‘Send Gladys.  Surely she is come back.’

’No, ma’am.  I can’t think where she is.  I went a little way to look for her, but she is not in sight.  Can I do anything, ma’am?’

‘No, thank you; but send Gladys as soon as she comes.  Provoking,’ continued Miss Gwynne, turning out two or three shelves of a large wardrobe.  ’Where are the trimmings of that blue dress?  He said I looked best in blue, and so, I think, I do.  That wreath of blue forget-me-nots and lilies of the valley, where in the world is it?  But forget-me-nots are so ridiculously sentimental; and the turquoise ornaments?  I suppose I must wear the bracelets and locket.  Oh! here they are; and here are the flowers and trimmings in a box, in the neatest possible order.’

Miss Gwynne began to arrange her hair.

’I declare I have forgotten how to do anything since Gladys has been with me.  I cannot put up this braid neatly.  I must wait, and it is nearly six o’clock, and dinner at half-past.  What does it matter how I look?  I daresay Miss Nugent will look twenty times as well, and her mother will dress her up to perfection.  But he cannot care for such a girl as that.  It is impossible; and he always looks at me with such interest, and has such a kind manner, and says things that convey so much.  But if he really cares for me, why does he not say so?  He knows papa would consent, and—­but he does not know that; I never—­Ah! here she is at last!  Come in!  Where have you been, Gladys?  It really is too provoking that you should have stayed so long, when you knew that I particularly wanted you to-day.’  Gladys enters the room pale and breathless, just as Miss Gwynne is endeavouring to fasten in the wreath of forget-me-nots and lilies.  She does not turn round, and is at the moment too much engrossed with her own appearance to think of Gladys.

’Come quickly and finish my hair, and put in this wreath.  We ought to be starting now.’

Gladys obeys without speaking, and steadying her nerves and fingers as best she may, begins to arrange a most elegant and becoming wreath round her young mistress’s head.  Whilst she does this, and afterwards dresses her and fastens on the turquoise ornaments, she endeavours to collect her thoughts, and to summon courage for what she has resolved to do and say.

Gladys has long known Miss Gwynne’s secret; as she discovered that she did not care for Rowland, so she has found out that she cares over much for Colonel Vaughan.  She now knows that he is not worthy of her, and that if he should ever ask her to marry him, it would be that he might gain possession of Clanyravon, and not of the warm, sincere heart of its mistress.  Gladys feels sure that a man who could say such words as Colonel Vaughan said to her, whether meant seriously or not, could not be worthy of Miss Gwynne; and she determines to open that young lady’s eyes to the real state of his mind, even if she loses her favour for ever by so doing.