Wilton did not observe wherefore his daughter quitted his arm, and re-entered the breakfast-room. In all probability, if he had seen the little incident which followed, he would have taken no notice of it. He took again her proffered arm, and together they entered his library. She arranged his easy chair--her frequent office--while he carefully fastened the door. Then, placing a chair for her, he motioned her to be seated. She obeyed, gazing upon him with an expression of gradually dawning surprise. “What can you possibly have to communicate to me in this retired, private manner, dear sir?” she exclaimed, expecting that the interview would result in the information that he had some present to make her--a pleasure he had frequently indulged in since his recent accession to wealth. Still there was an unusual expression in his air and manner that warranted a strange and uneasy foreboding that it would prove of greater importance and less pleasure than a mere present. The old man gave a loud preparatory hem! to clear his voice, and then said, with a peculiar earnestness of tone-- “Flo’, my sweet one, during the struggling years of poverty to which we were together doomed, neither I nor your sainted mother--a-a-a-hem!--made any allusion, in your presence or in that of your brother, to the past affluence from which we were so harshly and unexpectedly thrust. Nor did we mention, at any time, the names of those with whom we associated or with whom we were on intimate or friendly terms. But there were many. Some are dead; some I do not wish to renew relations with; others I may shortly invite here, that I may have the joy of seeing the old hall brightened up with the loved faces of happier times. To come, however, to the point and purport of this interview, I must tell you that there was one friend to whom I was greatly attached He was the playmate of my childhood, the school companion of my boyhood, and my friend in after years. His name was Montague Vane of Weardale. You heard me, I think, on meeting with the Honorable Lester Vane in London, name him in terms indicating the high esteem in which I held him.” Flora’s attention began to be riveted, and her wonder at the coming revelation to increase. She could not trust herself to speak. She merely bowed. “Well,” continued Wilton, “our friendship was so single-hearted and unselfish--as we each many times proved it to he--that we determined, on both contracting alliances, to draw that friendship yet closer by cementing, if Providence permitted us, a union between our families.” Flora felt the colour stealing from her cheeks, and she could hear the beating of her heart. She watched, with intense eagerness, the half-thoughtful, half-abstracted expression her father’s features wore while speaking, and she remained wholly silent, awaiting what was yet to come. Her father went on-----