Some one else had also seen Lady Dora--this was Aunt Sylvia. This busy, restless woman, had one decided affection--a love of gardening in all its branches. Her greatest crony after Dame Gillett, was John Gardener, as he had been surnamed, consequent upon his profession; for every thing is a profession now,--the humble trade eschews its name to become such, and professions, as they still are, are for the most part unmeaning words and falsehoods. Sylvia loved a garden, every atom of it,--kitchen, fruit, and flowers. She delighted in getting out _spudding_ in it, as she termed it--a corruption of spading, we presume; but it was her own coined word, and meant, digging, weeding, sowing, and planting, a composite word of much meaning. This morning, like many others, she was up, and busily inspecting some little green tips just bursting through the earth, which she pronounced "loves of things;" when raising her head, to push back the spectacles she had put on for a closer inspection of her budding flowers, she saw Lady Dora pass through the little door into the fields. Her niece had not perceived her; she was bent double nearly, and in a grass-coloured muslin, which made her appear, in the distance, like a heap of short, newly-mown turf on the lawn. Up she jumped at this vision. "My niece, Lady Dora!" she exclaimed--even in _thought_ she was "Lady Dora" to her--"where can she be going? I declare the young ladies of the present day, have the oddest manner of creeping about early in the morning; no good ever can come of it!" Thus soliloquizing, she stole after her, and, to her amazement, saw a man in the distance; who it was, she had not the slightest idea, not once dreaming of Tremenhere. Startled at the responsibility of so great a secret to herself alone, she hastened through the kitchen-garden to Mrs. Gillett's window, and rapping hastily until she summoned that familiar spirit to her aid, she imparted all her surprise to her no less astonished ear. Mrs. Gillett was literally lost in wonder; for she at once suspected that Tremenhere was the man, though she kept her suspicions to herself. This, then, was his engagement to which he had alluded; but how had it come about. She knew nothing about the portrait and Florence, or all would have seemed clear as noonday. In deep perplexity, with Sylvia's aid she mounted on a chair; and thus getting into the garden, accompanied her to the end of it, where they might, through the thick hedge on that side, see beyond. It was thus Minnie escaped seeing them, or their observing her. "Can you imagine who the creature is?" (_man_ she meant,) Sylvia asked. "He's come a purpose!" ejaculated Gillett, pursuing her own private thoughts, not heeding the other's question. "Who has come on purpose?" asked Sylvia, impatiently. "Why, he, miss--you know who I mean. Lauks-a-mercy me! here'll be a to do! Lauks-a-mercy! and my lady, too!"