y of her cheeks, and the frank eyes moistened. She came up
to him as he sat, and took his hand in both hers, pressing it warmly.
"Ah, Mr. Chillingly," she said, with impulsive tremulous tones, "look
round, look round this happy, peaceful home!--the life so free from a
care, the husband whom I so love and honour; all the blessings that I
might have so recklessly lost forever had I not met with you, had I been
punished as I deserved. How often I thought of your words, that 'you
would be proud of my friendship when we met again'! What strength they
gave me in my hours of humbled self-reproach!" Her voice here died away
as if in the effort to suppress a sob.

She released his hand, and, before he could answer, passed quickly
through the open sash into the garden.

CHAPTER IV.

THE children have come,--some thirty of them, pretty as English children
generally are, happy in the joy of the summer sunshine, and the
flower lawns, and the feast under cover of an awning suspended between
chestnut-trees, and carpeted with sward.

No doubt Kenelm held his own at the banquet, and did his best to
increase the general gayety, for whenever he spoke the children listened
eagerly, and when he had done they laughed mirthfully.

"The fair face I promised you," whispered Mrs. Braefield, "is not here
yet. I have a little note from the young lady to say that Mrs. Cameron
does not feel very well this morning, but hopes to recover sufficiently
to come later in the afternoon."

"And pray who is Mrs. Cameron?"

"Ah! I forgot that you are a stranger to the place. Mrs. Cameron is the
aunt with whom Lily resides. Is it not a pretty name, Lily?"

"Very! emblematic of a spinster that does not spin, with a white head
and a thin stalk."

"Then the name belies my Lily, as you will see."

The children now finished their feast, and betook themselves to dancing
in an alley smoothed for a croquet-ground, and to the sound of a violin
played by the old grandfather of one of the party. While Mrs. Braefield
was busying herself with forming the dance, Kenelm seized the occasion
to escape from a young nymph of the age of twelve who had sat next him
at the banquet, and taken so great a fancy to him that he began to fear
she would vow never to forsake his side, and stole away undetected.

There are times when the mirth of others only saddens us, especially
the mirth of children with high spirits, that jar on our own quiet mood.
Gliding through a dens