the other
fair archers, in her dress of green and gold, was Sibylla. All traces of
care had vanished from her face, her voice was of the merriest, her step
of the fleetest, her laugh of the lightest. Truly, Lionel marvelled.
There flashed into his mind the grieving face of another, whom he had
not long ago parted from; grieving for their woes. Better for his mind's
peace that these contrasts had not been forced so continually upon him.

Could she, in some unaccountable manner, have heard the consoling news
that Cannonby brought? In the first moment, he thought it must be so: in
the next, he knew it to be impossible. Smothering down a sigh, he went
forward, and drew her apart from the rest; choosing that covered walk
where he had spoken to her a day or two previously, regarding Mrs.
Duff's bill. Taking her hands in his, he stood before her, looking with
a reassuring smile into her face.

"What will you give me for some good news, Sibylla?"

"What about?" she rejoined.

"Need you ask? There is only one point upon which news could greatly
interest either of us, just now. I have seen Cannonby. He is here,
and--"

"Here! At Verner's Pride?" she interrupted. "Oh, I shall like to see
Cannonby; to talk over old Australian times with him."

Who was to account for her capricious moods? Lionel remembered the
evening, during the very moon not yet dark to the earth, when Sibylla
had made a scene in the drawing-room, saying she could not bear to hear
the name of Cannonby, or to be reminded of the past days in Melbourne.
She was turning to fly to the house, but Lionel caught her.

"Wait, wait, Sibylla! Will you not hear the good tidings I have for you?
Cannonby says there cannot be a doubt that Frederick Massingbird is
dead. He left him dead and buried, as he told you in Melbourne. We have
been terrified and pained--I trust--for nothing."

"Lionel, look here," said she, receiving the assurance in the same
equable manner that she might have heard him assert it was a fine day,
or a wet one, "I have been making up my mind not to let this bother
worry me. That wretched old maid Deborah went on to me with such rubbish
this morning about leaving you, about leaving Verner's Pride, that she
vexed me to anger. I came home and cried; and Benoite found me lying
upon the sofa; and when I told her what it was, she said the best plan
was, not to mind, to meet it with a laugh, instead of tears--"

"Sibylla!" he interposed in a tone of pai