Greatly changed, indeed paler and thinner, with dark circles round the eyes, and a faint hectic spot on each cheek, Kate O’Hara looked even more beautiful than ever; the extreme delicacy of every lineament, the faultless regularity of outline, were as conspicuous now, as before was that brightness which she derived from expression. If her eyes had no longer their look of haughty and defiant meaning, they seemed to have acquired a greater depth of colour and an expression of intense softness, and her lips, so ready once to curl into mockery at a moment, now appeared as if they faintly stirred with a smile, as some fancy crossed her. She was dressed in deep mourning, which heightened still more the statue-like character of her features. What a contrast to this placid loveliness was the careworn, feverish look of the old man at her side! Sir Within had aged by years within a few weeks, and in the anxious expression of his face, and his quick uneasy glances around him, might be read the fretful conflict of hope and fear within him. While he continued to speak, and describe the features of the scene before them, though she smiled at times, or assented by a slight gesture of the head, her mind was wandering--far, far away--to other thoughts and other places, and her fingers played feverishly with a letter, which she opened and closed up again time after time. “I am afraid, Ma Mie,” said he, with a tone of half reproach, “that your letter there has usurped all your interest, and my eloquence as Cicerone gone quite for nothing.” “No, Gardy, I heard you with much pleasure. What did you say that rock was called?” “That rock, Mademoiselle,” said he, dryly, “is a wreck, and I was vain enough to have believed that my narrative of the incident had moved you.” “I am so weak, Gardy, so very weak,” said she, plaintively, as she laid her hand on the back of his, “that I follow anything with difficulty.” “My sweet child, how cruel of me to forget it. Are we lingering too long on these sands?” “Oh no; let us stay here some time longer. I want to see the sun go down, it is so long since I saw a sunset.” He drew her shawl around her carefully, and sheltered her with his umbrella against the scarcely breathing wind. “How kind you are, how good,” said she, softly; and then, with a playful lightness, added, “how courtier-like, too.” “Why courtier-like, Ma Mie?” said he. “Is it not like a courtier,” said she, “to treat a peasant-girl as if she were a princess? You would not even ask me when I saw my last sunset, lest I should have to tell you that it was as I stood barefooted on the beach, the tangled seaweed dripping over me.” “How can you like to pain me by talking of these things?” “But we must talk of them, Gardy. You know we think of them; and this letter--this letter,” said she, tapping it with her finger impatiently, “must be answered one day.”