he will
teach me right. So he will teach you, Eleanor."

Eleanor bowed her head on her hands, and wept and wept; but while she
wept, resolutions were taking form in her mind. Mr. Rhys's words came
back to her--"Go no way, till you see clear." The renewed thought of
that helmet of salvation, and of that heavenly guidance, that she
needed and longed for; so supremely, so much above everything else;
gradually gained her strength to resolve that she would have them at
all hazards. She must have time to seek them and to be sure of her
duty; and then, she would do it. She determined she would not see Mr.
Carlisle; he would conquer her; she would manage the matter with her
mother. Eleanor thought it all over, the opposition and the
difficulties, and resolved with the strength of desperation. She had
grown old during this night. She had a long interval of quiet before
her mother came.

"Well, Eleanor! in your dressing-gown yet, and only your hair done!
When do you expect to be down stairs? Somebody will be here presently
and expect to see you."

"Somebody will be disappointed. My head is splitting, mamma."

"I should think it would! after yesterday's gambade, What did Mr.
Carlisle say to you, I should like to know? I thought you would have
offended him past forgiveness. I was relieved beyond all expression
this morning, at breakfast, when I saw all was right again. But he told
me not to scold you, and I will not talk about it."

"Mamma, if you will take off your bonnet and sit down--I will talk to
you about something else."

Mrs. Powle sat down, took her bonnet in her lap, and pushed her fair
curls into place. They were rarely out of place; it was more a form
than anything else. Yet Mrs. Powle looked anxious; and her anxiety
found natural expression as she said,

"I wish the twenty-first was to-morrow!"

"That is the thing I wish to speak about. Mamma, that day, the day for
my marriage, has been appointed too early--I feel hurried, and not
ready. I want to study my own mind and know exactly what I am doing. I
am going to ask you to have it put off."

"Put it off!--" cried Mrs. Powle. Language contained no other words of
equal importance to be spoken in the same breath with those three.

"Yes. I want it put off."

"Till when, if you please. It might as well be doomsday at once."

"Till doomsday, if necessary; but I want it put off. I do not stipulate
for so long a time as that," said Eleanor putting her hand to he