door, she came forward tremblingly as a man's deep voice mentioned her own name, and Brian Halfday stepped into the house. "Oh! she is not coming back then!" cried Mabel at once.

"No, Miss Westbrook, she is not coming back," answered Brian.

past transactions," Brian dryly continued.. "He was the first to hear of a will being in existence. He came to me with the news, but I received him churlishly, he tells his friends; he quarrelled with Peter Scone about it, and, for his daughter's sake, he went straight to his solicitor, Mr. Eversham,

Mabel returned to the room, and Brian Halfday followed her and closed the door behind him, skilfully cutting off the entrance of the landlady, who was also interested in the case, and wanted her information on the spot.

Mabel sank into the chair she had recently quitted, and pressed one fair hand across her eyes, whilst Brian took off his hat, and rather impetuously pitched it in the corner. The hat was a bad one, and deserved shabby treatment, possibly at all events its owner had no respect for it. Brian had come into the room looking hard and grim enough, but the first expression of Mabel's regret and disappointment softened his features wondrously.

"Bad news," he said, echoing Mabel's last words; "is it bad news that tells you Dorcas has left for good?

inquiry, and to cease all efforts to obtain letters of administration for himself, until the mystery was cleared up. You see, Miss Westbrook, there is a considerable amount of unselfishness in our family, after all."

An expression of pain passed over Mabel's face.

"I am tired of your satire," she murmured, "speak to me plainly and in sober earnest, Mr. Halfday."

He accepted the reproof with strange humility, and attempted no defence.

"Dorcas has gone away with her father. Michael Sewell thought it the more natural proceeding, and she was anxious to oblige her husband," he continued; "in a few weeks the discharge of that gentleman from military service will be obtained, and he will have time to consider how to act with regard to yourself. Meanwhile, Miss Westbrook, he removes her from the sphere of your influence as the wiser policy."

"Is this satire too?" asked Mabel. "No, it is the plain truth, which I am deeply sorry to convey to you," he answered.

"Because

"Because it adds to the shadows by which we are surrounded-because," he added more passionately, "the name of Halfday will, every hour of your life, grow more hateful to you."

"No," said Mabel, "it will not."

"It should; we have embittered your life we have robbed you-we have left you defenceless."

"Oh!-I can defend myself, I hope; and for what has happened neither you nor your sister is to blame."

"You are poor,"

"Yes."

"You are very poor-you know you are," he said with his voice raised to a higher pitch, 66 you are keeping back from me the exact position in which you stand."

"Surely you do not consider yourself my father confessor," said Mabel, half saucily,. half angrily.

Mabel coloured, and looked away from him.

"I told you this in the churchyard of Datchet Bridge, and I have sworn it with every day that has passed since. You are. a deeply injured woman, Heaven knows, and hate me as you may, as you must, I am pledged to live for you and for your future interests. Therefore "-he added in a less impetuous tone, and, indeed, assuming so suddenly a precise and business air, that Mabel's keen sense of humour brought a smile to her lips-"I shall feel obliged by your informing me how much money you have left in the world?"

TH

CHAPTER XVI.

BRIAN IS WEAK.

HE smile which flickered for a moment on the lips of Mabel Westbrook was displeasing to Brian Halfday. He was a man who looked at life too seriously, it was evident.

"This is a grave question, which I wish you to consider gravely," he said in half reproof.

"It is a question which I hardly think I am called upon to answer," answered Mabel more thoughtfully.

"Oh! yes, you are," was his flat contradiction.

"Go on, Mr. Halfday. I shall be pleased if you will explain."

"All the embarrassments of your present position" he began, when she cut him short by saying rapidly

"I have never confessed to any embar

rassments.

treated you with a scant amount of courtesy."

Mabel did not respond to this half apology; she did not know what to say on the spur of the moment, and after waiting as if for her answer, he continued

"Still, on this occasion, Miss Westbrook, be good enough to understand that I represent the family of the Halfdays collectively. That I am speaking of them as well as myself."

"Are you instructed in their name to come to me?"

He went on in his usual aggravating way, she thought, and without attending to her inquiries.

"It is no secret that you are ruined by paying over to us money to which we were never entitled,” he said, “and it is our turn to be of assistance to you in any way we think best. It would be a false modesty, another serious mistake, if you are not frank with us."

"With you, you mean?" said Mabel quietly.

"Say with me, if you wish," he replied. "I have already told you I represent the family that has done you all this harm."

"Well, go on," said Mabel. "Probably the sooner we comprehend the position the better."

