“Thank you, ma’am,” said Elizabeth once more, and obeyed.  She must speak to Tom some time, it might as well be done to-night as not.  Without pausing to think, she went down with dull heavy steps to the housekeeper’s room.

Tom stood there alone.  He looked so exactly his own old self, he came forward to meet her so completely in his old familiar way, that for the instant she thought she must be under some dreadful delusion; that the moonlight night in the square must have been all a dream; Esther, still the silly little Esther, whom Tom had often heard of and laughed at; and Tom, her own Tom, who loved nobody but her.

“Elizabeth, what an age it is since I’ve had a sight of you!”

But though the manner was warm as ever,

        “In his tone
        A something smote her, as if Duty tried
        To mock the voice of Love, how long since flown,”

and quiet as she stood, Elizabeth shivered in his arms.

“Why, what’s the matter?  Aren’t you glad to see me?  Give me another kiss, my girl, do!”

He took it; and she crept away from him and sat down.

“Tom, I’ve got something to say to you, and I’d better say it at once.”

“To be sure.  ’Tisn’t any bad news from home, is it?  Or”—­looking uneasily at her—­“I haven’t vexed you, have I?”

“Vexed me,” she repeated, thinking what a small foolish word it was to express what had happened, and what she had been suffering.  “No, Tom, not vexed me exactly.  But I want to ask you a question.  Who was it that you stood talking with, under our tree in the square, between nine and ten o’clock, this night three weeks ago?”

Though there was no anger in the voice it was so serious and deliberate that it made Tom start.

“Three weeks ago; how can I possibly tell?”

“Yes, you can; for it was a fine moonlight night, and you stood there a long time.”

“Under the tree, talking to somebody?  What nonsense!  Perhaps it wasn’t me at all.”

“It was, for I saw you.”

“The devil you did!” muttered Tom.

“Don’t be angry, only tell me the plain truth.  The young woman that was with you was our Esther here, wasn’t she?”

For a moment Tom looked altogether confounded.  Then he tried to recover himself, and said crossly, “Well, and if it was, where’s the harm?  Can’t a man be civil to a pretty girl without being called over the coals in this way?”

Elizabeth made no answer, at least not immediately.  At last she said, in a very gentle, subdued voice,

“Tom, are you fond of Esther?  You would not kiss her if you were not fond of her.  Do you like her as—­as you used to like me?”

And she looked right up into his eyes.  Hers had no reproach in them, only a piteous entreaty, the last clinging to a hope which she knew to be false.

“Like Esther?  Of course I do?  She’s a nice sort of girl, and we’re very good friends.”