Annie Grant found her friend strangely uncommunicative on the subject of her fit of weeping; she declared that it was nothing—that she felt nervous and overtired, but that a good night’s rest was all she required to set her to rights again; then kissing her affectionately, Laura, with much caressing, turned her out of the room. As sound sleep was the specific to which Miss Peyton trusted for the restoration of her health and spirits, it can scarcely be imagined that, after passing four restless hours in a vain attempt to obtain the desired boon, she should have felt particularly refreshed. Weary both in mind and body, she was aroused from a dreamy, half-sleeping, half-waking, but wholly uncomfortable state into which she had fallen by the sun shining brightly into her room. The beauty of the morning, though a thick hoar frost lay upon the ground, banished all further desire for sleep, and commencing her toilet, she resolved on a scheme which her acquaintance with the usual habits of the family led her to conceive feasible—namely, to possess herself of the third volume of a new novel in which she was considerably interested, and with that for a companion, to take a brisk walk in the clear morning air and return ere any of the party had made their appearance at the breakfast-table. Dressing hastily, she wrapped herself in a thick shawl and tripped lightly down the staircase, only encountering in her progress a drowsy housemaid, who stared at her with lack-lustre eyes, as though she took her for a ghost. Before she could carry her whole plan into execution, however, it was necessary that she should visit the library in order to procure the volume she wished to take with her. Opening the door quickly, she had proceeded half-way across the room ere she perceived it was not untenanted. As she paused, uncertain whether or not to proceed, Charles Leicester—for he it was who, acting on his resolution of the previous night, was writing a few lines to account for his abrupt departure—rose from the table at which he had been sitting and advanced towards her. He was attired for a journey, and his pale features and the dark circles under his eyes gave token of a sleepless night. There was a restless energy in his tone and manner, as he addressed her, totally opposed to his usual listless indifference; and no one could be in his company a moment without perceiving that (to use a common but forcible expression) something had come over him—that he was (at all events, for the present) a changed man.

“You are an early riser, Miss Peyton,” he said. “I did not expect to have an opportunity of wishing you good-bye in person.”

“I was not aware you intended leaving Broadhurst so soon,” returned Laura, feeling, she scarcely knew why, exceedingly uncomfortable. “Shall you return before the party breaks up?”

“No. I shall go abroad directly, and endeavour to procure an attachÉship to one of the embassies; the Turkish, I think: I’ve never seen Constantinople.”

“Surely you’ve formed this resolution somewhat abruptly,” observed Miss Peyton. “It was only yesterday you agreed to escort your cousin Annie and myself to ride over and sketch the ruins of Monkton Priory. I was thinking this morning, as soon as I saw the sunshine, what a charming canter we should have.”

“I should be more sorry, Miss Peyton, to be forced to break so agreeable an engagement, did I not feel certain you will have no difficulty in supplying my place on the occasion,” returned Leicester, laying a marked emphasis on the pronoun. “I must now wish you good morning,” he continued; then bowing coldly, he took up his hat and turned to leave the room.

Miss Peyton allowed him to reach the door ere she could make up her mind what course to pursue; then colouring brightly, she exclaimed, “Stay one moment, Mr. Leicester.” As he paused, and closing the door, which he had partially opened, turned towards her, she continued, “I will not affect to misunderstand your allusion, and although the subject is one on which I should not willingly have entered, I consider it due to myself not to suffer you to depart under a mistake, into which I should have thought you knew me too well to have fallen.”

“Mistake!” repeated Leicester eagerly. “Is it possible that I can be mistaken? Are you not then engaged to Mr. De Grandeville?”

“Most assuredly am I not,” returned Miss Peyton, “nor, unless I very greatly alter my opinion of that gentleman, shall I ever be so. I did think Mr. Leicester would have given me credit for better taste than to have supposed such a thing possible, but I see I was mistaken; and now,” she added, “having found the book I came to seek, I must wish you good morning, and—a pleasant journey to Constantinople.”

