This speech was so unusually civil for Miss Dartelle that the young governess was quite overpowered. "I will do it with pleasure," she replied. "I want it to be very nice," said Miss Dartelle, with a conscious smile that was like a dagger in the girl's breast; "one of our visitors, Lord Chandon, seems to have a mania for flowers. I had almost forgotten--are there any white hyacinths among the collection?" "Yes," was the brief reply. "Do you think there are sufficient to form a nice spray, mixed with some maiden-hair fern?" she asked. "I should be so pleased if you could manage it." "I will try; but, Miss Dartelle, there are so many other beautiful flowers here--why do you prefer the white hyacinths?" Her voice faltered as she uttered her name--a name she had never heard since she fled from all that was dearest to her. Miss Dartelle, who happened to be in the most gracious humors, smiled at the question. "I was talking to that same gentleman, Lord Chandon, yesterday, and I happened to ask him what was his favorite flower. He said the white hyacinth--oh, Miss Holte, what are you doing?" For the flowers were falling from the nerveless hand. How could he have said that? Adrian used to call her his white Hyacinth. Had he not forgotten her? What could he mean? "So you see, Miss Holte," continued Miss Dartelle, blandly, "that, as I should like to please his lordship, I shall wear his favorite flowers." Yes, she saw plainly enough. She remembered one of those happy days at Bergheim when she too had worn some fresh, fragrant hyacinths to please him; and she remembered how he had caressed her, and what loving words he had murmured to her--how he had told her that she was fairer in his eyes than any flower that had ever bloomed--how he had taken one of the hyacinths from her, and, looking at it, had said: "You were rightly named, my love. You are a stately, fair, fragrant hyacinth indeed." Now--oh, bitter irony of fate!--now she was to make another beautiful with these same flowers, in order to charm him. She was dead to him and to all the bright past; yet at the very thought of his loving another she grew faint with anguish that had no name. She went to the window and opened it to admit the fresh, cool air; and then the opportunity she had waited and longed for came. It was a bright, clear morning, the sun was shining, and the promise of spring filled the air. She did not think of seeing Adrian then; but the window overlooked the grove of chestnut trees, and he was walking serenely underneath them. She sunk on her knees, her eyes were riveted on his face with deepest intensity. It was he--Heaven bless him!--looking graver, older, and more careworn, but still the same brave, handsome, noble man. Those were the true, clear eyes that had looked so lovingly into her own; those were the lips, so firm, so grave, so kind, that had kissed hers and told her how dear she was to him; those were the hands that had clasped her own.