the day promised to be as warm as the preceding one. the night and morning mists were gone; the sun shone hot and bright. summer seemed to have come in before its time.

two white gothic villas stood side by side just within the neck of dallory ham, a few yards of garden and some clustering shrubs between them. they were built alike. the side windows, facing each other over this strip of ground, were large projecting bay-windows, and belonged to the dining-rooms. these houses were originally erected for two maiden sisters. a large and beautiful garden lay at the back, surrounding the two villas, only a slender wire fence, that a child might have stepped over, dividing it. entering the ham from the direction of dallory, these houses stood on the left; in the first of them lived mrs. cumberland, the mother of oliver rane. she had been married twice: hence the difference in name. the second house was occupied by dr. rane himself. they lay back with a strip of grass before them, the entrance-doors being level with the ground.

let us go into the doctor's: turning the handle of the door without ceremony, as dr. rane's more familiar patients are wont to do. the hall is small, narrowing off at the upper end to a passage, and lighted with stained glass. on the left of the entrance is the consulting-room, not much larger than a closet; beyond it is the dining-room, a spacious apartment, with its bay-window, already spoken of, looking to the other house. opposite the dining-room across the passage is the white-flagged kitchen; and the drawing-room lies in front, on the right of the entrance. not being furnished it is chiefly kept shut up. a back-door opens to the garden.

oliver rane sat in his consulting-room; the whitborough journal, damp from the press, in his hand. it was just twelve o'clock and he had to go out, but the newspaper was attracting him. by seven o'clock that morning he had been at the hall, and learnt that there was no material change in the patient lying there: he had then gone on, early though it was, to see the man, ketler. the journal gave the details of mr. north's seizure with tolerable accuracy, and concluded its account in these words: "we have reason to know that a clue has been obtained to the anonymous writer."

"a clue to the writer!" repeated dr. rane, his eyes appearing glued to the words. "i wonder if it's true?--no, no; it is not likely," came the quiet, contemptuous decision. "how should any clue----"

he stopped suddenly; rose from the chair, and stood erect and motionless, as if some thought had struck him. a fine man; almost as good-looking at a casual glance as another who was stepping in upon him. the front-door had opened, and this one was lightly tapped at. dr. rane paused before he answered it, and a fierce look of inquiry, as if he did not care to be interrupted, shot from his eyes.

"come in."

a tall, slender, and very handsome man, younger than dr. rane, opened the door slowly. there was a peculiar refinement in his proud fair features; a dreamy look in his dark blue eyes. an attractive face at all times and seasons, whose owner it was impossible to mistake for anything but an upright, well-bred gentleman. it was arthur bohun; captain bohun, as he was very generally called. he was the only son of mrs. north by her former marriage with major bohun, and of course stepson to mr. north.

"any admittance, doctor?"

"always admittance to you," answered the doctor, who could be affable or not, as suited his mood. "why don't you come in?"

he came in with his pleasant smile; a smile that hid the natural pride of the face. oliver rane put down the newspaper.

"well, is there any change in edmund north?"

"the very slightest in the world, the doctors think; and for the better," replied captain bohun. "dick told me. i have not been in myself since early morning. i cannot bear to look on extreme suffering."

a ghost of a smile flitted across dr. rane's features at the avowal. he could understand a woman disliking to look on suffering, but not a man. and the one before him had been a soldier!

captain bohun sat down on an uncomfortable wooden stool as he spoke, gently throwing back his light summer overcoat. he imparted the idea of never being put out over any earthly thing. the movement displayed his cool white waistcoat, across which fell a dainty gold chain with its transparent sapphire seal of rare and costly beauty.

"you have begun summer early!" remarked the doctor, glancing at captain bohun's attire.

the clothes were of a delicate shade of grey; looking remarkably cool and nice in conjunction with the white waistcoat. captain bohun was always well dressed; it seemed a part of himself. to wear the rude and rough attire that some men affect nowadays, would have been against his instincts.

"don't sit on that stool of penitence; take the patient's chair," said the doctor, pointing to an elbow-chair opposite the window.

"but i am not a patient."

"no. or you'd be at the opposition shop over the way."

arthur bohun laughed. "it was of the opposition shop i came to speak to you--if i came for anything in particular, where's alexander? is he keeping out of the way; or has he really gone to london as people say?"

