was as nothing to hers. In
granges, and such like rural retreats, people expect solitude; but
Miss Mackenzie had gone to Littlebath to find companionship. Had she
been utterly disappointed, and found none, that would have been bad;
but she had found it and then lost it. Mariana, in her desolateness,
was still waiting for the coming of some one; and so was Miss
Mackenzie waiting, though she hardly knew for whom. For me, if I am
to live in a moated grange, let it be in the country. Moated granges
in the midst of populous towns are very terrible.

But on the Monday morning,--the morning of the second Monday after
the Stumfoldian attach,--Mr Maguire came, and Mariana's weariness
was, for the time, at an end. Susanna had hardly gone, and the
breakfast things were still on the table, when the maid brought her
up word that Mr Maguire was below, and would see her if she would
allow him to come up. She had heard no ring at the bell, and having
settled herself with a novel in the arm-chair, had almost ceased
for the moment to think of Mr Maguire or of Mrs Stumfold. There was
something so sudden in the request now made to her, that it took away
her breath.

"Mr Maguire, Miss, the clergyman from Mr Stumfold's church," said the
girl again.

It was necessary that she should give an answer, though she was ever
so breathless.

"Ask Mr Maguire to walk up," she said; and then she began to bethink
herself how she would behave to him.

He was there, however, before her thoughts were of much service to
her, and she began by apologising for the breakfast things.

"It is I that ought to beg your pardon for coming so early," said he;
"but my time at present is so occupied that I hardly know how to find
half an hour for myself; and I thought you would excuse me."

"Oh, certainly," said she; and then sitting down she waited for him
to begin.

It would have been clear to any observer, had there been one present,
that Mr Maguire had practised his lesson. He could not rid himself
of those unmistakable signs of preparation which every speaker shows
when he has been guilty of them. But this probably did not matter
with Miss Mackenzie, who was too intent on the part she herself had
to play to notice his imperfections.

"I saw that you observed, Miss Mackenzie," he said, "that I kept
aloof from you on the two last evenings on which I met you at Mrs
Stumfold's."

"That's a long time ago, Mr Maguire," she answered. "It's nearly a
month si