I can only tell you that you are right to trust him and
believe in him--as _I_ trust him and believe in him with all my heart
and soul!"

She turned to him a little as she spoke, her eyes shining, her face
transfigured--the faith in her making itself manifest in feature and in
gesture alike. There was not applause so much as a murmur of assent when
she had done; and Caspar, laying hold of her hand, looked down at her
with a new warmth of tenderness, and said half wonderingly,

"Why, Alice!"

"Do you think I could let them go without telling them what you are to
me?" she said, with a kind of passion in her voice which reminded him of
Lesley. But there was no time to say more, for every person in the room
presented himself or herself to shake hands with Caspar and his wife,
and to admire the spoons, which had been purchased only the night
before.

"Very glad to see you amongst us, Mrs. Brooke, mum; and hope you'll come
again," was heard so often that Lady Alice was quite amazed by the
warmth of the greeting. "And the young lady too--where's she? she ought
to have been here as well," said one woman; to which Maurice Kenyon
responded in a pleased growl--

"Yes, confound your blundering, so she ought; and so she would have
been, if you hadn't nearly made such a blessed mull of the whole
affair."

He did not think that anybody heard him, and was rather taken aback when
Lady Alice smiled at him over her shoulder. "What do you mean, Mr.
Kenyon?" she said.

Maurice was on his good behavior immediately. "Oh, nothing, Lady Alice;
only that Miss Brooke might have been here if we had only had a hint
beforehand, and it is a pity she should have missed it."

"A great pity," said Lesley's mother; and she looked quite complacently
at the twelve silver spoons, which she was guarding so jealously, as if
she feared they would be taken away from her.

Outside the doors, when the assembly had reluctantly dispersed, after an
improvised collation, given by Caspar, of hot drinks and plum cake, a
little crowd of men and boys cheered the departing hero of the day so
valiantly that Lady Alice was almost glad to find herself once more
driving through the dusky London streets with her husband at her side.
Miss Brooke and Maurice had elected to walk home.

"There's one thing," said Caspar, rather later in the day, as a history
of these experiences was unfolded to Lesley; "we quite, forgot to tell
the good folks your mother's name and tit