"I write," he said.

“Oh! I am glad to hear it!" exclaimed Mabel, "you are clever!-you are a real author-you write books that people actually pay for? How delightful!"

"Yes, I write books and am actually paid," said Brian.

"Novels―poems-histories—what kind

of books?"

"Books and pamplets that would weary you to death to wade through," he said, half sadly, half dryly, "pages of heavy matter and ponderous detail, on which the bright eyes of women seldom rest."

"Scientific ?"

"Dry essays on our mother earth chiefly -with fragments here and there of county history by way of a change of work, when hard study of dead worlds becomes too much for me. I have been fortunate in earning money, if no fame, by these pursuits," he added modestly, "and I love the labour of the pen with all my soul."

He spoke with enthusiasm, and Mabel had never seen that thin, wan face with so much light upon it.

"And you have studied this for me," she said, "for the poor reward, the miserable satisfaction, of lending me the savings of your life."

"There is no higher reward I want," he replied, "you have been upon my conscience -I am happier than I have ever been, tonight."

And poorer, too."

"I can earn money easily now," he said somewhat proudly," I am known in London -the early struggles of one who writes for bread are past for ever. I think it is not wholly unlikely that I may even die a tolerably rich man."

"Not if you fling your money about in this reckless fashion," said Mabel archly, "and trust such a stranger as I am."

"Stranger," he repeated mournfully, "Oh! don't say that."

"No-but I will say this, I cannot accept all your money."

"Hush, hush! you must not break faith with me, and render me unhappy to-night," he said; "this is a night for ever to be remembered gratefully."

"I don't see why."

your savings? What do I want with it? Why should I let you run into debt for me?"

"My creditor will not harass me for his money back-and I shall earn it before the year dies out. Please, let me be, Miss Westbrook. You never cared to talk too long about money--it is, at the best, one of the most miserable topics under the sun, God knows."

"And yet what a deal we have had to say about it."

"Ay," asserted Brian, "we have never met without some sharp words on the question. But you always began it, if you remember."

"No I don't remember that," said Mabel. "Let us talk of something else before I say good night. May I ?"

"What do you wish to talk about ?" asked Mabel.

"Yourself."

"I am afraid we have been talking of that all the evening;" she said.

"But you have promised to answer all my questions-and it is my turn to be exceedingly curious," he urged.

Mabel regarded him with trepidation. "You will ask nothing of me that I cannot answer fairly?" she said.

"There was to be no reserve," was his reply, "there are to be from this day no secrets between us."

"N-no," she answered, hesitatingly.

"Very well," said Brian, in almost a business tone again, though it was an affectation of business that Mabel would have more quickly perceived had she not been nervous as to what was coming next; "and now the name of the bank in which all the money has been lost?"

Mabel told him, and he booked the title in a little note-book which he took from his breast pocket.

"Thank you," he said, "and now the name of THE MAN."

Mabel was for a moment or two speechless with astonishment, then she ejaculated

"The man! What man?"

"He who has stood between you and Angelo Salmon-whom you love, and are going back to?"

Mabel coloured at the peremptory tone which he had so suddenly assumed, and replied

"You have no right to ask me such a question as that."

"You have acted rashly," he continued in mild reproof, "no one should have so seriously embarrassed herself, and complicated matters so inextricably as you have done. And," he added, "if it had not been for a prior engagement, a gentle, unselfish woman would have naturally responded to that attachment which Gregory Salmon's son evinced."

"I don't know that," said Mabel shaking her head.

"I have answered your question-now reply to mine. See, I am waiting to enter the happy man's name in my note-book," said Brian with a rare exhibition of facetiousness, as he held his book up for inspection.

It was a compliment paid to Mabel at the expense of her sex, and she knew not how to reply. She was glad that he thought highly of her, and yet was angry and sorry that he had had but a poor opinion of women all his life. She had pledged herself to speak, she wondered a little why he was anxious to know, but she was half-disposed to be of fended with him again for thinking that under any circumstances he was justified in making the inquiry. Surely it was not his business-and the loan of a thousand pounds to her did not warrant him in assuming the airs of a dictator.

"What makes you think there is a gentleman anywhere, for whom I care one halfpenny?" she asked.

"I am sure there is," he answered very positively.

Why are you sure?" she inquired also, "it is only a little while ago you professed your inability to understand women, and now you pretend to read all that is in my heart." "I do not understand women, Miss Westbrook-but I know they are very positive, very obstinate, very eccentric when a lover is at their feet, who is all the world to them." "You did not discover that truth in the study of mother earth," said Mabel.

"No. In the study of mother nature." "Have I been very positive, obstinate, and eccentric ? "

"Decidedly."

Mabel considered this reply. "Probably, I have," she said at length.

gagement between him and me at present. But there is a gentleman-oh! a long, long way from here, far away in the backwoods of my native land-whom I could learn to love, and who I think might learn to love me in return."

"He must love you very deeply."

"Ah! I am not certain of that," answered Mabel, "and I only say I may learn to love him in good time."

"This is a three-cornered kind of confession," said Brian thoughtfully, "but I comprehend you. Very clearly too," he added, slowly dropping his note-book into his breast-pocket.

