'Is that you, Lennard?' asked Nell, arousing herself from the depths of an old armchair, in which, curled up into a little round ball, she had fallen asleep. 'How late you are!'

She was rubbing her small fists violently into her eyes, and stretching herself like an over-grown baby, when Lennard went up and kissed her, with a fervour that made her open her bright blue eyes doubly wide.

'What is it? what have you got there? It smells so lovely.'

'Don't, don't touch it, Nell! She gave it to me!'

'She!-who? That young lady?' 'Yes; and, Nell, I almost believe that she touched it with her beautiful red lips before she dropped it.'

'Lennard, how dare you say such things!'

'But she did, Nell,' he almost whispered, with a ring of happiness in his voice; and, oh, what harm can there be in it, when she made me feel so glad!'

'No,' said Nell, after a minute's reflection, there can't be much harm in kissing a flower; but she might have flung down a shining half-crown instead. What do such as we want with nosegays?'

'Half a crown! Nell Weston, I am ashamed of you!' he cried, flushing crimson with anger and pain.

Nell fluttered round him like a frightened bird. His wrathful tone was so unusual that it struck her to the heart.

'Don't be cross,' she murmured deprecatingly. "I am sure I didn't mean to vex you; but I can't see why money is not just as good as flowers, especially as it can buy them like fun any day.

But you know best, Lennard, of course. I don't want to say disagreeable things, but shillings are awful scarce just now, and father uses them up fast, you know.'

'I know,' said Lennard, with a deep sigh, his eyes growing sad again.

Why, Lennard, he swallows up a basketful of pins and needles, besides the tapes, at a single drink, and keeps doing it over and over again till I don't know what we shall get to; that is why money seems such a grand thing to me.'

Lennard listened to her in a bewildered way, and grew restless under her practical remarks. Sensible and necessary as they were, he felt them as a discord after the love and music which were still running through his brain.

'Good-night,' he answered gently; 'I am tired, Nell; it is getting late, you know.'

The child watched him for a moment in silence; then, when he was gone into the next room, curled herself up again in the chair, wondering why her brother's eyes were so full of light, and why he looked more beautiful than usual.

'Can a girl with feathers in her hat and high heels to her boots do all that, I wonder, with a boy like Lennard?' she soliloquised dreamily. Now I have worked and worked, and sewed buttons and sold pins and things for him ever so long, and he doesn't seem to care for it all a quarter as much as for that trumpery sprig of jasmine. Never mind; I'll get on in trade, and buy feathers and heels for myself. It's those things that do it; and that girl sha'n't get brother Lennard away from me without a fight for it. I ought to have been shut up in that cupboard with those quarrelsome rats and mice, and have had nothing but dry bread and water to feed on, for sending him to that theatre with the little baskets of flowers. It was the baskets that did it.'

Nell rose up slowly from her chair, and was creeping to bed, feeling very lonely and disconsolate,

when a soft tap at the door called her back. It was Ralph Pierce, whom she had not seen since she stood saying good-bye to Ursula.

'I saw a light from under the door,' he said, in a gentle voice, ' and I came to beg a match.'

'Then you have come home again! I am so glad, sir; it seemed lonesome to think you had gone. How is Miss Ursula? Is she downstairs ?'

'She is gone on a visit to a friend,' answered the man, in a scarcely audible tone. 'Goodnight.'

'Good-night, sir.'

Pierce descended the stairs at a snail's pace, unlocked his door, and went into the darkness within for the first time since his daughter's marriage; and the darkness that reigned in that shabby room was light compared to the darkness that filled his heart as he remembered the fate of his poor child.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

MR. ABEL WYCHCOTE.

URSULA LOCK stood before her mirror, preparing to descend into the superb reception-room below, in which scores of guests would shortly assemble.

She stood and looked at herself with a radiant glow of proud satisfaction at her own perfect beauty of face and form.

It would have been difficult to recognise the lovely vision at a first glance, for she was so different from and superior to 'Ursula Pierce' that her closest friend might have hesitated to claim her as the girl who had passed under that name. She appeared taller; for the robust proportions of excessive health and youth had softened down into an exquisite delicacy of outline.

Great violet shadows lay under her large black eyes, and the long curling lashes seemed to have grown longer and darker; but the greatest change was in the brightness and glory that had fallen upon her hair. A deep golden hue kindled the erewhile raven tresses into something radiant, altering the whole face so materially that the woman barely recognised herself.

