person
could need so much drapery.

"May I borrow Sylvia for a little while? A breath of air will do her
good, and I want her bright and blooming for to-morrow, else young Mrs.
Yule will outshine young Mrs. Moor."

"What a thoughtful creature you are, Geoffrey. Take her and welcome,
only pray put on a shawl, Sylvia, and don't stay out late, for a bride
with a cold in her head is the saddest of spectacles."

Glad to be released Sylvia went away, and, dropping the shawl as soon as
she was out of Prue's sight, paced up and down the garden walks upon her
lover's arm. Having heard her wish and given a hearty assent Moor
asked--

"Where shall we go? Tell me what you would like best and you shall have
it. You will not let me give you many gifts, but this pleasure you will
accept from me I know."

"You give me yourself, that is more than I deserve. But I should like to
have you take me to the place you like best. Don't tell me beforehand,
let it be a surprise."

"I will, it is already settled, and I know you will like it. Is there no
other wish to be granted, no doubt to be set at rest, or regret withheld
that I should know? Tell me, Sylvia, for if ever there should be
confidence between us it is now."

As he spoke the desire to tell him of her love for Adam rose within her,
but with the desire came a thought that modified the form in which
impulse prompted her to make confession. Moor was both sensitive and
proud, would not the knowledge of the fact mar for him the friendship
that was so much to both? From Warwick he would never learn it, from her
he should have only a half confidence, and so love both friend and wife
with an untroubled heart. Few of us can always control the rebellious
nature that so often betrays and then reproaches, few always weigh the
moment and the act that bans or blesses it, and where is the life that
has not known some turning-point when a fugitive emotion has decided
great issues for good or ill? Such an emotion came to Sylvia then, and
another temptation, wearing the guise of generosity, urged her to
another false step, for when the first is taken a second inevitably
follows.

"I have no wish, no regret, nothing but the old doubt of my unstable
self, and the fear that I may fail to make you happy. But I should like
to tell you something. I don't know that you will care for it, or that
there is any need to tell it, but when you said there should be
confidence between us, I felt that I wan