as she was, Maud could hardly help laughing
at this business-like method of tendering
a contract for life: but she simply
replied that she must decline the honour
Mr. Durborough had done her. Then the
baronet asked her why; and condescended
to argue with her, as he rarely did with a
woman, and when he found his  arguments
of no avail in changing her resolve, he
dismissed her in great anger. But to
Durborough, of Durborough, he softened
the refusal in such terms as left it to be
understood by that ardent suitor that a
little maidenly coyness alone rendered Miss
Pomeroy unwilling to accept him on so
slight an acquaintance.

"Come to us again in February
or March," Sir Andrew had said (it was then
November). " Girls like a little pressing,
you know—a deuced deal of romance and
nonsense about them—high-flown ideas,
and all that. They never like giving in all
at once; but come again in three or four
months' time, and you'll find, Durborough,
it will be all right."

Then Mr. Durborough had gone away,
if not satisfied, at least no more than
mildly surprised that any girl should be
found not to snatch eagerly—even at the
expense of maidenly coyness—at the alluring
prospect of becoming Mrs. Durborough,
of Durborough.

Sir Andrew, from that day forward, trusting
to the old Latin adage, that dropping
water will wear away a stone, began a system
towards his stepdaughter, in which he
was ably seconded by her mother. Well
might Maud declare. "Their only idea is to
get rid of me." Durborough's merits as a
man "universally respected," Durborough's
lineage, Durborough's rent-roll, the
excellence of Durborough's venison, the high
esteem in which Durborough's shorthorns
were held—almost every subject of discussion
at Mortlands was a well from which
some drop of water was drawn to let fall
upon the stone of Maud's heart. It is
astonishing, when you are so minded, how
every topic under the sun may be
ingeniously made to serve a particular purpose.
Maud grew positively to loathe the very
name of Durborough. She said nothing;
but she felt all the more bitterly how they
were trying to force her into this contract,
against which body and soul alike rebelled.

And now February had come, and with
it, Mr. Durborough in person, by no means
anxious as to the result of his visit, but
rather with the quiet confidence of a Cæsar.
Then Maud knew that a crisis was at hand
when she and her father-in-law would have
a pitched battle, compared with which all
former encounters were as mere skirmishes.
But she was so dead-sick of her life, so
weary of the monotony of her days, and of
the absence of any strong vital interests,
that there were moments when she asked
herself whether, after all, it might not be
better to go away with this man, and have
a home of her own, with a round of
active duties, and be independent. Aye, but
would she be independent, bound to such
a man?  She knew that she would not;
and it was only for an instant that such an
alternative suggested itself. Her nobler
nature scornfully rejected the idea. If they
wanted to get rid of her, let them do so;
she would gladly go out as a governess—
earn her bread in any honest way, nay, beg
it rather than sell herself, and commit
perjury by swearing to love, honour, and obey
a man whom she despised.

It was Lady Herriesson who opened the
trenches.

In the dusk of the same evening on which
Mr. Durborough arrived, Maud's step-
mother called her into her boudoir, on some
pretence, and shutting the door, drew her
to a sofa near the fire. Lady Herriesson
leaned back, and, looked away from her
daughter, straight into the burning embers.
She had a paper-knife in her hand and she
balanced it between her delicate fingers,
emphasising what she said occasionally
by a weak upraising of the bit of ivory.
Maud, on the contrary, sat erect, looking
her mother full in the face, with her hands
folded on her knees.

"My dear, I hope you have made up
your mind to be more reasonable. I hope
you have thought seriously, and are
prepared to listen to Mr. Durborough, now
that he has returned which, indeed, I am
sure is more than one had any right to
expect he would do, under———"

"I neither expected nor wished it," said
Maud, quickly.

"It really seems, my dear, like flying in
the face of Providence, when everything
that we could possibly wish for offers, that
you should set yourself against it in this—
this shocking way. As Sir Andrew says,
what do you expect? Very few girls have
such a chance of settling, and I really
must say I think it ungrateful after all Sir
Andrew has done for you, to be so—so
obstinate and headstrong."

"I don't wish to be ungrateful," said
Maud, with unusual gentleness. "I am
very sorry to be a burden to Sir Andrew,