Go to Norway; try to forget Janet Bertram amid those lonely hills, with no companions save the two faithful lads who carried his guns, and performed the rough services of life under canvas? Try to forget her amidst the solitude of nature? Vain hope! An hour’s contemplation of the subject on that lonely shore, remote from the parade and the band and all the holiday traffic of a popular watering-place, was enough to make a complete change in Mr. Hossack’s plans. He would not go to Norway. Why should he put the North Sea betwixt himself and his love? Who could tell what might happen in his absence, what changes might come to pass involving all his chances of happiness, and he, dolt and idiot, too far away to profit by their arising? No; he would stay in England, within easy reach of his idol. He might write her a little line now and then, just to remind her of the mere fact of his existence, and to acquaint her with his abode. She had not forbidden him to write. Decidedly, come what might, he would not leave England. This decision arrived at, after profound cogitation, he breathed more freely. He had been going forth like an exile—unwillingly, as if driven by Nemesis, that golden-winged goddess who made such hard lines for the Greeks. He had set forth in the first rush and tumult of his passion, deeming that in the wild land of the Norse gods he might stifle his grief, find a cure for his pain. He felt more at ease now that he had allowed love to gain the victory. ‘It is a privilege to inhabit the same country with her,’ he told himself. Not long did he linger in Hull. The next morning’s express carried him back to London, uncertain as to how he should spend his autumn; willing even to let his guns rust so that he need not drag himself too far away from Janet Bertram. ‘Janet,’ he repeated fondly, ‘a prettier name than Jane; a name made for simplest tenderest verse. I’m glad I have learnt to think of her by it.’ There were letters waiting for him at the Cosmopolitan, forwarded from Stillmington, nearly a week’s arrears of correspondence; letters feminine and masculine; the feminine bulky, ornamental as to stationery, be-monogramed, redolent of rose and frangipani; cousinly epistles which Geoffrey contemplated with a good-humoured indifference. He looked over the addresses eagerly, lest by remotest chance—yet he could not even hope so much—there might be a letter from Mrs. Bertram. There was none; so he opened one of the cousinly epistles with a profound sigh. Hillersdon Grange, Hampshire. _Her_ county and his. He and Lucius had been born and bred not twenty miles apart, and had begun their friendship at Winchester School. Mr. Hossack’s people lived in Hampshire, and were unwearying in their invitations, yet he had not revisited his native place since his return from America.