But there was another matter besides the one he had discussed with Benny Hines, which at this period of his career might not unreasonably be supposed to seriously ruffle that serenity of mind which Mr. Brabazon had heretofore been so successful in cultivating, and that was his love affair with Miss Leslie.

With his uncle\'s discarding of him, all his hopes in that direction had been irremediably blighted. As a pauper--for he was no more than that now--all thought of love-making was out of the question for years to come, if not for ever. It was true that he had won no promise from Clara, but he had so far declared himself to her at the moment of Mrs. Mordaunt\'s interruption that he felt it due to both of them that he should find an opportunity of explaining to Miss Leslie that, if he wished her to consider as unsaid the impassioned words he had poured into her ear on that never-to-be-forgotten occasion, it was not because his feelings towards her had undergone the shadow of a change, but because circumstances outside his control had rendered it impossible for him, as an honourable man, to press his suit to an issue. Bitter, very bitter to him, would such a confession be. During the last few months he had dreamt so many dreams of which Clara was the central figure, his imagination had indued her with so many precious attributes, and so full of happy confidence had he been but a little while before, that to find himself at one fell blow robbed of everything, even of hope for the future, had, taken in conjunction with that other stroke of fate, the effect, for the time being, of numbing all his faculties of thought and feeling. For hours he would lie on his back with shut eyes, his senses too dulled to allow of his suffering acutely, while yet what might be termed a slow fever of misery seemed to be eating his very life away.

Among all Mr. Brabazon\'s acquaintances, and they were more numerous than he could readily have counted, there was not one, perhaps, who would have credited him with the possession of more than that limited--mostly very limited--range of feeling and sensibility with which a somewhat parsimonious Providence has seen fit to endow your average young man about town. Indeed, it is only fair to assume that Burgo himself had no suspicion that there lay dormant within him such heights and depths of passionate but restrained emotion as those which now revealed themselves for the first time. But he was essentially a man of action, and before long he roused himself, although not without an effort, and shook off him a torpor which could not well be otherwise than enervating, and which seemed to him nothing less than a slur on his manhood. And with that his courage came back to him in full measure, and he set himself to confront the future with resolute eyes.

A wild, nay, nothing less than an insane notion, had more than once caught him by the throat, as it were, and for a little while had made his breath come thick and fast. What, he said to himself--what if, when he should tell Clara he was a ruined man, and that she must strive to forget he had ever spoken to her as he had, she were to reply that to her his loss of fortune meant nothing, that her heart was his and ever would be; that she loved him not one jot less now that he was poor than when all the world accepted him as his uncle\'s heir It was a madman\'s dream; yet he had read and been told of such things; and there were times when it refused to be scouted, and would "sweetly creep into his study of imagination." But even granting for a moment that such a thing were to come to pass, what then? The circumstances of the case would in no wise be altered. To tie any girl down to his broken fortunes would be both a cruelty and a wrong. It would be very, very sweet to listen to such a confession from the lips he loved--but--après?

Every morning he skimmed the columns of arrivals and departures in the Morning Post in quest of a notification of the return to town of Mrs. Mordaunt and her niece, for he was quite aware that to the elder lady life would have seemed scarcely worth living had her comings and goings failed to be duly recorded in that organ of the elect. At length he found what he was looking for. Mrs. Mordaunt and Miss Leslie had arrived from Paris at No. 6 Cantelupe Gardens. Then, a few days later, in one of the weekly society papers he came across an announcement of the engagement of Miss Leslie and Lord Penwhistle.

It was only what he had been expecting to hear for some time past, and yet the blow, when it did fall, seemed scarcely the less hard to bear on that account. Well, all was at an end now. Whatever faint but altogether illusory hopes had lurked unbidden in the most secret chamber of his heart that Clara might possibly rise superior to the prejudices of her station--might even rise to the height of a great sacrifice, and insist upon throwing in her lot with his--withered and fell dead before that fatal announcement.

On one point he was determined: he would see Clara and speak with her for the last time. After what had passed between them, after what he had said to her on the occasion of their last meeting, he felt that some justification of himself might not improbably be looked for by her. At any rate, it was due to himself to impress upon her that, although fickle fortune had left him in the lurch, there was no change in the sentiments with which he regarded her--that he still loved her as devotedly as ever he had done. No less than that and no more would he say to her.