"You will say nothing of this to Dorcas," suggested Mabel.

"I shall not see Dorcas. Besides-I have no confidence in her."

"You must not judge her too hastily yet."

And we are speaking to ourselves—not to the world," added Brian. "It is for this reason that I wish you all the happiness in lifeand I see only a little distance from you that happiness approaching. For he must love you-this man."

"Why?" asked Mabel, softly.

"You are different from other womensince you have been away from America, he must have missed you so much," replied Brian.

"Why did he not come after me, and keep me from the terrible temptation of the Salmon ?"

Brian stared hard at this sudden exhibition of levity.

"We have had a few words."

"Is he rich ?"

"It is as well you should know," replied Brian; "and you have done me a kind service in telling me of the lover in America,

"What is he?"

"In the dry-goods store line," was the prompt reply.

"That is an extraordinary business for the backwoods," remarked Brian.

"I did not say his business was in the backwoods, but that he was there at the present time. Don't criticise me-don't talk of this any more, please Mr. Halfday-I have told you more than I cared to tell already, but you have dragged this secret from me, for no earthly good. Spare me now— -I have been tried to-day severely."

"Yes-yes," said Brian in response to an appeal which had been uttered with great rapidity, and considerable excitement, "I am an intermeddler, and have worried you with questions I had no business to ask. You are quite right; I am an inquisitive man, and want to know too much. Forgive me, Miss Westbrook-I will not trouble you again in this way."

"Thank you," murmured Mabel.

"And as there are no secrets between us," he continued, "as from this day's date we stand on new ground together, with confidence in each other; I am going to tell you one more truth. It will put you on your guard against me-it will warn you of the power you may exercise for good or evil; it will show you, even, how a hard man like me can soften to a fool under the spell of a fair woman's influence."

He was standing before her, with his face full of trouble, but she had not the courage to look up at him, or arrest his words. He was so terribly in earnest that she was afraid to speak.

"When I came here this evening, it was, for the first time, with a faint hope that I might win upon your heart some day," he said; "and you might give me hope to win it, if I were strong and patient. You became suddenly my dream, and my ambition-but God knows the dream is over, and the ambition is at an end. That is why I tell you." "This is not sparing me, Mr. Halfday,"

for the collapse of an air-bubble in the sun. I was not selfish at least; I felt you were beyond me when Angelo Salmon told me how he loved you, and I have only seemed a little nearer since your rejection of his suit. I have thought of approaching you by slow degrees, and of being loved by slow degrees in turn. There was no securing you by a coup de theatre, and now that there is no securing you at all, I shall be a practical, matter-of-fact man for ever afterwards. But for ever your friend, Mabel Westbrook, who talks in this romantic strain for the first and last time in his life, and who makes a clean breast of his folly before he says goodnight."

He held out both his hands, and she saw the movement and put hers within them, and without looking up at him. Again the strong firm clasp of his hands startled her, and yet assured her of his earnestness, and strength of will, and faith in her.

"You are not offended?" he asked in a low tone.

"No," she replied in as low a tone as himself.

"If I have spoken out too plainly, forgive me, and think no more of it," he continued, "for I could not keep the truth back, after all that you had told me. And it is the solemn truth!-I shall not grieve, and you need not be afraid of my obtrusiveness. I am very strong, thank Heaven, and I say again that from to-night, I am simply your true friend, whom you are to trust as long as you live! There-God bless you, girl—and good-night again."

He kissed her hands, like a gentleman of the old school rather than a geologist of the new, and Mabel did not shrink from his reverent caress. When he was gone, she cast herself upon the couch, and shed many strange tears, and did not feel, despite her grief, that she was particularly unhappyalthough she had not told all the truth to Brian Halfday, and was to deceive him afresh to-morrow, when he might learn to despise her even for her want of trust in him.

R

CHAPTER XIX.

AFTER THOUGHTS.

OMANCE does not live long in the heart of a practical man. It is a temporary and uncomfortable aliment which he is bound in justice to his character to set aside, more especially when there is nothing for the ideal to subsist upon. This was Brian Halfday's theory, and he believed in it, and in his power to go back at any time to his old life-as if to retrace one's steps were ever possible to the sons of men. He went home to his stuffy top room in the Penton Museum, a grave and determined being; he had made up his mind to begin again to-morrow as if nothing had happened to lure his thoughts from those studies by which he had earned money, and which seemed, even to him, to point towards a name by which the world might know him presently. He had been wrong to swerve from the groove in which his life had been running easily till Mabel Westbrook's advent; he was sorry to confess it, but he had been for the first time in his life a fool.

He confessed it again when he was at home and had lighted his lamp and set his papers in order for an immediate dash at work. But the work was beyond him, and he contented himself with staring at it and the opposite wall by turns, finding that the woman he loved was too strong for the fossils and earths he loved too.

