"Did I frighten you, my pet?" said he, gaily; "I beg your pardon. I couldn't think where you were gone to. I am afraid you are tired. You have been waltzing too much. That fellow Dalrymple does go round at a killing pace with his long legs. Poor Miss Hale couldn't stand him at all--she nearly fainted. Ah, naughty child! Didn't I tell you not to dance with him? And you never paid the least heed! If this is how you defy me now, what am I to expect after we are married, eh?" She looked up in his face with guilty, bewildered eyes. He was not by any means so cool as he assumed to be, but it was evident that he intended to ignore her offence, and was not going to scold her. _He_ was not young and rash, if she was; and the few minutes he had taken for reflection, during her absence in the garden, had shown him where the path of wisdom lay. Her first sensation was one of extreme relief; and then she became slowly conscious of a vague sinking at her heart. Once more she sighed to herself--feeling discouraged and overpowered, and unequal to the formidable vastness of her resolution--"Oh, what shall I do?" It would have been much better--much easier--if he had scolded her. Before the revels of the night were quite over, Mrs. Hardy sent her to bed, noticing that she was looking unusually quiet and pale. She was very glad to go, and made haste to hide herself in the little impromptu nest that had been prepared for her on a couch in her aunt's room, before that lady should require the use of her apartment. She was wide awake, however, when Mrs. Hardy joined her, and too restless to disguise it; and the elder woman, who knew nothing of the girl's entanglements with her two lovers--who had, indeed, congratulated herself on the prudent abstinence which had been unexpectedly practised with reference to "that objectionable young man" who was such a dangerously delightful dancer--gossiped and grumbled over the little events of the evening, chiefly of the accident to her lace and the absurdities of Miss Hale and Mr. Lessel, who were publicly known to have had a serious misunderstanding, unaware of her listener's pre-occupation, until the candles were finally extinguished. About an hour later, as she was anxiously cogitating what steps she should take towards the repairing of her own mishap, Mrs. Hardy thought she heard a suspicious sound in the silence of the room. "Rachel," she called, softly; "is that you, child?" No answer. Only a rustle of drapery, indicating that Rachel had turned over in her bed. She listened a few minutes, and the suspicious sound was repeated. Raising herself on her elbow, she called more loudly. "You are not _crying_, Rachel, are you?" The girl flung herself out of bed, ran across the room, a little white ghost in the faint dawn, and threw her arms round her aunt's neck. She had no mother, poor little thing, to tell her troubles to; and she wanted a mother now.