“And was there a reason?”

“Yes, poor dear Ermine.  She knew he meant to come there to meet her, and she thought it would not be right; because his father had objected so strongly, and made him exchange into a regiment on foreign service.”

“And you did not know this?”

“No, I was away all the time it was going on, with my eldest sister, having masters in London.  I did not come home till it was all over, and then I could not understand what was the matter with the house, or why Ermine was unlike herself, and papa restless and anxious about her.  They thought me too young to be told, and the atmosphere made me cross and fretful, and papa was displeased with me, and Ermine tried in vain to make me good; poor patient Ermine, even then the chief sufferer!”

“I can quite imagine the discomfort and fret of being in ignorance all the time.”

“Dear Ermine says she longed to tell me, but she had been forbidden, and she went on blaming herself and trying to make me enjoy my holidays as usual, till this dreadful day, when I had worried her intolerably about going to this music meeting, and she found reasoning only made me worse.  She still wrote her note of refusal, and asked me to light the taper; I dashed down the match in a frenzy of temper and—­”

She paused for breath, and Grace squeezed her hand.

“We did not see it at first, and then she threw herself down and ordered me not to come near.  Every one was there directly, I believe, but it burst out again and again, and was not put out till they all thought she had not an hour to live.  There was no pain, and there she lay, all calmness, comforting us all, and making papa and Edward promise to forgive me—­me, who only wished they would kill me!  And the next day he came; he was just going to sail, and they thought nothing would hurt her then.  I saw him while he was waiting, and never did I see such a fixed deathly face.  But they said she found words to cheer and soothe him.”

“And what became of him?”

“We do not know.  As long as Lady Alison lived (his aunt) she let us hear about him, and we knew he was recovering from his wound.  Then came her death, and then my father’s, and all the rest, and we lost sight of the Beauchamps.  We saw the name in the Gazette as killed at Lucknow, but not the right Christian name nor the same rank; but then, though the regiment is come home, we have heard nothing of him, and though she has never spoken of him to me, I am sure Ermine believes he is dead, and thinks of him as part of the sunshine of the old Beauchamp days—­the sunshine whose reflection lasts one’s life.”

“He ought to be dead,” said Grace.

“Yes, it would be better for her than to hear anything else of him!  He had nothing of his own, so there would have been a long waiting, but his father and brother would not hear of it, and accused us of entrapping him, and that angered my father.  For our family is quite good, and we were very well off then.  My father had a good private fortune besides the Rectory at Beauchamp; and Lady Alison, who had been like a mother to us ever since our own died, quite thought that the prospect was good enough, and I believe got into a great scrape with her family for having promoted the affair.”