"Then, to be brief and plain with you, how much money have you left in the world?" he asked.

"It is an odd question to ask a lady," answered Mabel with the smile once more difficult to repress, "but I will tell you, as you claim a right to know."

She rose, walked to her desk, took out her bank-book, which she opened, glanced at, closed, and put back, and then returned to her seat and faced Mr. Brian Halfday's eager stare at her without flinching.

"All the embarrassments of your present position, Miss Westbrook, are due to a rash interference with the business of people worthy of your interest," he continued, paying no heed to her interruption, "people whom you came a long journey to ally your self with and whom there is no shaking from you again.

"What has this to do with your first inquiry?" asked Mabel.

"Your mission was a failure; the family, taken as a whole, was ungrateful for your : sympathy and greedy for your money, and

Brian Halfday's face became paler at this announcement, and his black eyes seemed starting from his head.

"No more than that," he murmured. "It will pay my debts and take me to America, where I shall not want friends." "You have not any great or dear friends there," said Brian.

"How do you know?" said Mabel, a little angrily.

"You have talked more than once of settling in England," answered Brian, "and you have spoken of leaving America for good without regret."

"I thought I was an heiress," said Mabel, "and should make many friends here in good time."

"Friends are easily bought, you think?" "Friends are not easily made by a woman standing alone in the world," was the reply, "and in America, I am at least sure of true sympathy, and of homes and helping hands being offered me by the old friends of James Westbrook. The world over there is not so full of uncertainty as this."

"There must be some dear friend in the background, after all, and you have not told me of him," muttered Brian.

"Perhaps there is-perhaps there is not," said Mabel enigmatically, "I am not bound to tell you everything."

"And that explains much of course," he added half absently.

"What does it explain ?" was Mabel's sharp inquiry.

"Your indifference to--but, no, I will not worry you with that subject again." "What subject?

"It distresses you. You can guess it." "My indifference to your advice to marry young Mr. Salmon, you mean," said Mabel confidently, "yes, I did not care to hear of that from you or him. And it distressed me-yes."

"It seemed for the best," said Brian, thoughtfully regarding her, "he was fond of you, and an amiable gentleman.”

"Are you going to advise me to accept him again?" asked Mabel, her face flushing with a new excitement, "have you seen him again? do you come here this time as his intercessor. If so—I shall hate him-there!" "No, I am not here to speak for him-I have not seen him since that night he came to you I hear they are anxious about him at the Hospital."

"Indeed. Has he not been home?" "Neither at home, nor at his chambers in town-but we are forgetting the business of the evening."

"Has he not written to his father or mother?” she asked, still curious.

"Not a word, I believe-but you are really interested in his absence, your face betrays anxiety and alarm," said Brian.

ing countenance," answered Mabel very satirically now, "but I am concerned for a missing friend, naturally."

"You own to his being a friend, then ?" "Yes-and the friend I can trust." Brian's face darkened at this. She had not intended to convey the impression that her visitor was not to be trusted, but he took it to heart as though his presence had suggested the comparison between Angelo Salmon and himself.

"I will endeavour to discover him if you wish it," he said in a deeper tone of voice." "He is away by his own choice-why should I wish it?"

"It is not for me to say," said Brian, carelessly.

"I advised him to take a holiday, I remember."

"He is quick to respond," replied Brian, "well, it is satisfactory to find you can give advice to Mr. Salmon as well as myself. Still, if he follows everybody's advice in this fashion, he will assuredly come to grief."

"Shall we proceed to business, Mr. Halfday?" was the quiet inquiry here.

"If you please," he replied.

For the first time during the interview he drew a chair towards him and sat down. His manner had changed; it was harder and colder, if marked by more deference towards his listener, and there was a set expression on his features difficult to comprehend.

"I have already said, Miss Westbrook, that I represent on this occasion the family that has been benefited by your egregious error," he began with great formality, "and it is purposed to place at your disposal, and to meet those demands which have necessarily arisen on account of recent losses, the sum of one thousand pounds, being the first instalment of the debt due from the Halfdays to yourself."

"I cannot accept it," said Mabel, “I——" "It is so small a sum in comparison with the amount to which you are entitledwhich you flung away with so little consideration for yourself, or for justice--that you are bound in honour, Miss Westbrook, to accept it," said Brian, with less formality in his address to her.

"No, no, no," said Mabel, shaking her head energetically, "I am not bound in honour to take one farthing of this money

"The example was set us in the case of Adam Halfday-and by yourself."

