members to Parliament, you will bring in a bill
to put down beer-barrels, and you will have
your revenge.

A RENT IN A CLOUD.

IN TWENTY-FOUR CHAPTERS.

CHAPTER XXI. THE RETURN.

WHEN Calvert found himself alone in the
drawing-room, he felt as if he had never
been away. Everything was so exactly as he
left it. There was the sofa drawn close to the
window of the flower-garden where Florence
used to recline; there the little work-table with
the tall glass that held her hyacinths, the flowers
she was so fond of; there the rug for her terrier
to lie on. Yonder, under the flg-tree, hung
the cage with her favourite canary; and here
were the very books she used to read long ago
——Petrarch and Tennyson and Uhland. There
was a flower to mark a place in the volume
of Uhland, and it was at a little poem they had
once read together. How full of memories are
these old rooms, where we have dreamed away
some weeks of life, if not in love, in something
akin to it, and thus more alive to the influences
of externals than if further gone in the passion!
There was not a spot, not a chair, nor a window-
seat that did not remind Calvert of some incident
of the past. He missed his favourite song, " A
place in thy memory, dearest," from the piano,
and he sought for it and put it back where it
used to be; he then went over to her table to
arrange the books as they were wont to be long
ago, and came suddenly upon a small morocco
case. He opened it. It was a miniature of
Loyd, the man he hated the most on earth.
It was an ill-done portrait, and gave an affected
tboughtfulness and elevation to his calm features
which imparted insufferable pretension to them:
Calvert held out the picture at arm's length, and
laughed scornfully as he looked at it. He had
but time to lay it down on the table when
Emily entered the room. She approached him
hurriedly, and with an agitated manner. " Oh,
Colonel Calvert——" she began.

"Why not Harry, brother Harry, as I used
to be, Milly dearest," said he, as he caught her
hand in both his own. " What has happened to
forfeit for me my old place in your esteem?"

"Nothing, nothing, but all is so changed;
you have grown to be such a great man, and we
have become lost to all that goes on in the
world."

"And where is your sister, will she not come
to see me?"

"You startled her, you gave her such a shock,
when you stood up in the boat and returned her
salute, that she was quite overcome, and has gone
to her room. Aunt Grainger is with her, and
told me to say—that is, she hoped, if you would
not take it ill, or deem it unkind——"

"Go on, dearest; nothing that comes from
your lips can possibly seem unkind; go on."

"But I cannot go on," she cried, and burst
into tears and covered her face with her hands.

"I never thought—so little forethought has
selfishness—that I was to bring sorrow and
trouble under this roof. Go back, and tell
your aunt that I hope she will favour me with
five minutes of her company; that I see, what
I greatly blame myself for not seeing before,
how full of sad memories my presence here
must prove. Go, darling, say this, and bid me
good-by before you go."

"Oh, Harry, do not say this. I see you are
angry with us. I see you think us all unkind;
but it was the suddenness of your coming; and
Florence has grown so nervous of late, so
disposed to give way to all manner of fancies."

"She imagines, in fact," said he, haughtily,
"that I have come back to persecute her with
attentions which she has already rejected. Isn't
that so?"

"No. I don't think—I mean Florence could
never think that when you knew of her
engagement—knew that within a few months at
furthest——"

"Pardon me, if I stop you. Tell your sister
from me that she has nothing to apprehend
from any pretensions of mine. I can see that
you think me changed, Milly; grown very old
and very worn. Well, go back, and tell her that
the inward change is far greater than the
outward one. Mad Harry has become as tame and
quiet and common-place as that gentleman in
the morocco case yonder; and if she will
condescend to see me, she may satisfy herself that
neither of us in future need be deemed dangerous
to the other."

There was an insolent pride in the manner of
his delivery of these words that made Emily's
cheek burn as she listened, and all that her aunt
had often told her of " Calvert insolence" now
came fully to her mind.

"I will go and speak to my aunt," she said,
at last.

"Do so," said he, carelessly, as he threw
himself into a chair, and took up the book that lay
nearest to him. He had not turned over many
pages—he had read none—when Miss Grainger
entered. She was flushed and flurried in manner;
but tried to conceal it.

"We are giving you a very strange welcome,
Colonel—Mr. Calvert; but you know us all of
old, and you know that dear Florry is so easily
agitated and overcome. She is better now,
and if you will come up-stairs to the little drawing-
room, she'll see you."

"I am all gratitude," said he, with a low bow;
"but I think it is, perhaps, better not to
inconvenience her. A visit of constraint would be, to
me at least, very painful. I'd rather leave the
old memories of my happiness here undashed by
such a shadow. Go back, therefore, and say
that I think I understand the reason of her
reserve; that I am sincerely grateful for the
thoughtful kindness she has been minded to
observe towards me. You need not add," said
he, with a faint smile, " that the consideration
in the present case was unnecessary. I am not
so impressionable as I used to be; but assure
her that I am very sorry for it, and that Colonel