regarded him, however, so calmly and sadly, with an expression so different to what he had last seen on her countenance -not making the slightest advance towards him, but sitting in grave contemplation of his movements-that his resolution gave way, and, coming towards her, he said, in a confused sort of way; that he hoped she had been quite well since they had last met. Looking down, she replied, in a low voice—

"I should never have spoken to you, Mr..Nugent, if you had not first spoken to me.'

"I beg your pardon if I have been rude-if I have in any way offended you."

"You may have been rude; but it not does not follow I should have thought it necessary to be offended,” answered Gertrude, a little proudly.

"I would suffer much-indeed I would-rather than give you the smallest cause of annoyance," continued Nugent. "I have felt severely the cessation of all intercourse between us. Some of the happiest hours of my life have been spent in your society. But why do I revert to them? They are past -they are gone by for ever! I have striven, Miss Usherwood-I have striven hard to forget you

"Thank you," interrupted Gertrude, with something like a smile. "That was friendly."

"I have striven to forget you," continued Nugent; "to devote myself to worldly realities; to walk in the light of common day; but the task is hard."

"Pray," exclaimed Gertrude, "what is the meaning of this excitement of this animosity towards me? What is all this mystery about? If you have taken a dislike to mamma and to all of us, say no more about it, but avoid us for the future. None of us will thwart you in your determination."

Gertrude quietly took up her but her hand slightly trembled. endeavouring to weigh his words.

pencil, and began to draw, Nugent stood before her, Then he said

"Miss Usherwood, believe me, there are few living creatures towards whom I bear animosity; towards you least of all. I have not intruded on you of late for many reasons. believe a secluded life safer and better for such as I am."

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I

Well, if that be so, far be it from me to argue the point. Perhaps, however, you will condescend to give me my glove, which I think I saw you fling away just now."

Nugent coloured and picked up the glove, without, however, returning it to Gertrude. He then said-

"Forgive me, but I cannot explain all that passed through my mind when I saw and touched this glove. I know that I am slow and awkward; a mere farmer, as your friend considersme and treats me

"Whom do you mean by my friend?'" asked Gertrude, with anger flashing from her eyes, and a heightened colour. Nugent, in a rather faltering voice, answered-" I mean Sir Eliot Prichard, who accompanies you in your rides, and who insulted me in your presence."

"How unkind! how unjust!" exclaimed Gertrude, rising suddenly, and speaking with rapidity. "It is very wrong, sir -it is very unseemly to call any one my friend. I am surprised you should treat me so

be

Nugent stood in some confusion. In a moment she would gone, and yet she looked so very lovely, even in her displeasure. So with precipitation he exclaimed-

"I heartily and sincerely beg your pardon! Indeed, I am very sorry. Do not leave me thus!"

Gertrude hesitated, and Nugent, taking courage, said"Let me keep this glove, merely as a token of forgiveness; will you, Miss Usherwood?"

His voice betrayed more feeling than he wished; but Gertrude, sitting down on the low rustic bench from which she had risen, said

"No! It would quite upset all your plans about forgetting me."

"Do not leave me without a kind word," pursued Nugent. "I know we must part; of course so: but do not let your last glance be scornful and indignant."

Why do you provoke me, then?" replied Gertrude. "What right have you to taunt me about any one I choose to ride with?"

"Forgive me! I have been insolent, presuming!" exclaimed Nugent, earnestly. "It was kind, most kind of you to suffer me to accompany you at all. It was not my place to interfere or dictate to you what friendships you should form. Say that you have forgiven me. I shall return to my solitary home with a less heavy heart if you will say that you forgive me, and that we part friends." Gertrude's head was turned away. After a pause, she said, half to herself, whilst she hastily collected her drawing materials—

"To think that I care for that disagreeable man! I cannot bear him! I wish I had never seen him!"

She rose abruptly. Nugent was disturbed by the conflicting thoughts that rushed through his mind. A haze seemed to spread over the landscape round him. He felt, however, that she was going from him, and that he should never, perhaps, have an opportunity of speaking to her again. In a voice 'indistinct from emotion, he almost involuntarily exclaimed-" Gertrude!" She turned her face suddenly, and he saw that it was bathed in tears. The next instant he was seated beside her, pressing her hand to his lips, and uttering, as the gravest men are apt to do under the circumstances, a great many extravagant things.

