onfession silenced him. He happened to be sitting
opposite to the glass, so that he could see his face. The poor wretch
abruptly moved his chair, so as to turn his back on it.

I looked at Nugent, and surprised him trying to catch his brother's eye.
Prompted by him, as I could now no longer doubt, Oscar had laid his
finger on a certain domestic difficulty which I had had in my mind, from
the moment when the question of the operation had been first agitated
among us.

(The marriage of Oscar and Lucilla--it is here necessary to explain--had
encountered another obstacle, and undergone a new delay, in consequence
of the dangerous illness of Lucilla's aunt. Miss Batchford, formally
invited to the ceremony as a matter of course, had most considerately
sent a message begging that the marriage might not be deferred on her
account. Lucilla, however, had refused to allow her wedding to be
celebrated, while the woman who had been a second mother to her, lay at
the point of death. The rector having an eye to rich Miss Batchford's
money--not for himself (Miss B. detested him), but for Lucilla--had
supported his daughter's decision; and Oscar had been compelled to
submit. These domestic events had taken place about three weeks since;
and we were now in receipt of news which not only assured us of the old
lady's recovery, but informed us also that she would be well enough to
make one of the wedding party in a fortnight's time. The bride's dress
was in the house; the bride's father was ready to officiate--and here,
like a fatality, was the question of the operation unexpectedly starting
up, and threatening another delay yet, for a period which could not
possibly be shorter than a period of three months! Add to this, if you
please, a new element of embarrassment as follows. Supposing Lucilla to
persist in her resolution, and Oscar to persist in concealing from her
the personal change in him produced by the medical treatment of the fits,
what would happen? Nothing less than this. Lucilla, if the operation
succeeded, would find out for herself--before instead of after her
marriage--the deception that had been practiced on her. And how she might
resent that deception, thus discovered, the cleverest person among us
could not pretend to foresee. There was our situation, as we sat in
domestic parliament assembled, when the surgeons had left us!)

Finding it impossible to attract his brother's attention, Nugent had no
alternative but to inte