fire safe: and I told myself that these signs and tokens which I beheld with such rapture were the evidence of a disinterested affection.

"I remembered the lady's elegant insolence in the greenroom of the Bonbonnière: and it pleased me to think that I had humbled so proud a spirit.

-Whether the sentiment which this most fascinating woman inspired in my mind was ever more than gratified vanity, I know not. For the moment it seemed a deeper feeling; and in thought and word I was already inconstant to that poor child whom I had loved so fondly, so purely, so truly, when we walked, hand locked in hand, on that lovely English shore beyond the little town of B——.

"I hated myself for my inconstancy, but was still inconstant. This woman had a thousand arts and witcheries wherewith to beguile me from my better self. Or were not all her witcheries comprised in one profound and simple art?—SHE FLATTERED ME.

"It is needless to dwell long upon this my second disappointment in affairs of the heart. The net was spread for me; and, unsuspecting as Agamemnon, I allowed this fair Clytemnestra to entangle me in her fatal web before she gave me the coup de grâce.

"Every morning I found some fresh excuse for spending my day in her society. We went upon all manner of excursions, with Mr. and Mrs. H. to play propriety. Any fragment of Gothic tower or ruined stone wall within twenty miles of E. T.'s small domain served as a pretext for a long drive and an impromptu picnic. We went fishing in a rough yacht, and brought up monsters in the way of star-fish and dogfish, sword-fish and jelly-fish, from the briny deep; but rarely succeeded in securing any piscatorial prize of an edible nature.

'I don't exactly know what kind of thing we are fishing for,' H. said piteously; but if the boat is to be filled with these savage reptiles, I should be obliged if you would allow me to be put on shore at the earliest opportunity.'

"In all our rambles, madame's gaiety and good-humour were the chief source of our delight. Her animal spirits were inexhaustible; and for me alone were reserved those occasional touches of sentiment which, in a creature so gay, possessed an unspeakable charm. Her accomplishments were of the highest order, but her reading very little. Yet by her exquisite tact and savoir-faire, she made even her ignorance bewitching. And then she had the art of seeming so interested in every subject her companion started, and would listen to my prosiest rhapsody with eyes of mute eloquence, and parted lips that seemed tremulous with suppressed emotion.

"One day, after she had been even more than usually vivacious and enchanting, during a little open-air repast among the most uninteresting ruins in A-, I was surprised, and indeed mystified, by a sudden change in her manner.

"We had wandered away from the ruins, leaving H. and his placid

BELGRAVIA

APRIL 1868

DEAD-SEA FRUIT

A Nobel

BY THE AUTHOR OF “LADY AUDLEY'S SECRET," ETC.

I

CHAPTER XXVI. "INFINITE RICHES IN A LITTLE ROOM."

DREW aside the portière and looked into the room. She was there -Carlitz-nestling in a deep easy-chair, with that perfect armwhose rounded line was accentuated by the tight-fitting sleeve of her violet-silk dress-flung above her head in an attitude expressive of weariness. She was not alone. In a chair almost as comfortable as her own sat a portly gentleman of middle age, upon whose handsome countenance good-nature had set a stamp unmistakable even by the shallowest observer. This gentleman was happily no stranger to me. I had met him in London, and knew him as the guide, philosopher, friend, and financial agent of Madame Carlitz; at once the Mazarin and the Colbert of that fair despot.

"The divinity arched her eyebrows in lazy surprise as I crossed the threshold.

'I really believe it is someone we know, H.,' she said to her friend with delightful insolence.

"Mr. H. received me with more cordiality. I had seen a good deal of him in London during the previous season. E. T. and he were sworn allies. H. had been lieutenant in a regiment of the line, and, after wasting a small patrimony, had sold his commission and turned stage-player. His intimates called him Captain H. and Gentleman H., and he was a man who in the whole of his careless career had neither lost a friend nor made an enemy. To Madame Carlitz he was invaluable. The divinity had of late years taken it into her splendid mind to set up a temple of her own, whereby the little Sheppard's-alley Theatre, the most battered old wooden box that ever held a metropolitan audience, had been transformed, at the cost of some thousands,

VOL. V.

K

into a fairy temple of cream-coloured panelling, and white-satin hangings, powdered with golden butterflies; and was now known to the fashionable world, whose carriages and cabs blocked Sheppard's-alley and overflowed into Wild's-corner, as the Royal Bonbonnière Operahouse.

"Here Carlitz had sung and acted in delicious little operettas imported from her native shores, to the delight of the world in general— always excepting those stupid people, the builders and decorators and upholsterers who had effected the transformation that made Sheppard'salley and Wild's-corner the haunt of rank and fashion, and who had not received any pecuniary reward for their labours. To keep these people at bay, or, it is possible, to reduce their claims to something like reason, Madame Carlitz employed my friend H., who of all men was best adapted to pour oil upon the stormy ocean of a creditor's mind. He was the enchantress's alter ego, opening and sifting her letters, arranging her starring engagements, choosing her pieces, managing her theatre, and receiving, with imperturbable temper, the torrents of her wrath when she was pleased to be angry. Nor were the proprieties outraged by an alliance so pure. H. was one of those men who are by nature fatherly-nay, almost motherly-in their treatment of women. No scandal had ever tarnished his familiar name. He had that tender, half-quixotic gallantry which is never allied with vice. He was the idol of old women and children, the pride of a doting mother, and the sovereign lord of a commonplace little woman whom he had taken for his wife.

"It was to this gentleman that I owed my right to approach Madame Carlitz. E. T. had obtained my admission to the side-scenes of the Bonbonnière, and had induced H. to present me to the lovely manageress, who was unapproachable as royalty. My introduction obtained for me only some ten minutes' converse with the presiding genius of the temple; but so supreme an honour was even this small privilege, that E. T. hastened to borrow a couple of hundred from me while my gratitude was yet warm.

"It will be seen, therefore, that I had little justification for intruding on the lady now, beyond the loneliness of the country in which I found her, and the primitive habits there obtaining.

"After I had been a second time presented by H.-the lady having quite forgotten my presentation in Sheppard's-alley-madame received me with more warmth than she had deigned to evince for me in the greenroom of the Bonbonnière.

These hills are so dreadfully dreary, and we are so glad to see anyone who can give us news,' she said with agreeable candour.

"And then H. explained how it fell out that I met them there. Madame had been knocked-up with the season-six new operettas, the lovely prima donna singing in two pieces every night, and never disappointing her public, which master this fair Carlitz served faith