own eyes—possessed a great many charms and
qualities calculated to attract the admiration
of people to whom the halo aforesaid was
invisible or unimportant; and she had not been
many days under his roof before Mr. Charlewood
had resolved that if it were possible, he would
bring about a marriage between his eldest son
and Miss Geraldine O'Brien.

"Clem likes her very much, I'm sure," said
Mr. Charlewood to his confidante, Penelope;
"and I'm sure I don't know how he could help
it, for she's charming, quite charming, and
they're a great deal together."

"Clem does like her very much, papa, and
she is charming, and they are a great deal
together; but still——"

"But what? Do you mean that she don't
like him?"

"No, papa. I certainly don't mean that."

"Perhaps you think she would not be satisfied
on the score of family; but, Penny, these
high folks know the value of money every bit
as well as the rest of the world. Wealth, my
girl, can command everything—almost
everything, at all events; and Miss O'Brien's too
sensible not to see that."

Clement, on his part, was inclined to like the
gay clever Irish girl very much indeed; and it
was true that he rode with her, walked with her,
and talked with her, with a constancy that might
have almost seemed to justify Mr. Charlewood's
hopes. But if that gentleman could have
overheard the conversations that took place between
Miss O'Brien and her cavalier during their long
rides in the pretty sylvan lanes around
Hammerham, his complacent assurance that matters
were going as he wished might have been
somewhat disturbed.

Clement, as I have said before, had a very
vivid and heartfelt interest in the wide-stretching
business of the great firm of Gandry and
Charlewood; and it was an interest, if not
altogether apart from, yet much superior to,
the mere money-grinding power of its vast
machinery. He was proud of its high repute,
its unblemished integrity, its daring and
enlightened speculations. The view of trade and
traders presented to the young Irish lady by
Clement Charlewood's conversation was an
altogether new one for her; and Clement found
in Miss O'Brien an intelligent and interested
listener to all he could say upon his favourite
theme.

Perhaps it would be too much to say that
Mr. Clement Charlewood would have found
absolutely the same amount of pleasure in these
equestrian excursions if his companion,
however intelligent, had been awkward and ugly
instead of being, as she undoubtedly was, a
handsome, graceful, distinguished looking
woman. Miss O'Brien's power of understanding
and appreciating Clement's conversation clearly
did not in any way depend upon the jaunty
droop of her feather, the admirable fit of her
riding-habit, the small well-shaped hand that
held the bridle so lightly, or the perfect ease
and skill with which she managed her horse.

But Clement Charlewood was a mortal man, and
I should be very loth to affirm positively that
these things did not tend to make his self-
imposed task of instructing Geraldine O'Brien as
to the doings of Gandry and Charlewood more
pleasant than its intrinsic merits might have
done.

But any thought that was disloyal to Mabel,
any faintest idea of love-making, was very far
from his mind.

And the lady?

The lady took a very great deal of interest in
the last new line of South American railway,
and the plans for the erection of a large pile of
government buildings in British India.

The reading of Lady Popham's letter had
struck a severe blow at Clement's inmost heart.
He alone of all the Charlewood family had been
quite sure from the first mention of the charming
Ophelia, that Mabel and no other was being
described; for although he was not aware that
she was acting under a feigned name, he had
learned from Mrs. Saxelby that she was to make
her first attempt at Kilclare. Lady Popham's
praise and patronage were distasteful to him,
perhaps from the assurance they seemed to
convey that Mabel was likely to continue in her
present path; perhaps because they realised,
and, as it were, brought home to him the fact
which had hitherto seemed hazy and distant,
that Mabel had in very earnest commenced a
theatrical career. But what followed was
worse; ten thousand times worse. The
mention of Alfred Trescott, and the coupling of his
name with Mabel's by the garrulous old lady,
had cut Clement to the heart. As he sat with
his arms folded on his desk he suffered the
keenest pangs of doubt and jealousy, and the
wounding of that sensitive shrinking delicacy—
almost like a second and finer self-love—with
which such men as Clement regard the image of
the woman they love, in their inmost soul. His
pure proud Mabel, his innocent, candid,
unprotected darling, she to be soiled by contact with
such a one as he knew Alfred Trescott to be!
The idea pierced him like a knife. Again and
again he told himself that it was impossible;
that Mabel would never stoop to think for one
moment of Alfred Trescott; that the romantic
credulous old woman had fancied or
misunderstood the whole matter; that the wily and
unprincipled young fellow had, for his own
purposes, been using Mabel's name with a boastful
lie in his mouth. It was impossible that this
thing should be. Impossible, incredible; an
insult and a treason to his love to give it one
instant's credence. And yet, and yet, the gnawing
doubt refused to be so stilled. It may be
urged that where Clement had bestowed a
perfect love he should have given also a perfect
trust. But that perfect trust, which comes from
a sure, almost intuitive knowledge, of how
certain circumstances and conditions will affect
another person, is usually the slow growth of
years of intimate companionship. As far as
an unwavering belief in Mabel's absolute pure-
heartedness and goodness went, his trust was