As Sir Temple said, Stephen Archdale had been moody during the remainder of the ride.  The old butler’s behavior, so at variance with his usual deference, disturbed him.  It was evident that Edmonson had come upon the man like an apparition.  But why?  Stephen intuitively connected this in some way with the conversation between the father and the son which he had overheard that winter’s day in the woods.  Glancing at his companion, he saw that Edmonson was aware of the startling effect he had produced, and that the answer was in his face, which was jubilant.  Indeed, he could hardly restrain himself.  Wheeling about in his saddle as they rode, he broke out into a few notes of some rollicking song, asking Sir Temple if he remembered it.  To him this effect that he had produced meant that the first stroke of the hour, his hour, had sounded; to Archdale it meant that some mystery was here, some catastrophe impending.  He could readily connect calamity with Edmonson.

At the door he dismounted like one lost in thought, and with difficulty threw off his moodiness; while Edmonson sprang to the ground and ran lightly up the steps into the house, his eyes sparkling and his face aglow with a beauty that Elizabeth was beginning to analyze.  Before half an hour his wit was being quoted over the room.  Other arrivals followed this first.  There was reason enough why Elizabeth should have dreaded this dinner, for the guests in the drawing-room now had nearly all of them been present at that wedding scene seven months before.  She knew when Katie Archdale came in.  It was almost at the last.  She was leaning on her father’s arm, her mother on his other.  Both friends felt that every eye in the room would watch their meeting.  There was an involuntary pause in the conversation; then it was taken up again here and there, languidly, to cover the attention that must not be marked.  Katie had been into company very little since her attempted wedding; her presence was almost a new sensation.  As usual, she behaved admirably.  After greeting her aunt she slipped away from her father, and walked slowly forward, on the way speaking to those she passed.  Her tones were mellowed a little by her suffering, but sweet and clear as ever, At last she came to Elizabeth.  They had not been face to face since that December day in Mr. Archdale’s library when Katie had turned away her head from Elizabeth’s pleading.  She did nothing of the kind now, she came forward with a chastened tenderness and said, “Elizabeth,” and kissed her.  It was Elizabeth, who the night before had been sobbing over Katie’s hard lot and praying that happiness might come to her, and who was looking at her now with a heart full of contrition and admiration, who seemed to those watching to greet the girl coldly, to be indifferent to her beauty and her disappointment.  Strangely enough, however, Stephen did not think so; he remembered the scene in the library, and it was possible that in the few