at this stern face, and it was only by a strong effort that she wrested her attention from it. She was glad when she was out in the sunshine and among the flowers again, and her lightheartedness soon returned. Alfred's mood was more subdued. Lily did not notice when they started from home that his gaiety was forced, and that he seemed to be playing a part; but it was so. His cheerfulness was only assumed. Notwithstanding the outward evidences of prosperity he displayed, he was in trouble again. In immediate trouble, that is. For, like a very numerous class, so long as his circumstances were easy for to-day, he was easy in his mind. He rarely looked beyond; sufficient for the day was the good thereof. But to-morrow comes inevitably, and it came to Alfred, and brought trouble to his door.

Nearly all his racing speculations had gone against him. The race for the Goodwood Cup, the winner of which he was so confident of having spotted,' as the phrase is, had proved disastrous to him. The acceptance for seventy-five pounds which he had given to Con Staveley would soon be due, and he had not the means to meet it. He had borrowed money of Mr. Sheldrake, and he had given that gentleman he did not know what documents as security, security of the frailest, as his friend took care to tell him.

'It is a mere matter of form,' Mr. Sheldrake had said; 'for as you have no property and are worth nothing, these bills and IO Us are worth almost as much as waste paper. But I trust to your honour, Alf; I know you'll not let me in. But although I am partial to you, my boy, and like you, and all that, I am not sure that I would assist you if it were not for Lily's sake. If you were to push me to it, I should be bound to declare that it

is for Lily I do this, and not for you. You don't mind my saying this, do you? It is because I like her, and want her to think well of me: not without deserving it, Alf; I think I deserve it that I'm disposed to stick to you. You'll have a slice of luck one day, my boy. That tip of yours for the Cup was a bad one; but better luck next time, that's my motto. How much did you lose? O, that wasn't a great deal' (making light of what was a serious sum to Alfred); 'you'll soon pull that up. Of course you'll be able to meet that little bill of Staveley's? If I didn't think it was all right, I wouldn't tell you what he said yesterday. He swore that if the bill wasn't paid (what put it into his head that it wouldn't be, puzzles me) he wouldn't hold me accountable, but would come down upon you, and press the money out of you. He's as hard as nails on some points, is Con Staveley, and he's sore because I've been let in by so many of my friends. He can't make out what makes me cotton to you so; but then he hasn't seen Lily, has he, Alf? or he might alter his tune.'

Of course Alfred said he would be able to meet Con Staveley's bill, hoping that meanwhile the slice of luck (which, unfortunately for the hopeful ones, is nearly always figurative) would be cut off Fortune's pudding for him. But it wasn't; and pay-day was drawing near; and he had been borrowing more money of Mr. Sheldrake, some of which he had lost in racing as usual, and some of which he had spent upon himself, and in other ways. So that altogether he was in a bad way; and supposing that Mr. Sheldrake failed him, he did not know where to turn for assistance to float him through his money scrapes. Of one thing he was certain-it depended upon Lily whether Mr. Sheldrake continued to be his friend. He ex

tracted comfort from this thought; for as the word of promise is often kept to the ear to break it to the hope, so he cajoled himself into believing that Lily entertained a warm feeling for Mr. Sheldrake; he believed it because it was vitally necessary to him that it should be so. Still he would make sure. He had a favour to ask of Mr. Sheldrake this very day, and Lily would be able to assist him in obtaining it. Perhaps she would be able to put in a word for him with that gentleman. He absolutely saw nothing wrong in the thought. It was, however, with an uneasy feeling that he commenced the conversation, and he was rather ashamed of himself for going roundabout instead of coming straight to the point.

'I am so glad you are enjoying yourself, Lily.'

He could find nothing better to say than this.

I can't help it, Alfred; it would be ungrateful not to on such a day. And I enjoy it all the more because you have brought me and because you are with me. What beautiful places there are to come to, if one has the time and the money!'

'Yes, and the money,' repeated Alfred, with a groan. Isn't it a shame, Lily, that a fellow can't get as much as he wants?'

"That depends, Alf,' answered Lily, with a touch of philosophy which sounded all the prettier from her lips, because she was the last person in the world who would be supposed to be given to philosophising, upon how much a fellow

wants.'

'Not much,' he said, 'not a great deal. There are hundreds of people who have more than they know what to do with.'

'I think,' said Lily, in a musing tone, 'one can do with a very little and be very happy.'

'You say so because you're a

girl; if you were a man, you would think different.'

'Perhaps,' she said, with a readier mental acquiescence than the word expressed.

'A man wants so many things,' continued Alfred, with only one interpretation of 'man' in his mind, and that was himself, 'that a girl has no idea of. He has to move in the world, and do as others do, if he doesn't want to look mean and shabby; it's hard lines on a fellow when it comes to that. Now a girl's different; so long as she's comfortable at home, she's all right. There is no occasion for her to knock about.'

