A few moments given to greeting, to the assuming of seats, and they were settled down. Lady Verner and Decima on a sofa opposite Sibylla; Lucy in a low chair--what she was sure to look out for; Lionel leaning against the mantel-piece--as favourite a position of his, as a low seat was of Lucy's. Sibylla had been startled by their entrance, and her chest was beating. Her brilliant colour went and came, her hand was pressed upon her bosom, as if to still it, and she lay rather back in her chair for support. She had not assumed a widow's cap since her arrival, and her pretty hair fell around her in a shower of gold. In spite of Lady Verner's prejudices, she could not help thinking her very beautiful; but she looked suspiciously delicate. "It is very kind of you to come to see me," said Sibylla, speaking timidly across to Lady Verner. Lady Verner slightly bowed. "You do not look strong," she observed to Sibylla, speaking in the moment's impulse. "Are you well?" "I am pretty well. I am not strong. Since I returned home, a little thing seems to flutter me, as your entrance has done now. Lionel had just told me you would call upon me, he thought. I was so glad to hear it! Somehow I had feared you would not." Candid, at any rate; and Lady Verner did not disapprove the apparent feeling that prompted it; but how her heart revolted at hearing those lips pronounce "Lionel" familiarly, she alone could tell. Again came the offence. "Lionel tells me sometimes I am so changed since I went out, that even he would scarcely have known me. I do not think I am so changed as all that. I had a great deal of vexation and trouble, and I grew thin. But I shall soon be well again now." A pause. "You ascertained no certain news of John Massingbird, I hear," observed Lady Verner. "Not any. A gentleman there is endeavouring to trace out more particulars. I heard--did Lionel mention to you--that I heard, strange to say, of Luke Roy, from the family I was visiting--the Eyres? Lionel"--turning to him--"did you repeat it to Lady Verner?" "I believe not," replied Lionel. He could not say to Sibylla, "My mother would tolerate no conversation on any topic connected with you." Another flagging pause. Lionel, to create a divertisement, raised a remarkably, fine specimen of coral from the table, and carried it to his mother. "It is beautiful," he remarked. "Sibylla brought it home with her." Lady Verner allowed that it was beautiful. "Show it to Lucy," she said, when she had examined it with interest. "Lucy, my dear, do you remember what I was telling you the other evening, about the black coral?" Sibylla rose and approached Lucy with Lionel.