"Can I speak with you, Fanny, for a few minutes?" said he.

"Yes, certainly."

"I want to consult. I want your opinion."

"My opinion!" she cried, shrinking from such a compliment, highly as it gratified her.

"Yes, your advice and opinion. I do not know what to do. This acting scheme gets worse and worse, you see. They have chosen almost as bad a play as they could, and now, to complete the business, are going to ask the help of a young man very slightly known to any of us. This is the end of all the privacy and propriety which was talked about at first. I know no harm of Charles Maddox; but the excessive intimacy which must spring from his being admitted among us in this manner is highly objectionable, the _more_ than intimacy--the familiarity. I cannot think of it with any patience; and it does appear to me an evil of such magnitude as must, _if_ _possible_, be prevented. Do not you see it in the same light?"

"Yes; but what can be done? Your brother is so determined."

"There is but _one_ thing to be done, Fanny. I must take Anhalt myself. I am well aware that nothing else will quiet Tom."