Miss

Meantime, the butler at Beaumont House was waiting to sound the gong for dinner; but Miss Usherwood was not forthcoming. Gradually the whole establishment was in commotion at her non-appearance. A party of light infantry, consisting of two footmen, all the gardeners, and a page who had once been shapely, but now presented a decidedly bloated aspect-aided by the cavalry of the garrison, consisting of the coachman and groom-scoured the vicinity of the mansion. Lady Maud walked up and down the lawn in front of the house in some uneasiness. Mr. Usherwood followed her example, keeping about ten paces distance, and diversifying the promenade by an occasional retreat to the entrance-hall, where he refreshed himself with sherry and water. Beverley gradually worked herself up to a pitch of desperation, and seizing a nightcap she had been furtively trimming, put it on her head in mistake for a bonnet; rushed out of the house by a back-door; and hurried along the high-road without the least idea where she was going, but under à full persuasion that she was materially assisting in the search for Gertrude. The screams of mingled admiration and amusement which her peculiar head-dress elicited from some schoolchildren in the road recalled her to herself, and she stopped, with professional promptitude, to rebuke their rudeness. Discovering the next instant the state of her toilette, she abandoned the field precipitately, and fled homewards indignant but abashed. As she reached the house, she found that the missing Gertrude was safe at home, having just returned through the shrubberies at the back of the house.

It was not particularly agreeable to Gertrude's feelings to find such an extraordinary bustle and excitement prevailing on her account. It seemed as though her recent interview with Nugent had been specially noted and witnessed by every

member of the household, and was somehow intimately connected with the disturbance. She blushed to the tips of her fingers as Lady Maud and her father alternately took her in their arms, and caressed and scolded her in one and the same breath.

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Naughty child!" cried Lady Maud. "How you have heated yourself! Kiss me, darling. I am quite angry with you."

"Poor thing-poor thing!" exclaimed Mr. Usherwood, pressing her to his side, and smoothing her long hair from her forehead. "How her heart beats! Why, you must have run all the way home! Have a glass of sherry, dear; there's

some in the hall."

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Sherry, my dear!" interposed Lady Maud. "How can you talk so? Lean on my arm, dear, and let us go in. Here, Paine," she added, as that domestic appeared at the hall-door with the never-failing diminutive smelling-bottle in her hand, "shut the windows in my room; there is too much air there."

"Shut the windows in Lady Maud's room!" re-echoed Mr. Usherwood, in an energetic voice. The two sisters now emerged from the schoolroom in a state of uproarious rapture. Miss Beverley, what with sympathy, fatigue, and excitement, sat down on a flower-stand, to the serious discomposure of a row of Jenny Lind geraniums, and energetically wiped her eyes with the head-dress before alluded to, crumpled up into a small muslin ball, from whence depended two long strings of white tape. Gertrude, who by this time was beginning to laugh and cry simultaneously, was hurried off by her mother, and, at her own earnest request, left alone.

CHAPTER VII.

NUGENT IN THE CONFESSIONAL.

NUGENT'S heart beat lightly as he strode homewards. Objects he had seen that very morning bore now a different aspect. That piece of grass was not half so brown as he had thought it to be. The "swedes" were coming up pretty well, after all. That ploughman yonder had really ploughed the furrows

not so very crooked. Nugent was sorry he had chided him so sharply about it. He would give him a bit of tobacco next time he passed him at work. The Manor House looked quite pretty. Many people would admire it, he thought. Then, the fine trees, and the rich landscape all round, with the far-off roar of the sea the other side of the hill; it was not so bad, after all! The library is dark; but how soothing in the glare of a summer's day! A great deal might be made of that house, he thought. The drawing-room, and some of the bedrooms, must be new furnished of course; and then the room with the mullioned window, looking into the lawn at the west end, would make quite a lady's boudoir. He was buoyed up with a strange, new feeling of joy. His eyes would now and then grow moist with tears, he scarce knew why. Thoughts more vivid and varied than usual traversed his mind. He sent Madocks home grinning from ear to ear at some humorous saying, and astonished Mrs. Finchley by a hearty shake of the hand on entering the house. Soon, however, graver considerations presented themselves. He was a conscientious man, and had not felt this unwonted access of good spirits very long, before he began asking himself"Have I any right to be so happy? Let me sce-let me reflect." He felt less satisfied as the first glow passed off, and the sober realities of the day's history were calmly unfolded before his mind.

It was true that Gertrude Usherwood had looked upon him kindly, gently, even tenderly. It was true her small hand trembled with emotion as he held it in his own under the shade of that old walnut-tree. It was true that those lustrous, dark-coloured eyes had for a moment looked up at his face with a kind of shy, tremulous, half-reproachful glance of affection. It was true that that musical voice had dropped lower and lower as it half confessed the sympathy and love which its very softness and hesitation had already revealed. This was true. Yet, who was Gertrude? A young girl, barely eighteen, brought up in luxury, accustomed to every species of refined enjoyment, reared in the expectation of largely sharing in the gaieties and distractions of fashionable life; little acquainted with any but those of her own sex; little acquainted with the real predilections and antipathies of her own heart. Even if her parents consented to their union-which Nugent in his modesty much doubted, and, had it not been for the civilities recently lavished upon him,