who is a great favourite of Charley's," and grandmamma smiled sweetly at the former, "made your welcome appearance—as welcome, I am sure, to the poor boy as to me."

How curiously inexplicable it all was! I felt more hopelessly bewildered than ever, and to think now that my theory of the love case was after all, perhaps, wholly incorrect-indeed Charley's assertion made me almost certain it

was.

"You know I have always been very sceptical on that point," replied grandmamma, on my alluding to it; "such a belief is utterly at variance with all my previous knowledge of his character."

"And it is very unlikely," interposed Miss Pitt-"impossible, I should say, that anything so simple as a mere youthful love-passion would or could have obtained such omnipotent power over his heart as to still retain possession with an influence so unmitigated that, although of three years' standing, even the most indirect allusion to the subject is utterly unendurable to him."

"Yes; three years since it occurred!" rejoined I. "It! What? What was the it? I

protest I feel as though I were talking of a ghost! The whole affair is so unsubstantial, so shadowy!"

"It is," replied grandmamma, sighing; "but, whatever it be, one thing is certain in its effects: it has planted a poisoned barb in the poor boy's soul which has darkened and tainted the lifecurrent of his existence, for how long God alone knows."

"I wonder," said I, breaking a rather long silence, "that, although he maintains secrecy towards the whole world besides, he should do so to his kind-hearted sister. I am sure any other brother would have felt it such an inestimable comfort to be able to take so truly trustworthy and sympathetic a friend into his confidence; but, there! Charles is unlike everybody else!" I concluded, impatiently.

"The safety or reputation of others may depend upon his silence and secrecy," interposed my governess, "and he may be restrained by a strong sense of honour from confiding the fearful mystery-for fearful it must be in some way-even to his sister."

"Do

you

think that is it?" I answered, doubtfully, feeling very unwilling to adopt so

matter-of-fact an opinion. In my girlish folly I greatly preferred, unless the clear truth were revealed, leaving the affair in the hands of imagination to mould after its own wild fashion; the wilder the more attractive.

CHAPTER X.

DIVERS SUBJECTS.

So time passed on, and, two years later, grandmamma and I again sat together in the oriel drawing-room one pleasant summer evening. We were alone, my kind governess, Miss Pitt, having recently left me to return to her aged mother, who had become too infirm to live by herself.

The losing this amiable Christian friend was, for a time, quite an affliction to me, and, indeed, it was little less so to my grandmother; but duty and affection demanded the sacrifice on both sides, and without hesitation it was made. Grandmamma settled an annuity upon her, to be continued in full during her mother's life, after which she was to permanently receive the half. "This is beautiful weather for our fête, is it

not, mammy?" exclaimed I, gazing hopefully, and with an admiration that had never palled, on the picturesque beauties of the sun-lit garden, and through its verdant glades and varied foliage to the sparkling lake in the distance, and the wide-spreading park.

"According to the sky and the weather-glass there seems abundant promise of its being so, . dear," she replied, "for both continue rising-a sign as good in the first as the second, I believe."

"Oh, yes; Captain Hilton told me he has sometimes seen the sky during very stormy weather at sea looking as if it was on the point of crushing down upon their heads. Talking of Charley's uncle reminds me that I forgot to tell you, mammy, he is come home again; I met him this afternoon."

66

Indeed, dear! What can have brought him back so soon? He was here only a fortnight ago," she replied, in a surprised tone, while a slightly worried expression, which I had noticed of late on mention of Charles Beechley's name, came into her soft face.

"That was just the question I laughingly asked him," replied I; "and the observation I