apron? A spot? I won't have spots! Take it
off after breakfast, and put on another. Pull
your chair to the middle of the table—more to
the left—more still. Make the breakfast."

At a quarter before eleven, Mrs. Wragge (with
her own entire concurrence) was dismissed to the
back room, to bewilder herself over the science
of dressmaking for the rest of the day.
Punctually as the clock struck the hour, Mrs. Lecount
and her master drove up to the gate of North
Shingles, and found Magdalen and Captain
Wragge waiting for them in the garden.

On the way to Dunwich nothing occurred to
disturb the enjoyment of the drive. Mr. Noel
Vanstone was in excellent health and high good
humour. Lecount had apologised for the little
misunderstanding of the previous night; Lecount
had petitioned for the excursion as a treat
to herself. He thought of these concessions,
and looked at Magdalen, and smirked and
simpered without intermission. Mrs. Lecount
acted her part to perfection. She was motherly
with Magdalen, and tenderly attentive to Noel
Vanstone. She was deeply interested in Captain
Wragge's conversation, and meekly disappointed
to find it turn on general subjects, to the exclusion
of science. Not a word or look escaped
her, which hinted in the remotest degree at
her real purpose. She was dressed with her
customary elegance and propriety; and she
was the only one of the party, on that sultry
summer's day, who was perfectly cool in the
hottest part of the journey.

As they left the carriage on their arrival at
Dunwich, the captain seized a moment, when
Mrs. Lecount's eye was off him, and fortified
Magdalen by a last warning word.

"'Ware the cat!" he whispered. "She will
show her claws on the way back."

They left the village and walked to the ruins of a
convent near at hand —the last relic of the once-
populous city of Dunwich which has survived the
destruction of the place, centuries since, by the
all-devouring sea. After looking at the ruins, they
sought the shade of a little wood, between the
village and the low sand-hills which overlook the
German Ocean. Here, Captain Wragge
manoeuvred so as to let Magdalen and Noel Vanstone
advance some distance in front of Mrs. Lecount
and himself—took the wrong path—and
immediately lost his way with the most consummate
dexterity. After a few minutes' wandering (in
the wrong direction), he reached an open space
near the sea; and, politely opening his camp-
stool for the housekeeper's accommodation,
proposed waiting where they were, until the missing
members of the party came that way and
discovered them.

Mrs. Lecount accepted the proposal. She was
perfectly well aware that her escort had lost
himself on purpose; but that discovery exercised no
disturbing influence on the smooth amiability of
her manner. Her day of reckoning with the captain
had not come yet—she merely added the new
item to her list, and availed herself of the camp-
stool. Captain Wragge stretched himself in a
romantic attitute at her feet; and the two determined
enemies (grouped like two lovers in a
picture) fell into as easy and pleasant a
conversation, as if they had been friends of twenty
years' standing.

"I know you, ma'am!" thought the captain,
while Mrs. Lecount was talking to him. "You
would like to catch me tripping in my ready-made
science; and you wouldn't object to drown me in
the Professor's Tank!"

"You villain, with the brown eye and the
green!" thought Mrs. Lecount, as the captain
caught the ball of conversation in his turn;
"thick as your skin is, I'll sting you through it
yet!"

In this frame of mind towards each other,
they talked fluently on general subjects, on
public affairs, on local scenery, on society
in England and society in Switzerland, on
health, climate, books, marriage, and money—
talked, without a moment's pause, without a
single misunderstanding on either side, for nearly
an hour, before Magdalen and Noel Vanstone
strayed that way, and made the party of four
complete again.

When they reached the inn at which the carriage
was waiting for them, Captain Wragge left
Mrs. Lecount in undisturbed possession of her
master, and signed to Magdalen to drop back for
a moment and speak to him.

"Well?" asked the captain in a whisper; “is
he fast to your apron-string?"

She shuddered from head to foot, as she
answered.

"He has kissed my hand," she said. "Does
that tell you enough? Don't let him sit next
me on the way home! I have borne all I can
bear— spare me for the rest of the day."

"I'll put you on the front seat of the carriage,"
replied the captain, "side by side with me."

On the journey back, Mrs. Lecount verified
Captain Wragge's prediction. She showed her
claws.

The time could not have been better chosen;
the circumstances could hardly have favoured her
more. Magdalen's spirits were depressed: she
was weary in body and mind; and she sat exactly
opposite the housekeeper—who had been
compelled, by the new arrangement, to occupy the seat
of honour next her master. With every facility
for observing the slightest changes that passed
over Magdalen's face, Mrs. Lecount tried her first
experiment by leading the conversation to the
subject of London, and to the relative advantages
offered to residents by the various quarters of
the metropolis on both sides of the river. The
ever-ready Wragge penetrated her intention
sooner than she had anticipated, and interposed
immediately. "You're coming to Vauxhall Walk,
ma'am," thought the captain; "I'll get there
before you."

He entered at once into a purely fictitious
description of the various quarters of London in
which he had himself resided; and, adroitly