'Madame can scarcely know herself,' said the Parisian soubrette, who stood behind smoothing down with reverential fingers the loop of a sash in which she had artistically mingled the gossamer lightness of some marvellous lace that flowed like mist over the folds of the rich satin robe, and lost itself in the lengthy train, just as fleecy clouds melt into the tender rose of a summer sky. It is magnifique ! There will not be a toilette to equal it!'

Ursula turned quickly. The fire that struck from the magnificent parure of brilliants adorning her bosom and round white arms quivered like a flash of lightning athwart the mirror, and fairly dazzled her.

'You are right, Stéphanie,' she answered, with a curious ring of sadness running through the triumph of her voice. 'I should not know myself.'

'Here is madame's fan-a superb Trianon fan; and here is a little bouquet that Monsieur le Mari hopes madame will wear.'

She presented exquisite hothouse flowers, a blending of snowy tuberose and stephanotis with some creamy and blushing roses.

A frown contracted Ursula's white forehead, and her scarlet lips curled in scorn.

'Take them away at once,' she desired, in an impatient peremptory tone. I hate their perfume. Besides, it is enough that I have accepted Mr. Lock's diamonds.

Give me my handkerchief; now shake out the folds of the train; I am going down.'

She made a few stately steps towards the door, then paused, lost in thought; a heavy cloud on her face; her fingers twining nervously together.

You have forgotten the chief thing, Stéphanie,' she said, in low dreary accents. 'Give me thecordial.'

The Frenchwoman glanced at her, shrugged her plump shculders, then poured out a wine-glass full of brandy.

Ursula seized the glass, and emptied it; then she swept down. the stairs.

Standing just outside the door of the reception-room, and looking up the grand staircase, was the master of the house.

He was eagerly waiting for the first glance of the woman who had so fascinated him that his love for her had become an abject worship.

His heart fairly leaped as he heard the rustle of her movements, and saw the silken-clad footlarge, but shapely-plant itself firmly on the first step, while her satin dress swept in waves as she descended towards him in the might of her regal loveliness.

John Lock actually trembled in every limb as he reached forth his hand to welcome her. She did not deign to touch it, however, not even in gratitude for the glorious jewels that blazed on her alabaster neck; but she held up her dress with one hand, and occupied the other with her perfumed handkerchief, passing her husband by with a careless nod and an indifferent glance as she entered the saloon. This is beautiful,' she said, more to herself than to him, as she looked round for some object that rendered the atmosphere fragrant, and advanced towards a huge vase overflowing

with rare exotics, which took her by surprise.

A card lay among the blossoms -a card with three words inscribed in a cramped handwriting :

'From the President.'

'How kind!' she murmured, with a certain haughty carelessness, as though such gifts were common to her; but she felt a secret pride at being singled out of a mass of beautiful women for such favour.

For the President of the United States of America is a great, a very great man indeed.

'Few women in Washington can boast of a compliment like that, Mrs. Lock,' said the master of the house, with a red flush of mingled triumph and jealousy sweeping his swarthy cheek; and, going up close to Ursula, he attempted to draw her towards him in a quick embrace, but she quietly evaded him with a sudden swerve of her figure.

'Yes,' she drawled, 'I know such compliments are pleasant, when no one else receives them. Here comes another basket of flowers. Mr. Lock, may I ask who has sent them ?'

John Lock, obedient as a slave, took the floral offering from the servant and carried it to his wife.

'From Senator-' she began, pausing at the name and tearing up the note in fragments. How

wearisome some men are! This is a bribe for taking me in to supper, but it's no go. I'

She checked herself once more, remembering the old solecisms of speech which she had tried to correct, and, turning crimson, she cast a bold defiant look at her husband, as if challenging him to a remark about her little outbreak from ladyism.

'I only wish it were the right thing to take you in myself,' he said. Ursula, I almost hate the man who takes you from my side, even for a moment.'

'I daresay; you are awfully jealous, a mole might see that; but for the life of me I cannot tell why, for the great men one hears such a deal about dwindle into nothing when one gets close to them. Here,' she added recklessly to the servant who entered the room, 'take these flowers and arrange them anywhere. They have come from some public hothouse, I'll swear; the people taxed to pay for every blessed bud, or the men would not be half so liberal!'

'O Ursula, the servile adulation of those very men has spoiled you,' said John Lock, secretly pleased with her imperial disdain.

'Their adulation! No, Mr. Lock, I don't care a straw about it; no more than I do for- But here comes some one.'

