and de
Bassompierres. Within reach of my hand--had I chosen to extend it--sat
a figure like a fairy-queen, whose array, lilies and their leaves
seemed to have suggested; whatever was not spotless white, being
forest-green. My godmother, too, sat so near, that, had I leaned
forward, my breath might have stirred the ribbon of her bonnet. They
were too near; having been just recognised by a comparative stranger, I
felt uneasy at this close vicinage of intimate acquaintance.

It made me quite start when Mrs. Bretton, turning to Mr. Home, and
speaking out of a kind impulse of memory, said,--"I wonder what my
steady little Lucy would say to all this if she were here? I wish we
had brought her, she would have enjoyed it much."

"So she would, so she would, in her grave sensible fashion; it is a
pity but we had asked her," rejoined the kind gentleman; and added, "I
like to see her so quietly pleased; so little moved, yet so content."

Dear were they both to me, dear are they to this day in their
remembered benevolence. Little knew they the rack of pain which had
driven Lucy almost into fever, and brought her out, guideless and
reckless, urged and drugged to the brink of frenzy. I had half a mind
to bend over the elders' shoulders, and answer their goodness with the
thanks of my eyes. M. de Bassompierre did not well know _me_, but I
knew _him_, and honoured and admired his nature, with all its plain
sincerity, its warm affection, and unconscious enthusiasm. Possibly I
might have spoken, but just then Graham turned; he turned with one of
his stately firm movements, so different from those, of a
sharp-tempered under-sized man: there was behind him a throng, a
hundred ranks deep; there were thousands to meet his eye and divide its
scrutiny--why then did he concentrate all on me--oppressing me with the
whole force of that full, blue, steadfast orb? Why, if he _would_ look,
did not one glance satisfy him? why did he turn on his chair, rest his
elbow on its back, and study me leisurely? He could not see my face, I
held it down; surely, he _could_ not recognise me: I stooped, I turned,
I _would_ not be known. He rose, by some means he contrived to
approach, in two minutes he would have had my secret: my identity would
have been grasped between his, never tyrannous, but always powerful
hands. There was but one way to evade or to check him. I implied, by a
sort of supplicatory gesture, that it was my prayer to be let alone;
after tha