"So I do, mamma, as liking goes. There is less to dislike about him than about most men. He is quiet and distingué." Gwendolen so far spoke with a pouting sort of gravity; but suddenly she recovered some of her mischievousness, and her face broke into a smile as she added—"Indeed he has all the qualities that would make a husband tolerable—battlement, veranda, stables, &c., no grins and no glass in his eye."
"Do be serious with me for a moment, dear. Am I to understand that you mean to accept him?"
"Oh pray, mamma, leave me to myself," said Gwendolen, with a pettish distress in her voice.
And Mrs Davilow said no more.
When they got home Gwendolen declared that she would not dine. She was tired, and would come down in the evening after she had taken some rest. The probability that her uncle would hear what had passed did not trouble her. She was convinced that whatever he might say would be on the side of her accepting Grandcourt, and she wished to accept him if she could. At this moment she would willingly have had weights hung on her own caprice.
Mr Gascoigne did hear—not Gwendolen's answers repeated verbatim, but a softened general-
