words, but they were said so conventionally as | to have been accurately described by you?" said to leave no excuse for reply. Mr. Haslop.

"I will tell you presently. Meantime will you favor me with an answer to a straightfor-you to give me a frank answer-is it so large as ward question, which you will believe that I put for a reason? What gentleman prepares deeds for you?"

"I will answer with perfect frankness—it is not. But I shall work it up, and I want this two thousand pounds as capital. I think I have "I am answered, of course, whether I am to spoken plainly, Mr. Haslop, but I am in the understand you literally or not."

"You knew that they employed me?" said the thing, but it is certain that a man, however Mr. Haslop, suddenly.

dignant speech, he rests a hand upon the back | fairly, and you may think that it is better to take yonder money now than wait for the chance of my changing my mind."

of the chair, and says:

"Percy Vaughan, two years ago you were living on the borders of South Wales. During your sojourn there you rendered an important service to a young lady-Magdalen Conway."

The name has been so suddenly brought out that Percy Vaughan has had no time for selfmastery, and his face breaks into a glow.

He makes no answer.

"You saved that young lady from an outrage, and her friends are mindful that you did so. They will save you, in return, from a peril that now hangs over you, and I am ready to be their agent. Will you come to me to-morrow night at eleven, and say that you are ready to leave England ?"

"If I say that I will not ?"

The younger man made no reply for some moments, and then appeared to revert to Mr. Haslop's last words.

"Is it courageous," asked Percy Vaughan, "to use such language to me, after giving the right to say what you had said before ?"

"I think it is," said Mr. Haslop, quietly. "But I have no wish to say any thing to you that is not strictly necessary. We all talk too much in this world. I was wrong," he added, "and I ask your pardon. I should have remembered that you showed yourself a brave man, when, single-handed, and with no weapon but a stake snatched from a hedge, you beat off the three miners, and rescued Miss Conway." "Do not act the madman, Percy Vaughan," "It is not a great matter,' " said Percy said Mr. Haslop, with actual agitation. "You Vaughan, "for an active man who understands must go, and we throw open a gate for you-single-stick to drive off a batch of half-drunken wait a few hours more and it must close against clowns. I did a braver thing than that, Mr. you. We would repay you the service you rendered to Magdalen Conway. We put no price upon such a service, but you wanted two thousand pounds-you shall have double the sum at ten to-morrow night. Am I to say any

more ?"

"Yes."

"You desire more money?"

Haslop."

"I suppose that I guess your meaning." "No one has ever had, from me, a right to guess it," replied Vaughan, earnestly; "but I tell you now, because we shall never meet again, that it was a braver thing in me to leave that neighborhood, and see Miss Conway no more.'

"If you felt it to be so, it was so," said Mr.

"I do not wish to speak of that-let me ask Haslop, coldly. you a question. Why am I to go?"

"You mean that my suit would have been

"Good Heaven! need I tell you to your face?" hopeless, that I might have staid for any chance

"Yes," said Percy Vaughan, as calmly as if he had heard indifferent words; "I supposed that to be your meaning. May I ask what has led up to the suspicion which you have done me the honor to state as a fact?"

"I will tell you, but what does it matter? In forging the last deed but one of the series set out in the title you have laid before me you were hasty or ignorant enough to use words that had not yet been adopted--you forgot the date of an Act of Parliament."

This was evidently the truth, or why did Percy Vaughan turn pale? Not with fear, but with anger-anger with himself that he should have made this false step. But though anger will turn like the scorpion, it will not do so when there is aught else to sting.

"Who detected this ?"

"I," was the calm answer.

He came on the following night, and very few words passed between them. Mr. Haslop placed the promised money in the hands of Percy Vaughan, refusing to take any sort of acknowledgment, and ending the interview as speedily as he could. Nothing could be less businesslike than the entire transaction, as performed by one of the most regular and business-like of men. But Mr. Haslop, when alone, felt satisfied with what he had done. To hint at unsolved mysteries is a vulgar device, to make premature disclosures is an error in art, but it may be said that he knew more than we have

“And you have kept the discovery to your- told, but far less than we shall have to tell. self?"

"We are quite alone, and there is no chance of any one entering these rooms for more than twelve hours. You are younger, and should be stronger than I am, and I take my seat in this chair," said Mr. Haslop, with calmness. "There is money in that cabinet, not so much, certainly, as I have offered you, but still a considerable sum. I have kept the secret to myself—no one else can know it but you. Are you thinking of violence? I have stated the temptations |

CHAPTER III.

THE OCTAGON CLUB.

"OH! come here a minute, Wigs-glad I caught you," said Mr. Charles Launceston to Mr. Henry Wigram, as they met, about lunch time, in the hall of the Octagon Club.

