desperate resolution as
with a hand of iron. If she shrank at that miserable moment, it was not
from her design--it was from the sense of her own helplessness. "Oh, if
I had been a man!" she said to herself. "Oh, if I could find a friend!"

CHAPTER LIII. THE FRIEND IS FOUND.

Mrs. Ellmother looked into the parlor. "I told you Mr. Mirabel would
call again," she announced. "Here he is."

"Has he asked to see me?"

"He leaves it entirely to you."

For a moment, and a moment only, Emily was undecided. "Show him in," she
said.

Mirabel's embarrassment was visible the moment he entered the room.
For the first time in his life--in the presence of a woman--the
popular preacher was shy. He who had taken hundreds of fair hands with
sympathetic pressure--he who had offered fluent consolation, abroad and
at home, to beauty in distress--was conscious of a rising color, and was
absolutely at a loss for words when Emily received him. And yet, though
he appeared at disadvantage--and, worse still, though he was aware of
it himself--there was nothing contemptible in his look and manner. His
silence and confusion revealed a change in him which inspired respect.
Love had developed this spoiled darling of foolish congregations, this
effeminate pet of drawing-rooms and boudoirs, into the likeness of a
Man--and no woman, in Emily's position, could have failed to see that it
was love which she herself had inspired.

Equally ill at ease, they both took refuge in the commonplace phrases
suggested by the occasion. These exhausted there was a pause. Mirabel
alluded to Cecilia, as a means of continuing the conversation.

"Have you seen Miss Wyvil?" he inquired.

"She was here last night; and I expect to see her again to-day before
she returns to Monksmoor with her father. Do you go back with them?"

"Yes--if _you_ do."

"I remain in London."

"Then I remain in London, too."

The strong feeling that was in him had forced its way to expression
at last. In happier days--when she had persistently refused to let him
speak to her seriously--she would have been ready with a light-hearted
reply. She was silent now. Mirabel pleaded with her not to misunderstand
him, by an honest confession of his motives which presented him under a
new aspect. The easy plausible man, who had hardly ever seemed to be in
earnest before--meant, seriously meant, what he said now.

"May I try to explain myself?" he asked.

"Certainly, if you wish it."