turn back, when Mrs. Cameron came into the hall, and, rather by
gesture than words, invited him to enter. Kenelm followed her into the
drawing-room, taking his seat beside her. He was about to speak, when
she interrupted him in a tone of voice so unlike its usual languor, so
keen, so sharp, that it sounded like a cry of distress.

"I was just about to come to you. Happily, however, you find me alone,
and what may pass between us will be soon over. But first tell me: you
have seen your parents; you have asked their consent to wed a girl such
as I described; tell me, oh tell me that that consent is refused!"

"On the contrary, I am here with their full permission to ask the hand
of your niece."

Mrs. Cameron sank back in her chair, rocking herself to and fro in the
posture of a person in great pain.

"I feared that. Walter said he had met you last evening; that you, like
himself, entertained the thought of marriage. You, of course when you
learned his name, must have known with whom his thought was connected.
Happily, he could not divine what was the choice to which your youthful
fancy had been so blindly led."

"My dear Mrs. Cameron," said Kenelm, very mildly, but very firmly, "you
were aware of the purpose for which I left Moleswich a few days ago,
and it seems to me that you might have forestalled my intention, the
intention which brings me; thus early to your house. I come to say to
Miss Mordaunt's guardian, 'I ask the hand of your ward. If you also woo
her, I have a very noble rival. With both of us no consideration for our
own happiness can be comparable to the duty of consulting hers. Let her
choose between the two.'"

"Impossible!" exclaimed Mrs. Cameron; "impossible. You know not what you
say; know not, guess not, how sacred are the claims of Walter Melville
to all that the orphan whom he has protected from her very birth can
give him in return. She has no right to a preference for another: her
heart is too grateful to admit of one. If the choice were given to her
between him and you, it is he whom she would choose. Solemnly I assure
you of this. Do not, then, subject her to the pain of such a choice.
Suppose, if you will, that you had attracted her fancy, and that now you
proclaimed your love and urged your suit, she would not, must not, the
less reject your hand, but you might cloud her happiness in accepting
Melville's. Be generous. Conquer your own fancy; it can be but a passing
one. Speak not to her,