'Oh, Heartsease,' he groaned, 'I fear that the mistake is mine, and that I have not yet won the whole of your innocent heart. I have taken it too much as a matter of course. Perhaps I have not wooed you so earnestly as I should have wooed an older woman, and yet I hardly think I have failed in either devotion or reverence. Ah,' he continued, with an involuntary sigh, 'what right have I to complain if she withhold her fresh young love--am I giving her all that is in me to give?' But here he stopped, as though the reflection pained him. He remembered with what sympathy Mildred had advocated his cause. She had looked excited--almost indignant--as Polly had uttered her piteous protest for time. Had her clear eyes noticed any signs of vacillation or reluctance? Could he speak to her on the subject? Would she answer him frankly? And then, for the first time, he felt as though he could not so speak to her. 'Every one takes their troubles to her, but she shall not be harassed by me,' he thought. 'She is sinking now under the burdens which most likely other people have laid upon her. I will not add to their weight.' And a strange pity and longing seized him to know what ailed the generous creature, who never thought of herself, but of others. Mildred felt as though some ordeal awaited her when she woke the next morning. She looked so ill and weak that Olive was in despair when she insisted on rising and dressing herself. 'It will bring on the faintness again to a certainty,' she said, in a tone of unusual remonstrance; but Mildred was determined. But she was glad of Olive's assistance before she had finished, and the toilet was made very slowly and wearily. At the drawing-room door Dr. Heriot met her with a reproachful face; he looked a little displeased. 'So you have cast my prescription to the wind,' he said, drily, 'and are determined not to own yourself ill.' But Mildred coloured so painfully that he cut short his lecture and assisted her to the couch in silence. 'There you may stop for the next two or three days,' he continued, somewhat grimly. 'Mr. Lambert has desired me to look after you, and I shall take good care that you do not disobey my orders again. I have made Olive head nurse, and woe be to her if there be a single infringement of my rules.' Mildred looked up at him timidly. He had been so gentle with her the preceding evening that this change of manner disturbed her. This was not his usual professional gravity; on such occasions he had ever been kindness itself. He must be put out--annoyed--the idea was absurd, but could she have displeased him? She was too weak to bear the doubt. 'Have I vexed you, Dr. Heriot, by coming down?' she asked, gently. 'I should be worse if I fancied myself ill. I--I have had these attacks before; they are nothing.' 'That is your opinion, is it? I must say I thought better of your sense, Miss Lambert,' still gruffly. Mildred's eyes filled with tears.