ill you talk about it? It's worse
than ghost-stories just before bed. I've heard you gentlemen insinuating
so much together that I fancy every night I hear the great alarm-bell
booming in my dreams."

"There's no danger of that here."

"But it would be so terrible anywhere!"

"Here is Will," said her mother, as the young brother of Laura entered.
"If, my dear friends, we should change the subject for bed-candles"--

"Check!" said Mr. St. George, rising.

It was a balmy meridional night, and Eloise, at length alone in her
misery, leaned from her window to breathe the wind that floated in over
the fields, fragrant and gentle. Leaning there, and great resplendent
stars seeming to hang out of heaven close above her, the minutes went
slipping into the hours, and the house-clock struck one, startling her
with its peal, as doubtless it did Miss Murray. Bending her head that
she might not strike the sash, a dark cobweb caught Eloise's eye;--it
was a lace shawl, which the draught had borne through the window, and
caught outside upon the thorny vine. It was too firmly fixed to
disentangle at a touch; she put out her hand, and, taking the stem,
shook the whole blossoming mass, scattering a rain of dew and perfume,
and the filmy thing detached and fluttered to the ground. Without
waiting to think, Eloise hastened down and found an exit. Coming round
beneath the gable, the great dog following with his nose in her hand,
she found herself insphered in a soft light that stole from the open
cabinet-casement, but, hoping to escape notice, flitted on after the
lace, with which the breeze was already frolicking. Suddenly the dog
perceived her object and bounded after it. Fear possessed her soul; it
was Laura Murray's; he would rend and mouth the costly thing, which her
whole year's salary, she thought, could not buy, as he would her
handkerchief. She softly called him away; but the dog refused to hear.

"Rounce!" cried another voice, and Rounce came tumbling and gambolling
back, while Mr. St. George obtained the shawl, and was beside her.

"So, Miss Changarnier, it was this little thing that brought you out
here after midnight? Never do it again. It is forbidden. Nothing could
be more unsafe."

"Thank you, Mr. St. George; I did not perceive danger."

As she spoke, and while they paused, there stole upon them the far and
faint pulsation of a bell. It was the tide-bell placed on a distant reef
to swing and ring with the ebb and flo