Those fillets, now--I wish you could taste 'em at my club; but we give our chef a thousand a year, and he drives up every day in his brougham." The novels of Charles Langholm were chiefly remarkable for their intricate plots, and for the hope of better things that breathed through the cheap sensation of the best of them.

But it was a hope that had been deferred a good many years.

His manner was better than his matter; indeed, an incongruous polish was said by the literary to prevent Langholm from being a first favorite either with the great public or the little critics.

As a maker of plots, however, he still had humble points; and Rachel assured him that she had burnt her candle all night in order to solve one of his ingenious mysteries.
"What!" he cried; "you call yourself a lady, and you don't look at the end before you reach it ?" "Not when it's a good book." "Well, you have pitched on about the best of a bad lot; and it's a satisfaction to know you didn't cut the knot it took some months to tie." Rachel was greatly interested.

She had never before met a literary man; had no idea how the trick was done; and she asked many of those ingenuous questions which seldom really displease the average gentleman of this type.