It is, nevertheless, true that certain favoured people do have beneficent omens to prepare them for their parts when the hero is in full career, so that they really may be nerved to meet him; ay, and to check him in his course, had they that signal courage.  For instance, Mrs. Elizabeth Berry, a ripe and wholesome landlady of advertised lodgings, on the borders of Kensington, noted, as she sat rocking her contemplative person before the parlour fire this very March afternoon, a supernatural tendency in that fire to burn all on one side:  which signifies that a wedding approaches the house.  Why—­who shall say?  Omens are as impassable as heroes.  It may be because in these affairs the fire is thought to be all on one side.  Enough that the omen exists, and spoke its solemn warning to the devout woman.  Mrs. Berry, in her circle, was known as a certificated lecturer against the snares of matrimony.  Still that was no reason why she should not like a wedding.  Expectant, therefore, she watched the one glowing cheek of Hymen, and with pleasing tremours beheld a cab of many boxes draw up by her bit of garden, and a gentleman emerge from it in the set of consulting an advertisement paper.  The gentleman required lodgings for a lady.  Lodgings for a lady Mrs. Berry could produce, and a very roseate smile for a gentleman; so much so that Ripton forgot to ask about the terms, which made the landlady in Mrs. Berry leap up to embrace him as the happy man.  But her experienced woman’s eye checked her enthusiasm.  He had not the air of a bridegroom:  he did not seem to have a weight on his chest, or an itch to twiddle everything with his fingers.  At any rate, he was not the bridegroom for whom omens fly abroad.  Promising to have all ready for the lady within an hour, Mrs. Berry fortified him with her card, curtsied him back to his cab, and floated him off on her smiles.

The remarkable vehicle which had woven this thread of intrigue through London streets, now proceeded sedately to finish its operations.  Ripton was landed at a hotel in Westminster.  Ere he was halfway up the stairs, a door opened, and his old comrade in adventure rushed down.  Richard allowed no time for salutations.  “Have you done it?” was all he asked.  For answer Ripton handed him Mrs. Berry’s card.  Richard took it, and left him standing there.  Five minutes elapsed, and then Ripton heard the gracious rustle of feminine garments above.  Richard came a little in advance, leading and half-supporting a figure in a black-silk mantle and small black straw bonnet; young—­that was certain, though she held her veil so close he could hardly catch the outlines of her face; girlishly slender, and sweet and simple in appearance.  The hush that came with her, and her soft manner of moving, stirred the silly youth to some of those ardours that awaken the Knight of Dames in our bosoms.  He felt that he would have given considerable sums for her to lift her veil.  He could see that she was trembling—­perhaps