The next day he stayed away from Ferndale, and the next day he sent his old friend a short note saying that he had been so busy he had no time to call, and found that unexpected business would take him into Lewisburg for several days. He hoped she would not wait for him any longer, as it might not be possible for him to go to the White at all. With a very sober face Mrs. Barry read this aloud to her niece, watching the guilty young face with covert eyes. “Louise Barry, you have done something to Cecil,” she said, with conviction. But Molly protested loudly that she hadn’t said a word to Mr. Laurens. Then she went off to one of her wildest haunts by a secluded little mountain stream and flung herself down on the green bank to rest and think. She caught a glimpse of her pale face and heavy eyes in the clear stream, and started in surprise. “Molly Trueheart, is that you looking so pale and big-eyed? What is the matter with you, silly? It is the best thing that ever happened. You ought to thank your lucky stars that you got rid of him so soon, the hateful wretch!” And then very inconsistently she burst into a storm of angry tears. CHAPTER XII. Mrs. Barry and her niece had been at the White two weeks, when Cecil Laurens made his appearance quite unexpectedly one evening, and explained to Mrs. Barry that as he was going away soon he had come over to bid her good-bye. To Molly he was very stiff and formal indeed, although he could almost have sworn that a sudden light of joy leaped into her eyes at his abrupt approach--a light instantly veiled beneath the fringe of her dark lashes, and her voice was distinctly careless as she gave him a brief greeting and went away from her aunt’s side with her partner in the dance. For Molly had become in the weeks of her sojourn here one of the belles of the place, and was enjoying her prestige with all the ardor of youth and a light heart. No one was more sought in the dance than she, no one had more bouquets and invitations, and she would not have owned to herself that pique lay at the bottom of her gayety. Her girlish pride had been cruelly wounded by Cecil Laurens’ sarcastic words, and a strange longing came over her to know if they were really true. “Would it indeed be such poor taste for any one to love _me_?” she asked herself, soberly; and the gravity of the thought turned the child into a woman. She threw aside the carelessness that had distinguished her, and put on what she called grown-up ways. As she had a good education, and a high order of intellect, she succeeded in making the change very striking and charming, and in less than two weeks disproved the truth of the ungallant Cecil’s assertion.