The door noiselessly opened, and Ursula caught sight of the very tall and spare figure of a man dressed in deep black, who bent forward in his swift walk up the hall, moving with a species of plunge as if he had some enemy ahead that he hoped to pounce on.

'It is Abel Wychcote,' whispered John Lock, in a deprecatory tone, as if afraid that the name would not be received with favour by the haughty woman at his side.

'Abel Wychcote !' cried Ursula insolently. How dare the wretch come here without an invitation? I sent him none !'

But I did, Mrs. Lock, and it is important that you receive him with feigned civility at least; that is if you have any regard for your husband's interests or your own!'

'But why?' she questioned, with a scornful gesture. The man is under the ban already. Charges have been made before a committee against him for conduct, official and social, that makes him an unfit associate for any honest man or respectable woman.'

'For any honest man or respect

Mr. Abel Wychcote walked into the room, black from head to foot, as has been said, save for the snowy linen at his bosom and his wrists, where it fell over a pair of immaculately white gloves. Certainly the man had done his very best to look like a gentleman, and it was scarcely his fault that he looked like an undertaker. He even held himself bolt upright as he entered.

'You are welcome, Wychcote. I am glad you have come early. Ursula, here is Mr. Wychcote.'

'Yes, I know,' she answered, holding out a reluctant hand and measuring the tall spare black figure contemptuously from head to foot. 'One sees Mr. Abel Wychcote so often that he hardly requires a presentation; but you two have something particular to say to one another, of course.'

With a slight wave of her hand Ursula left the two men, and, passing under a cloud of amber-hued silk that supplied the place of folding doors, she entered a green and gold saloon beyond, where she flung herself, regardless of damage to her attire, in a luxurious fauteuil.

She was flushed with indignation, and angrily beat the carpet with her foot, striking her fan against her knee with a force that shattered the delicate pearl handle to pieces.

'I hate that man,' she muttered. 'They are so much alike-he and-There is always so much secrecy going on too. If I cared

enough about either of them to ask their secret, I know it wouldn't be a secret very long. I was born to find out things, and I shall find them out one of these days for sure. I have a mind to order the creature out of the house.'

As she mused a noise of human feet aroused her, and in another moment guests, male and femalea bevy of pretty women-fluttered into the soft waxlight that flooded the room in which the most beautiful and popular woman in Washington City waited to receive them.

There can be no position more trying for a woman than that of hostess in the capital of the United States, where the best intellect and wit of the country are sure to be met, and where mere physical beauty goes to the wall unless sustained by ability.

But even here Ursula bore herself well. With her, rare natural capacity and sharpness took the place of taught accomplishment. From her very first plunge into the vortex of fashionable life she had measured her own quick wit and ready tact with others, and maintained her self-confidence so well that neither man nor woman would have guessed that she was but a novice in such scenes. Ursula had taken at once to the world, the flesh, and the devil; the three predominant objects her heart had hungered for since she crossed the boundary line that divides childhood from maidenhood.

This especial night she was resplendent. No hostess born and bred of noble birth and to high position could have made an abler hostess. In the broad soft light of a hundred tapers, amid the sparkling glitter of crystal, the flash

ing gleam of silver, and with the fragrant breath of a thousand blooming flowers floating around her, the girl we have known in that shabby, faded, Liverpool lodging-house might have passed as a veritable queen amongst her vassalage. She filled her position with the grace and talent of a female Talleyrand. John Lock, sitting opposite his wife, watched her with a feeling of genuine pride and satisfaction. Who, among the brilliant throng, could hold a candle to her? Even the wealth and luxury, the glare, the glitter, and the gaiety seemed too pale and modest for a beauty so imperial, a nature so full of sparkle. No wonder the senator who sat beside her seemed entranced by the clear sweet voice, the lovely mobile face. But, amidst the pride and satisfaction he felt, John Lock experienced a sentiment of annoy

ance.

Abel Wychcote, by an arrangement of his own, had been placed on the left hand of the hostess, and that hostess, resenting his presence at the supper-table, never noticed him.

Abel Wychcote's fox-like countenance lowered ominously, and he cast wrathful glances across at his host that pierced John Lock like barbed arrows.

The man was nothing more or less than the head of an important office in the Treasury department, but he had, by sheer audacity and a subtleness and adroitness that were remarkable, contrived to lift himself into a sort of companionship with the magnates of the United States.

A disgraceful odium had, however, been cast round him of late, and the numerous guests recognised his proximity with a coldness that disturbed both him and John Lock.

A strange, wicked, and surly ex