“La Donna e Mobile,” hummed Charley again and again, as he sat in the smoking-room of his hotel. He had paid no heed to the concert, his eyes being fixed all the while upon Max and his two companions; but that air had been sung by one of the great artistes, and words and music had forced themselves upon him so that they seemed for hours after to be ringing in his ears.

“La Donna e Mobile.” Yes, it was all plain enough, and it was nothing new. He had made an impression at first, and she had seemed to love him—perhaps, after her fashion, had loved him—but woman’s love, he said, required feeding. The fuel absent, the flame must become extinct.

He laughed bitterly, and a waiter came up.

“Did you ask for something, sir?”

“No!” roared Charley savagely; and the man shrunk away.

“I’ll pester her no more,” he said; “let things take their course. I’ll go down home and see the poor old gentleman to-morrow. I may just as well, as hang about here torturing myself over a slow fire. I wonder how the mare looks. A good run or two would do me no end of good. I’ll pack up and run down to-morrow.”

Then he laughed bitterly, for he knew that he was playing at self-deceit; he felt that he could not stir from London—that he was, as it were, fixed, and without a desire to leave the spot where he could feel that she was near.

“No,” he said, after a while; “I’ll not give up yet. I made a vow, and I’ll keep it. She is not his yet. She may have been—she must have been—deceived. I have been condemned. No; she would not listen. I don’t know—there, I think I’m half mad!”

Just then his hand came in contact with a couple of letters which had been awaiting him on his return, and which one of the waiters had handed to him, to be thrust unnoticed into his pocket.

“Bills,” said the waiter, to one of his fellows. “How nice to be tradesman to those young swells! I s’pose some of them must pay, some time or other, or else people couldn’t live.”

“O yes,” said the other; “some of them pay, and those who will pay, have to pay for those who won’t.”

“Through the nose,” said number one with a wink.

“To be sure,” said his confrère; and then they laughed at one another, and winked again.

But the waiter was wrong: those were not bills; one being a long and affectionate letter from Sir Philip Vining, telling Charley that he would be in town the next day, and asking if it would be convenient for his son to meet him at the station. The other was from Laura Bray, saying that they had heard from Sir Philip that he would be in town the next day, and asking that he and Charley would dine in Harley-street, where was the Brays’ town house, on the next day but one.

The above was all formal, and written at mamma’s command, but Laura had added a postscript, asking that Charley would come for the sake of the old times when they were friends. Max would be away, and the party very small.

Then came a quiet reminder of the encounter, and a word to say that the writer had looked out day by day, in the expectation of receiving a call, while poor Nelly was au désespoir.

Charley smiled grimly as he read the letter over, and then care............