'Alfred,' said Lily, looking into his face suddenly, you speak as you were in trouble.'

if

And if I were, and if you could help me, Lily, would you?'

'Would I She took his hand and kissed it, as she had done once before this morning. A wise man, or, rather, one who had learnt wisdom (for the two definitions are not synonymous), who was strolling in the gardens, saw the action, and thought,How fond that girl is of that young fellow naturally setting them down as sweethearts; and in his superior wisdom smiled somewhat sneeringly at the hollowness of love's young dream. 'Would I! what would I not do for those I love! It was her heart that spoke, and the words came from her unaware. 'Tell me your trouble, Alfred.'

'Money,' he replied curtly; 'that's my trouble.'

'Can I help you, dear? I earn some.'

'And give it all to grandfather,' he said bitterly; for he thought what better use he could make of Lily's earnings than his grandfather, and how many fine chances of backing the right horses he was throwing away for want of means.

'Yes,' she said, in a surprised

tone at his bitterness; 'surely that's right, Alf.'

'O, I suppose it is,' he answered, in a rough ungracious manner; whatever grandfather is mixed up with, and whatever he does, must be right, of course.'

What is the matter with you and grandfather ?' she asked in deep anxiety; the brightness was beginning to die out of the day. 'I can't tell you how grieved I have been to see the way you behave to each other. You do not love each other as you used to do. I was in hopes this morning that it was all right between you again.'

'How can I tell you what it is that makes him treat me as he does, Lily, when I don't know myself? Directly you went out of the room this morning, he began to nag me, and I couldn't stand it. He's always at me. If he sees me with a new suit of clothes on, he preaches at me either with his eyes or his tongue.'

Lily was exquisitely distressed. Alfred spoke as if his grandfather were his enemy, and they were both necessary to her; she loved them both-not equally; her love for Alfred was the stronger. If it were placed distinctly before her that she would be compelled to choose between them, she would have chosen Alfred. This contingency did not present itself to her now, but she was sufficiently grieved at the consciousness of the breach between the two persons upon whom until lately she had bestowed all her love. Could she heal it? could she do anything? she asked timidly.

'Whose fault is it, Alfred-yours or grandfather's?'

Is it mine?' he demanded impetuously, in return. 'Now, I ask you, Lily, do you think it is mine?'

'No, no,' she replied, with generous and loving impetuousness; 'I am sure it is not.'

And thus committed herself, almost instinctively, out of her love for him.

'Well, then,' he said, feeling like a coward, there it is.'

He paused, expecting Lily to speak, but she was silent. She was trying to collect her thoughts, so as to take a clear view of the breach, but she could not do so. Indeed, she was not strong enough.

'If I have a new suit of clothes,' continued Alfred, harping upon the theme, and inwardly chafing at her silence, 'grandfather preaches me a sermon. That's why I didn't show him the chain the other day. I don't want to say anything against him, but young men are not the same as they used to be. Now, I put it to you, Lily: if you had anybody that you liked-I mean that you cared for a bit— that-that-you were very fond

of

Alfred!' cried Lily, looking at him with eager eyes.

'You know what I mean, Lily. If you were a man and had anybody that you loved-there! now it's out!-wouldn't you like to look well in her eyes!'

'O, yes, yes, Alfred! And have you some one like that? I thought so I thought so!'

'Yes, I have, Lily,' he said, 'and she is the dearest, prettiest, best girl in the world, Lily. And it's because she's poor

"That's nothing, Alfred.'

'That's nothing, of course, in

her. But because she's poor I try to make a little money so as to be nice, and make her a present now and then, perhaps; and because of that grandfather's always at me, preaching preaching-preaching. O, Lily, you should see her! She is as good as you are, and as pretty, upon my word, Lil.'

'Prettier and better, Alfred,' said Lily, taking his hand and caressing. it. She would have liked to throw

her arms round his neck, but they were sitting in the gardens, and people's eyes were upon them; so she was compelled to restrain the impulse, and to content herself with caressing his hand and saying, 'I am so glad! I am so glad! and that was your secret. You have got some one that you love-my dear, my dearest! O, how happy you have made me! And you love her very, very much ?'

With all my heart and soul, Lily.' He spoke the truth.

And she loves you? But what a question! As if she could help it!'

She looked into his handsome face with genuine admiration. How bright the day was again! Earth, sky, air, grew lovelier in the light of her happiness; for in the love her brother bore to this girl she saw her own reflected.

'She loves me as well as I love her, Lily.'

"I am sure of it-I am sure of it; she couldn't do otherwise. What is her name?'

'Lizzie,' answered Alfred with gratified vanity.

