There was a shadow on the young man's face as he sped home to his scanty luncheon. He was too poor to take a house, so he rented three rooms in a sedate-looking villa in a side street. Doctors simply swarmed at Beachbourne, and sometimes Harold Inglis doubted the wisdom of trying to work up a connection there. The eldest son of an impoverished country squire, he had to depend upon his own exertions; and, after a brilliant college career, came to Beachbourne, hoping to work up a practice, as he was too poor to buy one. Could he have taken a fine house and kept a carriage, he might have succeeded; for he was a gentleman to the backbone, and had a pleasant face and manner. But he remained almost unknown, and, after a year of heart-breaking disappointments, found himself barely able to live. Before sitting down to the bread and cheese awaiting him in the bare little sitting-room, he thriftily changed his frock-coat for an old boating blazer. Dress was a terribly heavy item in his expenditure; the well-cut clothes, the glossy hat, and the snowy linen prescribed by medical etiquette being only procured at the cost of semi-starvation. To the hungry labourer or vagrant many people will give a meal; but, to my mind, the gentleman who has to go hungry that he may be well-dressed is far more deserving of pity. And many a professional man _has_ to go hungry in these sad days when "all the markets overflow." Meanwhile May and Doris Burnside were bound for Victoria Square, the most fashionable locality in Beachbourne. Mrs. Burnside resided with her aunt, Miss Waller, a sprightly spinster of fifty, who lived at the very top of her handsome income, and was a leader of local fashion. A smart footman opened the door, and the beautiful drawing-room they entered was a great contrast to Dr. Inglis's bare sitting-room. [Illustration: "I want a choc'late pig," wailed Doris.--_p. 395._] Miss Waller, a good-looking woman with white hair, and very richly dressed, turned round from a fine old Chippendale writing-table. "Oh! there you are." Then, as Doris began some childish babble about the chocolate pig, she added impatiently, "Ring for Mary to take that child upstairs. I wish you wouldn't bring her in here!" Miss Waller had no love for children; and Doris was too well trained to defy her great-aunt. Still hugging her precious sweets, she was whisked away; whilst the spinster, producing a gilt-edged account-book, methodically entered the sums paid by her niece that morning out of a twenty-pound note. Every halfpenny was accounted for, and when May closed her purse just one solitary sixpence remained in it which she could really call her own. Sometimes she had not even that. "I've ordered the carriage for three," announced Miss Waller. "We must call on Lady Lee, and the Amberys, and it's Mrs. Edgell's 'at home' day. Put on your grey dress and your new hat." "Yes, aunt," meekly responded May.