There was something very like a sob, making her throat swell as she considered. He would perhaps see them again, Mr. Leigh said. Ought she to trust to that chance? But then her courage might fail if he came over just like any ordinary visitor; and her young cousins from Chester were coming; and if they should be there, it would be another hindrance.

"And, oh! I must see him again," she said, "and find out whether we are not to be brother and sister any more."

She said "brother and sister" still, as she had done long ago; but she knew very well in her heart now, that _that_ had never been the relationship Maurice desired. And so she tore her note into little bits, and remained helpless, but rebelling against her helplessness. In this humour she went to her mother's room.

Mrs. Costello was not yet up. Lucia knelt down by the bedside, and laid Mr. Leigh's letter beside her.

"Mamma, I am very sorry," she said; "I think Mr. Leigh must have been very unhappy before he would write to you so."

"I agree with you. He is not a man to take fright without cause, either."

"Why do you say, 'to take fright?'"

"Why do I say so? Are you such a child still, that you cannot understand a man like Maurice, always so tender towards women--Quixotically so, indeed--making himself believe that he is doing quite right in marrying a poor girl in Miss Landor's position, when, in fact, he is doing a great wrong? It is a double wrong to her and to himself; and one for which he would be certain to suffer, whether she did or not. And, Lucia I must say it, whatever evil may come of it, now or in the future, is our fault."

"Oh, mamma! mamma, don't say 'our'--say 'your'--if it is mine--for certainly it is not yours."

"I will say your fault, then; I believe you feel it so."

"But, mamma, really and truly, is it anybody's fault? Don't people often love those who can't care for them in return?"

"Really and truly, quite honestly and frankly, Lucia, was that the case with you?"

Lucia's eyes fell. She could not say yes.

"I will tell you," Mrs. Costello went on, "what I believe to be the truth, and you can set me right if I am wrong. You knew that Maurice had always been fond of you--devoted to you, in a way that had come by use to seem natural; and it had never entered your mind to think either how much of your regard he deserved, or how much he really had. I will not say anything about Percy; but I do believe," and she spoke very deliberately, laying her hand on Lucia's, "that since Maurice went away, you have been finding out that you had made a mistake, and that your heart had not been wrong nearly so much as your imagination."

Lucia was still silent. If she had spoken at all, it must have been to confess that her mother was right, and that was not easy to do. Whatever suspicions she might have in her own heart, it was a mortifying thing to be told plainly that her love for Percy was a mistake--a mere counterfeit--instead of the enduring devotion which it ought to have been. But she was very much humbled now, and patiently waited for what her mother might say next.

"Well!" Mrs. Costello began again, "it is no use now to go on talking of the past. The question is rather whether anything can be done for the future. What do you say?"

"What can I say, mamma? What can I do?"

"I don't know. Maurice used to tell me of his plans, but he is not likely to do that now. I would write and ask him to come over, but it is more than doubtful whether he would come."

"He promised that if ever I wanted him he would come," Lucia said, hesitating.

"If you were in need of him I am sure he would, but it would be a kind of impertinence to send for him on that plea when it was not really for that."

"But it _is_. Mamma, don't be angry with me again! Don't be disgusted with me; but I want, so badly, to see him and tell him I behaved wrongly. I was so cross, so ungrateful, so _horrid_, mamma, that it was enough to make him think all girls bad. I should _like_ to tell him how sorry I am; I feel as if I should never be happy till I did."

When, after this outbreak, Lucia's face went down upon her hands, Mrs.

Costello could not resist a little self-gratulatory smile. 'All may come right yet,' she thought to herself, 'if that wilful boy will only come over.'

"I think you are right," she said aloud. "Possibly he may come over, and then you will have an opportunity of speaking to him, perhaps."

"Yes," Lucia said, very slowly, thinking of her note, and of the comfort it would have been if she _could_ but have sent it. "Oh, mamma, if we were but in England!"

"Useless wishes, dear. Give me your advice about writing to Mr. Leigh."

"You will write, will you not?"

"I suppose I must. Yet it is a difficult letter for me to answer."

"Could not you just say 'I will do what I can?'"

"Which is absolutely nothing--unless Maurice should really pay us a visit here, a thing not likely at present."

So the conversation ended without any satisfaction to Lucia. Nay, all her previous days had been happy compared to this one. She was devoured now, by a restless, jealous curiosity about that Miss Landor whom Mr.

Leigh feared--she constantly found her thoughts reverting to this subject, however she might try to occupy them with others, and the tumult of her mind reacted upon her nerves. She could scarcely bear to sit still. It rained all afternoon and evening, and she could not go out, so that in the usual course of events she would have read aloud to her mother part of the time, and for the other part sat by the window with her crochet in her hand, but to-day she wandered about perpetually.

She even opened the piano and began to sing her merriest old songs, but that soon ceased. She found the novel they were reading insufferably stupid, and took up a volume of Shakespeare for refreshment, but it opened naturally to the 'Merchant of Venice,' and, to the page where Portia says:--

"Though for myself alone, I would not be ambitious in my wish, To wish myself much better, yet for you I would be trebled twenty times myself; A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich; That only to stand high on your account, I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends, Exceed account."

She shut the book--yes, this was a true woman, who for true love thought herself and all she possessed too little to give in return; but for the little, foolish, blind souls that could not see till too late, what _was_ true love, she was no fit company.

The evening passed on wearily, and Mrs. Costello, who had her own share of disquiet also, though it was mixed with a little amusement at the impetuosity of these young people, who were so dear to her and so troublesome, did very little in the way of consolation.

Next day, the weather had cleared again, and was very lovely. In the afternoon, Lucia persuaded Mrs. Costello to go with her to the beach.

There they got chairs, and sat for a long while enjoying the gay, and often comical, scene round them. Numbers of people were bathing, and beside the orthodox bathers, there was a party of little boys wading about with bare legs, and playing all sorts of pranks in the water.

A little way to the left of where they sat, there was a curious kind of wooden pier, which ran far away out into the sea and terminated in a small square wooden building. The whole thing was raised on piles about five or six feet above the present level of the water which flowed underneath it. The pier itself, in fact, was only a narrow bridge or footpath railed partly on one side only, partly on both, and with an oddly unsafe and yet tempting look about it. Lucia had been attracted by it before, and she drew her mother's attention to it now--

"Look, mamma," she said, "does not it seem as if one could almost cross the Channel on it, it goes so far out. See that woman, now--I have watched since she started from this end, and now you can scarcely distinguish her figure."

"There is a priest coming along it--is it not Father Paul?"

"I do believe it is. I wish he would come and talk to you for a little while, and then I would go."

"You need not stay for that, dear. I shall sit here alone quite comfortably, if you wish to go out there."

"I should like very much to go. I want to see what the sea looks like away from the beach. There is no harm, is there?"

"None whatever. Go, and I will watch you."

Lucia rose to go.

"It _is_ Father Paul," she said, "and he is coming this way."

She lingered a minute, and the priest, who had recognized them, came up.

Mrs. Costello told him of Lucia's wish to go out on the pier, and he assured her she would enjoy it.

"The air seems even fresher there than here," he said; and she went off, and left him and her mother together.

For a few minutes they talked about the weather, the sea, and the people about them, as two slight acquaintances would naturally do; but then, when there had been a momentary pause, Father Paul startled Mrs.

Costello, by saying,

"Last night, madam, you told me of persons I had not heard of for years--this morning, strangely enough, I have met with a person of whom you probably know something--or knew something formerly."