reminded of their duties too, it would be better
for all of us, and much more to the honour of
England.

QUITE ALONE.

BOOK THE SECOND: WOMANHOOD.

CHAPTER LIV. LOVE AND GRATITUDE.

THE secret which the little bird whispered to
Lily perplexed and agitated her very much.

She had noticed the rise in her mother's
fortunes, but ascribed it to the popularity of her
performances in the circus, and the liberality of
Mr. M'Variety, the manager. The little bird
told her quite another story. It told her that
the dainty white bedroom had been furnished
for her by Sir William Long. It was easy to
infer from this that the Cottage, the renewed
engagement, the increase of her mother's salary,
the benefit, and the elegant supper, all came
from the same quarter.

For whose sake had the baronet spent so
much money, and taken so much trouble? For
her mother's? Lily would fain have let her heart
answer this question in the affirmative, but try
as she would, she could not impose that conviction
upon herself. Something, some still small
voice of the past, told her that it was not for
her mother's sake that the baronet had done all
these things, but for her own.

Lily strove to think that it was done in pity
for her hard life and forlorn condition; that it
was simply the act of a generous and
sympathising nature. But while she struggled to
interpret his motives in this wise, her heart was
agitated by a suspicion that filled her with a
vague feeling of dread.

Could it be possible that Sir William Long
loved her?

That was the question which strove to shape
itself in her mind. But Lily repressed it, and
kept it down, dreading to have to answer it.
And this she did to guard the image which
sat enthroned in her breast—the image of Edgar
Greyfaunt. But the question arose again and
again, and shaped itself definitely, and demanded
to be answered; and Lily, still hesitating, went
back over her weary life to the Greenwich
dinner. She had so few remembrances of pleasant
days, that she was not likely to forget that
day. It arose in her memory sharp and clear,
a bright green island in the midst of a great
waste of waters. She remembered sitting on
Sir William Long's knee; she recalled the kind
things he said to her, and how happy she felt at
being near him. If she had never thought of
him from that time until this moment, she might
have forgotten how he looked, where they sat,
what kind things he said to her, and many other
little particulars of the occasion. But she had
thought of him often, and carried him forward
on every new page of the ledger of her life up
to the day when she wrote the name of Edgar
Greyfaunt upon it. She thought of the tall,
kind gentleman less frequently after that; but
she had thought of him so often before, that his
image was indelibly impressed upon her memory.
She remembered everything; how he had laughed
and chatted with her, and asked her her name,
and inquired how old she was. She remembered
his peeling the apple and throwing the peel over
his shoulder, and saying that it would form the
initial of her sweetheart's name; how the peel
lay on the carpet in the shape of a W, and how
she clapped her hands and said she should like
to be his little wife, and make him a pair of nice
red muffatees for the winter. And she remembered
his stooping down and kissing her on the
forehead, and saying, " I heartily wish you were
my little sister, or my little daughter." Last of
all, she remembered that she was eight years of
age then, and he twenty-eight.

So far as Lily knew, she was now in her
twentieth year. And Sir William? Sir William
was forty!

When Lily had worked out this little sum,
and saw the figures staring her in the face, she
closed her eyes against them, as if by so doing
she could shut out the reflections to which they
gave rise.

She went back over her recollections of the
Greenwich dinner again, and always when she
came to those parting words her heart was
relieved: " I heartily wish you were my little
sister, or my daughter."

When Madame Ernestine was at the circus
rehearsing a new act of the haute-école for her
benefit, Lily wandered from room to room,
thinking, thinking, thinking. Every object
upon which her eyes rested was as dreary, and
miserable, and forlorn as her own heart. Looking
from the windows of the Cottage through
the pelting rain, she saw the leafless trees
nodding at her like grim spectres; the weeping ash-
trees bare and gaunt, overhanging the seats and
tables, appeared to her like huge skeleton hands
waiting to crush the votaries of pleasure in their
grip. Through the mist and drizzle of the
winter's day, the black flower-beds loomed upon
her sight like graves, of which the dripping
dirt-begrimed statues were the head-stones,
sacred to the memory of departed flowers, which
seemed to have died without issue. The
Muscovite illusion had in part been rudely
dispelled by the winter's wind. A portion of
the cupolas of the Kremlin had been blown
down, and the gap revealed some stacks of South
Lambeth chimneys, smoking dismally, and
dropping tears of soot upon the dingy gables.

One day, when Lily was looking out upon
this dreary scene, wondering if those trees
would ever again be covered with leaves; if
those scrubs and stumps in the beds would ever
again rise from their sepulchres crowned with
the glory of flowers, wondering if her own
heart would ever throb to an emotion of
joy, she saw the figure of a man looming
through the mist, and approaching the Cottage.
As the figure came nearer, Lily recognised Mr.
Kafooze.

Taking him in his most favourable aspect,
Mr. Kafooze was not a cheerful person to look