place in a joke between his daughter and Stephen Archdale, that the matter was to be thoroughly investigated at once, and if it turned out that Elizabeth was not Mistress Archdale, I had his permission to receive her answer from her own lips.  He was guarded enough; but on the way home I met Clinton who had been one of the guests at Mistress Katie’s attempted wedding last week.  He gave me details.  Here they are.”  And these details lost nothing through Edmonson’s racy recital of them.  “No, Bulchester,” he finished, “out of six people that I could name mixed up in this affair, on the whole, I am the best off.”

“Six?”

“Yes; counting in the love-lorn Waldo; that knave Harwin, who ought to swing for it; the poor little bride that lost her bridegroom; and the bridegroom; the young lady that got him when she didn’t want him, and missed me, whom, perhaps (without too much vanity) she did want a little; and last on the list of wounded spirits, your humble servant.  How wise that man was who said that one sinner destroyed much good.  By the way, Bulchester, who was he?  It is an excellent thing to quote in regard to this affair, and I should like to know where it comes from.”

An anxious expression crossed the other’s face as he cried: 

“Good heavens!  Edmonson, if you go to quoting the Bible and asking where the quotation comes from, you will get into awful disgrace with this strictest-sect-of-our-religion people, and then what will become of the other scheme that is bound to pull through?”

“True, most sapient counsellor, and I will be on my guard.  To show how I profit by your sageness, let us drop all thought of this royal maiden who is probably out of my reach, and attend to the other business.  It is good to have a sympathetic friend, Bul.”

They talked for nearly an hour after this, but not about Edmonson’s wooing.  When Bulchester left, the other sat looking after him a moment.

“Yes,” he said to himself, “it is well to have a sympathetic creature like that sometimes, but not if one tell him all his heart.  I hid my rage well, I passed it off for mere spleen.  But we are not a race to get over things in that way.  It is hate, hate, I say,” And he ground his teeth, and again threw himself upon the sofa his face downward and buried in his hands as if he were meditating deeply.

Edmonson told his friend of having met one of the guests at Katie Archdale’s wedding, but he did not say to him that coming out of Mr. Royal’s house and walking quickly down the street, he had met the bridegroom himself, and had returned Archdale’s bow with a politeness equally cold, while anger had leaped up within him.  Was Archdale going to call upon his wife?