He hurried away. Clarissa gave a long weary sigh, and that painful dizziness passed off in some degree. All she wanted was air, she thought, if there had been any air to be got that sultry night. She rose from the sofa presently, and went out upon the balcony. Below her was the river; not a ripple upon the water, not a breath stirring the rushes on the banks. Between the balcony and the river there was a broad battlemented walk, and in the embrasures where cannon had once been there were great stone vases of geraniums and dwarf roses, which seemed only masses of dark foliage in the moonlight. The Captain was some little time gone for that glass of water. Clarissa had forgotten him and his errand as she sat upon a bench in the balcony with her elbow leaning on the broad stone ledge, looking down at the water and thinking of her own life--thinking what it might have been if everything in the world had been different. A sudden step on the walk below startled her, and a low voice said, "I would I were a glove upon that hand, that I might kiss that cheek." She knew the voice directly, but was not less startled at hearing it just then. The step came near her, and in the next moment a dark figure had swung itself lightly upward from the path below, and George Fairfax was seated on the angle of the massive balustrade. "Juliet!" he said, in the same low voice, "what put it into your head to play Juliet to-night? As if you were not dangerous enough without that." "Mr. Fairfax, how could you startle me so? Lady Laura has been expecting you all the evening." "I suppose so. But you don't imagine I've been hiding in the garden all the evening, like the man in Tennyson's _Maud_? I strained heaven and earth to be here in time; but there was a break-down between Edinburgh and Carlisle. Nothing very serious: an engine-driver knocked about a little, and a few passengers shaken and bruised more or less, but I escaped unscathed, and had to cool my impatience for half a dozen hours at a dingy little station where there was no refreshment for body or mind but a brown jug of tepid water and a big Bible. There I stayed till I was picked up by the night-mail, and here I am. I think I shall stand absolved by my lady when she reads the account of my perils in to-morrow's papers. People are just going away, I suppose. It would be useless for me to dress and put in an appearance now." "I think Lady Laura would be glad to see you. She has been very anxious, I know." "Her sisterly cares shall cease before she goes to sleep to-night. She shall be informed that I am in the house; and I will make my peace to-morrow morning." He did not go away however, and Clarissa began to feel that there was something embarrassing in her position. He had stepped lightly across the balustrade, and had seated himself very near her, looking down at her face. "Clarissa, do you know what has happened to me since I have been away from this place?"