‘I can’t tell; Lucy and my father were here just now.’

‘Are you feeling the chill, Gilbert?’ asked Albinia, struck by something in his tone.  ‘You had better look from the window.’

He neither moved nor made answer, but a great illumination of Colonel Bury’s coat-of-arms, with Roman candles and Chinese trees at the four corners, engrossed every eye, and flashing on every face, enabled Albinia to join Mr. Kendal, who was with Lucy and Miss Ferrars.  No one knew where Genevieve was, but Albinia was confident that she could take good care of herself, and was not too uneasy to enjoy the grand representation of Windsor Castle, and the finale of interlaced ciphers amidst a multitude of little fretful sputtering tongues of flame.  Then it was, amid good nights, donning of shawls, and announcing of carriages, that Captain Ferrars and Miss Durant made their appearance together, having been ’looking everywhere for Mrs. Kendal,’ and it was not in the nature of a brother not to look a little arch, though Albinia returned him as resolute and satisfied a glance as could express ‘Well, what of that?’

In consideration of the night air, Mr. Kendal put Gilbert inside the carriage, and mounted the box, to revel in the pleasures of silence.  The four within talked incessantly and compared adventures.  Lucy had been gratified by being patronized by Miss Ferrars, and likewise had much to say of the smaller fry, and went into raptures about many a ‘dear little thing,’ none of whom would, however, stand a comparison with Maurice; Gilbert was critical upon every one’s beauty; and Genevieve was more animated than all, telling anecdotes with great piquancy, and rehearsing the comical Yankee stories she had heard from Captain Ferrars.  She had enjoyed with the zest and intensity of a peculiarly congenial temperament, and she seemed not to be able to cease from working off her excitement in repetitions of her thanks, and in discussing the endless delights the day had afforded.

But the day had begun early, and the way was long, so remarks became scanty, and answers were brief and went astray, and Albinia thought she was travelling for ever to Montreal, when she was startled by a pettish exclamation from Lucy, ’Is that all!  It was not worth while to wake me only to see the moon.’

‘I beg your pardon,’ said Genevieve, ’but I thought Mrs. Kendal wished to see it rise.’

‘Thank you, Genevieve,’ said Albinia, opening her sleepy eyes; ’she is as little worth seeing as a moon can well be, a waning moon does well to keep untimely hours.’

’Why do you think she is so much more beautiful in the crescent, Mrs. Kendal?’ said Genevieve, in the most wakeful manner.

‘I’m sure I don’t know,’ said Albinia, subsiding into her corner.

‘Is it from the situation of the mountains in the moon?’ continued the pertinacious damsel.