value on fine
moral distinctions; but she did regret just then that she had not
impressed on her daughter more deeply the virtue of perfect
truthfulness.

"By-the-by," said Mr. Adair, "I saw some letters on the hall table and
brought them out with me. Will you excuse me if I open them? Why--that's
the Brands' crest."

Lady Caroline wished that he had left the words unsaid. Margaret's face
went crimson and then turned very pale. Her mother saw her embarrassment
and hastened to relieve it.

"Margaret, dear, will you take Alicia my smelling salts? I think they
may relieve her headache. Tell her not to get up--I will come and see
her soon."

And as Margaret departed, Mr. Adair with lifted eyebrows and in
significant silence handed an envelope to his wife. She glanced at it
with perfectly unmoved composure. It was what she had been expecting: a
letter from Wyvis Brand asking for the hand of their daughter, Margaret
Adair.

CHAPTER XXIX.

MARGARET'S CONFESSION.

Margaret heard nothing of her lover's letter that night. It was not
thought desirable that the tranquillity of the evening should be
disturbed. Lady Caroline would have sacrificed a good deal sooner than
the harmonious influences of a well-appointed dinner and the passionless
refinement of an evening spent with her musical and artistic friends.
Mr. Adair's sisters were women of cultured taste, and she had asked two
gentlemen to meet them, therefore it was quite impossible (from her
point of view) to discuss any difficult point before the morning.
Margaret, who knew pretty well what was coming, spent a rather feverish
half-hour in her room before the ringing of the dinner-bell, expecting
every minute that her mother would appear, or that she would be summoned
to a conference with her father in the library. But when the dinner hour
approached without any attempt at discussion of the matter, and she
perceived that it was to be left until the morrow, it must be confessed
that she drew long breath of relief. She was quite sufficiently well
versed in Lady Caroline's tactics to appreciate the force and wisdom of
this reserve. "It is so much better, of course," she said to herself, as
her maid dressed her hair, "that we should not have any agitating scene
just before dinner. I dare say I should cry--if they were all very grave
and solemn I am sure I should cry!--and it would be so awkward to come
down with red eyes. And, of course, I could not stay upstairs