"i know nothing about him," returned dr. rane. "look here--i was reading the account they give in the newspaper. is this last hint true?"--holding out the journal--"that a clue has been obtained to the writer of the letter?"

arthur bohun ran his eyes over the sentence to which the doctor's finger pointed.

"no, this has no foundation," he promptly answered. "at least so far as the hall is concerned. as yet we have not found any clue whatever."

"i thought so. these newsmongers put forth lies by the bushel. just as we might do, if we had to cater for an insatiably curious public. but i fear i must be going out."

arthur bohun brought down the fore-legs of the stool, which he had kept on the tilt, rose, and said a word of apology for having detained him from his patients. his was essentially a courteous nature, sensitively regardful of other people's feelings, as men of great innate refinement are sure to be.

they went into the dining-room, dr. rane having left his hat there, and passed out together by the large bay-window. the doctor crossed at once to a door in the wall that bound the premises at the back, and made his exit to the lane beyond, leaving arthur bohun in the garden.

a garden that on a summer's day seemed as a very paradise. with its clustering shrubs, its overhanging trees, its leafy glades, its shrubberies, its miniature rocks, its sweet repose, its sweeter flowers. seated in a remote part of that which belonged to mrs. cumberland, was one of the loveliest girls that eye had ever looked upon. she wore a morning dress of light-coloured muslin, with an edging of lace at the neck and wrists. slight, gentle, charming, with a peculiar look of grace and refinement, a stranger would have been almost startled at her beauty. it was a delightful face; the features clearly cut; the complexion soft, pure, and delicate, paling and flushing with every emotion. in the dark brown eyes there was a singularly sweet expression; the dark brown hair took a lustrously bright tinge in the sunlight.

a natural arbour of trees and branches had been formed overhead: she sat on a garden bench, behind a rustic table. before her, at a short distance, a falling cascade trickled down the artificial rocks, and thence wound away, a tiny stream, amidst ferns, violets, primroses, and other wild plants. a plot of green grass, smooth and soft as the moss of the rocks, lay immediately at her feet, and glimpses of statelier flowers were caught through the trees. their rich perfume came wafted in a sudden breeze to the girl's senses, and she looked up gratefully from her work; some small matter of silken embroidery.

and now you could see the singular refinement and delicacy of the face, the pleasant expression of the soft bright eyes. a bird lodged itself on a branch close by, and began a song. her lips parted with a smile of greeting. by way of rewarding it, off he flew, dipped his beak into the running stream, and soared away out of her sight. as is the case sometimes in life.

on the table lay a handful of violets, picked short off at the blossoms. almost unconsciously, as it seemed, her thoughts far away, she began toying with them, and fell insensibly into the french schoolgirls' play, telling off the flowers. "m'aime-t-il?" was the first momentous question; and then the pastime, a blossom being told off with every answer. "oui. non. un peu. beaucoup. pas du tout. passionnément." and so the round went on, until the last violet was reached. it came, as chance had it, with the last word, and she, in an access of rapture, her soft cheeks glowing, her sweet lips parting, caught up the flower and pressed it to her lips.

"il m'aime passionnément!"

ah, foolish girl! the oracle seemed as true as if it had come direct from heaven. but can we not remember the ecstasy such necromancy once brought to ourselves!

with her blushes deepening as she woke, startling, into reality; with a smile at her own folly; with a sense of maidenly shame for indulging in the pastime, she pushed the violets together, threaded a needleful of green floss silk, and went on soberly with her work. a few minutes, and then either eye or ear was attracted by something ever so far off, and she sat quite still. quite still outwardly; but oh! the sudden emotion that rose like a lightning flash within! and she knew the footsteps. every vein was tingling; every pulse throbbing; the pink on her cheeks deepened; the life blood of her heart rushed wildly on, and she pressed her hand upon her bosom to still it.

he was passing on from dr. rane's to the other house, when he caught a glimpse of her dress through the trees, and turned aside. nothing could have been quieter or more undemonstrative than the meeting; and yet a shrewd observer, skilled in secrets, had not failed to read the truth--that both alike loved. captain bohun went up, calm as befitted a well-bred man: shaking hands after the fashion of society, and apparently with as little interest: but on his face the flush also shone with all its tell-tale vividness; the hand that touched hers thrilled almost to pain. she had risen to receive him: as calm outwardly as he, but her senses were in wild confusion.

