The dinner-table was a downright merry one, and we did not seem to miss Captain Foliott. Afterwards, when Sir John had made up his whist-table--with my lady, Miss Deveen, and the grey-haired curate, Mr. Lake, who had dropped in--we amused ourselves with music and games in the other room. "What do you think of the bridegroom, Johnny Ludlow?" suddenly demanded Miss Cattledon, who had sat down by me. "I hear you saw him at Malvern." "Think of him! Oh, he--he is a very fine man; good-looking, and all that." "That I have seen for myself," retorted Cattledon, pinching her hands round her thin waist. "When he was staying in London, two or three weeks ago, we spent an evening in Gloucester Place. Do you _like_ him?" She put the "like" so very pointedly, staring into my face at the time, that I was rather taken aback. I did _not_ like Captain Foliott: but there was no particular necessity for telling her so. "I like him--pretty well, Miss Cattledon." "Well, I do not, Johnny Ludlow. I fancy he has a temper; I'm sure he is not good-natured; and I--I don't think he'll make a very good husband." "That will be a pity. Helen is fond of him." Miss Cattledon coughed significantly. "Is she? Helen is fond of him in-so-far as that she is eager to be married--all girls are--and the match with Captain Foliott is an advantageous one. But if you think she cares for him in any other way, Johnny Ludlow, you are quite mistaken. Helen Whitney is no more in love with Captain Foliott than you are in love with me." At which I laughed. "Very few girls marry for love," she went on. "They fall in love, generally speaking, with the wrong person." "Then what do they marry for?" "For the sake of being married. With the fear of old-maidism staring them in the face, they are ready, silly things, to snap at almost any offer they receive. Go up to Helen Whitney now, tell her she is destined to live in single blessedness, and she would be ready to fret herself into a fever. Every girl would not be, mind you: but there are girls and girls." Well, perhaps Miss Cattledon was not far wrong. I did not think as she did then, and laughed again in answer: but I have learned more of the world and its ways since. In every corner of the house went Helen's eyes when we got back to Gloucester Place, but they could not see Captain Foliott. She had been hoping against hope. III.