“The girls will be here directly, M. Lacordaire; pray get up. I can talk to you much better if you will stand up, or sit down on one of these stones.” M. Lacordaire did as he was bid; he got up, wiped the knees of his pantaloons with his handkerchief, sat down beside her, and then pressed the handle of his cane to his heart. “You really have so surprised me that I hardly know how to answer you,” said Mrs. Thompson. “Indeed, I cannot bring myself to imagine that you are in earnest.” “Ah, madame, do not be so cruel! How can I have lived with you so long, sat beside you for so many days, without having received your image into my heart? I am in earnest! Alas! I fear too much in earnest!” And then he looked at her with all his eyes, and sighed with all his strength. Mrs. Thompson’s prudence told her that it would be well to settle the matter, in one way or the other, as soon as possible. Long periods of love-making were fit for younger people than herself and her future possible husband. Her object would be to make him comfortable if she could, and that he should do the same for her, if that also were possible. As for lookings and sighings and pressings of the hand, she had gone through all that some twenty years since in India, when Thompson had been young, and she was still in her teens. “But, M. Lacordaire, there are so many things to be considered. There! I hear the children coming! Let us walk this way for a minute.” And they turned behind a wall which placed them out of sight, and walked on a few paces till they reached a parapet, which stood on the uttermost edge of the high rock. Leaning upon this they continued their conversation. “There are so many things to be considered,” said Mrs. Thompson again. “Yes, of course,” said M. Lacordaire. “But my one great consideration is this;--that I love madame to distraction.” “I am very much flattered; of course, any lady would so feel. But, M. Lacordaire----” “Madame, I am all attention. But, if you would deign to make me happy, say that one word, ‘I love you!’” M. Lacordaire, as he uttered these words, did not look, as the saying is, at his best. But Mrs. Thompson forgave him. She knew that elderly gentlemen under such circumstances do not look at their best. “But if I consented to--to--to such an arrangement, I could only do so on seeing that it would be beneficial--or, at any rate, not injurious--to my children; and that it would offer to ourselves a fair promise of future happiness.” “Ah, madame; it would be the dearest wish of my heart to be a second father to those two young ladies; except, indeed----” and then M. Lacordaire stopped the flow of his speech. “In such matters it is so much the best to be explicit at once,” said Mrs. Thompson. “Oh, yes; certainly! Nothing can be more wise that madame.” “And the happiness of a household depends so much on money.” “Madame!”