But her silence was not noticed. It could not be, indeed, so great and so animated was the flow of Beauclerk's eloquence. Without addressing anybody in particular, he seemed to address everybody. He kept the whole table alive. He treated yesterday's adventure as a tremendously amusing affair, and invited everyone to look upon it as he did. He insisted on describing Miss Kavanagh and himself in the same light as he had described them earlier to his sister, as the modern Babes in the Wood, Mrs. Connolly being the Robin. He made several of the people who had dropped in to luncheon roar with laughter over his description of that excellent inn keeper. Her sayings--her appearance--her stern notions of morality that induced her to bring them home, "personally conducted"--the size of her waist--and her heart--and many other things. He was extremely funny. The fact that his sister smiled only when she felt she must to avoid comment, and that his host refused to smile at all, and that Miss Kavanagh was evidently on thorns all the time did not for an instant damp his overflowing spirits. * * * * * It is now seven, o'clock; Miss Kavanagh, on her way upstairs to dress for dinner, suddenly remembering that there is a book in the library, left by her early in the afternoon on the central table, turns aside to fetch it. She forgets, however, what she has come for when, having entered the room, she sees Dysart standing before the fire, staring apparently at nothing. To her chagrin, she is conscious that the unmistakable start she had made on seeing him is known to him. "I didn't know you had returned," says she awkwardly, yet made a courageous effort to appear as natural as usual. "No? I knew you had returned," says he slowly. "It is very late to say good-morning," says she with a poor little attempt at a laugh, but still advancing toward him and holding out her hand. "Too late!" replied he, ignoring the hand. Joyce, as if struck by some cruel blow, draws back a step or two. "You are not tired, I hope?" asks Dysart courteously. "Oh, no." She feels stifled; choked. A desire to get to the door, and escape--lose sight of him forever--is the one strong longing that possesses her; but to move requires strength, and she feels that her limbs are trembling beneath her. "It was a long drive, however. And the storm was severe. I fear you must have suffered in some way." "I have not suffered," says she, in a dull, emotionless way. Indeed, she hardly knows what she says, a repetition of his own words seems the easiest thing to bar, so she adopts it. "No?" There is a considerable pause, and then---- "No! It is true! It is I only who have suffered," says Dysart with an uncontrollable abandonment to the misery that is destroying him. "I alone."