More clearly, as time went on, was Burgo made to feel that he was being coldshouldered and quietly dropped by numbers of those with whom he had heretofore been on terms of intimacy, and who had always accepted him as one of themselves. Already his cards and invitations had dwindled by fifty per cent. People whom he had been in the habit of visiting for years seemed of late to have unaccountably forgotten his existence. Mothers with marriageable daughters no longer smiled on him so sweetly as they had been wont to do, indeed, they often forgot to smile on him at all; and the daughters themselves, or so he fancied, had become more shy and distant--in some cases positively chilling--and no longer evinced the readiness to dance with him or to allow him to escort them to the supper-room, to which they had accustomed him. Even at his club he detected a difference. There was a frigidity in the atmosphere such as he had never been conscious of before. Men who had always made a point of shaking hands with him, now satisfied themselves with a nod and a curt "How-de-do?" It was a lesson in life the value of which Burgo would recognise later on, but which at present he could only face in a spirit of proud, bitter indifference.

It is not to be presumed that among the circle of Mr. Brabazon\'s friends and acquaintances any knowledge of the fact that his uncle had discarded him had as yet leaked out. It was enough for society to know that Sir Everard Clinton had taken to himself a wife not more than half his own age, and that, as a consequence, his nephew\'s prospects had gone down nearly, if not quite, to zero. Henceforward Mr. Brabazon would be relegated to the great army of detrimentals.

But not all people are alike, and the Hon. Mrs. Dovering was one of those who never turned her back on any one whom she liked simply because fortune had chosen to frown on him or her. Yet Mrs. Dovering moved in very select circles indeed. Thus it came to pass that one day a card for her forthcoming garden party reached Burgo. He at once made up his mind to accept the invitation, for he knew that Mrs. Dovering and Mrs. Mordaunt were friends of long standing, and it seemed to him very likely that the latter, accompanied, of course, by Miss Leslie, would be at the party. If so, he might be able to secure his wished-for opportunity of speaking with Clara for the last time.

Twysden Court, the country house of the Hon. Mrs. Dovering, was about a dozen miles up river. When the day of the party arrived Burgo timed himself so as not to reach there till after the majority of the company would have assembled. The great attraction of the afternoon was to be a lawn-tennis match, in which two of the most accomplished amateur players were to take part.

After shaking hands with his hostess, who greeted him with a cordiality in no wise impaired by the recent change in his prospects, of which she had been duly informed, he sauntered off, keeping well on the fringe of the crowd--and it was a crowd, for there must have been quite a couple of hundred people present--which, just then, was, or professed to be, intensely interested in a critical point of the game, but not failing to keep a wary look-out for Mrs. Mordaunt and her niece. At length he caught sight of them, not among the mob round the players, but forming part of a thin outer fringe of people for whom tennis had no special charm, who were scattered about in little groups of three or four--the ladies seated, the gentlemen mostly standing or strolling from one group to another--in the welcome shade of some "immemorial elms." He saw them, but he was nearly sure that neither of them had recognised him, and as Mrs. Mordaunt was somewhat short-sighted, there was not much fear of that matron doing so so long as he kept outside her limited range of vision. They were seated on a couple of rustic chairs, and now and again one or another of the men would lounge up, chat for a couple of minutes, and then retire to make way for some one else. At length he saw his hostess approach them, say something to Mrs. Mordaunt, and presently carry that lady off in the direction of the conservatory. The fact was that, just at that time, the Hon. Mrs. Dovering\'s pet craze--she had a fresh one every year, sometimes two--was the cultivation of orchids, and as Mrs. Mordaunt, who dabbled a little in most things, but had no enthusiasms (they were too expensive, she said, and she was not overburdened with means), had on a recent occasion expressed a strong desire to see her hostess\'s collection, her wish was now about to be gratified.

Miss Leslie was left alone.

Here was Burgo\'s opportunity, and he was not slow to avail him self of it.

He made a little detour on purpose, and so took the girl unawares. She gave a great start as he stood suddenly before her, and caught her breath quickly. Then the hot colour surged up and dyed throat and face alike, but only, a few seconds later, to ebb as swiftly as it had come, leaving her paler than before. Burgo, on his part, was perhaps a trifle paler than ordinary, but perfectly self-possessed and unembarrassed.

"Good afternoon, Miss Leslie," he said in his blandest tones, as he smilingly raised his hat. "It seems a long time since I had the pleasure of seeing you last. As an old acquaintance, I trust it won\'t be deemed a liberty if I venture to congratulate you on a certain auspicious event which, I am told, may shortly be expected to take place." Then, with an almost startling change of voice and manner, he added: "For, of course, it is true that you are going to marry Lord Penwhistle."

"Yes, Mr. Brabazon, it is quite true," replied Clara in a timid little voice.

"In that case, pray accept my best wishes for your happiness," he said, as he dropped into the chair by her side. His voice had recovered its smoothness, his face was a mask. Only for a moment had he betrayed himself, and, if he could anyhow help it, it should not happen again.

