Mason began to pluck up a little at this. The association of Aunt Fanny's name suggested that she had talked the matter over with her niece, as she had with him, and broken the ice for him. He looked over his shoulder to see if the parlor was clear. She was leaning forward now, holding out two plump little hands, like a child going to beg, and with a sly, roguish look too. He thought he could do it now: he would drop gracefully on one knee and-- And Sudie went on: "Somebody else will be mad too, you don't know." A half whisper from the roguish pucker of those dimpling lips: "Ma'amselle Hortense." The blood rushed to that ensanguined face till it looked like a great romanete apple: "Hortense?" "Yes," with a half-dozen mischievous, confidential little nods. "There! Now you go right straight and see Mr. Nettles, and tell him _I_ sent you; and if he doesn't behave himself to you, just let _me_ know." And, nodding intelligence, little Sue rose with a rustle and flutter of puffs and bows, in childish confidence of having done her whole duty and stopped that wicked, wicked business. That skilful card-player Mason was as completely stumped as if some one had raked down the stakes on a pair of deuces against his exhibit of the four aces. Nothing but the most gracious condescension and chaste humility of salutation had passed between him and his aunt's French maid; yet shrewd little Sudie, with her intuitive woman's instinct, had shot her arrow in the dark and cloven the wand. She went out in the innocent simplicity of her childlike faith, and it was hours before she came to realize how utterly she had failed in stopping the execution of that deadly purpose. How often is it the case with her sex that, having no other coin than the affections, so dear to themselves, they over-value them for others, and only know from finding them soiled and trampled in the mud how little they are estimated in the hard and selfish dealings of man with man! But the little girl went off, happy in her delusion. God bless the rest of heart from apprehension that it gave her! But Mason had to slip aside into the hotel bar and drink a mighty jorum of brandy before he could rejoin his friends. As he thought of all the confounded annoyances and embarrassments growing out of the little girl's discovery, including the loss of her hand and fortune, the terse and pithy brevity of his summing-up of the situation was an epitome of Spartan eloquence. It was, "D---- it!" WILL WALLACE HARNEY. THE DOINGS AND GOINGS-ON OF HIRED GIRLS.