"He doesn't want to make his fortuneâ??he
might do much better."

"The deuce he might! Howâ??I should like
to know?"

"I'm afraid to tell you. I'm afraid you'll laugh
at me. Will you promise not to laugh at me?"

"Anything to please you, my dear. Yes: I
promise. Now then, out with it! How might
Frank do better?"

"He might marry Me."

If the summer-scene which then spread before
Mr. Vanstone's eyes, had suddenly changed to a
dreary winter viewâ??if the trees had lost all their
leaves, and the green fields had turned white
with snow, in an instantâ??his face could hardly
have expressed greater amazement than it
displayed, when his daughter's faltering voice spoke
those four last words. He tried to look at herâ??
but she steadily refused him the opportunity:
she kept her face hidden over his shoulder. Was
she in earnest? His cheek, still wet with her
tears, answered for her. There was a long pause
of silence; she waitedâ??with unaccustomed
patience, she waited for him to speak. He
roused himself, and spoke these words only:â??
"You surprise me, Magdalen; you surprise me,
more than I can say."

At the altered tone of his voiceâ??altered to a
quiet fatherly seriousnessâ??Magdalen's arms
clung round him closer than before.

"Have I disappointed you, papa?" she asked,
faintly. "Don't say I have disappointed you!
Who am I to tell my secret to, if not to you?
Don't let him goâ??don't! don't! You will break
his heart. He is afraid to tell his father; he is
even afraid you might be angry with him. There
is nobody to speak for us, exceptâ??except me.
Oh, don't let him go! Don't for his sakeâ??"
she whispered the next words in a kissâ??"Don't
for Mine!"

Her father's kind face saddened; he sighed,
and patted her fair head tenderly. "Hush, my
love," he said, almost in a whisper; "hush!"
She little knew what a revelation every word,
every action that escaped her, now opened before
him. She had made him her grown-up play-
fellow, from her childhood to that day. She had
romped with him in her frocks, she had gone on
romping with him in her gowns. He had never
been long enough separated from her to have
the external changes in his daughter forced on
his attention. His artless fatherly experience
of her, had taught him that she was a taller child
in later yearsâ??and had taught him little more.
And now, in one breathless instant, the conviction
that she was a woman rushed over his mind.
He felt it in the trouble of her bosom pressed
against his; in the nervous thrill of her arms
clasped round his neck. The Magdalen of his
innocent experience, a womanâ??with the master-
passion of her sex in possession of her heart
already!

"Have you thought long of this, my dear?"
he asked, as soon as he could speak composedly.
"Are you sureâ???"

She answered the question before he could
finish it.

"Sure I love him?" she said. "Oh, what
words can say Yes for me as I want to say it!
I love himâ??!" Her voice faltered softly;
and her answer ended in a sigh.

"You are very young. You and Frank, my
love, are both very young."

She raised her head from his shoulder for the
first time. The thought and its expression flashed
from her at the same moment.

''Are we much younger than you and mamma
were?" she asked, smiling through her tears.

She tried to lay her head back in its old position;
but as she spoke those words, her father
caught her round the waistâ??forced her, before
she was aware of it, to look him in the faceâ??and
kissed her, with a sudden outburst of tenderness
which brought the tears thronging back thickly
into her eyes. "Not much younger, my child,"
he said, in low, broken tonesâ??"not much
younger than your mother and I were." He put
her away from him, and rose from the seat, and
turned his head aside quickly. "Wait here,
and compose yourself; I will go in-doors and
speak to your mother." His voice trembled
over those parting words: and he left her without
once looking round again.

She waitedâ??waited a weary time; and he
never came back. At last, her growing anxiety
urged her to follow him into the house. A
new timidity throbbed in her heart, as she
doubtingly approached the door. Never had
she seen the depths of her father's simple
nature stirred as they had been stirred by
her confession. She almost dreaded her next
meeting with him. She wandered softly to and
fro in the hall, with a shyness unaccountable to
herself; with a terror of being discovered and
spoken to by her sister or Miss Garth, which
made her nervously susceptible to the slightest
noises in the house. The door of the morning-
room opened, while her back was turned towards
it. She started violently, as she looked round
and saw her father in the hall: her heart beat
faster and faster, and she felt herself turning
pale. A second look at him, as he came nearer,
reassured her He was composed again, though
not so cheerful as usual. She noticed that he
advanced and spoke to her with a forbearing
gentleness, which was more like his manner
to her mother, than his ordinary manner to
herself.

"Go in, my love," he said, opening the door
for her which he had just closed. "Tell your
mother all you have told meâ??and more, if you
have more to say. She is better prepared for you
than I was. We will take to-day to think of it,
Magdalen; and to-morrow you shall know, and
Frank shall know, what we decide."

Her eyes brightened, as they looked into his
face, and saw the decision there already, with
the double penetration of her womanhood and
her love. Happy, and beautiful in her happiness,
she put his hand to her lips, and went without