“Stay, Miss Peyton,” exclaimed Leicester, for once really excited; “you have said too much or too little. Pardon me,” he continued, “I will not detain you five minutes, but speak I must.” Taking her hand, he led her to a seat, and resumed—

“I am placed in a position equally painful and difficult, but the best and most straightforward course I can pursue will be to tell you in as few words as possible the simple truth, and then leave you to decide upon my fate. The difficulty! have to encounter is this:—You are an heiress; I, a portionless younger brother, without a profession, and brought up in expensive and indolent habits. Were I then to tell you that I love you, and that the dearest wish of my heart is to call you mine, how can I expect you to think that I am not actuated by mercenary motives? to believe that I do indeed, deeply, truly love you, with an intensity of which I scarcely could have believed my nature capable? When first I sought your society, I frankly own (and if the admission ruins my cause I cannot help it, for I will not attempt to deceive you) it was the report of your riches which attracted me. I considered you lady-like and agreeable, and this being the case, I would willingly have done as I saw men of my acquaintance do everyday—married for money; but as I became intimate with you, and discovered the priceless treasures of your heart and mind, my views and feelings altered. I soon learned to love you for yourself alone, and then for the first time, when I perceived that in marrying you I had everything to gain and nothing to offer in return, I became fully aware of the meanness of the act I contemplated—in fact I saw the matter in its true light, and felt that to ask you to become my wife would be an insult rather than a compliment. Thus, the more I grew to love you, the less I ventured to show it, till at last, pride coming to my assistance, I resolved to tear myself away, and quitted Scotland abruptly, intending never to renew our intimacy, unless some unexpected stroke of fortune should enable me to do so on more equal terms. My cousin Annie, however, had it seems guessed my secret, and invited you here without mentioning her intention to me till you had actually arrived. Had I acted consistently, I should have left this place a fortnight ago; but I had suffered so much during my absence, and the delight of again associating with you was so overpowering, that I had not sufficient strength of will to carry out my determination; thus I continued day by day yielding myself to the fascination of your society, learning to love you more and more, and yet not daring to tell you so, because I felt the impossibility of proving—even now it seems absurd to say—my disinterestedness; but that I loved you for yourself alone. Such had been for some days my state of feeling, when yesterday I was nearly driven distracted by that man, De Grandeville, actually selecting me as his confidant, and consulting me of all people in the world as to the advisability of making you an offer of marriage, hinting that he had reason to believe such a proposal would be favourably received by you.”

“Insolent!” exclaimed Miss Peyton, raising her eyes for the first time during Leicester’s address, and looking him full in the face. “So far from encouraging him, I have never spoken to him save to turn his pompous speeches into ridicule since I was first introduced to him.”

“So I would fain have taught myself to believe yesterday,” resumed Leicester; “but the coldness of your manner towards me, and the marked attention you allowed him to pay you during the evening, tortured me with doubts, and when, after an animated conversation in the music-room, I saw him raise your hand to his lips, I imagined he had put his design into execution, and was an accepted suitor.”

“A rejected one would have been nearer the mark,” murmured Miss Peyton.

“Utterly miserable,” continued Leicester, “at the idea of having irrevocably lost you—provoked that you should have accepted a man so completely your inferior in mind, and, indeed, in every particular, I ordered post-horses before I retired for the night, and but for this accidental meeting should have been already on my road to London. And now,” he continued with passionate eagerness, “it is for you to decide whether my future life is to be happy or miserable. If truth has any power of revealing itself, you will believe that I love you deeply, tenderly, for yourself alone; and you will decide whether such an affection is calculated to ensure your happiness; but if you are unable to credit my sincerity, only say the word, and I leave you for ever.”

He ceased, and clenching his hands in the excess of his emotion till the nails appeared to grow into the flesh, stood before her, pale and agitated, like a criminal awaiting the sentence which shall send him forth a free man or consign him to a felon’s grave. After watching her anxiously for a few moments, during which she remained without speaking, her head averted and her features concealed by her close straw bonnet, he resumed: “I see it is in vain to wait; your silence tells me that I have nothing to hope—fool that I was ever to deem it could be otherwise! Farewell, Laura; may you be as happy as I would have striven to render you.”

He turned, and his hand was again on the lock of the door, when a low, sweet voice, every accent of which thrilled through his very soul, murmured—

“Mr. Leicester—Charles—do not go—you will not leave me?”

And accordingly he did not go, but came back instantly like an amiable, obedient young man as he was, and received the reward of merit by learning from the lips of her he loved that she was not only convinced of the sincerity of the affection he had bestowed on her, but prized the gift so highly that she felt obliged to return it, which statement sounded very like a contradiction, but was nothing of the kind. Then followed a bright, happy half-hour, one of those little bits of unmitigated sunshine which gleam once or twice in a lifetime to thaw the ice that tears which have never found vent form more or less thickly around the heart of each of us; and ere it was over, Laura Peyton stood pledged to become the wife of Charley Leicester, who dis-ordered the post-horses and postponed his journey to Constantinople ad infinitum.

