tation the emotions they had
occasioned her, she complained of his injustice to her mother: this
was the cause of an interesting conversation of which her father
was the subject, and for which she had long sighed. With what deep,
unbroken attention she listened to her companion's enthusiastic
delineation of his character and career! What multiplied questions did
she not ask him, and how eagerly, how amply, how affectionately he
satisfied her just and natural curiosity! Hours flew away while they
indulged in this rare communion.

'Oh, that I could see him!' sighed Venetia.

'You will,' replied Plantagenet; 'your destiny requires it. You will
see him as surely as you beheld that portrait that it was the labour
of a life to prevent you beholding.'

Venetia shook her head; 'And yet,' she added musingly, 'my mother
loves him.'

'Her life proves it,' said Cadurcis bitterly.

'I think it does,' replied Venetia, sincerely.

'I pretend not to understand her heart,' he answered; 'it is an enigma
that I cannot solve. I ought not to believe that she is without one;
but, at any rate, her pride is deeper than her love.'

'They were ill suited,' said Venetia, mournfully; 'and yet it is one
of my dreams that they may yet meet.'

'Ah, Venetia!' he exclaimed, in a voice of great softness, 'they had
not known each other from their childhood, like us. They met, and they
parted, alike in haste.'

Venetia made no reply; her eyes were fixed in abstraction on a
handscreen, which she was unconscious that she held.

'Tell me,' said Cadurcis, drawing his chair close to hers; 'tell me,
Venetia, if--'

At this moment a thundering knock at the door announced the return of
the Countess and her sister-in-law. Cadurcis rose from his seat, but
his chair, which still remained close to that on which Venetia was
sitting, did not escape the quick glance of her mortified mother. The
Countess welcomed Cadurcis with extreme cordiality; Lady Annabel only
returned his very courteous bow.

'Stop and dine with us, my dear lord,' said the Countess. 'We are only
ourselves, and Lady Annabel and Venetia.'

'I thank you, Clara,' said Lady Annabel, 'but we cannot stop to-day.'

'Oh!' exclaimed her sister. 'It will be such a disappointment to
Philip. Indeed you must stay,' she added, in a coaxing tone; 'we shall
be such an agreeable little party, with Lord Cadurcis.'

'I cannot indeed, my dear Clara,' replied Lady Annabel; 'not to-day,
indeed not to-d