"Oh, a little private business of mine own; are you very curious?" she added, whilst Mary took little Charlie on her knee, to hide her conscious countenance. "Very well, you may be informed perhaps before long." She uttered all this with more playful and propitiatory suavity of tone and manner than she often condescended to use towards her husband, having probably in view her forthcoming interview, for she had proposed to Mary that she should first take upon herself to break the intelligence to Mr. de Burgh of _his_ cousin's engagement to _her_ cousin, Eugene Trevor; an offer to which Mary had willingly acceded. Accordingly, very shortly after they parted at the breakfast-table, Mrs. de Burgh followed her husband into the library, where he had gone to write his letters. Mary, as may be supposed, waited with some degree of nervous anxiety for the close of this interview--more perhaps than might have seemed suitable to the occasion, or than she could herself account for. Surely her cousin Louis was of no such very formidable a character. She tried to divert her mind during the interval, by occupying herself with the children, who were playing in the drawing-room, but she soon found the noisy merriment, and exacting attentions of the little creatures--as we are, even with the sweetest and most engaging, all apt to do, when the mind is in any way agitated or over-burdened--an infliction rather than a relief; so she gladly relinquished them to the nurse, who came to summon them for their walk; and then as she justly deemed the _éclaircissement_ between her cousins had lasted quite as long as was either necessary or desirable, and that it would be less formidable to join them at once than to wait any longer, in suspense, a formal summons, she determined to proceed to the library, and soon had carried this determination into effect. Opening the door rather timidly, she found Mrs. de Burgh seated with an expression of countenance plainly evincing that even a discussion in which they were neither personally concerned, had not passed off without giving occasion for altercation between the married pair; but immediately on perceiving Mary, she smoothed her brow, and exclaiming: "Oh here she is! well I will leave you together," smiled encouragement on Mary, and left the room. Mr. de Burgh, who it seemed had been perambulating the apartment during the latter part of his conversation with his wife, and had paused before the window on Mary's entrance--now turned, and without exactly looking her in the face, held out his hand as he advanced towards her, saying: "Well, I suppose I ought to congratulate you, Mary." His countenance too, Mary saw, bore signs of annoyance; but that his recent quarrel might have effected, and she affectionately placed her hand in his, and looked her thanks for the implied felicitations, coldly and cautiously as they were conveyed.