Several droll little scenes occurred later on that morning between various members of the party assembled at Broadhurst. In the first place, Annie Grant, who, completely tired out, and greatly concerned at the mysterious impediments which obstructed the course of her cousin Charles’s love affair, had sought her pillow with a firm conviction she should never close her eyes all night, fell asleep immediately, and woke soon after nine o’clock on the following morning under the impression that she had just gone to bed. While she was dressing she resolved in her anxious mind her cousin’s difficulties, and came to the following conclusions: first, that for sundry reasons connected with his natural indolence and a painful sense of his dependent position, Charley would never “tell his love;” secondly, that Laura, not divining these reasons, was piqued and hurt at his prolonged silence; and thirdly, that it behoved her (Annie) to remove these stumbling-blocks by a little judicious interference. Accordingly, when she had finished her toilet, and, giving a last parting glance at her pretty face and graceful figure in the cheval glass in her dressing-room, had thought—well, I don’t know that we’ve any business to pry into her thoughts, but by the bright half-smile, half-blush which resulted from the inspection it may be concluded they were of an agreeable nature. When she had performed this little unconscious act of homage to her own beauty she tripped off to her friend’s room, and found that young lady fastening a very dangerous little bow of ribbon around her neck, with a small turquoise brooch made in the shape of a true lover’s knot. I wonder why she should have selected it from some twenty others on that morning in particular?

“Idle girl!” exclaimed Annie, kissing her affectionately, as if idleness were a highly commendable quality, “idle girl! not dressed at ten o’clock, and I’ve been ready for the last five minutes.”

“I’m very sorry, dear; but if you knew what pleasant dreams I’ve enjoyed, you would not wish to have dispelled them,” returned Laura demurely, though there was a fund of merriment gleaming in her dark eyes which Annie in her innocence did not perceive. Feeling, however, that under the circumstances her friend had no business to have been so very happy, even in her dreams, she answered somewhat pettishly—

“You have been more favoured than I have been. I went to bed cross and worried, and fretted over all my troubles again in my dreams. Laura dear,” she continued, “I want to say something to you, if I thought you would not be angry with me: I wish you—but can’t you guess what I’m going to say?”

Miss Peyton shook her pretty head, and confirmed the conviction expressed by De Grandeville, that her family was of modern date, by repudiating any connection with the race of Odipus. So poor, sensitive Annie was forced to clothe her meaning in plain and unmistakable words, which she endeavoured to do by resuming—

“My cousin Charles, dear Laura—you know we were brought up together as children, and I love him as a brother; he is so kind-hearted and such a sweet temper; and of course I am aware he makes himself rather ridiculous sometimes with his indolence and affectation, but he has been so spoiled and flattered by the set he lives in—it is only manner—whenever he is really called upon to act, you have no notion what good sense and right feeling he displays. Dear Laura, I can’t bear to see him so unhappy!”

At the beginning of this speech Miss Peyton coloured slightly; as it proceeded her eyes sparkled, and any one less occupied with their own feelings than was Annie Grant might have observed that tears glistened in them; but at its conclusion she observed in her usual quiet tone—

“I don’t believe Mr. Leicester is unhappy.”

“Ah! you don’t know him as well as I do,” returned Annie, her cheeks glowing and her eyes beaming with the interest she took in the subject; “he was so wretched all yesterday evening; he ate no supper, and sat moping in corners, as unlike his natural, happy self as possible.”

“Did you hear that he had ordered post-horses at eight o’clock this morning?” inquired Laura.

“No! you don’t mean it!” exclaimed Annie, clasping her hands in dismay. “Oh, I hope he is not gone!”

“You may depend upon it he is,” rejoined Miss Peyton, turning to the glass avowedly to smooth her glossy hair, which did not in the slightest degree require that process, but in reality to hide a smile. “He must be on his way to town by this time, unless anything has occurred this morning to cause him to alter his determination.”

“That is impossible,” returned Annie quickly; then adding in a tone of the deepest reproach, “Oh, Laura! how could you be so cruel as to let him go?” she burst into a flood of tears. And Laura, that heartless young hyÆna of fashionable life, that savage specimen of the perfidious sex of whom a poet sings—

Woman, though so mild she seem,

Will take your heart and tantalise it;

Were it made of Portland stone,

She’d manage to Macadamise it”—

what do you suppose she did on the occasion? Nothing wonderful, and yet the best thing she could, for she wreathed her soft arms round Annie’s neck, and kissing away her tears, whispered in a few simple touching words the secret of her happy love.