neral
society.

On the evening of the next day, there was a thunderous knock at
Warburton's flat, and in rushed Franks.

"You were at Ashtead yesterday," he cried.

"I was. What of that?"

"And you didn't come to tell me about the Elvans!"

"About Miss Elvan, I suppose you mean?" said Will.

"Well, yes, I do. I went there by chance this afternoon. The two men
were away somewhere,--I found Mrs. Pomfret and that girl alone
together. Never had such a delightful time in my life! But I say,
Warburton, we must understand each other. Are you--do you--I mean, did
she strike you particularly?"

Will threw back his head and laughed.

"You mean that?" shouted the other, joyously. "You really don't
care--it's nothing to you?"

"Why, is it anything to _you_?"

"Anything? Rosamund Elvan is the most beautiful girl I ever saw, and
the sweetest, and the brightest, and the altogether flooringest! And,
by heaven and earth, I'm resolved to marry her!"

CHAPTER 5

As he sat musing, _The Art World_ still in his hand, Warburton could
hear his friend's voice ring out that audacious vow. He could remember,
too, the odd little pang with which he heard it, a half spasm of
altogether absurd jealousy. Of course the feeling did not last. There
was no recurrence of it when he heard that Franks had again seen Miss
Elvan before she left Ashtead; nor when he learnt that the artist had
been spending a day or two at Bath. Less than a month after their first
meeting, Franks won Rosamund's consent. He was frantic with exultation.
Arriving with the news at ten o'clock one night, he shouted and
maddened about Warburton's room until finally turned out at two in the
morning. His circumstances being what they were, he could not hope for
marriage yet awhile; he must work and wait. Never mind; see what work
he would produce! Yet it appeared to his friend that all through the
next twelvemonth he merely wasted time, such work as he did finish
being of very slight value. He talked and talked, now of Rosamund, now
of what he was _going_ to do, until Warburton, losing patience, would
cut him short with "Oh, go to Bath!"--an old cant phrase revived for
its special appropriateness in this connection. Franks went to Bath far
oftener than he could afford, money for his journey being generally
borrowed from his long-enduring friend.

Rosamund herself had nothing, and but the smallest expectations should
her father die. Two years before this, it had