They sat together by the wide hearth, and it seemed to him that in the soft light of the candles she might well pass for ten years less than her age, but as a matter of fact a stranger might well have taken her for but little older than himself; in her beauty there was something so soft and fair. They had been chatting of one thing and another--principally of Lady Edward Sothern, and the wedding--when suddenly it occurred to him that he had not enquired for Lord Osborne, and, to his amazement, learned that he was in Paris. "Upon my word I do not understand him," he said, rising to his feet, and leaning against the mantelpiece. "When we were in Italy he was for ever playing the _rôle_ of lonely exile, and pining for his native land!" He looked down at Lady Osborne, and she coloured. "I was particularly anxious to speak to you about him," she replied. "It is on account of his disappointment with Miss Watson. She has definitely refused him." "But what could have induced him to ask her when she is the betrothed of another?" "It was all a mistake--Mr. Musgrave confesses to having been misinformed. She continues to live with her brother and sister at Croydon--vulgar impossible people!--though Osborne insists that they have a child who is a perfect little lady!--I cannot understand these Watsons!" On the plea of his disordered dress, Mr. Howard soon after retired, but, as he crossed the room it was as though something of its beauty had faded. It no longer held the same spell for him. Something of disquiet had wakened in him. An instinct, not unakin to a sense of shrinking, had possessed him--almost as though there were a pitfall at his feet. As he entered his old apartment, he was again conscious of uneasiness. It had been freshly decorated, and re-furnished, and there was an air of luxury which somehow repelled him, giving him a feeling of oppression. He went over to the casement, and throwing it wide open, regardless of frost and snow, looked out into the quiet night, with its myriad of stars. On the following day he set out to call on some old parishioners, and had not gone very far on his way when he encountered Tom Musgrave riding along. "If ever I met such a fellow as you are, Howard! We all thought you'd been eaten by cannibals!" "Sorry to disappoint you!--but there are no cannibals in Spain!" "Well, crocodiles!--it's all one!--and here's Osborne gone off to Paris, clean out of his wits over Miss Watson!" "How came you to make such a mistake with regard to Miss Watson?" "Faith! I don't know that there was any mistake! Her people are wild with her for not having Osborne--but there seems to be some other fellow in the background--someone she had met at her aunt's--and she seems fully determined to have her own way. She has, absolutely, left them at Croydon, and gone to stay with her younger brother, where there will be nobody to look after her from morning to night!"