hare together, directly the firm could be persuaded to make the
salary, on which it was to be supported, a little more elastic.

"How do you do, my dear Mr. Browne?" inquired the lawyer, rising from
his chair as Browne entered, and extending his hand. "I understood you
were in Paris."

"I returned last night," said Browne. "I came up early because I want
to see you on rather important business."

"I am always at your service," replied the lawyer, bringing forward a
chair for Browne's use. "I hope you are not very much worried."

"As a matter of fact, Bretherton, I have come to see you, because at
last I am going to follow your advice, and--well, the long and the
short of it is, I am going to be married!"

The lawyer almost jumped from his chair in surprise. "I am delighted
to hear it," he answered. "As I have so often said, I feel sure you
could not do a wiser thing. I have not the pleasure of knowing Miss
Verney; nevertheless----"

Browne held up his hand in expostulation. "My dear fellow," he said,
with a laugh, "you are on the wrong scent altogether. What on earth
makes you think I am going to marry Miss Verney? I never had any such
notion."

The lawyer's face was a study in bewilderment. "But I certainly
understood," he began, "that----"

"So have a great many other people," said Browne. "But I can assure
you it is not the case. The lady I am going to marry is a Russian."

"Ah, to be sure," continued the lawyer. "Now I come to think of it, I
remember that my wife pointed out to me in some ladies' paper, that the
Princess Volgourouki was one of your yachting party at Cowes last
summer."

"Not the Princess either," said Browne. "You seem bent upon getting
upon the wrong tack. My _fiancee_ is not a millionairess; her name is
Petrovitch. She is an orphan, an artist, and has an income of about
three hundred pounds a year."

The lawyer was unmistakably shocked and disappointed. He had hoped to
be able to go home that night and inform his wife, that he was the
first to hear of the approaching marriage of his great client with some
well-known beautiful aristocrat or heiress. Now to find that he was
going to espouse a girl, who was not only unknown to the great world,
but was quite lacking in wealth, was a disappointment almost too great
to be borne. It almost seemed as if Browne had offered him a personal
affront; for, although his client was, in most respects, an easy-going
young man, still