Here she fell into a rather mournful reverie, thinking of her old life, with its shifts and privations--of her poor father, who had been so happy through it all, never feeling the weight of the petty debts and dishonours that lay like lead on her--of her struggles to keep his affairs straight--of her prayers that she might not live to despise and desert him, which was a temptation that grew with her growing years--and as she thought, she gazed absently, tenderly, pensively, not on the sealskin jacket, but on the faces of the passers-by. She had no idea how excessively interesting and pretty she looked to those passers-by with that expression in her eyes. However, a gentleman came by presently, a well-preserved young man of fifty or sixty, with a waxed moustache, and a slender umbrella carried musketwise over his shoulder; and his attention was violently arrested. "Where _have_ I seen that charming creature?" he asked himself, imploring his memory, which had a great store of miscellaneous treasures, to be quick and help him. "Surely I have been introduced to her somewhere. Oh, of course! it is old Hardy's niece, or ward, or whatever she is. Good day, Miss Fetherstonhaugh," turning back when he had nearly passed her, and making a profound obeisance with his hat off. "Fine afternoon for a drive." She recognised _him_ immediately. She had danced a quadrille with him at her memorable first evening "out," and she had learned a great deal of him since from the gossip of her aunt's circle. There was a time, she had been told, when he was nearly becoming a member of the family himself. He was a great merchant--or an ex-merchant rather--who had dealt in some mysterious commodity that had brought enormous profits; and he had risen by all kinds of good luck, from no one knew what depth of social insignificance to the proud position of a man of fashion about town, whom ladies delighted to honour. "Good day, Mr. Kingston," she responded, looking very pink and bright, and a little flurried as she returned his salutation. She had the daintiest complexion that ever adorned a youthful face, and whenever she was startled or embarrassed, however slightly, she blushed like a rose. Mr. Kingston, accustomed to appraise the charms of his female friends with an almost brutal impartiality, was unjustifiably touched and flattered by this innocent demonstration. He was really very glad he had remembered who she was before he had lost so good an opportunity for looking at and talking to her. "I don't think it _is_ a very fine afternoon," she remarked presently, as the gentleman seemed to find himself for once a little at a loss for a subject; and she smiled at him through her blushes, which went and came suddenly and delicately, as if they were breathed over her by the air somehow. "It has been looking grey, like rain, ever since we started; and it is rather cold, don't you think?"