n. "You surely did not make a
confidante of Benoite!"

"Of course I did," she answered, looking as if surprised at his
question, his tone. "Why not? Benoite cheered me up, I can tell you,
better than you do. 'What matter to cry?' she asked. 'If he does come
back, you will still be the mistress of Verner's Pride.' And so I
shall."

Lionel let go her hands. She sped off to the house, eager to find
Captain Cannonby. He--her husband--leaned against the trunk of a tree,
bitter mortification in his face, bitter humiliation in his heart. Was
this the wife to whom he had bound himself for ever? Well could he echo
in that moment Lady Verner's reiterated assertion, that she was not
worthy of him. With a stifled sigh that was more like a groan, he turned
to follow her.

"Be still, be still!" he murmured, beating his hand upon his bosom, that
he might still its pain. "Let me bear on, doing my duty by her always in
love!"

That pretty Mrs. Jocelyn ran up to Lionel, and intercepted his path.
Mrs. Jocelyn would have liked to intercept it more frequently than she
did, if she had but received a little encouragement. She tried hard for
it, but it never came. One habit, at any rate, Lionel Verner had not
acquired, amid the many strange examples of an artificial age--that of
not paying considerate respect, both in semblance and reality, to other
men's wives.

"Oh, Mr. Verner, what a truant you are! You never come to pick up our
arrows."

"Don't I?" said Lionel, with his courteous smile. "I will come presently
if I can. I am in search of Mrs. Verner. She is gone in to welcome a
friend who has arrived."

And Mrs. Jocelyn had to go back to the targets alone.

CHAPTER LXVI.

"DON'T THROTTLE ME, JAN!"

There was a good deal of sickness at present in Deerham: there generally
was in the autumn season. Many a time did Jan wish he could be master of
Verner's Pride just for twelve months, or of any other "Pride" whose
revenues were sufficient to remedy the evils existing in the poor
dwellings: the ill accommodation, inside; the ill draining, out. Jan,
had that desirable consummation arrived, would not have wasted time in
thinking over it; he would have commenced the work in the same hour with
his own hands. However, Jan, like most of us, had not to do with things
as they might be, but with things as they were. The sickness was great,
and Jan, in spite of his horse's help, was, as he often said, nearly
worked off his legs.

H