To this she could truly answer “No,” and he seemed satisfied. But the old cloud had not gone, and Florence felt more than ever that their felicity could not be perfect while it was so. Yet when he tenderly pressed her to promise that she would be his at the earliest period Mrs. Blunden could be prevailed upon to concede, she knew not how to refuse his ardent prayers. As he basked in the light of her smiles he became more and more like the Frank Dormer so well remembered, so unceasingly regretted. It was only when an hour of solitude enabled her to review all he had said that she was again compelled to acknowledge the galling fact that there was some important passage of his life which he withheld from her; some act or deed--whether of his own or another’s--which was an ever-present trouble to his harassed mind, and poisoned even the bliss of their reunion. CHAPTER XXI. A WHISPERED WORD. Mrs. Blunden, having once made up her mind to her niece’s marriage, quickly laid aside all her objections, and went heart and soul into the preparations she considered necessary for so important an affair. Mrs. Wilson was her delighted assistant, for she was sincerely attached to Florence, and considered her worthy to become the wife of Mr. Aylwinne, even though he was in her eyes of all men the most peerless. The boys were wild with joy when it was whispered to them that the Donna would soon become the bride of their guardian, and hung about their gentle governess with an affection that would not be repressed. Mrs. Blunden proposed that they should remove at once to London, where the very handsome trousseau she intended to purchase could be more easily procured; while Mrs. Wilson was impatient to return to Orwell Court, in order to commence the cleaning and polishing she thought the house and furniture would require before it was fit for the reception of its lovely young mistress. Florence was passive in the hands of her aunt, and raised no objections to anything she proposed; but Mr. Aylwinne would not hear of quitting Babbicombe Bay for the noisy metropolis; and by dint of an obstinacy equal to her own, he finally won from Mrs. Blunden a consent to stay where she was until the nuptial rite was celebrated. Florence, naturally domesticated and attached to Orwell Court, would have liked to go quietly home after her marriage. Mr. Aylwinne’s prolonged wanderings must, she fancied, have wearied him of other lands; yet it was he who sketched out a route which must detain them abroad for many months. She pointed this out to her lover, and hinted her own wish that they might at all events return to England in time to keep their Christmas at Orwell Court; but his answer, though affectionate, was unsatisfactory. “I shall not bring my darling back till she has learned to forget. When she wears the bright, untroubled face of the Florence I remember, then, and not till then, shall I be content.”