this
morning; I am not myself. I didn't mean what I said. Pray forgive me."
There was no resisting the caressing tenderness of voice and manner
which accompanied those words. He looked up; he took her hand. She bent
over him, and touched his forehead with her lips. "Am I forgiven?" she
asked.

"Oh, my darling," he said, "if you only knew how I loved you!"

"I do know it," she answered, gently, twining his hair round her finger,
and arranging it over his forehead where his hand had ruffled it.

They were completely absorbed in each other, or they must, at that
moment, have heard the library door open at the other end of the room.

Lady Janet had written the necessary reply to her nephew, and had
returned, faithful to her engagement, to plead the cause of Horace. The
first object that met her view was her client pleading, with conspicuous
success, for himself! "I am not wanted, evidently," thought the old
lady. She noiselessly closed the door again and left the lovers by
themselves.

Horace returned, with unwise persistency, to the question of the
deferred marriage. At the first words that he spoke she drew back
directly--sadly, not angrily.

"Don't press me to-day," she said; "I am not well to-day."

He rose and looked at her anxiously. "May I speak about it to-morrow?"

"Yes, to-morrow." She returned to the sofa, and changed the subject.
"What a time Lady Janet is away!" she said. "What can be keeping her so
long?"

Horace did his best to appear interested in the question of Lady Janet's
prolonged absence. "What made her leave you?" he asked, standing at the
back of the sofa and leaning over her.

"She went into the library to write a note to her nephew. By-the-by, who
is her nephew?"

"Is it possible you don't know?"

"Indeed, I don't."

"You have heard of him, no doubt," said Horace. "Lady Janet's nephew
is a celebrated man." He paused, and stooping nearer to her, lifted a
love-lock that lay over her shoulder and pressed it to his lips. "Lady
Janet's nephew," he resumed, "is Julian Gray."

She started off her seat, and looked round at him in blank, bewildered
terror, as if she doubted the evidence of her own senses.

Horace was completely taken by surprise. "My dear Grace!" he exclaimed;
"what have I said or done to startle you this time?"

She held up her hand for silence. "Lady Janet's nephew is Julian Gray,"
she repeated; "and I only know it now!"

Horace's perplexity increased. "My darling,