"If you're glad, I'm glad," said Mr. Wigram,

in a voice which, for some reason, he usually "Well, I can't help his having no end of busmade very melancholy, perhaps because no hand-iness, can I, you old grumble? He'll be a judge some young fellow in London had less to be un- one of these days, and then he need not run happy about. away. Then there's Doddy Dalston, and Alford, and your friend Marsden."

"I think there was something of the sort, | though collected with reference to Ernest Dorand one don't like to hear of such things. Peo-mer's position rather than to the liking of the ple who get converted are usually open to other influences. I really don't know which way it was. Dormer will be comfortable enough, I suppose he has about fourteen hundred a year, and his uncle cleared his debts, you know. And then he is not a helpless beggar without mental resources, like you. He can read a book, and understand it, and he can write reasonably well, so that he has occupation. It's a good hunting country. And I hear, too, that the girl is very nice indeed."

66

'Well, we'll hope for the best. Ring again, and ring like the devil. I believe that there is no house in the whole world where the servants are so long in answering the bells."

various men for one another, the gathering was a good and a representative gathering. Most of the fellows had a specialty, and few bored the others with it. Mr. Mangles, the editor of a critical journal, and one of its best writers, was appointed to be the chief of the feast, because on that occasion it would be necessary to make a little speech in honor of the guest, and Mr. Mangles was great at little speeches. He was an exceedingly good-hearted man, always doing kindnesses in a private way, and executing his public victims as matter of business and without either malice or mercy. If you were a poet, or a novelist, or a historian, he would utterly ruin -or instruct one of his brilliant myrmidons to Mr. Phelps, the cook at the Octagon, was on ruin-your play, tale, or romance, if he deemed his mettle. His predecessor, a splendid French- it meet, the week after he had dined with you man, had been adored by the female domestics, and floated French anecdotes to you through but obnoxious to the quieter members of the smoke until three in the morning. But if you club, by reason of his utter and avowed con- were in a scrape of any kind, or if there were tempt for any gentleman who ordered a mutton- illness in your house, he would drive over Lonchop. Many men like mutton-chops, and those don until that or any other hour in the morning who do are usually long-suffering, but very de- to hunt up friends, or doctors, or any body whom termined when they take action. The Octagon you thought could be useful, and his check-book men rebelled, and insulted the Committee. The was as ready as his kind words. Outsiders, who Committee were individually haughty, but as a knew nothing of his good-nature, believed him body submissive, and the French artist was dis- to be an incarnation of cruelty, sent on earth charged, nominally on the ground that the club- for the destruction of rising talent, and his maidens found him too fascinating for the mo- friends, who understood him, could not be exralities. He took this as a compliment, and re-pected to be always expounding his merits— tired gracefully. The Englishman's testimoni- friends do not exert themselves much to such als were admirable, and men do not give a testi-ends-so Mr. Mangles bore an unfavorable repmonial to a cook with the lavish and uncon-utation far and wide. This he bore very easiscientious profusion of laudation which one puts into a letter intended to help a clerical or medical friend into a responsible office. It was not denied that Mr. Phelps lacked some of the higher attributes of a cook, but if unimaginative, he was earnest, and a true, if not an inspired artist. He took office, but was made to understand that the Committee would be severe and perhaps unfriendly watchers of his policy. Happily for himself, he had both nerve and ambition, and he was sustained by the confidence of the middle classes in the club, to whose opinions he made no secret of his belief that much deference ought to be shown. He gave special attention to the mutton-chops.

ly; he made a great deal of money, and, being a bachelor, he lived pleasantly and wrote unpleasantly in the most comfortable of chambers in Lincoln's Inn Fields. His tall thin figure, keen features, and unsympathetic manner might have made it probable, as times go, that he was the husband of some very pretty and affectionate little woman who worshiped him, and doubtless he might have been, had he so chosen, but he did not choose to be worshiped, and certainly worshiped nobody.

There is not much more to say of Mr. Charles Launceston than we have already said in recording that gentleman's conversation with his friend. He had been in the army, and had seen some service, but had retired with the intention of marrying a young lady who had accepted him, and having then seen somebody whom she thought she liked better, had evaded the disagreeable duty of telling Launceston this except by eloping with the gentleman whom she preferred. Charley Launceston was chiefly enraged because Mary Woolnott's irregular behavior had caused him to disarrange his life to no purpose. His friends consoled him with the epigrams always made upon a girl who elopes, and with the prophecies which as regularly attend such an event, and Charley was readily comforted, and gave himself to billiards. Every body liked him. It has been said that nearly The party assembled, and it happened that all the guests on this occasion had specialty.

Launceston, who was on the Committee, and who belonged to the high epicurean party, had all a gentleman's sense of justice; and though, as we have heard, he was not inclined to be enthusiastic, he had even taken the trouble to hold a conference with Mr. Phelps touching the banquet in question, and had imparted to the cook some valuable hints, besides an intimation that this dinner would probably settle his status in the judgment of his patrons. The soul of the artist was touched; he thanked Launceston, but not with unworthy humility, and resolved, in the language of a sterner art than his own, to do all that he knew. He showed that he knew a great deal.

