"Well, if I were you, as you seem so far gone, I should take some steps," advised Dick. "I'm no friend of shilly-shallying. If you love the girl, go and tell her so, I advise." "I wish I'd more money," sighed the schoolmaster. "Many a good _paterfamilias_ has wished that before you, my lad," observed Tregurtha, with a laugh. "How does the country curate get on with his six children, do you suppose?" "Eh, I don't know. O Lord! I hope I never shall be the father of a _boy_!" exclaimed the pedagogue, with a sudden agitated glance up at the bedroom windows, as the dread crossed his mind that he might have been overheard all this while. However, all objection melted before the warmth of Roscoria's attachment, and one night he gave up his keys and authority to Tregurtha, bade him bolt the shutters and troll out prayers to the household in his jovial bass, for Louis Roscoria was going to a ball to "declare himself." He had found out all about Lyndis (or thought he had). She was the niece of Admiral Sir John Villiers; her father dead; her mother married again to a hunting, racing type of man who wanted no stepdaughter about. So fair Lyndis was staying with her uncle for the time, looking after the housekeeping in return for his kind protection. But Roscoria gathered much hope that his suit might possibly be the means of relieving her from any unsettled feeling that she might have about her future. And thus it came to pass that at the termination of their fifth dance together they were sitting in a ferny grotto--the goddess was all robed in blue this time, as if she had brought down a piece of summer sky trailing after her--and Louis began all at once to show the tenderness he felt. There was a little of the usual fencing with the subject, and then Roscoria came out with a few leading questions. He had heard rumors--very disquieting rumors--in short, would she set his mind at rest? Lyndis bent the glory of her mystic eyes upon him for an instant, whilst she said: "I was going to be married, but we were obliged to put it off. Where are you going, Mr. Roscoria?" "I don't know," said Louis miserably. He had risen and taken a few steps away, but he came back again and leant against the wall by her side, breathing quick and brokenly. "What is the matter?" "Oh!" groaned Roscoria, "I wanted you." He heard no answer, so he straightened up and took her kind hand and said, "Never mind; I was a fool not to be silent; but--but--if you had known your own charm, would you have made me so unhappy?" Then there seemed a light in her eyes which was not there before, and a whisper was borne to him low and far away as if it were the echo of the voice of Fate thousands of years ago: "By the favor of Heaven I am free!" Shortly afterward Louis believed he heard himself saying, "Why did you forsake him, for _he_ never did it?"