"But I can restore this money-I will write a cheque to-morrow for the amount and send it to you," said Mabel.

"I will pay it to your account, again, I swear."

"Then your father or Mr. Sewell must take the money, as representatives of the family to which you have alluded so constantly to-night," said Mabel, with great gravity of demeanour now, but watching Brian Halfday very closely.

His colour changed again, and he rose from his chair in evident alarm at this last proclamation.

"Good God! you would never send the money to them?

"Why should I not?"

"They are rich already by your rashness. And-and this is really yours. It is only one-twentieth part of your own money back. You would never give it to them of all people in the world."

"Mr. Halfday," said Mabel, "" will you let me trust you?—will you teach me from this night to believe in you implicitly ?"

It was a strange question, and uttered with great earnestness. Brian could not face the steady light shining at him from the depths of Mabel's full grey eyes. For the first time he felt cowed and disarmed, and at another's mercy.

"I hope you will believe in me in time," he murmured, looking away from her. "I want to believe in you now." "Well?"

"I want you to tell me all the truth-to disguise nothing. Will you?"

He could not resist her pleading, he had never felt the strong stern man in her presence as he had done in other men and women's. She exercised a mastery over him beyond his powers of analysis; from the dry depths of his inner consciousness there

AVING confessed the truth, Brian Halfday looked unflinchingly at Mabel Westbrook again. He was there to argue, to reason, to defend himself, to do anything but take back the money which he had placed at her disposal.

"Why have you done this?" she asked in a low voice; "I have never helped you in any way. I have been always opposed

to you.

You and I have been almost ene

mies at times."

me to the ground completely-if you ask me to take that money back," he cried, "there will be no trust-no confidence, if you will not let me help you.

"What do I want with a thousand pounds ?"

"A woman without money is at the mercy of the world. A man can work for more.' "You have promised me, Brian Halfday, to tell me everything I wish ?" Mabel reminded him.

"Did I say everything?"
"Yes."

"Is there anything more to ask of me?" "Certainly there is."

"Then it was a rash promise," he said restlessly; "I should have been upon my guard."

"No, no-don't conceal anything from me," said Mabel imploringly; "let me, for once in your life, know you as you are. You have been a riddle to me-I have never seemed to understand you."

"I was vain enough to think your faith in me began at Datchet Bridge," said Brian softly.

"It began-yes. I lost the old belief in your being my enemy. I felt you might at any time become my friend-but you always remained a mystery I could not comprehend."

"And now?" he asked eagerly. "And now I trust you with my whole heart-for I think I read all that is in yours." "Ah! that is impossible," he muttered. "Therefore, Mr. Halfday, with no secrets between us ever again, tell me where you got this money?"

Brian Halfday hesitated for an instant, and then one of his rare laughs escaped him. The position was becoming brighter and lighter, and the shadows were stealing from the scene.

"You will not ask me to take this money back?"

"You will let me pay you when I am rich again-I mean very rich? When Dorcas, or Dorcas's husband, for instance, insists upon my receiving back a fair share of the capital now in her possession."

"Yes-then," he answered.

"I ask you for your confidence," she said reproachfully.

"You shall have it. I saved the moneymost of it, that is," he added with a reserve. "From your small income-impossible ! "How do you know what my income is ?" asked Brian, not a little surprised at her last remark.

"Mr. Gregory Salmon told me," replied Mabel.

"Ah! yes-he is a man who knows everything except how to write sermons; which reminds me that I borrowed a book of you at Datchet Bridge. A terrible book that-"

"Go on, please.'

"And I may ask a few questions of you in return-as forcibly and abruptly as I have asked questions of my sister before this," he said.

"I don't think I have a secret in the world now," replied Mabel, "but proceed. I am very curious."

"I had saved up eight hundred pounds at the end of last month," said Brian at last; "I am of a saving turn of mind-the miserly habits of my grandfather are inherent in me, my expenses are few, I live rent free, I eat little and drink less."

"But from your salary, it seems to be impossible that you should have saved eight hundred pounds," said Mabel thoughtfully. "I did not say I saved that sum from my salary."

Mabel looked hard at him again. "Another mystery?" she said.

"No-I am going to tell you what few people in Penton are aware of what I have kept to myself as much as possible, having no friends in the world who would have been interested by the communication."

"What can it possibly be ?" said Mabel

He laughed again at her anxiety. Yes, the shadows were surely falling into the background of his life. Here was a woman interested in him and his pursnits.