Eunice looked up, too shy to say what
her eyes said for her:

"But —- I shall have Jack."

Belle came to me with an endless headache,
that I could not cure. She would sit
by my couch in silence, watching Eunice
and Curzon in the garden, till her eyes, I
should have thought, would have been
tired. I could not understand it. Our
proud Belle to think of a man who did not
care for her! And if he did not care for
her, then why were his eyes always seeking
her face? If he did care for her, then why
make love to Eunice? I wearied myself to
death with these questions.

Once, I remember, when Eunice had a
headache that kept her in her room, and
Curzon was in the garden, not looking up
at her window, as is the wont of lovers,
but smoking in a calm content, Belle went
out to him.

"Am I disturbing you?" she asked; for
at her approach he held his cigar in his
hand.

Curzon looked at her steadily for some
instants, and then, throwing away his cigar,
turned and walked with her.

I had never seen silence so effective.

I became very anxious, and spoke to our
hostess. He was the son of a clergyman;
she had known him all her life. A flirt?
Well, she had never thought so; she sup-
posed he did admire the girls, but not one
she thought more than the other. He was
oftener with Eunice. Well, you know, Belle
was peculiar, and men do not like oddity.
His looking at her so much would be easily
explained. She had expressions of face
which rivetted the attention.

It was all true, and I was not satisfied.

One day, I was more than usually unwell,
and did not leave my couch in the
drawing-room window. Sunset coming
round, found me there. Belle, who had
petting ways with her when she chose, was
lying curled up beside me, quiet and still,
with her hand in mine. It was I, at last,
who broke the long silence.

"Is Captain Frogmore with Eunice?"

"No, Mr. Curzon."

She spoke coldly, which was her way
when she was pained, and I dropped the
subject.

But there are some subjects that will not
be dropped: this one revived within our
hearing.

"No, I am not charming," said Eunice,
contradicting. " For a great many people
I should not be at all a good wife. I always
see things so wretchedly black, and I am
so often unhappy; but, of course, I shall
never be that when I am. with you."

"My darling!" said Jack. Belle gave a
little cry of pain.

I said some word to her as to the expediency
of moving, but she held me fast.

"Hush!" she said, sharply. " I will
listen."

"I never thought I should have a very
happy life," Eunice went on. "I am so
glad you love me, Jack. Belle and I were
always sure we should know who were
going to love us, the very first time we saw
them. Belle always declared she should
know."

"Did she?" said Jack, speaking almost
as dreamily as the girls might have done.

I supposed he did not care very much
to talk about Belle just then. Eunice
evidently took it so.

"You must love Belle," she said. " She
must come and stay with us. After you,
there is no one I love like Belle, and no one
understands her as I do. You do not know
what Belle could be if she were only
happier. There must be no more talk of
governessing and no fuss. Belle and I have
had horrid lives, but it must beover now.
From the day I marry she must never be
unhappy again, and I—-oh, Jack, Jack,
the old life is dropping away. I do not
believe in sorrow. I love you, Jack, I love
you.'

You may imagine it all. The hot broiling
day, just gradually turning cool; the
scents that rose upward from the red, rich
earth; the golden bees on the scented
flowers, and Eunice more beautiful than
ever, with her curling lashes drooping on
her clear grey eyes, and her colour rising
as she yielded to his kiss. I glanced at
Belle. Her face was grey and her eyes
were leaden. She did not stay to be looked
at, but escaped from the room.

Soon after this, I remember an evening,
when we were all out together on the lawn,
listening in the still twilight to Curzon, who
was addressing himself to Eunice.

He was imagining situations, and asking
her what she should do in them.

"Suppose," he said, " for instance, a man
goes and falls in love with a girl who has
no money, and in brief, he leaves her for
one who has. Should you say that fellow
could have no good in him, no heart, that
he never regretted what he had done?"

The gathering darkness came on apace,
but I saw that while most of us gave him
eager answers, Belle sat silent with trouble
in her eyes.