But Myra did not forget that glimpse of him, and would always be saying to Kitty such things as these

"I don't believe there is another woman in the whole world, Kitty, who would have spent her youth with such a man, and him love her, and leave him and be happy."

Or,—

"Of course I know you are fond of me; as fond, I believe, as of any one in the world just now; but my turn will come to be forsaken like poor Mr Perugino."

Or, worse still,

"I love you, Kitty, but I must say I think you have been heartless to that poor Perugino. Dr Norman I have no sympathy with; he is hard and dry, and, to my thinking, ugly; but I do wish we could contrive to make Mr Neeve happy. Would you like me to order a picture of him?"

But Kitty negatived the idea of the picture coldly, not seeing what good could result from bringing Myra and Perry together.

When not more than a week remained of their stay in Paris --the fact of their going was not to be told in Gath, nor proclaimed in Ascalon-she sent off the following promiscuous note addressed to Perry,

"DEAR PERRY, DEAR POLLY, AND ALL YOU DEAR THINGS,I have been so hindered in coming to you, so terribly hindered, that I thought I should never get a holiday at all; but I have an evening to myself at last-oh joy!-and, of course must spend it with you all. May I come to-morrow, at eight o'clock?

"Ever your runaway, repentant, affectionate (and, I know, forgiven !)

"KITTY.

Then she wrote to her "good, kind friend," Dr Norman, saying how glad she was to hear that they were all well; how sorry she was not to be able to show them any hospitality, and begging permission to join their early dinner next day.

Of course both answers were Come; and the matter being

settled, Kitty felt more easy in her mind than she had done for weeks past. Having determined that the sacrifice was to take place, she should deck herself, a second Polyxena, very meekly with flowers, and yield herself up to the powers she had offended.

She provided a few propitiatory offerings-wonderful toys for Prissy, trinkets for the other ladies, a book for Dr Norman, and an original pen-and-ink sketch, by a well-known artist, for Perry, that she knew he would prize. She scribbled on the back of it, "For Perry, with Kitty's love;" and she wrote on the fly-leaf of Dr Norman's book, "Dr Norman, with the affectionate and grateful regards of K. S."-thinking thus to put her two gifts on a proper footing.

Then she prepared herself.

She longed-oh! how she longed-to wear her jewels, but good feeling, good sense, expediency prevailed, and she put on an innocent-looking grey silk frock, and tied up her hair with a black ribbon, wishing she possessed moral courage enough to make herself hideous by some means or other.

If she had followed out her first impulse, she would have gone in a stately gown of ruby velvet, that made her look and feel quite queenly. It was a work of art in itself, and she knew how Perry would go into artistic raptures over it, and how Dr Norman would smile with simple pleasure at seeing her look so beautiful. If there were two things under heaven for which Kitty would have sold her soul to Mephistopheles, these were velvet dresses and jewels; and it did seem hard that the friends she loved best in the world should never see her "arrayed in all her glory."

Why could they not love her in moderation, and be contented to have her among them now and then? Oh, weary, woeful waste of human love! she said to herself, and sighed -how easy life would be without it! Poor Kitty was a pagan as yet, unlearned in any kind of moral scripture, and she could not see what right human passion had to disturb the even balance of things.

When the temptations of ruby velvet, and pearl necklets,

and gold ear-rings were put aside, she grew more cheerful, and made her adieux to Myra with a smile.

"Now, do be firm for once in your life, and give everybody to understand that this is "Miss Silver's last-positively last -appearance on the stage,'" Myra said. "It is so unreasonable and undignified to be dilatory in love affairs. If you really care-and I believe you do-for Mr Perugino, by all means marry him. I would never cast you off for being true to him; and I would help you both, and give him orders for pictures." Myra sat in an easy chair, the very impersonation of pretty, petted, inconsequent, traditional womanhood,-womanhood asking no new privileges at the hand of progressive society.

Kitty looked down upon her from the height of her cold, brilliant, calculating intellect.

