He gave them to her in the evening, when he found her alone in the drawing-room--alone, at least, in so far that Lady Frankland was nodding over the newspaper, and taking no notice of Miss Matty’s proceedings. “Oh, thank you; how nice of you!” cried the young lady; but she crumpled the little billet in her hand, and put it, not into her bosom as young ladies do in novels, but into her pocket, glancing at the door as she did so. “I do believe you are right in saying that there is nothing but prose here,” said Matty. “I can’t read it just now. It would only make them laugh, you know;” and she went away forthwith to the other end of the room, and began to occupy herself in arranging some music. She was thus employed when Harry came in, looking black enough. Colin was left to himself all that evening. He had, moreover, the gratification of witnessing all the privileges once accorded to himself given to his rival. Even in matters less urgent than love, it is disenchanting to see the same attentions lavished on another of which one has imagined one’s self the only possessor. It was in vain that Colin attempted a grim smile to himself at this transference of Matty’s wiles and witcheries. The lively table-talk--more lively than it could be with him, for the two knew all each other’s friends and occupations; the little services about the tea-table which he himself had so often rendered to Matty, but which her cousin could render with a freedom impossible to Colin; the pleased, amused looks of the elders, who evidently imagined matters to be going on as they wished;--would have been enough of themselves to drive the unfortunate youth half wild as he sat in the background and witnessed it all. But, as Colin’s evil genius would have it, the curate was that evening dining at Wodensbourne. And, in pursuance of his benevolent intention of cultivating and influencing the young Scotchman, this excellent ecclesiastic devoted himself to Colin. He asked a great many questions about Scotland and the Sabbath question, and the immoral habits of the peasantry, to which the catechumen replied with varying temper, sometimes giving wild answers, quite wide of the mark, as he applied his jealous ear to hear rather the conversation going on at a little distance than the interrogatory addressed to himself. Most people have experienced something of the difficulty of keeping up an indifferent conversation while watching and straining to catch such scraps as may be audible of something more interesting going on close by; but the difficulty was aggravated in Colin’s case by the fact that his own private interlocutor was doing everything in his power to exasperate him in a well-meaning and friendly way, and that the words which fell on his ear close at hand were scarcely less irritating than the half-heard words, the but too distinctly seen combinations at the other end of the room, where Matty was making tea, with her cousin hanging over her chair.