ela. He went to the
postoffice. No letter was there. The day wore on to evening--and, with
the evening, there appeared a woman who was a stranger to him. She
looked like a servant; and she was the bearer of a mysterious message.

"Please be at the garden-door that opens on the lane, at ten o'clock
to-morrow morning. Knock three times at the door--and then say 'Adela.'
Some one who wishes you well will be alone in the shrubbery, and will
let you in. No, sir! I am not to take anything; and I am not to say a
word more." She spoke--and vanished.

Cosway was punctual to his appointment. He knocked three times; he
pronounced Miss Restall's Christian name. Nothing happened. He waited a
while, and tried again. This time Adela's voice answered strangely from
the shrubbery in tones of surprise: "Edwin, is it really you?"

"Did you expect any one else?" Cosway asked. "My darling, your message
said ten o'clock--and here I am."

The door was suddenly unlocked.

"I sent no message," said Adela, as they confronted each other on the
threshold.

In the silence of utter bewilderment they went together into the
summer-house. At Adela's request, Cosway repeated the message that
he had received, and described the woman who had delivered it. The
description applied to no person known to Miss Restall. "Mrs. Margery
never sent you the invitation; and I repeat, I never sent you the
message. This meeting has been arranged by some one who knows that I
always walk in the shrubbery after breakfast. There is some underhand
work going on--"

Still mentally in search of the enemy who had betrayed them, she checked
herself, and considered a little. "Is it possible--?" she began, and
paused again. Her eyes filled with tears. "My mind is so completely
upset," she said, "that I can't think clearly of anything. Oh, Edwin, we
have had a happy dream, and it has come to an end. My father knows more
than we think for. Some friends of ours are going abroad tomorrow--and
I am to go with them. Nothing I can say has the least effect upon my
father. He means to part us forever--and this is his cruel way of doing
it!"

She put her arm round Cosway's neck and lovingly laid her head on his
shoulder. With tenderest kisses they reiterated their vows of eternal
fidelity until their voices faltered and failed them. Cosway filled up
the pause by the only useful suggestion which it was now in his power to
make--he proposed an elopement.

Adela received this bold