The dreaded moment came when Miss Richardia, who had been discussing autumn flowers with Carfax, asked the golden youth if he would like to see her chrysanthemums and asters in the sheltered posy-patch in the rear of the manor-house. And when they were gone, Tregarvon was left alone with his responsibilities. It was Miss Wardwell who first broke the little silence which followed the departure of the flower seekers, and her manner was distinctly at variance with her accustomed attitude of serenity and self-possession; was rather the manner of one marching reluctantly but firmly up to the mouth of a loaded cannon. “Were you tremendously shocked yesterday afternoon when you learned that I was coming?” she asked. “It is no use to deny it,” he confessed bravely. “It was a complete surprise--as you probably intended it to be.” “No; I didn’t intend it--until just at the last. Richardia has been asking me to come down, and she knew a week or more ago that I was coming. I supposed, of course, she would tell you, and didn’t know that she hadn’t told you until I received her last letter, just as we were leaving.” “You came with your father and mother?” “Yes. Pennsylvania has been building some monuments on the old battle-fields, and papa is one of the commissioners. He and mamma didn’t particularly wish to be bothered with me, I imagine, but I had to come. Have you guessed why, Vance?” Tregarvon thought he knew the constraining reason very well, indeed, but he was not quite courageous enough to say so. Instead, he temporized, as a man will, postponing the instant when the hair-hung sword must fall. “I’m the poorest of mind-readers,” he protested. “I can’t even read my own, at times. But I suppose you have my letter, and you thought it ought to be answered in person.” “I have had many letters from you: which one do you mean?” “The one I wrote a week ago to-day in the hotel in Chattanooga.” She shook her head slowly. “No; your last letter was written two weeks ago, and it was postmarked ‘Coalville.’ I remember you said you were writing after Poictiers had gone to bed.” Tregarvon groaned inwardly. The thing which he thought had been safely done had not been done at all; it still remained to be done. He was bracing himself to take the plunge when she went on hurriedly: “You were saying just now that you couldn’t read your own mind--sometimes. I wish I might read it now--this moment, Cousin Vance!” She was trying to look him fairly in the eyes and was not succeeding very well. “Read my mind?--heaven forbid!” he gasped. Then he came to his senses and tried to repair the terrible misstep. “You know--er--you know what I mean; a man’s mind is seldom fit for a--a good woman to look into, Elizabeth.”