Colonel Carlyle was as deeply infatuated with Bonnibel Vere as the jealous Felise had declared him to be; but, as she had always asserted, he was very wily and cautious in his advances. He was afraid of frightening the pretty bird he wished to ensnare. He, therefore, adopted a deportment of almost fatherly tenderness toward her that was very pleasant to the lonely girl, who missed her uncle's protecting care so much, and who also began to perceive in Mrs. Arnold and her daughter a changed manner, which, while it could scarcely be colder than usual, was tinged with an indefinable shade of insolence. Poor, pretty Bonnibel! she had fallen upon dark days. She had been deceived by Mrs. Arnold's protestations at first, but by degrees a new light began to break upon her. Mrs. Arnold began to practice a degree of parsimony toward her that was bewildering to the girl. She withdrew Bonnibel's allowance of money, and at last the girl found her dainty little purse quite empty, and likely to remain so--a thing that had never happened to her before in the course of her life, for her uncle had been lavishly generous to her in respect to pin-money. Her supply of mourning was extremely limited, and but for her quiet mode of life would have been quite inadequate to her needs. But if Mrs. Arnold had wished to diminish Bonnibel's beauty by giving it so meager a setting she failed in the endeavor. The jewel was too bright to miss extraneous adornment. The somber black dresses could not dim the gleam of her golden hair, the sparkle of her sea-blue eyes. Her white brow and throat were like the petals of a lily, and with returning health a lovely rose-tint began to flush her cheeks. Her beauty was a royal dower of which no spite or malignity could deprive her. Clothed upon with sackcloth she would still have remained, "A daughter of the gods, divinely tall, And most divinely fair." Bonnibel knew that she was beautiful. She had heard it remarked so often that she could not be ignorant of the fact. In those past happy days that now seemed so far away she had taken a childish, innocent pride in the knowledge. But now in her trouble and loneliness she had forgotten it, or cared for it no more. So it never occurred to her to ascribe the painful change in her aunt and Felise to the fact that was quite obvious to others--the very plain fact that she had unconsciously rivaled Felise with Colonel Carlyle and that he only waited a proper season to declare himself. There was none of the dawdling and hesitation now that had marked his courtship of Felise and prevented him from making the important declaration she had schemed and toiled for. He had virtually jilted Felise, for he had done everything but speak the important words, but the proud girl bore his desertion in ominous silence that boded no good to the man who had thus wronged her.