she began to go on with her work again in a hurried, trembling sort of fashion when he sat down. the day, for her, had turned to eden; all things seemed to discourse sweet music.

true love--passionate, pure love--is not fluent of speech, whatever the world may say, or poets teach. dr. rane and miss north thought they loved each other: and so they did, after a sensible, sober manner: they could have conversed with mutual fluency for ever and a day; but their love was not this love. it is the custom of modern writers to ignore it: the prevailing fashion is to be matter-of-fact; realistic; people don't talk of love now, and of course don't feel it: the capacity for it has died out; habits have changed. it is false sophistry. we cannot put off human nature as we do a garment.

captain bohun was the first to break the silence. she had been content to live in it by his side for ever: it was more eloquent, too, than his words were.

"what a lovely day it is, ellen!"

"yes. i think summer has come: we shall scarcely have it warmer than this in july. and oh, how charming everything is!"

"yes. yesterday i had a ride of ten miles between green hedges in which the may is beginning to blossom. envious darkness had shut out the world before i reached home again."

"and i sat out here all the afternoon," she answered--and perhaps she unconsciously spoke in pursuance of the thought, that she had sat out waiting and hoping for him. "where did you go, arthur?"

"to bretchley. some of my old brother officers are quartered there: and i spent the day with them. what's that for?"

he alluded to the piece of work. she smiled as she held it out in her right hand, on the third finger of which was a plain gold ring. a small piece of white canvas with a pink rose and part of a green leaf already worked upon it in bright floss silk.

"guess."

"nay, how can i? for a doll's cushion?"

"oh, arthur!" came the laughing exclamation. "if i tell you, you must keep counsel, mind that, for it is a secret, and i am working it under difficulties, out of mrs. cumberland's sight. don't you think i have done a great deal? i only began it yesterday."

"well, what's it for?" he asked, putting his hand underneath it as an excuse, perhaps, for touching the fingers that held it. "a fire-screen for pretty faces?"

the young lady shook her head. "it's for a kettle-holder."

"a kettle-holder! what a prosy ending!"

"it is for mrs. cumberland's invalid kettle that she keeps in her bedroom. the handle got hot a day or two ago, and she burnt her hand. i shall put it on some morning to surprise her."

a silence ensued. half their intercourse was made up of pauses: the eloquent language of true love. captain bohun, thinking how sweet-natured was the girl by his side, played abstractedly with the blossoms lying on the table.

"what have you been doing with all these violets, ellen?"

"nothing," she replied; and down went the scissors. but that she stooped at once, captain bohun might have seen the sudden flush on the delicate face, and wondered at it: a flush of remembrance. il m'aime passionnément. well, so he did.

"please don't entangle my silk, captain bohun."

he laughed as he put down the bright gold skein. "shall i help you to wind it, ellen?"

"thank you, but we don't wind floss silk. it would deaden its beauty. arthur! do you know that the swallows have come?"

"the swallows! then this summer weather will stay with us, for those birds have a sure instinct. it is early for them to be here."

"i saw one this morning. it may be only an avant-courier, come to report on the weather to the rest."

she laughed lightly at her own words, and there ensued another pause. captain bohun broke it.

"what a shocking thing this is about edmund north!"

"what is a shocking thing?" she asked, with indifference, going on with her work as she spoke. arthur bohun, who was busy again with the pale blue violets, scarcely as blue as his own eyes, lifted his face and looked at her.

"i mean altogether. the illness; the letter; the grief at home. it is all shocking."

"is edmund north ill? i did not know it."

"ellen!"

living in the very atmosphere of the illness, amidst its bustle, distress, and attendant facts, to arthur bohun it seemed almost impossible that she should be ignorant of it.

"why, what has rane been about, not to tell you?"

"i don't know. what is the matter with edmund north?"

captain bohun explained the illness and its cause. her work dropped on her knee as she listened; her face grew pale with interest. she never once interrupted him; every sympathetic feeling within her was aroused to warm indignation.

"an anonymous letter!" she at length exclaimed. "that's worse than a stab."

