Yes; whatever might have been the fault of her girlhood, her subsequent years had fully atoned for it; she had used her gifts rightly in the case of her step-son, and his father, who had died about a year ago, blessing her for her unwearied devotion, and the happiness she had given him, leaving her the undisputed guardianship of his only child.

As soon as their meal was concluded she went into the adjoining room, divided by folding-doors from the one in which they had been sitting. It bore no traces of a previous occupant like the other, save for a few perfectly executed pictures which hung above the mantel-piece. She had her travelling bag in her hand as she entered, which she was about to deposit upon a table, when her eye caught sight of one of the pictures, and the bag fell to the ground as she started forward to examine the pencil-sketch.

'Impossible!' she exclaimed; and she gazed around the room helplessly, to see if she could by any means find aught therein that would throw a light upon the mystery before her; but all was void: tables, chairs, wardrobe, and dressing appliances were what met her gaze; while, like one fascinated, she continued standing before the sketch as if spell-bound.

'Are you coming soon?' inquired Fred, knocking, who, notwithstanding his disinclination to free converse, could never bear her long out of his sight when they were together.

'I will be with you in a moment,' she returned, recalling herself with no slight effort.

'What is the matter?' he exclaimed as soon as she joined him. 'You look as white as a ghost; you are over-tired, I suspect: had you not better get to sleep as soon as you can?' he inquired with concern, as he noticed that she was suffering from an amount of nervous exhaustion that alarmed him.

'It is nothing,' she returned: 'the journey was fatiguing;' and then her eye stole round the room with suppressed interest.

'Is that the pretty girl you wanted me to admire, Fred, just now when I was too hungry to oblige you?'

'Yes. Is she not a picture? What I should call a "stunner!"'

'When shall I ever knock the school-boy out of you, Fred?' she cried, laughing. 'You are a long way off from that refined phraseology I am labouring to inculcate. But you are right in this case. It is a beautiful picture, of what I should call a detestable character. She is, as you remark, a "stunner." There is not the least soul in her face; nothing but proud self-consciousness, as if she were saying: "I am a beauty, and I know it." Poor thing! she is to be pitied, if that is a true picture, and it looks as if it were.'

'How is she to be pitied? I don't see that at all.'

'Because you can't see yet, Fred, from your brief study of her face, that a girl like that may learn to feel at some time or another; and when she does, the lesson is generally such a painful one that few have the courage to rise above it. The artist who drew her was in no lenient mood; he could detect nothing in her but the stern facts which possibly made him suffer,' she added in an undertone, accompanied by a long-drawn sigh.—'I wish we had a book to read; try the bookcase; it may be unlocked.'

He did as she bade him; and shook his head negatively as he went first to the bookcase and then to the piano.

'"The gentleman," as our landlady calls him, is a cautious man evidently,' said Mrs Arlington. 'Well, we must not find fault with him, for his amiability towards his landlady has secured us a night's repose. I wonder if he is the artist of these pictures? I am ashamed of my curiosity, but I have a wish to know. Could you be diplomatic, Fred, and find out for me?'

'Why not ask the landlady straight out?'

'I dislike to appear so inquisitive, as it is of no moment to us who he is.'

'I don't know that. If he is an artist, he would no doubt be much obliged to us for asking. Act on that presumption. You admire the pictures, and may possibly wish to order some, or to sit for your portrait.'

'How magnificent you are, Fred! We look a likely pair—don't we?—to order pictures or sit for portraits! A hundred guineas or so are nothing to us; are they, my poor boy? Rein in your fancy. I am afraid of you in this respect, when you are once fairly launched on your own resources, as I cannot always be at your elbow, to control your lavish ideas, and our means are not large.'

'Well, I was only suggesting, you know, a ready mode of solving your difficulty about finding out who is the artist of these pictures,' said the boy as he wished her good-night.

As soon as he was gone, Mrs Arlington went cautiously round the room making a minute survey of every article, with a look of intense interest in her face, as though she were searching for a clue she could not find. Every vase on the mantel-piece she subjected to a close scrutiny, to see if possibly a card or old envelope lay concealed therein. But everything was dumb, and refused to bear the least witness as to the name or calling of the previous occupant. Quite foiled, she sat down and fell into a profound reverie, which continued until the landlady knocked at the door, and entered to inquire if there was anything more she wanted, and when she would like her breakfast in the morning.

'Thank you; nothing more to-night; and breakfast at nine. By the way, have you any other lodgers in the house?'

'Yes, ma'am; the first floors are taken by a lady and gentleman for a month, leastways so they told me when they came; but the lady has got a maid who is that vexing I can't abear her; and I would be glad to give them notice to go if I could be sure of another party for the same time; but you see, ma'am, we who live by letting can't afford to have our rooms empty.'

'You cannot let me have these rooms, you say, beyond a couple of days?'

'No, ma'am. Mr Meredith—the gentleman—takes them by the year on the condition that they are always to be ready for him when he writes; and only this afternoon he sent me a letter to say he would be here on Wednesday.'

'Mr Meredith, did you say, was his name? An artist, I suppose? if I may judge by the pictures and the easel.'

'Dear, no, ma'am!' exclaimed the landlady, as if a discreditable imputation had been cast upon the character of her lodger by the question. 'He's got no call to earn his living, not he! He's got a place in the country, which he has let for I don't know how many years, and he keeps himself free to come and go as he likes. Such a fine noble-looking gentleman as he is! He took these rooms of me some eight years back, when I first married and set up housekeeping, because he said he liked the quiet of the place; and he keeps them by the year; but he lets me take in lodgers when he is away, so long as I don't bring children into the rooms. He has been here for a whole year at a spell; and then again he is off, and maybe we won't see him for months at a time. He is a most excellent lodger as ever was; and his man a nice civil, handy fellow, with none of them airs and graces as these minxes of girls give themselves; but then, "Like master, like man," say I, and I've always found it so.'

'And your first floors, you tell me, you would be glad to re-let, were you sure of another tenant?'

'Yes, ma'am.'

'Very well then; as I have no maid likely to disturb you, I will take them for a month certain, if I can have them on Wednesday morning; and I will further pay you the week's rent you will have to forfeit by giving the present lodgers notice to quit summarily; but remember I only take them on this one condition. It is now Monday night, and I must move in on Wednesday morning.'

'I'll manage it for you, ma'am, even if I get a summons for it.'

'You shall be no loser in any case; I will pay all expenses;' and she drew out her purse to deposit a week's rent in advance.

'Never mind it, ma'am; you look a lady as one may trust, and I'll see that you are in the rooms on Wednesday morning. I can easily put