Yes, Miss Desmond was very kind to the simple-hearted Cornishman. So kind is Madame Arachne to a big blundering blue-bottle fly that hovers ignorantly about the net she has spread for him. Julia had angled very patiently for the last two years in the great matrimonial fisheries, and had brought several fish to land, only to lose her hook and leave them to gasp and perish on the bank when she discovered their quality. But now, for the first time, she knew she had a prey worthy her skill and patience. She had taken good care to ascertain that Francis Tredethlyn’s thirty thousand a year was no mere figment of a gossip’s brain, and she set herself deliberately to work to win this prize so newly offered for competition in the matrimonial market. Mr. Hillary interested himself in the young man’s fortunes, and gave him some advice about the management of some of his Uncle Oliver’s numerous investments. This, of course, necessitated interviews at the merchant’s offices in Moorgate Street; and no interview ever came to a close until Francis had received hospitable Mr. Hillary’s invitation to “run down” to Twickenham. The young man seemed always running down to the Cedars. He slept there sometimes, in a pretty chintz-curtained chamber, all rosebuds and maplewood, and from whose jasmine-festooned windows he looked out upon the river--the perpetual river, now shimmering in the moonlight, now twinkling and glancing in the sunshine, but always “a thing of beauty and a joy” for the people who dwell upon its banks. Yes, he was always riding down to the Cedars. He had departed very little from his simple habits; but he had bought a couple of horses at Tattersall’s--such horses as a man who has been used to ride across wild moorland districts without saddle or stirrups from his earliest boyhood knows how to choose. He kept the horses at livery near his hotel, and he hired a smart young groom to attend to them, and even to ride behind him on occasions. Miss Hillary grew accustomed to the young man’s presence, and greeted him kindly when he came; but then she had so many friends, such enthusiastic female adorers in crisp muslins, who found the millionaire’s daughter the dearest darling in the world, and were always eager to pour some new confidence into her willing ears. She had so many friends, so many admirers, that Francis Tredethlyn always found her more or less difficult of approach. And in the meanwhile there was Miss Desmond perpetually smiling upon him, and talking to him, and listening to him.