"Yes, Mrs. Dormer, a gentleman living in chambers on the top floor of a house in South Square?"

Whatever emotion may have caused the flush which came over the face of the fair young wife, that face became crimson.

"I see," he said, hurriedly, "that you do remember it perfectly well, and therefore I need say nothing more, except this. You will wonder why you are asked the question.'

book, have done the same thing, and have therefore a second act before us. If the situation with which the new act commences be not all that one could desire, we have one character who is resolved to be all that she should be, and one who believes himself equally resolute to the same good end. What circumstances not immedi- The stranger seemed little at ease, and anxately in the reader's mind, or what future inci-ious to end the interview, but apparently had to dents, outside the life of our principal charac- acquit himself of a task. ters, may do toward disturbing or improving` the relations in question, time shall tell and patience shall learn. But we should preach a false moral, when we desire to preach no moral at all, did we allow it to be inferred from what has been said that there are rests in life from which the great account starts afresh, and old "When you have considered over the matter items are laid away as not to be again examined. you will probably think that you are interested That magnificent theory which the great phi--deeply interested-in knowing what any one losopher, Faraday, expounded on that world- else has to do with your conduct on that occafamous night when he revealed his views of the sion." Conservation of Forces may be questioned or accepted for the physical world. In the moral world it is safe to believe that few forces are generated which do not come into active play Sooner or Later.

CHAPTER XXX.

THE FIRST GUN.

"Yes," said Magdalen, hardly knowing what else to say.

"My conduct!" repeated Mrs. Dormer.

"The word will do as well as another, if it is understood. You can obtain any information, and it may be well that you should obtain some, by writing to the address upon this card."

Magdalen instinctively took the card he of fered.

"At present no one but myself knows that I have sought this interview," said the stranger, in the tone of one who repeats a message. "At present," he added, with emphasis. "And I have now only to renew my apology, and to say good-morning."

He raised his hat again, made a nervous bow, and walked away, at a rapid pace, in the di

Mrs. Dormer did not look again at him, but had she done so she would have seen that he struck off at the road leading toward the railway station, which he reached as speedily as he could. He departed for London by the next train.

WITHOUT actually discouraging his wife's visits to the poor cottagers, Ernest Dormer had managed to make it clear to Magdalen that he did not much desire the continuance of such missions, and the feeling that it was so, and anoth-rection of Naybury. er circumstance or two, had made her walks to Trafalgar much less frequent than before her marriage. One morning, however, when Ernest had signified that he must get through some work for Mr. Mangles, Magdalen had paid her round of charitable calls, and was leaving the last place which she had intended to visit-the cottage of the cripple Jull, who had been restored to the abode of his wife-when Mrs. Dormer was respectfully accosted by a stranger.

He was a tolerably well-dressed young man, pale, and evidently nervous, and he flushed to the forehead as he raised his hat for a moment. "I have the honor of speaking to Mrs. Ernest Dormer?"

"I am Mrs. Dormer," said Magdalen. She did not recognize the speaker, but had a momentary impression that she had at one time or other heard the voice, which was pitched somewhat higher than the ordinary masculine key.

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Every apology for this intrusion, but I will not detain you a moment," said the stranger. "I only wish to ask a question."

Magdalen looked at him inquiringly. “May I ask whether you remember paying a visit to a gentleman in Gray's Inn, about two years ago?"

"In Gray's Inn ?" repeated Magdalen, mechanically.

Leaving Magdalen, for the moment, to recover from her surprise, to arrange her thoughts, and to decide what course of action she should take-for some action she had instantly become convinced was necessary-we will follow the fugitive, who arrived in town in the evening, and immediately repaired to a place well known to

us.

"Well, Farquhar," said Mr. Dudley, as the younger man entered his friend's shop, "better late than never."

"May be so," said Farquhar, sulkily, and walking, uninvited, into the little parlor.

"Cheeky, is he?" muttered Mr. Dudley, glancing after him. "Then he has done it, or he wouldn't take that liberty."

Dismissing a customer, with the information that the latter talked more than was good for her, that she knew nothing about her case, and had better take the medicine and keep her mouth shut, the observer of human nature, physical and intellectual, followed Mr. Farquhar into the small parlor and closed the door.

"When did you speak to her?" asked Dudley, without prelude.

"Who told you I had spoken at all?" replied | said Farquhar, petulantly. "I went to York Mr. Farquhar, who seemed to be in a singularly and came back the same day, and thought nobad humor.

"You," said his friend. "You appear to be out of sorts, as they say. The journey has been too much for you. That shows you how you have played with your constitution, Farquhar. A fellow at your time of life to be knocked up by a morning's journey in a first-class carriage! I must take you in hand more seriously.'

"That was some time ago, young Sir, before we went in so hard for the music of the people. Besides, the filial pleasure of seeing our revered parent sustained us."

