was with a heavy heart that Lady Florence listened to the monotonous
clicking of the clock that announced the departure of moments few, yet
not precious, still spared to her. Her face buried in her hands, she
bent over the small table beside her sofa, and indulged her melancholy
thoughts. Bowed was the haughty crest, unnerved the elastic shape that
had once seemed born for majesty and command--no friends were near,
for Florence had never made friends. Solitary had been her youth, and
solitary were her dying hours.

As she thus sat and mused, a sound of carriage wheels in the street
below slightly shook the room--it ceased--the carriage stopped at the
door. Florence looked up. "No, no, it cannot be," she muttered; yet,
while she spoke, a faint flush passed over her sunken and faded cheek,
and the bosom heaved beneath the robe, "a world too wide for its shrunk"
proportions. There was a silence, which to her seemed interminable, and
she turned away with a deep sigh, and a chill sinking of the heart.

At this time her woman entered with a meaning and flurried look.

"I beg your pardon, my lady--but--"

"But what?"

"Mr. Maltravers has called, and asked for your ladyship--so, my lady,
Mr. Burton sent for me, and I said, my lady is too unwell to see any
one; but Mr. Maltravers would not be denied; and he is waiting in my
lord's library, and insisted on my coming up and 'nouncing him, my
lady."

Now Mrs. Shinfield's words were not euphonistic, nor her voice
mellifluous; but never had eloquence seemed to Florence so effective.
Youth, love, beauty, all rushed back upon her at once, brightening her
eyes, her cheek, and filling up ruin with sudden and deceitful light.

"Well," she said, after a pause, "let Mr. Maltravers come up."

"Come up, my lady? Bless me!--let me just 'range your hair--your
ladyship is really in such dish-a-bill."

"Best as it is, Shinfield--he will excuse all.--Go."

Mrs. Shinfield shrugged her shoulders, and departed. A few moments
more--a step on the stairs, the creaking of the door,--and Maltravers
and Florence were again alone. He stood motionless on the threshold. She
had involuntarily risen, and so they stood opposite to each other, and
the lamp fell full upon her face. Oh, Heaven! when did that sight cease
to haunt the heart of Maltravers! When shall that altered aspect not
pass as a ghost before his eyes!--there it is, faithful and reproachful
alike in solitude and in crowds--it is seen in