"He knows his power," she thought; and from sheer contrariness made no answer to his appeal. "He shall not know what I think about it," she said to herself. CHAPTER XXVII. The handsome young lord stood looking at the fair face and mute red lips with a half chagrined air for a moment; then he said, hastily: "Good-day, Miss West. I see how disagreeable my presence is, so I will leave you to your meditations among the tombs. I hope none of those old fellows will come out of their graves to haunt you for your scorn of their descendant. "I hope not, indeed!" said Leonora, and then she laughed. He turned back at the sound of that laugh. Perhaps she was relenting. She had risen, indeed, and was holding out to him the sketch he coveted. "Take it," she said. "I was in a bad temper just now. Lady Adela may have it." "Will you, indeed, be so kind?" he exclaimed, radiant with pleasure. "But, indeed, you must not give your whole morning's work for nothing. Let me--" He put his hand into his pocket and brought out a shining gold piece. "Thank you, my lord," said Leonora, demurely, as she received the money into her palm. "I shall be able to buy myself a new dress with this." "You are not angry?" he said, struck by an inexplicable something in her tone. "Oh, no; I am very glad to be so well paid for my work," she answered, with the same demure air; and then she said, suddenly: "Good-morning," and walked away from him. He followed her. "Are you going home alone, Miss West?" "No; I have a small escort hereabouts, if he has not eaten my lunch and run away," she replied, carelessly. "Johnnie Dale? No, he has not run away. You will find him in the lane, where I saw him as we came through. Shall I find him for you?" "No, thank you. Doubtless Lady Adela is impatient at your long stay," she said, walking coolly away from him. "The deuce! I expect she is. I had quite forgotten the daughter of a hundred earls," he said to himself, ruefully. "I forget everything with Leonora West. She would not answer my question, yet I would give the world to know what she really thinks. If I had not promised De Vere a fair field, I would try to find out what she thought before the sun sets. How brusque she is! Ah!" The last exclamation was wrung from him by seeing Leonora lift her hand as she walked across the field. Something bright and shining flashed in the air a moment, then fell into the grass. "She has thrown my gold piece away like so much dross! What does she mean?" he asked himself. But the question was one not easily answered, so he returned to his friends, who were chattering like so many magpies among the ruins. "We thought you had gone back home, you were so long away," said Lady Adela, looking rather cross. "Now I shall have to invent some fiction to account for my long absence," he thought, pulling vexedly at his long mustache. "Deuce take the women! They pull one this way and that way, until one is out of patience!"