feast and ask her questions.
'0 Guy, you must not go before that!' cried Charlotte.
'Are you going away?'
'He is very naughty, indeed,' said Charlotte. 'He is going, I don't know where all, to be stupid, and read mathematics.'
'A true bill, I am sorry to say,' said Guy; 'I am to join a reading- party for the latter part of the vacation.'
'I hope not before Thursday week, though we are not asking you to anything worth staying for.'
'Oh, surely you need not go before that!' said Amy, 'need you?'
'No; I believe I may stay till Friday, and I should delight in the feast, thank you, Miss Ross,--I want to study such things. A bit more matting, Amy, if you please. There, I think that will do.'
'Excellently. Here is its name. See how neatly Charlie has printed it, Mary. Is it not odd, that he prints so well when he writes so badly?'
''The Seven Sisters.' There, fair sisterhood, grow and thrive, till I come to transplant you in the autumn. Are there any more?'
'No, that is the last. Now, Mary, let us come to mamma.'
Guy waited to clear the path of the numerous trailing briery branches, and the others walked on, Amy telling how sorry they were to lose Guy's vacation, but that he thought he could not give time enough to his studies here, and had settled, at Oxford, to make one of a reading- party, under the tutorship of his friend, Mr. Wellwood.
'Where do they go?'
'It is not settled. Guy wished it to be the sea-side; but Philip has been recommending a farmhouse in Stylehurst parish, rather nearer St. Mildred's Wells than Stylehurst, but quite out in the moor, and an immense way from both.'
'Do you think it will be the place?'
'Yes; Guy thinks it would suit Mr. Wellwood, because he has friends at St. Mildred's, so he gave his vote for it. He expects to hear how it is settled to-day or to-morrow.'
Coming out on the lawn, they found the three ladies sitting under the acacia, with their books and work. Laura did, indeed, look older than her real age, as much above twenty as Amy looked under nineteen. She was prettier than ever; her complexion exquisite in delicacy, her fine figure and the perfect outline of her features more developed; but the change from girl to woman had passed over her, and set its stamp on the anxious blue eye, and almost oppressed brow. Mary thought it would be hard to define where was that difference. It was not want of bloom, for of that Laura had more than any of the others, fresh, healthy, and bright, while Amy was always rather pale, and Lady Eveleen was positively wan and faded by London and late hours; nor was it loss of animation, for Laura talked and laughed with interest and eagerness; nor was it thought, for little Amy, when at rest, wore a meditative, pensive countenance; but there was something either added or taken away, which made it appear that the serenity and carelessness of early youth had fled from her, and the air of the cares of life had come over her.
Mary told her plans,--Church service at four, followed by a tea- drinking in the fields; tea in the garden for the company, and play for the school children and all who liked to join them. Every one likes such festivals, which have the recommendation of permitting all to do as they please, bringing friends together in perfect ease and freedom, with an object that raises them above the rank of mere gatherings for the pleasure of rich neighbours.
Mrs. Edmonstone gladly made the engagement and Lady Eveleen promised to be quite well, and to teach the children all manner of new games, though she greatly despised the dullness of English children, and had many droll stories of the stupidity of Laura's pupils, communicated to her, with perhaps a little exaggeration, by Charles, and still further embellished by herself, for the purpose of exciting Charlotte's indignation.
Mary proceeded to her consultation about the singing, and was conducted by Guy and Amy to the piano, and when her ears could not be indoctrinated by their best efforts, they more than half engaged to walk to East-hill, and have a conversation with the new school-master, whom Mary pitied for having fallen on people so unable to appreciate his musical training as herself and her father. The whole party walked back with her as far as the shade lasted; and at the end of the next field she turned, saw them standing round the stile, thought what happy people they were, and then resumed her wonder whither Laura's youthfulness had flown.
The situation of Philip and Laura had not changed. His regiment had never been at any great distance from Hollywell, and he often came, venturing more as Laura learnt to see him with less trepidation. He seldom or never was alone with her; but his influence was as strong as ever, and look, word, and gesture, which she alone could understand, told her what she was to him, and revealed his thoughts. To him she was devoted, all her doings were with a view to please him, and deserve his affection; he was her world, and sole object. Indeed, she was sometimes startled by perceiving that tenderly as she loved her own family, all were subordinate to him. She had long since known the true name of her feelings for him; she could not tell when or how the certainty had come, but she was conscious that it was love that they had acknowledged for one another and that she only lived in the light of his love. Still she did not realize the evil of concealment; it was so deep a sensation of her innermost heart, that she never could imagine revealing it to any living creature, and she had besides so surrendered her judgment to her idol, that no thought could ever cross her that he had enjoined what was wrong. Her heart and soul were his alone, and she left the future to him without an independent desire or reflection. All the embarrassments and discomforts which her secret occasioned her were met willingly for his sake, and these were not a few, though time had given her more self-command, or, perhaps, more properly speaking, had hardened her.
She always had a dread of tete-a-tetes and conversations over novels, and these were apt to be unavoidable when Eveleen was at Hollywell. The twilight wanderings on the terrace were a daily habit, and Eveleen almost always paired with her. On this evening in particular, Laura was made very uncomfortable by Eveleen's declaring that it was positively impossible and unnatural that the good heroine of some novel should have concealed her engagement from her parents. Laura could not help saying that there might be many excuses; then afraid that she was exciting suspicion, changed the subject in great haste, and tried to make Eveleen come indoors, telling her she would tire herself to death, and vexed by her cousin's protestations that the fresh cool air did her good. Besides, Eveleen was looking with attentive eyes at another pair who were slowly walking up and down the shady walk that bordered the grass-plot, and now and then standing still to enjoy the subdued silence of the summer evening, and the few distant sounds that marked the perfect lull.
'How calm--how beautiful!' murmured Amabel.
'It only wants the low solemn surge and ripple of the tide, and its dash on the rocks,' said Guy. 'If ever there was music, it is there; but it makes one think what the ear must be that can take in the whole of those harmonics.'
'How I should like to hear it!'
'And see it. 0 Amy! to show you the sunny sea,--the sense of breadth and vastness in that pale clear horizon line, and the infinite number of fields of light between you and it,--and the free feelings as you stand on some high crag, the wind blowing in your face across half the globe, and the waves dashing far below! I am growing quite thirsty for the sea.'
'You know, papa said something about your taking your reading-party to Redclyffe.'
'True, but I don't think Markham would like it, and it would put old Mrs. Drew into no end of a fuss.'
'Not like to have you?'
'0 yes, I should be all very well; but if they heard I was bringing three or four men with me, they would think them regular wild beasts. They would be in an awful fright. Besides, it is so long since I have been at home, that I don't altogether fancy going there till I settle there for good.'
'Ah! it will be sad going there at first.'
'And it has not been my duty yet.'
'But you will be glad when you get there?'
'Sha'n't I? I wonder if any one has been to shoot the rabbits on the shag rock. They must have quite overrun it by this time. But I don't like the notion of the first day. There is not only the great change, but a stranger at the vicarage.'
'Do you know anything about the new clergyman? I believe Mrs. Ashford is a connection of Lady Thorndale's?'
'Yes; Thorndale calls them pattern people, and I have no doubt they will do great good in the parish. I am sure we want some enlightenment, for we are a most primitive race, and something beyond Jenny Robinson's dame
