seen her. She did not speak, but played with
the boughs of a coronella near her.

"You remember" (I went on speaking as briefly as possible, lest the old
lady's toilet should be finished, and our tete-a-tete cut short) "I gave
you my word of honor never to speak again of what you told me in the
Kursaal last autumn until you gave me leave; that leave I ask you for
now. Silence lies in the way of your own happiness, I feel sure, and not
alone of yours. If you give me carte blanche, you may be certain I shall
use it discreetly and cautiously. You made the prohibition in a moment
of heat and passion; withdraw it now--believe me, you will never
repent."

The flush died out of her cheeks as I spoke; but her little, white
teeth were set together as they had been that night, and she answered me
bitterly,--

"You ask what is impossible; I cannot, in justice to myself, withdraw
it. I would never have told you, but that I deemed you a man of honor,
whom I could trust."

"I do not think I have proved myself otherwise, Beatrice. I have kept my
word to you, when I have been greatly tempted to break it, when I have
doubted whether it were either right or wise to stand on such punctilio,
when greater stakes were involved by my silence. Surely, if you once had
elevated mind enough to comprehend and admire such a man as Earlscourt,
and be won by the greatness of his intellect to prefer him to younger
rivals, it is impossible you can have lowered your taste and found any
one to replace him. No woman who once loved Earlscourt could stoop to an
inferior man, and almost all men _are_ his inferiors; it is impossible
you can have grown cold towards him."

She turned her eyes upon me luminous with her old passion--the color hot
in her cheeks, and her attitude full of that fiery pride which became
her so infinitely well.

"_I_ changed!--_I_ grown cold to him! I love him more than all the
world, and shall do to my grave. Do you think that any who heard him
last night could glory in him as I did? Did you think any physical
torture would not have been easier to bear than what I felt when I saw
his face once more, and thought of what we _should have been_ to one
another, and of what we _are_? We women have to act, and smile, and wear
a calm semblance, while our hearts are bursting; and so you fancy that
we never feel."

"But, great Heavens! Beatrice, if you love Earlscourt like this, why not
give me leave to tell him? Why not write to him y