But before Mr. Wynter had time to reply.—indeed, by the very first possible post—came a letter to Lucia, the sight of which made her very rosy. She had had plenty of letters from Maurice long ago, and never blushed over them as she did over this; but then this was so different. She did not even like to read it in her mother's presence. She just glanced at it there, and carried it off to devour in comfort alone. It was quite short, after all, for he had scarcely had ten minutes before the post hour; but it said—beside several things which were of no interest except to the reader—that he had found Lady Dighton at Hunsdon on his arrival, and had told her and his father together of his engagement; that his cousin was going to write and invite Mrs. Costello to Dighton; and that Mr. Leigh said, if they did not come down immediately, he should be obliged to start for London himself to tell them how pleased he was.

"At any rate," Maurice concluded, "I shall be in town again on Saturday. I find I have business to see my lawyer about."

All this—as well as the rest of the note—was very agreeable. Lucia went and sat down on a footstool at her mother's feet to tell her the news. Mrs. Costello laid her hand on her child's head and sighed softly.

"You will have to give up this fashion of yours, darling," she said, "you must learn to be a woman now."

Lucia laughed.

"I don't believe I ever shall," she answered. "At least, not with you or with Maurice."

"Would you like to go to Dighton?"

She considered for a minute.

"Yes, mamma, I think I should. You know how things are in those great houses; but I have never seen anything but Canada, and even there, just the country. I should not like, by-and-by, for people to laugh at Maurice, because I was only an ignorant country girl."

She spoke very slowly and timidly; but Mrs. Costello began to think she was right. It would be as well that the future mistress of Hunsdon should have some little introduction to her new world, to prepare her for "by-and-by."

Next day came two letters for Mrs. Costello, as well as one for Lucia. The first was from Lady Dighton full of congratulation, and pressing her invitation; the other, from Mr. Wynter, announced that he, his wife, and daughter, would be in London next evening. Next evening was Saturday, and Maurice also would be there, and would, of course spend Sunday with them; so that they had a prospect of plenty of guests.

Maurice, however, arrived early in the day. He had established himself at a neighbouring hotel, and came in quite with the old air of being at home. He made a little grimace when he heard of the others who were expected, but contented himself by making the most of the hours before their train was due. He found an opportunity also of conveying to Mrs. Costello his conviction that Hunsdon was very much in want of a lady to make it comfortable, and that Lucia would be much better there than shut up in London. The fact that London was in its glory at that moment made no impression on him.

"That is just it," he said, when this was suggested to him. "I want to get it settled and bring her back to enjoy herself here a little before the season is over."

It seemed, indeed, pretty evident that the present state of things could not last long; there was no reason why it should, and nothing but the bride's preparations to delay the long-desired wedding.

The Wynters came about nine o'clock. Mrs. Wynter instantly recognized Maurice. Her daughters had speculated enough about her mysterious visitor that winter night, to have prevented her forgetting him, if she would otherwise have done so, and the state of affairs at present was very soon evident as an explanation of the mystery. When the party separated for the night, Mrs. Costello and Mr. Wynter remained in the drawing-room for that consultation for which he had come, while his wife and daughter stayed together upstairs to talk over their new relations before going to bed.

Mrs. Costello, as briefly as possible, made her cousin comprehend that she had been compelled to leave France, and had fled to England because it was the most accessible refuge.

"I never meant to have come back," she said. "I have never allowed myself to think of it, because I could not disobey my father again."

"I am glad you have come, to tell you the truth;" he answered. "I do not at all imagine that, in your present circumstances, my uncle would have wished to keep you away."

Mrs. Costello looked relieved.

"I am almost inclined to go further," he continued, "and to say that he must have anticipated your return."

"Why?"

"Because in his will he gives you your income unconditionally, and only expresses a wish that you should not come back."

"Is it so really?"

"Certainly. But you have a copy of the will."

"It has not been unpacked since we came from Canada. I had made it so much my duty to obey the request that I had forgotten it had no condition attached to it."

"It has none."

"I am very glad; and you think he would have changed his mind now?"

"I think so. Especially as it seems to me Lucia is likely to settle in England."

"Yes, indeed. That was the second thing I wanted to speak to you about."

"They are engaged, I suppose?"

"Yes; it has been the wish of my heart for years. Maurice is like a son to me."

They discussed the matter in its more commonplace aspect. The wealth and position of the bridegroom elect were points as to which Mr. Wynter felt it his business to inquire, and when he found these so satisfactory, he congratulated his cousin with great cordiality, and plainly expressed his opinion that delays in such a case were useless and objectionable. He liked Lucia, and admired her, and thought, too, that there would be no better way of blotting out the remembrance of the mother's unfortunate marriage than by a prosperous one on the part of the daughter.

Meantime Mrs. Wynter sat in an easy-chair by her dressing-table, and her daughter was curled up on the floor near her.

"Well, mamma," Miss Wynter said, "you see I was right. I knew perfectly well that there must be some romance at the bottom of it all."

"You were very wise, my dear."

"And, mamma, if I had seen Lucia, I should have been still more sure. Why, she is perfectly lovely! I hope she will let me be her bridesmaid."

"Tiny, you know I don't approve of your talking in that way."

"What way, mamma? Of course, they are going to be married. Anybody can see that."

"If they are, no doubt we shall hear in good time."

