ny flowers about. I
am so fond of them myself, you see, that I always look for them."

"You are very kind," answered Mrs. Goddard. "But I would not have you
take any trouble on my account. We are so comfortable and so fond of the
cottage already--"

"Well, I hope you will grow to like it even better," returned the squire
with a genial smile. "Anything I can do, you know--" he rose as though to
take his leave. "Excuse me, but may I look at that picture? Andrea del
Sarto? Yes, I thought so--wonderful--upon my word, in a cottage in
Billingsfield. Where did you find it?"

"It was my husband's," said Mrs. Goddard.

"Ah--ah, yes," said the squire in a subdued tone. "I beg your pardon," he
added, as people often do, unconsciously, when they fancy they have
accidentally roused in another a painful train of thought. Then he turned
to go. "We dine at half-past seven, you know, so as to be early for Miss
Nellie," he said, as he went out.

Mrs. Goddard was glad he was gone, though she felt that he was not
unsympathetic. The story of the dog had frightened her, and her own
mention of her husband had made her nervous and sad. More than ever she
felt that fear of being in a false position, which had assailed her when
she had first met the squire on the previous evening. He had at once
opened relations with her in a way which showed that he intended to be
intimate; he had offered to improve her cottage, had insisted upon making
frames in her garden, had asked her to dinner with the Ambroses and had
established the right to talk to her whenever he got a chance. He
interested her, too, which was worse. His passing references to his
travels and to his adventures, of which he spoke with the indifference
of a man accustomed to danger, his unassuming manner, his frank
ways--everything about him awakened her interest. She had supposed that
in two years the very faculty of being interested by a man would be
dulled if not destroyed; she found to her annoyance that though she had
seen Mr. Juxon only twice she could not put him out of her thoughts. She
was, moreover, a nervous, almost morbid, woman, and the natural result of
trying to forget his existence was that she could think of nothing else.

How much better it would be, she thought, if he knew her story from the
first. He might then be as friendly as he pleased; there would be no
danger in it, to him or to her. She almost determined to go at once and
ask the vicar's advice. But by the