"

Peter did not know; and, besides, it was as difficult for him to picture himself in the act of seizing a hypochondriacal judge by his watch-chain or coat-tail, as it was for him to comprehend the utter want of feeling that could prompt such a question from the sufferer's own daughter.

"I hope," he said, with a gravity which he intended as a rebuke—"I hope I treated him with all the respect and consideration possible under the—er—circumstances.... I am sorry that that remark appears to amuse you!"

For Miss Tyrrell was actually laughing, with a merriment in which there was nothing forced.

"How can I help it?" she said, as soon as she could speak. "It is too funny to hear you talking of being regretful and considerate to a horrid monkey!"

"A monkey!" he repeated involuntarily.

So it was a monkey that was under restraint, and not a Judge of Her Majesty's Supreme Court of Judicature: a discovery which left him as much in the dark as to what particular service he had rendered as ever, and made him tremble to think what he might have said. But apparently, by singular good fortune, he had not committed himself beyond recovery; for Miss Tyrrell only said:

"I thought you were speaking of the monkey, the little wretch that came up behind papa and snatched away all his notes—the notes he had made for the great case he tried last term, and has to deliver judgment upon when the Courts sit again. Surely he told you how important they were, and how awkward it would have been if the monkey had escaped with them, and torn them into pieces or dropped them into the sea?—as he probably would have done, but for you!"

"Oh, ah, yes!" said Peter, feeling slightly crestfallen, for he had hoped he had performed a more dashing deed than catching a loose monkey. "I believe your father—Sir John?" he hazarded ... "Sir William, of course, thank you ... did mention the fact. But it really was such a trifling thing to do."

"Papa didn't think so," she said. "He declares he can never be grateful enough to you. And, whatever it was," she added softly, and even shyly, "I, at least, can never think lightly of a service which has—has made us what we are to one another."

What they were to one another! And what was that? A dreadful uncertainty seized upon Peter. Was it possible that, in some way he did not understand, he was engaged to this very charming girl, who was almost a stranger to him? The mere idea froze his blood; for if that was so, how did it affect his position towards Sophia? At all hazards, he must know the worst at once!

"Tell me," he said, with trembling accents,—"I know you have told me already, but tell me once more—precisely what we are to one another at present. It would be so much more satisfactory to my mind," he added, in a deprecatory tone, "to have that clearly understood."

"I thought I had made it quite clear already," she said, with the least suspicion of coldness, "that we can be nothing more to one another than friends."

The relief was almost too much for him. What a dear, good, sensible girl she was! How perfectly she appreciated the facts!

"Friends!" he cried. "Is that all? Do you really mean we are nothing more than friends?"

He caught her hand, in the fervour of his gratitude, and she allowed it to remain in his grasp; which, in the altered state of things, he found rather pleasant than otherwise.

"Ah!" she murmured, "don't ask me for more than I have said—more than I can ever say, perhaps! Let us be content with remaining friends—dear friends, if you like—but no more!"

"I will," said Peter promptly, "I will be content. Dear friends, by all means; but no more!"

"No," she assented; "unless a time should come when——"

"Yes," said Peter, encouragingly, as she hesitated. "You were about to say, a time when——?"

Her lips moved, a faint flush stole into her cheeks; she was about to complete her sentence, when her