to quit. It would have been so much more
humiliating to have waited for a forcible ejectment."

And I promised to accompany her to London.

                  CHAPTER XI.

MRS. HILL had a pretty little bedizened
boudoir, blue silk hangings elegantly festooned
with birdcages; couches and divans for its
mistress's dogs and cats; with a spare seat for
a friend who might venture in at any time for a
dish of private chit-chat with the lady of the
hall. Into this apartment I was confidentially
drawn by Mrs. Hill on the morning after my
moonlight conversation with John, as with
heavy eyes and hectic cheeks, but with a saucy
tongue in reserve, specially sharpened, and a
chin held at the extreme angle of
self-complacency, and no toleration of interference from
others, I was sailing majestically down-stairs
to put my melancholy finger as usual into
the pie of the pleasures and pastimes of the
day.

"Come in, my dear," she said, mysteriously,
with her finger to her lip, nodding her little fat
face good humouredly at me, and making all
her little curls shake. "I think you are a very
safe person, my love, and, besides, so fond of
Rachel. I would not trouble you with my
news only that it is a secret, and a secret is a
thing that I never could endure for any length
of time without bringing on hysterics. You
are not fond of my darlings, I know. There,
we will send away the noisiest."

And Mrs. Hill hereupon tumbled some
half-dozen fluffy bodies out of the window on to the
verandah below, and stood for the next few
moments wagging her head and coqueting
down at the ill-tempered looking brutes, who
whined and scowled their resentment of the
disrespectful treatment they had received.

"Ho, my beauties! run, skip, jump!" cried
the lady, throwing up her little fat arms. And
the dogs, rolling their bodies away into the sun
at last, her attention returned to me.

"I must first tell you, my love," said she,
drawing a letter from her pocket, and smoothing
it open on her knee, "I must first confide to
you in strict secresy that our dear Rachel is
engaged to be married."

Here the ecstatic fury of the singing-birds
reached such a deafening climax that their
mistress was obliged to pause in her
communication, and to go round the room dropping
extinguishers of silk and muslin over the cages.
"When the pie was opened the birds began to
sing," thought I, the pie being Mrs. Hill's
budget, and I had also time to consider that
John must have sat up very late last night, or
risen very early this morning to have matters
already so very happily matured. "I wonder
if Grace would mind travelling a day sooner
than she named," was the third thought that
went whizzing through my head before Mrs.
Hill could proceed any further with the news
that she had in store for me.

"Yes," said Mrs. Hill, "it is true that we
are destined to lose her, and it is very kind and
sympathising of you, my dear, to look so miserable.
You can readily imagine how I shall
suffer—I, who have loved that girl far more
than if I had been ten times over her mother."
And the little lady wiped her eyes. "I told
you, my dear, that the matter is a secret. Old
Sir Arthur wants his son to marry another lady,
and Arthur Noble cannot marry without his
father's consent. But, in the mean time, the
children are engaged, hoping for better days.
And now there is a letter from the dear fellow
saying he will be here this evening. Only
I am not to tell Rachel, as he wants to
surprise her. You will keep my counsel, Miss
Dacre?"

I murmured, "Oh, certainly," but the things
in the room were swimming about strangely,
and my wits were astray.

"And do you know, my dear (I feel I can
trust you thoroughly), do you know I am
exceedingly glad of this for many reasons. I have
noticed poor young Hollingford! Rachel is an
attractive creature, and I fear a little
inconsiderate. But the queen of beauty must be
excused, my dear, and she is a queen, our
Rachel. We cannot help the moths getting
round the candle, can we?"

After this I curtseyed, and made my escape as
quickly as possible. "Poor young Hollingford!
Oh, John, John! why have you brought
yourself so low as this?" I cried, across the
wood to the farm chimneys.

My children, there is a rambling old garden
at the back of the hall, a spot which the sun
never leaves. Wild tangles of shadow fall now
as then on the paths, from the gnarled branches
of moss-eaten apple-trees. In the season of
fruit, blushing peaches and plums, yellow and
transparent as honey, hung from its ancient
lichen-covered walls. Raspberry brambles,
borne out of their ranks by the weight of their
crimson berries, strayed across the path. There
were beehives ranged against the fiery creeper
on the far-end wall, and the booming of the
bees made a drowsy atmosphere in the place.
This, together with the odour of stocks and
wall-flowers, was deliciously perceived as soon
as your hand lifted the latch of the little green
door, and regretfully missed when you closed it
behind you.

You know it, my children. I need not tell
you that it is a homely retreat compared with
the other gardens near, costly, curious, and
prim, where the beds are like enormous
bouquets dropped on the grass, and the
complexion of every flower is suited with that of its
neighbour. But this old garden was always a
favourite, for its unfailing sunshine, its
murmurous repose, and the refreshing fragrance of
its old-fashioned odours.

Well, my dears, all day long I stayed in my
room, fighting a battle of sorrow and passion,
and when evening came I stood at the window
and saw the sun go down behind the trees of the
old garden. I bethought me of its soothing
sights and sounds, and fled away to it, as to a