"On the one side youth and beauty," he continued, "on the other a title and a rent-roll of thirty thousand a year, with Love himself, young, fresh, and pure as the dawn, to pipe before the glowing hours as they pass! It will, indeed, be an ideal union--one of those marriages (alas, that they should be so few in number!) which are said to be made in heaven itself."

"You are very cruel, Mr. Brabazon," murmured Clara, with a tear in the corner of either eye.

"Am I? I did not mean to be," he said; and some of the hardness melted out of his eyes as he looked at her.

She was not regarding him, but looking straight before her. How lovely she looked, with her delicate clear-cut profile, her fresh purity of complexion, her long brown upcurved lashes, which half veiled the violet orbs beneath them, and that half-opened rosebud of a mouth which seemed made purposely for kisses--and, perhaps, for sugar-plums! Burgo, as his eyes devoured her, was possessed by an almost irresistible longing to put his strong arms around her and strain her to his heart. How was he to know that beneath that lovely exterior there fluttered the soul of a butterfly (if butterflies possess souls), at once vain, frivolous, and shallow--incapable of constancy, or of any depth of affection, and infected by a certain mercenary quality which would grow and develop into something hateful as years went on, and had already instilled its first great lesson into her mind--that a girl\'s primary duty to herself; more especially if she be a girl without a "tocher," is to make a wealthy marriage?

Of all the men to whom she had been introduced since her aunt had taken her in hand and brought her out, she liked Burgo Brabazon best. His good looks were of a kind which took her fancy captive. As a rule she did not care for fair men--and yet, little Lord Penwhistle had straw-tinted hair, eyes of the colour of skim milk, and a faint, fluffy moustache, like the down on the breast of a very young chicken--while Brabazon, the first time she saw him, seemed to her her own embodiment of Byron\'s Corsair, a poem which she had lately read for the first Lime; or the hero of one of those very sentimental milk-and-water novels, to a perusal of which a large share of her leisure hours was devoted. But although Burgo\'s personality appealed so strongly to the romantic side of her character, she would never have devoted a second serious thought to him (for one can be at once romantic and mercenary-minded) had he been nothing more than (say) a banker\'s clerk, instead of the nephew and heir of a wealthy baronet.

Mrs. Mordaunt had made it her business to ascertain as much about Mr. Brabazon\'s family history as it concerned her to know, and she was quite satisfied that he would make as good a match for her niece as that charming but impecunious young woman could reasonably look for. At any rate, unless something better should presently offer itself, he must by no means be allowed to slip through Clara\'s fingers, for although Mr. Brabazon had not yet spoken, his infatuation was as plain as a pikestaff to that astute matron. Therefore the mot d\'ordre was passed to Clara, much to her delight. She was to lead him gently on as by a silken thread, but never, if possible, to let him suspect that her fingers had fast hold of the other end of it. It ought not to be a difficult matter to bring him to book, Mrs. Mordaunt opined, "for, unless I am very much mistaken, the bandage is over his eyes already."

Nobody, therefore, could have been more astonished than Miss Leslie was that evening when, Mr. Brabazon having been brought to declare himself, her aunt (who had known quite well where to find them) bore down upon them just in time to prevent her from accepting him, and, with a request to Mr. Brabazon to rearrange the conservatory slides, carried her off from under the nose of her would-be lover.

But Clara comprehended when, a few minutes later, her aunt said to her: "Mr. Brabazon\'s uncle has got married somewhere abroad. I\'ve just heard the news. It may--nay, it must--make a great difference as regards the young man\'s prospects. The safest plan will be to give him his congé. Besides, Lord Penwhistle, with whom you danced twice the other night, has been asking for you. He\'s very rich. If you play your cards judiciously, there\'s no knowing what may come to pass."

Miss Leslie cried a good deal in the course of the next few days in the solitude of her chamber. She disliked Lord Penwhistle as much as she liked Burgo; indeed, it might be said that she loved the latter as much as her shallow little heart was capable of loving any one. But she was a good girl, and thoroughly amenable to her aunt\'s dictates. No thought of rebellion ever entered her mind. Besides, if Mr. Brabazon was going to be a poor man it was far better that they should not marry. She had seen and understood enough of the horrors of genteel poverty when a child at home. It had been the perpetual worry about sordid details and the long, hopeless struggle to free himself from debt, which had worn out her father years before his time. Even now the recollection of it made her shudder.

No, there was no help for it. Fate was very unkind, but she and Mr. Brabazon must part. And when--her birthday falling about a week later--Lord Penwhistle requested her acceptance of a ruby and sapphire bracelet, she felt still more convinced that all must be considered at an end as between Burgo and herself.

