who had an ear for music, was wroth at him every Sunday, though he himself went to church for no loftier object than to look when he could at Miss Donne. So John scraped acquaintance with the rector at Shareham, expressed himself as being deeply interested in church music, got leave to try the organ, of which instrument he knew next to nothing, enthusiastically pronounced upon it, and offered at once to subscribe fifteen pounds per annum towards the expenses of a salaried organist. The rector jumped at the offer, and John almost swore him to secresy, using such vehemence in his request that the rector thought him a sort of bashful saint. Then the young pretender incited the rector to offer the berth to the arrant duffer who tortured the churchgoers at St. Stephen's, and the rector did it, setting another five to John's fifteen and making the pay twenty pounds a year. The arrant duffer also jumped, and went about inflated, thinking himself a pearl amongst organists. Next, the secret schemer told the vicar of St. Stephen's that he had a very angel

of an organist in his congregation, and told Dinah also that the post of organist was vacant, and indeed there was no one left to play at all. So Ethel got one of the smaller longings of her soul, and the congregation within the Martyr's walls were no longer martyred as of old.

At first, when John went to church after completing this arrangement, he felt that he had cheated himself. Ethel was no longer in her old place to be furtively stared at. But he got the better of this grief in a while, and many a time the sound of the pealing organ poured peace into his heart and sacred joy; and to Ethel-while she played it-there was no longer any sorrow in the world, and she would leave the church radiant, and her sabbaths at least were filled with a tranquillity she had never hoped to taste again.

It came to her ears after a while that all this was John Keen's doing. Her pride prompted her to surrender her joy rather than owe it to him, but she had not the heart for this extreme measure. She contented herself with snubbing John, and he bore it with wonderful meekness.

CHAPTER XV.

THE Saracen having fallen into new hands, assumed a new aspect and a new title. The real old Saracen, who for many a summer day had looked on the sunshiny street with bilious eyes, and on many a winter night had shrieked and creaked complainingly against the stormy weather, was taken down and relegated to a lumber room, and ultimately chopped up for firewood. For weeks the front of the house was obscured by scaffolding, and quite a little army of men were at work about it. Finally it came out with plate-glass windows and stuccoed front, with a great gilded sign which expressed it as the Saracen and Railway Hotel. Within, things were changed as much as without, and Meshach and Aminadab and

the rest found it on its re-opening night no fit home for them and their memories, and so carried themselves elsewhere with a general feeling of being uprooted.

Prosperous George Bushell, pausing before the house one sunny morning, felt his heart lifted at the sight. The Saracen and Railway Hotel by Andrew Royce was nothing to him, except as a token of the removal of the Saracen by Daniel Banks, and the consequent removal of Daniel and his daughter. They had gone away, having made no sign, and he was once more safe in the possession of his fortune. The heiress had left him in undisputed possession of the field; and although he could not understand its why and wherefore, he appreciated the fact. He could scarcely resist the smile that strove to curve his features as he looked at the transformed structure.

'Hullo! Bushell!' cried a voice, and he turned to face a middle-aged man sitting in a neat dog-cart, between the shafts of which stood a slashing-looking bay mare .The middle-aged man was loud of voice, florid of complexion,

and cheery of aspect, and he wore an enormous beard of chestnut colour, laced, but only laced, with grey.

'Good mornin', Sir Sydney,' said old George as he turned. Fine growin' mornin' for the crops, isn't it?'

George had no interest in farming, but Sir Sydney Cheston had, having but recently taken Quarrymoor Farm upon his hands, as Mr. Bushell knew.

'Splendid weather,' said the Baronet. 'Going up to the court? Shall I give you a lift ? '

Why, thank you, Sir Sydney,' said George in his provincial slow drawl; 'I don't mind if I do ride. It's a goodish pace up theer.'

'So it is,' assented Sir Sydney; and the old fellow, moving as heavily and deliberately as he spoke, climbed into the dog-cart, and took his seat by the Baronet's side.

'Nobody iver expected to see me a-ridin' alongside of a baronet,' he said to himself, as the owner of the mare touched her lightly with his whip and set her going.