He nodded happily, and answered in a voice full of emotion, “And she loves me.”

“It is the countenance of an angel.”

“And she loves me.  I am not worthy to touch the hem of her garment, Charley, but she loves me.”  Then Charlotte lifted the pictured face to her lips.  Their confidence was complete; and they did not think it necessary to talk it over, or to exact promises of secrecy from each other.

The next day Harry returned to his regiment, and Sophia’s affairs began to receive the attention which their important crisis demanded.  In those days it was customary for girls to make their own wedding outfit, and there was no sewing-machine to help them.  “Mine is the first marriage in the family,” Sophia said, “and I think there ought to be a great deal of interest felt in it.”  And there was.  Grandmother Sandal’s awmries were opened for old laces and fine cambric, and petticoats and spencers of silks wonderful in quality and color, and guiltless of any admixture of less precious material.  There were whole sets of many garments to make, and tucking and frilling and stitching were then slow processes.  Agnes Bulteel came to assist; but the work promised to be so tedious, that the marriage-day was postponed until July.

In the mean time, Julius spent his time between Oxford and Sandal-Side.  Every visit was distinguished by some rich or rare gift to his bride, and he always felt a pleasure in assuring himself that Charlotte was consumed with envy and regret.  He was very much in love with Sophia, and quite glad she was going to marry him; and yet he dearly liked to think that he made Charlotte sorry for her rejection of his love, and wistfully anxious for the rings and bracelets that were the portion of his betrothed.  Sophia soon found out that this idea flattered and pleased him, and it gave her neither shame nor regret to indorse it.  She loved no one but Julius, and she made a kind of merit in giving up every one for him.  The sentiment sounded rather well; but it was really an intense selfishness, wearing the mask of unselfishness.  She did not reflect that the daily love and duty due to others cannot be sinlessly withheld, or given to some object of our own particular choice, or that such a selfish idolatry is a domestic crime.

It was a very unhappy time to Charlotte.  Her mother was weary with many unusual cares, her father more silent and depressed than she had ever before seen him.  The sunny serenity of her happy home was disturbed by a multitude of new elements, for an atmosphere of constant expectation gave a restless tone to its usual placid routine.  And through all and below all, there was that feeling of money perplexity, which, where it exists, is no more to be hid than the subtle odor of musk, present though unseen.