"I'll thank you not to chaff me just now, Dudley, because I'm not in the humor for it. It is bad enough to be the tool in this business,

"The journey has had nothing to do with it," without being annoyed and insulted."

"Making all allowance for a person out of health, my friend, I think I may as well recommend you to get off the high ropes, and not give me the trouble of reminding you that this business, as you call it, is your own. But you mention York. Would you like to make another visit to that interesting city? You can easily have an excuse, you know, and a devilish good one; only I doubt whether the jaunt would do your nerves any good."

Mr. Farquhar made no reply, but took out a gaudy cigar-case, and proceeded to light a thin, black, villainous-looking weed, which well deserved that opprobrious name. Mr. Dudley quietly permitted him to kindle it, but as soon as the first poisonous whiff had insulted even the air of that den he rose and coolly took the cigar from the young man's hand. He then pitched the weed, neatly, into the fire-place, and merely said, "No, Sir."

Mr. Farquhar crimsoned with rage, used a profane expression, and defiantly took out another cigar.

"Were you ever there more than once, about two years ago?" demanded Dudley, angrily. "You know you never were. What's the good of humbug with me? You might have gone often, I dare say, to Mr. Justice Trailbaston's, and many other good houses, but you chose to drop into Bohemian life and habits; you did not leave cards, and you did not answer notes, and so good people dropped you. For society can do perfectly well without any one person, my friend, let him think himself ever so necessary to the world's peace of mind and happiness.”

"You are a good one to preach on such things," retorted Farquhar.

"Perhaps I have seen better society than you will ever know, my boy, even if you don't go altogether to the bad, as seems likely at present. But that's my business. Well, you once had an invitation to the Judge's-somebody got it for you-and you saw Miss Conway, now Mrs.

"I will not have it, Farquhar,” said Mr. Dud- Dormer, and you were not introduced to her, ley. "Put it up or go."

His voice and look mastered his weak young companion, who, without exactly obeying, refrained from lighting his tobacco, and availed himself of the last word to avoid further contest. "Yes, you would like me to go, wouldn't you, without hearing what I have done?"

"I know you have been away four days," said Mr. Dudley, accepting the submission with a grim smile, "and I know that you have seen Mrs. Dormer."

"Yes, I have been away four days, and precious pleasant ones they were, of course. If I had not succeeded on the fourth I should have come away, I can tell you."

but said a few words-asked her whether she was being attended to, at supper, perhaps, or advised her to sit out of a draught, and she replied courteously, like a lady, that she was being attended to, or that she liked the air—and thus you acquired the right to say that you knew her, and that she was a most charming person, as I dare say you did in many places and to many people-in one place and to one person I know you did. But you had not courage, on the strength of this intimacy, to call on the lady at Naybury, but you lurked about and watched until you could speak to her in the street. That's about the story you had to tell me, is it not?"

To all this, which was said in the most deliberately impertinent way, Mr. Farquhar listened, holding the cigar which he would neither light nor put away, and by this little bit of weakliness exposing his nature, very needlessly, to the friend who had gauged it with fractional accuracy. When Dudley had done, the other said: "You are devilish fond of hearing your own tongue, doctor."

"You can tell me that, or any other falsehood you please," said Mr. Dudley, coolly. "But you would have been too wise to fail. I suppose you found it difficult to get to speak to the lady, and yet, you being a sort of lady's man, ought to have been able to manage an interview. I have heard you speak rather triumphantly of your cleverness in such matters." "I don't say that I have been unfortunate in Mr. Dudley laughed. He was terribly adthem," said Mr. Farquhar, with one of those ex-dicted to what Mr. Farquhar called chaff of the ecrable smiles which are meant to imply worlds of mystery and success, and which disturb the right foot of the observer, if he be a gentleman, until he recollects that the smile is an acted lie, and that a liar is not worth kicking.

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No, you don't. I never said you did. But you mean that it is one thing to get speech with a lady, and another to manage meetings with milliners and bar-maids. That is true enough, Farquhar. But then you have been in good society, you know. You told me that you met this very lady at Mr. Justice Trailbaston's, and actually spoke to her there."

We were

"So I did, but only a few words. not introduced, and there was a great crowd, as there always is at Trailbaston's."

"Is," repeated Dudley, pointedly.

most offensive kind, but to do him justice he did not resemble most proficients in the art, who grow angry the moment they are repaid in notes from their own bank.

"One of us must talk," he said, "and as you sit there mum and sulky because I won't have bad tobacco smoked in a room in which I receive ladies I am doing the talking. Come, put up that beast, or send it after its brother, and I'll give you a gem that shall do you good instead of harm. If a statue could smoke those things of yours they would make him nervous."

"I could get nothing better at Naybury," said Farquhar.

