'O yes, I know; there are girls who would stop to have their hair done in Grecian plaits, if the dearest friend they had in the world was waiting for them in the drawing-room. My hair will do well enough, Sarah.--Come, Mary, you'll come to the house with me, won't you?' 'Lor', miss, here comes the gentleman,' said Sarah; and then decamped by an obscure side-path. 'I had better leave you to see him alone, Milly,' I said; but she told me imperatively to stay, and I stayed. She went a little way to meet the gentleman, who seemed pleased to see her, but whom she received rather coldly, as I thought. But I had not long to think about it, before she had brought him to the summer-house, and introduced him to me. 'My cousin Julian--Miss Crofton.' He bowed rather stiffly, and then seated himself by his cousin's side, and put his hat upon the table before him. I had plenty of time to look at him as he sat there talking of all sorts of things connected with Thornleigh, and Miss Darrell's friends in that neighbourhood. He was very good-looking, fair and pale, with regular well-cut features, and rather fine blue eyes; but I fancied those clear blue eyes had a cold look, and that there was an expression of iron will about the mouth and powerful prominent chin. The upper part of the face was thoughtful, and there were lines already on the high white forehead, from which the thin straight chestnut hair was carefully brushed. It was the face of a very clever man, I thought; but I was not so sure that it was the face of a man I could like, or whom I should be inclined to trust. Mr. Stormont had a low pleasant voice and an agreeable manner of speaking. His way of treating his cousin was half deferential, half playful; but once, when I looked up suddenly from my work, I seemed to catch a glimpse of a deeper meaning in the cold blue eyes--a look of singular intensity fixed on Milly's bright face. Whatever this look might mean, she was unconscious of it; she went on talking gaily of Thornleigh and her Thornleigh friends. 'I do so want to come home, Julian,' she said. 'Do you think there is any hope for me this midsummer?' 'I think there is every hope. I think it is almost certain you will come home.' 'O Julian, how glad I am!' 'But suppose there should be a surprise for you when you come home, Milly,--a change that you may not quite like, at first?' 'What change?' 'Has your father told you nothing?' 'Nothing, except about his journeys from place to place, and not much about them. He has written very seldom during the last six months.' 'He has been too much engaged, I suppose; and it's rather like him to have said nothing about it. How would you like a stepmother, Milly?' She gave a little cry, and grew suddenly pale. 'Papa has married again!' she said. Julian Stormont drew a newspaper from his pocket, and laid it before her, pointing to an announcement in one column: