a
pursued.

Ho admitted it, and to her outcry of "Oh, that noble public life!" smiled
deprecatingly--"My dear young lady, if you only knew the burden it
brings!"

"It brings its burden," said Adela, correcting, with a most proper
instinct, another enthusiastic burst. "At the same time the honour is
above the load. Am I talking too romantically? You are at least
occupied."

"Nine-tenths of us to no very good purpose," the baronet appended.

She rejoined: "If it were but a fraction, the good done would survive."

"And be more honourable to do, perhaps," he ejaculated. "The consolation
should be great."

"And is somehow small," said she; and they laughed softly.

At this stage, Adela was 'an exceedingly interesting young person' in Sir
Twickenham's mental register. He tried her on politics and sociology. She
kept her ears open, and followed his lead carefully--venturing here and
there to indicate an opinion, and suggesting dissent in a pained
interrogation. Finally, "I confess," she said, "I understand much less
than I am willing to think; and so I console myself with the thought
that, after all, the drawing-room, and the...the kitchen?--well, an
educated 'female' must serve her term there, if she would be anything
better than a mere ornament, even in the highest walks of life--I mean
the household is our sphere. From that we mount to companionship--if we
can."

Amazement of Sir Twickenham, on finding his own thought printed, as it
were, on the air before him by these pretty lips!

The conversation progressed, until Adela, by chance, turned her eyes up a
cross pathway and perceived her sister Cornelia standing with Mr. Barrett
under a beech. The man certainly held one of her hands pressed to his
heart; and her attitude struck a doubt whether his other hand was
disengaged or her waist free. Adela walked nervously on without looking
at the baronet; she knew by his voice presently that his eyes had also
witnessed the sight. "Two in a day," she thought; "what will he imagine
us to be!" The baronet was thinking: "For your sister exposed, you
display more agitation than for yourself insulted."

Adela found Arabella in so fresh a mood that she was sure good news had
been heard. It proved that Mrs. Chump had sent a few lines in a letter
carried by Braintop, to this effect: "My dears all! I found your father
on his back in bed, and he discharged me out of the room; and the sight
of me put him on his legs, and you will