were ac

customed to call it, is a suburban square on the outskirts of the noise and traffic of the great city; and yet it is not in the country. The fields about it are mostly brickfields, the streets which open into it are paved London streets, and the quiet which pervades it is not the murmuring peacefulness of a country lane, but rather the stillness of a highway, where only those sit down to rest who are too tired to go farther. We are most of us middleaged people; we have for the most part done with the bustle and excitement of life; in our own square we find shut in our greatest interests and our closest ties. We pass out of it on our little missions of charity and kindness; but as for our social pleasures, they are chiefly such as spring from intercourse amongst ourselves: there is a slender invisible chain running round the square which connects us with each other, and the links are rarely broken.

The houses are generally inhabited by portions or remnants of families. There is a brother and sister in No. 1, and an old lady next door. There are two maiden sisters in No. 5, and a widow with a little lame boy in No. 7. There are two brothers, who in a quiet way carry on solicitors' business, in No. 10; and there is a doctor at the corner. Then in the big house in the middle of the square old Mr. Deane has lived for the last twenty years.: only one or two people can remember when he first came to live there. The big house must have been there long before the square. was built, for it is an old house; much older than those which have sprung up around it. It has a

where apricots and peaches ripen in the autumn, and where children might have hedged round their little gardens and worn the grass with their aimless pattering feet, and young people might have read and worked and played croquet through the summer afternoons, in spite of the London smoke which is drifted overheard. But as it chanced, there were no little children to pick the daisies, and there were no young people to wander about the walks in the summer twilight.

we

The

People had often wondered why Mr. Deane lived alone in his big house, keeping his riches, and comforts, and feelings to himself: sociable people pitied him for the solitary state in which he lived; and if he would have allowed us we should have been very ready to welcome him to our firesides, though he was rather an alarming person in some respects. He was nearly seventy years of age, I believe; a tall, thin, stately man, with overwhelmingly polite manners. expression of his mouth was somewhat severe and cynical, his cold blue eyes were piercing and relentless; and moreover, beneath his polished exterior there were sometimes startling flashes of nervous excitement and irritation. Some people who were romantic enough to like a little mystery used to declare that it was plain he had something upon his conscience, but, for my part, I liked the old gentleman. He generally made his way up to me when we happened to meet in society; he could be agreeable when he chose; and I think he liked me.

I was then no longer young; indeed I do not think that I ever had been

young. Mine had been a hard,

struggling life; I had never had time for the pleasant troubles and uncertain hopes which hang around the youth of most girls. Perhaps it might have been different if I had. been particularly clever or beautiful; but my practical difficulties had occupied my whole thoughts at a time when I should have been acquiring knowledge; and as to beauty, no one ever paid me a higher compliment than when my old nurse consoled me by the assurance that I was very passable.' I dare say she was right; for certainly I passed through life without attracting much observation.

After my parents' death I took a small house, one of the smallest, in Belfield Square. When that little house is once more to be let or sold I shall have dropped out of life altogether. Once only have I left it since I first came to live hereonce for a year; but it was an eventful year in my quiet life, and as I look back upon it, it stands out as a distinct portion of my existence.

How well I remember my surprise when I received Mr. Deane's letter. I remember every word of it, the old-fashioned phrases and the stiff, cramped hand-writing. A brother of his had died in very distressed circumstances, leaving an only daughter. Her other relations were too poor to bring her up in a befitting manner, and he proposed to take this charge upon himself. Would I lend my valuable assistance?

The offer was couched in the most delicate and ambiguous words, but the upshot of it was that he proposed to engage me at a fixed and most liberal salary as resident governess or companion to this young lady. Well, I pondered it long, and finally I accepted the offer. I was somewhat weary of my solitude, I felt a curiosity to see something new, it was November, the weather was dull and I was dull; and finally, I had a friendly wish to be of service to Mr. Deane.

Looking back upon it, I can hardly tell what determined me, but I was determined, and I closed with the offer.

I confess that when I went to establish myself in my new home my heart failed me a little. I felt as if the servants despised me, and knew that I was only Miss Ford from the little house over the way. Mr. Deane was alarming, with his courteous welcome and formal hope that I would make myself at home. I felt as if he, too, knew that it was an unwonted luxury to find a fire blazing in my bedroom, and I cowered over it, feeling shy and miserable, and glad to turn from the reflection of my own scared face in the large pier-glasses.

As I glided softly down the stairs I thought somewhat compassionately of my future charge. How strange it would seem to her, entering upon a new life in the constrained atmosphere of that house, which seemed as if it never could have echoed to the sound of children's feet. But upon the other hand, she would be at once placed in a higher position; Mr. Deane would of course make her an heiress, and coming from the painful struggles of a poverty-stricken home, it might well be that the elevation would dazzle her for a time. I thought it all over as I sat upon an ottoman in the middle of the large formally-furnished drawing-room, awaiting her arrival.

There was a sharp ring, a bustle in the hall, then the door opened and little Miss Deane stood before me. She looked about sixteen, and was small of her age. Her features were regular and delicate, her eyebrows arched and clearly defined, her complexion perfectly colourless, her expression very grave. I had looked for a little shrinking from the new scene, and for some natural diffidence at a first meeting with strangers; but she came forward at once, apparently without the least shyness, and held out her hand to

me, not cordially, but with instinctive courtesy.

'You must be cold and tired,' I said rather nervously, for her composure made me feel a little shy. Won't you come to the fire, and will you have some tea?'

