you think not? Well, that's a great comfort: besides, Lord
Ballindine never was particular. But still, Fanny, had I known he was
coming so soon, I would have had Murray down from Dublin again at once,
for Mrs Richards is not a good cook."

During the remainder of the morning, Fanny was certainly very happy;
but she was very uneasy. She hardly knew how to meet Lord Ballindine.
She felt that she had treated him badly, though she had never ceased
to love him dearly; and she also thought she owed him much for his
constancy. It was so good of him to send his friend to her--and one to
whom her uncle could not refuse admission; and then she thought she had
treated Mr Armstrong haughtily and unkindly. She had never thanked him
for all the trouble he had taken; she had never told him how very happy
he had made her; but she would do so at some future time, when he
should be an honoured and a valued guest in her own and her husband's
house.

But how should she receive her lover? Would they allow her to be alone
with him, if only for a moment, at their first meeting? Oh! How she
longed for a confidante! but she could not make a confidante of her
cousin. Twice she went down to the drawing-room, with the intention
of talking of her love; but Lady Selina looked so rigid, and spoke so
rigidly, that she could not do it. She said such common-place things,
and spoke of Lord Ballindine exactly as she would of any other visitor
who might have been coming to the house. She did not confine herself to
his eating and drinking, as her mother did; but she said, he'd find the
house very dull, she was afraid--especially as the shooting was all
over, and the hunting very nearly so; that he would, however, probably
be a good deal at the Curragh races.

Fanny knew that her cousin did not mean to be unkind; but there was
no sympathy in her: she could not talk to her of the only subject
which occupied her thoughts; so she retreated to her own room, and
endeavoured to compose herself. As the afternoon drew on, she began to
wish that he was not coming till to-morrow. She became very anxious;
she must see him, somewhere, before she dressed for dinner; and she
would not, could not, bring herself to go down into the drawing-room,
and shake hands with him, when he came, before her uncle, her aunt, and
her cousin.

She was still pondering on the subject, when, about four o'clock in the
afternoon, she got a message from her aunt, desiring her to go to her