`Yes, it would,' cried the other, following him into the hall. `If you've the heart of a man it would be the very ticket for you. It's just this, my lad,' he continued, rather lowering his voice, but not enough to prevent me from hearing every word he said, though the half-closed door stood between us: `I think you're an ill- used man--nay, now, don't flare up--I don't want to offend you: it's only my rough way of talking. I must speak right out you know, or else not at all;--and I'm come--stop now! let me explain--I'm come to offer you my services, for though Huntingdon is my friend, he's a devilish scamp as we all know, and I'll be your friend for the nonce. I know what it is you want, to make matters straight: it's just to exchange a shot with him, and then you'll feel yourself all right again; and if an accident happens--why, that'll be all right too, I dare say, to a desperate fellow like you.--me now! give me your hand, and don't look so black upon it. Name time and place, and I'll manage the rest.'

`That,' answered the more low, deliberate voice of Lord Lowborough, `is just the remedy my own heart-- or the devil within it, suggested--to meet him, and not to sever without blood. Whether I or he should fall--or both, it would be an inexpressible relief to me, if--'

`Just so! Well then--'

`No!' exclaimed his lordship with deep, determined emphasis. `Though I hate him from my heart, and should rejoice at any calamity that could befall him--I'll leave him to God; and though I abhor my own life, I'll leave that too, to Him that gave'

`But you see in this case,' pleaded Hattersley--

`I'll not hear you!' exclaimed his companion, hastily turning away. `Not another word! I've enough to do against the fiend within me.'

`Then you're a white livered fool, and I wash my hands of you,' grumbled the tempter as he swung himself round and departed.

`Right, right, Lord Lowborough!' cried I, darting out and clasping his burning hand, as he was moving away to the stairs. `I begin to think the world is not worthy of you!'

Not understanding this sudden ebullition, he turned upon me with a stare of gloomy, bewildered amazement that made me ashamed of the impulse to which I had yielded; but soon a more humanized expression dawned upon his countenance, and, before I could withdraw my hand, he pressed it kindly, while a gleam of genuine feeling flashed from his eyes as he murmured,--

`God help us both!'

`Amen!' responded I; and we parted.

I returned to the drawing-room, where, doubtless, my presence would be expected by most, desired by one or two. In the ante-room was Mr. Hattersley, railing against Lord Lowborough's poltroonery before a select audience, viz. Mr. Huntingdon, who was lounging against the table exulting in his own treacherous villainy and laughing his victim to scorn, and Mr. Grimsby, standing by, quietly rubbing his hands and chuckling with fiendish satisfaction. At the glance I gave them in passing, Hattersley stopped short in his animadversions and stared like a bull calf, Grimsby glowered upon me with a leer of malignant ferocity, and my husband muttered a coarse and brutal malediction.

In the drawing-room I found Lady Lowborough, evidently in no very enviable state of mind, and struggling hard to conceal her discomposure by an overstrained affectation of unusual cheerfulness and vivacity, very uncalled for under the circumstances, for she had herself given the company to understand that her husband had received unpleasant intelligence from home, which necessitated his immediate departure, and that he had suffered it so to bother his mind that it had brought on a bilious headache, owing to which and the preparations he judged necessary to hasten his departure, she believed they would not