“He said three in his note, did he not, Lady Peters?”

“Yes, my dear, but it is impossible for any one to be always strictly punctual; a hundred different things may have detained him.”

“But if he were really anxious to see me, he would not let anything detain him,” she said.

“Your anxiety about him would be very flattering to him if he knew it,” remarked the elder lady.

“Why should I not be anxious?  I have always loved him better than the whole world.  I have had reason to be anxious.”

“Philippa, my dear Philippa, I would not say such things if I were you, unless I had heard something really definite from himself.”

The beautiful young heiress laughed a bright, triumphant laugh.

“Something definite from himself!  Why, you do not think it likely that he will long remain indifferent to me, even if he be so now—­which I do not believe.”

“I have had so many disappointments in life that I am afraid of being sanguine,” said Lady Peters; and again the young beauty laughed.

“It will seem so strange to see him again.  I remember his going away so well.  I was very young then—­I am young now, but I feel years older.  He came down to Verdun Royal to bid us good-by, and I was in the grounds.  He had but half an hour to stay, and mamma sent him out to me,”

The color deepened in her face as she spoke, and the light shone in her splendid eyes—­there was a kind of wild, restless passion in her words.

“I remember it all so well!  There had been a heavy shower of rain in the early morning, that had cleared away, leaving the skies blue, the sunshine golden, while the rain-drops still glistened on the trees and the grass.  I love the sweet smell of the green leaves and the moist earth after rain.  I was there enjoying it when he came to say good-by to me—­mamma came with him.  ‘Philippa,’ she said, ’Norman is going; he wants to say good-by to his little wife.’  He always calls me his little wife.  I saw him look very grave.  She went away and left us together.  ‘You are growing too tall to be called my little wife, Philippa,’ she said, and I laughed at his gravity.  We were standing underneath a great flowering lilac-tree—­the green leaves and the sweet flowers were still wet with the rain.  I remember it so well!  I drew one of the tall fragrant sprays down, and shaking the rain-drops from it, kissed it.  I can smell the rich, moist odor now.  I never see a lilac-spray or smell its sweet moisture after rain but that the whole scene rises before me again—­I see the proud, handsome face that I love so dearly, the clear skies and the green trees.  ‘How long shall you be away, Norman?’ asked him.  ‘Not more than two years,’ he replied.  ’You will be quite a brilliant lady of fashion when I return, Philippa; you will have made conquests innumerable.’  ‘I shall always be the same to you,’ I replied; but he made no answer.  He took the spray of lilac from my hands.  ’My ideas of you will always be associated with lilacs,’ he said; and that is why, Lady Peters, I ordered the vases to be filled with lilacs to-day.  He bent down and kissed my face.  ‘Good-by, Philippa,’ he said, ‘may I find you as good and as beautiful as I leave you.’  And then he went away.  That is just two years ago; no wonder that I am pleased at his return.”