Her hand trembled on the bridle-rein, his eyes were fixed upon her downcast lid, and her lip was quivering with its effort not to speak. At that moment a close carriage passed them, in which was an invalid, a lady, and child. It was going very slowly--the invalid was Minnie, the child and woman, little Miles and Mary. This latter endeavoured to veil the vision before them by leaning across, but Minnie had seen all; his look, air, their closely-drawn figures, and grasping Mary's hand she became pale as death. Mary had been urging, and she had almost consented to Skaife's telling Tremenhere that she lived! "Oh, I have done well to refuse!" she cried. "Mere sufferance from him would kill me! Oh, would that I were dead!--would that he were free! Then he might marry her! Poor Miles--poor Miles, he never will be happy! Were I gone, her proud heart would not perhaps reject him at last; I know her well, and how difficult his task must be; is he not deserving all pity? He _thought_ he loved me, to awaken and know another held his heart in bondage! He loves her well! no wonder he looks so sad and ill: poor Miles!" and the generous heart bled more for him than for its own breaking sorrow! A few moments afterwards, Lady Dora and her two attendant suitors passed the quiet carriage in a hand-canter. CHAPTER XX. Days passed after the events related in the last chapter, and Tremenhere did not make his appearance in Lady Ripley's apartments, at l'Hotel Mirabeau; to a person of Lady Dora's despotic temper, his conduct was maddening. He never lost an opportunity of uttering words leading her to believe his affections entangled beyond remedy; no one could look at him without seeing that he suffered keenly from some mental cause, and something of recent occurrence; therefore, it was not Minnie's loss--but this she would not permit herself to think for a moment--no, 'twas herself; consequently his manner of acting was the more inexplicable. He never sought her, but when they met; he seemed unable to controul his feelings, his avowal of love; but this was not all she would have. She would have him throw himself, a slave enchained before her, beseeching her love, to loosen his bonds, or rivet them for ever. In her impatient rage she hated all, even Lord Randolph at last, for the very friendship he had for Tremenhere. It was this, she thought, which, acting on an overstrained (to her) idea of honour, prevented his admitting all, and claiming a return. Her every thought became bitterness. Nothing is nearer love than hate; they are two extremes a child's tiny hand might unite. Thus, then, she fostered in absence a bitter hatred towards Tremenhere, which melted like a waxen flower in the sun when he approached, and became quite as impressionable, capable of any feeling he might stamp there in its place. In her rage she looked around for some one wherewith to wound him, and the thought after appeared in the