The girl laughed merrily after saying the brief monosyllables in a demure tone, and the mother recognised that the replies were only too true. Mr. Gilmour did seek and follow, and Elsie, alas! Allowed herself to be sought and overtaken, there was no doubt about it. But in another moment the young arms were round the mother's neck, and Elsie whispered, "Trust me, dear, do trust me, and Mr. Gilmour too. You shall owe no sorrow to me, thoughtless as I may seem sometimes. My mother's heart shall never ache through Elsie's doings. There is nothing you need trouble about, believe me." The girl's head was hidden on Mrs. Manning's shoulder, and the mother clasped her closely, kissing the soft wavy tresses and then the sweet face which she turned lovingly towards her own. "Darling child," she whispered, "it is only my true anxiety for your happiness which makes me speak. This young man comes so often, and is made almost like a son in the house. Uncle Edward encourages him, and I—well, I cannot help owning how much there is about him which is calculated to win the affection and respect of a true-hearted, pure-minded girl. But even were he to enter into an engagement, years and years might pass before he could marry. I have been a little ambitious for you two girls, perhaps most for you, and I cannot bear to think of your young life being spent in waiting for a future which may be so distant." "Uncle Edward loves you girls—indeed, to all of you he has been a second father since he brought us out of comparative poverty to this beautiful home. But though he will no doubt provide for you, so far as to keep you above want, that provision will be yours only when he no longer needs it, and I am sure we should hate ourselves were we to calculate on what may come from such a source." "I hate to hear it named even," said Elsie. "True, dear; but fancy what it would be to go through—" Elsie stopped the rest of the sentence with a kiss. "Mother, dear, do not try to fancy anything. Let us just be happy and thankful in the present, and not trouble ourselves about possibilities. Where is the good of singing—" "'Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see The distant scene; one step enough for me.'" "If we go on hesitating and worrying ourselves as to the next?" "Ah! it is like the young to dance gaily on to the very edge of the precipice, and not concern themselves about what the path leads to, so long as it is strewn with flowers." "But our path only led to the gate, mother; there was no sign of a precipice beyond, and the path, though bordered with flowers, is by no means strewn with them, but with fine new gravel, extremely trying to Miss Chatterton's favourite corn, she tells me. I am half hoping it may make her visits more angelic—that is, fewer and farther between—than they have been." Mrs. Manning sighed.