teners hear no good of
themselves.' You've proved the proverb."

"Not for the first time when you are the speaker. I have found that out.
How are you, Kitty? Good evening, Miss Murray."

"How good of you to come to see us, Mr. Vivian!" said Mrs. Heron, in a
low, sweetly-modulated voice, as she held out one long, white hand to
her visitor. She re-arranged her draperies a little, and lay back
gracefully when she had spoken. Rupert had never seen her do anything
but lie on sofas in graceful attitudes since he first made her
acquaintance. It was her _metier_. Nobody expected anything else from
her except vague, theoretic talk, which she called philosophy. She had
been Kitty's governess in days gone by. Mr. Heron, an artist of some
repute, married her when he had been a widower for twelve months only.
Since that time she had become the mother of three handsome, but
decidedly noisy, children, and had lapsed by degrees into the life of a
useless, fine lady, to whom household cares and the duties of a mother
were mere drudgery, and were left to fall as much as possible on the
shoulders of other people. Nevertheless, Mrs. Heron's selfishness was of
a gentle and even loveable type. She was seldom out of humour, rarely
worried or fretful; she was only persistently idle, and determined to
consider herself in feeble health.

Vivian's acquaintance with the Herons dated from his first arrival in
London, six years ago, when he boarded with them for a few months. The
disorder of the household had proved too great a trial to his fastidious
tastes to be borne for a longer space of time. He had, however, formed a
firm friendship with the whole family, especially with Percival; and for
the last three or four years the two young men had occupied rooms in the
same house and virtually lived together. To anyone who knew the
characters of the friends, their friendship was somewhat remarkable.
Vivian's fault was an excess of polish and refinement; he attached
unusual value to matters of mere taste and culture. Possibly this was
the link which really attached him to Percival Heron, who was a man of
considerable intellectual power, although possessed sometimes by a sort
of irrepressible brusqueness and roughness of manner, with which he
could make himself exceedingly disagreeable even to his friends.
Percival was taller, stronger, broader about the shoulders, deeper in
the chest, than Vivian--in fact, a handsomer man in all respects.
Well-cut fe