It was a trifling incident, but it meant a great deal to Robert Streightley; so much, that when they were seated in the carriage he thanked her with all the ardour of a lover. He told her he had never seen her half so beautiful; he reminded her--he who rarely dared to refer to the past--of the first time he had seen her dressed for a ball; and told her what a vision of beauty, what an enchantress she had appeared to him then,--what an unending spell she had cast upon him. There was no wrath, no bitterness in Katharine's heart that night, though the remembrances evoked were all of the kind calculated to provoke them. Time, and the unfailing, persevering love of this man,--love which she wondered at, and which had begun to touch her heart,--were working on her proud nature. She listened to him with a smile, with a faint, beautiful blush. She was glad that she had pleased him; it was not hard to do so: to wear a gorgeous ornament like that, and be thanked for it, was not a great sacrifice. To be so passionately admired by one's own husband was not unpleasant. Katharine was quite aware that it was not a very common case. Their carriage fell into the line; the light of many lamps was flitting about. She threw her cloak off the arm that bore the bracelet, and admired the splendid jewel, rippling with many-coloured light: "It is extremely beautiful, Robert," she said. "I like it better than any of your presents. It was your first, you know:" He did know; and he also knew that this was the first, the very first word he had ever heard from his wife's lips which implied any sentiment concerning the past connected with him. A fresh tide of hope and joy welled up in his heart; and as she laid her hand lightly in his, and let it rest there until their turn had come, and the carriage drew up under the striped awning, surrounded with a gaping crowd of idlers collected to see the ball-goers, Robert Streightley was happier than he had ever been in his life before.