'Twould be a thousand pities to let slip such a neat offer of adjusting
difficulties as accident makes you in this. You could marry more tin,
that's true; but you don't want it, Paula. You want a name, and historic
what-do-they-call-it. Now by coming to terms with the captain you'll be
Lady De Stancy in a few years: and a title which is useless to him, and
a fortune and castle which are in some degree useless to you, will make
a splendid whole useful to you both.'

'I've thought it over--quite,' she answered. 'And I quite see what
the advantages are. But how if I don't care one atom for artistic
completeness and a splendid whole; and do care very much to do what my
fancy inclines me to do?'

'Then I should say that, taking a comprehensive view of human nature
of all colours, your fancy is about the silliest fancy existing on this
earthly ball.'

Paula laughed indifferently, and her uncle felt that, persistent as was
his nature, he was the wrong man to influence her by argument. Paula's
blindness to the advantages of the match, if she were blind, was that of
a woman who wouldn't see, and the best argument was silence.

This was in some measure proved the next morning. When Paula made her
appearance Mrs. Goodman said, holding up an envelope: 'Here's a letter
from Mr. Somerset.'

'Dear me,' said she blandly, though a quick little flush ascended her
cheek. 'I had nearly forgotten him!'

The letter on being read contained a request as brief as it was
unexpected. Having prepared all the drawings necessary for the
rebuilding, Somerset begged leave to resign the superintendence of the
work into other hands.

'His letter caps your remarks very aptly,' said Mrs. Goodman, with
secret triumph. 'You are nearly forgetting him, and he is quite
forgetting you.'

'Yes,' said Paula, affecting carelessness. 'Well, I must get somebody
else, I suppose.'

X.

They next deviated to Amiens, intending to stay there only one night;
but their schemes were deranged by the sudden illness of Charlotte. She
had been looking unwell for a fortnight past, though, with her usual
self-abnegation, she had made light of her ailment. Even now she
declared she could go on; but this was said over-night, and in
the morning it was abundantly evident that to move her was highly
unadvisable. Still she was not in serious danger, and having called in a
physician, who pronounced rest indispensable, they prepared to remain in
the old Picard capital t