ainly! I see it has already begun." Mrs. Vivian
laid her hand upon her daughter's with a little murmur of tender
deprecation, and the girl bent over and kissed her. "Mamma will tell you
it 's the effect of agitation," she said--"that I am nervous, and don't
know what I say. I am supposed to be agitated by Mr. Wright's departure;
is n't that it, mamma?"

Mrs. Vivian turned away, with a certain soft severity.

"I don't know, my daughter. I don't understand you."

A charming pink flush had come into Angela's cheek and a noticeable
light into her eye. She looked admirably handsome, and Bernard frankly
gazed at her. She met his gaze an instant, and then she went on.

"Mr. Longueville does n't understand me either. You must know that I am
agitated," she continued. "Every now and then I have moments of talking
nonsense. It 's the air of Baden, I think; it 's too exciting. It
's only lately I have been so. When you go away I shall be horribly
ashamed."

"If the air of Baden has such an effect upon you," said Bernard, "it
is only a proof the more that you need the solicitous attention of your
friends."

"That may be; but, as I told you just now, I have no confidence--none
whatever, in any one or anything. Therefore, for the present, I shall
withdraw from the world--I shall seclude myself. Let us go on being
quiet, mamma. Three or four days of it have been so charming. Let the
parcel lie till it 's called for. It is much safer it should n't be
touched at all. I shall assume that, metaphorically speaking, Mr.
Wright, who, as you have intimated, is our earthly providence, has
turned the key upon us. I am locked up. I shall not go out, except upon
the balcony!" And with this, Angela stepped out of the long window and
went and stood beside Miss Evers.

Bernard was extremely amused, but he was also a good deal puzzled, and
it came over him that it was not a wonder that poor Wright should not
have found this young lady's disposition a perfectly decipherable page.
He remained in the room with Mrs. Vivian--he stood there looking at
her with his agreeably mystified smile. She had turned away, but on
perceiving that her daughter had gone outside she came toward
Bernard again, with her habitual little air of eagerness mitigated by
discretion. There instantly rose before his mind the vision of that
moment when he had stood face to face with this same apologetic mamma,
after Angela had turned her back, on the grass-grown terrace at Si