‘Fifty-seven,’ said Helena. ‘Jacky, dear, if you pull Teddy’s hair again, I’ll make you sit outside the omnibus.’ ‘Fifty-seven. Best make a note of it, for fear I should forget it,’ he added, jotting it down, while Helena, with a brave assumption of indifference, looked straight before her, and choked back her tears. ‘You are not engaged until four o’clock on Sundays, are you?’ he suddenly asked. ‘No--but--oh, don’t come on Sunday!’ said Helena in her old tragic manner. ‘I solemnly swear that I will not come on Sunday!’ he said. ‘And equally solemnly I swear I will make you tell me why I am forbidden to come on that day.’ ‘Why?’ said Helena, with a kind of half-laugh, not quite free from an hysterical sound--‘why, the reason is simple enough. Because----’ The omnibus is almost more relentless in its punctuality than time and tide. Not another word could be exchanged. They ran down the steps, and went through the ignominious performance of hailing and catching the vehicle. Sebastian, with great presence of mind, did manage to clasp Helena’s hand once more, and to repeat the words, ‘I shall come soon, and _not_ on Sunday.’ Then he stood in the middle of Mosley Street gazing after the omnibus, until an uproar caused him to look up, and he found himself surrounded with infuriated lorrie-drivers, swearing at him for getting into the way, while a hansom cabman had just pulled his horse up on to its very haunches, and was apostrophising him in a manner the reverse of complimentary. Newspaper boys were jeering at him, and an indignant policeman was ordering him to move on. With an amiable smile, and a murmured general apology, he made his way to the footpath, and then on to the station. CHAPTER II. FENCING. Towards five o’clock on the following Tuesday afternoon, a hansom-cab drove rapidly up that Manchester thoroughfare known as Oxford Street, and the address given by the man who took it had been, ‘Fifty-seven Woodford Street.’ As they spun rapidly along, he looked out wondering on which side of Oxford Street Woodford Street might lie; how far from town, and if it would turn out to be a very poor little street indeed. He remembered Helena’s look of embarrassment, as she said the house was small and uncomfortable. They drove on; the cab passed the Owen’s College, passed the ‘Church of the Holy Name,’ passed some other buildings, and at last turned off to the right. Sebastian shook his head. ‘Not the best side. Poor little Helena!’ Why did he always think of her as ‘little Helena,’ she who was taller than most women, and whose disdainful head, set upon her long white neck, had been wont to look over the heads of a good many even of the men of Thanshope? Three whole days had passed since he had met her in the Royal Institution--three whole days, and part of a fourth, because she had told him not to come on Sunday.