Too strong for that night at least, but these were early times to shake off the sense of disappointment which he felt despite his philosophy. To-morrow Brian Halfday would be himself again. Nothing had happened which he had not expected, surely. It was unlikely that this good-looking American girl should think of loving a man who had aged so much before his time as he had, not one attribute that might stand as a fair passport to that lady's society which he had studiously shunned until a goddess had surprised him in his den here. It was as well that it was quickly over, and Mabel Westbrook had owned to a lover already. It settled the whole affair completely, and rendered the path ahead of him smooth, and free from pitfalls, and-only a little dull! That last feeling he should get over-all men were dull at times-and his studies would

give him tone and strength of character. It pained and irritated him upon mature consideration to think that he had acted as foolishly as Angelo Salmon, and with about the same result. He had had rather more than a dim consciousness of being a clever and shrewd fellow until that particular night, and now he could see where he had blundered. The more he stared at the opposite wall, and at the geological maps which were hanging there, the more he became convinced that he had been betrayed by impulse and vanity, and-heaven have mercy upon him-by sentiment! His fingers tugged at his long hair in dismay at this-what would Mabel Westbrook think of him when she reconsidered all the nonsense which he had talked during the latter portion of their interview? If he could live that evening over again! If he had not told her of his love she would have respected him more, and he should have been a prouder man. What had been the use of so maudlin an avowal, save to render her distrustful of him? Why could he not have buried, deep down in his heart, that knowledge which had not even benefited himself? And to tell her that he loved her, a few moments after giving her, or lending her, all the money which he possessed too, as if he had kept back his passion until he had the opportunity of offering her a bribe.

"No-no-she will not think that!" he cried aloud, for it was a thought too galling for him, in these salutary moments of selfdepreciation, "she is warm-hearted, generous, and will do me justice."

He took a long walk round his room after this, and it was a wise dispensation that there was no human being taking rest in the apartment beneath, he tramped on so persistently, and stamped his feet at times so heavily. Suddenly he made a dash at his work again.

"I am sulking like a child at the inevit able," he said, "and I will not have it!"

There was the courage to write a few lines, the manliness to persevere; but his heart was too strong for his brains, and presently his pen dropped, and the blurred manuscript was pushed unconsciously aside. After all, it was pleasant to think of hereven at that hour, and with the bronze clock registering two-to remember all that she had said, to dwell upon the expression of her faith in him, the frank confession of her

trust, the acceptance from him of that pecuniary help which she would not have taken at Angelo Salmon's hands, or from anyone but him. Theirs had been a long meeting, full of discussion and explanation, and winding up by love matters that might have been more fittingly postponed, and yet were mercifully terminated for all time; but there was nothing really to regret in the interview, except his own' stupidity. She had been as gentle as a true woman should be, and heaven bless her for it. He hoped the man she loved would make her a good husband -he thought he would, for Mabel was one to cherish very tenderly, and observant enough not to make a bad choice for herself.

To-morrow, or the next day, he should face her as a friend, or a brother, and be very business-like with his friendship and advice, and fight her battles in his oldfashioned forcible way. All this as long as she lived-or as long as he lived to be a duty and a comfort to him. She had placed confidence in him-she had made less difficulty about accepting his service than he had imagined that she would-and despite the greed of his relations the world seemed brightening for her.

But on the morrow the shadows came up thick and fast again, and there was no more brightness in his little world.

It was noon, and he was busy in his office downstairs, and two little boys, representing the visitors of Penton, were playing hideand-seek behind the big glass cases, when a letter came by post to him. It had been dropped in the letter-box at Penton High Street, only a stone's throw from his door, by the bearer, who had not the courage or the inclination to face him again, he thought. Brian had not seen the writing of Mabel Westbrook, but he knew it; it was not his sister's scrawl, and no other woman had ever written a line to him. He opened the letter with impatient hands, and two banknotes fell out, and fluttered to the floor.

would not trust him after all. She knew and saw the great gratification that it would have been to him to help her, and yet her pride had dashed him down like that. This was her return-almost her revenge, he thought-for his refusing the sacrifice of his money to his grandfather; but in what an arrogant spirit, and with how miserable a reason! He had thought her very different from this!

He did not quickly refer to her own explanation of this step. He seemed content to sit there with the notes and the unread letter in his hands, and guess at her resolves and motives. Having worked out the theory to his satisfaction, he took the number of her notes, which he locked within his desk, and then opened the letter, saying, between his set teeth,

"She shall have the money! I will help her, in spite of herself and her miserable pride."

The first words took away all sense of anger from his heart, however, although there were only three to thrill him with a new and sudden sense of joy. He read them aloud in his exultation and excitement, and his red-haired clerk entering at the minute, stopped at the door with his mouth open.

"My dear Brian!" quoted the curator; "yes," he added, "that is what it is-my dear Brian !"

"What did you say, sir?" exclaimed the young subordinate. "Get out !" "Yes, sir, but

"Oh, yes I hear," said the clerk who was uncivilly disposed, and quick to retaliate. Brian looked fiercely at him, and the youth vanished at his glance. After his clerk's departure Brian went on with the perusal of the epistle which Mabel had sent to him, and which we will read with him.

It had no address or date, which for a lady's letter was not particularly remarkable it was wild and rambling, which was not remarkable either, and it ran thus

;

Don't be very,