CHAPTER LXIII.

"VARIUM ET MUTABILE."

"You escaped us last night, Mrs Dudley," said one of her acquaintances next morning.

"Yes. I wanted to watch the dancing; but the salon gets so warm in the evening, I could not stand it. We went for a stroll instead."

"Neither of you gives us too much of your company, certainly. I am anxious to hear your husband's opinion of a leader in this morning's _Times_."

"Here he comes, then," said Mona, as Ralph appeared with a rug over his arm. "Captain Bruce wants to speak to you, dear. You will know where to find me by-and-bye."

She strolled on into the woods, and ensconced herself comfortably on a gnarled old trunk, to wait for her husband. It was not many minutes before he joined her.

"That's right!" he said, throwing himself on the grass at her feet, with a long sigh of content. "How you spoil one, dear, for other people's conversation!"

"I have not had a very alarming competitor this morning," she said, smiling.

"No; but if he had been an archangel, it would have made little difference. Go on, lady mine, talk to me--talk to me 'at lairge.' I want to hear your views about everything. Is not it delightful that we know each other so little?"

Mona laughed softly and then grew very grave.

"I hope you will say twenty years hence, 'How delightful it is that we know each other so well!'"

"I will say it now with all my heart! But it is very interesting to live when every little event of life, every picture one sees, every