affectionate warmth. Then he held her out at arm's-length, and for the
several hundredth time admired her handsome, clear-skinned,
high-coloured, gipsy face, her black, rather wild eyes, and the black
hair wreathed round her head in so heavy a mass.

"It has been an awful long time between the kisses," he said.

She sighed a sigh of content and laughed softly. Then she said: "I
sometimes think that you must have had a great deal of practice."

"No," said Mr. Manley firmly. "I have never had occasion to be in
love before."

He put her back into the chair from which he had lifted her, sat down
facing her, and gazed at her with adoring eyes. He was truly very much in
love with her.

They were excellent complements the one of the other. If Mr. Manley had
the brains for two--indeed, he had the brains for half a dozen--she had
the character for two. Her chin was very unlike the chin of an eagle. She
was not, indeed, lacking in brains. Her brow forbade the supposition. But
hers was rather the practical intelligence, his the creative. That she
had the force of character, on occasion the fierceness, which he lacked,
was no small source of her attraction for him.

"And how was the hog this morning?" she said, ready to be soothing.

"The hog" was their pet name for Lord Loudwater.

"Beastly. He's an utterly loathsome fellow," said Mr. Manley with