"O, Paddy, Paddy!" cried Charles, and there was a general laugh.

"Laura seems to be doing it in good earnest without announcing it,"

added Charles, when the laugh was over, "which is the worst sign of all."

"Nonsense, Charles," said Laura, hastily; then afraid she had owned to annoyance, she blushed and was angry with herself for blushing.

"Well, Laura, _do_ tell me who your partners were?"

Very provoking, thought Laura, that I cannot say what is so perfectly natural and ordinary, without my foolish cheeks tingling. He may think it is because he is speaking to me. So she hurried on: "Maurice first, then Philip," and then showed, what Amy and Eveleen thought, strange oblivion of the rest of her partners.

They proceeded into the history of the ball; and Guy thought no more of his offences till the following day, when he went to Broadstone. Coming back, he found the drawing-room full of visitors, and was obliged to sit down and join in the conversation; but Mrs. Edmonstone saw he was inwardly chafing, as he betrayed by his inability to remain still, the twitchings of his forehead and lip, and a tripping and stumbling of the words on his tongue. She was sure he wanted to talk to her, and longed to get rid of Mrs. Brownlow; but the door was no sooner shut on the visitors, than Mr. Edmonstone came in, with a long letter for her to read and comment upon. Guy took himself out of the way of the consultation, and began to hurry up and down the terrace, until, seeing Amabel crossing the field towards the little gate into the garden, he went to open it for her.

She looked up at him, and exclaimed--"Is anything the matter?"

"Nothing to signify," he said; "I was only waiting for your mother. I have got into a mess, that is all."

"I am sorry," began Amy, there resting in the doubt whether she might inquire further, and intending not to burthen him with her company, any longer than till she reached the house door; but Guy went on,--

"No, you have no occasion to be sorry; it is all my own fault; at least, if I was clear how it is my fault, I should not mind it so much. It is that ball. I am sure I had not the least notion any one would care whether I was there or not."

"I am sure we missed you very much."

"You are all so kind; beside, I belong in a manner you; but what could it signify to any one else? And here I find that I have vexed every one."

"Ah!" said Amy, "mamma said she was afraid it would give offence."

"I ought to have attended to her. It was a fit of self-will in managing myself," said Guy, murmuring low, as if trying to find the real indictment; "yet I thought it a positive duty; wrong every way."

"What has happened?" said Amy, turning back with him, though she had reached the door.

"Why, the first person I met was Mr. Gordon; and he spoke like your father, half in joke, and I thought entirely so; he said something about all the world being in such a rage, that I was a bold man to venture into Broadstone. Then, while I was at Mr. Lascelles", in came Dr.

Mayerne. "We missed you at the dinner," he said; "and I hear you shirked the ball, too." I told him how it was, and he said he was glad that was all, and advised me to go and call on Colonel Deane and explain. I thought that the best way--indeed, I meant it before, and was walking to his lodgings when Maurice de Courcy met me. "Ha!" he cries out, "Morville! I thought at least you would have been laid up for a month with the typhus fever! As a friend, I advise you to go home and catch something, for it is the only excuse that will serve you. I am not quite sure that it will not be high treason for me to be seen speaking to you." I tried to get at the rights of it, but he is such a harum-scarum fellow there was no succeeding. Next I met Thorndale, who only bowed and pa.s.sed on the other side of the street--sign enough how it was with Philip; so I thought it best to go at once to the Captain, and get a rational account of what was the matter."

"Did you?" said Amy, who, though concerned and rather alarmed, had been smiling at the humorous and expressive tones with which he could not help giving effect to his narration.

"Yes. Philip was at home, and very--very--"

"Gracious?" suggested Amy, as he hesitated for a word.

"Just so. Only the vexatious thing was, that we never could succeed in coming to an understanding. He was ready to forgive; but I could not disabuse him of an idea--where he picked it up I cannot guess--that I had stayed away out of pique. He would not even tell me what he thought had affronted me, though I asked him over and over again to be only straightforward; he declared I knew."

"How excessively provoking!" cried Amy. "You cannot guess what he meant?"

"Not the least in the world. I have not the most distant suspicion. It was of no use to declare I was not offended with any one; he only looked in that way of his, as if he knew much better than I did myself, and told me he could make allowances."

"Worse than all! How horrid of him."

"No, don"t spoil me. No doubt he thinks he has grounds, and my irritation was unjustifiable. Yes, I got into my old way. He cautioned me, and nearly made me mad! I never was nearer coming to a regular outbreak. Always the same! Fool that I am."

"Now, Guy, that is always your way; when other people are provoking, you abuse yourself. I am sure Philip was so, with his calm a.s.sertion of being right."

"The more provoking, the more trial for me."

"But you endured it. You say it was only _nearly_ an outbreak. You parted friends? I am sure of that."

"Yes, it would have been rather too bad not to do that."

"Then why do you scold yourself, when you really had the victory?"

"The victory will be if the inward feeling as well as the outward token is ever subdued."

"O, that must be in time, of course. Only let me hear how you got on with Colonel Deane."

"He was very good-natured, and would have laughed it off, but Philip went with me, and looked grand, and begged in a solemn way that no more might be said. I could have got on better alone; but Philip was very kind, or, as you say, gracious."

"And provoking," added Amy, "only I believe you do not like me to say so."

"It is more agreeable to hear you call him so at this moment than is good for me. I have no right to complain, since I gave the offence."

"The offence?"

"The absenting myself."

"Oh! that you did because you thought it right."

"I want to be clear that it was right."

"What do you mean?" cried she, astonished. "It was a great piece of self-denial, and I only felt it wrong not to be doing the same."

"Nay, how should such creatures as you need the same discipline as I?"

She exclaimed to herself how far from his equal she was--how weak, idle, and self-pleasing she felt herself to be; but she could not say so--the words would not come; and she only drooped her little head, humbled by his treating her as better than himself.

He proceeded:--

"Something wrong I have done, and I want the clue. Was it self-will in choosing discipline contrary to your mother"s judgment? Yet she could not know all. I thought it her kindness in not liking me to lose the pleasure. Besides, one must act for oneself, and this was only my own personal amus.e.m.e.nt."

"Yes," said Amy, timidly hesitating.

"Well?" said he, with the gentle, deferential tone that contrasted with his hasty, vehement self-accusations. "Well?" and he waited, though not so as to hurry or frighten her, but to encourage, by showing her words had weight.

"I was thinking of one thing," said Amy; "is it not sometimes right to consider whether we ought to disappoint people who want us to be pleased?"

"There it is, I believe," said Guy, stopping and considering, then going on with a better satisfied air, "that is a real rule. Not to be so bent on myself as to sacrifice other people"s feelings to what seems best for me. But I don"t see whose pleasure I interfered with."

Amy could have answered, "Mine;" but the maidenly feeling checked her again, and she said, "We all thought you would like it."

"And I had no right to sacrifice your pleasure! I see, I see. The pleasure of giving pleasure to others is so much the best there is on earth, that one ought to be pa.s.sive rather than interfere with it."