to Julie's ear still more
plainly that he stood tacitly and resolutely by Aileen Moffatt and her
money, and that all he was prepared to offer to the dear friend of his
heart was a more or less ambiguous relation, lasting over two years
perhaps--till his engagement might be announced.

A dumb and bitter anger mounted within her. She recalled the manner in
which he had evaded her first questions, and her opinion became very
much that of the Duchess. She had, indeed, been mocked, and treated like
a child. So she sent no answer to his first letter, and when his second
came she forbade herself to open it. It lay there on her writing-table.
At night she transferred it to the table beside her bed, and early in
the spring dawn her groping fingers drew it trembling towards her and
slipped it under her pillow. By the time the full morning had come she
had opened it, read and reread it--had bathed it, indeed, with
her tears.

But her anger persisted, and when Warkworth appeared on her threshold it
flamed into sudden expression. She would make him realize her friends,
her powerful friends--above all, she would make him realize Delafield.

Well, now it was done. She had repelled her lover. She had shown herself
particularly soft and gracious to Delafield. Warkworth now would break
with her--might, perhaps, be glad of the chance to return safely and
without further risks to his heiress.

She sat on in the dark, thinking over every word, every look. Presently
Therese stole in.

"Mademoiselle, le souper sera bientot pret."

Julie rose wearily, and the child slipped a thin hand into hers.

"J'aime tant ce vieux monsieur," she said, softly. "Je l'aime tant!"

Julie started. Her thoughts had wandered far, indeed, from Lord
Lackington.

As she went up-stairs to her little room her heart reproached her. In
their interview the old man had shown great sweetness of feeling, a
delicate and remorseful tenderness, hardly to have been looked for in a
being so fantastic and self-willed. The shock of their conversation had
deepened the lines in a face upon which age had at last begun to make
those marks which are not another beauty, but the end of beauty. When
she had opened the door for him in the dusk, Julie had longed, indeed,
to go with him and soothe his solitary evening. His unmarried son,
William, lived with him intermittently; but his wife was dead. Lady
Blanche seldom came to town, and, for the most part, he lived alone in
the f