I scanned her face in vain; its soft expression and lovely features, her hair of golden-brown, her eyes of dark blue-grey--eyes full of faith, of truth and merriment withal, were quite unknown to me, and my heart beat quicker while my bewilderment increased, as she said-- "We have heard that this ill-starred lad has become wild, rakish, bad, incorrigible and ugly." "Ugly? Come, I am sorry you say so," said I, with something of pique. "Why?" asked the mamma, raising her eyebrows and eyeglass. "Gauntlet and I are alike as twin brothers could be, and I don't like to hear him reviled." "Ah, indeed," said she, glancing at me leisurely through her eyeglass. Then, as thoughts of Jack Charters' countess, and the scrape _she_ had lured him into occurred to me, I resolved to become reserved; but could not help inquiring-- "Permit me, ladies, to ask how poor Gauntlet is so fortunate as to interest you?" "We are namesakes--that is all," replied the elder lady, rather coldly. "Namesakes!" echoed I; but at that moment, as the arms on the panel of the carriage door caught my eye--a shield _argent_ charged with a gauntlet _gules_--a new light broke upon me. Anger--sudden, fierce, and glowing anger--was my next impulse, and, turning to the fair rider, I stammered, but my voice almost failed me, "You are--you are----" "The granddaughter of Sir Basil Gauntlet, of Netherwood," said she, with haughty surprise. I was silenced and confounded! This lovely girl whom I had twice met so singularly and so abruptly, was my cousin Aurora, the new usurper of my patrimony--one whom I had schooled myself to hate and in my soul revile; and this elder lady, so noble, so courtly, and still so handsome, was the mother of my late fox-hunting cousin Tony--my aunt by marriage--she who doubtless believed me to be--if she ever thought of me at all--the outcast, runaway, and worthless wretch my unnatural grandfather had sought to make me. Pride and a just sense of indignation swelled up within me, and I sat on my horse, silent, irresolute, and stern. Aurora and her mother knew little of the stormy, the fierce conflict of nameless emotions that raged in my heart. "Adieu, soldier," said the mamma, "with a thousand thanks for the service so bravely and politely rendered. If you will not give us your name, at least do me the favour of accepting this," she added, drawing forth her---purse. I uttered a scornful laugh, and reining back my horse, said-- "Nay, nay, ladies, though impoverished and humbled, I cannot submit quietly to the degradation of being offered money." "This is most singular!" "How is mamma to reward you?" asked the young lady, with something of surprise and, as I thought, pleasure in her tone. It might be that I flattered myself. "By permitting you to give, and me to accept--" said I, taking a lace handkerchief from her hand, for I was always a lover of effect, and resolved to produce one now--"of this trifle as a remembrance----"