Francis Tredethlyn spent the bright summer Sunday afternoon and evening at the Cedars. Mr. Hillary generally filled his house with company on the day of rest; and hard-working commercial magnates, and lazy West-end loungers, were alike glad to spend their Sabbath amongst the flower-beds and trellised walks, under the shadow of black spreading cedars, or on the terrace by the river. The merchant’s house was only another Star-and-Garter, where the _menu_ was always irreproachable, and where one escaped that little bugbear so common to the close of all social entertainments, and known by the vulgar name of “Bill.” Mr. Tredethlyn found the house full of strangers, and Miss Hillary very difficult of approach. He was not allowed to feel embarrassed, however; for Julia Desmond always happened to be in his neighbourhood, and he found her society as charming as on the previous occasion. She was so very handsome, and there was really something so bewildering about her dark eyes, and white teeth, and fluent talk upon every possible subject, that the young man--who had never been accustomed to the society of well-educated women--may be forgiven if he admired her. He admired her, but not as he admired Maude Hillary. No thrill of half-fearful rapture stirred his pulses as he stood by Julia’s side upon the moonlit terrace, looking down at the rippling water, darkened by the tremulous shadows of the trees; but the faintest flutter of Maude’s airy flounces stirred his soul like a burst of music. But she was only a beautiful, far-away creature, who never could have any part in his destiny. He acknowledged this in a half-despairing way; and then resigned himself to look at her only now and then from a distance, and to behold her always surrounded by those elegant amber-whiskered loungers, whose admiration of her loveliness never made them awkward in her presence; who could approach her without suffering from a sudden determination of blood to the head; who could hover near her without trampling half-a-yard of her lace flounce to destruction under the savage tread of a clumsy foot. “Those fellows are fit to talk to her,” he thought; “they’ve been brought up to it, I suppose: but I’m better out of her way; for even if she speaks to me, I make a fool of myself somehow, and feel as if I couldn’t answer her. I get on better with Miss Desmond; she’s so kind, and she doesn’t seem to mind my being awkward and stupid.”