The love dream of youth had hardly time to be told until the future dream of wonder and dread was about to be prophesied. A couple of months or so after Lady Dunfern took up her residence at Audley Hall found her more a dependent than a patroness. She had recently fled from a dungeon, still it was not one of either starvation or poverty. Whilst occupying its darkened midst she never had any cause for complaint regarding food or attendance, both of which could not possibly have been excelled. It was only when staring her lover's scanty table fully that thoughts of any nature, save cruelty, haunted her and caused a sad expression to appear which before seemed invisible. Oscar, who had no means whatever of a private nature, soon commenced to feel the touch of want as well as Lady Dunfern. He had no situation, neither had he the means to afford the homeliest fare, and although made owner of his present habitation, yet it was only conditionally he obtained it from his uncle. Must not the great love they naturally had for each other have been of very superlative strength, since it bade adieu to boundless wealth on the one hand and a comfortable allowance on the other, to face the future with penniless pride! Advertisements were often seen in the leading journals for a situation, and once the name "Oscar Otwell" appeared below. It was treated with muffled silence, so much so that after a month's daily appealing to a praiseworthy public, the result proved a decided failure. Did he imagine his conduct in robbing Sir John Dunfern of his youthful wife would be appreciated by a public band of critics? Did he by his various attempts to enter the minds of the needy ever think to solicit their assistance or gain their confidence by tearing asunder the lawful bond of superficial union and right, casting it upon the sieve of shattered shelter to separate the corn of crowded comfort from the chaff of crafty want? Oscar Otwell, whose literary abilities were proved beyond doubt, and which were the sole source of his existence, was, by his conduct and craving desire, driven into the pit of trifling tenure and allowed to lie dormant until again aroused in a clime to which he soon must wend his wasted way. It was now that the heated passion of youth's folly became abated as Oscar was beginning to near his purse's wrinkled bottom, and failing in his strenuous efforts to secure a tutorship, was smartly made to feel that he must visit a land of strangers, where height of ability and depth of character were alike unquestioned. It was at this stage, too, that Lady Dunfern was made to taste of the dish of fanciful wish in which she often dipped her slender fingers to sprinkle her body of dishonesty. She got time now to brood over her actions of silly execution and hatch them with heated hunger. The orphan, the pampered, the honoured was at this period the deluded, the mocked, the hungered.