rrow.'

How had she behaved? What could be Seymour Austin's idea of her?

She saw the blind thing that she was, the senseless thing, the
shameless; and vulture-like in her scorn of herself, she alighted on
that disgraced Cecilia and picked her to pieces hungrily. It was clear:
Beauchamp had meant nothing beyond friendly civility: it was only her
abject greediness pecking at crumbs. No! he loved her. Could a woman's
heart be mistaken? She melted and wept, thanking him: she offered him
her remnant of pride, pitiful to behold.

And still she asked herself between-whiles whether it could be true of
an English lady of our day, that she, the fairest stature under sun, was
ever knowingly twisted to this convulsion. She seemed to look forth from
a barred window on flower, and field, and hill. Quietness existed as
a vision. Was it impossible to embrace it? How pass into it? By
surrendering herself to the flames, like a soul unto death! For why,
if they were overpowering, attempt to resist them? It flattered her to
imagine that she had been resisting them in their present burning might
ever since her lover stepped on the Esperanza's deck at the mouth
of Otley River. How foolish, seeing that they are fatal! A thrill of
satisfaction swept her in reflecting that her ability to reason was thus
active. And she was instantly rewarded for surrendering; pain fled, to
prove her reasoning good; the flames devoured her gently they cared not
to torture so long as they had her to themselves.

At night, candle in hand, on the corridor, her father told her he had
come across Grancey Lespel in Bevisham, and heard what he had not quite
relished of the Countess of Romfrey. The glittering of Cecilia's eyes
frightened him. Taking her for the moment to know almost as much as he,
the colonel doubted the weight his communication would have on her; he
talked obscurely of a scandalous affair at Lord Romfrey's house in town,
and Beauchamp and that Frenchwoman. 'But,' said he, 'Mrs. Grancey will
be here to-morrow.'

'So will Nevil, papa,' said Cecilia.

'Ah! he's coming, yes; well!' the colonel puffed. 'Well, I shall see
him, of course, but I... I can only say that if his oath 's worth
having, I ... and I think you too, my dear, if you... but it's no use
anticipating. I shall stand out for your honour and happiness. There,
your cheeks are flushed. Go and sleep.'

Some idle tale! Cecilia murmured to herself a dozen times, undisturbed
by the recurren