“Be quiet, Arthur.  Pick up that mignonette-pot you threw down, sir.”

“My darling!” came in a low, heartfelt whisper.  And Miss Ashton, with a faint cry, turned to see her engaged lover, Val Elster.

She stood before him, literally unable to speak in her great astonishment, the red roses going and coming in her delicate cheeks, the rich brown eyes, that might have been too brilliant but for their exceeding sweetness, raised questioningly to his.  Mr. Elster folded her in his arms as if he would never release her again, and kissed the shrinking face repeatedly.

“Oh, Percival, Percival!  Don’t!  Let me go.”

He did so at last, and held her before him, her eyelids drooping now, to gaze at the face he loved so well—­yes, loved fervently and well, in spite of his follies and sins.  Her heart was beating wildly with its own rapture:  for her the world had suddenly grown brighter.

“But when did you arrive?” she whispered, scarcely knowing how to utter the words in her excessive happiness.

He took her upon his arm and began to pace the room with her while he explained.  There was an attempt at excuse for his prolonged absence—­for Val Elster had returned from his duties in Vienna in May, and it was now August, and he had lingered through the intervening time in London, enjoying himself—­but that was soon glossed over; and he told her how his brother was coming down on the morrow with a houseful of guests, and he, Val, had offered to go before them with the necessary instructions.  He did not say why he had offered to do this; that his debts had become so pressing he was afraid to show himself longer in London.  Such facts were not for the ear of that fair girl, who trusted him as the truest man she knew under heaven.

“What have you been doing, Anne?”

He pointed to the maps, and Miss Ashton laughed.

“Mrs. Graves was here yesterday; she is very clever, you know; and when something was being said about the course of ships out of England, I made some dreadful mistakes.  She took me up sharply, and papa looked at me sharply—­and the result is, I have to do a heap of maps.  Please tell me if it’s right, Percival?”

She held up her pencilled work of the morning.  He was laughing.

“What mistakes did you make, Anne?”

“I am not sure but I said something about an Indiaman, leaving the London Docks, having to pass Scarborough,” she returned demurely.  “It was quite as bad.”

“Do you remember, Anne, being punished for persisting, in spite of the slate on the wall and your nursery-governess, that the Mediterranean lay between Scotland and Ireland?  Miss Jevons wanted to give you bread and water for three days.  How’s that prig Graves?” he added rather abruptly.

Anne Ashton laughed, blushing slightly.  “He is just as you left him; very painstaking and efficient in the parish, and all that, but, oh, so stupid in some things!  Is the map right?”