shall make the country wonder. The workpeople
shall have holiday, and the wheels shall rest.
Eh! Miss Sylvia?"

At this moment I asked Sylvia, rather sharply,
for a cup of tea, and Luke flung down his
newspaper ami came over to the table with a black
frown on his face. Something had put him in a
very bad humour that morning. Sylvia seemed
the only one who appreciated my father's joke.

My father left the room first, and Sylvia
followed, singing a little catch as she closed the
door. I hastened out also, but Luke stopped me.

"What is the meaning," he said, "of this
sudden visit to Eldergowan?"

"The meaning is," I answered, looking him
full in the face, "that Sylvia wishes to go, and,
of course, I am going with her."

He turned his back to me, and began to fidget
with the blind, on pretence of drawing it up.

"Why does she wish to go?" he asked.

I was silent for some moments, not knowing
how to answer this question. I watched his
nervous fingers playing with the cord of the
blind, and wondered at him. I felt that he was
false, but I could not understand him.

"Why does she wish to go?" he repeated,
impatiently.

"You can best answer that question yourself,"
I said, at last.

He wheeled round suddenly. " You have
broken your word," said he; " you have told her
of the engagement between you and me."

"Yesterday," I said, " you gave me a good
character for truth. I am sorry to say I kept the
secret; Miss Pollard enlightened her by accident."

"When?" he said. " Since yesterday evening?"

"Last night," I said.

"Meddling old fool!" he muttered under his
breath.

Again I looked at him, wondering at the
unaccountable meanness of his conduct.

"Luke," said I, " if you knew what I am
thinking of you now, you would give me my
liberty at once."

He smiled at me, with a sort of admiration
in his eyes.

"There is a great deal of the child about you
yes, Mattie," said he. " What is your terrible
thought?"

"I have been hating you," I said.

"That is nonsense," he said. " I never did
you any harm that you should hate me."

"You have done me harm," I said, " a great
deal; and you have done Sylvia harm."

"Has she complained to you?" he said, with
sudden anger and triumph struggling in his
face. Just at this moment Sylvia passed under
the window, to pluck some lavender from a bed
close by, to lay amongst the linen she was packing
in her trunk. A startling change passed
over Luke's face when she appeared; he flushed
up to the forehead, and his lip quivered.

"Four years ago," he said, huskily, " she cost
me bitter suffering. I have been trying to punish
her, but she is as heartless as ever. Let her
go as she came. She shall not interfere
between you and me. You are too good for me,
Mattie, I know you are; but I will not give you
up. nor your father."

He rushed out of the room and down the
path to the bridge, without once looking at
S!via, who was coming in with her lavender;
and we saw no more of him till after our return
from Eldergowan. I followed Sylvia, who had
passed him, smiling, on the steps. When I
arrived up-stairs, her door was locked. I knocked,
and there was no answer. Afterwards, when I
coaxed my way in, she was packing her trunk
with a dark face, and very few words for me.
Good-bye had been said to our friendship; she
could not forgive me.

I found Elspie in my own room, waiting for
me in triumph, with a pile of white muslins,
coloured cambrics, dainty laces, bright ribbons,
shoes with rosettes on them, and pretty morsels
of jewellery which she had taken from my
mother's old casket, and rubbed up with her
kindly hands till they sparkled again in the sun.
Her bairn had been covered up in ugly black
the last time she went visiting, said Elspie;
this time she should be as gay as a garden of
posies. She took a simple delight in watching
me dress myself in white, and tie a rose-coloured
ribbon among my curls. She had little bits of
gold and diamonds for my ears and throat; but
"yon braw ring o' Luke's," she said, " has the
bonniest glint o' them a'." I sighed a passionate
sigh as I dropped my hand into the folds of
my gown. I could not but see that these bright
garnishings had made me a different creature.
Little black Mattie might sit in the corner and
cry over her sorrows; but this shining young
woman looked like some one fit to be loved,
some one with a right to walk out into the
summer sunshine, and stretch forth her hand for
her share of human happiness. And again the
fruitless question, " Why had not I been Sylvia,
why had not Sylvia been me?" rang its sharp
changes on my heart; while Elspie chuckled and
admired, hoping Mr. Luke would come back to
take just one peep before I went off in my glory.

I was surely mad that day as we drove out
into the wreathed and scented midsummer
world, along the sunny roads, under the arching
trees, and between the blossomed hedges, mad
with the madness of nineteen years, from whose
hands trouble drops of its own weight, while
joy fills them with flowers at a moment's notice.
I was mad to tremble with ecstasy when we
turned into the avenue of Eldergowan, and the
scent of the wild orange-blossoms stole to my
senses; maddest of all when Mark Hatteraick
handed me out of the carriage, and I stood by
his side on the gravel, with the dear old house
beaming down on me, with its sunny windows,
and puffing welcomesfrom all its thrifty chimneys,
with bright faces flashing out of the open door
and down the steps, with voices of delight
ringing, with dogs leaping and barking, and Mark
holding my hand longer than he need have done,
and looking at me and my pretty dress, my gay
bonnet, and my little gold things, till I could not
see for blushes, and got so dizzy, I did not know
who was speaking to me at this side or that,
but answered all at random and in confusion.