a few last pansies, looked at them, and as
idly flung them away, goes on her listless way through the gardens. A
whole _long_ month and not one word from him! Are his social duties now
so numerous that he has forgotten he has a ward? "Well," emphatically,
and with a vicious little tug at her big white hat, "_some_ people have
strange views about duty."

She has almost reached the summer-house, vine-clad, and temptingly cool
in all this heat, when a quick step behind her causes her to turn.

"They told me you were here," says the professor, coming up with her. He
is so distinctly the professor still, in spite of his new mourning, and
the better cut of his clothes, and the general air of having been
severely looked after--that Perpetua feels at home with him at once.

"I have been here for some time," says she calmly. "A whole month, isn't
it?"

"Yes, I know. Were you going into that green little place. It looks
cool."

It is cool, and particularly empty. One small seat occupies the back of
it, and nothing else at all, except the professor and his ward.

"Perpetua!" says he, turning to her. His tone is low, impassioned. "I
have come. I could not come sooner, and I _would_ not write. How could I
put it all on paper? You remember that last evening?"

"I remember," says she faintly.

"And all you said?"

"All _you_ said."

"I said nothing. I did not dare. _Then_ I was too poor a man, too
insignificant to dare to lay bare to you the thoughts, the fears, the
hopes that were killing me."

"Nothing!" echoes she. "Have you then forgotten?" She raises her head,
and casts at him a swift, but burning glance. "_Was_ it nothing? You
came to plead your friend's cause, I think. Surely that was something? I
thought it a great deal. And what was it you said of Mr. Hardinge? Ah! I
_have_ forgotten that, but I know how you extolled him--praised him to
the skies--recommended him to me as a desirable suitor." She makes an
impatient movement, as if to shake something from her. "Why have you
come to-day?" asks she. "To plead his cause afresh?"

"Not his--to-day."

"Whose then? Another suitor, maybe? It seems I have more than even I
dreamt of."

"I do not know if you have dreamed of this one," says Curzon, perplexed
by her manner. Some hope had been in his heart in his journey to her,
but now it dies. There is little love truly in her small, vivid face,
her gleaming eyes, her parted, scornful lips.

"I am not given to dreams