ew nothing about this.

The second letter was equally without enclosure or message, though from
a very different cause. It was scarcely a dozen lines in length, and
only said that Mr. Beresford was dying. Maurice had just received Mrs.
Costello's farewell note; he was feeling angry and grieved, and could
think of no better expedient than to keep silence for the moment, even
if he had had time to renew his expostulations. He had not fully
comprehended the secret Mrs. Costello entrusted to him, but in the
preoccupations of the moment, he put off all concerns but those of the
dying man until he should have more leisure to attend to them. Thus, by
a double chance, Mr. Leigh was allowed to persuade himself that Maurice
had either never had any absorbing interest in the Costellos, or that
his interest in them was being gradually supplanted by others. In this
opinion, and in a curiously uncomfortable and contradictory humour, his
friends found him when they came back from the island.

Mrs. Costello, on her part, had been entirely unable to keep Maurice out
of her thoughts. As Christian's death, and all the agitation consequent
upon it, settled back into the past, she had plenty of leisure and
plenty of temptation to revert to her old hopes and schemes. Half
consciously she had allowed herself to build up a charming fabric of
possibilities. _Possibly_ Maurice might write and say, "It is Lucia I
love, Lucia I want to marry. It matters nothing to me what her father is
or was." (Quixotic and not-to-be-counted-upon piece of generosity!)
_Possibly_ she herself might then be justified in answering, "The
accusation brought against her father has been proved false--my child is
stainless--and you have proved your right to her;" and it was
impossible, she believed, that Lucia, hearing all the truth, should not
be touched as they would have her.

These imaginations, built upon such ardent and long-indulged wishes,
acquired a considerable degree of strength during her visit to Mr.
Strafford; and although a little surprised at not receiving, during her
stay there, the usual weekly note from Maurice which she had calculated
would cross her last important letter on the way, she came home eager to
see Mr. Leigh, and to hear from him the last news from England.

But when she had paid her visit to her old neighbour, she came back
puzzled, disappointed, and slightly indignant. There was an air of
constraint about Mr. Leigh, especially when he