importance either to himself or to anybody else, but which took nearly as long to communicate as the original history. During this infliction, Harry’s attention was occupied by observing the behaviour of Mr. Crane. Almost as soon as Alice quitted the boudoir, Kate Marsden had entered it, and begun a long and apparently interesting conversation with Mr. Crane, during which that gentleman, who at the commencement appeared rather low and desponding, gradually brightened up, and, under the influence of his fair companion’s society, grew quite lively and animated; in fact (if by any stretch of imagination the reader can connect two such antagonistic and incongruous ideas as Mr. Crane and flirtation), an uninitiated spectator, beholding the pair, might legitimately have come to the conclusion that Kate Marsden and the cotton-spinner were very decidedly and unmistakably flirting. The longest evenings come to an end at last, and Coverdale having seen Knighton safely deposited in a dog-cart, with nobody to bore but a sleepy groom, was making his way to the spot where the bedroom candlesticks were usually to be discovered, when he suddenly encountered Mr. Hazlehurst. Standing aside to let him pass, Harry, in his most polite and conciliatory manner, wished him good-night. The only reply vouchsafed was the slightest and stiffest possible nod of the head, and with a countenance as dark and lowering as the most viciously disposed thunder-cloud, the offended autocrat passed on. CHAPTER XIII.--“DEEPER AND DEEPER STILL.” When Coverdale reached his own room, his first act was to lock the door, his next to fling open the window; he then untied his neck-cloth, pulled off his coat and boots, and substituting for them a dressing-gown and slippers, cast a long, lingering glance at his cigar-case. Shaking his head negatively, he muttered, “I daren’t risk it; old Hazlehurst has a wonderful nose for tobacco--if it were but as good for partridges and pheasants he’d make an invaluable retriever!”--he paused, sighed deeply, partly for want of a cigar--partly because, though he was not at all aware of it, one of the great realities of life was for the first time dawning upon him; then drawing a chair to the open window he seated himself, and gave way to thought.