“She doesn’t think me grand enough for her brother,” suggested Bluebell’s wounded pride.

“And, therefore,” pursued her Mentor, “absence is the best thing in these cases; and when you come back I trust you will have got rid of such hopeless fancies.”

Bluebell was deeply mortified,—­she lost all expectation of sympathy, and with a touch of pride, said,—­“You must know best, Mrs. Rolleston, but I shall never care for any one else; and I must tell you honestly, I can’t give it up if he doesn’t.”

“You will not see him at home?” said the elder lady, hastily.  Such a gleam of hope irradiated Bluebell’s face; she had never thought of that.

“Dear me, this is too bad!” continued the other, quite disheartened.  “I shall take care you have no more opportunities of meeting here.  Bluebell, do be warned.  I only speak for your good.”

“How self-interest deceives one,” moralized the girl; “it is only because I am, as she says, ‘a most undesirable connexion for her brother!’”

Cecil entered at this juncture, and Bluebell, hearing the Colonel’s step also approaching, made a hasty escape from the room.

“What is the matter with her?” asked Cecil.  “She brushed by me so suddenly, and looked so strange.”

“Nearly knocked me over,” said the Colonel, who had caught the last words.

“Don’t notice it; I am afraid Bluebell has lost her heart to young Vavasour; and she is miserable at going home, because she thinks she will not see him.”

“I am delighted you have put a stop to that folly,” said the Colonel; “that boy dawdles over here every afternoon.  I can’t have Miss Bluebell’s ‘followers’ everlastingly caterwauling in my house.”

An expression of extreme astonishment came over Cecil’s face.

“Bluebell doesn’t care in the least for Jack Vavasour,” said she.

“You are evidently not in her confidence.  She told me ’she should never care for any one else’—­her very words, the little goose.”

Cecil seemed lost in perplexity.  “And she doesn’t want to go home?” asked she in a bewildered manner.

“Crying her eyes out at this moment I dare say.”

“Then for goodness sake let her go home, and stay there till she is better,” said the Colonel, irritably.  “A love lorn young lady perpetually before me I cannot and will not endure.”

His daughter’s brow was knitted with thought.  Bluebell was evidently in distress at going, but that it had any reference to Jack she totally disbelieved.  A latent suspicion revived, and her face grew pained and hard.  It was near dinner time, but, instead of going up to dress, she turned into a little smoking room to ponder it out.  What motive could Bluebell have had to avow a perfectly fictitious love affair with Vavasour, unless it was to throw dust in Mrs. Rolleston’s eyes and blind her to, perhaps, some underhand flirtation with Bertie?  Cecil’s affection for her friend received a severe wrench directly she admitted such a possibility, and then, as she meditated, two or three incidents, too slight to be noticed at the time, rose up to confirm it.