Part 53 (1/2)

Janet raised and let fall her eyebrows The fiction, that sobeen said, an inorance of them, was one she subscribed to merely to humour the squire I was half in doubt whether I disliked or admired her want of decent hypocrisy She allowed him to suppose that she did not hear, but spoke as a party to the conversation My aunt Dorothy bla both, contented herself with impartial comments

'I always think in these cases that the women must be the fools,' she said Her affectation was to assus in it We rode over to Julia's cottage, on the outskirts of the estate now devolved upon her husband Irish eyes are certainly bewitching lights I thought, forhis country in foreign parts, while such as these were shi+ning without a captain at hoht 'What can a wife think the uard his house-door?' she answered'This,' said I, 'comes of made-up matches,' whereat she was silent

Julia took her own view of her position She asked rass , and was in reality a salt-water one, to keep fresh, with a lapdog, a cook, and a ate twenty ti to look for but this disappointing creature day after day! At first she was shy, stole out a coy line of fingers to be shaken, and lisped; and out of that ret that she supposed she must not kiss o?'

said I 'Then if nobody's present I 'll be talked of,' said she,queerly The tendency of her hair to creep loose of its bands gave her handsome face an aspect deliriously wild I co so fresh, in spite of her salt-water hood She turned the tables on n princess

'Oh! but that'll blow over,' she said; 'anything blows over as long as you don't go up to the altar'; and she eyed her ringed finger, woebegone, and flashed the pleasantest of smiles with the name of her William Heriot, whom she always called Walter Heriot, was, she inforreat house, built on a plot of ground that the Lancashi+re ht up, while the squire and the other landowners of the neighbourhood were sleeping 'And if you get Walter Heriot to come to you, Harry Richmond, it'll be better for him, I'm sure,' she added, and naively:

'I 'd like to e' Te in London for the Bar--good news toabout your princess, Harry,' Janet observed on the ride home

'Do you take her for a real person, Janet?'

'One thinks of her as a snow-'

'Very well; so let her be'

'Is she kind and good?'

'Yes'

'Does she ride well?'

'She rides remarkably well'

'She 's fair, I suppose?'

'Janet, if I saw you reat wish of my heart'

'Harry, you're a bit too cruel, as Julia would say'

'Have you noticed she gets more and more Irish?'

'Perhaps she finds it is liked Some women can adapt themselves they 're the happiest All I meant to ask you is, whether your princess is like the rest of us?'

'Not at all,' said I, unconscious of hurting

'Never ood woirl can see that; only she can't bear loneliness, and doesn't understand yet what it is to be loved by a true gentleman Persons of that class can't learn it all at once'