"I am glad to have secured this opportunity, Miss Leslie, for a little quiet talk with you," resumed Mr. Brabazon after a pause which to Clara was fast becoming intolerable. The dying embers of her love for Burgo had been fanned afresh into a flame by his presence. Never had Lord Penwhistle seemed so odious to her as at that moment. "After to-day, however, you need have no fear that I shall trouble you again. On a certain occasion I took the liberty of saying certain things to you, but was interrupted before I had got more than half-way through. Your aunt broke in upon us and carried you off--for what reason is now plain enough. She had just heard that my uncle, whose heir I was supposed to be, had taken to himself a wife, and that, consequently, my eligibility as a parti for her niece had suddenly gone down to vanishing point. Is my statement very wide of the mark, Miss Leslie?"

"No, it is not, Mr. Brabazon," replied Clara without hesitation. Just then she felt that she hated Mrs. Mordaunt. She would save her nothing in the way of exposure. "My aunt had heard the news you speak of, and she told me that as between you and me everything must at once come to an end."

"And you?" said Burgo quietly.

"What could I do? When you called, we were not at home. A few days later my aunt carried me off to Paris, and from the date of that evening in the conservatory till now you and I have never met."

"That has been owing to no remissness on my part, I assure you. I was most anxious to meet you. I wanted to tell you that, although I was unfortunately no longer in a position to ask you to become my wife, my sentiments towards you had in no wise changed--that it was not I, but circumstances, that were to blame."

He paused till a burst of clapping and cheering from the crowd round the players had died away.

"I am glad to have been able to tell you this at last," he went on. "But if fortune has behaved scurvily by me, she has dealt kindly by you. If you had conceded me that which I was on the point of asking you for when Mrs. Mordaunt appeared so inopportunely on the scene, you would have made me a happy man, but think what you would have lost yourself!"

"I fail to understand you. Pray explain yourself, Mr. Brabazon," said Clara a little uneasily.

"\'Tis plain enough. Had you given your hand to me, you would never have had the happiness of becoming Lady Penwhistle."

A faint "Oh!" was Clara\'s sole reply. Why was he so bitter? He must have loved her very much to talk as he did.

"So that you see everything has happened for the best as far as you are concerned," resumed Burgo in his soft drawling tones. "Indeed, I think that you ought to be very thankful for your escape--probably you are. The Penwhistle family diamonds are said to be superb, and rumour has it that his lordship is disposed to behave most liberally in the way of settlements. You are a very fortunate young woman, Miss Leslie."

Clara\'s heart, such as it was, was full to bursting. "Oh! if you knew all," she exclaimed; "if you knew how I was pestered and badgered into accepting Lord Penwhistle, you would pity me instead of sneering at me! If you think I like him, you are mistaken. I don\'t. There! And I don\'t care who knows it." For once she was carried out of herself.

"Pestered and badgered, indeed! Is that all? Why should any young woman allow herself to be pestered and badgered by anybody into marrying a man for whom she does not care? What a confession of weakness is here!"

"As I said before, you don\'t know my aunt--as I know her."

"No--thank heaven!" murmured Burgo.

"But all this talk is to no purpose, Mr. Brabazon," said Clara hastily. She already regretted her little outburst. "In fact, I ought not to have listened to it. It is enough that I have promised to marry Lord Penwhistle, and I am not going to run away from my promise."

"Of course you are not," assented Burgo with that exasperating smile of his. "You would regret it to the last day of your life if you did."

"Ah, here comes my aunt," said Clara with a sigh of relief.

Burgo stood up as Mrs. Mordaunt drew near. Her face became charged with thunder the moment she recognised him. But that in no wise discomposed our friend. "Delighted to see you again, Mrs. Mordaunt," he said, as he raised his hat. "It seems ages since I parted from you last. I have just been felicitating Miss Leslie upon a certain event which, I hear on good authority, is to take place very shortly. I suppose, if it would not be considered presumptuous on my part, that I ought also to congratulate you, Mrs. Mordaunt, for affairs of this sort, to be successfully carried through, necessitate delicate manipulation and diplomatic talent of a very special kind. Yes, I am quite sure you ought to be congratulated. Penwhistle\'s a decent little chap enough, though they did blackball him at the Corinthian. Still, I don\'t think it can be true that the reason they \'chucked\' him was because his grandfather is said to have been a marine-store dealer in Auld Reekie. No man can help his grandfather, can he? And when a fellow is worth thirty thousand a year, it would not matter a button even if one of his ancestors was hanged for sheep-stealing."