boundary of Low Town. A huge dark archway,
popularly called Monk's Gate, at the angle of
this square, made the entrance to Abbey Hill.
When the arch was passed, one felt at once that
one was in the town of a former day. The
pavement was narrow, and rugged; the shops small,
their upper stories projecting, with, here and
there, plastered fronts, quaintly arabesqued. An
ascent, short, but steep and tortuous, conducted
at once to the old Abbey Church, nobly situated in
a vast quadrangle, round which were the genteel
and gloomy dwellings of the Arcopagites of the
Hill. More genteel and less gloomy than the
rest—lights at the windows and flowers on the
balcony—stood forth, flanked by a garden wall at
either side, the mansion of Mrs. Colonel Poyntz.

As I entered the drawing-room, I heard the
voice of the hostess; it was a voice clear,
decided, metallic, bell-like, uttering these words:
"Taken Abbots' House? I will tell you."

CHAPTER VI.

MRS. POYNTZ was seated on the sofa; at her
right sat fat Mrs. Bruce, who was a Scotch
lord's granddaughter: at her left thin Miss
Brabazon, who was an Irish baronet's niece. Around
her—a few seated, many standing—had grouped
all the guests, save two old gentlemen, who
remained aloof with Colonel Poyntz near the
whist-table, waiting for the fourth old gentleman,
who was to make up the rubber, but who
was at that moment spell-bound in the magic
circle, which curiosity, that strongest of social
demons, had attracted round the hostess.

"Taken Abbots' House? I will tell you.—
Ah, Dr. Fenwick! charmed to see you. You
know Abbots' House is let at last? Well, Miss
Brabazon, dear, you ask who has taken it. I
will tell you—a particular friend of mine."

"Indeed! Dear me!" said Miss Brabazon,
looking confused. "I hope I did not say
anything to——"

"Wound my feelings. Not in the least. You
said your uncle, Sir Phelim, had a coachmaker
named Ashleigh, that Ashleigh was an uncommon
name, though Ashley was a common one;
you intimated an appalling suspicion that the
Mrs. Ashleigh who had come to the Hill was the
coachmaker's widow. I relieve your mind—
she is not; she is the widow of Gilbert
Ashleigh, of Kirby Hall."

"Gilbert Ashleigh," said one of the guests, a
bachelor, whose parents had reared him for the
church, but who, like poor Goldsmith, did not
think himself good enough for it,—a mistake of
over modesty, for he matured into a very harmless
creature. "Gilbert Ashleigh. I was at
Oxford with him—a gentleman commoner of Christ
Church. Good-looking man—very: sapped——"

"Sapped! what's that?—Oh, studied. That
he did all his life. He married young—Anne
Chaloner; she and I were girls together:
married the same year. They settled at Kirby Hall
—nice place, but dull. Poyntz and I spent a
Christmas there. Ashleigh when he talked
was charming, but he talked very little. Anne,
when she talked, was common-place, and she
talked very much. Naturally, poor thing, she
was so happy. Poyntz and I did not spend
another Christmas there. Friendship is long,
but life is short. Gilbert Ashleigh's life was
short indeed; he died in the seventh year of his
marriage, leaving only one child, a girl. Since
then, though I never spent another Christmas at
Kirby Hall, I have frequently spent a day there,
doing my best to cheer up Anne. She was no
longer talkative, poor dear. Wrapt up in her
child, who has now grown into a beautiful girl
of eighteen—such eyes, her father's—the real
dark blue—rare; sweet creature, but delicate;
not, I hope, consumptive, but delicate; quiet—
wants life. My girl Jane adores her. Jane has
life enough for two."

"Is Miss Ashleigh the heiress to Kirby
Hall?" asked Mrs. Bruce, who had an unmarried
son.

"No. Kirby Hall passed to Ashleigh Sumner,
the male heir, a cousin. And the luckiest of
cousins! Gilbert's sister, showy woman (indeed,
all show), had contrived to marry her kinsman,
Sir Walter Ashleigh Haughton, the head of the
Ashleigh family,—just the man made to be the
reflector of a showy woman! He died years ago,
leaving an only son, Sir James, who was killed
last winter by a fall from his horse. And here,
again, Ashleigh Sumner proved to be the male
heir-at-law. During the minority of this
fortunate youth, Mrs. Ashleigh had rented Kirby
Hall of his guardian. He is now just coming of
age, and that is why she leaves. Lilian Ashleigh
will have, however, a very good fortune—is what
we genteel paupers call an heiress. Is there
anything more you want to know?"

Said thin Miss Brabazon, who took advantage
of her thinness to wedge herself into every one's
affairs, "A most interesting account. But what
brings Mrs. Ashleigh here?"

Answered Mrs. Colonel Poyntz, with the military
frankness by which she kept her company in
good humour, as well as awe:

"Why do any of us come here? Can any one
tell me?"

There was a blank silence, which the hostess
herself was the first to break.

"None of us present can say why we came
here. I can tell you why Mrs. Ashleigh came.
Our neighbour Mr. Vigors is a distant
connexion of the late Gilbert Ashleigh, one of the
executors to his will, and the guardian to the
heir-at-law. About ten days ago Mr. Vigors
called on me, for the first time since I felt it my
duty to express my opinion about the strange
vagaries of our poor dear friend Dr. Lloyd. And
when he had taken his chair, just where you
now sit, Dr. Fenwick, he said, in a sepulchral
voice, stretching out two fingers, so,—as if I
were one of the what-do-you-call-'ems who go to
sleep when he bids them, 'Marm, you know Mrs.
Ashleigh? You correspond with her.' 'Yes,
Mr. Vigors; is there any crime in that? You