far niente_ land; and you
exemplify its nationality. Five was the hour you named, and my little
Swiss tell-tale is even now sounding the last stroke."

She did not rise, seemed on the contrary, to sink farther back in her
velvet-lined chair; and bending down General Laurance touched her
hand.

"When a man's happiness for all time is at stake does he loiter on
his way to receive the verdict? Surely you will----"

He paused and glanced significantly at the figure whose white cap was
bowed low, as its wearer slumbered over the interminable crochet.

"May not this interview at least be sacred from the presence of your
keepers?"

"Poor dear soul, she is happily oblivious, and will take no
stenographic notes. I would as soon declare war against my own shadow
as order her away."

Evidently chagrined, the visitor stood irresolute, and meanwhile the
gaze of his companion wandered back to the beauty of the Bay.

He drew a chair close to that which she occupied, and holding his hat
as a screen, should Mrs. Waul's spectacles chance to turn in that
direction, spoke earnestly.

"Have I been unpardonably presumptuous in interpreting favourably
this permission to see you once more? Have you done me the honour to
ponder the contents of my letter?"

"I certainly have pondered well the contents."

She kept her hands beyond his reach, and looking steadily into his
eager handsome face, she saw it flush deeply.

"Madame, I trust, I believe you are incapable of trifling."

"In which, you do me bare justice only. With me the time for
trifling is past; and just now life has put on all its tragic
vestments. But how long since General Laurance believed me incapable
of--worse than trifling?"

"Ever since my infamous folly was reproved by you as it deserved.
Ever since you taught me that you were even more noble in soul than
lovely in person. Be generous, and do not humiliate me by recalling
that temporary insanity. Having blundered fearfully, in my ignorance
of your real character, does not the offer of yesterday embody all
the reparation, all the atonement of which a man is capable?"

"You desire me to consider the proposal contained in your letter, as
an expiation for past offences, as an _amende honourable_ for what
might have ripened into insult, had it not been nipped in the bud? Do
I translate correctly your gracious diction?"

"No, you cruelly torment me by referring to an audacious and shameful
offence, for which I blus