An awkward general silence ensued, when Juliet, hearing other steps, was moving off; but Lady Aurora, following, and holding out her hand, affectionately said, 'Are you going, Miss Ellis? Must you go? And will you not bid me adieu?'

Touched to the soul at this public mark of kindness, Juliet was gratefully returning, when the voice of Lord Melbury spoke his near approach. Trembling and changing colour, her folded hands demanded excuse of Lady Aurora for a precipitate yet reluctant flight; but she had still found neither time nor means to escape, when Lord Melbury, who was playing with young Loddard, entered the gallery, saying, 'Aurora, your genealogical studies have lost you a most beautiful sea-view.'

The boy, spying Juliet, whom he was more than ever eager to join when he saw that she strove to avoid notice; darted from his lordship, calling out, 'Ellis! Ellis! look! look! here's Ellis!'

Lord Melbury, with an air of the most animated surprize and delight, darted forward also, exclaiming, 'Miss Ellis! How unexpected a pleasure! The moment I saw Mrs Ireton I had some hope I might see, also, Miss Ellis—but I had already given it up as delusory.'

Again the fallen countenance of Juliet brightened into sparkling beauty. The idea that even Lord Melbury had been infected by the opinions which had been circulated to her disadvantage, had wounded, had stung her to the quick: but to find that, notwithstanding he had been prevailed upon to acquiesce that his sister, while so much mystery remained, should keep personally aloof, his own sentiments of esteem remained unshaken; and to find it by so open, and so prompt a testimony of respect and regard, displayed before the very witnesses who had sought to destroy, or invalidate, every impression that might be made in her favour, was a relief the most exquisitely welcome to her disturbed and fearful mind.

Eager and rapid enquiries concerning her health, uttered with the ardour of juvenile vivacity, succeeded this first address. The party standing by, looked astonished, even abashed; while the face of Lady Aurora recovered its wonted expression of sweet serenity.

Mrs Ireton, now, was seized with a desire the most violent, to repossess a protegée whose history and situation seemed daily to grow more wonderful. With a courtesy, therefore, as foreign from her usual manners, as from her real feelings, she said, 'Miss Ellis, I am sure, will have the goodness to help me home with my two little companions? I am sure of that. She could not be so unkind as to leave the poor little things in the lurch?'

Indignant as Juliet had felt at the treatment which she had received, resentment at this moment found no place in her mind; she was beginning, therefore, a civil, however decided excuse; when Mrs Ireton, suspicious of her purpose, flung herself languishingly upon a seat, and complained that she was seized with such an immoderate pain in her side, that, if somebody would not take care of the two little souls, she should arrive at Brighthelmstone a corpse.

The Arramedes, Miss Brinville, and Selina, all declared that it was impossible to refuse so essential a service to a health so delicate.

The fear, now, of a second public scene, with the dread lest Lord Melbury might be excited to speak or act in her favour, forced the judgment of Juliet to conquer her inclination, in leading her to defer the so often given dismission till her return to Brighthelmstone; she acceded, therefore, though with cruel unwillingness, to what was required.