Harry Annesley, a day or two after he had left Tretton, went down to Cheltenham; for he had received an invitation to a dance there, and with the invitation an intimation that Florence Mountjoy was to be at the dance. If I were to declare that the dance had been given and Florence asked to it merely as an act of friendship to Harry, it would perhaps be thought that modern friendship is seldom carried to so great a length. But it was undoubtedly the fact that Mrs. Armitage, who gave the dance, was a great friend and admirer of Harry\'s, and that Mr. Armitage was an especial chum. Let not, however, any reader suppose that Florence was in the secret. Mrs. Armitage had thought it best to keep her in the dark as to the person asked to meet her. "As to my going to Montpelier Place," Harry had once said to Mrs. Armitage, "I might as well knock at a prison-door." Mrs. Mountjoy lived in Montpelier Place.

"I think we could perhaps manage that for you," Mrs. Armitage had replied, and she had managed it.

"Is she coming?" Harry said to Mrs. Armitage, in an anxious whisper, as he entered the room.

"She has been here this half-hour,—if you had taken the trouble to leave your cigars and come and meet her."

"She has not gone?" said Harry, almost awe-struck at the idea.

"No; she is sitting like Patience on a monument, smiling at grief, in the room inside. She has got horrible news to tell you."

"Oh, heavens! What news?"

"I suppose she will tell you, though she has not been communicative to me in regard to your royal highness. The news is simply that her mother is going to take her to Brussels, and that she is to live for a while amid the ambassadorial splendors with Sir Magnus and his wife."

By retiring from the world Mrs. Mountjoy had not intended to include such slight social relaxations as Mrs. Armitage\'s party, for Harry on turning round encountered her talking to another Cheltenham lady. He greeted her with his pleasantest smile, to which Mrs. Mountjoy did not respond quite so sweetly. She had ever greatly feared Harry Annesley, and had to-day heard a story very much, as she thought, to his discredit. "Is your daughter here?" asked Harry, with well-trained hypocrisy. Mrs. Mountjoy could not but acknowledge that Florence was in the room, and then Harry passed on in pursuit of his quarry.

"Oh, Mr. Annesley, when did you come to Cheltenham?"

"As soon as I heard that Mrs. Armitage was going to have a party I began to think of coming immediately." Then an idea for the first time shot through Florence\'s mind—that her friend Mrs. Armitage was a woman devoted to intrigue. "What dance have you disengaged? I have something that I must tell you to-night. You don\'t mean to say that you will not give me one dance?" This was merely a lover\'s anxious doubt on his part, because Florence had not at once replied to him. "I am told that you are going away to Brussels."

"Mamma is going on a visit to her brother-in-law."

"And you with her?"

"Of course I shall go with mamma." All this had been said apart, while a fair-haired, lackadaisical young gentleman was standing twiddling his thumbs waiting to dance with Florence. At last the little book from her waist was brought forth, and Harry\'s name was duly inscribed. The next dance was a quadrille, and he saw that the space after that was also vacant; so he boldly wrote down his name for both. I almost think that Florence must have suspected that Harry Annesley was to be there that night, or why should the two places have been kept vacant? "And now what is this," he began, "about your going to Brussels?"

"Mamma\'s brother is minister there, and we are just going on a visit."

"But why now? I am sure there is some especial cause." Florence would not say that there was no especial cause, so she could only repeat her assertion that they certainly were going to Brussels. She herself was well aware that she was to be taken out of Harry\'s way, and that something was expected to occur during this short month of her absence which might be detrimental to him,—and to her also. But this she could not tell, nor did she like to say that the plea given by her mother was the general state of the Scarborough affairs. She did not wish to declare to this lover that that other lover was as nothing to her. "And how long are you to be away?" asked Harry.

"We shall be a month with Sir Magnus; but mamma is talking of going on afterward to the Italian lakes."

"Good heavens! you will not be back, I suppose, till ever so much after Christmas?"

"I cannot tell. Nothing as yet has been settled. I do not know that I ought to tell you anything about it." Harry at this moment looked up, and caught the eye of Mrs. Mountjoy, as she was standing in the door-way opposite. Mrs. Mountjoy certainly looked as though no special communication as to Florence\'s future movements ought to be made to Harry Annesley.

Then, however, it came to his turn to dance, and he had a moment allowed to him to collect his thoughts. By nothing that he could do or say could he prevent her going, and he could only use the present moment to the best purpose in his power. He bethought himself then that he had never received from her a word of encouragement, and that such word, if ever to be spoken, should be forthcoming that night. What might not happen to a girl who was passing the balmy Christmas months amid the sweet shadows of an Italian lake? Harry\'s ideas of an Italian lake were, in truth, at present somewhat vague. But future months were, to his thinking, interminable; the present moment only was his own. The dance was now finished. "Come and take a walk," said Harry.

"I think I will go to mamma." Florence had seen her mother\'s eye fixed upon her.

"Oh, come, that won\'t do at all," said Harry, who had already got her hand within his arm. "A fellow is always entitled to five minutes, and then I am down for the next waltz."

"Oh no!"

"But I am, and you can\'t get out of it now. Oh, Florence, will you answer me a question,—one question? I asked it you before, and you did not vouchsafe me any answer."

"You asked me no question," said Florence, who remembered to the last syllable every word that had been said to her on that occasion.

"Did I not? I am sure you knew what it was that I intended to ask." Florence could not but think that this was quite another thing. "Oh, Florence, can you love me?" Had she given her ears for it she could not have told him the truth then, on the spur of the moment. Her mother\'s eye was, she knew, watching her through the door-way all the way across from the other room. And yet, had her mother asked her, she would have answered boldly that she did love Harry Annesley, and intended to love him for ever and ever with all her heart. And she would have gone farther if cross-questioned, and have declared that she regarded him already as her lord and master. But now she had not a word to say to him. All she knew was that he had now pledged himself to her, and that she intended to keep him to his pledge. "May I not have ............