NEVER FORGOTTEN.

PART THE SECOND.

CHAPTER IV. THE HOUSE IN ALFRED-PLACE.

IN time, over the interval of two months.
In space, from Paris to London. From the Grand
Hotel to a bright cozy compact house—one of a
clean series in Alfred-place, standing together
like a row of Sunday-school children. Neighbours
hardly knew who lived there, but the number was
down in the note-books, and in the minds of many
skilful men; was familiar at the Great Literary
Club, and the name of Pauline Manuel lifted
many faces from the Times or Globe. Among
these was the face of, say, a Herculean humorist
who growled pleasantly at a hollow world over
claret; the faces of leading witty men, who brought
their jokes and quips to dinners, like conjurors
bringing their apparatus to a child's party, and
who, like the conjurors, would not be received
without their apparatus; of leading clergymen,
hard thoughtful men, who dug and trenched in
the heavy soil of reviews; of younger and more
unclerical men, who did the ornamental gardening
of magazines; of a placid Italian barytone,
gentleman in everything save birth; of a bishop
or two; of a doctor or two; of a lawyer or two; of
a member of parliament or two. These, with the
faces of their wives, were Pauline Manuel's
constituency—a miniature world in itself. In that
small house in Alfred-place was a small round
table that held exactly eight; it was lighted by
white Dresden candelabra, and the light fell
usually on a witty face, a clerical-reviewing face,
a singing, a barristerial, a senatorial, or an
editorial face. They were delightful little meals—
choice in all points.

How she drifted into such circles, or rather
how they came floating and drifting about her,
was through the mere general attraction which
a bright flashing, dazzling face, a face that people
looked long after in the street, always exercises.
Lord Putnenham, who had but one standard of
beauty, and who always introduced that standard
by an unnecessary appeal to his Maker, said she
was like Grisi in her best days. To the house in
Alfred-place came fossil old noblemen like Lord
Putnenham, about as infirm as old furniture; tall,
florid, general officers, as fond of the warm rays
of beauty as of sitting in the sun; lively wives of
lively men; in short, a delightful miscellany. At
Alfred-place were the most delightful of morning
calls, where new music was heard, and new
painting worked at; of afternoon visits, where tea
was drunk, and talk mixed with the tea like cream,
and where the little dinner was spread; from
Alfred-place went the pleasant party to opera or
play, and to Alfred-place came home the pleasant
party from opera or play to the little supper on
the round table. All liked her. Older acquaintances
were eager to know her better; others
outside were struggling and canvassing to be
admitted. It was noted how eager she was to
extend her list. She wished to know everybody.

"You only care for new faces," said Fobley
of the Guards; "half a dozen in the day—like
gloves."

Pauline, who had for many minutes been
eagerly searching a gay crowd, flashed him a gay
smile. "I do," she said; "I like variety. The
man from Covent-garden changes these flowers for
me every second day. Mr. Griesbach," she said
to that reviewer of Gibbon, Pitt, and other heavy
subjects, "being at a window and seeing a
procession go by all day long, that is the true notion
of life! Don't you think so?"

When a new soldier came home from the
Caroo Islands, or a new sailor from the Main,
she always said to some of her staff, "Bring him
to me." Travellers of any degree she relished,
making them sit down beside her. The young
soldier would think fatuously of his own charms,
the seaman would glow with his pinkest blushes.

"O," she would say, "I have known so many
who have gone out there. It must be delightful.
I envy you all."

"We were up at Yalalabad, you know," the
fatuous youth would say. "I and Filmer and
old Jekyl. We used to dine with the
commissioner, an old Scotchman, with a daughter,
and—"

"Did you ever meet with Sir Hopkins Pocock
out there?"

"Who? Never heard of him—who's he?"

"O, nothing," said she. "An old friend—I
thought you might."

From that instant the youth—and he was but
a type of many more who suffered under the
same process—found the soft warm water growing
suddenly colder, until he had to leap out and
fly in confusion. So with an agreeable traveller,