"You soft-hearted baby!" she said, toying with her hair; "what would the world be like if all women were Myras?" "Like what it ought to be. Everybody should love somebody, and those who were rich should give half they had to those who were poor."

"As you do," Kitty said, with a pretty show of humility. "What a selfish wretch I am! How can I be something lower in the scale of creation than a barnacle, and not die of shame!"

"A-what?"

"An ignoble animal that fastens itself upon some other animal, and there sticks and grows fat!" Kitty cried, with fine disdain, adding, as she dropped at Myra's feet, "Spurn me from you as I deserve, and I should feel happier."

"How beautifully you act!" Myra said; "you know you care for me, and I suppose the barnacles have no particular affection for the creatures they stick to!"

"What a child you are!" cried Kitty, in an abandonment of rapture; adding, gravely, "but you will never understand me-never!"

"Oh! I never shall; and I suppose nobody ever did, for that matter," Myra said. "You are more of a riddle to me than ever, to-day."

"Because you have all along declared to me that Dr Norman and Mr Perugino are nothing to you, and yet I know that you will come home from these visits without having made them a bit wiser than they were."

66

They won't take the truth from me, the intractable creatures," Kitty said, naïvely.

"Of course you must do as you like, but, you know, one cannot go on for ever shilly-shallying, either in small matters or great. Now go, you insinuating monkey, and get rid of all your lovers, and be home early. I shall be horribly dull." Kitty went away leaving Myra in a reverie.

Myra worshipped her idol none the less for discovering that it had a clay foot. People took her for a very simple, unreflective little thing, but she had a subtle insight into character; and all the time that Kitty's will moulded her as clay is moulded in the hands of the potter, she was admiring the potter's ingenuity, and wondering what the next form would be.

When two women enter into a co-partnership of friendship -one furnishing brains, the other wealth, as their joint stockin-trade-it is highly desirable that the sleeping partner should not look into the other's books.

Myra was the sleeping partner in this Friendship Unlimited Liability Company-of course we speak figuratively-and would unwisely glance over accounts sometimes. She did not always feel that she had made a safe investment. She mistrusted Kitty a little now and then.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE FIRST FATTED CALF IS KILLED.

It was a very pale Polyxena who was led to the sacrificial altar. Kitty had set herself a harder task than she thought, and when the carriage stopped at the door of Dr Norman's

hotel, her heart was beating uneasily. All at once the old time at Shelley House came back to her; and what had happened since to make it so painful to recall? Nothing, of which she was not alone guilty; and she trembled at her own boldness in coming. Why, in Heaven's name, had she come? would it not have been better to appear cold and cruel at first than bring all this on us all? she thought; but it was too late to draw back now.

The hotel was one of those quiet old-fashioned places that English travellers rarely patronise; the suites of apartments were silent, sombre, and furnished after an aristocratic but somewhat shabby fashion; the waiters were unpolished, provincial-looking youths, who wore long brown-holland aprons with bibs; and the proprietress shelled all the green pease herself as she sat in her little office and carried on the business of the house.

At the merest finger-tap on the door, out flew Laura, all tears and kisses.

"Here she is, papa!" she cried; "she is really, really here!" Then she dragged Kitty into an inner room, where Dr Norman sat reading the newspaper, with Prissy at his feet. The child had made a work-table of his knees, and stopped him from rising abruptly with a petulant

"Papa, I must take off my doll's work first," and she would have removed every shred and reel by turns if he had let her.

But he brushed the gay bundle into her lap, and came forward holding out both hands to Kitty with a shy, eager, searching look.

Kitty hardly knew how to meet that gaze, but she made a great effort at self-control, and shook hands with him, looking They said a mere "How d'ye do?" then Prissy came up with her doll in her arm.

up.

"Kiss me and kiss my doll," she said, very peremptorily, adding, "we have got such a grand dinner for you. I heard papa order it."

"But I didn't want a grand dinner, my child," Kitty interposed.