A little after nine Miss Lecky left Flora at her home. As soon as she got into the drawing-room she threw herself into an armchair, and then proceeded to give an account of their adventures.


[CHAPTER III.]

We must now turn our attention to some of our other friends of the croquet party, and especially to one about whom, as we have already seen, Flora Adair's thoughts were not a little occupied, namely, Mr. Earnscliffe, in order to endeavour to learn something of his appearance and his mode of life.

He lived in the Piazza di Trajana, in a handsome and thoroughly Italian apartment on the second floor—or, as it is more properly called, secondo piano—of a house situated at the lower end of the Piazza, nearly opposite to the church of Santa Maria di Loretto.

He was seated in an armchair by a table covered with books and writing materials,—to all appearance he had been reading. His tall and strongly-built form seemed made for activity and energy, and in keeping therewith was the well-shaped hand, which rested upon the arm of his chair,—a hand full of vigour, one of those which show at a glance that its support could be trusted to in any trial or danger. His brown, yet almost auburn, hair was brushed off from a high forehead, but one marked with many a line,—too many for a man of six-and-thirty. Byron speaks of

"Those furrows which the burning share
Of sorrow ploughs untimely there;"

and so, perhaps, was it with Mr. Earnscliffe. His large blue eyes had a strangely stern expression in them, "pour les doux yeux bleus," but at times, when moved by even a momentary feeling of enthusiasm, there beamed in them a winning softness which looked far more natural to him than that strange sternness. It may be, however, that this was

"A light of other days."