"The--the ideal, if I may so call it, that I have just drawn by no means resembles the writer of a letter which I received this morning honouring me by a proposal for Katharine's hand." Streightley's arm dropped upon the table, and he leant forward with an eager gaze. "Yes, my dear Robert, the Goths are already in full march upon the--what d'ye call 'em?--Capitol; and it is under these circumstances that I have sent for you to ask your advice." "You--you're very good," murmured Streightley; "and of course any thing that I can do--but I really scarcely see in such a matter as this--and without knowing--knowing any thing of the--the parties----" "My dear Robert, you don't think I would have sent for you with the notion of making any half-confidences. You shall know every detail. The writer of this letter," pursued Mr. Guyon, producing a packet from his desk,--"of these two letters rather, for there is an enclosure for Katharine which I have not yet delivered--is a young man whom you may have seen with us--a Mr. Gordon Frere. A doosid good-looking, well-born, well-connected young fellow, who seems tremendously in earnest about it too," continued Mr. Guyon, balancing his trim gold eyeglasses on the bridge of his nose; "for he writes to me to say--to say that--there, I need not read his letter--the gist of it is that he's been down to his father, at some place in the country where he writes from, and his father, who is a member of the House, has promised to use his influence with Government to get him a decent berth. Now that's plucky and honourable--I like that, eh, Robert?" "O yes, sir--very honourable indeed," said Streightley nervously. "I think you mentioned that you had not forwarded the enclosure to Miss Guyon?" "Not yet,--no. I was desirous of having your opinion--as a man of business--on the proposal." It had come at last then, this long-expected blow to that dream of future happiness in which, spite of his own better reasoning, he had dared to indulge. She would be wrested from him--be taken to the heart of that smooth-spoken dandy whom he had loathed from the first instant of seeing him. All her loveliness--ah, how he remembered each brilliant charm!--would go to grace the life of that silly fop. The blood rushed back to Robert Streightley's heart as he thought of all this; his teeth were clenched, his pallid lips trembled and shook, and he thought that if he had had Gordon Frere before him at that instant he could have killed him without remorse. For an instant his better feeling struggled with his passion--the struggle was short and sharp, but the passion was victorious; and he said, in a strange dry voice, "This gentleman scarcely fulfils the requirements you named just now, Mr. Guyon?" "Admirably put, my dear Robert--clearly and admirably put! I must allow it, he does not." "If there were some one who, by his age and position at least, was calculated to--to be to this young lady--what you----" "Yes, my dear Robert, yes I--"