MABEL'S PROGRESS.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "AUNT MARGARET'S TROUBLE."

                         BOOK VI.

          CHAPTER III. JACK'S TIDINGS.

JACK'S reception by his newly found friend and
patron, was most kind and cordial. The young
painter was highly delighted with Mr. M'Culloch's
collection of pictures, and with the old
Scotchman's shrewd apt criticisms on them.
"He doesn't talk technical jargon, you know,"
said Jack, eulogistically; "doesn't knock about
chiar'oscuro, and middle distances, and breadth
of handling, or anything of that kind. Neither
does he go in for High Art, nor make himself
unintelligibly imposing by kicking up a
dust of words that convey nothing to
commonplace people like me. But, for all that, he
practically knows a good picture when he sees
one; and he's moreover an uncommonly jolly
old blade in his douce Scotch fashion, and can
take off his tumbler of punch—toddy, he calls
it—in first-rate style."

Oue morning, Jack, lounging into the garden
of Desmond Lodge from the Hawthorns (at
which latter place he had taken up his abode
for a day or two), found Mabel alone on the
lawn with a book open on her knees, and her
eyes fixed on the distant city seen through an
opening between the trees. She was very still,
and was unaware of his approach until he was
quite close upon her.

"I wonder," said Jack, looking over her
shoulder at the smoke-veiled roofs of London,
"what new triumphs the popular actress was
contemplating so earnestly in the future!"

"I was contemplating nothing in the future,
Jack. I was looking back, back—oh, a long
way! Not so exhilarating a view, perhaps. But
it has a sad charm of its own, and is not without
its value in this busy work-a-day world."

The cousins remained silent for a while, side
by side; Jack looking at the landscape with a
painter's eye, and Mabel gazing in dreamy
abstraction before her. After a time, Jack spoke
abruptly, and put the unexpected question:

"Do you know anything about handwritings,
Mabel?"

"About handwritings? I know whether I
can read them or not."

"Of course; but I mean—can you judge
character by the handwriting, or do anything
of that sort that people profess to do?"

"Nothing whatever."

"You couldn't give a guess at the kind of
person who might have written such and such a
hand, for example?"

"Good gracious, Jack, certainly not! Why
do you ask?"

"A conversation that I had with Mr. M'Culloch
last night put it into my head to do so.
He was telling me such a queer story—by the
way, you knew some people of the name of
Charlewood, in Hammerham, did you not?"

Mabel's heart seemed to stand still for a
moment, but she answered quite quietly, "I
knew them well."

"Yes; I remember hearing my mother talk
of your rich friends; and that handsome Irish
girl who came to see you in Kelly's-square was
a relation of theirs, wasn't she? No! Well,
no matter. It seems these Charlewoods fell
into terrible misfortune. The firm smashed up,
owing to those great bank failures, and they
say that the father, old Charlewood——Ah,
you know the story. But that's not what I
had to say. The eldest son, an uncommonly
plucky fellow, gave up everything to the creditors
in the most straightforward manner, and
came to London in a position of trust in old
M'Culloch's house. They're builders, you
know, and Charlewood understands the whole
thing thoroughly, and is in every respect a first-
rate chap, from all I hear."

"What was the strange story Mr. M'Culloch
related to you, Jack?" asked Mabel, with
her hands clasped nervously together, and her
pale face turned away from her cousin.

"Oh, to be sure. About the writing. Well,
it is the most mysterious thing you can fancy.
For the last two months and more, M'Culloch
has been receiving anonymous letters accusing
young Charlewood of every kind of vileness.
Drinking, gambling, peculation, hypocrisy, and
so forth. The queer thing is, that Charlewood
can't pitch upon any enemy he has in the world
likely to attack him in so abominable a manner.
And yet the letters are written by some one
who knew the family well, for there are little
details of their life at Hammerham, and since
they have been in London, all given correctly.
M'Culloch is warned not to trust Charlewood
in the smallest degree, and, indeed, is urged to
get rid of him without delay."