in wait for her in the hall, on all manner of flimsy
pretexts; either until she came down, or came in
or came up. But whether she came down or came
up, somehow that Ridley fellow always contrived
to thrust himself upon her. By some intriguing
he managed to sit beside her at the dinners.
No doubt she rebelled against this tyranny and
persecution. Meanwhile, my life was becoming
almost intolerable from agitation and struggle
and I felt it must end in some way—not life, but
the state of things generally.

I have spoken of coming up and of going
down; and I have avoided hitherto coming
directly to that portion of the narrative. There
hangs thereby more than would be conceived—
more certainly hangs, than the simple chamber
which the mysterious agency of science, as
manifested in the hydraulic apparatus, raised so
many times in the day to the top of the house.
I have alluded before to the cruel pulmonary
infirmity to which I was a sufferer, and which
unfortunately about this time began to be more
troublesome than usual. The house was very
full, so I had to be content with a chamber very
near to the roof, a region which would have
been practically unattainable by me but for the
blessings of modern science. The "lift " was
my salvation—my pulmonary salvation. I
enjoyed my rides in the lift, and relished the mode
of travelling so much, that I made it the excuse
for many journeys to and from my room. But
there was yet another meaning in it. She, like
most other guests, availed herself of it. Am I
followed now? And when I was lying in wait,
as I may call it, in the hall, I confess to a little
artifice. When she had entered the apparatus, /
used to emerge, feign having forgotten a pocket-
handkerchief, or some other article, and would
be transported in her delightful society up to
the roof. It was charming; I could have gone
up and down from year's end to year's end,
without ever getting out. But that, of course,
could not be. At last it all came to an end,
and the lift—accursed invention—was at the
bottom of it. I mean morally. Here are the
particulars:

The very first journey we had made together
he was there too, looking at me with undisguised
insolence and jealousy. She had called
out, with great laughing and clapping of hands:

"I say, Ridley, Ridley! What a place to make
a proposal in! Fancy two people shut up here
together!"

He laughed loudly. "A good idea," he said;
"worth making a note of."

"Not at all a bad idea," I said, from a corner
of the "lift."

He looked at me, as he always did when I
spoke.

"The only difficulty," he said, "is, that under
certain circumstances it is almost impossible
for two people to get the opportunity of being
alone. There are busy-bodies who will be always
sticking themselves in where they are not
wanted, and to whom, I think, for the good of
the house even, I must give a lesson."

"As for that," I said, smiling, "so despotic
a course would scarcely be tolerated. The lift,
as we all know, is public—like a weighing-
machine—or the pavement of Regent-street.
The proprietor might as well shut up as
introduce any restriction of the kind you allude to."
He burst out laughing to hide the effect of my
quiet retort. She laughed too. "You see," I
said to her, "his plan would scarcely answer."

"I shall think of something that will, though, "
he said.

In a few days, however, there was a curious
change. When she came into the hall with
him, and while I was lying in wait until she
should have entered the lift, she suddenly
turned and said, "O, that machine is too
troublesome. The stairs are twice as fast. What
do you say to a race, Ridley?" And off she
bounded, with that person in pursuit. For the
moment, my instinct was to follow also; but a
few steps at a rapid pace soon showed me that I
must stop. The pulmonary affection developed
itself in a second, and, at the end of the first
flight, I was panting in deep distress.

I grieve to say, that under the instigation of
Ridley she carried out his unworthy tactics
steadily on every occasion. They always went
up by the stairs, and, as a matter of habit,
avoided the lift. I had to make solitary journeys
by the hydraulic agency. One evening,
however, I found that I could bear it no longer.
I said to myself that it must come to a crisis, one
way or the other. Which was the one way or which
was the other way, I did not know and did not
care; but the way should be discovered. As I
was brooding over this, the idea suddenly flashed
upon me. What if the pulmonary affection were
not so confirmed? What if I braved its effects—
tried—went into training a little? I might baffle
it—and be once more on equal terms with the
enemy.

I almost at once began to act on the suggestion;
with a little practice I found my power
of endurance improving marvellously; I
progressed in a steady ratio. To my surprise, I
found that when I could effect two flights of
stairs on one day, I could manage three on the
following day. This promised well. And, the
better to carry out my design, I determined to
my training, as I might call it, a secret,
until I was perfect. Just as I was nearly perfect
—which was on a Saturday—the news came
to me that she was going away, that her uncle
had written for her, and that she must leave by
the four o'clock train. She did not tell me this
herself, but I overheard her telling it to her
Ridley friend. No time, therefore, was to be lost.
Whatever I had to do, had best be done, if it
were to be done, done quickly. This is not the
precise form of words used by the immortal
William; but it conveys his idea pretty
accuately. In a moment I had the plan settled.
Nearly the whole day I waited in or about the hall
for her to come in. I had determined, in a word
—bearing in mind the remark so disparaging to a
faint heart—to be bold and speak. I was in
ambuscade I say the whole day, in or about
the hall, rushing out of concealment whenever
I heard any one coming. I believe the young
lady who looked after the books and accounts,