I had observed that lately he never mentioned or alluded to Miss Bellasys, but he had been equally silent about his present betrothed.  I told my host of the news directly.

“I am very glad to hear it,” he said.  “I never heard any thing but good of his fiancee.  She is wonderfully beautiful, too, I believe, and her blood is unexceptionable.  And yet,” he went on musingly, “I should hardly have fancied that she would quite suit Guy.  I don’t know any one who would exactly.  By-the-by, was there not a strong flirtation with a Miss Bellasys?”

“Yes; so strong that I should have been less surprised to have seen her name in this letter.”

“Then he has not got out of that scrape yet,” Mohun observed.  “That girl comes of the wrong stock to give up any thing she has fancied without a struggle.  I knew her father, Dick Bellasys, well.  He contrived to compress as much mischief into his five-and-thirty years, before De Launy shot him, as most strong men can manage in double the time.  He was like the Visconti—­never sparing man in his anger, or woman in his love.”

I felt that he was right.  I did not fancy the idea of Flora’s state of mind when she heard that all her fascinations had failed, and that her rival had won the day.

“I think I must leave you sooner than I had intended,” I said; “I should like to be in England to see how things are going on.”

“You are right,” answered Ralph, “though I shall be sorry to lose you.  You have some influence with Livingstone, I know, though he is so hard to guide and self-reliant that advice is almost useless.  If I had to give you a consigne, it would be—­Distrust.  If Miss Bellasys seems to take things pleasantly, be still more wary.  I never saw a peculiarly frank, winning smile on her father’s face without there being ruin to some one in the background.  After all, you can do but little, I suppose. Che sara, sara.”  He said this drearily, and with something like a sigh.

I had some business which detained me in Dublin, and it was nearly a fortnight after I received Guy’s letter before I reached London.

Early on the morning after my arrival I went down to his lodgings in Piccadilly.  I found him at breakfast; after the first greetings, before I could say one word about his own affairs, he began to speak eagerly.

“What a pity you should have come too late for the catastrophe, when you had seen all the preface!  Five days ago Bella and Charley made their great coup, and were married in Paris.”

“And Bruce?” I said, recovering from the intelligence, which was not so unexpected, after all.