"I didn't think of not explaining things to her," said Mrs Dalrymple, rising irresolutely from her seat as she spoke. "_I_ could have done that. However, I daresay it is better for you to see her yourself." "I am quite sure it is," said Captain Chancellor. "And to confess all my wickedness to you, had you prevented my seeing Miss Laurence here openly, I should, I assure you, have done my best to see her some other way. You could not have put a stop to either of us walking in the gardens, for instance?" He smiled as he paid it; there was a little defiance in the smile. Mrs Dalrymple sighed gently, and shook her head. "You were always a very self-willed little boy, Beauchamp," she remarked, as she at last departed on her errand. Then she put her head in again at the door with a second thought. "You will not blame me if Eugenia does not wish to see you at once?" she said. "She has been very much upset this morning, and perhaps it may be better to let her rest a little, and see you this evening."--"And by then Henry will be back," she added in her own mind, with a cowardly sense of satisfaction that in that case her lord and master would go shares in the possible blame. "By all means beg Miss Laurence to do just as she likes," replied Beauchamp, urbanely. "I can call again at any hour this evening she likes to name, if she prefers it to seeing me now." His misgivings, however, were of the slenderest. When he was left alone, he strolled again to the window, and stood looking out, but without seeing much of what was before him. He was thinking, more deeply perhaps than he had ever thought before; and when at last he heard the sound of the door opening softly, he started and looked round, not without a certain anxiety. But it was as he had expected, Eugenia herself,--and, oh, what a transfigured Eugenia! Never yet had he seen her as he saw her now. Notwithstanding the still evident fragility of her appearance, there was about her whole figure a brightness, a soft radiance of happiness impossible to describe. Her brown hair seemed to have gained new golden lights; her eyes, always sweet, looked deeper and yet more brilliant; there was a flush of carnation in her cheeks over which lugubrious Major Thanet would have shaken his head, which Beauchamp at the moment thought lovelier than any rose-tint he had ever seen. She came forward quickly,--more quickly than he advanced to meet her. He seemed almost startled by her beauty, and looked at her for a moment without speaking. He could hardly understand her perfect absence of self-consciousness, her childlike "abandon" of overwhelming joy. "Beauchamp, oh, Beauchamp," she exclaimed, as their hands met, "she has told me it was all a mistake, and, oh, I am so very happy!"