poor pretty blind
face turned so insensibly towards mine, after such words as I had just
said to her. She was standing within my reach. I took her by the arm, and
made her sit on my knee. "My dear!" I said, very earnestly, "you must not
go to him again to-day."

"I have got so much to say to him," she answered impatiently, "I want to
tell him how deeply I feel for him, and how anxious I am to make his life
a happier one if I can."

"My dear Lucilla! you can't say this to a young man. It is as good as
telling him, in plain words, that you are fond of him!"

"I _am_ fond of him."

"Hush! hush! Keep it to yourself, until you are sure that _he_ is fond of
_you._ It is the man's place, my love--not the woman's--to own the truth
first in matters of this sort."

"That is very hard on the women. If they feel it first, they ought to own
it first." She paused for a moment, considering with herself--and
abruptly got off my knee. "I _must_ speak to him!" she burst out. "I
_must_ tell him that I have heard his story, and that I think all the
better of him after it, instead of the worse!"

She was again on her way to get her hat. My only chance of stopping her
was to invent a compromise.

"Write him a note," I said--and then suddenly remembered that she was
blind. "You shall dictate," I added; "and I will hold the pen. Be content
with that for to-day. For my sake, Lucilla!"

She yielded--not very willingly, poor thing. But she jealously declined
to let me hold the pen.

"My first note to him must be all written by me," she said. "I can
write--in my own roundabout way. It's long and tiresome; but still I can
do it. Come and see."

She led the way to a writing-table in a corner of the room, and sat for
awhile with the pen in her hand, thinking. Her irresistible smile broke
suddenly like a glow of light over her "Ah!" she exclaimed, "I know how
to tell him what I think."

Guiding the pen in her right hand with the fingers of her left she wrote
slowly, in large childish characters, these words:--"DEAR MR. OSCAR,--I
have heard all about you. Please send the little gold vase.--Your friend,
LUCILLA."

She enclosed and directed the letter, and clapped her hands for joy. "He
will know what _that_ means!" she said gaily.

It was useless to attempt making a second remonstrance. I rang the bell,
under protest (imagine her receiving a present from a gentleman to whom
she had spoken for the first time that morning!)--and the groo