"And why couldn't you take advantage of the fresh air, and abstain altogether while you had "Might that to breathe?"

"A lady who doesn't like the smell of that is no lady at all," said Mr. Dudley, "and I don't care whether she's pleased or offended. A bride might smoke it as she went to church and the parson wouldn't find it out." "It's none so mild, though," said Mr. Far- cially when they are out of health, are very apt quhar.

"It isn't the law; I could manage that for myself perfectly well."

"What else?"

"A good deal, I imagine," replied Dudley, slowly, and looking steadily at his friend, as if considering whether it were worth while to be more explicit. Apparently he came to a decis

Here Mr. Dudley, totally unable otherwise to control his lips from a smile, whistled the beginning of a hymn, and thus recovered his gravity. The immediate cause of his disposi-ion, for he suddenly said: tion to mirth was Farquhar's evincing a disposition to boast his legal knowledge. But for a reason that will have presented itself long ago to legal readers, Mr. Farquhar's ignorance of his calling is much clearer to them than it was to Mr. Dudley, who believed that he was menacing the other with what, if real, would have been all he represented it to be. In plainer English, Dudley did not know that the supposed client of Mr. Hobbins's firm had no case.

"I am, of course, deeply interested in your business, Farquhar, but I must also have an eye to my own. Luckily it happens that I can combine both. While playing the game that

"You mean," said Dudley, "that you want advice as to your conduct. But you keep me so completely in the dark about yourself that I can say nothing useful. You profess abject fear lest your father, at York, should know any thing about your danger. Well, fathers are not, on the whole, such desperately bad fellows as they are made out in stories, and I have even known some who, though they have been cruel enough to kick up a great row because their sons have taken to evil lives, have had the grace to repent and forgive their injured offspring. Is your father likely to take that line ?"

"No, never. I don't want to talk of him, but take this as my solemn assurance. He would never forgive me, and he would do something worse than disinherit me. I can not tell you more, but I am in his power, and always shall be until he uses it."

"And then? There is nothing like knowing the worst.

"I should be a beggar, and something else would have happened which must not, and shall not happen, Dudley. I would rather ask you to do a friend's last office, and give me something out of that iron safe you lock so carefully." He added, tearfully, an earnest oath.

"Yes," said Dudley, in a gentler tone than he often used, and with a certain careless but not unsympathetic manner, "I have a true friend or two behind that iron door, but there let them stay till the hour of need. They are friends whose service we ask but once, and it lasts us forever. Perhaps some of us are fools to be so shy of asking what they give so readily. But that is not the way to talk to you. I will not seek to know more of what you hint at. It shows me that our efforts must all be directed to one point, namely, the spiking the enemy's guns before he can begin firing."

"You mean-"

"I mean that we must lose no time in making the good folks at Naybury understand that we have a terrible power, and that we mean to use

it."

is to save you I can also play one which will serve myself. I think you may as well be content to know that our interests are one, as that will assure you that I shall do all in my power to promote them. All you have to do is to act exactly as I shall suggest. After what you have said about Mr. Farquhar the elder, I imagine that you will be happy to do any thing which shall keep matters from his knowledge.

"That is my one desire. But, of course, I do not want to injure any body, or do any thing that may be hurtful to my professional character hereafter," said poor George Farquhar.

Mr. Dudley could not stand this, and he blazed up.

"Don't sit there talking trash, will you? If you think I am going to work with rose-water you are a greater ass than I supposed you. Take it in the plainest English that I am very likely going to injure somebody very much, though it will be somebody's own fault if I do. And I do not care one cent whether I do or don't, and if there's a smaller coin I don't care that for your future professional character. That's plain speaking, isn't it?"

"Yes, and something else."

"No doubt. But some people require it to make them gripe at a fact, and the fact I want you to gripe at, and hold it hard and fast, is, that this is not a business to be managed with bows and smiles and mock diplomacy, but is a rough and rugged and disreputable affair. Comprehend that, and when you think of kicking against it, think also that it is the only thing between you and this nameless terror at York. If you do that, I shall find you a very useful and docile assistant. But don't let us have any more cant; it makes me savage. No need of assistance for that, you'll say," added Mr. Dudley, who had by this time stormed himself back into good temper.

"No," replied his victim, "but I will forget your language.'

"But you'll do nothing of the kind, my friend. You'll remember it, especially when I ask you to pay another visit to Mrs. Dormer." "You don't mean that?"

"I do, though. I can't say when exactly. If her legal friends press, you will have to go instantly. If they don't-we shall see. In that case we will give her a little time, and see "Unless they consent to refrain from action." whether she applies to have the prescription "We make no terms." you handed to her prepared as recommended. "Yes, if they accept the apology there is an I shall give her very few days, even in that end." case. You don't understand a tenth part of "Is there ?" asked Mr. Dudley, significantly. what that card said to her. If she means