r health is restored, you shall be richly repaid for all your
present self-denial. Every day I will procure you new pleasures, prepare
you new _fetes_; you shall dance upon carpets of roses like an elfin
queen."

"You promise me that?" said Camilla; "you promise me that you will not
prevent my dancing as much and as gayly as I like?"

"I promise you all this, Camilla, if you will only not dance now."

"Well," sighed she, "I agree to this; but I fear that my cousin, Count
Kindar, will be seriously displeased if I suddenly refuse him the dance
I promised him."

"He will excuse you, sweetheart, when I beg him to do so," said Lord
Elliot, with a soft smile. "I will seek him at once, and make your
excuses. Be kind enough to wait for me here, I will return immediately."
He kissed her fondly upon the brow, and hastened off.

Camilla looked after him and sighed deeply; then, drawing back the long
leaves of the palm, she entered the grotto; she stepped hastily back
when she saw that the green divan was occupied, and tried to withdraw,
but her mother held her and greeted her kindly. Camilla laughed aloud.
"Ah, mother, it appears as if I am to be ever in your way; although I
no longer dwell in your house, I still disturb your pleasures. But I am
discreet; let your friend withdraw; I will not see him, I will not know
his name, and when my most virtuous husband returns, he will find only
two modest gentlewomen. Go, sir; I will turn away, that I may not see
you."

"I rather entreat you, my dear Camilla, to turn your lovely face toward
me, and to greet me kindly," said Major du Trouffle, stepping from
behind the shadow of the palm, and giving his hand to Camilla.

She gazed at him questioningly, and when at last she recognized him, she
burst out into a merry peal of laughter. "Truly," said she, "my mother
had a rendezvous with her husband, and I have disturbed an enchanting
marriage chirping. You have also listened to my married chirp, and know
all my secrets. Well, what do you say, dear stepfather, to my mother
having brought me so soon under the coif, and made her wild, foolish
little Camilla the wife of a lord?"

"I wish you happiness with my whole soul, dear Camilla, and rejoice to
hear from your mother that you have made so excellent a choice, and are
the wife of so amiable and intellectual a man."

"So, does mamma say that Lord Elliot is all that? She may be right,
I don't understand these things. I know only that I fi