"a fellow, writing one of malice, puts himself beyond the pale of decent society: shooting would be too good for him," quietly remarked captain bohun. "here comes a summons for you, i expect, ellen."

even so. one of the maids approached, saying mrs. cumberland was downstairs; and so the interview was broken up. captain bohun would perforce have taken his departure, but miss adair invited him in--to tell the sad story to mrs. cumberland. only too glad was he of any plea that kept him by ellen's side.

putting her work away in her pocket, she took the arm that was held out, and they went wandering through the garden; lingering by the cascade, dreaming in the dark cypress walk, standing over the beds of beautiful flowers. a seductive time; life's summer; but a time that never stays, for the frosts of winter and reality succeed it surely and swiftly.

nothing had been said between them, but each was conscious of what the other felt. neither had whispered in so many words, "i love you." ellen did not hint that she had watched for him the whole of the past livelong day with love's sick longing; he did not confess how lost the day had been to him, how worse than weary, because it did not bring him to her presence. these avowals might come in time, but they would not be needed.

stepping in through the centre doors of the bay window, as arthur bohun had made his exit from the opposite one, they looked round for mrs. cumberland, and did not see her. she was in the drawing-room on the other side the small hall, sitting near the gothic windows that faced the road. a pale, reticent, lady-like woman, always suffering, but making more of her sufferings than she need have done--as her son, dr. rane, not over-dutifully thought. her eyes were light and cold; her flaxen hair, banded smoothly under a cap, was turning grey. but that mrs. cumberland was quite occupied with self, and very little with her ward, ellen adair, she might have noticed before now the suggestive intimacy between that young lady and arthur bohun.

"captain bohun is here, mrs. cumberland," said ellen, when they entered. "he has some sad news to tell you."

"and the extraordinary part of the business is that you should not have heard it before," added arthur, as he shook hands with mrs. cumberland.

mrs. cumberland's rich black silk gown rustled a very little as she responded to the greeting; but there was no smile on her grey face, her cold eyes wore no brighter light. in her way she was glad to see him: that is, she had no objection to seeing him; but gladness and mrs. cumberland seemed to have parted company. the suffering that arises from constant pain makes a self-absorbed nature doubly selfish.

"what is the news that ellen speaks of, captain bohun?"

he stood leaning against the mantelpiece as he told the tale: told it systematically; the first advent of the anonymous letter to mr. north; the angry, passionate spirit in which edmund north had taken it up; his stormy interview with the surgeon, alexander; the subsequent attack, and the hopelessness in which he was lying. for once mrs. cumberland was aroused to feeling sympathy in another's sufferings: she listened with painful interest.

"and it was oliver who was called in first to edmund north!" she presently exclaimed, with emphasis, as if unable to credit the fact.

"yes."

"but how was it he did not step in here afterwards to tell me the news?" she added, resentfully.

captain bohun could not answer that so readily. ellen adair, ever ready to find a charitable excuse for the world, turned to mrs. cumberland.

"dr. rane may have had patients to see. perhaps he did not return home until too late to come here."

"yes, he did; i saw his lamp burning before ten o'clock," was mrs. cumberland's answer. "ah! this is another proof that i am being forgotten," she went on, bitterly. "when a woman has seen fifty years of life, she is old in the sight of her children, and they go then their own way in the world, leaving her to coldness and neglect."

"but, dear mrs. cumberland, dr. rane does not neglect you," said ellen, struck with the injustice of the complaint. "he is ever the first to come in and amuse you with what news he has."

"and in this instance he may have kept silence from a good motive--the wish to spare you pain," added captain bohun.

"true, true," murmured mrs. cumberland, her mind taking a more reasonable view of the matter. "oliver has always been dutiful to me."

departing, captain bohun crossed the road to mr. alexander's; a slight limp visible in his gait. the mystery that appeared to surround the surgeon's movements at present, puzzled him not a little; his prolonged absence seemed unaccountable. the surgery, through which he entered, was empty, and he opened the door leading from it to the house. a maid-servant met him.

"is mr. alexander at home?"

"no, sir."

"papa's gone to london," called out a young gentleman of ten, who came running along the passage, cracking a whip. "he went last night. they sent for him."

"who sent for him?" asked captain bohun.

"the people. mamma's gone too. they are coming home to-day; and mamma's going to bring me a chinese puzzle and a box of chocolate if she had time to buy them."

not much information, this. as captain bohun turned out again, he stood at the door, wishing he had a decent plea to take him over to mrs. cumberland's again. he was an idle man; living only in the sweet pastime of making that silent love.

but mrs. north never suspected that he was making it, or knew that he was intimate at mrs. cumberland's. still less did she suspect that mrs. cumberland had a young lady inmate named ellen adair. it would have startled her to terror.