The Baron began to elevate his eyebrows, and became silent. The Count looked uneasy; one glass more, he suggested, and then they would join the ladies. They did so; but on entering the drawing-room found the Countess asleep as usual, with the Spitz pug in her lap; Herminia idling over the piano, while longing for Heinrich; and that Ernestine was--which was never her wont--absent. She had pleaded a headache, and retired to her own room. The Baron looked glum and disconcerted. He had been framing many fine speeches to make to his intended; but now they were no longer required. He should see her no more for that night. Charlie fingered the little note in his waistcoat-pocket, and felt defiant and jubilant. The truth was that the Countess and her daughter had almost had high words on the subject of the Baron. 'Mamma,' the latter had said, 'the idea of such a thing is intolerable and absurd!' 'Why absurd, Grafine?' asked her mother, with asperity. 'A man of forty or more, getting bald already,' said Ernestine mockingly; 'a stout man in a blue coat and brass buttons, with a red ribbon, of course, at his lapelle; a man who, for twenty years, has never made up his august mind to marry, comes now to make a matrimonial victim of me. Thanks--no. I am the Grafine Ernestine of Frankenburg, and such I shall remain.' 'Do you prefer anyone else?' asked the Countess, her eyes glittering with sudden suspicion. 'No--none,' she falteringly said, with her cheeks aflame. 'Is there not _one_?' 'What do you mean, mamma?' 'I mean this,' said the Countess, with grim asperity, hiding her suspicions, if she had any, 'my dear child, the regiment of Heinrich is under orders for foreign service! his leave is conditional, and may be cancelled by telegraph at any moment; so that if we wish his presence at the marriage, the ceremony must be performed without much delay.' 'It shall never take place with me,' replied Ernestine resolutely. 'To your room, Grafine,' said the Countess with hauteur; so her daughter gladly withdrew, leaving her to make excuses for her absence as she pleased, so the usual female ailment of a headache came at once into play. CHAPTER VII. AMONG THE BREAKERS. The Baron had been driven home to Aix in his britzka, promising to return for some final arrangements on the morrow, when he hoped to find the health of the Grafine restored; prayers were over; the household were all a-bed, or supposed to be so, and Charlie sat in his own room, looking sadly out upon the distant lights of Aix, which seemed to twinkle like the stars above them. He had ample food for reflection. Fear of the Baron's influence on Ernestine he had none; but he had real fear of the influence her family, and long-trained habits of implicit obedience, might have on her, and genuine love and truth are commodities too scarce and valuable in this world to be wasted.