teps to receive him.
How often had her husband cautioned her not to forget herself in this
monstrous fashion!

"Did you think I had run away? Have you come to see me?" she said,
with a bright, roseate gladness on her face which reminded him of many
a pleasant morning in Borva.

"I did not think you had run away, for you see I have brought you some
flowers," he said; but there was a sort of blush in the sallow face,
and perhaps the girl had some quick fancy or suspicion that he had
brought this bouquet to prove that he knew everything was right,
and that he expected to see her. It was only a part of his universal
kindness and thoughtfulness, she considered.

"Frank is up stairs," she said, "getting ready some things to go
to Brighton. Will you come into the breakfast-room? Have you had
breakfast?"

"Oh, you were going to Brighton?"

"Yes," she said; and somehow something moved her to add quickly, "but
not for long, you know. Only a few days. It is many a time you
will have told me of Brighton long ago in the Lewis, but I cannot
understand a large town being beside the sea, and it will be a great
surprise to me, I am sure of that."

"Ay, Sheila," he said, falling into the old habit quite naturally,
"you will find it different from Borvabost. You will have no
scampering about the rocks with your head bare and your hair flying
about. You will have to dress more correctly there than here even;
and, by the way, you must be busy getting ready, so I will go."

"Oh no," she said with a quick look of disappointment, "you will not
go yet. If I had known you were coming--But it was very late when we
will get home this morning: two o'clock it was."

"Another ball?"

"Yes," said the girl, but not very joyfully.

"Why, Sheila," he said with a grave smile on his face, "you are
becoming quite a woman of fashion now. And you know I can't keep up an
acquaintance with a fine lady who goes to all these grand places and
knows all sorts of swell people; so you'll have to cut me, Sheila."

"I hope I shall be dead before that time ever comes," said the girl
with a sudden flash of indignation in her eyes. Then she softened:
"But it is not kind of you to laugh at me."

"Of course I did not laugh at you," he said taking both her hands in
his, "although I used to sometimes when you were a little girl and
talked very wild English. Don't you remember how vexed you used to be,
and how pleased you were when your papa turned the laugh ag