'Lizzie! Lizzie! I shall have a sister; I love her already, my dear. Of course,' she said slyly, 'you have her portrait?'

'How do you know, you puss?' he asked, with a laugh and a blush.

She echoed his laugh, and said, with an affectation of superior wisdom,

'I could shut my eyes and find it-there and she touched his breast-pocket lightly.

'Here it is, Lil,' he said bashfully and proudly, taking Lizzie's portrait from his pocket. 'What do you think of her? But it doesn't do her justice.'

The accumulative sins that photographers are guilty of in 'not doing justice' must surely bring a heavy retribution upon them one of these days. But in this instance they found a zealous champion in Lily,

who gazed at the portrait with admiring eyes, and kissed it again and again.

'What a beautiful face! what lovely hair!' ('All her own, Lil,' interpolated Alfred.) I can tell that. And she has brown eyes, like mine. And your portrait is in this locket round her neck. When shall I see her really?'

'Soon; I have told her about you. But O, Lily, I am so unhappy with it all! I am the most miserable wretch in the world, I do believe!'

Unhappy!' exclaimed Lily, bewildered by these alternations of feeling. Miserable! I don't understand you, Alfred.'

Indeed, she could not understand it. She judged from her own feelings; to love and to be loved was to her imagination the highest condition of happiness. Earth contained no brighter lot; and if in the Heaven and future life we believe in and look forward to all of us, I hope-some such bliss as the bliss of pure love is to be ours, there can be no better reward for living a good life.

'You asked me to tell you my troubles,' said Alfred, a little sulkily, and I told you: money. But you seem to have forgotten it already.'

'I did, for a moment, my dear,' she replied remorsefully; 'I forgot it in my delight at the news you have told me for and in the contemplation of your happiness.

'How can I be happy,' he grumbled, with such a trouble upon me? You do not know what it is, and how it weighs me down. How can I show my face to Lizzie when I am so pressed, and when I am in debt, and can't pay?'

And yet,' she said, out of her own goodness and unselfishness, 'you have brought me here for a holiday to-day, and I have been thoughtless enough to come, and

put you to expense, when I ought, to have guessed you could not afford it!'

The very construction she placed upon it displayed him in a generous light, which he so little deserved that he felt inwardly ashamed of himself.

'How could you guess? I have kept my troubles to myself. Why should I bother you with them? And it would be hard, indeed, if I could not give you a little pleasure now and then. It isn't much I give you, Lil—not as much as I should like to. Until I saw Lizzie, I had no one to love but you, and now, when everything might be so splendid with me, here am I stumped because I am hard up. It's too bad, that's what it is--it's too bad altogether; and just at the time that I have got the tip for the Cesarewitch, and could make a thousand pounds as safe as nails.'

All this was Greek to Lily. She did not know what the 'tip' or the Cesarewitch was, but she was too anxiously interested in Alfred's main trouble to go into details.

'Is it much money you want, Alfred?'

'No, not much, Lily.' 'Why not ask grandfatherBut he interrupted her with sudden vehemence.

'Lily!' he cried, 'I forgot. Grandfather mustn't know anything of this. Promise me.'

'I promise,' she answered readily; but why, Alfred?'

He dared not tell her the truth; he dared not say that his grandfather suspected him, and suspected him with just cause; he himself did not know whether it was suspicion or actual knowledge that caused his grandfather to be doubtful of him. Then how could he tell her to what purpose her earnings were devoted; if she knew that, not only would she become acquainted with the shameful story of their father's

crime, but she might get to learn the story of the little iron box. For he was guilty of the theft; it was he who had stolen the money, intending, of course, to replace it, and not knowing why it was hoarded up so carefully.

As he sat silent now in the light of the beautiful day, with his trouble heavy upon him, and suffering from the remorse that is not born of repentance, all the circumstances of the theft spread themselves swiftly before him. The money had been stolen in just the way his grandfather had surmised in the interview that took place between them on the night of his mother's death. He had seen his grandfather go often to the iron box, and he suspected that it contained money. One day, when his grandfather was not at home, he tried the cupboard in which the iron box was placed for safety, and found it locked. Seeing a key upon the mantelshelf, and believing it to be the key of the iron box, he ran out of the room with it, and took an impression of it, and from the impression had a false key made. Then, on the very night his grandfather had mentioned, he watched the old man out of the house, and took the iron box from the unlocked cupboard. He opened the box, and was taking the money from it when he heard a sound from the bed behind him. Turning, he saw his mother with her eyes open, as he thought, watching him. For a few moments he could not stir, he was so dismayed; but a sigh from his mother which was half a groan completely aroused him, and going to the bed he found his mother asleep. lieved, he completed the theft. This scene was always before his eyes when he was in trouble; when his money affairs were easy and he had sufficient for the day, he rarely thought of it. He had quite made up his mind that, supposing his

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