"Better than to sacrifice everything to oneself," said Alick.

"Not at all. The latter practice is the only way to be agreeable!

By-the-bye, Alick, I wonder if she will deign to come to the ball?"

"What ball?"

"Your ball at Avoncester. It is what I am staying on for! Major McDonald all but promised me one; and you know you must give one before you leave this place."

"Don't you know that poor Fraser has just been sent for home on his sister's death?"

"But I conclude the whole regiment does not go into mourning?"

"No, but Fraser is the one fellow to whom this would be real enjoyment.

Indeed, I particularly wish no hints may be given about it. Don't deny, I know you have ways of bringing about what you wish, and I will not have them used here. I know something of the kind must be done before we leave Avoncester, but to give one this autumn would be much sooner than needful. I believe there is hardly an officer but myself and Fraser to whom the expense would not be a serious consideration, and when I tell you my father had strong opinions about overdoing reciprocities of gaiety, and drawing heavily on the officers' purses for them, I do not think you will allow their regard for him to take that manifestation towards you."

"Of course not," said Bessie, warmly; "I will not think of it again.

Only when the fate does overtake you, you will have me here for it, Alick?"

He readily promised, feeling gratified at the effect of having spoken to his sister with full recognition of her good sense.

Meantime Rachel was feeling something of what Bessie ascribed to her, as if her sacrifice had been snatched away, and a cloud placed in its stead. Mortification was certainly present, and a pained feeling of having been made a fool of, whether by the Colonel or herself, her candid mind could hardly decide; but she was afraid it was by herself.

She knew she had never felt sure enough of his attentions to do more than speculate on what she would do if they should become more pointed, and yet she felt angry and sore at having been exposed to so absurd a blunder by the silence of the parties concerned. "After all," she said to herself, "there can be no great harm done, I have not been weak enough to commit my heart to the error. I am unscathed, and I will show it by sympathy for Ermine. Only--only, why could not she have told me?"

An ordeal was coming for which Rachel was thus in some degree prepared.

On the return of the party from the book club, Mrs. Curtis came into Rachel's sitting-room, and hung lingering over the fire as if she had something to say, but did not know how to begin. At last, however, she said, "I do really think it is very unfair, but it was not his fault, he says."

"Who?" said Rachel, dreamily.

"Why, Colonel Keith, my dear," said good Mrs. Curtis, conceiving that her pronominal speech had "broken" her intelligence; "it seems we were mistaken in him all this time."

"What, about Miss Williams?" said Rachel, perceiving how the land lay; "how did you hear it?"

"You knew it, my dear child," cried her mother in accents of extreme relief.

"Only this afternoon, from Bessie Keith."

"And Fanny knew it all this time," continued Mrs. Curtis. "I cannot imagine how she could keep it from me, but it seems Miss Williams was resolved it should not be known. Colonel Keith said he felt it was wrong to go on longer without mentioning it, and I could not but say that it would have been a great relief to have known it earlier."

"As far as Fanny was concerned it would," said Rachel, looking into the fire, but not without a sense of rehabilitating satisfaction, as the wistful looks and tone of her mother convinced her that this semi-delusion had not been confined to herself.

"I could not help being extremely sorry for him when he was telling me,"

continued Mrs. Curtis, as much resolved against uttering the idea as Rachel herself could be. "It has been such a very long attachment, and now he says he has not yet been able to overcome her scruples about accepting him in her state. It is quite right of her, I can't say but it is, but it is a very awkward situation."

"I do not see that," said Rachel, feeling the need of decision in order to reassure her mother; "it is very sad and distressing in some ways, but no one can look at Miss Williams without seeing that his return has done her a great deal of good; and whether they marry or not, one can only be full of admiration and respect for them."

"Yes, yes," faltered Mrs. Curtis; "only I must say I think it was due to us to have mentioned it sooner."

"Not at all, mother. Fanny knew it, and it was nobody's concern but hers. Pray am I to have Owen's 'Palaeontology'?"

"No, Colonel Keith bought that, and some more of the solid books. My dear, he is going to settle here; he tells me he has actually bought that house he and his brother are in."

"Bought it!"

"Yes; he says, any way, his object is to be near Miss Williams. Well, I cannot think how it is to end, so near the title as he is, and her sister a governess, and then that dreadful business about her brother, and the little girl upon her hands. Dear me, I wish Fanny had any one else for a governess."

"So do not I," said Rachel. "I have the greatest possible admiration for Ermine Williams, and I do not know which I esteem most, her for her brave, cheerful, unrepining unselfishness, or him for his constancy and superiority to all those trumpery considerations. I am glad to have the watching of them. I honour them both."

Yes, and Rachel honoured herself still more for being able to speak all this freely and truly out of the innermost depths of her candid heart.

CHAPTER XIV. THE GOWANBRAE BALL.

"Your honour's pardon, I'd rather have my wounds to heal again, Than hear say how I got them."--Coriolanus.

"Yes, I go the week after next."

"So soon? I thought you were to stay for our ball."

"Till this time next year! No, no, I can't quite do that, thank you."

"This very winter."

"Oh, no--no such thing! Why, half the beauty and fashion of the neighbourhood is not come into winter quarters yet. Besides, the very essence of a military ball is that it should be a parting--the brightest and the last. Good morning."

And Meg's head, nothing loth, was turned away from the wide view of the broad vale of the Avon, with the Avoncester Cathedral towers in the midst, and the moors rising beyond in purple distance. The two young lieutenants could only wave their farewells, as Bessie cantered merrily over the soft smooth turf of the racecourse, in company with Lord Keith, the Colonel, and Conrade.

"Do you not like dancing?" inquired Lord Keith, when the canter was over, and they were splashing through a lane with high hedges.

"I'm not so unnatural," returned Bessie, with a merry smile, "but it would never do to let the Highlanders give one now. Alick has been telling me that the expense would fall seriously on a good many of them."

"True," said Colonel Keith, "too many fetes come to be a heavy tax."

"That is more consideration than is common in so young a lad," added Lord Keith.

"Yes, but dear Alick is so full of consideration," said the sister, eagerly. "He does not get half the credit for it that he deserves, because, you know, he is so quiet and reserved, and has that unlucky ironical way with him that people don't like; especially rattlepates like those," pointing with her whip in the direction of the two young officers.

"It is a pity," said the Colonel, "it lessens his influence. And it is strange I never perceived it before his return to England."

"Oh! there's much owing to the habitual languor of that long illness.

That satirical mumble is the only trouble he will take to lift up his testimony, except when a thing is most decidedly his duty, and then he does it as England expects."

"And he considered it his duty to make you decline this ball?" said Lord Keith.