Patty roused herself to do justice to the occasion. She set forth a table with her best damask and the few old pieces of family silver; she spread out the choicest of her culinary stores, and invited Gregory Leslie to dine, and Mattie crowned the board with flowers, and put on her best dress, while Doris played the young _fiancee_ to sweet perfection. Yet the keen eyes of the artist read not only Mattie's hidden pain, but Patty's sorrow and anxiety, and saw that Mark was not a rural father, joyful in a good match for his child, but a man in dire perplexity, uncertain what was right and wise for him to do. "This girl and all her surroundings are a mystery," said the artist to himself. Earle Moray saw no mystery; all was broad day in the light of his love. It seemed high noon even, when he went home at night, and the heavens were lit with starry hosts. Doris had kept him late, not unmindful of the mother watching alone to hear her boy's tale of wooing, mindful of her, rather, and finding it a pleasure to tantalize the unknown mother by a long delay. But once free of the beguiling voice of his little siren, Earle remembered heartily his mother, and hurried to her as if his feet were winged with the sandals of Apollo. He flung open the gate with a crash; his joyous tread rang on the gravel walk; he dashed into the house, and into the sitting-room, and dropping on his knees by his mother, clasped his arms about her waist and cried: "Mother! she is mine!" "Heaven bless you, my son!" said his mother; but she sighed. "You will go and see her, mother, to-morrow? You will see how wonderfully lovely she is; witty and accomplished, too; you are sure to be charmed, mother!" If he had chosen a beggar maid, like King Cophetua, the mother would have made the best of it. Yet in her secret heart Mrs. Moray thought Earle too young to marry, and, besides, this girl was very young, and who knew if she would be a good wife. Earle's poetizing and dreaming were bad enough, but his love-making was even worse! Still his mother hid her fears, and sympathized and helped him plan his future, while in her soul she blessed Mark Brace for that year's delay. Accustomed from childhood to open his heart to his mother, Earle poured forth to her the full story of his love, his adoration, his intoxicating passion for Doris. The mother heard and trembled. His was not the love of a Christian man for a wife, but of a pagan for the idol in his shrine. She felt that this love could not be blessed or bring blessing; it was earthly, infatuated, unreasoning, terrible. She trembled; yet trembling did not foresee the stormy and dreadful way that this love should lead her boy, nor in what horror and blackness its grave should be! While Mrs. Moray and her son forgot the flight of time, one in anxiety, the other in overflowing joy, Mark Brace and Patty, at Brackenside Farm, also kept vigils. They were perplexed to know what was right.