uty towards you?"

"In none of the outward observances," she says, faintly. "And yet you
have broken my heart!"

There is a pause. And then Dorian laughs aloud,--a terrible, sneering,
embittered laugh, that strikes cold on the hearts of the hearers.

"Your heart!" he says, witheringly. "Why, supposing for courtesy's
sake you did possess such an inconvenient and unfashionable appendage,
it would be still absurd to accuse me of having broken it, as it has
never been for five minutes in my possession."

Taking out his watch, he examines it leisurely. Then, with an utter
change of manner, addressing Lord Sartoris, he says, with cold and
studied politeness,--

"If you have quite done with me, I shall be glad, as I have another
appointment at three."

"I have quite done," says his uncle, wistfully, looking earnestly at
the handsome face before him that shows no sign of feeling whatsoever.
"I thank you much for having so far obliged me."

"Pray do not mention it. Good-morning."

"Good-morning," says Sartoris, wearily. And Branscombe, bowing
carelessly, leaves the room without another word.

When he has gone, Georgie, pale and trembling, turns to Sartoris and
lays her hand upon his arm.

"He hates me. He will not even look at me," she says, passionately.
"What was it he said, that I had no heart? Ah! what would I not give
to be able to prove his words true?"

She bursts into tears, and sobs long and bitterly.

"Tears are idle," says Sartoris, sadly. "Have you yet to learn that?
Take comfort from the thought that all things have an end."

CHAPTER XXX.

"Oh that the things which have been were not now
In memory's resurrection! But the past
Bears in her arms the present and the future."--BAILEY.

Of course it is quite impossible to hide from Clarissa Peyton that
everything is going wrong at Sartoris. Georgie's pale unsmiling face
(so different from that of old), and Dorian's evident determination to
absent himself from all society, tell their own tale.

She has, of course, heard of the uncomfortable gossip that has
connected Ruth Annersley's mysterious disappearance with Dorian,
but--stanch friend as she is--has laughed to scorn all such
insinuations: that Georgie can believe them, puzzles her more than she
cares to confess. For a long time she has fought against the thought
that Dorian's wife can think aught bad of Dorian; but time undeceives
her.

To-day, Georgie, who is now always feverishly