out her graceful shoulders and fair head in an attitude of anxious expectation looking for him. What could he say to her? The return of her image thus suddenly thrust before him filled him with impatience and annoyance. Yet he could not withdraw himself; he went on without a pause, wondering with a troubled mind how far his mother had committed him, what she expected; what she wanted, this girl who was no heroine, no ideal woman, but only Janet Spears. Her eyes drooped as he came forward, with a shyness which had in it something of finer feeling than Janet had yet known. He was very dazzling to her in the light of his social superiority. A gentleman! Janet had heard all her life that a gentleman was the work of nature, not of circumstance, that those who arrogated the title to themselves had often far less right to bear it than the working men whom they scorned; but all these theories had passed lightly over her. _She_ knew the difference. They might talk what stuff they liked, but that would not make one of them a _Sir_--a man whose wife would be “my Lady,” a dazzling personage who drove in his carriage, who had horses to ride, and men in livery to walk behind him. The other was all talk! fudge! rubbish! but these things were realities. She watched him coming down the street in the grey twilight, in the faint yellow of the lamps. His very walk was different, the way in which he held his arms, not to speak of his clothes, of which even the Sunday clothes of the others bore but the faintest resemblance. Janet’s nature, such as it was, prostrated itself before the finest thing, the highest thing she knew. And if this is noble in other matters, why not in the most important of all? If it is a sign of an elevated soul to seek the best and loftiest, why not in a husband? Janet did not stand upon logic, yet her logic here was far better practically than her father’s. She recognised Paul without a moment’s hesitation as the best thing within her reach, and why should not she put forth her entire powers to gain the perfection she sought? “They have not come yet, Mr.--Paul,” said Janet, casting down her eyes. She had always called him Mr. Markham before; but she could not help hoping that now he would tenderly reprove her for the previous title, and bid her call him by his Christian name. Was not this the first step in lovers’ intimacy? But this was not what happened. It struck Paul disagreeably to hear his name at all, even with the Mr. before it. His mind rebelled at this half appropriation of him. He could not help feeling that it was cowardly of him to be rough with Janet, who had no power of defending herself; but he could not help it. He brushed past her with a half-sensation of disgust. “Haven’t they?” he said; “never mind. I dare say your father is in.”