For an hour and more she sat in the same place, looking forth into the brightness of the morning, and hearing without heeding the murmurs of busy life that each moment became more audible throughout the house. For an hour and more she sat there, the light breeze fanning her flushed cheek, and cooling the full and crimson lips, which ere another sun should go down upon the earth would be part and parcel of another’s wealth! “What is the use of thinking?” she said half aloud, and rising with a slight shiver, for the morning air was fresh, and her light wrapping-gown afforded but a thin protection from the cold. “What is the use of thinking? There is no use of tormenting myself when I ought to be happy, in this stupid senseless way.” And Honor was right. Use there could be none now in asking herself how much she loved the excellent man who in all loyalty believed that he possessed her whole, entire heart. She had not intentionally deceived him; indeed this inexperienced girl was little likely to surmise whether or not she had so deceived him. “Thinking” was, therefore, in her case, “but idle waste of thought.” Nothing--_that_ at least was quite clear to Honor--was farther from her wish than to alter her relations with the generous lover, who, as the saying is, worshipped the very ground she trod on. For nothing that the world could offer, so she told herself, would she grieve or disappoint him; and so nothing remained for this young woman, whom so many in her own degree, and of her own sex, were envying for her good fortune, but to bestir herself, both mentally and physically, and accept the good things that had been provided for her with a grateful heart? A little womanly vanity--could anything be more natural?--came to the aid of John Beacham’s _fiancée_ as she braided the soft brown tresses that the honest gentleman farmer was never weary of admiring. It would never do, she thought, to look dull and _ugly_ on her wedding-day; so she threw melancholy to the winds, and decked her face with smiles, and called that busy little Jenny in, to hinder rather than to help the important business of the toilet. Honor’s was not a selfish nature, and when the children threw their arms round her neck, kissing her with more zeal than discretion, and calling her their “sweet, their pretty Honey,” she almost forgot the circumstance of the “new frock,” and returned the truthful caresses in much of the spirit which dictated their bestowal. CHAPTER VI. NOT QUITE FOR MONEY. “How like my mother to be patronising this wedding--just the thing she is certain to do! That sort of popularity costs nothing--not five shillings, or trust Milady for staying away.”