And yet love is so sweet! She slept towards morning, as Walter did, and when she woke, woke to a sense of happiness so exquisite and tender that her soul was astonished and asked why in an outburst of gratitude and praise to God. And it was not till afterwards that the burden and all the darkness came back to her. But that moment perhaps was worth the pain of the other--one of those compensations, invisible to men, with which God still comforts His martyrs. She rose from her bed and came back to life with a face full of new gravity and thoughtfulness, yet lit up with smiles. Even Mrs. Forrester, who had seen nothing and suspected nothing on the previous night except that Oona had perhaps taken a chill, felt, though she scarcely understood, a something in her face which was beyond the ordinary level of life. She remarked to Mysie, after breakfast, that she was much relieved to see that Miss Oona's cold was to have no bad result. "For I think she is looking just bonnier than usual this morning--if it is not my partiality--like a spring morning," Mrs. Forrester said. "Ah mem, and mair than that," said Mysie. "God bless her! She is looking as I have seen her look the Sabbath of the Sacrament; for she's no like the like of us, just hardened baith to good and evil, but a' in a tremble for sorrow and joy, when the occasion comes round." "I hope we are not hardened," said Mrs. Forrester; "but I know what you mean, Mysie, though you cannot perhaps express it like an educated person; and I was afraid that she was taking one of her bad colds, and that we should be obliged to put off our visit to Mrs. Methven--which would have been a great pity, for I had promised to Lord Erradeen." "Do ye not think, mem," said Mysie, "that yon young lord he is very much taken up with--the isle and those that are on it?" "Hoots," said Mrs. Forrester, with a smile, "with you and me, Mysie, do you think? But that might well be after all, for I would not wonder but he felt more at home with the like of us, that have had so much to do with boys and young men, and all the ways of them. And you know I have always said he was like Mr. Rob, which has warmed my heart to him from the very first day." Perhaps the mother was, no more than Mysie, inclined to think that she and her old maid won the young lord's attention to the isle: but a woman who is a girl's mother, however simple she may be, has certain innocent wiles in this particular. Lord Erradeen would be a great match for any other young lady on the loch, no doubt: but for Oona what prince was good enough? They both thought so, yet not without a little flutter of their hearts at the new idea which began to dawn.