Presently Cordelia looked up, with a new light in her eyes and a new look on her beautiful face. A new thought had possessed her--a thought that sent a tremor to her heart, imparting a perceptible quiver to her lips. “Percy!” she said, withdrawing her hand from his grasp and transferring it to his arm, where it clung trustingly. “Percy! what did you mean by what you said to me last evening when you asked me to look when you worked out that matter of interest?” He looked at her with surprise, and his look plainly asked her to what she referred. “Don’t you remember?” she said, in answer to his silent question. “You said I shouldn’t have you always to help me; and--and--Percy--you spoke as though I might not have you a great while. Did you mean that?” The girl’s look and tone--the light of her eyes, and the deep feeling unmistakably stamped on her face, would have caused a colder, sterner, and a duller man than was Percy Maitland to pale and tremble. The great love of his heart was never so near the surface before. It threatened, almost, to burst the bounds of sense and reason, and find for itself utterance. But it must not be. The pure, gentle girl had trusted him, and that trust he would not betray. “Dear lady,” he said, as soon as he dared venture his voice, “you can not know how aimless is the life I now lead. I gave to my father, when he lay dying, a solemn promise that I would remain with my mother until I was one-and-twenty. That event is past. I saw the dawning of my twenty-second year three months ago. I am but wasting my life here.” “Wasting--your--life! Oh, Percy! Have all the months--the years--been wasted that you have spent in helping me? What should I do if you were gone?” “Hush, hush! You know not what you are saying.” “Percy! What is the matter with you? What new freak have you taken into your head? Why are you so eager to go away?” Was she playing with him--trifling with his heart? He asked himself the question, and then bent his gaze upon her upturned face. Oh, no, no! There were tears in her eyes, and on her face a soul-sent prayer. What could she mean? How much dared he to speak? A curious thought occurred to him. In all the years he had known her--through all their intimate association--though she had always called him by his Christian name, she had done it in the days of childhood, and she had done it ever since--in all that time he had never dared, had never presumed, to address her in any way save as a lady, set by the rank of birth high above him. In the early days he had been old enough, with manly feelings enough, to respect the rank she held, and he had felt proud that he was admitted to her friendship. And now the thought came to him--an audacious thought--that he would call her as her grandfather called her; as Lord Oakleigh was permitted to call her. He would do it, and mark the result. He expected it would startle her; most likely, offend her; she might be angry, but he would try it.