"And I am sure, if either of us were to marry half as well, the whole house would be in a flutter. I mean to be very good friends with Lucia, and then, perhaps, she will invite me to go and see her. And I must be her bridesmaid, because I am her nearest relation; and she can't have any friends in England, and I shall make her let me have a white dress with blue ribbons."

Mrs. Wynter still reproved, but she smiled, too; and Tiny being a spoiled child, needed no greater encouragement. She stopped in her mother's room until she heard Mr. Wynter coming, when she fled, dishevelled, to her own, and dropped asleep, to dream of following Lucia up the aisle of an impossible church, dressed in white with ribbons of bleu de ciel.

Lucia perhaps had said to herself also that she meant to be good friends with Tiny. At all events, the two girls did get on excellently together; before the week which the Wynters spent in London was at an end, they had discussed as much of Lucia's love story as she was disposed to tell, and arranged that Tiny and her sister should really officiate on that occasion to which everybody's thoughts were now beginning to be directed.

Another week found the Costellos at Dighton. They meant to stay a fortnight or three weeks, and then to return to town until the marriage; but of this no one of their Norfolk friends would hear a word. Lady Dighton, Maurice, and Mr. Leigh had made up their minds that Lucia should not leave the county until she did so a bride; and they carried their point. The wedding-day was fixed; and Lucia found herself left, at last, almost without a voice in the decision of her own destiny.

And yet, these last weeks of her girlhood were almost too happy. She went over several times with her mother and Lady Dighton to Hunsdon, and grew familiar with her future home; she saw the charming rooms that were being prepared for herself, and could sit down in the midst of all this new wealth and luxury, and talk with Maurice about the old times when they had no splendour, but little less happiness than now; and she had delicious hours of castle-building, sometimes alone, sometimes with her betrothed, which were pleasanter than any actual realization of their dreams could be.

Of course, they had endless talks, in which they said the same things over and over again, or said nothing at all; but they knew each other so thoroughly now, and each was so completely acquainted with all the other's past that there was truly nothing for them to tell or to hear, except the one old story which is always new.

One day, however, Maurice came over to Dighton in a great hurry, with a letter for Lucia to read. He took her out into the garden, and when they were quite alone he took it out and showed it to her.

"What is it?" she said. "It looks like a French letter."

"It is French. Do you remember your friend, Father Paul?"

"Of course. Oh, Maurice! it cannot be about Bailey?"

"Indeed, it is. But don't look frightened. I wrote to Father Paul, and this is his answer."

"What made you write?"

"Did not I say I would pension Bailey? I don't forget my promises if other people do."

"Surely, you were only joking?"

"Very far from it, I assure you. Your good friend undertook to manage it, and he writes to me that my letter only arrived in time; that Bailey was ill, and quite dependent on charity, and that he is willing to administer the money I send in small doses suitable to the patient's condition."

"But, Maurice, it is perfect nonsense. Why should you give money to that wretched man? We might, indeed, do something for him."

"Who are 'we?' You had better be careful at present how you use your personal pronouns."

"I meant mamma and I might, of course."

"I do not see the 'of course' at all. Mamma has nothing whatever to do with it—nor even you. This is simply a mark of gratitude to Mr. Bailey for a service he did me lately."

Lucia let her hand rest a little less lightly on Maurice's arm.

"And me too," she said softly.

"Use your 'we' in its right sense, then, and we will reward him. But not unless you are sure that you do not repent having been frightened."

"Ah! you don't know how glad I was when mamma made me write that note. It did better than the one I tore up."

"What was that? Did you tear one up?"

"Yes. After all, I don't believe you were as miserable as I was; for I wrote once; I did actually write and ask you to come—only I tore up the note—and you were consoling yourself with Miss Landor."

"Miss Landor! By the way, has she been asked to come over, for the tenth?"

"I don't know. You ought to ask her yourself. Why did not you propose to her, Maurice? Or perhaps you did?"

"If I did not, you may thank Bailey. Yes, indeed, Lucia, you contrived so well to persuade me you never would care for me that I began to imagine it was best I should marry her; that is, supposing she would have me."

"And all the while I was doing nothing but think of you, and of how wicked and ungrateful and all sorts of bad things I had been in Paris."

"And I—" etc. etc.

The rest of their conversation that morning was much like it was on other days, and certainly not worth repeating. Lucia, however, took the first opportunity of speaking to Lady Dighton about Miss Landor, and seeing that her invitation for the wedding was not neglected.

The tenth of July, Lucia's birthday and her marriage-day, came quickly to end these pleasant weeks of courtship. It was glorious weather—never bride in our English climate had more sunshine on her—and the whole county rung with the report of her wonderful beauty, and of the romantic story of these two young people, who had suddenly appeared from the unknown regions of Canada, and taken such a prominent and brilliant place in the neighbourhood.

But they troubled themselves little just then, either with their own marvellous fortunes or with the gossip of their neighbours. Out of the quaint old church where generations of Dightons had been married and buried, they came together, man and wife; and went away into "that new world which is the old," to fulfil, as they best might, the dream to which one of them had been so faithful. They went away in a great clamour of bells and voices, and left Mrs. Costello alone, to comfort herself with the thought that the changes and troubles of the past had but served to redeem its errors, and to bring her, at last, the fuller and more perfect realization of her heart's desire.

END OF VOL. III.

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