He did not permit the conversation to flag, but hovered near her, venturing to look over her shoulder from time to time, and giving little suggestions concerning her drawing, while in reality he was admiring the ladylike contour of her head, the delicacy of her slender neck, and the gloss of a single thick dark ringlet that strayed so captivatingly behind. The first flush of emotion passed away in Sybil's breast, and insensibly she found herself lured into an easy interchange of opinion on various subjects; for in the topics of foreign travel, the galleries, habits, tastes, and amusements of other lands, they had ample matter for conversation, and found themselves sliding into the position of friends, and talking of things and themes that seldom occupy the thoughts of a young girl. Now, as each knew not the name of the other, and could not ask it, there was a decided awkwardness in this; and as they continued to talk with animation, the huge Thibet mastiff, who had been their _introducteur_, rolled his great dark eyes from one to the other, and lashed the grass with his tail, as if quite satisfied with the result. "After the colourless Indo-Britons and yellow Bengallees, how lovely seems the complexion of this fresh young English girl!" was the ever-recurring thought of the young officer, as he surveyed her critically, from her smart hat and feather to her foot that peeped from under her dress; and a lovely little foot it was--tiny enough to have entered the famous slipper of Cinderella. That the solitary girl was a lady was evident to him; her carriage and bearing were full of graceful ease, and she had an attraction of manner and gesture peculiarly her own; but _who_ was she, that she, at her early years, had seen so much of the world, and could speak of Spain and Rome, of Athens and Sicily, and seemed to know every second village among the wilds of the Apennines and the Abruzzi? The sketching of this day was somewhat protracted, and Sybil became aware that their eyes sought each other with an interest she had never felt before in those of a stranger, and that each time they so met, her pulses quickened and her cheek flushed or grew pale. Whence was this emotion? she whispered in her heart. "I shall often think of this moorland tarn, when I am far away," said the officer. "You leave this soon, then?" she remarked. "Yes; I am, ere long, going back to India." "My brother Denzil has gone there to join his regiment." Had the stranger asked the almost inevitable military question, "What regiment?" a little discovery might have been made; but he was full of the girl's beauty, and thought of that only. Something of admiration or of ardour in his eyes inspired her with confusion, and abruptly closing her book as on the preceding day, she rose from the bank on which she had been seated, and said, with a little trepidation, "I am going now, and--and here our sketching and meetings must end." "Ah! why?"