"I don't know what he said before."

"He said they were both of them using a feigned name."

"It's nothing to me what name they use. I know I wish they hadn't come here, if I'm to be troubled about them in this way—first by Wright and then by you."

"They have been very good tenants, papa."

"You needn't tell me that, Clara, and remind me about the shooting when you know how unhappy it makes me."

After this Clara said nothing more, and simply determined that Mr. Wright and his gossip should have no effect upon her intimacy with Mrs. Askerton. But not the less did she continue to remember what her cousin had said about Miss Vigo.

And she had been ruffled a second time by certain observations which Mrs. Askerton made to her respecting her cousin—or rather by little words which were dropped on various occasions. It was very clear that Mrs. Askerton did not like Mr. Belton, and that she wished to prejudice Clara against him. "It's a pity he shouldn't be a lover of yours," the lady said, "because it would be such a fine instance of Beauty and the Beast." It will of course be understood that Mrs. Askerton had never been told of the offer that had been made.

"You don't mean to say that he's not a handsome man," said Clara.

"I never observe whether a man is handsome or not; but I can see very well whether he knows what to do with his arms and legs, or whether he has the proper use of his voice before ladies." Clara remembered a word or two spoken by her cousin to herself, in speaking which he had seemed to have a very proper use of his voice. "I know when a man is at ease like a gentleman, and when he is awkward like a—"

a—"

"Like a what?" said Clara. "Finish what you've got to say."

"Like a ploughboy, I was going to say," said Mrs. Askerton.

"I declare I think you have a spite against him, because he said you were like some Miss Vigo," replied Clara, sharply. Mrs. Askerton was on that occasion silenced, and she said nothing more about Mr. Belton till after Clara had returned from Perivale.

The journey itself from Belton to Perivale was always a nuisance, and was more so now than usual, as it was made in the 

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