A Little Rebel

s temper; but he is more excellent who c

wife," says Hardinge. He knocks the ash off his cigar, and after meditating

ays the professor, idly tapping his forefinger on the table nea

never grasp another!" says Mr. Hardinge,

ofessor. "It looks as though your time were n

I drop in for a smoke with you," says the younger man. "You began very well, with that s

se?" says the profess

since the afternoon-the afternoon of this very day-when he had seen Perpetua sitting in that open carriage. He had only been half glad when Harold Hardinge-a young man, and yet, strange to say, his most intimate friend-had dropped in to smoke a pipe with him. Hardinge was fond

, a dark moustache and a happy manner, Mr. Hardinge laughs his

he. "Go on, Curzon

terest you," sa

ing; I've got to keep an eye on you, or else

ssor move

ow you knew

find you absent and Mrs. Mulcahy in possession, pretending t

e professo

y. He's that distracted over a young lad

s suggestive of the horror I was experiencing, and finally I covered my face wit

ye scamp o' the world. 'Tis a ward th

d if you had taken it badly, and what the docto

or the professor. I haven't seen the young lady, I confess, but I'm cock-sure that she's g

face rises before him-and then a laughing one. "No," says

then, after a kindly survey of his companion's feature

oesn't seem to get on with the aunt to whom her poor father sent her-he is dead-and

ng his cigar from his lips, and letting the smoke curl upwards slowly, thoughtful

essor, with anxious haste.

bod

er aunt's. If she were to go to her, she wou

er name? What a pecu

ynter,"

Highflown! Well, your Lady Highflown doesn't seem to have many

essor is

ning for the freedom of her old home. And, I must say,

say she had

whisky and soda, but pauses to pat th

up to defend her at every corner. You should get her a satisfactory home as soon as you can-it would ease your

rily, "any and everywhere. She is a lady. She has been well brough

't s

both men at this moment. It is a most peculiar so

"Everett" (the man in the ro

here," says t

is a rustle of silken skirts, and there-there, where the gas-li

feet. His face is deadly whit

essor; it would be imposs

. "I have done with Aunt Jane, for ever," casting w

lack that sparkles and trembles and shines with every movement. She seems, indeed, to be hung in jet, and out of all this sombre gleaming her white neck rises, pure and fresh and sweet as a little child's.

neck, her fingers. Her father, when luck came to him, had found h

he room on Perpetua's entrance, is now standing staring at her as if bewitched. His expression

ould be impossible to go without hearing the termination of this exciting episode. Everett's rooms being provi

ofessor is star

happened