"Poor school," says Gower, pityingly, "for the first time I feel deep sympathy for it. But with regard to myself, I am flattered you troubled yourself to think of me at all. Did it really matter to you what my convictions might be?" "Yes, of course," says Dulce, opening her eyes, and showing herself half in fun, half in earnest, and wholly desirable. "Such a near neighbor as you must be. I suppose we shall see a good deal of you--at least"--sweetly--"I hope we shall; and how would it be with us if you called here every morning with lanky tresses, and a cadaverous face, and words culled from a language obsolete?" This little speech quite dazzles Gower. Not the sauciness of it, but the undercurrent of kindliness. "_Every_ morning!" Does she really mean that he may come up to this enchanting spot every morning? It had, of course, occurred to him, during prayers, in the early part of the day, when he had sat out the dreary service with exemplary patience, and his eyes fixed on the Blount pew, that, perhaps, he might be allowed to call once a week at the Hall, without being considered by the inmates an absolute nuisance--but every day! this sounds too good to be true, and is, therefore, received by him with caution. "You needn't be afraid of me," he says, apropos of Dulce's last remark. "I can speak no language but my own, and that badly." "What a comfort," says Miss Blount. She is now wondering if she has done her duty by her new guest, and if she has been everything to him that she ought to have been, considering her promise to Roger. "Where is Fabian?" she asks, suddenly, peering through the dusky gloom. "Are you there, darling?" But no one answers her. It seems to them, that, tiring of their company, he has betaken himself to solitude and the house, once more. No one has seen him go, but, during the last few minutes, a gray black cloud has been slowly wandering over the pale-faced moon, and forms and features have been more indistinct. Perhaps Portia, who is sitting on the outer edge of the group, might have noticed his departure, but, if so, she says nothing of it. Time runs on. Some one yawns, and then tries vainly to turn it into a sigh. The bell from some distant steeple in the little slumbering village far below in the plain, tolls slowly, solemnly, as though to warn them that eleven more hours have slipped into the great and fathomless sea of Eternity. "Ah! so late!" says Dulce, with a little start. "How swiftly time has gone to-night. I never knew it fly with such hot haste. That proves I have been happy, does it not?" She smiles down upon Mr. Gower, who is still at her feet, and he smiles up only too willingly at her.