Charley Launceston was an exception, unless | mob of Indian niggers, and with his own small we may reckon as an accomplishment his un- white hand had sent a dozen of them to Padarivaled power of giving nicknames at the short-lon before the relieving force of cavalry came est notice. Some of them stuck.

down to the slaughter. He had a gentle feminine voice, and was loved of women for his beauty and valor, and of children because his business in life was the invention of child-games. It may be that he was wicked at odd hours. Then there was the instructive Dick Marsden, who knew every thing, and the indolent Tom Alford, who knew nothing, and the remaining type was Willy Daimes, who went in for politics, and was always standing for some place or other, and always losing because he made his agents leave off bribing just at the point when another three hundred pounds would have sent their principal into the British Legislature.

The Reverend Edward Grafton, who had been invited by Mr. Mangles, for the reasons which we have heard imparted in the Launceston fashion, will be heard of hereafter, and it is not desirable to keep the dinner waiting while we enter into his history or his character. He appeared to the rest of the party in the guise of a tall, slight, fresh-colored young clergyman, who had a good deal to say, but not the art which enables a man to bring out what is in him. He colored a little in speaking, spoke too long when he got an innings, and waited too long to get one. Two or three of the party noticed that he took wine somewhat too fast, and that late in the dinner he was inclined to echo the words of others, and express himself captiously thereabout. These small signs might merely indicate that the young clergyman had not had time to become a man of the world.

Mr. Milwarden was a handsome, very brighteyed, and very pleasant-tongued barrister, who was rising rapidly. Foreseeing that he would, as Launceston had said, become a judge, and having observed that some of our excellent judges have fallen into error for want of practical knowledge of life, Mr. Milwarden, with a prudence hardly to have been expected in one so young, was taking pains to familiarize himself with all kinds of life, daily, and likewise nightly. The unthinking might suppose that he was only amusing himself and gratifying an energetic and buoyant nature when they met him at all sorts of places and at all sorts of hours, but he was always ready with the gravest explanation that a lawyer can never tell what sort of knowledge may not be useful to him. Like Bacon, he said he held all knowledge to be his province. Milwarden's readiness and presence of mind were rare gifts. To see him, after a clamorous supper-party at chambers, throw down his cards and cigar, and suddenly address himself to stupid and earnest law talk on a remote sofa, was to be convinced that his future would be just what he pleased to make it. He made his present as crowded and exciting a day as is good for a gentleman of thirty. The other London guests may just be "observed," as the reporters say. Doddy Dalston -let us save the honor of his sponsors by mentioning that he was christened Theodore-was not thought to have much imagination; but if he had a dim idea of a future state, it was held Nor will we, as yet, say much more of the that Doddy's visions were of some place where chief guest of the evening, Ernest Dormer, than nobody has to pay debts. His earthly power could have been said next day by any of those of incurring obligations of the kind, notorious- who dined with him. Let him disclose his ly never meeting them, and yet of always look-character for himself as he goes through life. ing like a gentleman, and having money for It is only in novels that you are given so treevery body but creditors, amounted to a financial mendous an advantage over a new acquaintance and social miracle. His utter ruin had long as is comprised in your reading his biography ceased to be matter of prediction, and had taken before you meet. Let us, being among gentleits place in history; but there Doddy sat, ex-men, play more fairly. Nobody at that table, ceedingly well-dressed, and listening with an air of complacency to solvent men, and as if his only doubt was whether he should buy the house which one of them wished to sell, or to beg the other to invest the money for him in Madagascar Passives. Moreover, whether Doddy Dalston got hold of his money by burglaries, as some of his friends insisted, or by picking the pockets of bankers' clerks in the City, as others contended, he got it, and never sponged. It need not be said, therefore, that Dalston was much liked. So was Jemmy Rydon, for other causes, the most salient perhaps being the capital parties which he was fond of giving at a certain secluded villa in a northwestern suburb, where Mr. Rydon, who always intended to marry, but never did, was rehearsing domesticity. So was little Walter Latrobe, because he had been a gallant soldier, and in an emergency had held a fort with a handful of men against a raging

except Mr. Mangles, knew much about Ernest Dormer, popular as he was at the club that was thus affectingly bidding him farewell. Every body was always glad to see the handsome, easymannered, frank-spoken man, of two or three and thirty, who could talk horses and salmon and ballet with the light-minded, but had an eye for the Indépendance Belge and the British division lists, and could not only quote Horace, but had, on occasion, proved that he knew Greek. He was ready with good stories and sayings, discreet or less discreet, by other people, and he was able, without manifest effort, to say a reasonably smart thing of his own. He always spoke kindly of women; in fact, so charitably that pious women did not believe he had any religion. He was not, however, reluctant to say unkind things of men; but it was in a way which seemed to imply that this was only the conventional mode of showing one's clear