The general heard and saw all that went on without seeming to take heed, only once he asked Cecilia how long she thought her cousins would stay. She did not know, but she said “she saw he wished them to be what they were not--cousins once removed--and quite agreed with him.” He smiled, for a man is always well pleased to find his wife agree with him in disliking her cousins. One night--one fine moonlight night--Lady Castlefort, standing at the conservatory door with Beauclerc, after talking an inconceivable quantity of nonsense about her passion for the moon, and her notions about the stars, and congenial souls born under the same planet, proposed to him a moonlight walk. The general was at the time playing at chess with Helen, and had the best of the game, but at that moment he made a false move, was check-mated, rose hastily, threw the men together on the board, and forgot to regret his shameful defeat, or to compliment Helen upon her victory. Lady Castlefort, having just discovered that the fatality nonsense about the stars would not quite do for Beauclerc, had been the next instant seized with a sudden passion for astronomy; she must see those charming rings of Saturn, which she had heard so much of, which the general was showing Miss Stanley the other night; she must beg him to lend his telescope; she came up with her sweetest smile to trouble the general for his glass. Lord Castlefort, following, objected strenuously to her going out at night; she had been complaining of a bad cold when he wanted her to walk in the daytime, she would only make it worse by going out in the night air. If she wanted to see Saturn and his rings, the general, he was sure, would fix a telescope at the window for her. But that would not do, she must have a moonlight walk; she threw open the conservatory door, beckoned to Mr. Beauclerc, and how it ended Helen did not stay to see. She thought that she ought not even to think on the subject, and she went away as fast as she could. It was late, and she went to bed wishing to be up early, to go on with a drawing she was to finish for Mrs. Collingwood--a view by the river side, that view which had struck her fancy as so beautiful the day she went first to Old Forest. Early the next morning--and a delightful morning it was--she was up and out, and reached the spot from which her sketch was taken. She was surprised to find her little camp-stool, which she had looked for in vain in the hall, in its usual place, set here ready for her, and on it a pencil nicely cut.