paid a long visit, and in a few days he
came again. He was staying at Cooksley, he told them carelessly; and
if they would allow it, he added courteously, he should like to walk
over to Daintree and see them sometimes.

Miss Mordaunt gave him gracious permission, and Fay looked shyly
pleased; and so it came that Hugh called daily at the cottage.

He sent for his horses presently, and drove Miss Mordaunt and her
niece to all the beautiful spots in the neighborhood; and he joined
Fay in her canters through the lanes, and found fault with Fairy, much
to her little mistress's dismay; but Fay blushed very prettily when
one day a beautiful little chestnut mare, with a lady's side-saddle,
was brought to the cottage-door, where Fay was waiting in her habit.

"I want you to try Bonnie Bell," he said, carelessly, as he put her on
her saddle. "You ride perfectly, and Fairy is not half good enough for
you;" and Fay was obliged to own that she had never had such a ride
before; and Hugh had noticed that people had turned round to look at
the beautiful little figure on the chestnut mare.

"I shall bring her every day for you to ride--she is your own
property, you know," Hugh said, as he lifted Fay to the ground; but
Fay had only tried to hide her blushing face from his meaning look,
and had run into the house.

Hugh was beginning to make his intentions very clear. When he walked
with Fay in the little lane behind the cottage he did not say much,
but he looked very kindly at her. The girl's innocent beauty--her
sweet face and fresh ripple of talk--came soothingly to the jaded man.
He began to feel an interest in the gentle unsophisticated little
creature. She was very young, very ignorant, and childish--she had
absolutely no knowledge of the world or of men--but somehow her very
innocence attracted him.

His heart was bitter against his old love--should he take this child
to himself and make her his wife? He was very lonely--restless, and
dissatisfied, and miserable; perhaps, after all, she might rest and
comfort him. He was already very fond of her; by and by, when he had
learned to forget Margaret, when he ceased to remember her with these
sickening throbs of pain, he might even grow to love her.

"She is so young--so little will satisfy her," he said to himself,
when a chill doubt once crossed his mind whether he could ever give
her the love that a woman has a right to demand from the man who
offers himself as her husband; b