Winterbourne!--this _is_ a sight for sair een!"

And the portly member with great effusion grasped the hand of a stately
lady in black, whose abundant white hair caught the moonlight.

"_Marcella_!" cried a woman's voice.

Yes--there he was!--close behind Lady Winterbourne. In the soft darkness
he and his party had run upon the two persons talking over the wall
without an idea--a suspicion.

She hurriedly withdrew herself from Lady Winterbourne, hesitated a
second, then held out her hand to him. The light was behind him. She
could not see his face in the darkness; but she was suddenly and
strangely conscious of the whole scene--of the great dark building with
its lines of fairy-lit gothic windows--the blue gulf of the river
crossed by lines of wavering light--the swift passage of a steamer with
its illuminated saloon and crowded deck--of the wonderful mixture of
moonlight and sunset in the air and sky--of this dark figure in front of
her.

Their hands touched. Was there a murmured word from him? She did not
know; she was too agitated, too unhappy to hear it if there was. She
threw herself upon Lady Winterbourne, in whom she divined at once a
tremor almost equal to her own.

"Oh! do come with me--come away!--I want to talk to you!" she said
incoherently under her breath, drawing Lady Winterbourne with a strong
hand.

Lady Winterbourne yielded, bewildered, and they moved along the terrace.

"Oh, my dear, my dear!" cried the elder lady--"to think of finding _you_
here! How astonishing--how--how dreadful! No!--I don't mean that. Of
course you and he must meet--but it was only yesterday he told me he
had never seen you again--since--and it gave me a turn. I was very
foolish just now. There now--stay here a moment--and tell me about
yourself."

And again they paused by the river, the girl glancing nervously behind
her as though she were in a company of ghosts. Lady Winterbourne
recovered herself, and Marcella, looking at her, saw the old tragic
severity of feature and mien blurred with the same softness, the same
delicate tremor. Marcella clung to her with almost a daughter's feeling.
She took up the white wrinkled hand as it lay on the parapet, and kissed
it in the dark so that no one saw.

"I _am_ glad to see you again," she said passionately, "so glad!"

Lady Winterbourne was surprised and moved.

"But you have never written all these months, you unkind child! And I
have heard so little of you--your mother n