"No, no! Don't say that!" she said, quickly. He looked at her with a sad smile. "My dear," he answered, "I do not speak without cause. I have reason to be incredulous as to the faith and honesty of women. But my trust in you is as limitless as the sky yonder. I don't think you will destroy it, Stella," and he turned to his picture again. The tears came into Stella's eyes, and she clung to his arm in silent remorse. "Uncle!" she said, brokenly, then she stopped. The clock chimed the half-hour; it was time that she started, if she intended to obey Leycester. Unconsciously the old man helped her. "You look pale this morning, my dear," he said, patting her shoulder. "Go and run in the meadows and get some color on your cheeks; I miss it." Stella took up her hat, which was generally lying about ready to be snatched up, and kissed him without a word, and left the room. Five minutes afterward she passed out into the lane and hurried toward the road. Frank was waiting for her with boyish impatience. "I thought you were never coming!" he exclaimed. "We haven't over much time," and he slung the two bags together and led the way; but Stella paused a moment to look back with a pang at her heart, and it was not until Frank seized her arm that she moved toward the railway station. But once there, when the tickets were taken, the excitement buoyed her up. Frank, with the two bags, was perpetually on the alert, watching for someone they knew, and preparing to meet them with some excuse. But no one of the village people appeared on the platform, and much to Frank's relief, the train drew up. With all the pride of a chief conspirator and guardian, he put Stella into a carriage and was stepping in after her, when a groom came up to the door and touched his hat. "Mr. Etheridge--Mr. Frank Etheridge, sir?" he said, respectfully. Frank stared, but the man seemed prepared for some little hesitation, and without waiting for an answer, thrust a note into Frank's hand. "From Lord Guildford, sir," he said. The train moved off, and Frank tore open the envelope. "Why, Stella," he exclaimed, in an excited whisper, though they were alone in the carriage, "it is from Lord Leycester. Look here! he wants us to get out at the station before London--at Vauxhall--he has changed his plans slightly," and he held the note out to her. Stella took it. It was written on paper bearing the Wyndward crest; the hand-writing was exactly like that of Lord Leycester. No suspicion of its genuineness crossed her mind for a moment, but yet she said: "But--Frank--isn't Lord Leycester in London?" Frank thought a moment. "Yes," he said; "but he must have sent this down to Lord Guildford; sent it down by special messenger--special train perhaps. It wouldn't matter to him what trouble or expense he took. And yet how careful he is. He asks us to destroy it at once. Tear it up, Stella, and throw it out of the window."