low the
interference of my feelings. I will, however, to prove to you that there
is nothing personal in my request, here solemnly engage my word that I
will never put another tenant in this house."

"Madam," said Florizel, "you plead your cause too charmingly to be
refused."

Thereupon we all three withdrew. The young man, still reeling in his
walk, departed by himself to seek the assistance of his
fellow-conspirators; and the prince, with the most attentive gallantry,
lent me his escort to the door of my hotel. The next day the lease was
cancelled; nor from that hour to this, though sometimes regretting my
engagement, have I suffered a tenant in this house.

THE SUPERFLUOUS MANSION (_continued_)

As soon as the old lady had finished her relation, Somerset made haste
to offer her his compliments.

"Madam," said he, "your story is not only entertaining but instructive;
and you have told it with infinite vivacity. I was much affected towards
the end, as I held at one time very liberal opinions, and should
certainly have joined a secret society if I had been able to find one.
But the whole tale came home to me; and I was the better able to feel
for you in your various perplexities, as I am myself of somewhat hasty
temper."

"I do not understand you," said Mrs. Luxmore, with some marks of
irritation. "You must have strangely misinterpreted what I have told
you. You fill me with surprise."

Somerset, alarmed by the old lady's change of tone and manner, hurried
to recant.

"Dear Mrs. Luxmore," said he, "you certainly misconstrue my remark. As a
man of somewhat fiery humour, my conscience repeatedly pricked me when I
heard what you had suffered at the hands of persons similarly
constituted."

"Oh, very well indeed," replied the old lady; "and a very proper spirit.
I regret that I have met with it so rarely."

"But in all this," resumed the young man, "I perceive nothing that
concerns myself."

"I am about to come to that," she returned. "And you have already before
you, in the pledge I gave Prince Florizel, one of the elements of the
affair. I am a woman of the nomadic sort, and when I have no case before
the courts I make it a habit to visit continental spas: not that I have
ever been ill; but then I am no longer young, and I am always happy in a
crowd. Well, to come more shortly to the point, I am now on the wing for
Evian; this incubus of a house, which I must leave behind and dare not
let, hangs hea