feeling you are tied, chained, bound to a creature like that! His mind painted Milly in a thousand ways; at the head of his table, seated beside him on his four-inhand, riding to the Meet on the best horse in the three kingdoms, lying on the deck of his yacht, making bright the old house at Wentworth with her sweet presence, Then came a revulsion of feeling absolutely painful. How dare he think of winning her? What was there in him to make such a woman care for him?

He went to his room, and tried to sleep. His thoughts maddened him. He rose and paced to and fro, and longed frantically for the morning. It might be odd, strange, mad almost, but he would see Mrs. Scarlett the next morning, and tell her just what he felt for her.

When the broad daylight came in he fell into a feverish sleep, and slept late into the

morning. When he awoke and had breakfasted, his ideas underwent a considerable change as to the propriety of declaring his passion to Mrs. Scarlett. Oh, how grievously long that day seemed! how utterly consumed he was by ennui! what countless cigars he smoked! In the afternoon he got a message to say the ladies were tired, so they would dine in their rooms, and the dinner at the Maison Dorée must stand over until the next evening. Since he was a schoolboy, deprived of a holiday, Guy had never felt a disappointment so bitterly. He and Charles Vivian dined tête-à-tête in the Palais Royal; they were both out of sorts -the latter had quarrelled with his wife for spending too much money. She had sulked and refused to join the proposed dinner-party, and Guy, of course, was dreadfully put out at the absence of the woman he was so eager to see. The

dinner was excellent, but they both abused it and sent away half the dishes untasted.

"After all," said Guy, ladies is very slow work.

that, Vivian."

a dinner without

You must admit

"Hang the women! You and I have had plenty of jolly dinners together without them, and should have had to-night but for their fault."

"You can't blame them for being tired," remarks Guy.

"Tired! pshaw! they haven't walked five hundred yards to-day. My wife's in a temper, and wouldn't come to spite me, and of course Mrs. Scarlett was obliged to stay at home with her. Ah! my boy, you'll know all these little delights for yourself one day. Your wife, like mine perhaps, will have the most extravagant tastes, and spend a small fortune on her infernal bonnets and capes-you'll remonstrate-she

will fly into a passion and call you mean, and cowardly, and ungentlemanlike-you will retort-she will have hysterics, and for the next twenty-four hours will be exercising her ingenious mind on the problem of how she can most vex and thwart you."

Guy is silent; he is wishing passionately that he could spend every farthing he has on the woman he loves.

A man's mind is apt to look at these things in a different light when he is doubtful about possessing his treasure, and when it is unmistakeably, positively, unchangeably his own.

"I hope Mrs. Vivian will be all right tomorrow," Guy says, after the silence has remained unbroken for some little time.

"Of course she will. She won't stop at home when she knows it doesn't annoy me, and, thank Heaven! she can't know how angry I am, and what a stupid dinner

we've had. How she would

"It isn't very lively here.

the theatre."

glory in it!"

Let's go into

They do so, and Guy is horribly disgusted with every woman upon the stage; so they stroll off to the Valentino

are more disgusted still, and return to their hotel-Charles Vivian to have the rest of the quarrel out; and Guy, more fortunate, to enjoy his slumbers undisturbed.

The next day was an immensely happy one-the first part, at all events. In the morning he met Mrs. Vivian and her friend in the courtyard, and was graciously allowed to escort them on their shopping expedition. Milly was as bright as a lark, full of fun and sprightliness-rallied Guy on a thousand subjects, laughed at him, smiled at him, consulted him on her purchases, and scolded him for his extrava