"Begged me to take no notice, and pleaded for Lilias, like the angel she is. But I was knocked completely over, didn't know what I was doing, and told her straight out that it was true. Perhaps I should not have done it, but I could not help myself, and she gave me one look, just one! Oh, Jim, old man, if this crash has shown me the awful mistake I was making, it will be indeed a blessing in disguise. I will work like ten men, I will laugh at difficulties, I will do anything and everything, if only, only I can win Maud in the end. You will be my friend, won't you? You will help me, and tell her what I hope?" "Not if I know it!" returned Jim, with masculine candour. "You have done quite enough mischief for the time, old chap, and had better lie low until things have blown over. I've a great deal too much respect for Maud, to suggest that she should adopt you as her lover the moment you are dropped by Lilias. Wait a year or two until you have made your position, and then come down and ask her yourself--" "A year or two! And meantime she might think I had changed again, and had forgotten all about her--That's too much to expect! I don't ask you to say anything just yet, but in time to come you might drop a hint, or let her see one of my letters, show her in any indirect way you like that I know my own mind at last, and am working towards an end. It isn't much to ask from an old chum--I'd do as much for you if I were in your place." "Humph!" quoth Jim concisely; but his grey eyes sent out a kindly gleam, and Ned Talbot went away comforted by the knowledge that his friend would be kinder in deed than in word, and that his message would not fail to be delivered. He had another friend at court to whom he gave less thought, but whose loyalty was at least as strong as that of her brother. Nan had her own dreams of the future, of which she breathed no word to a living soul, but she set herself to work to clear away such difficulties as lay in Ned's path, with her accustomed energy and daring. "If I were a nice old gentleman with heaps of money and nothing to do, I would give a good situation to a young fellow who was miserable and ill- treated!" she announced to Mr Vanburgh, at the conclusion of the story of the broken engagement; and that gentleman chuckled with enjoyment as he listened. "Would you, indeed? And in what capacity? I don't quite see what situations I have to offer which would meet Mr Talbot's requirements. There is a good deal of machinery of one sort and another involved in the work of a house like this, but I fear it is hardly the kind which he is accustomed to superintend." "Don't snub me, please. I'm too reduced. I don't mean in this house, but somewhere else where there are Works like his own. If you would just write to the people and say how clever he is, and what a good manager, and that you are sure they would like him!"