a cigar-case.

Never had Valentine Hawkehurst found his patron more agreeably disposed
than he seemed to be this evening, and never had he felt more inclined
to suspect him.

"And what have you been doing while I have been away?" the young man
asked presently. "Any more promoting work?"

"Well, yes, a little bit of provincial business; a life-and-fire on a
novel principle; a really good thing, if we can only find men with
perception enough to see its merits, and pluck enough to hazard their
capital. But promoting in the provinces is very dull work. I've been to
two or three towns in the Midland districts--Beauport, Mudborough, and
Ullerton--and have found the same stagnation everywhere."

Nothing could be more perfect than the semblance of unconscious
innocence with which the Captain gave this account of himself: whether
he was playing a part, or whether he was telling the entire truth, was
a question which even a cleverer man than Valentine Hawkehurst might
have found himself unable to answer.

The two men sat till late, smoking and talking; but to-night Valentine
found the conversation of his "guide, philosopher, and friend"
strangely distasteful to him. That cynical manner of looking at life,
which not long ago had seemed to him the only manner compatible with
wisdom and experience, now grated harshly upon those finer senses which
had been awakened in the quiet contemplative existence he had of late
been leading. He had been wont to enjoy Captain Paget's savage
bitterness against a world which had not provided him with a house in
Carlton-gardens, and a seat in the Cabinet; but to-night he was
revolted by the noble Horatio's tone and manner. Those malicious sneers
against respectable people and respectable prejudices, with which the
Captain interlarded all his talk, seemed to have a ghastly grimness in
their mirth. It was like the talk of some devil who had once been an
angel, and had lost all hope of ever being restored to his angelic
status.

"To believe in nothing, to respect nothing, to hope for nothing, to
fear nothing, to consider life as so many years in which to scheme and
lie for the sake of good dinners and well-made coats--surely there can
be no state of misery more complete, no degradation more consummate,"
thought the young man, as he sat by the fireside smoking and listening
dreamily to his companion. "Better to be Mrs. Rebecca Haygarth,
narrow-minded and egotistical, but always looking beyond he