“How are you?” he exclaimed. “What a lucky chance that we should have run across each other in the dark like this! Have you been long in England?” Frithiof, at the first word of hearty greeting, looked up with startled eyes, and in the dim gas-light he saw the honest English face and kindly eyes of Roy Boniface. CHAPTER VII. Meantime the brougham had bowled swiftly away and its two occupants had settled themselves down comfortably as though they were preparing for a long drive. “Are you warm enough, my child? Better let me have this window down, and you put yours up,” said Mrs. Boniface, glancing with motherly anxiety at the fair face beside her. “You spoil me, mother dear,” said Cecil. “And indeed I do want you not to worry about me. I am quite strong, if you would only believe it.” “Well, well, I hope you are,” said Mrs. Boniface, with a sigh. “But any way it’s more than you look, child.” And the mother thought wistfully of two graves in a distant cemetery where Cecil’s sisters lay; and she remembered with a cruel pang that only a few days ago some friend had remarked to her, with the thoughtless frankness of a rapid talker, “Cecil is looking so pretty just now, but she’s got the consumptive look in her face, don’t you think?” And these words lay rankling in the poor mother’s heart, even though she had been assured by the doctors that there was no disease, no great delicacy even, no cause whatever for anxiety. “I am glad we have seen Doctor Royston,” said Cecil, “because now we shall feel quite comfortable, and you wont be anxious any more, mother. It would be dreadful, I think, to have to be a sort of semi-invalid all one’s life, though I suppose some people just enjoy it, since Doctor Royston said that half the girls in London were invalided just for want of sensible work. I rather believe, mother, that is what has been the matter with me,” and she laughed. “You, my dear!” said Mrs. Boniface; “I am sure you are not at all idle at home. No one could say such a thing of you.” “But I am always having to invent things to do to keep myself busy,” said Cecil. “Mother, I have got a plan in my head now that would settle my work for five whole years, and I do so want you to say ‘yes’ to it.” “It isn’t that you want to go into some sisterhood?” asked Mrs. Boniface, her gentle gray eyes filling with tears. “Oh, no, no,” said Cecil emphatically. “Why, how could I ever go away from home and leave you, darling, just as I am getting old enough to be of use to you? It’s nothing of that kind, and the worst of it is that it would mean a good deal of expense to father, which seems hardly fair.” “He wont grudge that,” said Mrs. Boniface. “Your father would do anything to please you, dear. What is this plan? Let me hear about it.”