Why that insistence on the word "trust"? Was it--strange contradiction--because he felt himself so utterly unworthy of her confidence? He said not a word of love.

Enid looked round at him at last. Her gentle face was pale, her lashes were wet with tears, but the traces of emotion were not unbecoming to her. Even to Hubert's cold eyes, cold and critical in spite of himself, she was lovelier than ever.

"I want to trust you--I do trust you," she said; but there were trouble and perplexity in her voice. "I don't know what to do. You would not let me be deceived, Hubert? You would not let dear uncle be tricked and cheated into thinking--thinking--by Flossy, I mean---- Oh, I can't tell you! If you knew what I know, you would understand."

Hubert had never been in greater danger of betraying his own secret.

Knowing of no other, his first instinctive thought was that Enid had learnt the true story of her father's death and Flossy's share in bringing it about; but a second thought, quickly following the first, showed him that in that case she would never have said that she wanted to trust him, or that he would not let her and her uncle be deceived.

No, it could not be that. But what was it?

By a terrible effort he kept himself from visibly blenching at her words. He stood still holding her hands, feeling himself a villain to the very lowest depths of his soul, but looking quietly down at her, with even a slight smile on the lips that--do what he would--had turned pale--the ruddy firelight glancing on his face prevented this change of color from being seen.

"But how can I understand," he said, "when I have not the slightest notion of what you mean?"

"You have not?"

"Not the least in the world."

She crept a little closer to him.

"You are not sheltering Flossy from punishment?"

It was what he had been doing for the past eight years.

"Good heavens, Enid," he cried, losing his self-possession a little for the first time, "what on earth can you possibly mean?"

She thought that he was indignant, and she hastened tremblingly to appease his apparent wrath.

"I don't mean to accuse you or her," she said; "I have said a great deal too much. I can trust you, Hubert--oh, I am sure I can! Forgive me for the moment's doubt."

"If you have not accused me, you have accused my sister. I must know what you mean."

"Forgive me, cousin Hubert! I can't tell you--even you."

"But, my dear Enid, if you said so much, you must say more."

"I will never say anything again!" she said, her face quivering all over like that of a troubled child.

He loosed her hands and looked at her steadily for a moment; he had more confidence in his power over her now.

"I think you should make me understand what you mean, dear. Do you accuse my sister of anything?"

She looked frightened.

"No, indeed I do not. I don't know what I am saying, Hubert. Tell me one thing. Do you think we should ever do wrong--or what seems to be wrong--for the sake of other people's happiness? Clergymen and good people say we should not; but I do not know."

"Enid, you have not been consulting that parson at Beechfield about it?"

"Not exactly. At least"--the ingenuous face changed a little--"we talked on that subject, because he knew that I was in trouble, but I did not tell him anything. He said one should always tell the truth at any cost."

"And theoretically one should do so," said Hubert, trying to soothe her, yet feeling himself a corrupter of her innocent candor of mind as he went on; "but practically it would not be always wise or right. When you marry, Enid"--he drew her towards him--"you can confess to your husband, and he will absolve you."

"Perhaps that is what would be best," she answered softly.

"To no man but your husband, Enid."

She drew a quick little sigh.

"You can trust me?" he said, in a still lower voice.

"Oh, yes," she said--"I am sure I can trust you! It was only for a moment--you must not mind what I said. You will it set all right when you know."

He was silent, seeing that she had grasped his meaning more quickly than he had anticipated, and had, in fact, accepted him, quite simply and confidently, as her husband that was to be. Her child-like trust was at that moment very bitter to him. He bent his head and kissed her forehead as a father might have done.

"My dear Enid," he said, "we must remember that you are very young. I feel that I may be taking advantage of your inexperience--as if some day you might reproach me for it."

"I told you I did not feel young," she said gently; "but perhaps I cannot judge. Do what you please."

The listlessness in her voice almost angered Hubert.

"Do you not love me then?" he asked.

"Oh, yes--I always loved you!" said the girl. But there was no look of a woman's love in her grave eyes. "You were always so kind to me, dear cousin Hubert; and indeed I feel as if I could trust you absolutely. You shall decide for me in everything."

There was certainly relief in her tone; but Hubert had looked for something more.

"I have been wanting to speak to you for several days," he said, "but I have never had the opportunity before; and I must tell you, dear, that I spoke to the General before I spoke to you."

"Oh," Enid's fair face flushed a little. "I thought--I did not know that you intended--when you began to speak to me first, I mean----"

Hubert could not help smiling.

"I understand; you thought I spoke on a sudden impulse of affection, longing to comfort and help you. So I did. But that is not incompatible with previous thought and preparation, is it? Surely my care for you--my love for you--would be worth less as a sudden growth than as a plant of long and hardy growth?" He groaned inwardly at the subterfuge contained in the last few words, but he felt that it was unavoidable.

Enid looked up and gave him an answering smile.

"Oh, yes, I see!" she said hurriedly; but there was some little dissatisfaction in her mind, she did not quite know why.

Even her innocent heart dimly discerned the fact that Hubert was not her ideal lover. His wooing had scarcely been ardent in tone; and to find that it had all been discussed, mapped out, as it were, and formally permitted by the General, and perhaps by his wife, gave her a sudden chill. For Flossy's interpretation of Enid's melancholy was by no means a true one. She had dreamed a little of Hubert in a vague romantic way, as young girls are apt to do when a new-comer strikes their fancy; but she had not set her heart upon him at all in the way which Florence had led her brother to believe. There was certainly danger lest she should do so now.

"The General says," Hubert went on more lightly, "that you cannot be expected to know your own mind for a couple of years. What do you say to that?"

"I think that uncle Richard might know me better," said the girl, smiling. She was still standing on the hearthrug, and Hubert put his arm round her as he spoke.

"And he will not consent even to an engagement until you are eighteen, Enid. But he did not forbid me to speak to you and ask you whether you cared for me, and if you would wait two years."

"Oh, why should it be so long?" the girl cried out; and then she turned crimson, seeing the meaning that Hubert attached to her words. "I only mean," she said, "that I wanted to tell you everything that was in my mind just now."

"And can't you do it now, little darling?"