ied again till she sighed for very weariness; and
then Maurice came to her aid with a few forcible sentences; and so it
got itself written--the saddest, most penitent little letter that a
daughter's hand could frame.

But when she had laid down the burden of her secret, and the special
messenger had been dispatched to Belgrave House, Nea put off thought
for awhile, and she sat by the window and chatted to Maurice about the
gay doings they would have at Pau, and Maurice listened to her; but
always there was that sad, incredulous smile on his face.

And so the day wore on, but when they had finished their simple dinner
and the afternoon had waned into evening, Nea grew strangely quiet and
Maurice's face grew graver and graver as they sat with clasped hands
in the twilight, with a barrier of silence growing up between them.

And when the dusk became darkness, and the lamp was brought in Nea
looked at Maurice with wide anxious eyes and asked what it meant.

Were they not going to send the carriage for them after all? she
wondered; must she go home on foot and brave her father's anger? he
must be so very, very angry, she thought, to keep them so long in
suspense.

"Hush!" exclaimed Maurice, and then they heard the rumbling of wheels
that stopped suddenly before the door, and the loud pealing of a bell
through the house.

"The carriage! the carriage!" cried Nea, and the flush rose to her
face as she started to her feet, but Maurice did not answer; he was
grasping the table to support himself, and felt as though another
moment's suspense would be intolerable.

"A letter for Mrs. Trafford," observed the landlady in solemn
awe-struck tones, "and a man in livery and the cabman are bringing in
some boxes."

"What boxes?" exclaimed Nea; but as she tore open the letter and
glanced over the contents a low cry escaped her.

"Maurice! Maurice!" cried the poor child; and Maurice, taking it from
her, read it once, twice, thrice, growing whiter and whiter with each
perusal, and then sunk on a chair, hiding his face in his hands, with
a groan. "Oh! my darling," he gasped, "I have ruined you; my darling,
for whom I would willingly have died, I have ruined and brought you to
beggary."

They had sinned, and beyond doubt their sin was a heavy one; but what
father, if he had any humanity, could have looked at those two
desolate creatures, so young, and loving each other so tenderly, and
would not have had pity on them?

The lette