“What was that, Mr. Mangan?” she asked.

“He said he was too busy to think of getting married.”

“Oh, indeed?” she said, with her eyes directed towards the ground.  “We—­we have always been expecting to hear of his being engaged to some young lady—­seeing he is made so much of in London—­” She could say no more, for now they were arrived at the doctor’s house, which was separated from the highway by a little strip of front garden.  They passed in through the gate and found the door left open for them.

“Well, Miss Savonarola,” said Lionel, as he hung up his hat in the hall and turned to address her, “how have you been all this time?”

“I have been very well, Mr. Pagan,” said she, smiling.

“And how are all those juvenile Londoners that you’ve planted about in the cottages?”

“They’re getting on nicely, every one of them,” said she, with quite an air of pride; and then she added, “When is your Munificence going to give me another subscription?”

“Just now, Francie,” was the instant reply.  “How much do you want?”

“As much as ever you can afford,” said she.

He pulled from his pocket a handful of loose coin, and began to pick out the sovereigns.  But Miss Francie, with a little touch of her fingers, put the money away.

“No, Linn, not from you.  You’ve given me too much already.  You give too freely; I like to have a little difficulty in obtaining subscriptions; it feels nicer somehow.  But if my funds should run very low, then I’ll come to you, Linn.”

“Whenever you like, Francie,” said he, carelessly; he poured the money into his pocket again and bade Maurice Mangan come up to his room, to get the dust of travel removed from his hands and face before going in to luncheon.

Then while Mangan was busy with his ablutions in this small upper chamber, Lionel drew a chair to the open window and gazed absently abroad on the wide stretch of country visible from the doctor’s house.  It was a familiar view; yet it was one not easy to get tired of; and of course on such a morning as this it lost none of its charm.  Everywhere in the warm breeze and the sunshine there was a universal rustling and trembling and glancing of all beautiful things—­of the translucent foliage of the limes, the pendulous blossoms of lilacs and laburnums, the swaying branches of the larch, and the masses of blue forget-me-nots in the garden below.  Then there were all the hushed sounds of the country:  the distant, quick footfall of a horse on some dusty road; the warning cluck of a thrush to her young ones down there among the bushes; the glad voices and laughter of some girls in an adjacent garden—­they, too, likely to be soon away from the maternal nest; the crow of a cock pheasant from the margin of the wood; the clear, ringing melody of an undiscoverable lark.  Everywhere white light, blue skies, and shadows of great clouds slow-sailing over the young