It was just about the same moment that Henry Burrel, rising up from a desk at which he had been writing, closed it, rang the bell, and, giving two letters to his servant for the post, ordered him to bring his hat and stick. It happened, of course, that at the very same time the whole of the most gossiping heads in Emberton were at the windows of their several dwellings, endeavoring to ascertain if it were going to turn out a fine evening, and, of course, their speculations were soon confined to Burrel, who was seen to walk slowly along the street, to stop for ten minutes at the principal inn, either--as it was conjectured by the spectators--for the purpose of giving some orders, or of inquiring after the health of Mrs. Darlington, and then to proceed leisurely across the bridge, turn the corner of the park, and approach the widow's cottage. The cottage itself being, as I have before said, two or three hundred yards removed from the town, in the turnings of a narrow road, was out of sight. But there was a house, which stood at the corner of the bridge, on the opposite side to the park, commanding a view of a considerable part of the grounds; and from the windows of the first floor, a female figure having been seen walking quickly down among the trees on the left, while Burrel was pausing at the inn--Miss Mildew, the fair tenant of that story--a lady of about fifty-nine, who had exercised millinery, and had her heart broken several times by the perfidy of man--put on her bonnet, and ran across the street to tell a congenial spirit, from whom she concealed nothing, that Miss Delaware was just going down to give the strange gentleman a meeting at the widow's cottage. Both held up their hands, and sighed mournfully over the depravity of the world, and the sad decline of female modesty in this latter day. In the mean while Burrel pursued his way, and entering the open door of the cottage, knocked at that of the room in which he had before seen the widow. Another door opposite, however, was immediately opened by widow Harrison, and Burrel, entering the room with that pleasant and unpretending easiness of demeanor which is always received as a kindly compliment by the lower classes, found himself, to his surprise, in the presence of Miss Delaware. Although her mind was too little acquainted with evil in any shape to lead Blanche Delaware to fancy for a single instant that any one would put a wrong construction on her actions, yet there was something, she knew not well what, in all that had passed between Burrel and herself since their first meeting, that called up into her cheek a slight blush, unconnected with any unpleasant feelings, as soon as she beheld him. Those blushes are great tell-tales, and will often let out the secret of a woman's heart before she herself knows that there is any secret in it; but we shall have more to say of them hereafter.