She grew pale and melancholy, was often abstracted while in the company of those who sought exclusively to occupy her attention; and, without being marked in her increasing desire for seclusion, she presented herself in the drawing-room or dining-room only when she could not well escape the duties of her position.
It was not difficult for either Colonel Mires or Lester Vane to see that Flora looked upon the seemingly accidental rencontres with themselves in their strolls as unfortunate, and that she viewed them with distaste. Colonel Mires even took the trouble to sound her on the subject, and succeeded in eliciting from her that she preferred in her morning walks to be quite alone.
Lester Vane caught at her acknowledgment, and proposed a shooting excursion for the following morning to Colonel Mires, who promptly acceded to the proposition. Flora perceived that this was a delicate attention to her wish, and responded by a grateful look to Vane, who treasured it up to be that night gloated over as a step gained towards the goal he looked forward to reach.
“I see my way better from that glance,” he thought, “than I have yet by any occurrence that has happened. I will rack my brain to lay her under small obligations; those little thankfulnesses gathered together will reach to the magnitude of fondness; and if I but make her fond—if I can only make her fond—the victory is mine.”
That morning early, Lester Vane and Colonel Mires, equipped for the sport, attended by the gamekeeper and their grooms, set out upon their expedition. Flora, seeing her father safe in his library, surrounded by his favourite authors, and bent upon scientific experiments, which were likely to absorb his devoted attention until dinner-time, took a book with her, and sauntered away from the house in an opposite direction to that which she had seen the gentlemen take. She directed her steps towards a sequestered glen, through which the valley stream flowed, chanting its bubbling lay, and where wild flowers were profuse. Young trees, thickly intertwined, shaded the sun from the soft, even, emerald sward, and the silence was only disturbed by the singing of birds, striving to rival the musical murmur of the rippling water as it swept windingly through the secluded place.
Of late she had visited this spot more frequently than any other; for, in her approach to it, she had not been encountered by either the Colonel or Vane, nor did she ever within its precincts see living creatures, save the birds darting from the sunlight into the shadowy trees, or the fish leaping out of the stream in pursuit of their prey.
She was, therefore, not a little disturbed and surprised, on making her way to her accustomed seat, to find it occupied by a gentleman, who, with his head resting upon his hand, was seated, gazing upon the ever-moving stream in an attitude of abstracted contemplation.
She would have retreated, if possible, without attracting the observation of the stranger, but the glitter of her flowing garments had attracted his eyes, and he turned towards her, rising up as he did so.
A faint exclamation burst from her lips as the stranger advanced in her direction with something of a hesitating manner, but she eagerly held out both her hands to greet him; her eyes glittered like diamonds, and a rosy flush suddenly spread itself over neck, face and forehead.
“Mr. Vivian!” she exclaimed, “how strange we should meet here. You have come down to pay us a visit—have you not. Heaven! how pale you look—are you ill?”