, as though meditating a
ceremonious morning call, while all the time his heart was under
the laburnums in the centre of the Square gardens, at the feet of a
haughty, handsome girl, dressed in half-mourning, with the prettiest
black-laced parasol to be found on this side of the Rue Castiglione,
for love--of which, indeed, as the gift of Mr. Ryfe, it was a type--or
money, which, not having been yet paid for, it could hardly be said to
represent.

That heart of his gave a bound when he saw it in her hand as she
sailed up the broad gravel-walk to let him in. He was almost happy,
poor fellow, for almost a minute, not distressing himself to observe
that the colour never deepened a shade on her proud, pale cheek; that
the shapely hand, which fitted its pass-key to the lock, was firm as
a dentist's, and the clear, cold voice that greeted him far steadier
than his own. It is a choice of evils, after all, this favourite game
of cross-purposes for two. To care more than the adversary entails
worry and vexation; to care less makes a burden of it, and a bore.

"Thank you so much for coming, Miss Bruce--Maud," said Tom
passionately. "You never fail, and yet I always dread, somehow, that I
shall be disappointed."

"I keep my word, Mr. Ryfe," answered the young lady, with perfect
self-possession; "and I am quite as anxious as you can be, I assure
you. I want so to know how we are getting on."

He showed less discouragement than might have been expected. Perhaps
he was used to the _sang-froid_, perhaps he rather liked it, believing
it, in his ignorance, a distinctive mark of class, not knowing--how
should he?--that, once excited, these thoroughbred ones are, of all
racers, the least amenable to restraint.

"I have bad news," he said tenderly. "Miss Bruce, I hardly like to
tell you that I fear we cannot make our case enough to come into
court. I took the opinion of the first man we have. I am sorry to
say he gives it against us. I am not selfish," he added, with real
emotion, "and I am sorry indeed, for your sake, dearest Miss Bruce."

He meant to have called her "Maud"; but the beautiful lips tightened,
and the delicate eyebrows came down very straight and stern over the
deep eyes in which he had learned to read his fate. He would wait for
a better opportunity, he thought, of using the dear, familiar name.

She took small notice of his trouble.

"Has there been no mismanagement?" she asked, almost angrily; "no
papers lost?