is not pious, but he isn't a Puseyite, and old uncle Wentworth was very sound--he was brought up under the pure Gospel. How is that the boys are so foolish, Dora?" said Miss Leonora, sharply; "it must be your doing. You have told them tales and things, and put true piety out of their head." "My doing!" said Miss Dora, faintly; but she was too much startled by the suddenness of the attack to make any coherent remonstrance. Miss Leonora tossed back her angry head, and pursued that inspiration, finding it a relief in her perplexity. "It must be _all_ your doing," she said. "How can I tell that you are not a Jesuit in disguise? one has read of such a thing. The boys were as good, nice, pious boys as one could wish to see; and there's Gerald on the point of perversion, and Frank--I tell you, Dora, it must be your fault." "That was always my opinion," said Miss Cecilia; and the accused, after a feeble attempt at speech, could find nothing better to do than to drop her veil once more and cry under it. It was very hard, but she was not quite unaccustomed to it. However, the discoveries of the day were important enough to prevent the immediate departure which Miss Leonora had intended. She wrote a note with her own hands to her nephew, asking him to dinner. "We meant to have gone away to-day, but should like to see you first," she said in her note. "Come and dine--we mayn't have anything pleasant to say, but I don't suppose you expect that. It's a pity we don't see eye to eye." Such was the intimation received by Mr Wentworth when he got home, very tired, in the afternoon. He had been asking himself whether, under the circumstances, it would not be proper of him to return some books of Mr Wodehouse's which he had in his possession, of course by way of breaking off his too familiar, too frequent intercourse. He had been representing to himself that he would make this call after their dinner would be over, at the hour when Mr Wodehouse reposed in his easy-chair, and the two sisters were generally to be found alone in the drawing-room. Perhaps he might have an opportunity of intimating the partial farewell he meant to take of them. When he got Miss Leonora's note, the Curate's countenance clouded over. He said, "Another night lost," with indignant candour. It was hard enough to give up his worldly prospects, but he thought he had made up his mind to that. However, refusal was impossible. It was still daylight when he went up Grange Lane to the Blue Boar. He was early, and went languidly along the well-known road. Nobody was about at that hour. In those closed, embowered houses, people were preparing for dinner, the great event of the day, and Mr Wentworth was aware of that. Perhaps he had expected to see somebody--Mr Wodehouse going home, most likely, in order that he might mention his own engagement, and account for his failure in the chance evening call which had become so much a part of his life. But no one appeared to bear his message.