young lady's lineaments,
though not so inconsistent as to make her plain, would have been accepted
rather as pleasing than as correct. The preoccupied expression which,
like images on the retina, remained with her for a moment after the state
that caused it had ceased, now changed into a reserved, half-proud, and
slightly indignant look, in which the blood diffused itself quickly
across her cheek, and additional brightness broke the shade of her rather
heavy eyes.

'I know I have no business here,' he said, answering the look. 'But I
had a great wish to see you, and inquire how you were. You can give your
hand to me, seeing how often I have held it in past days?'

'I would rather forget than remember all that, Mr. Barnet,' she answered,
as she coldly complied with the request. 'When I think of the
circumstances of our last meeting, I can hardly consider it kind of you
to allude to such a thing as our past--or, indeed, to come here at all.'

'There was no harm in it surely? I don't trouble you often, Lucy.'

'I have not had the honour of a visit from you for a very long time,
certainly, and I did not expect it now,' she said, with the same
stiffness in her air. 'I hope Mrs. Barnet is very well?'

'Yes, yes!' he impatiently returned. 'At least I suppose so--though I
only speak from inference!'

'But she is your wife, sir,' said the young girl tremulously.

The unwonted tones of a man's voice in that feminine chamber had startled
a canary that was roosting in its cage by the window; the bird awoke
hastily, and fluttered against the bars. She went and stilled it by
laying her face against the cage and murmuring a coaxing sound. It might
partly have been done to still herself.

'I didn't come to talk of Mrs. Barnet,' he pursued; 'I came to talk of
you, of yourself alone; to inquire how you are getting on since your
great loss.' And he turned towards the portrait of her father.

'I am getting on fairly well, thank you.'

The force of her utterance was scarcely borne out by her look; but Barnet
courteously reproached himself for not having guessed a thing so natural;
and to dissipate all embarrassment, added, as he bent over the table,
'What were you doing when I came?--painting flowers, and by candlelight?'

'O no,' she said, 'not painting them--only sketching the outlines. I do
that at night to save time--I have to get three dozen done by the end of
the month.'

Barnet looked as if he regretted it de