Arthur Vaughan hesitated. He knew that he ought, that it was his duty, to say “No.” But something in the woman’s humorous eye challenged him, and recklessly—for the gratification of a moment—he said: “Yes, if you please, I will see her.” “Very good, very good,” Miss Sibson answered slowly. She had not been blind to the momentary hesitation. “Then I will send her to you to make her apologies. Only be kind enough to remember that she does not know that you have seen that slip of paper.” He assented, and with a good-natured nod Miss Sibson rose and went heavily from the room. Not for nothing was she held in Bristol a woman of sagacity, whose game of whist it was a pleasure to watch; nor without reason had that attorney of character, of whom we have heard, chosen her _in custodiam puellæ_. Vaughan waited, and to be frank, his heart beat more quickly than usual. He knew that he was doing a foolish thing, though he had refused to commit himself; and an unworthy thing, though Miss Sibson, perhaps for her own reasons, had winked at it. He knew that he had no right to see the girl if he did not mean her well; and how could he mean her well when he had no intention of marrying her? For, for a man with his career in prospect to marry a girl in her position—to say nothing of the stigma which no doubt lay upon her birth—was a folly of which none but boys and old men were capable. He listened, ill at ease, already repenting. The voices in the next room, reduced to a faint murmur by the closed doors, ceased. She was being told. She was being sent to him. He coloured. Yes, he was ashamed of himself. He rose and went to the window, and wished that he had said “No”; that he had taken himself off. What was he doing here at his time of life—the most sane and best balanced time of life—in this girls’ school? It was unworthy of him. The door opened, and he forgot his unworthiness, he forgot all. The abnormal attraction, allurement, charm, call it what you will, which had overcome him when she turned her eyes on him on the coach overcame him again—and tenfold. He thought that it must lie in her eyes, gentle as a dove’s. And yet he did not know. He had not seen her indoors before, and her hair gathered in a knot at the back of her head was a Greek surprise to him; while her blushes, the quivering of her mouth, her figure slender but full of grace, and high-girdled after the mode of the day—all, all were so perfect, so enticing, that he knew not where the magic lay. But magic there was. And such magic that though he had prepared himself, and though the last thing in his thoughts was to insult her, he forgot himself. As she paused, her hand still resting on the door, her face downcast and distressed, “Good G—d,” he cried, “how beautiful you are!”