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128 anxious that his companion should be invited to stop at Tolldale. He had brought the Frenchman to the Priory, but he had only done so because Monsieur Bourdon was one of those pertinacious gentlemen not easily to be shaken off by the victims who are so unfortunate as to have fallen into their power.

“Well,” said the artist, as the two men walked away from the Priory in the murky dusk, “what do you think of her?”

“Of which her? La belle future, or the otha-i-r?”

“What do you think of Mrs. Monckton? I don’t want your opinion of my future wife, thank you.”

Monsieur Bourdon looked at his companion with a smile that was half a sneer.

“He is so proud, this dear Monsieur Lan—Darrell,” he said. “You ask of me what I think of Mrs. Monck-a-tonne,” he continued in English; “shall I tell you what I think without reserve.”

“Yes, of course.”

“I think then that she is a woman of a thousand—in all that there is of resolute—in all that there is of impulsive—in all that there is of daring—a woman unapproachable, unsurpassable; beautiful to damn the angels! If in the little business that we came to talk about lately, this woman is to be in the way; I say to you, my friend, beware! If there is to be any contest between you and her, beware!”

“Pray don’t go into heroics, Bourdon,” answered Launcelot Darrell, with evident displeasure. Vanity was one of the artist’s strongest vices; and he writhed at the notion of being considered inferior to any one, above all, to a woman. “I knew Mrs. Monckton, and I knew that she was a clever, high-spirited girl, before to-day. I don’t want you to tell me that. As to any contest between her and me, there’s no chance of that arising. She doesn’t stand in my way.”

“And you refuse to tell your devoted friend the name of the person who does stand in your way?” murmured Monsieur Bourdon, in his most insinuating tones.

“Because that information cannot be of the least consequence to my devoted friend,” answered Launcelot Darrell, coolly. “If my devoted friend has helped me, he will expect to be paid for his help, I dare say.”

“But, certainly!” cried the Frenchman, with an air of candour; “you will recompense me for my services if we are successful; and above all for the suggestion which first put into your head the idea—”

“The suggestion which prompted me to the commission of a—”

“Hush, my friend, even the trees in this wood may have ears.”

“Yes, Bourdon,” continued Launcelot, bitterly, “I have good reason to thank you, and to reward you. From the hour in which we first met until now, you have contrived to do me some noble services.”

Monsieur Bourdon laughed a dry, mocking laugh, which had something of the diabolically grotesque in its sound.

“Ah, what a noble creation of the poet’s mind is Faust!” he exclaimed; “that excellent, that amiable hero; who would never, of his own will, do any harm; but who is always led into the commission of all manner of wickedness by Mephistopheles. And then, when this noble but unhappy man is steeped to the very lips in sin, he can turn upon that wicked counsellor and say, ‘Demon, it is for your pleasure these crimes have been committed!’ Of course he forgets, this impulsive Faust, that it was he, and not Mephistopheles, who was in love with poor Gretchen!”

“Don’t be a fool, Bourdon,” muttered the artist, impatiently. “You know what I mean. When I started in life I was too proud to commit a dishonourable action. It is you, and such as you, who have made me what I am.”

“Bah!” exclaimed the Frenchman, snapping his fingers with a gesture of unutterable contempt. “You asked me just now to spare you my heroics; I say the same thing now to you. Do not let us talk to each other like the personages of a drama at the Ambigu. It is your necessities that have made you what you are, and that will keep you what you are so long as they exist and are strong enough to push you to disagreeable courses. Who says it is pleasant to go out of the straight line? Not I, Monsieur Lance! Believe me, it is more pleasant, as well as more proper, to be virtuous than to be wicked. Give me an annuity of a few thousand francs, and I will be the most honourable of men. You are afraid of the work that lies before you, because it is difficult, because it is dangerous; but not because it is dishonourable. Let us speak frankly, and call things by their right names. You want to inherit this old man’s fortune.”

“Yes,” answered Launcelot Darrell. “I have been taught from my babyhood to expect it. I have a right to expect it.”

“Precisely; and you don’t want this other person, whose name you won’t tell me, to get it.”

“No.”

“Very well, then. Do not let us have any further dispute about the matter. Do not abuse poor Mephistopheles because he has shown the desire to help you to gain your own ends; and has already by decision and promptitude of action achieved that which you would never have effected by yourself alone. Tell Mephistopheles to go about his business, and he will go. But he will not stay to be made a—what you call—an animal which is turn out into the wilderness with other people’s sins upon his shoulders?—a scape-goat; or a paws-cat, which pull hot chestnuts from the fire, and burn her fingers in the interests of her friend. The chestnuts, in this case, here, are very hot, my friend; but I risk to burn my fingers with the shells in the hope to partake the inside of the nut.”

“I never meant to make a scapegoat of you, nor a cat’s-paw,” said Launcelot Darrell, with some alarm in his tone. “I didn’t mean to offend you, Bourdon. You’re a very good fellow in your way, I know; and, if your notions are a little loose upon some subjects, why, as you say, a man’s necessities are apt to get the upper hand of his principles. If Maurice de Crespigny has chosen to make an iniquitous will, to the ruin of