half-startled apprehension that others
might have thought the same thing, and that all kinds of disagreeable
consequences might flow from such misapprehension, he perceived what she
was thinking of, and said, so suddenly and sharply that even Fanny
started,

"You think I want to marry Hope Wayne?"

"Of course I do. So does every body else. Do you suppose we have not
known of your intimacies? Do you think we have heard nothing of your
meetings all winter with that artist and Amy Waring, and your reading
poetry, and your talking poetry?" said Fanny, with infinite contempt.

There was a look of singular perplexity upon the face of Lawrence Newt.
He was a man not often surprised, but he seemed to be surprised and even
troubled now. He looked musingly across the room to Hope Wayne, who was
sitting engaged in earnest conversation with Mrs. Simcoe. In her whole
bearing and aspect there was that purity and kindliness which are always
associated with blue eyes and golden hair, and which made the painters
paint the angels as fair women. A lambent light played all over her form,
and to Lawrence Newt's eyes she had never seemed so beautiful. The
girlish quiet which he had first known in her had melted into a sweet
composure--a dignified serenity which comes only with experience. The
light wind that blew in at the window by which she sat raised her hair
gently, as if invisible fingers were touching her with airy benedictions.
Was it so strange that such a woman should be loved? Was it not strange
that any man should see much of her, be a great deal with her, and not
love her? Was Fanny's suspicion, was the world's gossip, unnatural?

He asked himself these questions as he looked at her, while a cloud of
thoughts and memories floated through his mind.

Yet a close observer, who could read men's hearts in their faces--and
that could be more easily done with every one else than with him--would
have seen another expression gradually supplanting the first, or mingling
with it rather: a look as of joy at some unexpected discovery--as if, for
instance, he had said to himself, "She must be very dear whom I love so
deeply that it has not occurred to me I could love this angel!"

Something of that kind, perhaps; at least, something that brought a
transfigured cheerfulness into his face.

"Believe me, Fanny," he said, at length, "I am not anxious to marry Miss
Wayne; nor would she marry me if I asked her."

Then he rose and passed acr