e. "They were farther off than
you thought, were not they? I began to think you had not been able to
find them."

"Have we been so long?" I say, surprised. "It did not _seem_ long! I
suppose we dawdled. We began to talk--bah! it is growing chill! let us
go home!"

Mr. Musgrave accompanies us to the entrance to the gardens.

"Good-night, Frank!" cries Sir Roger, as he follows me into the
carriage.

As soon as I am in, I recollect that I have ungratefully forgotten to
shake hands with my late escort.

"Good-night!" cry I, too, stretching out a compunctious hand, over Sir
Roger and the carriage-side. "I am so sorry! I forgot all about you!"

"What hotel are you at?" asks Sir Roger, closing the carriage-door after
him. "The Victoria? Oh, yes. We are at the Saxe. You must come and look
us up when you have nothing better to do. Our rooms are number--what is
it, Nancy? I never can recollect."

"No. 5," reply I. "But, indeed, it is not much use any one coming to
call upon us, is it? For we are always out--morning, noon, and night."

With this parting encouragement on my part, we drive off, and leave our
young friend trying, with only moderate success, to combine a gracious
smile to Sir Roger, with a resentful scowl at me, under a lamp-post. We
roll along quickly and easily, through the soft, cool, lamplit night.

"Well, how did you get on with him, Nancy?" asks Sir Roger.
"Good-looking fellow, is not he?"

"Is he?" say I, carelessly. "Yes, I suppose he is, only that I never
_can_ admire _dark_ men: I am so glad that all the boys are fair--I
should have hated a _black_ brother."

"How do you know that my hair was not coal-black before it turned gray?"
he asks, with a smile. "It may have been the hue of the carrion-crow for
all you know."

"I am _sure_ it was not," reply I, stoutly; then, after a little pause,
"I do not think that I _did_ get on well with him--not what _I_ call
getting on--he seems rather a touchy young gentleman."

"You must not quarrel with him, Nancy," says Sir Roger, laughing. "He
lives not a stone's-throw from us."

"So he told me!"

"Poor fellow!" with an accent of compassion. "He has never had much of a
chance; he has been his own master almost ever since he was born--a bad
thing for any boy--he has no parents, you know."

"So he told me."

"Neither has he any brothers or sisters."

"So he told me!"

"He seems to have told you a great many things."

"Yes," reply I, "but then I as