She at once went to her room, and sent down her maid to say that she would not appear at prayers or at breakfast. She would not see him again before he went. How probable it was that her eyes had rested on his form for the last time! How beautiful he was, how full of grace, how like a god! How pleasant she had found it to be near him; how full of ineffable sweetness had been everything that he had touched, all things of which he had spoken to her! He had almost overcome her, as though she had eaten of the lotus. And she knew not whether the charm was of God or devil. But she did know that she had struggled against it,--because of her word, and because she owed a debt which falsehood and ingratitude would ill repay. Lord Lovel had called her Lady Anna now. Ah, yes; how good he was! When it became significant to her that he should recognise her rank, he did so at once. He had only dropped the title when, having been recognised, it had become a stumbling-block to her. Now he was gone from her, and, if it was possible, she would cease even to dream of him. "I suppose, Frederic, that the marriage is not to be?" the rector said to him as he got into the dog-cart at the rectory door. "I cannot tell. I do not know. I think not. But, uncle, would you oblige me by not speaking of it just at present? You will know all very soon." The rector stood on the gravel, watching the dog-cart as it disappeared, with his hands in the pockets of his clerical trousers, and with heavy signs of displeasure on his face. It was very well to be uncle to an earl, and out of his wealth to do what he could to assist, and, if possible, to dispel his noble nephew's poverty. But surely something was due to him! It was not for his pleasure that this girl,--whom he was forced to call Lady Anna, though he could never believe her to be so, whom his wife and sister called cousin Anna, though he still thought that she was not, and could not be, cousin to anybody,--it was not for anything that he could get, that he was entertaining her as an honoured guest at his rectory. And now his nephew was gone, and the girl was left behind. And he was not to be told whether there was to be a marriage or not! "I cannot tell. I do not know. I think not." And then he was curtly requested to ask no more questions. What was he to do with the girl? While the young Earl and the lawyers were still pondering the question of her legitimacy, the girl, whether a Lady Anna and a cousin,--or a mere nobody, who was trying to rob the family,--was to be left on his hands! Why,--oh, why had he allowed himself to be talked out of his own opinion? Why had he ever permitted her to be invited to his rectory? Ah, how the title stuck in his throat as he asked her to take the customary glass of wine with him at dinner-time that evening!