mmock, and
looking up through her one unglazed window, high up in the roof, to the
stars that slowly travelled across the space, she came back to a more
collected opinion. She had no right to sacrifice Mr. Ward as well as
herself. Louis could not be more free than she had made him already,
and it would be doing evil that good might come, to accept the
addresses of one man while she could not detach her heart from another.
'Have I ever really tried yet? she thought. 'Perhaps I am punishing
him and poor Mr. Ward, because, as papa says, I have languished, and
have never tried in earnest to wean my thoughts from him. He was the
one precious memory, besides my dear mother, and she never thought it
would come to good. He will turn out to have been constant to Clara
all the time, though he did not know it.'

Even if Mr. Ponsonby had been in full health, he would have had no
inclination to spare Mary the conversation with Mr. Ward, who took his
hot nine miles' ride from Lima in the early morning, before the shadow
of the mountains had been drawn up from the arid barren slope leading
to Chorillos.

He came in time for the late breakfast, when the table was loaded with
various beautiful tropical fruits, tempting after his ride, and in his
state of suspense. He talked of his journey, and of his intended
absence, and his regret, in a manner half mechanical, half dreamy,
which made Mary quite sorry for him; it was melancholy for a man of his
age to have fixed so many fond hopes where disappointment was in store
for him. She wished to deal as kindly with him as she could, and did
not shrink away when her father left them, muttering something about a
letter, and Rosita went to take her siesta.

With anxious diffidence he ventured to ask whether she remembered what
had passed between them on the San Benito mountain.

'Yes, Mr. Ward, but I am afraid I do not think differently now, in
spite of all your kindness.'

Poor Mr. Ward's countenance underwent a change, as if he had hoped
more. 'Your father had given me reason to trust,' he said, 'that you
had recovered your spirits; otherwise I should hardly have presumed to
intrude on you. And yet, before so long an absence, you cannot wonder
that I longed to hear something decisive.'

'Indeed I wished what I said before to be decisive. I am very sorry to
give pain to one so much kinder than I deserve, and to whom I look up
so much, but you see, Mr. Ward, I cannot say what is u