not shut his image from her thoughts; she walked about in a perpetual dream, and rarely awakened to the consciousness that there was wickedness in so dreaming; and even when she did reflect upon her sin, it was very easy to excuse it and make light of it. _He_ would never know. In November he would be gone, and the dream would be nothing but a dream. It was only one o'clock, by the old-fashioned eight-day clock in the passage, when they went home after church. The gig was to be ready at a quarter before three, and at that hour they were to start for Mordred. George meant to put up his horse at the little inn near the Priory gates, and then they could walk quietly from the church to Mr. Lansdell's after the service. Mr. Gilbert felt that Brown Molly appeared rather at a disadvantage in Roland's grand stables. Sigismund was still sitting in the little parlour, looking very warm, and considerably the worse for ink. He had tried all the penny bottles in the course of his labours, and had a little collection of them clustered at his elbow. "I don't think any one ever imagined so many ink-bottles compatible with so little ink," he said, plaintively. "I've had my test ideas baulked by perpetual hairs in my pen, to say nothing of flies' wings, and even bodies. There's nothing like unlimited ink for imparting fluency to a man's language; you cut short his eloquence the moment you limit his ink. However, I'm down here for pleasure, old fellow," Mr. Smith added, cheerfully; "and all the printing-machines in the city of London may be waiting for copy for aught I care." An hour and three quarters must elapse before it would be time even to start for Mordred. Mrs. Gilbert went up-stairs and rearranged her hair, and looked at herself in the glass, and wondered if she was pretty. _He_ had never told her so. He had never paid her any compliment. But she fancied, somehow, that he thought her pretty, though she had no idea whence that fancy was derived. She went down-stairs again, and out into the garden, whence Mr. Smith was calling to her--the little garden in front of the house, where there were a few common flowers blooming dustily in oval beds like dishes; and where, in a corner, there was an erection of shells and broken bits of coloured glass, which Mr. Jeffson fondly imagined to be the exact representation of a grotto.