ent character, _especially_ for sobriety, and till
yesterday I had no fault to find with her. Then, the girls say, she
became quite wild and intoxicated, and it is hard to believe that this
is the first time she yielded to that horrid temptation. Don't you think
it was odd of Mr. Cranley? And I sent round a messenger with a note to
his rooms, but it was returned, marked, 'Has left; address not Known.'
I don't know what has become of him. Perhaps the housekeeper could have
told us, but the unfortunate woman is beyond reach of questions."

"Do you mean the Mr. Cranley who is Rector of St. Medard's, in Chelsea?"
asked Barton.

"No; I mean Mr. Thomas Cranley, the son of the Earl of Birkenhead. He
was a great friend of mine."

"Mr. Thomas Cranley!" exclaimed Barton, with an expression of face which
probably spoke at least three volumes, and these of a highly sensational
character.

"Now, please," cried Mrs. St. John Deloraine, clasping her hands in a
pretty attitude of entreaty, like a recording angel hesitating to enter
the peccadillo of a favorite saint; "please don't say you know anything
against Mr. Cranley. I am aware that he has many enemies."

Barton was silent for a minute. He had that good old school-boy feeling
about not telling tales out of school, which is so English and so
unknown in France; but, on the other side, _he_ could scarcely think
it right to leave a lady of invincible innocence at the mercy of a
confirmed scoundrel.

"Upon my word, it is a very unpleasant thing to have to say; but really,
if you ask me, I should remark that Mr. Cranley's enemies are of his own
making. I would not go to him for a girl's character, I'm sure. But I
thought he had disappeared from society."

"So he had. He told me that there was a conspiracy against him, and that
I was one of the few people who, he felt sure, would never desert him.
And I never would. I never turn my back on my friends."

"If there was a conspiracy," said Barton, "I am the ringleader in it;
for, as you ask me, I must assure you, on my honor, that I detected Mr.
Cranley in the act of trying to cheat some very young men at cards. I
would not have mentioned it for the world," he added, almost alarmed at
the expression of pain and terror in Mrs. St John Deloraine's face; "but
you wished to be told. And I could not honestly leave you in the belief
that he is a man to be trusted. What he did when I saw him was only what
all who knew him well would have