CHAPTER VI.

"The charm's wound up."

Shakespeare.

66

WELL, two months have now expired, and yet Mr. Wilton has not made his appearance," remarked Mrs. Grenville to her companion, as they sat, on a beautiful forenoon, near one of the balconied windows.

"It will not be two months till Wednesday next, calculating by the weeks," said the party addressed;" and not until Saturday if we calculate by months."

"Dear me! what a talent you have for chrono

logy, Frances! I declare, if my poor dear husband were alive, and heard you speak of dates with such exactitude, he would have given you his bill-book to keep. But you are a happy girl. Heigho!"

"And I am sure you have every reason to be happy too," rejoined her companion.

"Yes; I have sundry books on cookery to study, and a treatise on teething has been dedicated to me; I have a house to sit and ennui myself to death in-a carriage to drive in, and can thus see the streets of London, all the other carriages, carts, and people on the various pavements, without the fatigue of walking to look at them; I have a circle of friends who play at whist and keep poodles, and a harp that I can't keep in tune. I am a very happy person, certainly!"

Nay, dear madam; this is the very petulance of good fortune. I know no one who has more reason to be happy than yourself: you have youth, beauty, wealth"

"Stop! stop! I am not so very young, so

very beautiful, nor so very rich, as to be happy on that account alone; and if I were the whole three to a superlative degree, you see no good comes of it." "How-what do you mean?"

"Tush! girl; you know well enough-but, hark! a double knock. Now I shall have a visit from old Lady Winterblossom, who, because she still wears a widow's cap, thinks fit to

"Mr. Wilton and Colonel Gascoigne," said a servant, entering with two cards.

"Shew them up. Well," continued Helen, as the servant retired, "now for some shrivelled, withered, bilious child of the East-some vile curry-consumer. Psha! how I do hate these old highdried-"

But here the widow was interrupted in her expressions of dislike by the entrance of Wilton, with a tall, handsome man of about five-and-thirty, whose bronzed, but fresh-coloured cheek-open, manly brow-and rich, dark hair-gave a fine expression to his well-chiselled features, and enhanced his gentlemanly and soldier-like bearing.

The widow did not rise-she actually started to her feet, for she remembered the Colonel's face, although she had forgotten-perhaps had not distinctly heard his name, the evening in which they had met.

Wilton was welcomed, and the Colonel introduced.

"Thank Heaven for all things!" thought the widow, as the Colonel, with easy politeness, seated himself near her.

Wilton had taken his place near to Frances.

The conversation was animated, pleasing, but not general. The rich flush on Frances's cheek, and the joy that was sparkling in her fine blue eyes, made her look more lovely than ever; while Wilton, charmed and fascinated, looked on her with an earnest fondness, which a spectator would have had no difficulty in interpreting.

But there was no spectator here. The Colonel was wholly engrossed with the charming widow, who, on her part, was gratified by the attentions of such a man. For the Colonel, although he looked

the beau ideal of a fortune-hunter, was in reality no such thing; but a man of good property, and of some political influence. His very advantages of person, however, had rendered him no great favourite with match-making mothers, from the old apothegm, to which they stuck closely—namely, "that a man who has received Fortune's blessings in the way of person, is never favoured with it in the way of purse." purse." Nor could the Colonel's handsome bays, smart servants, and elegant carriage, convince them; and once or twice, when on the eve of marriage, this very circumstance had caused it to be broken off-for, to a high-spirited man, perhaps there is no idea more vexatious than the conviction that he is deemed sordid by her whom he loves.

After a visit, prolonged beyond what the strict rules of etiquette set down, the gentlemen departed; but they left their hearts behind them, and took away others in exchange.

They called again on the following day; the next day and the next was the same-and the