“But you don’t mean to say that I’ve done Miss Desmond any wrong?” cried Francis. “How should I be otherwise than grateful to her when she was kind to me, and set me at my ease somehow, and made me feel a little less like an Ojibbeway Indian suddenly let loose amongst fashionable people? How should I imagine that she would think of me except as--as Miss Hillary thinks of me?” His voice grew low, and an inexpressible change came over his whole manner as he mentioned Maude Hillary’s name. “They know my history, and that this time last year I was a private in a foot regiment, with nothing higher to hope for than an extra stripe upon my sleeve.” “Miss Hillary is one person and Miss Desmond is another,” Mr. Somerset replied, with just the least suspicion of _hauteur_. “The lovely Julia’s face is her fortune, you know, dear boy. You ask me if you’ve been wrong; and I tell you frankly, as a gentleman, that I think you have. A man can’t be exclusive in his attentions to a woman without other people perceiving the fact, and forming their own conclusions thereupon. I know everyone who comes here regards the matter as settled, and I heard Maude say the other day that she thought you a very good fellow--_she_ didn’t say fellow,--and would be delighted to see her dear Julia so pleasantly established.” “Did she say that?” cried Francis, with a dusky blush kindling under his dark skin; “did she speak well of me? And if--if she should think I have done Miss Desmond some kind of wrong by usurping her society and setting people talking about us--if _she_ should think me mean or base----” Montagu Somerset interrupted Mr. Tredethlyn by a long whistle. “Oh! the wind’s in that quarter, is it?” he exclaimed; “you’re down in that list; then in that case I’ve nothing more to say. The river flows at your feet, my dear friend; and I dare say there’s a rope for sale somewhere in the villages of Twickenham or Isleworth.” The young man sauntered away, leaving Francis with his arms folded on the balustrade, and his face darker than it had been, even when he had thought remorsefully of his missing cousin.