luxury, and with none of the sleepiness of an
over-rich prosperity about it. In spite of the late June sun, there is a
general air of life, a tremulous merriment, everywhere: the voices of
the children, a certain laugh that rings like far-off music, the cooing
of the pigeons beneath the eaves, the cluck-cluck of the silly fowls in
the farm-yard,--all mingle to defy the creeping sense of laziness that
the day generates.

"It is late," says Mr. Massereene to himself, examining his watch for
the fifteenth time as he saunters in a purposeless fashion up and down
before the hall door. There is a suppressed sense of expectancy both in
his manner and in the surroundings. The gravel has been newly raked, and
gleams white and untrodden. The borders of the lawn that join on to it
have been freshly clipped. A post in the railings, that for three weeks
previously has been tottering to its fall, has been securely propped,
and now stands firm and uncompromising as its fellows.

"It is almost seven," says Letitia, showing her fresh, handsome face at
the drawing-room window. "Do you think he will be here for dinner,
John?"

"I am incapable of thought," says John. "I find that when a man who is
in the habit of dining at six is left without his dinner until seven he
grows morose. It is a humiliating discovery. Surely the stomach should
be subservient to the mind; but it isn't. Letitia, like a good girl, do
say you have ordered up the soup."

"But, my dear John, had we not better wait a little longer?"

"My dear Letitia, most certainly not, unless you wish to raise a storm
impossible to quell. At present I feel myself in a mood that a very
little more waiting will render ferocious. Besides,"--seeing his wife
slightly uneasy,--"as he did not turn up about six, he cannot by any
possibility be here until half-past eight."

"And I took such trouble with that dinner!" says Letitia, with a sigh.

"I am more glad to hear it than I can tell you," says her husband,
briskly. "Take my word for it, Letty, your trouble won't go for
nothing."

"_Gourmand!_" says Letitia, with the smile she reserves alone for him.

* * * * *

Eight,--half-past eight--nine.

"I don't believe he is coming at all," says Molly, pettishly, coming out
from the curtains of the window, and advancing straight into the middle
of the room.

Under the chandelier, that has been so effectively touched up for this
recreant knight