and when we arrived at Mrs. Gillott's I thanked him, and bade him Goodnight. He took off his hat again, and left me at once. "He found out who I was--how, I don't know--for next day I had a polite note, hoping I had quite recovered from my alarm, expressed in the most gentlemanly manner, and signed 'Paul Douglas.' I have met him several times since, always in the street, and have walked and talked with him. He is always most polite and respectful, but of course professes himself to be madly in love. Yesterday, for the first time, I found out who he is. He has an appointment in a Government office, the 'Stannaries' they call it, and his family live somewhere in the West of England. They are evidently well off, and he, Paul, is what they call a 'swell.' Very good-looking, slight and dark, about five-and-twenty, and always beautifully dressed. "You don't fear me, mother? You have sufficient reliance on me to know that I would never discredit your training. You will want to know whether I am in love with this young man. I think I am--so far. And you need not be afraid. He vows--everything, of course; but he is too much of a gentleman, in the first place, to offer to insult me, and in the second--well, to speak plainly, he knows it would be of no use. Is this the chance that you taught me to look for? I think it is. But we shall soon know. Meanwhile believe in the thorough discretion of your loving daughter FANNY." Up and down the soft turf path paced Mrs. Stothard in the glorious summer evening, with the open letter in her hand, deep in cogitation. Her head was bent upon her breast, and occasionally raised as she referred to the paper. Suddenly a light gleamed in her face; she hurriedly re-perused the letter, folding it so as only to make herself thorough mistress of a certain portion of its contents, and then she smiled a hard grim smile, and said to herself in a hard bitter voice: "Of course, of course! What an idiot I was not to see it at once! The mention of the Stannaries Office might have convinced me, if all my senses had not been blunted by my wretched work in this wretched place! Douglas, indeed! Paul Douglas is Paul Derinzy; slight, dark, handsome--none but he! Family in the West of England, too--no doubt of it! And in love with my Fan! Oh, my dear friends, I'll spoil your game yet! I'm so blind. Quiet and seclusion for dear Annette's health; no other reason, oh no! Not to keep her out of the way of fortune-hunters, and save her up for our son, oh dear no! That shall never be! Our son shall marry my Fan! What is it? 'The sins of the fathers shall be visited on the children.' I never believed much in that sort of thing; but in this instance it really looks as though there were something in it." CHAPTER VII. FRIENDS IN COUNCIL.