mentioned once that you told her I was small and
plain."

"Oh! she recollects that, does she?" he
said, with a laugh that had an unpleasant ring.
"Well, does she think you answer to the
description, I wonder? She did not expect to
find you an engaged woman, Mattie."

"She does not know anything about that," I
said. "Indeed, you have been so little at the
Mill-house since she came, that nothing of the
kind has occurred to her; and I have never
made occasion to tell her," said I, blushing to
think of the exceeding dislike I always felt of
thrusting the information upon any one. I
thought that Luke would see this and resent it,
and I gave a very troubled glance upward. But
he was not looking at me.

"Don't tell her, then," he said, turning to
me with that narrow look across his eyes and
brows which often spoiled his face. "Promise
that you will not tell her till I give you
leave."

I was pleased to be able to comply willingly,
for he had often found me stubborn enough, and
just now I was trying to do my duty. I
promised on the impulse of the moment, without
stopping to wonder about his motive.

And yet, many a time after this, I longed
to open my heart to Sylvia, and tell her all
my trouble. I longed for some one to mourn
over me, and chide me for wishing that I
was buried with my mother in the Streamstown
churchyard. I longed to pour out the
rebellion in my heart, and be answered by
some other monitor than the rebukes of my
own conscience. And still I was thankful on
the whole to the promise I had given Luke
for obliging me to keep my own counsel on the
subject. I could scarcely have told Sylvia of
my engagement without letting her know, or at
least guess, my unhappiness. And where would
have been the use of that? Since for my father's
good I had bound myself to Luke Elphinstone,
I was also bound to be a true wife to him, and,
both for my own sake and his, it were a bad way
to begin by revealing to a third person the
repugnance with which my heart turned from the
life that lay before me. For there was no
escape from it that I could see. My father
was getting an old man, and his health was
failing; he had never been the same since those
days when ruin had stared him in the face.
His head grew confused now over the details of
business. He was nervous and timorous,
where he had formerly been bold and sanguine.
He leaned upon Luke, and as his powers failed
he clung to and loved, in his undemonstrative
way, the youth and strength, the industry and
long-headedness, that carried his younger partner
from beginning to end of whatever undertaking
he engaged in. I felt this when the little book
full of grim figures, over which it had been his
custom to pore with energy the livelong evening,
was handed over to Luke, while my father
himself lay back in his chair and slept, like a
maa whose age was assured of ease, whose house
was well propped and guarded, and whose fireside
was free of care. He already counted Luke
as his son, and me he treated with indulgence;
for by me he had gained that son. And
meanwhile the days were lengthening, the summer
deepened, roses increased and multiplied, and
the hay was sweet in the meadows. My year
was passing away.

That book of figures above mentioned was an
excuse for Luke remaining in the dining-room
almost the whole of the long light evenings. My
father liked his doing so, liked to rouse up now
and again and see the younger, stronger man
thus alive to the interests of business; it was a
sign of thrift that pleased his eyes, just as his
waking ears were also charmed by the recurrence
of the homely, monotonous purring that sounded
drowsily from the distant beetling-house, whose
wheel turned night and day. Sylvia and I were
busy contriving baby-clothes for a poor woman
in one of the cottages, and we made tea for
ourselves at an end window in the drawing-room,
which commanded a view of the mill-settlement.
From thence we could see the sun setting redly
behind a hill covered with dark firs, dashing the
sycamores near us with ruddy gold, hanging a
lustrous haze over the little wooden bridge till it
looked like a bridge in a dream, and opening up
wonderful chambers of colour in the smooth
deep tide of the river. Luke sometimes came in
for a cup of tea. He and Sylvia got on so badly
together, however, that we had pleasanter times
when he stayed away. At first I had thought she
seemed bent on charming him, as it was her
nature to love to please every one; but her efforts
had been so clearly thrown away, that of late she
had given them up. As the time went on, her
bright spirits fell away; she grew silent and sad,
sometimes even discontented and pettish; she
ceased to take any interest in the things that at
first had delighted her. I thought she was tired
of the dulness of the Mill-house, and longed to
get back to London. Nor did I wonder at this,
when I, who should have loved the Mill-house as
my home, felt the chill of its atmosphere even
in the hot, bright days of summer with Sylvia's
companionship. Outside all nature was gay;
fields ripened, and gardens flaunted with flowers;
but within, the spell of melancholy that belonged
to the house never had hung so heavily as it did
now, when Sylvia had been about three weeks
our guest. Gradually this conviction dawned
upon me, that we were worse now, as we
formerly had been better, for Sylvia's presence
amongst us.

One day I had coaxed Luke into a promise to
take an afternoon's holiday from his eternal
plodding at the mill, and to give Sylvia and me a
drive. When the time came, we two girls sat
waiting under the sycamores, beside the river.
Sylvia was more carefully dressed than usual,
and all her gay spirits had revived. Instead of
Luke, however, there came a note, saying that
pressure of business prevented his fulfilling his
promise. Sylvia's eyes flashed as she read the
note which I gave her. It was addressed to
us jointly, and began, "Fair ladies!" Sylvia
crushed the paper in her hand and tossed it into