'No, thank you. But if you please I should like to go to my own room.' There was composure in her manner, but the voice that answered me was very sweet and childlike, and now, when she lifted her deep brown eyes to mine, I began to feel drawn towards her. She had taken off her hat, and the soft wavy locks of dark hair which clustered low over her forehead shadowed the somewhat too severe outlines of her

face.

Apparently it was not the first constraint of her arrival which made her words so few, and her composure so repelling. With her uncle she was equally unembarassed, quiet, and undemonstrative; she was very grateful to him, and she said so; but whether her outward calmness proceeded from indifference or suppressed excitement I could not tell. In spite of her childish looks it was impossible to caress, and equally impossible to contradict her. She never seemed to need sympathy or encouragement, and yet she was not uncourteous; she was simply gentle, independent, and reserved. I thought it was best to let time do its work, and I let her alone; but I sometimes wished that she might find it in her heart to confide in me.

One day I could not help saying, 'Do you not feel a little strange, Laurette, in this big house, alone with Mr. Deane and me? never a little homesick?'

Are

you

'No, Miss Ford,' she said, and she looked up with a little smile; 'I am not homesick, because I know that I shall go home some day. One can always wait, you know.'

'I don't quite understand,' I said, feeling perplexed as to the meaning of her words. 'It is all changed

now.

Mr. Deane wants you to live with him always. Your aunt would not wish to take you back, away from all that you have here, even if you should wish to leave Mr. Deane, which is what you are thinking of, I suppose.'

'I shall go back to my old home some day,' she persisted. But then she turned to her work, and would say no more.

She was not repellant or uncourteous, and yet it seemed impossible to know more about her. What seemed her old habits were kept up in her new circumstances. Nothing appeared to dazzle or surprise her. Day after day she sat down to her sewing, as I suppose she had sat down to it in her aunt's little parlour. The yards of beautiful embroidery which passed through her little hands were beyond anything that I had ever supposed it to be possible for women's hands to compass, but she never seemed tired. After a time, I began to suspect that it went to her aunt: it was finished, folded up, and then it disappeared. Possibly she helped, as hitherto, to support the family by needlework. Certainly she spent very little upon herself, though her uncle behaved most liberally to her in respect of pocket-money.

It is true her wants were few. Her dress was always plain and simple, but somehow it suited her slight, childish figure better than gay bright colours, and I did not wish to see it altered, though, as a rule, I like to see young people dress like young people. As to her reading, it was confined to fairy tales on week-days and her Bible on Sundays: more had evidently never been a habit with her. Yet she did not seem to want food for thought. Whilst at work I am sure her mind was ever busy, and when twilight darkened round us, she would lay her work aside, and creeping to the window, curl herself up on the window-seat and sit there, looking out into the street, as the dark

ness deepened and the lamps were lighted, and the people passed up and down; dreaming her own thoughts, no doubt, and seeing her

own visions.

She went about amongst the neighbours with me, and they all made a great deal of 'little Miss Deane,' as she was always called in the but she seemed to care nothing for admiration, and she did not really get on with them.

square;

Mr. Deane had said that he looked upon her as a daughter, so of course every one knew that she would be an heiress, and perhaps they sought her the more upon that account; but she never seemed to see it; only, as I have said before, she did not get on with them. It astonished and vexed me a little.

Why do you not talk more, Laurette?' I said; 'you will make people think you proud. Why do you not make more friends? don't you like people?'

'I like you, Miss Ford,' she said; and, undemonstrative as she was, the simple assertion gratified me.

By degress she told me more of her former life. She talked of her sickly, patient aunt, of the struggles for bread, of their goodness to her. But some day she would make them happy.

You mean when you marry, I suppose? You think that you will marry and be rich some day?' I asked curiously.

'I don't know,' she said, and let her work fall suddenly.

CHAPTER II.

It was nearly Christmas-time when a new element was introduced into the quiet monotony of our life. Mr. Deane had been looking harassed for some time, and complaining of overwork. At this time he engaged as confidential clerk a young Canadian who had just come to England; and applied for employment at Deane & Co.'s

firm in the City. Mr. Deane still went to his office every day, but he had generally business to transact at home, and it was principally to assist him in this that Mr. Charleton was engaged.

I heard of the plan with placid indifference, little thinking what a change he was to make in my little Laurette's destiny. Yet now, as I think of it, I remember so well his first arrival.

The tall, athletic young man, standing in the fire-light with an amused smile upon his face as Laurette, who had been dreaming as usual, curled up in the windowseat, came forward, pushing aside the curtain and looked at him, opening her dark eyes wide as if she saw the realisation of a vision. What a pretty picture it made! As she stood hesitating, with one hand still upon the curtain, with her hair clustering round her forehead, and a little flush of surprise upon her face, she looked so much younger than she really was that I was not surprised at his taking her for a child.

'Won't you shake hands with me?' he said, still smiling, and holding out his hand, and then Laurette stepped forward and put her slender little hand in his.

I do not quite know how it was, but in a very short time Charleton came to be quite at home in the house. Mr. Deane placed great confidence in him, although it was not his habit to lean much upon any one; indeed, he admitted him to an intimate footing at which I secretly wondered, more especially as Charleton's personal demeanour denoted none of the caution which should have characterised Mr. Deane's confidential clerk. I suppose he was discreet about business affairs, and he certainly must have shown great ability thus to obtain and retain his em ployer's favour; but his manners were singularly free and open, and