shall render me a strict account the moment I have settled with his master. They would have found, indeed, that I was neither to be galled nor intimidated into the marriage they projected for me, but the insult is not the less audacious and unpardonable. Why was I pitched upon, I would fain know, for the double honour of espousing the lady, and screening her seducer from assassination ?"

"Seagrave was doubtless to be handsomely rewarded for accomplishing a negotiation that was rendered doubly difficult because the lady insisted upon having a gentleman for her husband, and no one could be so expressly adapted for his purpose as yourself. Your total unacquaintance with the characters and scandal of the metropolis, and the silence they had enjoined you, secured them pretty well against any discovery of their plot, or of Mrs. Audley's real history; while your fine figure-(mi perdona questo complimento,) and the respectability of your family, were equally sure to please the lady, and to satisfy her brothers."

"As you seem to possess some magical power of penetrating all the plots of London, and developing every thing that is obscure, perhaps your ladyship can also inform me who were the strange gentlemen in the lone house, to one of whom I stand indebted for the preservation of my life."

"The spies and scouts from whom I gleaned my other intelligence could tell me nothing upon this subject. While those parties remained in the house, their proceedings were involved in deep mystery; they decamped before daylight on the morning subsequent to your attack, nor have they been heard of since."

"It was my intention to have visited Mrs. Audley this night for the purpose of"

"I suspected that you might be contemplating a return to Ormonde Street, and therefore was it that I dispatched a messenger in such haste to your quarters to desire an immediate interview with you. As you value your life, dream not of again calling upon that woman. Through one of her servants who is in my pay, I learn that the conspirators have hatched a new

plot for inveigling you. The lady-poor thing! that is natural enough, is most anxious to secure you for her husband; when next you call, the brothers are to surprise you in her company; a priest is to be in readiness; and you are to be offered the pleasant alternative of either marrying her, or having your throat

cut.

Whether Sunderland and Seagrave be parties or not to this nefarious scheme, I cannot exactly determine; but certain it is that the latter has contrived to pacify the brothers, either by large bribes, or by pledging himself to assist in securing you as a husband for the sister, for which service the worthy Captain has been rewarded by his noble patron with a Major's Commission, though I cannot learn in what regiment.'

"To what a precious gang was I about to commit myself, and what an atrocious plot have you unravelled! Oh Madam! how shall I ever express, I know not what acknowledgments my heart is full of gratitude, although my lips may refuse to give it utterance." "So much the better; I told you once before

that I hated all effusions of the sort, though I will put your sincerity to the practical test. Promise me that, for the present, you will abandon all thoughts of revenge. Against visiting Mrs. Audley I exact no pledge, for you will not of course rush upon destruction; but promise me that you will seek no quarrel, either with Sunderland or Seagrave, one of whom is as much above your reach as the other is beneath your notice. Eventually you shall do yourself justice, both as a gentleman and a soldier - I only ask a delay of a few days, of a fortnight, - — will you comply with my request ?”

"After reserving to myself the right of eventually vindicating my own honour, I can refuse you nothing, and I promise therefore to conform to your wishes."

"Basta! vanne via! enough! begone-I told you my time was short. Remember that you are upon honour, and that your hands are tied up for a fortnight. You, I see, may be saved from running your head against a wall, but there is one coming who will build up a

wall against which to run his head." She waved her hand impatiently, as if to silence Walter as he was about to speak, and he accordingly made his bow and withdrew, thrilling with varied emotions as he thought of the snare that had been laid for him, and of the fatal catastrophe to which it might possibly have led; penetrated with gratitude towards his fair and fascinating preserver, and inflamed with rage as he reverted to the treacherous machinations of Sunderland and Seagrave. Hastening to a chocolate house, he wrote a few lines to the former, enclosing the leave of absence which had been forced upon his acceptance, and simply stating that at the end of a fortnight he should call upon his Lordship for certain explanations in which his honour was deeply implicated. He then set off for Hounslow, too much exasperated to reflect how completely his fair prospects were blighted by this most unexpected denouement, devising various plans for punishing the Peer and his satellite, and feeding his wrath by muttered exclamations of "Yes, for fourteen days