Who shall say now that Charley wasn’t a lucky dog, with a handsome heiress almost thrown into his arms by a dowager-guardian, with whom he stood as dear Charles? What numberless opportunities would he not enjoy! Sole protector of two lone women; the one laid up by rheumatism, and fully occupied by devotion and card-playing; the other dying for the want of country air and exercise, and in all probability not at all averse to the idea of sharing her delights with a companion. They would be absolutely his own fee-simple property. Such good fortune was not an every-day affair, and deserved more than every-day exertion to second and secure it. So Charley set about his aunt’s commission in earnest, and before nightfall succeeded in ferreting a half-pay lieutenant and his family out of the best house in the town, to make room for the dowager and her daughter; wrote in reply an account of his doings, with such a list of the amenities of the locality as would have added fifty per cent, at least, to its value if it were to be sold by auction; and inclosed at the same time a well-authenticated statement of a most extraordinary cure of rheumatism which had been effected by the waters of a blessed well in the neighbourhood. In due course of time the ladies were domiciled in their new dwelling, with Charley, of course, for their factotum and natural protector. The blessed well began to work a miracle on the aunt, and the country air would have done as much for Lucy if she required it; but deuce a bit of it she wanted; her cheeks were as red and her step as firm as if she had been born and bred within the precincts of the parish; and whatever was the cause of her rustication, Charley could swear it was not bodily weakness. Ill-natured people said she had been a thought too sweet to an attorney’s apprentice in the city, and that therein lay the secret of her mother’s forsaking the delights of Marsh’s prescriptions and Gregg’s new chapel--that prudent personage not approving of the connection. If that be the case, a tough heart had Lucy Bindon, and never may it be my lot to make such a faint impression on womankind as was made by that luckless apprentice; for a merrier laugh never rang in the precincts of B----, and a brighter pair of eyes never glittered in its dull, quiet street. But, oh! that laugh and those eyes, they played the devil entirely with the heart of her cousin Charley.